“I didn’t tell anybody anything.”
“So you signaled someone?”
“No. I didn’t signal anyone.”
“In that case, who do you think alerted the patrol to our location?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you alert this patrol to our location?”
It was pretty clear to me that was the only real question in the bunch. If they made sure it wasn’t No Way who turned them in, then they’d have to look elsewhere. Probably among their so-called friends in the army.
“No,” No Way said.
“Why did you alert this patrol to our location?”
“I didn’t,” No Way said. The voltmeter slid slowly up, from a hundred-volt tickle to two thousand and then to eight thousand. After three seconds, at fifteen thousand, No Way couldn’t hold it in anymore. His back arched higher and bounced and there was a squeal of his vocal cords sawing into each other. His body bounced again and then relaxed as the voltage went back to zero.
“That was a one-second application of a level two shock,” Grgur said. “On your next false answer we’re going to wait five seconds and then administer a level four shock. Just so you know, a level eight might be fatal.”
“Let’s try it,” No Way squawked.
“I’m going to have to ask you again,” Grgur said. Pause. “It’s not a big deal, you know, we’re not out to get anyone. We just want to know where we went wrong. No Way? Who alerted the patrol to our location?”
“I don’t know.” No Way’s readings thrashed, anticipating the shock. His temperature was dipping and his galvanic skin resistance was down twenty percent. The EEG was showing sharp seven-hundred-microvolt eliptiform spikes and big asymmetries between the right and left hemispheres of his brain. The shock didn’t come, though.
“So you’re saying you know someone did.”
“No. Didn’t.” No Way’s voice sounded like a crushed bullfrog’s. The Estimated Voice Stress Level thingy reset itself to the new timbre. Eighty-five percent, it said.
“You didn’t what?”
“I didn’t. Alert. Anyone.”
“One of the patrol officers already told us the information came from you.”
“Not true.”
“Then who did?”
“I don’t know. If anyone did. Or not.”
“Who do you think may have alerted this patrol to our location?”
“?Quien sabe?”
“You’re sure? I’m going to have to give you a long charge in a minute.”
“Can you execute me now, please?” No Way asked, but the voltage was climbing again and his voice rose into a screech and then petered out in gooey sputtering. Grgur held it for three seconds. The EEG dropped down to what it said was an unconscious alpha level. Grgur cut the charge and Leonidas took the muff away from No Way’s neck. Passing out was one thing, but they didn’t want him to go into shock.
(98)
“T his isn’t good,” Leonidas said. There was blood all over No Way’s chin and when they wiped it off I could see he’d bitten through his lower lip. I guess they were worried about it because it was a torture-victim giveaway. Leonidas stuck some bits of gauze between No Way’s teeth and his upper and lower lips. It gave him kind of a Ubangi-woman look. No Way was waking up, and he drew in a breath to try and get a scream together-he’d picked up on their stealth factor-but Leonidas remuffled him before any noise came out. He taped a shock of hair back out of his eye.
“Come on,” Grgur said.
“Okay, it’s okay,” Leonidas said.
“Okay, No Way?” Grgur asked. “Can you hear me?”
“Uh-hunh.” I think he was trying to make himself pass out again, but the Royal Ordnance system was good at not letting that happen. Grgur gave him a hundred-volt wake-up buzz.
“Who is Jed’s backup?” Grgur asked.
“I am.” His vowels were just ragged grunts and he didn’t have any consonants left, but I could still understand him.
“All right. Listen. We already know the patrol was acting on a signal from you. We only want your confirmation of who set up the contact and how they were signaled.”
No answer. Of course, they didn’t actually have Clue One. It was just more standard procedure to tell the subject they knew he was lying. No Way wasn’t buying it, though.
Torture for information usually actually works well, but it can take time. No Way’s choice now was either to start changing his answers to try to buy time, or to keep to the true answers so they’d kill him as soon as possible. All guerrillas were trained to try to do the first, to hold up the interrogators for as long as possible. The main reason was what used to be called the “forty-eight-hour rule”: you stalled in order to give the other people in the cell time to relocate before the other side learned their whereabouts. The other was that there was more of a chance for you if your interrogators had to take you back to wherever with them. Once you were in prison, you were less likely to be executed. In this case there wasn’t anyone else trying to get away, although maybe No Way thought I might need to get out of here myself, and I’m pretty sure he knew there wasn’t any hope for him either. But he did pick up on the fact that these people were nervous, and had been spotted by someone. And so just to screw them up as much as possible-I think-he did the right thing. Which was to start off telling the truth and then to reverse himself as they turned up the screws and the physiological readings got harder to evaluate.
“No Way? Listen. Who’s your primary runner on the Guate side?”
“Cano.”
“Rank and first name?”
“Captain. Juan.”
“Would you please tell us how and when you signaled this patrol?”
“Fresh stolen phone. Leave text asking for a subscription to newsletter.”
“Would you please tell us the name of this patrol’s commanding officer?”
“No se.”
“Who have you told about this operation?”
“Cano y los GNAH.”
“Who else?”
“I can’t remember right now.”
“What have you told them about this operation?”
“Everything, your schedule, your objective, cargo, everything.”
“And what do you think is our objective?”
“Royal tombs.”
“What about the royal tombs?”
“Specific artifacts.”
“Which are?”
“I don’t know.”
“Would you like a cigarette?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Then please tell us that list and we’ll give you a cigarette.”
“Uh, de Vega,” No Way said, pretending to think. “De Rivera. Caballero, Negrin, uh, Azana y Diaz-”
“That doesn’t look right,” Grgur said. He made out like they were checking the names No Way gave them against a list, but I bet they weren’t really. “I’m going to have to give you a level six shock.” Grgur gave him a little
