this bunch of crazies living up in the hills, the Holy Bloods, fighting the NPA with nothing but knives. He said they deserved to get the odds evened up some. Bullshit. He wanted them to take charge of his haciendas. The NPA are telling him how to run his farms, how to treat his people, and he's not going to let that happen. Under no circumstances.

     Other planters raise their private armies, they tell the world about it. A guy hires three or four security guards, all of a sudden he's calling himself a warlord, he's begging the Sparrows to put him on their hit list. Luis is much too slick for that. He keeps quiet, he still pays his NPA dues, he stays off the Top Forty.

     Me, I was supposed to join a new goon squad that he was forming up. Heavyweight stuff this time. He mentioned names that I knew from before. I told him I wanted to spend a couple days looking up old friends. No problem. He never worried about me—he always had me, any time he wanted.

     I looked up old friends, all right. A few years, Remy has turned into Kumander Rocky. A goddamn folk hero. Give me a break. We got together. I told him what I needed, what was going on, but I don't think he believed me. Then the guns started to show up. The S.D. gets sixty new AK's, Yugo-made, they're kicking ass all over the place. Including the hacienda, my barrio.

     Now Remy is ready to help. They have a shootout with the S.D., they recover a body. Remy's boys carry it into the cane outside Lanao. I show up with rum, get half the barrio drunk, I know everybody's going to be sleeping real hard. I have the empty hut all picked out. They haul in the body, we torch the hut, I head up to the hills with Remy and his bunch.

     I'm dead. Everybody knows I'm dead. Best of all, Luis knows I'm dead. I'm so dead, I can't believe there's any problem with the insurance. It's the last thing I'm worried about. But the first insurance guy shows up from the