chairman, Mr. Merlot, put it very well when he said that Americans are… what’s the word…?” The Turk was thinking hard, eyes wrinkled shut.
“Prudes?”
“Exactly! Prudes. That’s precisely the word. Are you and your old friend like most Americans? Or do you agree that we all have different
… needs?”
Tucker was now sitting on the couch, staring into the hookah’s smoky glass globe. He was still wearing his gray rodeo hat, white sports coat, ankles crossed showing his fancy boots. He stirred, looked around, finally found the Turk with his eyes. Said, “Old? Fuck you.”
“A generous offer, but no thanks,” smiled the Turk. “Well… who the hell you callin’ old, boy? How’d you like to go home and tell your mama that some boy just spanked your… your… spanked your…” Tuck’s voice flattened and disappeared. He’d lost the thread… but he’d found the hookah again, something easy to look at, not loud, not penetrating.
He sighed; folded his hands in his lap.
I watched his head fall before I said, “I’ll look at anything you’ve got to show me. I’m wide open.”
“Open to anything?”
“You think I came to Colombia for the fishing?”
The Turk’s laughter said okay, he was convinced. Sounded very enthusiastic as he said, “Then you will love Gamboa. Because in Gamboa, you can have anything you want.”
“I know, the motto. Because I deserve it.” Like it was bullshit.
“No, when I say anything, that’s exactly what I mean. The Chinese, the Japanese, they know how to relax. Gamboa is being created for them
… and for Mr. Merlot’s own personal interests.”
On the screen now, new images were appearing. I stepped back a little, watched.
Felt that chill again. A swelling nausea…
The Web page had a very complete catalogue of pornography, most of it shot at Gamboa, I was told, but a few things from Mr. Merlot’s own personal collection.
The stuff from Merlot’s collection, I didn’t see till the very end…
The way it worked, the Turk told me, was that he recruited “help” to work in Gamboa. In return, Mr. Merlot paid him a small finder’s fee, promised him a prime vacation time-share on the canal, plus allowed him to be Gamboa’s sole agent in Colombia. He got 10 percent of anything he could prove that he moved.
“If I can sell a few of these time-shares,” he said, “I can pay Mr. Garret enough to get the case out of the courts. I can save my yacht in this way.”
I said, “So convince me. Make a good case for your project, and I’ll buy.”
The shrug, the hands, the facial expression, all said no problem. “First thing, Colombia has the most beautiful women in the Americas, perhaps the world,” the Turk said. “If you sign the contract, purchase a time-share with us, what you do then is tell Mr. Merlot what you, want while you’re in Gamboa on vacation. Anything you want, I can find it for you. A beautiful Negro housemaid? A young Latina cook? Or perhaps… perhaps a teenage boy.” He held his palms up-whoa, he wasn’t judging, just giving an example. “You want all three at once… or five at once, you can have that, too. If we get your order in advance, I find what you want in Bogota or here, in the slums of Cartagena.” The palms again. “Poor, yes, but very clean and beautiful. You pay a small fee for each and they will do anything you wish them to do. Truly, Gamboa is the place to make your fondest dreams come true.”
“So what happens if I happen to be visiting Panama, I’ve got some clients with me, but the time-share I bought is for a different time of the year?”
“As a member of Club Gamboa, you may rent by the night, by the week, whatever you want. True… on such short notice, we may not be able to provide precisely what you want. But the club’s entire staff will be made up of very beautiful women and very willing boys and they are always at the members’ disposal. But here-let me show you the kind of pleasure we have to offer.” As the screen changed, he said, “Are you sure you would not like to smoke a bit while you watch?” A. minute or so later, he said, “You don’t mind if I do?”
I wasn’t looking at the screen. Had long since turned my eyes away
… not out of disgust, but out of… sadness? No, but an emotion that was close to it. More like a… hollowness.
I did not look at the computer screen for the same reason that I do not go to topless bars or strip shows or watch pornographic films. Sex? Yeah, I love sex. Love the tender anything-to-bring-her-pleasure kind and the sweaty belly-slapping variety and anything, absolutely anything else, that will make me or my like-minded partner happy. But when the debasement of an individual is viewed as entertainment, we are all diminished… plus I am always, always perplexed by a very basic question: How does it come to pass that the lives of otherwise-healthy men and women are so tragically compromised?
“Mr. Ford. Do you not find them very beautiful?”
I had signed a one-page form, printed in English and Spanish, acknowledging that Jamael Hasakah had introduced me to the glories of Club Gamboa, thereby confirming his legal right to a finder’s fee as well as elevating me to the status of a man who deserves a respectful prefix.
Tucker had dozed off on the couch. Had his cowboy hat tilted down over his eyes, boots up on the coffee table. He’d had six or seven small beers plus the dope. He was out.
I said, “Yes, the women are gorgeous.”
“But a trifle old, perhaps?” The Turk’s words were saying one thing, but his tone was saying something else. Maybe asking me a delicate question. What?
So I played along. “Sure, maybe a bit too old.” I glanced at the screen. The two girls soaping each other beneath a waterfall couldn’t have been more than, what? fifteen, sixteen? They were cold, had goosebumps, but were toughing it out for the camera. A third woman, performing oral sex on an Asian man, looked to be about the same age.
“The girls you see here, they all work as housemaids at Gamboa. You will meet them. Very nice. I selected them myself. From Bogota!”
The Turk’s professional pride showing.
“But if you’re feeling adventurous, let’s go to Mr. Merlot’s personal room. Is that all right with you?”
“Sure. I want to see it all.”
“Then you shall!”
Click.
I looked at the screen, then looked away quickly, as the Turk said, “Mr. Merlot’s tastes are not as unusual as many people think. Perhaps you agree? Mr. Merlot enjoys and appreciates children. It was a preference that he says he learned in China when he himself was a child.
“Here… in this photograph, you are introduced to a man you will come to know if you become a member. His name is Akibar, but everyone calls him Acky. Not only is Acky” — I noted the meaningful chuckle-“quite a man, as you can see, but he is the reason why Gamboa is guaranteed to be a peaceful place. Acky looks quite terrifying, but that is not a bad thing. There will be no obnoxious drunks or uninvited guests, you may be certain of that. Who needs policemen with Acky around!”
I looked just long enough to commit to memory the face of a man who appeared to be Afro-Asian; half Vietnamese, perhaps, or half Chinese. His face reminded me of the face of an ant but in human form. Big cheekbones like mandibles, skin tight over the bones, black piercing eyes. Big man, probably well over six feet tall, though his height was difficult to gauge.
He was standing before a teenage boy…
But a very powerful man; with the body of a steroid-user, a weightlifter. I remember Amanda telling me about the showdown with Merlot. How Merlot’s roommate was there, pissed off at her and Frank, ready to fight.
So say hello to Akibar, the giant ant. That’s the way I thought of him. Merlot’s enforcer and roommate… and who knew what else…
I had to ask: “Merlot and his friends-they don’t find it embarrassing being part of a show like this?”
“Not at all. Mr. Merlot feels it’s important to set an example. In any healthy culture, my own country, for instance, what you are seeing is perfectly acceptable behavior as long as it is done… quietly. I myself occasionally
