Out of Captivity : Surviving 1,967 Days in the Colombian Jungle

204 OUT OF CAPTIVITYthis piece of news quiet. If word got out about this kind of thing goingon, then the two pairs—Ingrid and Lucho and Gloria and Jorge—werevulnerable. When we first arrived, I knew that the four of them wereclose, but as the months went on it was obvious that both pairs hadbecome couples in every sense of the word.As the initial shock of her announcement wore off, the will of thecouples won out, and Clara remained silent about the identity of thefather. Whatever had happened, I assumed there was something morecomplicated going on, but as her pregnancy progressed she still refusedto give up the father. The mystery remained in place.When April rolled around, she was escorted from camp to give birth.While she was gone, we speculated about the whole thing, and the longershe was gone, the more we figured that the little bird was a lotcagier than we thought. On the surface it looked like her pregnancyhad gotten her released, but that didn’t seem like something the FARCwould do. It was too decent a gesture for them; however, after fourweeks of her absence, we couldn’t come up with a better explanation.If she’d gotten away, then we were happy for her. That gave us all hope.If she had just been relocated, we were happy for ourselves. If any oneof us had been taken out of the mix, I would have said the same thing.Marc always said we were like rats in an experiment, and if one rat wasout of the cage, it gave the rest of us more room.One day near the beginning of May, Marc and I were exercising. Iwas on the stepper, and when I rose up a few inches, I could see outinto the clearing. A convoy of FARC was heading our way. A small phalanxof guards, and a few others, flanked Clara. I didn’t have to shoutto anyone, because the military group had seen her and were shoutingher name. As she came to the gate, we could see that she was holdinga baby wrapped up in a thin cotton sheet. Clara smiled sheepishly, andducked under the arm of the guard who held the gate open for her, andwith that, she was back in Camp Caribe.