Perhaps, just perhaps, things will get better." Pausing, Guajardo let out a sigh, letting his right hand come to rest on his right thigh while he let his head drop down as if to study his resting hand. "But, alas, nothing changed. The politicians, they came and went. Programs to solve our debt, create jobs, and remedy our social problems were launched with great fanfare and wonderful speeches. For a while, whatever problem the program was aimed at solving would improve."
In a flash, Guajardo changed. Jan was startled by the sudden transformation.
When their eyes met, she was greeted by eyes that were cold and distant, set in a face contorted in anger. Though she didn't notice, Guajardo's right hand was now clenched into a fist, a fist that he was slowly using to pound his right thigh as he spoke with a harsh, cutting voice.
"But then, when no one was looking, the politicians went back to their big houses and the programs were forgotten. The only thing that did not change was the faces of the people. In their eyes, you could see the flame of hope slowly dying, drowned by the harsh reality of survival in modern Mexico."
Jan, momentarily caught off guard by Guajardo's response, paused.
After thirty minutes of simple banter and short, crisp answers, she had finally gotten the colonel to react. Sensing it was time, she seized the mood and drove on. "So, you and your fellow colonels decided that you had to act. But I wonder, was it necessary to eliminate the entire government and the leadership of the PRI, as well as the other political parties? Surely there was no-need to turn on the PAN and the PSUM. If anything, wouldn't they have been better as allies, not rivals, in your efforts to establish a new government?"
Again Guajardo paused before answering. He continued to look into Jan Fields's eyes while he thought. She was attempting to provoke him.
It was as if she had driven a knife into him and was slowly twisting it.
Well, he thought, if you want a reaction, you shall have one. But Guajardo, ever the professional soldier, sought to maintain control.
"The PRI has rooted itself throughout our nation like a great cancer. It is everywhere, it touches everything and everyone. And everyone it touches it infects. For decades, men like my father struggled to cure the cancer from within. He served the party well, doing what was asked in the belief that he was doing something important for Mexico. And all the while, he closed his eyes to the graft, the corruption, the fixed elections, the misappropriation of funds. I would hear him at night telling my mother that someday, when he had the power, he would do what was right. He would come forth, like the knight on the white horse, and change everything."
Pausing for a moment, Guajardo shifted in his seat, turning his head to look up at the great mural depicting the heroes of the first revolution.
Without looking back at Jan, he continued. "I think, in his heart, he really believed he was doing what was right. Just like the politicians in the PAN and PSUM, I truly believe he was trying as hard as he could. But the cancer had seized him. Its roots slowly wrapped themselves about him, squeezing every trace of compassion out of him. By the time he died, he was like a man who had stared at the sun too long, he was blind to the reality of the world around him, a reality that threatens to destroy everything that the Revolution stands for.''
"Is that how you see yourself, Colonel, a savior on a white horse, coming forward to correct all the ills of Mexico by execution and terror?''
Guajardo could feel the blood rush to his head. He snapped his entire body about and faced the American female. For a moment, he eyed Jan Fields, fighting hard to maintain his composure. What arrogance, he thought. How can she, sitting here, dressed in clothes and shoes that cost her more money than the average family in Mexico made in half a year, understand what we are trying to do? What does she know of poverty, of crushed dreams and stillborn hopes? How dare she come into my country and impose her morals on our people when she has no idea what it means to be a Mexican?
For the longest time, Jan watched as Guajardo glared at her. Perhaps, she thought, she had gone too far.
As if in response to Jan's thoughts, Guajardo stood up, coming to a ramrod straight position of attention in front of Jan. There was a moment of silence as everyone waited for Guajardo to announce that the interview was over. Instead, Guajardo summoned, with a slight motion of his hand, a captain who had been patiently waiting in the background.
As the captain came forward, Jan looked at her crew. Ted the cameraman, nicknamed Theodore because of the round wire-rimmed glasses he wore, not seeing any cues from Jan, had his eye glued to the camera as he continued to shoot. Joe Bob, her sound tech and the only native Texan in the crew, looked at Jan, shaking his head. Also at a loss, Jan shrugged her shoulders and threw her hands out, palms up. Only Juan, standing against the wall, was visibly upset. Like a barefooted man on a hot beach, he nervously moved and shuffled his feet about, his eyes jumping from the spot where Guajardo stood conferring with the captain to the door at the far end of the room. To Jan, it appeared as if Juan were mentally measuring the distance he would have to run if something happened.
Did he know something, Jan thought, that we didn't? Or was he just overreacting? For the first time, Jan began to take the situation seriously, reminding herself that the man standing in front of her had something to do with a revolution that had begun by killing the same leaders he had, as a soldier, pledged fidelity to.
The clicking of the captain's heels as he turned and walked away caused Jan to turn back and face Guajardo. In a moment, he had changed.
His face was transformed, his eyes, his whole attitude had changed. The calm, relaxed man in the overstuffed chair was now towering over her.
From her chair, she looked up at him. In his brown uniform, he looked like a great grizzly bear. The soft brown eyes that had been so disarming were now dark, vacant, and piercing. Whether he intended to be intimidating didn't matter as far as Jan was concerned; she was duly intimidated, though she tried not to show it.
"Ms. Fields, a minute ago you asked me what finally drove me to turn against my government and the political system that kept it in power.
Come, I will show you." Without waiting for an acknowledgment, Guajardo turned and left the room.
The colonel's announcement had been an order, plain and simple.
Although she had no idea where he was going to take them, Jan knew she had hit a nerve and that whatever he was going to show them could only enhance the material they had collected during the interview. Without hesitation, she was up out of her seat and scurrying across the floor, leaving Ted and Joe Bob scrambling to grab cases and cables. Juan, seizing the confusion of the moment, deciding that he had greater need of his life and liberty than of double pay, quickly and quietly slipped away through the door he had been eyeing.
With Colonel Guajardo leading, Jan and her crew trotted through the corridors and down the grand staircases, in an effort to match the colonel's great strides. None of them noticed that Juan was not with them.
Even when they walked into the great courtyard where a military sedan and the rental van Jan's small crew was using sat waiting with doors open and engines already running. Neither Jan nor Joe Bob, the driver, thought to ask how or by whom the van had been moved. Such details weren't important at that moment.
What was important was where they were going and what the colonel wanted them to see. Pausing at the open side door, Jan all but shoved Ted and Joe Bob in, shouting, "Go, go, go," as they passed her. As soon as Joe Bob was clear, Jan turned to follow, but was held back by a hand on her arm. Turning, she saw that the captain Guajardo had talked to was holding her. With a slight smile, he informed her that Colonel Guajardo would like her to come with him in the sedan. Caught off guard, Jan looked back to Joe Bob, noticing for the first time that there was a soldier in the van's driver's seat.