Jonny rattles the shiny black security grille with its knowing gleam. He should go and file on the financial crisis immediately. He should head straight for that fucking phone box across the street and place a decisive reverse-charge call to Trib HQ. Filing some short sharp copy down the line should be his first – no, his only – priority. Full of the kind of urgency and gravitas that befits a pivotal moment on a fast-developing news story. Full of the kind of perspective and analysis that only a reporter who has spent the best part of a year following the same story can deliver. Except all Jonny seems to be able to do with any kind of focus is stare at the abandoned bicycles lying on the pavement next to the phone box. And think about where they could get him.
A cover story, he thinks, scanning the empty street. And a distraction. He needs both to get himself inside the ESMA. And he’s got himself a distraction right now, that’s for sure. Riots like these are excuse enough for the Argentinian military to hit the streets and start herding people around. This is a country with a military that still barely needs an excuse to do anything. A wholly disproportionate show of force is routine around here. And the closest military base – which is hopefully emptying out right this minute – just so happens to be exactly where Jonny wants to be. Getting inside the Dirty War’s most notorious prison and torture complex felt almost impossible when Jonny first thought of it. But now?
With that he makes his decision. The financial crisis isn’t going to disappear. It’ll still be around when Jonny gets back. Whereas 93he might not get a chance like this again. And judging by Paloma’s most recent emotional outburst, she isn’t going anywhere for a while.
Crossing the street, he grabs the nearest bicycle, hunching his shoulders as if it will somehow render the theft invisible. Slinging a leg over the saddle, he pedals away and around a corner as fast as he can. He pored over the map for long enough before to know exactly where he is going now.
Bustle is starting to return to the streets. With every block that Jonny covers, he sees shops reopening their doors, trestle tables clattering optimistically out on to the pavement, and the distinctive sharp and bitter smell of yerba mate is starting to disperse the tension in the air. But Jonny is already out of breath. The unmistakable clatter of a bus approaching in the distance is the push he needs to keep moving. One last desperate burst of speed later and he’s got just enough time to stash the bike on a rack before flagging down the bus and jumping aboard. The vehicle itself is mercifully deserted. Collapsing into a seat, Jonny passes the last few miles to Belgrano in a haze – trying by turns to bring his heart rate down and to figure out how the hell he is going to get himself past the guards at the gates to the ESMA.
The building looks so at home on one of the city’s most palatial avenues that he misses it at first, its extravagant stucco columns and intricate naval insignia flashing past in a blur of wedding-cake white before he can fully register their significance. Stumbling off the bus at the next earliest opportunity, Jonny finds his legs are still shaking. Set back from a wide, almost Parisian-style boulevard in one of Buenos Aires’ most upmarket suburbs, the ESMA’s incongruous location makes it almost impossible to imagine that torture of the worst kind went on behind its gates for years.
Jonny recalls last night’s car journey with the pilot. They were 94speeding along a wide, smooth highway for the part that he can remember. Is it possible that Jonny has already been here? His pulse quickens at the prospect of finding more clues to the man’s identity inside the black iron security gates just a few metres away. Gates that, right at this moment, are opening to let a fleet of gleaming Ford Falcon sedans out into the street, one smooth manoeuvre after the other.
Jonny freezes, trying to remember the exact details of the car he was bundled into the previous night. He takes a step towards the gates, squinting at each vehicle’s darkened windows. There are nine – no, ten – cars in total, sliding seamlessly on to the tarmac of the road, turning and heading in the direction of the city centre. To help with crowd control? Or to secure the banks? If the point is to put on a wholly disproportionate show of force, are ten carloads of military officers even enough? Jonny starts to panic as the gates begin to close again, casting around for anything that he could possibly say to the guards at the side that won’t result in getting himself arrested almost immediately.
And then it hits him.
That’s exactly what he’s going to have to do.
That’s exactly how he can get himself between those gates – maybe even inside the former cells themselves – without having to say much at all.
Hiding in plain sight, Jonny thinks, staring up at the ESMA’s impassive façade, a pristine white cover for the dirtiest kind of warfare. Jonny is going to have to fight just as dirty. The plan is still building in his mind even as he begins to carry it out.
Launching himself towards the gates, Jonny arrives with seconds to spare before they close. Playing dumb, he edges between them, gazing wide-eyed to his either side. Two military guards rush over immediately.
‘Disculpa!’ Jonny gabbles, holding his hands in the air, noting, with a little jolt of adrenaline, the gates closing behind him. ‘Turista! Ingles!’
95The men manhandle him over to the guard post. Jonny goes limp, lets himself move like a rag doll, for once grateful that he doesn’t have to feign ignorance of the rapid-fire Spanish being shouted over his head.
‘I made a mistake,’ he says, keeping his hands in the air. ‘Isn’t this a stately home? I thought … I thought this was a stately home … I’m from England, you see …’
He trails off as one of the guards barks something unintelligible into a radio. The other pushes him down on to a small wooden stool, shiny silver handcuffs dangling at his belt.
‘I made a mistake,’ he repeats. ‘Ingles. I’m English. Turista.’
The guards exchange a look.
‘I have money,’ he adds, then makes a show of dropping his hands to dig around with purpose in his pockets. The guards react instantly, each grabbing an arm, hauling him up and out of the guard post towards the building’s imposing entrance. Jonny gibbers incomprehensibly in broken Spanish, all the while noting the absence of any other visible military presence around the building. A wholly disproportionate show of force, he thinks, fresh burst of adrenaline firing. He lets himself be manhandled up the wide steps and into the foyer.
Inside, Jonny feels the chill immediately. Other than the entrance doors, there are no windows in the building’s thick stone walls. The domed ceiling is cavernous, alien-yellow lights mounted haphazardly on the walls. Jonny is led through a side door and up some dank, steep stairs to an equally dank corridor. His breathing quickens as he notes the small, empty rooms set off to either side – are these former cells? The guards lead him to the end of the row, depositing him inside one at the far end. He doesn’t complain, just lets them seat him on one of two long, thin bunks propped against either wall. Both are made up with flat pillows, thin white sheets and sky-blue blankets.
96There the guards pause, regarding him with suspicion.
‘I made a mistake,’ Jonny ventures again. ‘I’m from England. I just thought this was a stately home.’
One guard says something to the other before turning to open a small wall-mounted cupboard. Jonny notices an identical one tacked on to the wall opposite. He takes in the rest of the room’s sparse furnishings – the two cupboards, some frayed and tattered paperback books, a small, stainless-steel sink.
‘Is this your dorm?’ Jonny asks, pointing at the guards one at a time. ‘Where you sleep?’ He pats the bunk on which he is seated. ‘You sleep in here?’
The guard at the cupboard closes its door with a scowl, muttering something to his opposite number.
‘You are partners?’ Jonny tries, finger moving between them. ‘You work together?’
Two blank stares. Jonny takes the respite to absorb as many details of his surroundings as he can. An identical dorm room is visible opposite through the still-open door. The doors themselves are solid, conspicuously lacking the small, barred hatches found in cells. Low down beside the bunks, the clammy white walls are covered in etchings and scribbles.
The guards exchange another look.
‘Is this a police station?’ Jonny asks, letting a note of indignation creep into his voice.
‘No,’ one of the guards answers with an emphatic shake of his head. ‘No policia.’
‘Policia,’ Jonny echoes. ‘Yes. Si, I mean. You are policia?’
The guard’s brow furrows. He mumbles something unintelligible to his colleague.
‘I haven’t done anything wrong.’ Jonny folds his arms. ‘You can’t detain me against my will.’
He stands, and instantly the guards react again. A meaty hand lands in the centre of Jonny’s chest, dispatching him back down 97on to the bunk. Then both men turn on their heels and walk out, slamming the solid door behind them.
‘Wait!’ Jonny shouts, seized by a curious mixture of relief and panic. He’s inside the ESMA, he’s even got himself inside the guards’ quarters by the looks of it, but he’s still not entirely sure he’s going to be able to get himself out quite as easily.
‘You can’t just leave me in here,’ he adds half-heartedly, turning to the scribbles on the walls. Marianna, he murmurs to himself, running a finger over the name scratched into the plaster. Tamara, says another. Natacha, says a third. He leans closer, takes in the myriad of names and numbers marked on the walls above the cots. And then – Jonny gasps as he spots some Spanish he understands. Forgive us, Jonny translates under his breath, staring at the words. Disculparnos: we are sorry.
Then the heavy door flies open again.
Jonny flinches. A different man is framed in the doorway, the two guards standing just behind him in the corridor. Short and sturdy, filling out his pressed military uniform, displaying an impressive battalion of medals and badges on his barrel-shaped chest. An officer of senior rank, without doubt.
Jonny raises a shaky hand to his temple in an approximation of a salute.
‘Now I understand,’ he says, sounding as clueless as possible. ‘No policia. You are army.’
A shiver runs down his back as the officer replies in perfect, if heavily accented English – a cadence Jonny has heard from another military man just a little too recently for comfort in the back of a locked sedan.
‘Yes,’ the officer says. ‘This is an army facility. It is not open to visitors.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Jonny replies earnestly. ‘Disculpame. Please forgive me. I did not realise. I am from England. Our army buildings are not so grand.’
98The officer’s expression darkens. Jonny instantly regrets the comparison.
‘Come with me.’ He motions that Jonny get up. ‘Ya vamos.’
Jonny keeps gabbling: ‘Of course. Gracias. You have such a beautiful city.’
The officer steps aside to let Jonny out. He follows the guards back down the corridor with the officer at his back until they reach the door at the end.
But the guards don’t head for the entrance hall. They turn in the opposite direction.
Jonny pauses. ‘Donde vamos? Where are we going?’
The officer pokes him hard in the shoulder. The guards have already started to climb the stairs.
Jonny stands his ground. ‘What’s up there?’
‘You are trespassing,’ the officer growls into his ear.
‘No, I am not.’ Jonny tries and fails to keep the tremor out of his voice. ‘I made a mistake, that’s all.’
This time the poke is more of a solid shove. Jonny stumbles, banging a shin on a step. Before he can say anything else the guards have turned back and are grabbing his arms to haul him along. A little cry escapes him. Jonny can’t help himself – the stone steps are sharp and steep. A flight up and they’re in an identically dismal corridor. But this time the small rooms are crammed with quadruple bunks stacked impossibly close together and instead of doors they have gates made of thick iron bars.
The cells, Jonny thinks, assailed again by that curious mix of relief and panic. The setup is exactly as the pilot described – the guards’ quarters directly below the cells. They would pass each other on the stairs. Living in those rooms, they were prisoners too.
Jonny readies himself for a fight but instead of depositing him behind the first available set of bars, the guards hustle him down the corridor and into a bigger room at the end. Two desks, a good 99few chairs, and – Jonny’s breath catches in his throat – two smart, black and decidedly shiny telephones.
He turns to find the guards stationed either side of the open, and thankfully solid rather than barred, door. The officer clomps past and sits down at the bigger desk, pulling a clipboard from a drawer.
‘What is your name?’ The officer looks up, pen poised.
‘What’s yours?’ Jonny replies, folding his arms to stop them shaking.
The officer glares at him.
‘Jonny Murphy,’ he adds just a little too quickly. ‘But I haven’t done anything wrong. If you’ll let me make a phone call I can prove it.’
The officer’s pen scratches across the clipboard, scribbling randomly.
‘The penalty for trespassing is one thousand pesos,’ the officer states. ‘This is a military facility. You have twenty-four hours to pay. Then it doubles. Again and again if you do not pay.’
Jonny balks. ‘That’s ridiculous. I don’t have that kind of money. No one does around here. You know that. You’ve just sent most of your men out into the city to help control people rioting about exactly that.’
The officer’s pen stills. A long, slow beat of silence passes between them.
‘What exactly are you doing here in Buenos Aires?’ the officer finally asks.
Jonny takes a deep breath. ‘I work here,’ he answers simply, watching the officer’s jaw slacken as he continues talking. ‘I’m a journalist for the International Tribune. And I have been covering the financial crisis in your country for the past year now. I have been doing everything I can to draw as much international attention as possible to the crazy decisions your government is making, to how desperate things are getting for your people. I 100know the military is in need of as much money as everyone else in this country – and would manage it better, too. My newspaper is American. The officials in charge of international aid read it every day. My reporting is going to help your country get the money it needs.’
By now the officer is staring at him open-mouthed, clipboard lolling in his lap. Jonny has to fight the beginnings of a smile as he notes that the piece of paper the officer has been scribbling on is otherwise completely blank – not even a semblance of an official form. So much for the penalty for trespassing being a one-thousand peso fine, doubling into oblivion.
‘Just let me call my editor,’ Jonny adds, eyeing the shiny black telephone on the desk. ‘I can prove it. Money is all the International Tribune cares about in Argentina.’ For now, he adds silently to himself, thinking about the names scratched into the walls directly below.
The officer recovers himself, shouting angrily in Spanish to the guards behind Jonny, waving a hand. Both men mutter back, hanging their heads and shifting awkwardly from foot to foot.
‘You said you were a tourist,’ the officer grumbles.
Jonny shrugs. ‘My Spanish isn’t very good.’