Night of the Jaguar Read Online Free Page A

And although the breath was knocked out of him, he knew what was happening. The soldier had not gotten himself dressed, but armed. He was drawing the pistol he’d secreted under his jumper and swinging it up at Gladys. He knew that the soldier was not giving himself up, but facing his tormentors one last time. The rifles went off like a single shot. Like a firing squad might. And at that sound a crow leapt out of a tree. Circled once. And was gone.
    Ajax writhed in the dirt, suffocating. Drowning. The soldier’s fist had created a vacuum in his lungs. Stranded on hands and knees, he could only heave as if trying to vomit air. Boots rushed around. But all was silence, except the blood pounding in his head. And then hands rolled him onto his back. The sun blinded him, caused a small explosion in his lungs, which suddenly filled with air.
    â€œAjax are you all right? Are you shot?”
    He shoved Gladys’s hands away. Looked around with swimming eyes and saw the soldier sprawled on his back. He rolled onto hands and knees, crawled to the boy, swatting at the robots’ legs. “Get away, you fucking asesinos !” Assassins! “Don’t touch him!”
    Fortunado’s arms were flung akimbo. Holes in his chest pooled blood. The sharpshooters would be proud of such a tight grouping. Ajax put a hand over the one hole in the soldier’s forehead, to cover the goo that had blossomed there. His face was in repose. His eyes were open, and to Ajax’s amazement they were no longer bloodshot. Yes, that’s what had alerted him. The soldier’s eyes had cleared. He patted the boy’s chest affectionately. Felt the little box, and retrieved the bloodstained pack of Reds. A neat hole was drilled between the M and O, like a carnival trick shot. The package now spelled M ORO .
    Then he heard the cawing of crows. He saw them in the tree. The last thing Fortunado Gavilan had seen. He snatched up the soldier’s AK from the dirt. For the first time in years, the blood rage returned. He opened fire on them.

 
    2
    1.
    Ajax lay on the hammock in his tiny, wet garden, looking at the stars, thinking, It must be Wednesday . Because the stars were all he could see. His barrio was without electricity on Wednesdays. No water on Mondays and Thursdays. No lights on Wednesdays. But at least he had both on the weekends.
    Like that did some good. When was the last time you had someone here on the weekend? You’re a fucking monk.
    He noticed that he was spinning the Python’s cylinder but wasn’t sure how long he’d been doing it, nor how long he’d lain in the hammock talking to his pistol.
    He sat up, rubbing his tongue over his lips, saliva building in his mouth. He could kill for a glass of Flor de Caña. Nicaragua exported eighty million pounds of coffee beans a year. Yet the coffee in the mercados was shit. But the rum, the Flower of the Cane, was famous in Latin America for its delectability. As if the poorest province of France produced its finest wine.
    Ajax exhaled a breath as long as the day had been. “If those crows hadn’t been there I could’ve saved that kid.”
    If you’d put cuffs on him you would have. Gladys knew it and you noticed how she didn’t say anything?
    Then he had another thought: Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! Gimme just the one drink! He spun the Python’s cylinder, pointed it into the air, and pulled the trigger. Click! An empty chamber. “Eighty-six,” he muttered, disappointed. Damn, he’d been sure he’d hit it the eighty-sixth time.
    Ajax dropped the Python next to the Makarov 9mm he’d retrieved from the soldier. Then he rose, and walked automatically through the dark. The house was almost the same as when he’d been assigned it in ’80 after joining State Security. He hadn’t been in it long when he’d moved into Gioconda’s house with its yard and pool for all her entertaining.