The computer was on a three-tiered desk near the TV. It was small, about the size of a reference book. A Macintosh Powerbook G3-something with a color screen that reminded me of Tomlinson’s machine.
Tucker and I stood behind the Turk as he tried to get the thing going. But something was wrong. Couldn’t get a dial tone; couldn’t get on-line. He checked the beige telephone wire that was plugged into the machine. The wire ran across the floor on top of the carpet and out an open porthole on the marina side of the freighter.
The Turk shook the wire, said something loud, furious in Turkish, then charged across the deck to the porthole where he yelled, “Garret
…! Mr. Garret! You have unplugged my telephone line again!”
Didn’t wait very long before he screamed the same thing again.
Finally, there was an answer: “Stick it up yer arse, you fuckin’ raghead! I’m busy!”
“I need my telephone, Mr. Garret!”
“If you don’t like the service, pay your bloody bill and tow that garbage scow out to sea. The federales, they’d love that! You wouldn’t make it past Bocachica before they had you in cuffs!”
No mistaking the bush brogue of northern Australia. So… Garret, owner of Club Nautico, was back from his shopping.
The Turk fixed us with a look-Give me a moment, I’ll get this straightened out-before he yelled through the porthole. “Mr. Garret! I have clients here. Americans who may be interested in buying a membership in Mr. Merlot’s project.”
Tucker and I exchanged looks at the mention of Merlot.
The Aussie yelled back, “They ain’t my bloody problem, Turk! You want the phone line hooked up, I’m gonna charge you double this time. Them long-distance access calls for your bloody computer bullshit ain’t bloody cheap. Fifteen… no, twenty dollars U.S. for the first half-hour and then I cut you off.”
The Turk was smiling-okay, things were all arranged now. “Yes, of course. That is acceptable. To show my appreciation, Mr. Garret, I will pay you twenty-five U.S. It is worth it to me! Put it on my bill.”
As the Turk sat at the computer again, he said, “It is a game that Mr. Garret and I play. He pretends to expect payment from me and I pretend as if I expect to one day pay.”
He was working at the keyboard.
“You stay here for free?”
“I owe Mr. Garret a year’s back dockage. Plus utilities. plus our restaurant bill and tips.” He looked up at me briefly, very serious. “I am the grandson of a Sultan, you must understand. I am accustomed to living comfortably; to the better things life has to offer. It is what I deserve, so it is what I demand. In my country, my family is of the highest social station. President Demirel is a second cousin to my mother. Prime Minister Erbakan attended the same British preparatory school as my father. You can understand, then, why I refuse to allow money to dictate my lifestyle. Plus, I entertain many ladies here, many, many ladies. As a part of our new real estate venture, understand.” The laughter, that cocaine sniff!
“The owner lets you stay here even though you don’t pay?”
“Mr. Garret? He would prefer not to be paid because he hopes to take my yacht. Naturally, he would be very disappointed if I paid even a portion of the bill. Already he has filed papers with the Colombian court. So I live here and he keeps charging me and the bill keeps adding up. See? It is now a game that we play! Ah-h-h-h, here we are!” The Turk gestured with his hand. “Our Web page!”
The Turk said, “You were under the impression our property is in Colombia? No. It is in Panama. Over the water and through the jungle. Not far! Just as Ohio is next to… next to an adjoining state in your country. Illinois? Very close, very, very close. And if you like what you see on the computer, we have a plane. We will fly you there. At no charge, of course.”
I don’t know that I’d ever seen a Web page, but this one certainly seemed professionally done. What Merlot and company were offering was membership and time-share participation in a converted country club in an old Panama Canal Zone village, a tiny place called Gamboa. The locator map showed it to be about midway between the Pacific coast and the Caribbean coast, on a paw of jungle where the Chagres River entered the canal. The Isthmus of Panama, where the canal cuts through, is less than fifty miles ocean to ocean, so Gamboa was close enough to Panama City to make for easy access.
But Merlot was offering more than just property.
The home page headline read:
Gamboa
A Private, Protected Community for Fun-Loving People
Then in smaller letters:
Gamboa
Finally! The Freedom to Live Our Dreams!
Anything you want… because you’ve earned it.
The script was backdropped by a stunning photograph of classic tropical homes overlooking the canal on a hillside of dense rain forest. There were flowers, gigantic luminous leaves, clapboard and wedges of bamboo fence showing through. The houses appeared to be from another time: wooden, perfectly maintained, elevated off the ground like tree houses.
The jungle that dwarfed the houses implied components that jungle always implies: shadows, waterfalls, vines, earth as black and potent as gunpowder, wild parrots.
I’d driven through Gamboa once years ago, but it was at night. Didn’t see much, but remembered the smell of the jungle there, and the solid look of the houses that drifted past in our Humvee’s headlights. Like most structures in the Zone, the houses had been built back in the 1920s and ‘30s by American shipwrights. The guy who’d been driving was an old hand from the Jungle Operations Training Base at nearby Fort Sherman, and I remember him telling me how the houses were built: redwood imported from California, hardwood floors, copper plumbing, even roofs layered with copper sheeting, for God’s sake, everything pegged and bolted and dovetailed solid as a ship, built for the long haul of colonialism. Only the best if the U.S. government was buying and building it. Also told me something about the work-hard-drink-hard locals… yes, he’d told me what they called themselves: Gambodians.
Right… and I had certainly passed Gamboa while transiting the canal by ship or boat. I had a vague recollection of white houses on a hillside, a little working tugboat and dredge marina. But I had not realized what a truly lovely place it was.
The Turk was clicking through a scrapbook of photos: houses, interiors and exteriors, swimming pool, tennis courts, a refurbished bar and restaurant on a high hill. “The Gamboa Country Club,” it was labeled.
“Is it not beautifully done?” The Turk asked.
“The Web page? First-class. Really nice.”
Looking at the computer screen, reading the words, I felt a chill
… the kind of chill that precedes nausea. It is always troubling when innocent words are used to mask a broader meaning: If the buyers Merlot wanted to attract were nothing more than fun-loving people, why did they need to be protected? If they had legitimate dreams, why was it so difficult to find a place where those dreams could be realized?
The Turk wanted to ask us something, I could tell. But he was having difficulty finding the right approach. Finally:
“You are men of the world, I take it.”
“I’ve been around.”
“Gawldamn right we have! I’d barely scratched the surface when I told you about that bawdy house in Tampico. Tampico, the best place in the world to buy hand-tooled boots. Also, maybe the toughest city in Mexico to leave without takin’ a case of the clap home as a souvenir. Lotta people don’t know that, either.”
The Turk smiled indulgently. “So you appreciate the more pleasurable… the more sensual needs that all men of health and vitality share. Of course! Why else would two successful American men come to a place such as Cartagena.”
Yeah, the sex trade. Why else would a Yankee come to Colombia?