Confrontation Ch. 02: Serious Clash

"I'm sorry about your girl, Carlos. I shouldn't have said those things that hurt you."

Then my guilt comes pouring out.

"She was my little one and... now she's gone. I let her down. Didn't talk to her enough. Got too busy with this new job. She fell in with the wrong crowd.... Overdosed.... Dead at fifteen...."

The memories of Verena have me losing control. Elena wraps her arms around me while I sob on her shoulder. She whispers and pats my back like a mother while her warmth surrounds me. Gradually my sorrow eases and she kisses my cheek. Then it's quiet- nothing else is said as she continues to hold me close.

Suddenly, we're aware of noise outside, screeching brakes across the street below. I shift away from Elena enough to see that a small white delivery van, lettered Nino's Padaria [bakery]- Is parked beside the club. The driver wears the same uniform as the one I've seen before- it could even be the same guy. It looks like another pick up is about to take place.

"The scope, Elena! There's a delivery truck out there, maybe the same driver too!"

We both scramble for it, but she's on the instrument first.

"The camera! The camera!" I remind her.

"I know! I know!" she hisses.

She's hunched over the viewer now, the magnification cranked up, and I'm behind her looking down into the street. The driver isn't carrying anything- this is no bakery delivery. He scurries into the bar and we both wait to see if he's going to reappear shortly upstairs in the office. We're not surprised when we see Antonio rise from his desk and meet the guy at the office door. He closes it behind him.

The boss greets the courier and goes back to his desk. Bending down, he unlocks a large bottom drawer and retrieves a cubic box, about 30 cm [a foot] square. It's large enough that I can see it without any magnification. The two men talk while Antonio carefully opens the box, lifts out a bubble-wrapped object and places it on the desk. Then he peels back the wrap for the driver to examine the goods.

"Omigod!" Elena gasps.

"What?"

"It's a Nazca vessel. An Early Intermediate Period bridge-spouted drinking pot. Ceremonial. Omigod! It's decorated with the Oculate Being! Perfect, complete with severed heads hanging from its belt. There's one almost exactly like it in the San Antonio Texas Museum of Art. Almost the same one. Incredibly valuable in that condition! Those fuckers!"

The driver carefully picks it up to look more closely.

"Don't drop it, Bastardo! It belongs to Peru," Elena exclaims, seething with anger. "Look in the viewer, Marcos. The colours are perfect and the detail! Those fuckers are stealing it from us!"

I'm no archaeologist, but I appreciate that the piece is colourful and... well, strange. She told me before that the Oculate Being is an all-seeing god from two-thousand years ago that flew overhead watching mortals. Worshippers appeased it with severed heads, often taken from enemies of the Nazca, sometimes from their own sacrificial victims. I know that ancient Peruvian worship- all through Central America, in fact- was sometimes violent and bloody.

We see the driver nod his head and reach into his jacket pocket to pull out a thick wallet. He counts out a big pile of bills, which Antonio watches, then recounts himself. They talk for a minute, then the driver turns to leave.

Elena suddenly jumps from behind me and bolts for the door. She shouts back over her shoulder.

"They can't get away with this!"

She's out into the hallway before I can say anything to stop her. I hear her thundering down the stairs to the street and call down after her. But she's gone, so I rush back to the window to see what's happening below.

"Stop! Stop! Bastardo!" Elena shouts as she runs across the street, heading straight for the courier leaving the bar with his parcel.

He sees her coming and rushes for the van, jumping inside, slamming the door just before she gets there. He tosses the box onto the passenger seat and fires up the engine.

"That box! Give it to me! It's ours. Give it to me," she yells.

The driver's window is down, so he reaches across and pushes her back hard as he accelerates. She screams, and I see her fall backwards, bouncing off the brick wall of the club before slumping to the narrow sidewalk. The van streaks away as Elena raises her head, then sags back when she sees the parcel is gone.

I'm so shocked that it seems everything happened in slow motion, right in front of me. Is she badly hurt? I race down the stairs to help her.

There are already a few people gathered around Elena, and more are coming from the bar. I see the burly bartender pushing forward, shouldering others aside. He pulls her to her feet, supporting her as she wobbles. Blood is dripping from an open abrasion on her forearm. I hope nothing is broken. She looks dazed and confused.

"Elena! Elena!" I call as I wade into the cluster of bodies around her. "Are you alright?"

"Carlos!" she recognizes me. "He pushed me against the wall."

"I saw it. Come with me now."

I want to get her away as fast as possible so we don't compromise the investigation. Maybe the bartender is in on the smuggling operation? So I put my arm around her waist to hold her up and quickly walk her across the road to the apartment. She's shaking and muttering as we go. Tears fill her eyes.

"Couldn't stop him. It's gone now. Couldn't get it back."

I knew that Elena was passionate about Peru's heritage, but I had no idea that she would risk her life like this to protect it.

"You could have been killed!" I scold her as we hobble together up two flights of stairs, holding her all the way. "Is it really worth dying for?"

She nods her head as if to say "Yes," and I realize that this is her life. Is the most important thing of all for her really the country's rich and colourful heritage? Elena is a patriot, maybe even a zealot. Today she showed me how far she will go to protect it.

I help her to her bed, then go for some clean water and a towel to sop up the blood still coming from her arm. When I return, she's undressed herself and is in her underthings. I glimpse Elena's tempting breasts but look away to avoid embarrassing her. She quickly pulls up the sheet to hide herself while I turn to dip the towel into the warm water to clean her wound.

"Another pillow behind your neck? I have one. You must have smacked your head hard on that wall, or the sidewalk when you fell."

"Yes, it hurts. Do we have any medicine with us?"

"No. I can go out for some."

"Don't leave me alone. I need you here. There are dangerous people around us- Antonio and the courier, probably plenty of others."

"I should take you to the hospital, Elena."

"No. Just this scrape and a headache. Probably some bruises in the morning. Let's wait to see how I am then. I want to stay safely locked in here tonight."

"Some alcohol then? I have a half bottle of Pisco in my room. It'll do the trick for tonight. I can get some medicine in the morning."

I go for the fiery booze and come back with two glasses from the kitchen. There's enough in the bottle for me to calm down and for her to go to sleep comfortably. I pour us each a double, then lean over from my chair beside her bed.

"A drink for Peru!" I propose, lifting my glass.

Elena laughs, adding, "And people who love their country."

"And those who will go to the wall for it! Like you."

She smiles at my compliment before emptying her glass.

"More like against the wall for it," she jokes, reaching to pat the back of her head.

It isn't long before I see her pained expression beginning to go away. I pour us each another double, probably enough to get Elena through 'til morning. She tells me a story about our mutual friend Jaguar.

"I went through something like this with Jag a few years back, but he was the one who was hurt, not me. We were up in northern Peru with his wife Marina, just a bit after they were married. There was a rumour that a priceless piece was about to be taken out of the country. When we finally tracked it down, their guards started to beat him up and... and...." [Background: New Wife, Old Lover, Ancient Gods in Loving Wives.]

The alcohol is starting to affect Elena and she seems be losing the direction of the story.

"Really! What happened?" I interrupt.

"Uh... somebody called them off, I think. Anyway, they weren't going to get that piece."

"Jaguar never told me about this. I guess this can be a dangerous this line of work."

"Yes. Maybe we should pull out of Manaus?" she mumbles. "It's not going to get any easier."

"But we're finally making some headway," I protest.

Now Elena's eyes are drooping shut and she murmurs.

"They're playing for keeps, Carlos... You might get hurt too."

It is an ominous warning that I ignore...

At my own peril.

Chapter Three will appear very shortly.