by Mark Gimenez
‘What does she have?’
‘A new husband.’
The sheriff walked back in. ‘Miss Honeywell, did you see anything last night?’
‘Stars.’ She turned her eyes back to Book. ‘Professor, I want to go home. I want to sit in a Starbucks and drink a latte and text in relative safety.’
‘You can’t leave the hospital for a few days. They’ve got to make sure you don’t have a serious head injury. I’ll leave the laptop with you. You can work on the Welch brief.’
She blinked back tears. Book felt his blood pressure ratchet up a notch.
‘And I’ve got some unfinished business with Billy Bob Barnett.’
‘Hold on there, podna,’ the sheriff said. ‘If Billy Bob’s behind this, I’ll find out and then I’ll arrest him. But you take the law into your own hands in my county, even if you are a law professor, I’ll throw your butt in jail, I don’t care how famous you are.’
The professor and the sheriff had left, and Nadine Honeywell lay alone in the hospital room. She started to cry. But just as she was entering the full-scale slobbering and self-pity stage, she thought of Leslie Benedict in Giant, the barbecue scene where she passes out from the heat and the sight of the cooked calf’s brain, and everyone thinks she’s too weak to survive in Texas. She could have run home to her dad in Virginia—just as Nadine now wanted desperately to call her daddy in San Francisco to come and take her home. She didn’t. Leslie. Instead, she got up the next morning, determined to be a tough Texan, to work the cattle alongside Bick.
Elizabeth Taylor had been only twenty-three when she came to Marfa to play Leslie Benedict in Giant. Nadine was only twenty-three, and she was now in Marfa playing intern to the professor. They had both come from California to Texas. They had both stayed in the same room at the Paisano Hotel. They had both been knocked down to the dirt of this same desert.
Leslie Benedict had gotten up.
Nadine adjusted the bed until she came to a sitting position, wiped the tears from her face, and buzzed the nurse. When she entered, Nadine said, ‘Please hand me my glasses and that laptop and take this needle out of my arm.’
The nurse smiled. ‘My, we seem to be feeling better now. Are we ready for breakfast?’
‘We are. A double order. And a large coffee. With real cream. And we want our own bottle of Purell. We’ve got work to do.’
‘Little tough on your gal back there,’ the sheriff said. ‘Making her work with a broken arm and leg.’
‘That’s my job—to make my students tough enough to survive as lawyers.’
‘Guess it didn’t take with Nathan Jones.’
The sheriff gave Book a ride back to Marfa. He chewed tobacco and spat the juice into a Styrofoam cup; with the wind, spitting out the window could get messy.
‘Nathan’s senior partner in Midland said they found marijuana in his office.’
The sheriff grunted.
‘Of course,’ Book said, ‘he might’ve lied.’
‘Why would he do that?’
‘To get me to go home.’
‘I reckon he ain’t alone in wanting you to go home.’
‘Just about everyone we’ve met wants us to go home … except you.’
‘I’m a slow learner.’ The sheriff spat into the cup. ‘Fact is, I like a change of pace. And we’re both in the truth business.’
‘You ever find it? The truth.’
‘Not as often as I’d prefer. So you figure maybe Nathan Jones got into drugs?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Wouldn’t be the first time. It can take down the best of men. It’s the devil, just waiting for a weak soul seeking refuge from this world or a greedy heart wanting to strike it rich. Too much temptation and money for some folks to stay on the good side of the law. Even the law. Sheriff before me, ex-Marine, six-four, wore black boots and a white Stetson, looked like John Wayne on a bad day. Law-and-order sort of guy, worked the West Texas Drug Task Force hard, made a lot of drug busts … you ever heard of those task forces?’
‘As a matter of fact, I have.’
‘Law and order got out of hand there. Anyway, he was a real hard-ass, figured he was twice as smart as anyone else in the county. Half the county loved him, the other half feared him. Which is the way he wanted it. Figured Presidio County was his personal sandbox. Being sheriff for twenty years will do that to a man.’
‘How long have you been sheriff?’
‘Sixteen years.’
‘Take care you don’t suffer the same fate.’
‘Every day, Professor.’
He slowed the cruiser and drove along the shoulder, eyeing the bare land and grunting now and then. Book had learned that a grunt was a part of speech for the sheriff, but also that it was more rhetorical in nature, so Book did not respond to his grunts.
‘Turned out, he was living a double life. Him and a cowboy from Alpine teamed up to run drugs across the border for fifteen years, driving pickup loads of cocaine right across the river—north of Presidio, the Rio Conchos empties into the Rio Grande. Above that, it’s usually dry, especially in a drought like this. Stashed the dope in horse trailers at the county fair-grounds. Made a million bucks off each load. Apparently he didn’t want to depend on the county pension fund for his retirement. DEA nabbed him bringing a load up one night with twenty armed guards. Now he’s retired to the federal prison. Life sentence.’
‘Hard way to end your life.’
‘I reckon. He’s never gonna see another West Texas sunset, eat another steak at Reata, drink another cold Lone Star beer on a hot summer day. Man can live without a lot of things, those would be tough.’
‘What about sex?’
The sheriff grunted. ‘Hate to break the news to you at such a tender age, Professor, but you’re already on the downside of sex.’
‘This day just keeps getting worse.’
Which evoked another grunt.
‘Anyway, since the artists came to town, recreational use has shot up. Dope’s always come through town, just sixty miles from the border. Not much I can do about that, figure that’s a job for the Border Patrol and DEA. But now a lot is staying in town. And that is my job.’
He spat.
‘We call ourselves Marfans.’ He jabbed a thumb behind them. ‘Folks in Alpine and Fort Davis, they call us Marfadites. They’re jealous of our notoriety. They shouldn’t be. ’Cause, damn, we’re stocked full up on attorneys, artists, and assholes.’
‘Triple As.’
‘You been talking to Sam Walker?’
‘I have.’
‘He’s a good man.’
‘What about the mayor?’
‘He’s a real-estate broker.’
‘He seems happy to have the artists in Marfa.’
The sheriff spat.
‘Reckon he is, making money hand over fist. See, some folks think a town is a place to live. Other folks think it’s a place to make money. Mayor, he figures those homosexuals are gonna be struck down by God’s wrath one day, but in the meantime he’s willing to pocket some real-estate commissions off of them. Me, I don’t care what two consenting adults do, long as they do it indoors. They want to get married, I say, Why shouldn’t homosexuals have the same right to be miserable like the rest of us?’
The sheriff had amused himself.
‘You get along with the artists?’
‘I try to get along with everyone. Liking people comes easy for me, just my nature. Guess that’s why I’m in the people business. But, those people, I have to confess, they’re a hard bunch to like. They segregate themselves, don’t want to live in Marfa as much as above Marfa. They don’t want to eat with us, live with us, or shop for groceries with us. They don’t want their kids sitting next to cowboys and Mexicans in the public schools, so they start their own private school charging more than most folks around here make in a year. They wear those “What Would Donald Judd Do?” caps and shirts, but Judd didn’t do that. He put his kids in the public schools like everyone else.
’
He spat.
‘We’ve been hoping for a Walmart, but they don’t want one here, too working class for their tastes. That’s how they view us, a lower class, the little people who don’t know modern art from old art. It’s like ’cause they’re from New York and know art, they got nothing but disdain for us.’
‘It’s not just you.’
‘You try to be friendly, say “howdy” when you walk past them on the sidewalk, even two boys holding hands, but they don’t say “hello” or “go to hell,” just give you a look like they’re telling an inside joke and you’re the punch line, got their iPhones and their iPads and their iMentalities.’ He exhaled. ‘My wife’s got one of them.’
‘A homosexual?’
‘iPad. She reads books on it in bed, you believe that?’
He spat.
‘Judd gave us boxes. These young artists, they gave us the finger. They put up that “Hello Meth Lab in the Sun” exhibit and call it art. They paint that “Axis of Evil” sign downtown and call it freedom of speech. I mean, what’s the point of getting in people’s faces like that? You know, I don’t much care for intolerant right-wing Republicans, but these folks taught me I don’t much care for intolerant left-wing Democrats either. And these folks are as intolerant as the wind.’
The sheriff pointed.
‘Eagle.’ He watched the bird soar on the currents a moment then said, ‘Sometimes I wish to hell Judd had moved to New Mexico instead of Marfa. I mean, you can’t get a goddamn Viagra prescription filled in Marfa, but you sure as hell can buy cheese called Gouda at The Get Go.’ He paused. ‘You know, if you needed Viagra.’
He spat.
‘American cheese ain’t good enough for those folks. They got to have cheese from France, so that gal opens an organic store, got all kinds of cheese. Hell, it’s just cheese, for Pete’s sake. City folks think living out here in this desert’s kind of neat at first, then they want what they left behind.’
‘Human nature.’
‘Reckon so. Course, wanting to eat a special kind of cheese, that’s harmless. Trying to take folks’ jobs, that can be dangerous.’
‘The artists protesting fracking?’
‘Put a flame to that gas, someone’s gonna get hurt. They don’t seem to understand what having a job means to a man. It ain’t just the money or a place to be. It’s who he is. It gives value to his life. It means he’s worth something in this world. What would I be if they took my badge? Or you, if they took your professorship? Folks would look at me and figure I’m just a dumb cowboy. They’d look at you and figure you’re just a hippie biker. But our jobs give us our identity. Tell us who we are. You take that away, and a man’s got nothing left. And that’s what those artists are trying to do to the locals.’
‘What do you know about Carla Kent?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Seems like there’s a connection between Nathan’s death, the art, the artists, fracking … and Ms. Kent’s right in the middle of it all.’
The sheriff grunted. ‘Hell, she just showed up a year or so ago, comes and goes, stays a few months at a time … heard she stays in one of those teepees. I wonder what that’s like, sleeping in a teepee? She’s a nice-looking gal, but she’s always stirring up trouble.’
‘And you’re in the middle of that conflict.’
‘Yep. I’m just refereeing this intramural match between the old Marfa and the new Marfa.’
‘What do you figure will happen to Marfa?’
‘Sooner or later—hopefully sooner—the artists, they’ll get bored and move on … to the next Marfa.’
The sheriff braked to a stop. They had returned to the scene of the crime. Where Book and Nadine had been run off the road. They got out and walked to the railroad tracks that paralleled the highway. Book had seen nothing the night before, just the bouncing light from the Harley’s headlight until they went airborne. Now he saw everything. Where they had gone off the road, the short distance to the embankment, the barbed-wire fence where he had landed, and the mesquite bush that had broken Nadine’s fall—and her arm and leg.
‘EMTs, they had a hell of a time cutting you out of that barbed wire,’ the sheriff said. ‘Said that gash on your forehead was bleeding like a stuck pig.’
Blood stained Book’s white T-shirt.
‘Lucky your gal was unconscious, or she would’ve been hurting something bad.’
The heat rose inside Book. He took a deep breath to calm himself.
‘Damn,’ the sheriff said, ‘this land is brittle dry. Nothing but kindling. We get a desert storm, one lightning strike could set the plateau on fire, might not stop till the flames get to Fort Worth. Could be biblical.’
The sheriff knelt and grabbed a handful of prairie grass; it broke off in his hand like twigs instead of grass.
‘Year ago this time, the Rock House fire ignited two miles west of town, raced across the grassland. If the wind was blowing east instead of north, it would’ve taken out most of Marfa—downtown, homes, the art. Instead, it went north and burned a lot of Fort Davis. Burned for a month, scorched three hundred thousand acres, killed a lot of livestock. Horses couldn’t outrun the flames.’
He shook his head.
‘To see those horses burned to a crisp, make a man cry. We put up the “Burn Ban” notices, but folks from out of town, they flick cigarettes out the window ’cause they never witnessed a wildfire, so they can’t imagine what it’s like, to see that wall of fire coming your way fast. When the wind’s blowing fifty miles an hour, neither man nor horse can outrun the flames.’
‘Anything you can do, to prevent a fire?’
‘Pray for rain.’
Book walked around the scene. The desert lay silent, and the morning air smelled fresh. The grass crunched under his boots. He spotted something near a yucca plant. He squatted and picked it up: a small plastic bottle of Purell hand sanitizer. He squeezed his hand tight around the bottle as if making a fist.
‘I need to see Billy Bob Barnett.’
‘Now, Professor, I’m conducting a homicide investigation. I’m compiling a list of suspects—’
‘Including Billy Bob?’
‘He’s at the top of my list.’
‘Then arrest him, throw him in jail.’
The sheriff smiled. ‘See, you’re talking like a man whose gal got hurt, not like a law professor teaching all those constitutional rules we gotta follow—Miranda warning, probable cause, plain sight, incident to an arrest—all those fine points of the law just waiting to trip us up out here in the real world. All that sounds real good in a classroom, but out here when there’s a victim in the hospital and a bad guy on the loose laughing at you, it don’t feel so good, does it? The rules are meant to slow us down, make sure we get the right bad guy, but now it’s personal for you so you want to go fast. ’Cause you think he did it.’
‘So what are you going to do?’
‘I’m gonna investigate, not kick someone’s ass—and you are not gonna kick any more ass in my county. I’m gonna build a case, prove he did it. I’m going to go back to my office, call Mr. Barnett, and set up an appointment. Then I’m going to interview him and take a look at the black pickup truck his boys were driving, see if there’s any evidence they ran you off the road. Now, we can work together, Professor, or you can go home. Comprende?’
‘I’ll take care of Billy Bob Barnett myself.’
The sheriff spat.
‘Oh, I see how it is. The famous law professor, he likes to work alone. Running all over the country, saving folks, righting wrongs, just him and his Harley. He helps everyone, but he don’t need help from anyone, is that it? ’Cause he’s just so damn smart and tough. Well, first of all, Professor, you playing the Lone Ranger got your little gal back there put in that hospital bed, that’s a fact. And you got to live with that fact. And second of all, even the Lone Ranger had Tonto.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Means it’s okay for a man to n
eed help. And, podna, you need help.’
Chapter 26
The sheriff dropped Book at the Paisano so he could change before meeting the deputy about the Harley. But as soon as the sheriff’s cruiser turned out of sight, Book ran down Highland Avenue to Billy Bob Barnett’s office. He thought, I don’t need an appointment. I don’t need to play by the rules I teach. I don’t need help. And he thought of his intern; he had promised to protect her. He had not. The sheriff was right about that: his actions had put Nadine in the hospital. His anger built with each step. His years of taekwondo training to control his emotions failed him. He was mad.
Billy Bob Barnett had hurt his intern.
He arrived at the Barnett Oil and Gas Company office—the black pickup truck was nowhere in sight—and barged through the front door and hurried past Earlene without asking permission—
‘Hey! Professor! He’s in a meeting!’
—and down the hall past the lunchroom where donuts were piled high on the table—
‘Wait!’ Earlene yelled from behind.
—and opened the closed door and marched into the office.
Billy Bob sat at the conference table with three other men. They wore maroon shirts and were watching the fracking video.
‘Mr. Barnett,’ Earlene said, ‘he rushed right past me.’
Billy Bob held up a hand. ‘It’s okay.’ To Book: ‘You just have something against appointments, don’t you?’
He looked Book up and down—the bloodstained shirt and the bandage on his forehead—then stood.
‘The hell happened to you?’
‘You happened to me. And to Nadine. She’s hurt.’
‘Honeywell? She’s hurt?’
‘She’s in the hospital. Broken arm and leg. She could’ve been killed.’
‘What the hell are you talking about?’
The same two bald goons who had followed them to Midland entered the office and advanced on him. Book closed the distance and got in the driver’s face again. He was a side of beef.
‘You ran us off the road, didn’t you?’
The man’s muscles tensed as if to strike Book.
