| | Right Now, Gringo: Prolog,
and enuf to get the hero to Belize! (January
2008)
Right Now, Gringo!
A Belizean Adventure
by
Rick Zahniser (Señor Reek)
Prolog -- "Sun, sea, sand and sex"
Nibbling on a Twinkie and humming Margaritaville, Jack
Arnold crossed the Arizona/Mexico border at Nogales, sixty-eight miles south of
Tucson. He was driving a year-old maroon Nissan Altima, which he had just
purchased for cash in Tucson. He had bogus Arizona plates on the car and a fake
emission sticker on the windshield. Stowed in the trunk was a small roller bag
and a Conn trumpet in a nice case.
At the US exit gate, he smiled sheepishly as he told the
Border Patrolman that he was going to Canal Street. He told the Mexican
immigration official the same thing. However, instead of going to the well-known
red-light district, he turned left and took a bad dirt road out of town which
lead to Naco, sixty miles east, on the border just south of Bisbee.
As he drove toward Naco, he thought about his situation
there. The Border Patrol at Naco had a staff of a half dozen. Usually one agent
manned the single gate, and there were never any drug-sniffing dogs. Virtually
all the traffic was local, including his surplus deuce-and-a-half trucks which
traveled back and forth from his burnt adobe block factory in the Sonora Desert
to the thriving community of Sierra Vista, adjacent to Fort Huachuca. Sometimes
the trucks traveled north to Tucson. Sometimes the load of blocks concealed a
load of 'Columbian Marching Powder.' Sometimes the blocks concealed
plastic-wrapped roller bags packed with twenty and one-hundred dollar bills.
In Naco, Jack pulled into the empty courtyard of a small
Mexican hotel he owned with a Mexican friend. He locked the gate to the
courtyard and went and chatted with his friend, who assured Jack that his room
– and his cargo -- were all ready and the rest of the hotel was empty. He went
out to the dusty car, changed the Arizona plates for Mexican ones, scraped off
the emission sticker, and changed out some papers in the glove box, He took his
roller bag in and then took a long hot shower until the water began to turn
cold. He turned on the cable TV to TeleMundo and settled down for a good
night's sleep before he began the long drive to the Free Zone on the Northern
border of Belize..
***
Jack would not have slept well if he had known what was going
on at Arnold Enterprises in the Free Zone. A Belizean named Cholo Archuleta,
bound and gagged with duct tape, sat and watched two men dig their way into the
side of a six by six cement vault in the office he had been guarding. The big
steel safe door on the front was impressive, but they had just finished digging
thru the side wall with sledge hammer, pick and shovel. They filled black
plastic garbage bags with the pesos and dollars inside the vault. They tied
Cholo to a clothesline leash and, carrying the bags, made their way thru the
darkness to a skiff beached on the water side of the Free Zone.
***
The next morning, Jack loaded his personal roller bag and his
trumpet case in the back seat. He took two big rollerbags
out of a storage closet across from his room, put them in the trunk of the car
and headed south toward Mexico City. As he drove, he thought about the past few
years. After the Iran/Contra drug conduit seemed to fall apart in the 90's, he
had picked up some of the slack at the western end. His brother Dave was
handling the link at the Belize border. Airplanes or trucks delivered cocaine
from Columbia to a ranch outside of Guaymas, and one of his trucks, carrying a
load of straw and manure – hiding a load of powder -- drove up to the block
factory. The manure stayed at the block factory. The powder, nestled in a load
of adobe bricks, crossed the border easily at Naco, and was delivered to a
dealer in Tucson. The cash came back in a roller bag, hidden beneath a load of
fresh straw destined for the brick factory. It was a sweet setup. .
This trip, Jack was taking about two million dollars down to
his brother. He looked forward to sitting in with the local bands in Corozal.
And, he looked forward to some beach time out on the Cayes, where he could count
on a little "sun, sea, sand and sex."
Chapter 1: Denver, Colorado. Tuesday, February
15, 2000.
Tommy Conklin surveyed his recent life. Fifteen years in
Information Technology had just culminated in a successful Y2K project. His team
had handled thirty years of millennium bugs buried in the massive databased
system supporting Consolidated Banks of Colorado.
The project had consumed the
last two years of Tommy’s life and he was ready for a break.
It was Tuesday – no status meeting (there had been a status
meeting every Tuesday since he could remember) and he was sitting with his feet
up on his desk, trying to decide which of the twenty-one Colorado ski resorts he
would visit first. His phone beeped, announcing Filene Robb, the program
librarian who served as his secretary.
"Tom, will you take a call from Lynette Conklin?"
Filene asked on the speakerphone. "She says she’s calling from Belize and
it’s urgent."
"Sure, put her on" Tommy picked up the handset.
"Tommy, it’s Lynette"
Tommy was staggered. An old flame. THE old flame, from six
years ago. He faked jolly cordiality.
"Hey! Good to hear from you after all these years! What’s
up?"
"Your brother is lying in Karl Heusner Hospital here in
Belize City. He’s in a coma. If you want to see him alive, you ought to come
down."
She paused, and then… "I’d like to see you again,
too." Oh, my gosh, he thought. What that voice can do to me.
Tommy wanted to say "Tell me again, where is
Belize?" but instead "No sweat, Lynn. I’ll be there as soon as I
can. How can I reach you when I get there?"
"I’m staying at the Hotel Biltmore. Leave me a message
in the morning and I’ll pick you up at the Ladyville airport.."
Tommy switched to project manager mode, jotting down details
and mentally listing the things he would have to do to leave this job and get to
Belize in a hurry. And again, where was Belize? Someplace south of the border.
Someplace you can fly to, certainly.
"It’ll take me a day to shut everything down so I’ll
probably leave Thursday if I can get a ticket. I’ll leave you the
details."
"Thanks, Tommy. I really need the help. I’ll wait for
your message." Click, beep, that funny sound that signifies a long distance
call.
Tommy put his phone back in the cradle and began listing
details on his yellow pad. Put the Porsche in storage. Let the housekeeper know
that his condo was going on standby. Get a ticket. Where is Belize? He switched
his laptop computer, nestled in its desktop crib, to the Internet. Look up
"Belize" on Google. CIA Worldbook looks like a good place to start.
"Belize: Population 247,323 (1998) Not including illegal
aliens". Oh ho! That’s a problem there, huh? He studied the map. Latitude about
19 degrees, just south of Mexico on the Yucatan Peninsula. Caribbean coast. I
could drive there, through Mexico, in a couple or three days. Not now – got to
fly. Tickets now. He dialed his favorite travel agent.
"Barbara, I need a ticket to Belize for Thursday. He
waited while she checked her computer. "OK" he affirmed,
"American all the way, Denver to Houston, Houston to Belize City. 10AM
depart. I’ll pick up the ticket at the American ticket counter at DIA. Uh, do
I need a passport?"
Yes, Barbara told him. He had gotten a passport in 1998,
thinking he might go visit Philip, and never used it.
Tickets. Passport. Now, what to pack? For the tropics. Wow!
How thrilling!
* * *
Tommy was in his boss’s big corner office. Windows looked
out on the campus of the Denver Tech Center. Vance Prichard had been a good
friend for twelve years, and he knew Lynette and her history with Tommy.
"So after six years, Lynette has called!"
Tommy nodded. "It must be really serious for her to
call. She knows how I feel."
"Just because she dumped you and married your older
brother? You hold a grudge?"
Tommy grinned wryly, thinking how hard he tried to just
write it off to experience.
"Yeah – I was pretty serious about Lynn. And I
certainly didn’t think I had anything to worry about when I introduced her to
my own brother!"
"Well, you might have known. Good old Phillip -- one of
the youngest millionaires in the Petroleum club -- with more money than he knew
what to do with!"
"And I, Bozo that I am, didn’t realize that Lynette
was actually tired of skiing. When he offered her that trip to sunny Belize, she
jumped at the chance. Two weeks of snorkeling and SCUBA and she was hooked. On
Belize AND Phillip!"
Tommy thought wistfully about Lynette and her charms. They
seemed to have so much in common – music, skiing, movies – he had been so
comfortable with her. He was planning a future for both of them. And then…
"I guess I just took her for granted. Serves me
right." He drifted into silent reverie about possible lives with Lynette.
"So anyway," Vance said, dragging him back to
reality. "Where is Belize? Isn’t it an island?"
"Nope. First country south of Mexico on the Caribbean.
Little tiny place – about the size of New Hampshire, with maybe 250,000
people. Sounds like paradise."
"And you have an excuse to go down there and find out
what’s going on? In February?"
"Yup! She just said he’s in the hospital; sounds like
it’s really serious. He’s my only brother, and I would feel terrible if I
just let him lay down there and die."
Even if he did steal the girl of my dreams, he thought to
himself.
"Well, we just need to cut a check for your bonus, and
you can clear out of here. 200 grand! That won’t be too hard to take!"
"Well, that was my agreement with Jonathan." Tommy
said with a feeling of righteous satisfaction. "We brought it in on time,
and there haven’t really been any hiccups since that we didn’t anticipate. I’ll
have to talk to the team members, but they’ve been pretty independent workers
for the past six months, since we put the conversion plan in place, so it’s
just a matter of patting them on the back again and saying ‘job well done’
and ‘see you around!’"
"Well, Tom, you did a good job. I would never have given
you that big a bonus, but Jonathan trusted you and knew how to motivate you."
In early 1998, Jonathan Constantine, grand architect and CEO
of Consolidated Banks of Colorado, had begged Tommy to take on the
responsibility for fixing all the millennium bugs. Tommy put on his Brooks
Brothers suit and cordovan shoes and went to see him in his office at the top of
the Bank Tower in downtown Denver.
Jonathan said, "You know, Tommy, you turned me on to Ed
Yourdon, and I’ve been reading Time Bomb 2000, his new book about the
problems we’re going to have with dates in our old programs. If we let it,
that bomb could blow this company to hell. I’ve decided that you’re the guy
to save us."
"I want you to put a team together to fix all those
bugs. Hire the best people, and set up a plan that will ensure success. I know
you can do that, and you’re the only one I trust to pull it off. I’ll pay
you $15,000 a month until February of 2000, and a $100,000 bonus if you pull it
off."
Tommy had just read most of the book and knew about the death
march that the project implied. Sixteen hour days, working weekends, incredible
pressure to meet an immoveable deadline. Well, if I’m going to do it, I night
as well make it worthwhile, he thought.
"Make it $200,000, and I’ll do it," he countered,
"and I’ll need to pay bonuses to the good people I’m going to hire, as
well."
"Do it!" said Jonathan, and that roller
coaster ride began!
* * *
By mid-afternoon, Tommy had received his bonus check, and
deposited it in the Tech Center Branch of CBC. Getting $4,000 in Traveler’s
Cheques had taken more time that he expected. Maybe I should take some cash, he
thought, and went back to a cashier’s window and got another $4000 in hundreds
and fifties.
On the way home, he stopped at Cinderella City, shopping for
a money belt. At a luggage store, he found a cool one that zipped all his money
into a normal-looking leather belt. He bought two pairs of khaki shorts with
cargo pockets, four muscle shirts, and two light blue short-sleeved
button-down shirts. So much for tropical wear, he thought.
At home, he checked the refrigerator for leftovers that might
turn into lab projects while he was gone; emptied a couple of storage containers
and threw them in the dishwasher. . He called his housekeeper, told her he would
be gone for a week or so, and asked her to stop by on her usual Thursday and
check the place.
As he packed, he thought about footwear? Tennies? Sure.
Jungle Boots? Probably not; hopefully he wouldn’t be trekking thru the bush,
and he liked to pack light. Boat shoes, tennies, six pairs of white sox.
Skivvies for a week. Four white T-shirts. An old pair of khaki shorts with a
belt in the back. Toilet kit: razor, blades, shave cream, deodorant, toothbrush
& paste, Imodium – essential for Mexico, and any place south of there. He
put a little bottle of OFF in his kit – left over from a fishing trip to Dog
Lake in northern Canada.
He put all this stuff in a medium-sized roller
b ag, part of a
set he’d bought a year before. Just right, he thought, for the well-equipped
jungle bopper!
Chapter 2: Corozal,
Belize, Central America. Tuesday
Morning
Situated just south of the border between Mexico and Belize,
the Commercial Free Zone is a Mecca for Mexican shoppers who cannot get cheap
Chinese goods in their own country. They
save for months, plan trips, and come to Chetumal, just north of the border.
Then, they take a taxi to La Zona Libre,
where they collectively spend over a million Pesos a day on Chinese trinkets.
Dave Arnold had a nice business in the Free Zone.
An American from Arizona, he exchanged Pesos for Dollars.
Dave had lots of dollars. His
brother Jack brought them down from Arizona and Dave sold them to Free Zone
merchants for a very attractive rate. The merchants needed dollars to buy
Chinese goods; he needed Pesos for a large new land development on the coast
just north of Chetumal.
Right now, however, he had a big problem.
Last Friday night, persons unknown had broken into his place, punched a
hole in the side wall of his vault, and stolen about four million in US dollars
and Pesos. And, because the money
was really waiting to be laundered, Dave didn't want to get the police involved.
And Cholo Archeleta, the night watchman, was missing.
So, he was out of business until his brother Jack
arrived with more money. Unfortunately,
Jack seemed to be taking his sweet time driving through Mexico.
Either that, or he had been hijacked.
Dave tried to keep his mind occupied with the task at hand --
rebuilding the vault. The vault had
an attractive steel front, with massive hinges and a big dial.
But he had used ordinary building blocks for the walls.
He wished someone had told him that the blocks, built with smooth sea
sand, were actually quite fragile. Now, he
had a crew mixing cement, using construction sand and gravel, and they would
pour foot-thick steel-reinforced wall in a little while.
He had a shipment of steel girders coming in to support the ceiling, and
he would space them 6" apart!
***
Seven miles south, in Corozal, a Belizean called el Jefe
(the chief) by his few employees, was wrestling with a problem.
His problem was an American expat named Phillip Conklin.
El Jefe had become involved with this Gringo and his wife and
supplied him with some money for a land development that Conklin was running. But Conklin was always curious about the source of el
Jefe's money.
"Don't worry about it!" el Jefe would say.
"It's Belizean politics, and you don't want to get involved."
Things had come to a head last Sunday when Conklin came to his house and
accused him of cleaning out Dave Arnold's vault and 'disappearing' the guard.
El Jefe thought he had solved
his problem with Conklin, who was presently in a coma in the hospital in Belize,
but now he discovered that it was more complicated than that. Conklin had been
making audio tapes and video recordings of their meetings.
I need to deal with that problem right now, he thought.
I need to deal with you, Gringo. Right
now.
Chapter 3. Denver,
Wednesday, 9:45
Tommy was early for the meeting he had called in CBC’s team
conference room. He surveyed the
empty room. It seemed as though his life had always been defined by status
meetings, separated by crises. But
that was over. “The circus has
left town” was the way Vance described it.
Tommy was sitting at the middle of the 16-foot conference table with his
back to a couple of white boards. The
room was designed for Tommy's style of collaborative teamwork, which had been
adopted by several other teams at CBC.
 Dillon
“Dilly” Marshall, first to arrive, took her regular seat at the end of the
table to Tommy's left, and arranged her yellow tablet & coffee.
Dilly was a statuesque blonde with amazing powers of memory and strong
analytical skills. Her forte was
negotiating with tough users, converting their vocal requirements into written
ones. Tommy liked to think of her
as his “well-structured programmer.” Dilly
often functioned as a facilitator when Tommy demurred.
Roy Alvarez, their data base programmer, came in and sat down
next to Dilly.
"Buenos dias," he said to Dilly.
"Como esta?"
"Asi! Asi!" she said with a grin. The little
ritual celebrated the fact that they both spoke Español.
Dilly had made trips to Acapulco, and one year she and her husband went
to Carnival in Rio, only to find that her Spanish didn't help – they spoke
Portuguese!
Fred Plunkett came in and sat down next to Roy, where he had
a good view of Dilly. He surveyed
her appreciatively. Recently
divorced, Fred was always looking – but Dilly was happily married and
pretended not to notice his daily checkout.
Labeled “Phred, the Phireman” in many of the e-mail posts, he was
often called in during the wee small hours when someone
had broken something. As the
system configuration guy, he applied changes every morning, and sometimes backed
them off when they didn’t work. He
was a hard-ass when he had to be, and a Godsend when he rebuilt the system.
“Call Phred” was the watchword whenever something went wrong.
Filene Robb marched in with her laptop and took the seat
directly across from Tommy. “Filene,
the Filer,” she was called. An
experienced program librarian, Filene had been one of Tommy’s keys to success
on the project. She typed 90 words
a minute, and stored everything in a personal database on her laptop so that she
could lay hands on it at a moment’s notice.
She doubled as Tommy’s secretary, because she knew everything about the
project, including Tommy’s schedule. Before
she sat down, she grabbed a Cat-5 cable that was hanging from a hook on the
wall, and plugged it into her machine. She checked it to make sure that she was networked.
Roger “Fahrly” Farquar slouched in and took his seat next
to Filene. He looked like he was
staking out a place to sleep. Fahrly
was hard drinking, but hard-working too --
a “garbage programmer” who could keep hundreds of details in his head
as he read and changed intricate operating system code. Fahrly had designed and built the bug trap that caught (and
would continue to catch) 98% of the unexpected “millennium bugs” which
occurred as the new century rolled on.
Finally, Phyllis Quinn came in and took an empty seat at the
other end of the table. Tommy thought of her as “The Rock” – a
well-disciplined programmer who worked steadily throughout the day with measured
breaks. Any time, he could always
count on her to be in her office working!
Tommy marveled at the small size of his team.
Organization -- he thought. Organization
– keeping these people focused and working on just the right things at the
right time. Teamwork!
By golly, he thought, I deserve that big bonus!.
The formal wrap-up for the team had taken place January 19-21
at Breckenridge Ski Area. Tommy
believed that one of the keys to successful project management was a periodic
weekend meeting every three or four months where everyone presented their work
to date, and shared their plans for the future. He called this a “checkpoint”
-- a look backward – a chance for everyone to brag and pat everyone
else on the back for a job well done. And
then a chance to look forward, with some serious planning sessions.
The latest, four weeks ago in Breckenridge, was 'The Last Checkpoint.'
Since then, Tommy had been working on appraising each person’s
performance and negotiating the bonus which they deserved. As they sat watching
him, their smiling faces told him that he had done a good job.
“Folks,” he began “I’ve got some good news or bad
news. I’m done, and I’m leaving. In fact, I’m leaving tomorrow!”
He waited a moment for the shock to fade and then continued.
“Yesterday, I got a call from my sister-in-law in Belize.
My brother’s in the hospital down there, in a coma, and I’ve got to
go see him.”
“Belize!” said Fred. “That’s an island somewhere in
the Caribbean, isn’t it?”
“Belize is the first country south of Mexico on the
Caribbean. It’s not an island.”
Phyllis, usually reticent, was speaking out positively.
“It’s about 250 miles south of Cancun.
My father lives there.”
“I didn’t know that, Phyllis!” Tommy exclaimed.
“What’s his name, and where does he live?”
“Charles Acres. He
lives in Corozal, which is right up on the Mexican border, north end of the
country. He’s been down there since 1996.”
“Wow! Have you
ever visited?”
“Yes. Bob and
I went down in 1997, when my Mom was still there. We spent about a week. Bob
didn’t like it much – he’s a cold weather person – but I thought it was
neat.”
“How did you get there?”
“We flew into the airport at Ladyville, and Dad picked us
up.”
“Yeah, that’s how I’m getting there.”
As they chatted, Filene was looking up Belize on the
Internet. She put a map of Belize
up on one of the white boards, which was actually a large interactive display.
 The team
studied the map. Tommy turned
around and studied the map for a moment.
“OK. So we
know where Belize is!"
He turned back to the team. "Phyllis, I’d like to get
some details about your dad, but I’ll do that later. Do we have anything else to settle before I go?”
“Do they have e-mail down there?” Dilly asked.
“You should take your laptop, and you can keep us informed.”
“Good idea,” Tommy said.
He looked at Phyllis. “Do they have e-mail?”
“Sure,” she replied.
“BTL, the local telephone company, is pretty good, even if it is
expensive. I think you can probably
go to the local office and hook up your laptop.
You ought to take it along.”
“How long do you think you’ll be there?” Fahrly
interjected. I’ll have to find
someone to fill in for you at our weekly poker games!”
“Fahrly, I don’t have a clue. I don’t even know
what’s wrong with Phillip yet. I’ll
just have to let you guys know."
* * *
Tommy drove to the downtown Headquarters of CBC; now the
corner of the Banking District in Denver. He
had phoned ahead and Muriel, Jonathan's secretary for 25 years, had assured him
that Constantine could see him.
"So you're off on yet another adventure, eh,
Tommy?" Constantine said with
a grin.
"Yes, sir. I
haven't seen Phillip since he married my fiancée and took her off to
Belize."
"Are you bitter about that, Son?"
"To tell the truth, I was so busy with Y2K, I didn't
have time to brood about it. And
maybe that was the trouble. I was
neglecting her."
"Well, now, Y2K is behind us, and maybe you can make
amends. I hope the salary and bonus
we paid you will give you the wherewithal to do that properly."
"It certainly should. I'm really grateful to you, Sir,
for the opportunity to do something significant, and of course, to be rewarded
for it."
"I still owe you a lot, Tommy.
If you need any help, you can always call on me!"
They stood up and shook hands.
"God speed," Jonathan said sincerely.
***
Tommy was still hanging around his office, cleaning out his
desk and making notes in his Day-Runner. He
looked at his Timex 'nerd-watch.' Seven
o’clock in Denver. What time zone
is Belize in? Well, Central,
probably, so that would be eight PM. He
called the international operator, and gave her the number of the Biltmore
hotel. Pause. British-sounding rings.
Well that’s right, he
thought. According to the CIA book,
Belize used to be British Honduras.
“Belize Biltmore Hotel.
Good night.”
“I believe you have a guest there named Lynette Conklin.
Could I speak to her?”
“I’ll ring her room, Sir.
Right now.”
“Lynette Conklin!” he heard.
“Lynette. This
is Tommy. How is Phillip?”
“No change, really. When
are you coming?"
“I just booked a ticket for tomorrow on American through
Dallas to Belize City."
“The American flight gets in about 2:30.
I’ll pick you up.”
“If it’s a problem, I can take a cab.”
“No problem! Look
for me on the second deck at the airport.”
Chapter 4: Denver,
Thursday Morning
Tommy had stored his Porsche, buttoned up his digs and Vance
was driving him to DIA.
“The flight is at 9:10, right?”
“Right. American
1122 to Dallas and a nonstop to Belize City.
Looks like a nice day for flying.”
“Yup. Nice day
for skiing, too, buddy. Wouldn’t
you rather be going to my condo up at Breckenridge?”
“Actually, I’m pretty jazzed about finally going to
Belize. I put it out of my mind before, because of Lynette, but it’s a whole
new world to me. The Marine Corps
trained me for it, but they never sent me back to the jungle after I finished
the school. So I’m finally gonna get to test my ‘legs.’”
Tommy thought about the jump training at Fort Benning that
originally gave him his “legs” and the jungle warfare school in Panama after
he came back from Lebanon. In turn,
Vance glanced over at his favorite manager, seeing him in yet another light.
“You know, Tommy, I tend to forget that you’re a
‘trained killer'! Did you ever
have to kill anyone?”
“Well, we shot back in Lebanon, but we usually denied that
we’d personally killed anyone. The
jungle stuff was all training. We used to talk about that cartoon showing the
two buzzards sitting on a fence. ‘Patience,
hell’ – says one to the other. ‘I’m gonna kill something.’
We were all dressed up with no place to go."
“Wait. You
mean, you’d already been to Lebanon, and then they sent you to Jungle
Training?”
“Well, yeah. Everyone
in MAU-22 went back to Camp LeJeune, and I had a choice of being a DI –
because I had combat experience -- or going to another school.
I picked the school. It was fun. Eating
ants & cockaroaches, living off the land!”
He laughed.
“Well, now, you’ll find out if Belize looks like ‘the
jungle’ in Panama.”
“Yup. Hopefully,
I won’t get to find out if my training was any good. I’m getting pretty old for that ‘Gung Ho’ shit.
I am NOT taking my jungle boots!”
“How old are you, now, Tommy?”
“36. And I
feel like an ‘old guy’"
“Well, this ‘old guy’ is 50, and you look like a spring
chicken to me!”
“We’ll see, Vance.”
Chapter 5: Corozal,
Belize, Thursday Morning
El Jefe closed up his cell phone.
He had just finished speaking with Lynette Conklin, who was with her
husband in Belize City. He sat back and thought about the situation.
For years, el Jefe had been part of the shadow
government's drug operation that began with the Iran/Contra affair.
The Columbians – discouraged by the US DEA from flying over Belize, had
started dropping bales of powder in the sea, where it was picked up by a fleet
of Belizean skiffs and trucked across Belize to the Mexican border. They took
the powder across the river west of the Free Zone and then thru Mexico to the US.
He didn't know any of those details and he didn't want to know.
What he did know a lot about was money.
El Jefe laundered money that came down by boat from Florida.
His favorite way of laundering money was putting it into
projects; usually construction projects like Phillip Conklin's.
Like so many naïve real estate developers, Conklin grossly
underestimated the amount of money required to subdivide a property and sell it
as lots. Phillip thought he was
rich, but he didn’t have nearly enough money to subdivide.
There's never enough money! – thought el Jefe.-- but there's
enough if you don't care where it comes from.
And a real estate deal makes a wonderful laundromat.
And Gringos have so many good ideas for development and promotion.
Phillip wasn't desperate but he began to cast about for
solutions. He met el Jefe at
a Rotary dinner, invited him to lunch, and they began to explore their mutual
interests.
They had some meetings and el Jefe became a silent
partner in one subdivision. They
talked about the future, about sandy beaches and a golf course.
El Jefe had his own priorities for the project, and he could
subtly include these along with Phillip's.
For instance, he wanted one road in the development to be long enough to
be used for an air strip.
El Jefe, already rich, could be charming.
He was invited to some parties at the Conklin house.
He met Lynette, Phillip’s very attractive wife, and began to enjoy her
company. He took both of them to
Chetumal – the Mexican city just north of the border.
They watched some movies together and exchanged gifts – usually CDs and
now DVDs. DVD’s – how much
nicer than tapes, which mildew in the tropical moisture.
Things went well for a while. Phillip got busy developing his first project.
He spent a lot of time on the job site.
El Jefe spent some time with Lynette.
He took her to Chetumal, showed her the best restaurants, the best
hotels… ah yes!
Phillip, like many Gringo developers, was dreaming hard about
his development. He envisioned a
Club House, and started building. He
laid out lots, and started putting in streets.
He arranged for BEL (Belize Electric Limited) to bring a major power
line. He made plans to dig a deep
well for water. He made plans for a
sewer system – something almost unheard of in suburban Belize!
And he needed more money -- more than el Jefe had on hand.
But the Mexican Navy was patrolling the shore too well, and they had
already captured one boat full of money. (No
reports of that in the Press!)
So, el Jefe was actually short of money!
Johnny's excavating company needed a big payment.
BEL needed another payment. So,
last week, Phillip cashed a half-million in securities, and told el Jefe
that he needed a matching contribution.
El Jefe had a competitor in the Free Zone.
Arnold Enterprises supplied dollars to the merchants so that they could
buy new goods. And, the Arnolds
were doing well, so last Friday night, he arranged for a couple of his minions
to execute a funds transfer from the Arnold vault. Saturday, he told Phillip he had
the matching funds. Unfortunately Phillip had a desk in the offices of Arnold
Enterprises, and after he visited Dave Arnold, he put two and two together.
He came to el Jefe's house on Sunday morning,
and there was a nasty scene. El Jefe felt like killing him on the spot,
but he always showed great restraint in his own house.
He knew that Phillip bought cocaine from a posse of boys at Miami
Beach every Monday morning, and so he arranged for Phillip to get some really
hot powder. The "hot
dose" didn't
kill him – it put him in Karl Heusner Hospital -- and now Lynette was
suggesting that her husband had been accumulating evidence -- incriminating
videos and audio tapes. Evidence
which could connect el Jefe and Phillip and the Arnold robbery.
She had found a CD under their bed.
Tapes?
Where are these tapes? Lynette
didn't know. Only Phillip knows,
she said. He opened up his cell
phone and speed dialed.
"Paco, you and Flaco have to go to the Hospital in
Bleece."
Chapter 6: Houston,
Thursday Morning
The flight attendant was tall, dark, and appreciative of
Tommy’s lanky good looks. She
smiled winningly as she looked at his ticket.
“16C, Mr. Conklin” she said. “Looks like we’ll have wonderful weather for the
flight”
“Great, Louise,” Tommy said with a tight smile, reading
her nametag. “I don’t need any excitement right now.”
Louise watched him as he walked down the aisle to his seat.
About six foot two, curly brown hair, really broad shoulders, trim butt.
Blue blazer over a white button down shirt and khaki slacks.
Having already done a long flight from San Francisco to Houston, she was
laying over in Ladyville this trip; Mr. T. Conklin might make the stay more
interesting.
***
After she and her partner had made their pass down the aisle,
handing out picnic style lunches and drinks, Louise checked Tommy.
“Can I get you anything special?”
“I guess you could bring me another Coors.”
She brought back the beer. “Is this your first trip to
Belize?”
“Well, yes. Until
yesterday, I wasn’t sure where Belize is!”
He didn’t volunteer any more information.
“Well, I’ve got to lay over in Ladyville, and I thought
maybe we could hook up.”
Tommy shook his head, brightly. “Aw, shucks, Ma’m, I really appreciate the offer, but I
have an old girl friend picking me up at the airport, and I think she’s got
plans for me.” He gave her his
best smile as a consolation prize, but it wasn’t enough.
Rebuffed, she turned swiftly and retreated to the food
alcove.
Tommy studied the brochure on Belize that was in his seat
pocket. The big destination seemed
to be San Pedro; an island off the coast. He
studied the map a bit. San Pedro
was a town on Ambergris Caye. The
brochure was full of ads for hotels and restaurants there.
The blurb made it sound like Cancun, except maybe a little cheaper.
Tourist trap, he thought. I’m
not going there.
***
The 737 settled onto the runway and Tommy looked out the
window as they taxied by the low terminal building. Yet another airport, he thought.
But this one seemed different! Promised
adventure! He collected his
carry-on from the overhead and, after waiting for the aisle traffic to thin
down, headed up to the first class section and the exit.
“Enjoy your stay in Belize” Louise smiled a mechanical smile and looked quickly past him
to the next passenger.
He ducked through the door and stood up on the stairway.
Interesting little airport – no real 'gates' – a 75-yard walk across a
glaring white-hot tarmac to the two-storied terminal building.
Sweat breaking out under his arms. People on the second floor waving to the passengers – to him!
He looked for Lynette. By
golly, there she was! Incredibly
healthy looking – tan, tan, tan, everywhere.
Brown hair sun-bleached at the ends.
She waved and he nodded energetically and waved back.
Inside, the sign said 'Immigration' and he picked one of the
lines and got out his passport. So
far, not too different from any international airport anywhere.
He looked at all his fellow passengers standing in line.
Conspicuously white, he thought, thank goodness for my skiing tan!
What do Belizeans look like? Brown,
he suspected, thinking back to his experience at the Jungle Training Center in
Panama. But Lynette is brown all
over! he thought.
It’s just a matter of time. Maybe
we all turn the same color, given enough time in the sun!
The very brown, very pretty young woman at the counter said
“Passport?” brightly and he handed it over.
She flipped it open expertly, looking for a blank page, stamped it, and
then began writing in a book. No computer, he thought.
Well, does Belize have computers?
“No computers?” he vocalized his thought.
“Not, yet! They
keep promising, but meanwhile, we just keep writing.” She began stamping his passport energetically.
“Will you be here long?” she asked.
“I don’t know, yet.”
“Well, your passport serves as a Visa, but if you stay more
than 30 days, you’ll have to get it renewed,” she explained.
“You can do that at any immigration office.
It costs 25 dollah.” Tommy
thought about that. A dollah must be a Belizean dollar.
How much is that in US money, he thought.
As if she was reading his mind, she smiled and said “One US
dollar equals two Belizean dollah. But
everyone will gladly take your US dollars and give you change in Belizean.”
“I hope you enjoy our little country” she said, as she
handed back his passport with a big smile.
In the large customs hall, beneath a sign that said
“Incoming Baggage,” he found his roller bag.
There were separate lines for 'Declare' --a red sign-- and 'Nothing to
Declare' – a green sign. He chose
Nothing to Declare – no line, really – and walked up behind a very dark man
carrying a 19” TV. The officials
had just stopped him, and were trying to look inside the TV.
Tommy wondered why the guy thought he didn’t have to declare the TV.
One of the officials pulled out a screwdriver and started unscrewing the
retaining screws on the back of the set.
“Wait a minute” the dark man said.
“What you doing, Mon?”
“This will only take a minute, Sir” said the man with the
screwdriver, as he took out the last screw.
As he pulled the back loose, US dollars began falling out onto the
counter and floor. The TV was
stuffed with money, and Tommy started laughing.
He handed another official his form stating that he had nothing to
declare.
“You can pass, Sir,” the man with the screwdriver said,
to Tommy’s relief.
Tommy passed the dark man, who was obviously in a lot of
trouble, and walked through the narrow exit hallway to the outside.
“Lynette!” Tommy
dropped his carry-on and the roller bag.
“Tommy!” she said, giving him a gratifying hug.
He noticed the feel of her breasts against his chest, and realized how
long it had been since he held a woman. And
now he was having lustful thoughts about his sister-in-law!
“The car is right out here,” she said, and turned toward
the parking lot. She took his left
arm, and began guiding him across the curb and out to the parking lot.
They worked their way through the waiting cabs and walked
into the lot; fifty steps to a 1999 Grand Cherokee. Tommy spent the time sweating and looking appreciatively at Lynette.
Tall, slim, brown legs, pink shorts and a starched white cotton blouse.
She flushed under his scrutiny.
“It’s been a long time, hasn’t it,” she said.
“Boy, I’ll say. I’m
sorry we’re meeting again under such circumstances. I guess I should have visited earlier, but I’ve been pretty
busy with Y2K.”
“So, now it’s 2000. Is that all over with?”
“You bet. My team can handle anything that comes up.
I’m all yours!”
Lynette unlocked the back door, Tommy swung out the tire, put
his roller bag in the back, and carried his AWOL bag around to the right-hand
door where Lynette waited.
“I think I need my sunglasses” he squinted.
“And maybe some sun block”
“Good,” she nodded, “I’m glad you brought some.”
She unlocked her door, and handed Tommy the keys.
“Belizeans don’t approve of women drivers!”
Tommy helped her climb aboard, and then went around to the
other side. As he climbed into the
driver’s seat, he put his bag between the seats and put on sunglasses.
“The exit is down here at the end,” she pointed, as he
started the car, backed out, and headed in that direction “We’re going out
to the highway, and back down to the hotel.
I’ll let you get a room, and then we’ll go over to the hospital.”
Tommy stopped at the exit, and Lynette handed him a Belizean
twenty-dollar bill. He studied the
orange bill, smaller than a US bill, and noted that it had a picture of Queen
Elizabeth on one side. The other
side had a bunch of animals and a big-billed bird. Jungle animals, he thought,
reminding him of his new surroundings.
Tommy took the change from the gatekeeper and handed it back
to Lynette. He drove down the
two-lane exit road that surrounded the parking lot. He turned right at the end, onto a road that Lynette pointed
to. Lush tropical foliage filled
his vision. Jungle at last, he
thought.
“This heads for the highway and one of the worst roads in
the country,” she said with a wry smile.
“It’s a shame that it’s the first thing that most travelers see
when they hit Belize, but it’s very heavily traveled during rush hours.
Lots of wealthy Belizeans live in housing projects out here at Ladyville
and drive into the city every day.”
Tommy came to a big modern Shell station and a stop sign.
Lynette said “Right” and he waited for a break in the traffic and
joined the stream of cars. They
were a mix; lots of old cars, but a few new ones, too.
The car behind him tailgated him for a quarter mile, and then passed him,
barely missing an oncoming taxi. Tommy
backed off and gave him plenty of room.
“What the hell?” he said.
“Belizeans are very aggressive drivers!” Lynette
explained. “You took his space.
He owns that little space in front of his car, and he showed you that
he’s a better man than you by passing you.
It’s called machismo — ‘macho man’.”
“Really!” Tommy said.
“Well, I don’t mind him proving his manhood but I don’t want to die
while he’s doing it!”
“Belizean drivers take some getting used to.
They haven’t been driving very many years, and they all drive like
teenagers.”
The traffic moved fairly smoothly, although the road was
pitted with potholes and the margins were uneven. Tommy watched the road carefully, trying to avoid the holes.
“How much of this do we have?”
“Only about five miles.
The Biltmore is on the edge of the city. We’re almost to the city now.
This bridge is the 'Haulover Bridge'.”
“Haulover?”
“Yes. In the
early days, before the bridge, they used to haul freight over the river with
ropes. This is the Belize River –
the biggest river in the country.”
“OK. So much
for trivia! Tell me about
Phillip.”
“He’s in the hospital, in a coma!”
“I know that! Give
me a rundown!”
“Well,
it was Monday afternoon. Phillip
promised to take me out for Valentine’s Day dinner, and he was upstairs in his
office. I know now that he was
snorting cocaine. I called him, and
he didn’t answer, and when I went up, he was crumpled up on the floor beside
his chair. His single-edged razor
blade, the one he used to set up a line, was sitting on a mirror on his desk.
I tried to wake him up, looked at his eyes and they were rolled back in
his head. He was breathing,
shallow, but I felt his pulse and it was obvious to me that that he wasn’t
dying. I called the clinic and then
Melody – my next-door neighbor -- and together we put him in the Cherokee and took him up to the
Clinic. They tried giving him an IV shot of caffeine but that didn’t have any
effect. They decided that he ought
to be seen by a specialist in Belize City.
So, we brought him down here in an ambulance. He still hasn’t come out of it, unless something happened
since I’ve been gone.”
Tommy thought about her account for a minute.
Phillip is tall. I’ll bet getting him down the stairs was a hassle.
“So, you stayed at the hospital with him?”
“For a while. He just lay there, breathing slowly.
I talked to him, but he didn’t move, didn’t show any sign that he
heard. Dr Leslie came in and tried
another shot of caffeine, but it didn’t really make any difference.
Finally after three hours, I decided to go get some sleep and checked
into the Biltmore. I went back to
the hospital next morning. Went out
and had breakfast after I saw that there was no change.
Then I went over to BTL – which is right down the street – and called
you.”
“BTL?” Tommy
queried.
“Belize Telecommunications Limited – the only phone
company. They have phone booths so
you can make long distance calls. After
I called you, I came back to the
hospital and stayed with Phillip all day. Dr.
Leslie came in and examined him again, and talked to me about the circumstances.
I told him that Phillip had been taking cocaine, and he suggested that it
might have been an overdose – a "Hot Dose" – they call it. He
tried to ask me questions about the source, and Phillip’s usage but I really
didn’t want to talk about it."
“Well Lynette, you’re going to have to talk about it to
me! I didn’t know Phillip was
doing cocaine. How long has this
been going on?"
“Oh, Tommy, you’re so naive! Phillip used to use cocaine in Denver. Not all the time, but when he needed a lift.
Lots of guys in the stock business use it.”
“Yeah, well I guess I know that. I just always thought my Big Brother…” Tommy lapsed into thought about his brother and how much he
used to look up to him. Before he
stole Lynette!
Lynette watched him speculatively, trying to decide how much
to tell him. Well, he’s here. she
thought. He needs to know more.
“Phillip found out that both pot and cocaine were easy to
get here in Belize. Illegal, of
course, but really easy to get if you have the money.
And of course, Phillip has always had the money! So he’s been a steady
user since we got here. I guess
he’s addicted. I use it
occasionally, but I can take it or leave it."
She paused and looked at him. "I
thought you had done some of that?”
“When I was younger, I tried just about everything.
I guess I look like a straight arrow now, but I’ve had a couple of
friends die because they were using cocaine or speed.
Heart attacks. It’s a
wonder Phillip hasn’t had any heart trouble.”
“Except for the cocaine, Phillip is actually a health nut.
He doesn’t eat a lot, and runs a couple of miles three or four times a
week. Sometimes I run with him.”
Tommy looked at her long, brown, strong legs.
“Yep. It shows!”
She grinned, used to Tommy checking her out.
“We do a lot of drinking, Tommy. The
only way to keep from turning into a blimp is to exercise.
Here’s the Biltmore coming up on the right.
Pull in and park as close to the front door as you can, and we’ll get
you checked in. "
***
The Biltmore was a nice tropical hotel, reminding him a lot
of the El Conquistador in Tucson
where he’d attended a database conference. His room, on the second floor, was spacious, with a ceiling
fan turning over the bed, and a big tiled bathroom. After he’d installed his roller bag on a folding shelf in
the closet, he changed his sweaty shirt and then headed down the hall to the bar, where
he met Lynette She was having
a Rum & Coke.
“Have a Belikin Beer” she commanded, “and then we’ll
go see Phillip.”
“Well, I’m pretty anxious to go now.
I guess you’ve been waiting around for days here, and you’re getting
pretty relaxed.”
“Yes, well, this is Belize, and nobody gets very excited
about anything. Charlie Acres tells
everyone ‘If you can learn to relax, you can live to be 100.’ And he’s
right. Phillip never has learned,
and look where he is now.”
Tommy was surprised. “You
know Charlie? His daughter worked
for me in Denver!”
“Well, Belize is pretty small – you’ll run into
coincidences like that often. Anyway,
Corozal is even smaller, and everyone knows everyone.“
The bartender handed Tommy an ice-cold bottle of beer.
Smallish, brown, with a little collar of napkin folded around the top.
Tommy took the collar off, and took a taste.
It was light, a little hoppy, a lot like Coors, which was his favorite.
“What’s with the collar on the beer?
Pretty fancy!”
“Barry Bowen has trouble with his bottle caps rusting, so
bartenders put the napkin on the bottle so you can wipe off the rust!”
“Who’s Barry Bowen?”
“Barry owns the only brewery in Belize, the Coke
distributorship, and a big water purification plant. He’s one of the rich guys.
His plant is the main thing at Ladyville besides the airport.”
The beer tasted fine; light, ice cold, just about right for
the climate, which seemed hot to Tommy after the weather in Denver.
He finished it in a couple of swallows and looked at the writing on the
back. 248 ml. About 10
ounces, he guessed. Just right for
a "quick beer."
“Let’s go see Phillip,” he said, getting up and heading
for the door. Lynette slugged her
Rum & Coke and came after him.
“Slow down,” she said.
“You always used to do that, run off and leave me.
Damn old long-legged Okie!”
Tommy smiled at her ruefully. “Yeah, I guess I did.
Always figured you were tall enough to keep up.”
***
Lynette directed him to turn right out of the parking lot,
and they drove down a congested street. He
judged that they were going East, since the sun was behind him.
Eventually they came to a traffic circle
-- not Tommy’s favorite thing. There
were traffic lights around the periphery.
“You’re going to make a left, so get in the circle, but
stay to the right, go around and come out over there” she said, pointing, as
the light changed. Tommy made the
maneuver, noting that the Belizean drivers were single-minded and non-defensive.
If we have any defensive driving
at all in this place, I guess it’s all up to me, he thought,. The hospital
was a little ways down the street on the right, and he pulled into the nearly
empty parking lot. They debarked,
locked the car, and headed into the lobby.
The hospital was a low building, two stories, cream-colored.
Tommy tried to slow down, offering an arm to Lynette.
“That’s better, cowboy!” she grinned at him.
They entered the building and made their way across the
hospital lobby to a reception desk, where an old black gentleman in a guard
uniform took Tommy’s name and wrote it in a reception book.
He knew Lynette, and wrote her name, and Phillip’s name as the patient.
“There’s no ICU,” Lynette explained, “but they have
him in a curtained-off area in a small ward ‘way down in the back.
They haven’t mentioned any visiting hours for me, so far.
I told them you were coming and were ‘immediate family.’
It’s actually a pretty good hospital for Third World.
You ought to see the hospital in Corozal.
It looks like something out of Doctor
Mudd.”
Tommy searched his mind and recalled that Doctor Mudd was the
Civil War era doctor who was sentenced to Shark Island because he had treated
John Wilkes Booth’s leg. He and Lynette had watched the John Ford movie
together at a Denver art house. .
“No wonder you brought Phillip to Belize City.”
They arrived at Phillip’s curtained off area.
He was flat on his back, very pale, shallow breathing, an IV dripping
something – probably glucose – into his left arm.
Tommy grabbed his brother’s right arm and shook it.
“Phillip!” he said, hopefully. “Phillip, it’s me – Tommy. Hey,
Bro, I’m here! Wake up and
let’s talk about things.”
Nothing. It was
like talking to the Sphinx. Phillip
lay there, looking at the ceiling, breathing slowly. No signs of hearing, of being aware of anything.
Tommy sat down and studied him for a while.
His body – mostly uncovered except for a sheet over his mid-section –
was richly tanned; his hair was sun-bleached like Lynette’s.
“Jeez” Tommy said. “That’s
it. huh? No wonder you don’t want
to hang around.”
Lynette smiled ruefully and shook her head.
“It’s not easy. I feel like I’m talking to a brick wall, but he’s
obviously alive, and some experts think that people in a coma actually hear and
remember everything they hear. So I
talk to him, and try to make sense when I do.”
They sat together, silently, for thirty minutes or so, while
Tommy watched his brother closely for any signs of recognition.
Nothing. What a bummer.
He began to think of the movies and books about people in a coma. Kept alive to be organ donors – in the Michael Crichton
thriller. Well, that's not likely
here. So what do we do next?
Sit here. Go eat. Tommy looked at his Timex.
7:30 Mountain Time, and he hadn’t had anything but a beer since the
picnic lunch on the plane.
“Let’s go eat,” he suggested, getting up and turning to
the door.
“There’s no cafeteria here in the hotel.
We’ll have to drive somewhere. We
can go over to the Princess and get something.
They drove to the Princess Hotel, a large six-story building
on the sea-front, where they both had fried fish and rice pilaf.
Tommy had another Belikin beer and decided he liked it about as well as
Coors, maybe better! He admired the view of the water.
“No surf!” he observed.
“The surf is all out on the reef, about fifteen miles out.
Bleece gets tides, and gentle waves, but no real pounding surf like
beaches in the States. In fact,
there isn’t much of a beach anywhere on the mainland except down south.”
“No ‘white silver sands'?" Tommy exclaimed.
“How can it be a tropical paradise?” He grinned.
“The beaches are almost all out on the Cayes”.
(She pronounced that 'keys') Here,
the shoreline is covered with mangroves, which serve as a breeding ground for
the little ‘fitties.’ That’s
one of the crimes the land developers are committing; cutting down the mangroves
to make sandy beaches. Then the
sandy beaches erode and basically disappear.”
“You sound like an eco-freak!” Tommy chided.
“Well, down here, we learn to take the environment
seriously since it’s the key to eco-tourism..
If that makes me an ‘eco-freak’ then so be it!”
Tommy realized that he might have hit a nerve.
Since Phillip was a land developer, maybe
this was a bone of contention between them.
He tried to change the subject.
“A minute ago, you said ‘Bleece’. You meant Belize City?”
“The city was just called ‘Belize’ when the country was
British Honduras. Now, most people
just call the city “Bleece.” It’s
the same with Corozal. It’s
actually named “Corozal Town” to distinguish it from Corozal District, but
everyone calls it Corozal. Orangewalk
Town is just Orangewalk.”
“I think I need a map to sort all this out!” he grinned.
“Let’s get back to the hospital and talk about geography tomorrow.”
##
I can let you read more... but... bear in mind that I'm look for an
agent!!.
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