The Vermeer

"I would have done it. You know it," said Camilo as he stuffed a spoonful of food into his mouth.

"I know you would have." I sipped my beer and watched my plate get heaped up and then I added, "I had to go through fucking hell to pay you, with some added benefits, but that's beside the point. I need to lay low for a short while, so if you don't mind, can I ask you to keep your eyes off me for a while? In case they're watching me. It's an unrelated matter, but very high profile. You don't want to be anywhere near me."

My plate was passed back to me.

"Wow, what is all this?" I saw rice and beans and sausage and a few other things all topped with a fried egg.

"Bandeja paisa," answered Ernesto.

"In English?"

"Lunch," answered Camilo.

"It's from the Paisa region, it's where we're from," added Ernesto.

"Okay."

With his knife, Camilo pointed to my plate, "Red beans with pork, rice."

"Okay,"

"Morcilla."

"Looks like blood sausage."

"Yeah that's it," then he pointed to another sausage, "chorizo."

"Yup."

"Patacones."

"What's that? In English?"

Camilo was asking Ernesto, who couldn't come up with a translation either, one of the tattooed thugs offered, "Plantains." They all roared in agreement as I stuffed my mouth.

I held up my thumb and with full mouth said, "Excellent food." It really was good.

I made sure that my driver was getting some lunch, too, together with a can of soda and then returned to the business of stuffing my face.

I looked across to Camilo as I scooped up some food. "What if it's glass? Or it's not worth enough?" he said staring down at me with his black eyes.

I swallowed my mouthful, "Camilo, do I look like a fucking idiot? Am I even going to make it out of Bogota airport if it's glass? Do I not know the actual value of stones? Come on, Camilo." I stuffed more rice and beans into my mouth.

In a raised voice he said, "If it's only worth half of what you owe me, don't worry, we will only chop off half your head!" he pushed an elbow towards Ernesto and they both and the rest of the thugs burst out laughing.

Even I had to chuckle. "Nice one boys!"

They were all laughing to themselves and talking very fast and completely incomprehensible to me. They were having a good time. It was, after all, payday.

After a few moments, pretty well everyone returned to the business of eating. Even the chickens resumed their ground pecking.

"Camilo, did you really expect me to draw up a new will?"

"Yes I did," he said with his cold, dark eyes, "if you didn't have these stones coming, I guarantee, you would have done that to save your daughters."

I pulled the piece of paper with the name on it from my jacket pocket and put it on the table. "You're right." We sat and stared at each other for a moment with knives and forks in our hands.

"The will just makes things easier. It's business."

I stared at the cold fucker. But, then I murdered the kid. I'm no fucking angel.

I took a swill of my beer. Camilo peeled at the label of his bottle with his thick fingers. "I've still have some product I need to move, Ben."

"Where to?" I asked.

"Amsterdam."

I sighed and half smiled. Life was back to normal.

"Chicarones," Ernesto motioned down the table, one of the guys reacted by picking up a plate.

Ernesto turned to me, "Fried pork skin."

"Pass me some," I said.

Just then Marguerite and Liliana showed up with a big wooden platter filled with coffee cups. "Pollo Gritador." The whole table raucously erupted. Starting at the opposite side of the table at the far end each of us had a coffee cup placed in front. Each cup had a chicken drumstick sticking out of it as if it were an edible swizzle stick.

Camilo leaned towards me, "It's a chicken stew. Marguerite makes the best. I'll make a toast."

I must've seemed puzzled.

Ernesto added, "Pollo Gritador is made with a little aguardiente," he looked to Camilo for a translation.

"It's a liquor, she makes it with a lot," a cup with handle and red sauce and chicken drumstick poking out was placed in front of me, "we'll drink."

I took a whiff of it, I could smell garlic and anise and the alcohol, "Is it spicy?" I asked Camilo.

"Ahh..." he was shaking his head looking to Ernesto and said, "Colombian food isn't spicy..."

Ernesto objected, "The chorizo, that was spicy."

"No," countered Camilo, "not like Mexican."

"Oh no, not like Mexican. This is Pollo Gritador, it means screamer chicken."

"Odd name," I observed, "Why is it named that?"

Camilo and Ernesto both looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders, clearly they had no idea.

Camilo got everyone's attention, picked up his coffee mug, pulled out the chicken drumstick and held the cup in the air. Everyone else followed suit. I did the same, too.

All fell silent. "Ben," said Camilo in a slightly raised voice while looking straight at me, "I want to give you a warm thank you for not making me kill you!"

I chuckled, "Camilo, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for not killing me." Bizarre.

"Salud!" He belted back the cup full of stew.

"Salud!" came the immediate response from Ernesto and all of the thugs, as they, too, drained back their stew and then fell in to guffaws and laughter, clearly loving the stew.

Fucking strange sense of humour. I pulled the drumstick out, "Salud!" I responded and belted back my stew.

Burning spicy fuck-hot! "Auuugh! Shiiittt!" I dropped the cup and reached for a beer while still holding my chicken drumstick. "Auuughhh!" Even through the searing pain in my head and throat I could make out the uproarious laughter as the whole table erupted chanting, "Gritador gritador gritador!" while banging the table, Ernesto and Camilo included.

"You fucking guys!" I was hyperventilating between big slugs of Bud Lite. My eyeballs were nearly popped from my head; they all continued to laugh as I pointed to the salad bowl down the table. I dropped the uneaten drumstick back into my cup, while gasping.

"A warm thank you! Ahh hha haa! Gritador gritador gritador!"

Fucking animals.

"Aji," I stammered pointing to the salad. While they were all still laughing

"Wow," I laughed, "very funny, guys, and screamer chicken is the perfect name for it. Wooh!" I gulped back half of my beer, much to everyone's delight.

"Ours was not spicy," laughed Ernesto.

It was like I was dealing with a bunch of ten-year-olds.

The salad came. As I loaded my plate with diced tomato and cucumber, the laughter subsided and everyone got back to the business of eating lunch. Camilo looked straight at me and asked, "Are you going to be able to pay me? Or are you going to be short again?"

I scooped some salad up and chewed it for a moment before swallowing and answered him, "I can pay you," I squeaked, cleared my throat and continued, "Excuse me, but we'll have to keep it a little smaller next time." I turned to the side and gave a good cough, "Sorry." I said pointing to my throat, "It's that Gritador chicken," I stammered. "Anyway, give me a couple of weeks to get organized. I'm very dubious about the Irish connection. Those fuckers in Istanbul still haven't paid Mallory's boys. Boy." I corrected myself while reaching for a paper napkin.

"Yes, Ernesto reported to me. It's seems there was an accident in an alleyway. Was he part of one of those Irish gangs?"

I blew my nose and coughed again, clearing away some of the agony. How did he know that? I scrunched up and then dropped the napkin next to my plate and then picked up and sipped my beer, but said nothing.

"I don't understand. What were they buying in Istanbul? Istanbul sells."

"Your cocaine."

"In Istanbul?"

"Yeah, it's the new gateway to the entire Middle East and Asia Minor, or it was from our perspective. But don't worry, Europe is still hungry."

I wasn't. I was getting full. I had some more red beans, rice and salad.

"If not the Irish, who else?" asked Camilo.

"Ah, don't worry about it, I've got Germans, I've got Serbians, Russians, I've still got a lot of ways to move product in and out of Europe."

He was looking at me with interest.

"That's something my father taught me. As soon as one secure route is established, start on a second. When that's done, set up another one. Use the best route available but keep the others active. When one eventually goes down, you don't want to be left scrambling to stay in business."

Camilo was listening intently.

"The Irish," I continued with burning mouth, "at least Mallory's people, were the best because they understood that and were able to use those same resources to and fro. So as they were bringing Asian product into Europe I, in turn, could move some of that into North America, and your coke would go back the same way."

I took a sip of my beer and continued, "That way those Saudi princes with their fucking gold Maseratis and Lamborghinis had a complete pharmacopeia with which to get their jollies off. It wasn't a huge market, but with the Irish everything was tight and neat. We would trade. Mallory was still able to bring in black hashish, even after all those years, in spite of the Middle East turmoil, and he maintained a steady route into and out of Iran. The Canadians produce a lot of MDMA, and other chemicals like LSD. I'd flip some of that to him, we had a good thing going. Together, Mallory and I were global. Small time, but global in our combined reach. Until the Athens bust and until the bee got him."

I finished my plate, placed the knife and fork at a 45 degree and angle, wiped my mouth with a fresh napkin, flipped it to the clean side and wiped my forehead as I sighed in satisfaction. My mouth was still on fire. My plate was whisked away as I reached for my beer. I was pretty well the last to finish eating. I drained back the last of my beer and let out a small belch.

"Wow, that was good, thank you boys."

"What about marijuana?" Camilo asked and then went on, "I've some friends that have set up a very impressive operation not too far from here. They're growing very high quality product."

I laughed. "Camilo, that's bulky stuff, but if you've got a buyer lined up, hey, let me know, I'll see what I can do."

I could see he didn't have a buyer lined up. He wanted me to buy some.

Marguerite and Liliana each came by with a big tray of cut up fruits and made space on the table to put it down.

"Camilo, the market is saturated. It's huge, probably has never been bigger. It's now fragmented into basically little cottage industries." I picked up a fresh beer off the table and took a sip. "There are too many little grow-ops out there. The Chinese triads in North America, at least, were deep into it. Even they are being forced to scale back. The Mexican's, as far as I know, can't get rid of it fast enough and land up shooting each other over their rapidly decreasing US export market." I looked straight in his dark eyes, "Camilo, I'm rarely asked to touch it, anymore. It's pretty well legal now, anyway. I don't know of anyone that is looking for product."

Camilo just stared back at me.

"I suggest your friends try to get rid of it locally." I flipped my hand in the air and added, "The shipping costs are too high to try to compete with locally grown product. Your friends must have known this before they invested in their operations."

"Yeah, that's what I thought, too, but I had to ask."

We both stared at each other for a moment, "I thought there was still a market in Europe."

"There's a market everywhere and a cost to ship. Camilo, for me to move tons of bulk product across to Europe will cost a small fortune. Those are my costs, I can do it, but I guarantee it won't be economical."

I could see that Camilo fully understood the situation, just smuggling small brick packets of pure cocaine wasn't cheap.

"I thought you guys were moving coke product through West Africa, too? Why not do the same with marijuana?"

"Some of us do go through Africa, but not so much anymore."

"Why not?"

"Ahh," he dismissed with a wave of his hand and obvious displeasure in his mind, "they're not very good with the money and there's always something new. Something stupid. And the truth is, you can't fucking trust them."

I laughed.

He swilled his beer back. "Some fruit?"

"No, I'm full. Thanks. That was really good." I checked the time on my cell phone.

"Have another beer. Relax, its mid day."

"No thanks, I've got to go. I've a plane to catch. But Camilo, leave it up to me, I'll set up Amsterdam. How much do you want to move?"

"I'm not sure yet."

"Fine, but give me some time and keep it smallish."

"Okay. But soon though, otherwise I'll be talking to New York."

"Soon," I said. Fucking hell, I don't get a break do I?

I took another swig of my beer, shook his hand, Ernesto's, too, I waved to the tattooed thugs and jumped back into the hired car.

*****

I just made my flight in time. Bogota to Caracas, Venezuela. The flight was scary. The turbulence was brutal and the countryside below me was rugged. I kept thinking about the flight of a rugby team that went down somewhere around where I was. They landed up eating each other. Why was everybody watching me funny?

The chicken was screaming in my guts the entire flight.

Simon Bolivar International Airport in Caracas seemed quite modern with its blue, orange, black and yellow tile flooring laid in a mind-numbing, slightly curving, elongated pattern. No matter where one looked, it was quite evident there was no prosperity left in the country. Or, what little wealth remained was carefully secluded.

There was no toilet paper in any of the stalls.

I managed, with broken Spanish, hand gestures and by pointing at a map, to hire a small plane to fly me the short flight from Caracas to Bradshaw International in St. Kitts.

For nine hundred and fifty freaking dollars, US!

The flight, over clear blue Caribbean waters was blood curdling terrifying. Are Venezuelan planes even subject to FAA rules and inspections? The four-seater plane had to have been fifty years old, maybe older. All shiny aluminium with just a few bumps here and there. The tires were bald. Everything about the plane was just kind of patched together. Duct tape on the flight gauge instrument panel? Seriously? From my passenger seat, I could see that the air-speed gauge didn't work. It was stuck at zero. And how can you be a pilot at age fifteen? That was a white knuckle experience in spite of the fact that the weather was perfect.

I wondered about the colour of my underwear as I stepped off the little plane.

Brixton was at the airport to greet me. Brixton is my Ma and Pops driver, groundskeeper and general odd-jobs guy. I had called him from Caracas. No one at customs was on duty, though, and it didn't seem that air traffic control had been working, either. Or put it this way, no one at the Bradshaw control tower answered when the kid called in on the radio. Or maybe the radio didn't work either.

Never again.

After a good twenty minutes in the Bradshaw airport washroom, where I was able to confirm that my underwear was still presentable, I found my way outside to Brixton's little white sedan.

Brixton told me in his island sing-song voice that Flo had arrived yesterday and that she was absolutely thrilled at finding him standing at the gate with a sign that said 'Florence'. He had set her up at my parent's Turtle Bay villa with a couple of bags of groceries, white wine and beer, all purchased from the RAM'S supermarket.

The island of St. Kitts is shaped like a chicken drumstick. Nevis, its mate, is a volcanic island dot on a map. Together, they form an exclamation mark. My parents' villa is located right between the two, on the knuckle of drumstick that you don't eat, maybe a hundred and twenty feet up the mountain. Nevis is so close you think you can swim to it. I certainly can't. It has to be a couple of miles between the two. The warm Caribbean and the cool Atlantic waters meet right there. The reef is teeming with life.

"Did you give her the restaurant account info?"

"Oh yes," he confirmed. "She was jus' 'eading off to de restaurant when I lef' to come 'ere."

I smiled, thinking of Flo.

Brixton dropped me off in the parking lot next to the Turtle Beach restaurant. The smell of the sea instantly hit me as I stepped out of his little car. "Thanks, Brixton. You're probably going to have to take me shopping tomorrow, I don't know what clothes I've got here. I'll call you."

"Did you want me to set you up wit' any'ting else?"

"Not for now, but thanks Brixton." I chuckled to myself. Even here they can't get rid of the stuff.

"Okay, bye," he was grinning.

It was a brilliant day, hot and sunny with not a cloud in the sky. I could feel the salt in the air and the quiet roar of the waves lapping the long curving beach.

I stepped inside from the sandy parking lot and was immediately greeted by shade relief from the wooden roof structure. Time itself is altered in that restaurant. Seconds are slowed down to synchronize with the arrival of each languid wave just a few feet away on the long sandy beach. The vertical majesty of Mount Nevis looms in full-on in-your-face view. Just like an outstretched arm, an empty jetty reaches out from the front of the restaurant, pointing towards Nevis. A moored white motorboat with a red Bimini roof bobbed in the azure-blue water two hundred and fifty feet or so offshore and slightly to the right.

I ordered a Heineken as I walked past the bar.

I spotted Flo lying in a lounge chair, on the beach, in the sun. A small table was on her right with a little clip-on umbrella shading her drinking glass. She was down a few feet from the steps which lead to the beach from the bar, and the step up to the jetty, and about eight feet or so from the water's edge. St. Kitts' short tide was out, revealing bright, smooth sand etched with patches and lines of fine grey.

She was the only one on the beach, and the open air restaurant had only two other tables with guests.

It was, after all, June already. Now that the May honeymoons had past, low tourist season in the Caribbean was trickling in. It coincided with my parents' and other islanders exit from the island to avoid the hot summer months.

As I made my way over to the steps I noted that one table had two couples with drinks and snacks in front of them. They were giggling as friendly little Bananquit finches in their bright yellow, black and white plumes flitted around them and snatched sugar from the palm of one of the ladies' hands. A brown bullfinch with its red chest flash claimed the sugar as its own and chased the guilty Bananquit towards the palm fronds that edged the shoreline next to the restaurant. Another Bananaquit instantly replaced the first, much to the delight of the guests.

Another couple was sitting tete-to-tete a few tables away, whispering over beer bottles and sandwiches and, clearly amused, were watching the flying avian entertainment show from a safe distance.

Some of the tables were covered with white linen table cloths and elegantly set for lunch with flowers at each table. Brown whicker easy chairs complemented each setting. White linen drapes were bunched around each white column, softening the view of the sea, of Mount Nevis and the jetty from the patio. A freshly painted white railing stretched across the front of the restaurant.

The tables not set for lunch were adorned with a single conch shell or a tall glass encased brown candle.

My heart skipped a beat. I took a deep breath. I've always loved this tiny little corner of the planet.

As I walked up to Flo, I saw that she was wearing a red bikini and red plastic sunglasses with a straw sunhat, reading a book. Matching straw sandals were off her feet, planted in the hot sand next to her. Her toe nails and finger nails were painted red. She had a nearly depleted tall glass with its own little red umbrella and red drinking straw sitting in the shade on the low white table next to her. She looked totally relaxed and maybe just a little bit too pink from the sun.