maid for wealthy people around Gavea and Leblon. Maria’s parents wanted a better life for her and sent her to school outside the slum.”
“What kind of a student was she?”
“Excellent.” Viana tapped her file. “She became very committed to human rights, social justice. She was a community activist and a conscientious worker. She was taking courses to be an administrator.”
“How would you rate her honesty, her integrity?”
“She was beyond reproach. She was one of our best workers.”
“Were there any problems with her work at Worldwide Rio Advogados?”
“None. Wherever she went, she was praised. At Worldwide Rio Advogados Maria was filling in for a worker on maternity leave. It was one of her longer assignments.” Viana stroked his beard as if coaxing a memory. “There is one odd thing about the firm and Maria.”
“What’s that?”
“She was always interested in postings at that specific firm.”
“Why?”
“Again, I must emphasize that this is not for publication?”
“Certainly.”
“There were rumors that Worldwide Rio Advogados represented the interests of big narco networks,” Viana said. “Some said they set up shell companies for the CIA, or numbered companies operating child labor sweat shops in contravention of UN treaties. All of it rumor, nothing ever surfaced. If it had, we would never send our people there.”
“Yes, but would Maria be the kind of person who would want to expose such activities if she’d found evidence, say documented evidence?”
“Perhaps. She was passionate about human rights, but really-” Viana shook his head as if to downplay the subject “-I don’t know. Those are only rumors and my speculation is not for publication, please.”
“Where did Maria live?”
“In the favela with her parents, Pedro and Fatima Santo.”
“She never moved out?”
“No, she wanted to make life better in her neighborhood.”
“Which favela?”
“Ceu sobre Rio. Loosely translated, it means, heaven over Rio,” Viana said.
“Do you have a specific address? I’d like to go there and talk to her family and friends.”
“That’s not advisable,” Viana said.
“As a journalist, I must go. Luiz here can be my guide.”
“No, I could not,” Luiz said. “It would not be safe for either of us. Ceu sobre Rio is one of the most dangerous favelas in all of Rio de Janeiro,”
“The drug gangs live there and control it,” Viana said. “As you may know, they control many favelas. In exchange for loyalty, they protect the residents and provide them with the things governments don’t,” Viana said. “If you enter as a stranger without permission, you could be robbed or beaten, taken hostage for ransom, or worse.”
“I understand it can be dangerous.”
“Especially for people like you, Mr. Gannon,” Viana said. “A year ago, a Brazilian TV crew doing interviews in the favelas was taken hostage after the narco chiefs accused them of being police sympathizers. They were tortured for days, their agony recorded with their own TV cameras.”
“I recall reading about that case. They were killed?”
“Executed,” Viana said. “No one was arrested. Then just last month, a reporter and photographer from Spain went into Ceu sobre Rio. No one heard from them for five days-that is when their bodies were found in a Dumpster behind a Zona Sul police station. The drug bosses had suspected them to be undercover international police posing as foreign journalists. They were tortured, their torment recorded on a disk left on their bodies. It shows their killers, their faces hidden under bandannas, warning other ‘foreign police rats’ to stay away. It was on the TV news.”
“I understand,” Gannon said, taking a few moments to ponder Viana’s advice. Then he asked a few minor questions before closing his notebook and thanking him.
The taxi trip back to Centro was a long, silent one until the cab neared the bureau and Luiz turned to Gannon.
“You did some good digging, Jack, finding out Maria Santo was Gabriela’s source and everything else we learned today.”
“We got lucky there.”
“I guess we’ve reached a dead end at the favelas.”
“I’m not sure where we go on this story next,” Gannon said.
“The others are due back the day after tomorrow. It doesn’t leave you much time.”
The taxi had stopped in front of their building.
“It’s been a long day, Luiz, thanks for your help. Send a news status update to New York, say that follow-up stories to the bombing are in development, then go home. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Okay, thank you.”
After Luiz entered the building’s lobby Gannon said to his driver, “Do you speak English?”
“A little.”
“Take me to a restaurant that is as close as possible to the entrance for Ceu sobre Rio.”
“Ceu sobre Rio?” The driver raised his eyebrows, shifted his transmission and eased into traffic. “Okay.”
After negotiating heavy late-day traffic, the driver came to a collection of boutiques and shops bordered by rising hills. The taxi stopped at a small restaurant called the Real American Diner, where Gannon got a table outside on the patio and ordered a burger made with beef from Argentina. In making awkward small talk with his waiter, Gannon confirmed that ascending beside him was the favela, Ceu sobre Rio, an explosion of clustered shacks, jutting at all angles, piled on top of each other as they clung in defiance to the steep hill. While the sun sank behind the hill, Gannon asked his waiter if any of the staff lived there, or if he knew anyone who lived there.
After several minutes, Gannon was invited into the darkened restaurant, to the end of the bar where some of the staff had gathered. A man in his thirties, who bore a friendly face and spoke English, nodded to the youngest in the group, a teenager wearing an apron over jeans and a white T-shirt.
“Alfonso, our dishwasher, lives in the favela.”
“I am a journalist from New York City.” Gannon showed them his laminated WPA ID, then the clipping about the bombing victims. “I need to find the family of this woman.” He tapped Maria Santo’s picture. “Pedro and Fatima Santo. I need to visit them in the favela and talk about Maria.”
The older man translated and Alfonso began nodding.
“He knows Maria’s family.”
“Will he take me to them? Will he be my guide? I will tip him.”
The older man asked the boy, who spoke for a moment.
“Yes, he says. Meet him out front of this restaurant tomorrow at noon.”
“Can’t we go now?”
The man asked the boy.
“No, it is almost night, tomorrow is Sunday, it will be safer to take you then.”
“Good.”
Energized by the break and the meal, Gannon tipped the staff, who called a cab for him. As he waited, twilight fell and he gazed up at the Ceu sobre Rio. The echo of traffic, shouting and throbbing hip-hop music rolled down in the evening air.
Every now and then, Gannon heard the sporadic pop of gunfire.
17
