FLIGHT Last post

That afternoon, Major Morales arrived with a big dark soldier, carrying a large pot.

Morales dismissed the soldier and explained that it was a special roast he had brought as a dinner contribution.

Ricardo had Morales wait until his mother and Elsa ground up some corn in their pilon, a rustic hollowed tree trunk with a heavy pestle; ground corn meal is a key ingredient to prepare arepas, a staple of the local cuisine.

Ricardo’s mother brought a tray to the table.

—Here are the arepas, Major.

He reached to get one, but it was the last thing he did; the mortar pestle hit him across his temple, and he fell to the floor. Elsa hit him again and he stretched his legs.

Ricardo jumped to his feet.

—Elsa, have you gone mad? In reprisal, they will kill us all!

— Dear brother, I had no choice. He had us at his mercy; we must escape.

Our brother Carlos; is waiting for us at Bochalema. There are only two sentries at the boat landing and two boats with outboard engines.

Ricardo turned to Paco — See who is outside.

One sentry guarded the shed.

They dragged the Major’s body into another room and Ricardo called the sentry.

As the man entered, Ricardo pointed the Major’s pistol to his head, Paco took his rifle, and they tied and gagged him; the man's eyes bulged with terror at the sight of the Major’s bloody head.

Elsa was consoling her mother, crying with fright while packing a small suitcase.

Paco went outside and returned running.

— Ricardo, let’s hurry; we have about 20 minutes.

Getting to the boat landing was a race.

Ricardo’s mother stumbled and Elsa caught her.

—It is dark, dear children.

Two sentries were chatting and smoking at the landing; Ricardo walked up to them. Paco went behind them.

He addressed them, “Is Julio with you?

— What Julio?

He distracted them. Paco clubbed one of them and when the other whirled, Ricardo punched him and wrested the rifle from him.

They tied them back-to-back to a tree and threw one of the rifles in the river.

Before Elsa and her mother boarded one of the boats Paco loosened the ties of the second boat and let it drift downstream. That prevented anyone from following them.

Ricardo and Paco pushed their boat  into the river and Ricardo pulled the start lanyard, but the motor sputtered without starting; while the boat drifted downstream, he gave it two additional pulls, and nothing happened.

Voices reached them and a flashlight scanned the waters.

Another pull and the engine started with a roar.

Paco fired a burst of shots towards the holder of the flashlight, darkness ensued.

Ricardo accelerated the engine and the canoe surged, leaving a wake of foamy water. A fusillade of shots resounded, but the dark made them inaccurate.

An unexpected thunderous blast and an orange fireball illuminated the waters, a crackling of secondary explosions followed, raining flaming debris into the river, and starting fires in the foliage.

The boat, its engine roaring at top speed, flew towards Puerto Santander and the Colombian shore.

Behind them there was nothing but a flaming ruin of the shed and their home.

—Was that your handiwork, Paco?

— Yes, don’t you remember that trick with the matchbook and the cigarette? I applied it to a string holding the lever of a grenade.

The Colombian border guards found no weapons; Paco had discarded the automatic rifle upon their arrival at a lighted boat landing in Puerto Santander.

Questioning at a Colombian army post and the vaccination of Ricardo followed.

Carlos arrived the following day. 

His work at Bochalema had aged him; his demeanor contrasted with Ricardo's relief.

Carlos lowered his head and told him that Colombia had the same seeds of disaster, the same Venezuelan madness.

—How so, dear brother? Asked Ricardo.

With immense sadness in his eyes, Carlos replied,

— Poverty, and an entrenched landowning class indifferent to the true causes of misery, facing a small cadre of well-intentioned intellectuals composes the government; democracy is applicable to them, excluding us, the current perioikoi; the country is revolution-ripe; it will cause the same disaster you have fled.

—perioikoi? was that? Chinese? — asked Paco, mocking his older brother

No, look it up in Greek history —Carlos replied to his mocking younger brother.

 

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