06.5 Ransom

In Santa Rosa, Marina was tied down in a bed with a raised mattress placed in a little nook of a rustic little room. A parquetry floor under the bed and a narrow space between. A chair placed there and a mirror on the wall. An awning vent on the bedside wall blocked with planks from the outside and venetian blinds from the inside. In straps, she could not reach the ledge within two feet. They left a light on which was too bright.

Roco and Pedro hauled her out of the meat factory that very night Jamal showed up. They picked the caftan from her bag and put on her body, shoved her into the back of the Mustang and drove off to the second hideout. They arrived at dawn.

Then it was Pedro who stayed at 1051 to take care of her. She did all her basics in the room while tied in bed. Marina could not use her hands to eat.

Pedro called Roco and he came on the following afternoon. Tied her ankles together and fastened a chain to the bedpost letting her hands free. Locked and took the key with him telling Pedro, “Keep the door locked.”

Pedro brought some clothes for her to wear, cooked food and sometimes sat to chat with her. She loved chorizo buns and drinking beer. Unfortunately, she ate little since the ab-duction. In two days, she lost three kilos and ten by the week.

Pedro, a young bloke, worriedly tried to reach Roco on the telephone who seemed to be absent unusually at the workshop. Roco did not want to discuss this matter on the phone. He told him to do his best and keep her upbeat for a few days when this would be over.

Marina could reach the door and look outside. All she could see was a narrow empty corridor. She asked him to keep the door open when he went out or cooking downstairs and sleep in the room after locking the door.

On this evening on the twenty-ninth, they brought her out of the tiny room into a narrow space with glass panel windows shut of blinds. Again, lit bright and a parquet floor, pine shelves and white walls. They sat down at a corner and placed her on a fine chair. Pedro standing there and Carlos with the handset sat on a wooden chair by a table with another tele-phone. They never took the satellite phone out of doors. Castillo was there too.

Carlos passed the phone for her to talk and cut off just as she could release her voice. Then Castillo and Pedro took her back into the little room.

“Pedro! Get her dressed!” Carlos cried after that phone call.

Pedro entered with a pair of blue jeans and a white blousy top. Marina insisted him to stay in the room while she changed. She could trust Pedro but not those out there. She lost her jewellery, wristwatch and micro-string.

“Señora! We are going to free you. If we drop you at Malibet, can you find your way to the Silverside?” asked Castillo.

She nodded meekly, “Yes.”

“You’ll be blindfolded when we drive. Do you understand?”

She nodded. She was very frail.

A short while later, Pedro entered with Bock beers and cheesy chorizo buns. He spent a moment talking with her and she felt at ease with him.

Meanwhile, Castillo and Carlos waited for a call from an informer at Casino Domingo, drinking beer and playing cards. Roco headed in his Mustang towards COTO Supermarket in Ezeiza to detonate a bomb. His objective was to blow a Ford in the car park using a remote control once he got news that the leather case with the gaming chips was in it.

After the call from the informer, Carlos shouted, “Pedro! What the fuck are you doing there with that woman?”

“Eating!” he called back.

“It is time!” Carlos dropped his hand of cards and entered the little room, “Gag her!”

And that gag was light; a black piece of cloth on her mouth, another around her wrists tied from behind and ankles bound together. She wore her tennis shoes. Set ready to drive her to Malibet in about an hour. They locked the room and sat down to play cards, few feet from the door standing in the alley.

When the motorcade passed Puente 12, the scene of Ezeiza Massacre and almost in the minute Emilio in the Carry said he was here in seventy-three, an informer passed news to the team in Santa Rosa.

“Lose the rear!” cried Carlos, “Pedro, go get the woman!”

Pedro unlocked and opened the door to find an empty bed, “She’s gone!”

“What do you mean she’s gone!” Carlos kicked the chair and reached the door, “Bitch! She kicked the planks and jumped out of bed! Find her!”

“She must be on the terrace!” muttered Castillo holding his hat in his hand, “She could not go very far!”

Three dashed out to the terrace of the half-done house. A full moon shone bright in the sky right above. They could clearly see the ground around, low-level rooftops of the row of houses facing Route 604 and a green field beyond. There was no sign of the woman.

Carlos and Pedro took off in a vehicle and searched the area. They couldn’t find her. They spent an hour on the road and called off the search.

Meanwhile, the motorcade reached the car park beside COTO and waited for the call. Then they began to ring up the satellite phone. Castillo sat listening to its beeps. It became a wordless charade.

Carlos entered, “She’s nowhere around to be found. It must be Fish. We better get out of this place and dump the phone.”

“What about Roco?” asked Castillo.

“We’ll abandon the car to sit there and rust. Tell him our plan has changed. Come to Bernal at once and do nothing.”