Amazonia

Louis announced himself. “Tshui, my dear, is our visitor ready for company?” He pulled back the flap and bowed his way through the opening.

It was intolerably hot inside. A small brazier was burning in a corner. His mistress knelt naked before the small camp stove, lighting a bundle of dried leaves. Aromatic smoke spiraled upward. She rose to her feet. Her mocha skin shone with a sleek layer of sweat.

Louis stared, drinking her in. He longed to take her then and there, but he restrained himself. They had a guest this morning.

He turned his attention to the naked man staked spread-eagle on the bare-earth floor. The only bit of clothing he wore was a ball gag. Louis kept his eyes diverted from the bloody ruin of the corporal’s body.

Still holding the man’s dog tags, Louis crossed to a folding camp chair and sat down. He glanced to the name etched on the tags. “Corporal James DeMartini,” he said in crisp English, reading the name, then looking up. “I’ve heard it from good authority that you’re ready to cooperate.”

The man moaned, tears flowed from his eyes.

“Is that a yes?”

The Ranger, a beaten and tortured dog, nodded with a pained wince. Louis studied the man. What hurt more, he wondered, the torture? Or the actual moment you finally broke?

With a tired sigh, he pulled the man’s gag free. Louis needed information. Over the years, he had learned that the difference between success and failure lay in the details. He had reams of facts on the opposing team—not only information supplied directly by St. Savin, but also timely intelligence gained from a closer source.

Still Louis hadn’t been satisfied.

He had kidnapped the young corporal because his other resources had proved woefully lacking in specific details about the Army Ranger unit: their firepower, their radio codes, their timetables. Furthermore, there was always the unspoken military objective, orders meant only for military ears. And last, Louis had arranged the abduction simply as a challenge, a small test of his forces.

The maneuver had gone flawlessly. Equipped with night-vision glasses, a small team had snuck in via the river. Once the chance arose, they had poisoned one of the Rangers with a special curare dart prepared by Tshui. Afterward, they had covered their tracks, setting up a false trail beside the river with caiman dung and prints. His mistress had then kept the kidnapped man alive by breathing mouth-to-mouth until he could be revived back at their camp with a special antidote.

But Tshui’s true talents were proven during the long night. Her art of torture was without equal, plying pain and pleasure in a strange hypnotic rhythm until finally her prey’s will broke.

“Please kill me,” the man begged, hoarse, blood dribbling from his lips.

“Soon enough, mon ami…but first a few questions.” Louis leaned back as Tshui walked around the corporal, waving her smoking bundle of dried leaves through the air. He noticed the broken soldier flinch from the woman, his terrified eyes following her every move.

Louis found this extremely arousing, but he kept himself focused. “Let’s first go over a few numbers.” Over the next few minutes, he extracted all the codes and time schedules of the army unit. He did not have to write any of it down, setting all the frequencies and numbers to memory. The information would greatly facilitate eavesdropping on the other team’s communications. Next, he collected the details on the Ranger force’s strength: number and types of weapons, skill levels, weaknesses, means of air support.

The man proved most talkative. He babbled on and on, giving out more information than requested. “…Staff Sergeant Kostos has a secret stash of whiskey in his rucksack…two bottles…and in Captain Waxman’s boat, there’s a crate that holds a cradle of napalm minibombs…and Corporal Conger has a Penthouse mag—”

Louis sat up. “Hold on, monsieur. Let’s back up. Napalm bombs?”

“Minibombs…an even dozen…”

“Why?”

The corporal looked confused.

“James,” he said sternly.

“I…I don’t know. I suppose if we need to clear a section of jungle. Something that blocks our way.”

“How large a region would one of those bombs clear?”

“I…” The man choked back a sob. “I’m not sure…maybe an acre…I don’t know.”

Louis leaned his elbows on his knees. “Are you telling me the truth, James?” He wiggled a finger for Tshui, who had grown bored with the conversation and sat cross-legged, busy laying out a new set of tools.

On his signal, she rose from her work and crawled like some jungle cat toward the naked soldier.

“No,” the corporal cried, mewling, “no, I don’t know anything more.”

Louis shifted back in his seat. “Do I believe you?”

“Please…”

“I think I will believe you.” Standing, he turned to his mistress. “We’re done here, ma chérie. He’s all yours.”

She slid smoothly to her feet, offering a cheek to be kissed as he passed.

“No,” the man on the ground moaned, pleading.

“Don’t dawdle,” he said to Tshui. “The sun is almost up, and we’ll need to be under way shortly.”

She smiled, smoky and full of hidden lusts. As he stepped to the tent’s threshold, he saw her bend down and collect her bone needle and thread from the spread of tools. Lately, Tshui had been trying a new approach in preparing her specimens for head-shrinking. She now liked to sew her victims’ eyelids closed while they were yet alive. To better capture their essence, he supposed. The Shuar shamans placed special significance in the eyes, a path to the spirit.

A sharp scream arose behind him.

“Tshui, don’t forget the man’s gag,” Louis scolded. He made the mistake of glancing over his shoulder.

Tshui squatted above the face of Corporal James, her thighs on either side of his head, holding the squirming man in place as she busied herself with her needle and thread. He lifted an eyebrow in surprise. It seemed Tshui was trying something new.

“Pardon, ma chérie,” he said, bowing out of the tent. Apparently he had scolded her too soon. The gag truly wasn’t necessary.

Tshui was already sewing the corporal’s lips shut.

Act Three

Survival of the Fittest

BRAZIL NUT

family: Lecythidaceae

genus: Bertholletia

species: Excelsa

common names: Brazil Nut, Castanheiro do Para, Para-Nut, Creamnut, Castana-de-Para, Castana-de-Brazil