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‘We expect Caquetá to conform to this new pattern. There’s an army airstrip at Puerto Pizarro, fairly close by, and a military outpost. But we’re not too struck on low-level air reconnaissance. First, the distances are very big. Second, if the facility’s a few kilometres off the river, you’re probably going to miss it on a single pass. Third, the narcos are more than capable of shooting down a low-flying aircraft. They have all modern weapons, including surface-to-air missiles.’

I nodded. An awkward silence followed. I wanted to propose a plan of action, but at the same time I didn’t want this guy to think I was teaching him to suck eggs. In the end I said, ‘Do you mind if I make a suggestion?’

‘Go right ahead.’

‘If a major assault went in on the facility — say by helicopter gunships — the narcos would top the hostages and throw them in the river before any incoming troops could get on the ground. Now in a way this problem is of our own making. If possible we’d like to crack it ourselves. I have a team of ten men, all highly trained. We’re used to working together. We operate best as a self-contained unit, and our speciality is covert approach. We’d aim to infiltrate the area without being detected, find out the camp routine, and strike at whatever moment seemed most advantageous. We’re most effective in that covert kind of role. If we can be sure the hostages have been taken to this place, and you can lift us to within a reasonable distance of it, we’ll recover them on our own.’

The General looked at me steadily, as if he was sizing up my fighting potential. Then he said, ‘Your men have won a lot of respect down at Santa Rosa.’

‘We’re jungle trained,’ I said.

‘We have helicopters — Hueys.’

‘Where are they?’

‘All over.’

‘Could you get a couple down to Puerto… Puerto Pizarro today?’

‘I expect so, yes.’

‘We’ll need some logistics back-up, too.’

‘Such as?’

‘Mosquito nets, hammocks, DPMs, medical packs. Ropes, in case we have to rope down out of a chopper. Inflatable boats, too, by the sound of it. Normally, we’d have all this as a matter of routine. But we didn’t come equipped for an operation of this kind. Rations, also. We brought a small amount of food with us, for emergencies, but not enough to deploy with.’

‘All that can be arranged.’ Nariño had been making some notes, and now looked coolly at me.

‘I’m sorry to break the training course. That’s going well.’

‘Too bad. Maybe you can pick it up again when this is over.’

Once more I nodded. Then I said, ‘The immediate problem is, we left most of our stuff in the camp at Santa Rosa. We need to get back there fast to pick up our kit and weapons.’

‘Of course. One moment.’ He picked up a telephone, pressed a single button and began to speak, quietly but firmly. I could pick up the gist of it; he was giving orders for an aircraft to be made available. I sat looking at the big map, and the ocean of green, denoting jungle, that lay in the far south.

The General put his hand over the mouthpiece of the phone and asked, ‘Where are your men now?’

‘At the Hostal Bonavento.’

He spoke into the receiver again, then turned back to me and said, ‘A truck will collect them at eleven o’clock and lift them out to the military airfield. The flight down will take less than an hour. The aircraft can refuel at Santa Rosa, and then fly you on to Puerto Pizarro.’

‘Thank you,’ I replied. ‘I appreciate your quick response.’ As soon as I’d said that, I thought it sounded phoney — but I didn’t want to seem too effusive. To appear a bit warmer I added, ‘Bill Egerton at the embassy asked me to give you his best wishes.’

For the first time a slight smile lit up the broad, impassive face. With his right elbow on the desk he held out his hand, palm down and fingers extended, and in a curious gesture rocked it slightly to right and left, as if to express that a certain amount of give-and-take went on between the DAS and the embassy. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Bill is a good friend of ours.’

As I got up to go, he brought out a card, scribbled a number on the back, and handed it to me. ‘This is my direct line, here or at home. You can call me any time,’ he said. ‘I’m glad to help.’

Back at the embassy I found Tony talking on the satcom telephone. He was giving, or checking, some coordinates. ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘that’s seventy-three fifty west, zero degrees fifty south. OK.’

Seeing me come in, he turned and raised a thumb, then said into the mouthpiece, ‘Call back when you’ve seen the next one. Fine. Thanks.’

He hung up and said, ‘We got it!’

‘What?’

‘The hostage location.’

‘How?’

‘Satellites. I called my guys in Fort Worth, and they went right through to Langley, Virginia. One satellite or another is passing over here every twenty minutes. They checked their records and found that a new construction site’s been growing during the past few weeks on a big bend of the Rio Caquetá —’

I held up a hand. ‘Don’t think I’m trying to take the piss, Tony, but I know all that already.’

I told what I’d heard from the general.

‘OK,’ he said equably. ‘Anyway, the controllers are going for a high-resolution shot of it on one of the next passes.’

‘Brilliant!’

Our only map was too small-scale to be much use, but Tony had marked a dot in the green area just north of the river, about eighty ks east of the settlement. No road of any kind approached the township, or whatever it was.

Already it was after 10.30. Time was zipping past. I phoned the hotel to warn the guys to be ready for the off at eleven. Then I called Hereford to update the boss on the situation. I said we were planning to set up a forward mounting base at Puerto Pizarro, and play it from there. I told him I’d leave Tony Lopez as anchorman in the embassy, and report in on our portable satcom phone as soon as I got back to it.

I was on the point of leaving when Tony’s mate in Langley came through again to say that the close-up satellite shot showed details of the new workings at the Caquetá site. There were now three buildings, as opposed to two a week ago, and the snap-shot, taken twenty minutes earlier, showed a twin-engined aircraft sitting on a strip carved out of the jungle alongside the river about one k away.

‘That’s got to be the aircraft which took our party in,’ I said. ‘That clinches it.’

Getting up to go, I tried to thank Bill Egerton for all he’d done. ‘I’m sorry. This has wrecked your weekend.’

‘Not a bit. If I wasn’t here, I’d only be sitting in the garden reading The Times weekly edition. This is much more entertaining!’

Tony came down in the lift with me. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I’m really sorry to be leaving you here.’

‘No sweat, Geordie. I’m having a ball. Playing ambassadors is great.’

‘Yep, but if there’s some action, you’ll want to be part of it.’

‘Sure. But who knows where the action’s gonna be? Take care, anyway.’

A battered army three-ton truck clattered up to the hotel a couple of minutes before eleven. I checked that all bills were paid and all rooms clear, then we bundled into the back and rode out to the airfield, a short run of less than fifteen minutes.

The military field proved to be one side of the El Dorado civilian airport. A Herc, painted drab olive green, without markings, stood on the pan. A military truck was parked beside the tail-ramp, and guys were loading stores into it like ants. Our driver drew up alongside it and we piled out. Inside the back of the plane there was already a fair stack of kit, and as we arrived some of the loadies were starting to lash it down.

The Colombian head-loadie came down from the flight-deck for a rapid conference with the boss of the logistic party, ticking items off a list. Then he turned to me with a cheerful grin and said, ‘Por favor’, waving us to go aboard. He followed us in, checking that we’d all belted up into the canvas sling-seats along the sides. He said, ‘Fly one hour.’ Then he spoke to the pilot on the intercom, and hit the button to raise the tail ramp. The engines began to turn, and that dreaded whine built up to full strength as the big aircraft lumbered forward.