Open Pit (33 page)

“You can think about it,” Carlos says, and the familiarity in the way he says this, like Pepe is close, practically family, takes Cristóbal aback. “By the time we get to Zarcero, though, I need to know.”

Cristóbal sees his cousin watch as Carlos turns from them and walks off, the satellite phone bulging from the pocket of his pants. The little birds take his place, approaching with wobbly guns up.

11:20 AM
. 2 KM east of the hamlet of Zarcero, Morazán

The man with the beard and his fellow tracker, whose arms droop heavily from the rack of his shoulders, were happy enough to receive the
GPS
coordinates from their boss, despite the abuse Sobero heaped upon them over the phone for not finding the group on their own and therefore requiring him to do all the work he's been paying them to do.

The man with the beard knew better than to say aloud what he knew: that the Americans' drone coordinates, already more than twenty-four hours old, were practically useless. After the call, he plotted them on his maps amid all the other locations where they'd found evidence of the fugitives. The pattern he saw emerge was not reassuring. He and his colleague both understood that there was nothing more to go on except instinct.

Not long after the call from Reverte, they'd come across a nearly overgrown trail running north and south, likely unused since the war. They'd decided it was unrealistic that the kidnappers would follow any known trail system.

This morning, the man with the beard rechecked that logic. Probably by now the fugitives are tired. One has diarrhea. They will be more eager than before to reach the Honduran border. They won't be so quick to bypass a shortcut. The trackers both agreed to double back and follow that trail.

They move silently and steadily uphill, keeping their thoughts to themselves about the consequences of returning to Sobero empty-handed. The man with the big shoulders clasps his hands and makes a foothold, heaving his bearded companion up a particularly steep section of trail, where they stop for several minutes to drink water. They have just picked up the pace again and are rounding a corner when they stumble into a man of medium but bulky build, wearing a facemask, at the head of a long line of people going downhill.

Everyone is running. The strangers' guns fire. Their shots receive replies from terrified, inexperienced hands alongside more experienced ones. It's difficult to determine whose shots are connecting with those who are hit. Danielle definitely sees Carlos running towards Pepe and passing him the handgun he received from her earlier. She sees Pepe fall to the ground to begin shooting. Sworn enemies, yet they're working together against whomever has found them. She cannot understand this and doesn't try.

At some point, one of the strangers — they don't look at all like police, but then who? — collapses within sight of her and is bleeding from the head.

Danielle watches Rita go down too, though it's unclear whether she has been hit by a bullet or has merely tripped. Probably the latter, because Rita gets up again and runs screaming, very much alive, a section of her forehead still exposed, moving uphill and past a rocky outcrop until she's clear out of sight.

Martin takes a bullet in his thigh, which leaves him bloodied and screaming for help and for his lord Jesus Christ in a high-pitched voice about thirty feet from where the second stranger is still firing. But Cristóbal crawls over and drags the young man over a sheltered dip in the land, ensuring that all of Martin's limbs are hidden. Then Cristóbal takes a gun from him and rushes back out, still shooting.

Tina sees Cristóbal get shot in the stomach. After the first of the intruders took a bullet in the head, she rose from where she had dropped to the ground when they first appeared and ran as fast as she could away from everyone, her gun bouncing painfully against her back. She ended up slightly uphill, which is where she is when Cristóbal goes down. Tina has to swallow a cry of concern, an uncomfortably strong feeling that adds to the overall confusion of the situation. Not long later, Delmi passes very nearby, moving with a swiftness and silence that Tina could not have foreseen into the tall trees.

Danielle sees Carlos on the ground, firing his own weapon. He seems confident to her, young in his movements, the way he was when she knew him. Invincible. But not so heroic now. More like resolved. She's aware of a feeling of pride on Aida's behalf. And then something makes Carlos jerk twice. He slumps over himself awkwardly, landing on his stomach, and Danielle knows he's gone without even having to go over and check, which she can't do anyway because she's hiding, her lips coming into contact with the dirt, her palms burning from having skidded over pebbles. There, she cries silently for her daughter as she waits for whatever will happen next.

Nothing does. What Danielle has hoped for since that long-ago first morning is suddenly real: their capture is over. The thrashing and screaming and shooting have abated, and the sounds of the day fill the void. Insects. The breeze steadily brushing over pine branches. A distant, indifferent airliner arcing far overhead. Danielle rises slowly and goes over to the body of the man she knew as Adrian. She looks at him in the face, closes his eyes. He's done something good after all, hasn't he? She pulls the satellite phone gently from his pocket. Then she removes her own backpack and withdraws a piece of paper where she knows she wrote down a phone number before leaving San Salvador. With trembling fingers, she dials.

12:30 PM
. Mil Sueños
mine

“You're not going to believe this,” says Neela.

Marta puts a finger to her ear to hear better. One of the foreign reporters standing beside her is speaking loudly and self-importantly in English into his own phone. “Is it over?” she hears him ask, as if he too is speaking to Neela. Then the reporter drops the following line in Marta's general direction, nonchalantly, as if it were equal — no less valuable but no more — to all news updates he's ever passed along: “Three dead. Lots injured. Being flown in to the hospital in Gotera now.” He turns to his photographer. “Let's go!” They rush down the road towards their vehicle.

The scope of what Marta can think shrinks momentarily to those two English words: “three dead.”

“Marta? Are you there?” Neela sounds frantic.

“
Sí,
” says Marta, but she can't focus on her friend's voice. At the mine's main gate, everyone halfway important among MaxSeguro's army of guards is speaking on their phones too. The police, who did eventually join them before yesterday's demonstration, are also abuzz. Something is happening.

A lens is shoved up close to Marta' face. She pushes it back. “
Un momento,
” she says to the reporter and to Neela too, because beyond the cameraperson she has caught sight of a familiar car on the main road. Pedro. “Intercept them!” Marta calls out to anyone who might help. “Tell them to go back!” But before those within earshot can figure out what she means, Pedro drives straight up and all the reporters who've begun approaching Marta turn to swarm the car.

“What's going on?” says Neela. “Talk to me.”

In the car, Pedro seems to realize what's happening. He brakes and puts the vehicle into reverse. The reporters surround him anyway, their cameras making contact with the windows, stopping his progress.

“The families are here,” Marta says to Neela. “I'll call you back.” She feels horrible cutting Neela off, but Marta has to get to the Canadians before the reporters bombard them with the news. Three dead. And there's the demonstrators to think about. MaxSeguro and the police now have no reason to hold back. Marta quickly charges people with the task of disbanding the protesters. Everyone is to calmly gather up their things and be ready to board the buses. She has just started towards Pedro when someone calls her attention to the mine's gate. Marta turns. The unbroken line of security personnel has shifted. Guards are moving to one side. The human barrier breaks open completely as the gate is withdrawn and two minivans, flanked by more security personnel, are slowly escorted out.

It's too soon. Too fast. “
No!
” Marta yells. But there's absolutely nothing she can do to stop their expulsion.

A bewildering mass of reporters scream over one another as Pedro honks and Sylvie, in the back middle seat, screams. Ralph, on the right, is giving an overeager camera the finger. Benoît, in the front seat, reaches back to take his wife's hand and shush her comfortingly. Pedro's phone rings and he answers, all the while reversing, inch by inch, in a wide half-circle.

Aida trusts him to take them to safety. They'll be fine. No tear gas here. But suddenly, every camera, every palm that's been banging on their windows, turns away and the area around the car clears. The reporters are all running towards two vehicles — vans. Now that she can see again, Aida scans the area where they held the protest yesterday. Her eyes find Marta Ramos. Short, badly dressed Marta, who nonetheless looks like a general. She's pointing at the vans, advising someone beside her, talking on the phone, visibly upset — all at once.

“It's the exhumation team, isn't it?” Aida says.

“
Quoi? Non!
” says Sylvie, straining past her with her perfumed head to get a better look at the vans, which are disappearing beneath three layers: first guards, then police, and now the reporters. Sylvie makes a horrible animal noise. Aida wants to get away from her panic, but she feels it too. She realizes that the exhumation has started to matter to her, and as more than just a way to get her mother home. She's wanted them to find something — anything. Now the process has been cut off. She puts her index finger to her teeth and peels away a sliver of nail.

“Maybe they found what they looked for,” says Benoît.

“If they did, the mine probably took it,” says Ralph, and Benoît turns to challenge the remark before registering that it's likely true and letting himself turn back towards the front, his shoulders folding in.