22 kilometers outside Cuautla, Morelos
August 23, 1994
3:11 AM
“One, two…
three!”
The two men grunted with exertion as they yanked the cold, stiff remains of Manuel Bartlett Díaz out of the backseat. Despite their best efforts, the body slipped out of their grasp, tumbled out lifelessly and hit the gravel with a
thud.
They stared down at the corpse. A minute went by. Then, without a word, the pilot bent down dutifully, hoisted the former President onto his back, and trudged off into the darkness.
Porfirio Muñoz Ledo slammed the Jeep door and squinted at the night. For a moment, the headlights were just bright enough to make out a small section of the beige-brown airstrip, the dense wall of fir trees surrounding it, and the silhouette of the plainclothed pilot as he marched headlong into those fir trees. Then the lights flicked off and suddenly Porfirio was blind, guided only by the crunch of boots on gravel as he followed the airman to the appointed spot.
After wandering around for a minute in total blindness, Porfirio heard a
ka-chunk. Then the darkness was pierced by the tinny glow of a cabin light, by which the President-elect saw his predecessor’s corpse being stuffed into the backseat of a dinged-up Cessna 152. The plane had been concealed inside a little divot carved into the forest; it probably wouldn’t have been hard to spot in broad daylight, but Porfirio was amazed that the pilot had managed to find it in so quickly in the dark (perhaps
too quickly, he thought to himself—General Santoyo had insisted this airstrip hadn’t been used for trafficking since the Army had discovered it in February, but Porfirio couldn’t help wondering whether this particular flying ace hadn’t been doing a few “side missions” here and there at his higher-ups’ behest).
Not that any of that mattered now.
"Señor el Presidente,” the pilot called as Porfirio approached the airplane. Porfirio stopped short for a moment. Less than thirty-six hours after his election, he already knew it would be a while before he got used to that title.
"Would you mind clearing away some of the branches while I get the plane ready,
señor?” The airman asked with reasonable respect. Muñoz Ledo looked down at the ground in front of the plane, saw a pile of large sticks between it and the runway, wondered if it was possible to look presidential while cleaning up underbrush, then decided he didn’t care and got down on all fours. As he scooped the branches into his hands, he stole a glance through the windscreen and saw his rigor mortis-stricken predecessor being propped up in the backseat and buckled into place. A spidery chill crawled up his spine.
Morbid.
After a few more minutes of branch-clearing, Porfirio heard the pilot’s voice again. “
Señor el Presidente, would you help me pull the plane out?”
Without a word, he got up, brushed the dirt off his pants, and positioned himself behind the left wing. After five minutes spent writhing around in the dirt, he wasn’t too concerned with protecting his presidential dignity—and besides, he thought to himself, this guy wouldn't be telling too many tales after he accomplished this particular mission.
"Ready,” the pilot shouted, “and…
push!”
They did. Within seconds, the plane started to budge. The President-elect dug in his heels and pushed even harder. The plane nudged forward, centimeter by centimeter. Finally, after two minutes of primeval grunts and groans, the two men succeeded in pushing it past the treeline and out onto the gravel. Three more minutes and they had gotten it into position, the landing light illuminating half a kilometer of rough, unpaved runway.
The pilot circled around the tail of the plane to face Porfirio. “Forty minutes east-by-south,
señor?” He asked in confirmation. “Yes,” said the President-elect, still panting from the exertion.
The airman smiled slightly. "I hope I get some kind of medal after this, sir,” he joked.
"You get this done and keep the secret,” replied Porfirio, trying hard to smile while still gasping for air, “and you’ll be the next Commander of the Air Force.”
The lieutenant chuckled appropriately, then stiffened up and gave a crisp salute, which Porfirio returned. Then the airman lowered his arm, turned around, and clambered into the cockpit. Porfirio, for his part, felt his way back to the Jeep, climbed into the driver’s seat and shut the door.
While the pilot fiddled around with his instruments, Porfirio took stock of the exterior of the craft. It certainly matched his expectations: in the glow of the headlights he saw dings, scuffs, scratch marks, dirt, and flecks of paint missing from the livery. He felt vaguely reassured—this was the spitting image of a trafficker’s plane, a fact which would surely help build the illusion.
Finally, after a few more minutes, the engine gasped, cranked, and sputtered its way to life. The pilot finished his last few checks, flashed one final salute to the President-elect and pushed in the throttle. The aircraft lurched forward. Porfirio caught one last glimpse of his late predecessor in the backseat as the plane sped up, lifted off, cleared the trees at the end of the runway and streaked out into the night, hovering in the sky for a minute before banking left and disappearing behind a distant mountainside.
Porfirio sighed to himself. He reached into the glovebox, pulled out a mobile phone and punched in a number. Two rings later, the voice of General Jesús Gutiérrez Rebollo appeared on the other end. “Are they in the air?”
"Yes, General.”
"Good,” came the response, followed by a
click and a dial tone.
Porfirio blinked. He felt pretty certain that no self-respecting President would allow his generals to talk to him that way. For the moment, though, he wasn’t in much of a position to gripe. After all, if Gutiérrez’s flyboys didn’t do their job right tonight, Porfirio would have a hell of a lot of explaining to do tomorrow.
He put the phone back in the glovebox and snapped it closed. He felt around for the key, found it, and put it in the ignition. Then he froze.
The pilot.
What the hell was his name?
He couldn't remember. He couldn't remember the man's name. Porfirio scoured his memory but came up blank. Had the pilot forgotten to introduce himself? No, of course not. That made no sense. Had Porfirio just forgotten it? He'd spent three-and-a-half-hours in the car with this guy but couldn’t even remember his
name?
Desperate, he started searching in the dark for any name that seemed remotely familiar. It started with an L, didn’t it? Luis, Lorenzo, Lázaro…no. Well, it had an L
somewhere in it, at least, didn't it? Alberto? Uh…Alfonso?
No. Not Alberto. Not Alfonso. Porfirio sighed in resignation. He wasn’t even president yet, and somehow he’d already managed to dispose of a man whose name he couldn't remember.
He looked back at the sky, as if the plane would somehow still be there, hanging in the air, navigation lights flashing in the air like a pair of bashful stars. But all he saw was an endless expanse of bluish-black nothingness, punctuated here and there by a star or two.
Porfirio felt a mix of discomfort and disgust rising within his chest.
If this is what it's like to President, he thought to himself,
then God only knows why Bartlett wanted the job so damn badly.
With that, he turned the key, put it the Jeep in gear and drove off into the night.
)
