What dont you understand?
Why you are going to the home of a man like Josef Sholokoff.
Mohammed pulled the cab up to the locked gates of a compound that was sculpted back into the mountain. Inside the walls, the lawn was a deep, cool green in the shadows, the sod soggy from soak hoses, the citrus trees heavy with fruit, the balconies on the upper stories of the house scrolled with Spanish-style ironwork. The gates swung inward electronically, but no security personnel or even gardeners were in sight. Mohammed drove to the carriage house and stopped.
Youre gonna wait, right? Nick said.
I think so, sir.
Think?
I have a wife and children to consider, sir.
The guy sells dirty movies. Hes not Saddam Hussein.
They say he kills people.
Yeah, that, too, Nick said to himself.
By the side of the house were a flagstone patio and a swimming pool that glittered like diamonds from the underwater lighting. A half-dozen women lay on beach chairs or on float cushions in the pool. Four men were playing cards on a glass-topped table. They wore print shirts with flower or parrot designs and golf slacks and sandals or loafers. Their demeanor was that of men who felt neither threatened nor ill at ease with their role in the world nor aggrieved by tales of carnage or privation or suffering on the evening news. Nick knew many like them when he ran the cardroom for Didoni Giacano in New Orleans. They turned their lethality on and off as easily as one did a light switch, and they did not consider themselves either violent or aberrant. Ultimately, it was their personal detachment from their deeds that made them so frightening.
The overseer of their game sat in a high chair, the kind used by an umpire on a tennis court. He was a small, fine-boned man with a long jaw and narrow cranium. His grin exposed his teeth, which were long and crooked and looked tea-stained and brittle, as though they would break if their possessor bit into a hard surface. His nose was scarred by acne, his nostrils were full of gray hair, the shape of his eyes more Asian than Occidental. There he is, right on time, he said.
Im Nick, if youre talking about me. Youre Mr. Sholokoff?
This is him, boys, the man in the chair said to the men playing cards.
I thought maybe we could talk in private.
Call me Josef. You want a drink? You like my ladies? Your eyes keep going to my ladies.
I feel like Im at the public pool here.
Tell me what you want. You had a long trip out. Maybe you want to relax in one of my cottages back there. See the Negro girl down at the shallow end? Shes starting her movie career. Want to meet her?
I didnt have anything to do with killing those women you were running into the country.
Sholokoff seemed barely able to contain his mirth. So you think Im a human smuggler? And youve come out here to tell me you never did me any injury? Maybe you got a wire on you. You got a wire? You working for the FBI?
Hugo Cistranos had the women killed. He used to do hits in New Orleans for Artie Rooney. I wanted to get even with Artie for some things he did to me a long time ago. I thought it was him bringing the Asian women in. I thought I was gonna put them to work for me. I came to these kinds of conclusions because I was a dumb fuck who should have stayed in the restaurant and nightclub business. I dont want my family hurt. I dont care what yall do to me. Im getting a crick in my neck looking up at you here.
Get him a chair, Sholokoff said. Bring me the artwork, too.
One of the cardplayers brought a white-painted iron chair from the lawn for Nick to sit in; another went inside the house and returned with a manila folder in his hand.
Sholokoff opened the folder on his lap and sorted through several eight-by-ten photos, glancing at each of them appraisingly, the grin never leaving his face.
These guys arent Russians? Nick asked, nodding at the cardplayers.
If they were Russian, my little Jewish friend, they would eat you alive, toenails and all.
How do you know Im Jewish?
We know everything about you. Your family name was Dolinski. Here, look, Sholokoff said. He tossed the folder into Nicks lap.
The photos spilled out in Nicks hands: his son, Jesse, entering the San Antonio public library, the twin girls crossing a busy street, Esther unloading groceries in the driveway.
Your wifes family came from the southern Siberian plain? Sholokoff said.
Who took these pictures?
They say Siberian women rule their men. Is that true?
You leave my family out of this.
Sholokoff propped his elbows on the arms of the chair, elevating his shoulders up around his neck, his face still split with a grin. I got a deal for you. And if you dont like it, I got maybe one other deal. But theres not many deals on the table for you. Think real hard about your choices, Mr. Dolinski.
I came here to tell you the truth. Everyone says youre a good businessman, the best at marketing the product youre in. A good businessman wants facts. He doesnt want bullshit. Thats what Artie Rooney and Hugo Cistranos sell, one hundred percent bullshit. You dont want the facts about those women, Im out of here.
You said you wanted to get even with Arthur Rooney. What did Arthur Rooney do to you?
Nick glanced sideways at the cardplayers and at the women floating on cushions in the pool or lying on beach chairs. When we were kids, him and his friends did a swirlie on me at the movie theater.
Explain this swirlie to me.
They used my face to scrub out the toilet bowl. It was full of piss when they did it.
Sholokoffs laughter caused a convulsion in his cheek muscles that was like rictus in a corpse. He held a stiffened hand to his mouth to make it stop. Then his men started laughing, too. You were paying back a guy because he washed your hair in piss? Now youre in Phoenix bringing Josef a great truth about the operation of his business. I am in awe of you. You are what they call a great captain of industry. Now here are the deals for you, Mr. Dolinski. You ready?
You can give Josef your restaurant and your vacation house on the river. Then Arthur Rooney and Hugo wont be doing swirlies on your head anymore. Or you can take the second deal. This one is more interesting, one I like a lot more. Your wife has all the marks of a Siberian woman, a strong face and big tits and a broad ass. But I got to try her out first. Can you fly her out here?
The men at the card table did not look up from their game but laughed under their breath. The hot wind blowing across the face of the mountain rustled the palm and bottlebrush trees and scattered bits of leaves on the surface of the pool. The womens bodies looked as hard and sleek as those of seals.
Nick stood up from the chair. His feet were sweaty and felt like mush inside his socks. I met some of your whores when I was running an escort service in Houston. They talked about you a lot. They kept using words like rodent or ferret. But they werent just talking about your face. They said your dick looked like a thumbtack. They said that was how come you got into porn. You got secret desires to be a human tampon.
Sholokoff began laughing again, but much more quietly and not nearly as convincingly. One of his eyes seemed frozen in place, as though a separate and ugly thought were hidden in it.
And heres my deal to you, you Cossack cocksucker, Nick continued. You come around me or my family, Im gonna mortgage or sell my restaurant, whichever is quicker, and use every dollar of the money to have your bony worthless ass greased off the planet. In the meantime, you might run a VD test on your skanks and Lysol your pool. I think I saw a couple of them lined up at the free herpes clinic in West Phoenix.
Nick walked back across the lawn toward the carriage house. He could hear chairs scraping behind him and the voice of Josef Sholokoff starting to rise, like that of a man tangled inside his own irritability and his unwillingne
ss to concede its origins.
Be there for me, Mohammed, Nick thought.
Mohammed was having his own troubles. He had moved the cab from near the carriage house to a spot by the corner of the buildingprobably, Nick suspected, to avoid seeing women dressed only in bikini bathing suits. But two of Sholokoffs men had come out the front door and were blocking the driveway. Nick headed straight down the drive toward the electronic gates. Behind him, he heard Mohammed stepping on the gas, then the sound of tires whining across a slick surface.
Nick looked over his shoulder and saw Sholokoffs cardplayers coming around the side of the house. Nick broke into a jog, then a run.
The cab was fishtailing across the lawn, blowing fountains of black soil and water and divots of grass from under the fenders, exploding a birdbath across the grille, destroying a flower bed in order to get on the driveway again. Mohammed swerved past Nick and hit the brakes. Better get in, sir. I think were in deep excrement, he said.
Nick piled into the backseat, and Mohammed floored the accelerator. The front end of the cab crashed into the gates just before they could lock shut, flinging them backward on their hinges, breaking both of the cabs headlights. The cab careened into the street, one hubcap bouncing over the opposite curb, rolling like a silver wheel down the mountainside.
Nick sat back in the seat, his lungs screaming for air, his heart swollen the size of a bass drum, sweat leaking out of his eyebrows. Hey, Mohammed, we did it! he shouted.
Did what, sir?
Im not sure!
Why are you shouting, sir?
Im not sure about that, either! Can I buy you a drink?
I dont drink alcohol, sir.
Can I buy you a late dinner?
My ears are hurting, sir.
Sorry! Nick shouted.
My family is waiting supper for me, sir. I have a wife and four children at home. I have a very nice family.
Can I take all of you to a late dinner?
Thats very good of you, sir. My family and I would love that, Mohammed said, pressing his palm to one ear, starting to shout himself. I could hear you talking to those men. These are very dangerous men. But you spoke up to them like a hero. You are a very nice and brave man. Hang on, sir.
24
THE PREVIOUS DAY Hackberry Holland had given over the back bedroom and the half-bath of his house to Vikki Gaddis and Pete Flores. In the first silvery glow on the horizon the next morning, he could not account to himself for his actions. He owed Flores and Gaddis nothing on a personal basis. He was incurring legal and political risk, and at the least, he was ensuring the permanent enmity of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the FBI. Age was supposed to bring detachment from all the self-evaluative processes that kept people locked inside their heads. As with most of the other aphorisms associated with getting old, he thought this one a lie.
He showered and shaved and dressed and went out to the horse lot to clean off the top of the tank for his foxtrotters and to fill it with fresh water. On the lip of the tank, he had constructed a safety ladder out of chicken wire for field mice and squirrels who, during drought or severe heat spells, would otherwise climb up the water pipe onto the tanks edge in order to drink and fall in and drown. The chicken wire was molded over the aluminum rim, extending into the water, so small animals could climb back out. While Hackberry skimmed bird feathers and bits of hay off the tanks surface, his two foxtrotters kept nuzzling him, breathing warmly on his neck, nipping at his shirt when he paid them no mind.
You guys want a slap? he said.
No reaction.
Whyd we bring these kids to our house, fellows?
Still no response.
He went inside the barn and used a push broom to begin cleaning the concrete pad that ran the length of the stalls. The dust from the dried hay and manure floated in the light. Through the barn doors, he could see the wide sweep of the land and hills that were rounded like a womans breasts, and the mountains to the south, across the Rio Grande, where John Pershings buffalo soldiers had pursued Pancho Villas troops fruitlessly in 1916. Then he realized there was a difference in the morning. Dew was shining on the windmill and the fences; there was a softness in the sunrise that had not been there yesterday. The air was actually cool, blessed with a breeze out of the north, as though the summer were letting go, finally surrendering to its own seasonal end and the advent of fall. Why couldnt he resign himself to the nature of things and stop contending with mortality? What was the passage from Ecclesiastes? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever?
Eleven thousand years ago people who may or may not have been Indians lived in these hills and wended their way along the same riverbeds and canyons and left behind arrowheads that looked like Folsom points. Nomadic hunters followed the buffalo here, and primitive farmers grew corn and beans in the alluvial fan of the Rio Grande, and conquistadores carrying the cross and the sword and the cannon that could fire iron balls into Indian villages had left their wagon wheels and armor and bones under cactuses whose bloodred flowers were not coincidental.
Right here he had found the backdrop for the whole human comedy. And what was the lesson in any of it? Hackberrys father the history professor had always maintained the key to understanding our culture lay in the names of Shiloh and Antietam. It was only in their aftermath that we discovered how many of our own countrymenwho spoke the same language and practiced the same religion and lived on the same carpet like, green, undulating, limestone-ridged farmlandwe would willingly kill in support of causes that were not only indefensible but had little to do with our lives.
At six A.M. Hackberry saw Pam Tibbss cruiser turn off the asphalt road and come under the arch and up his driveway. She parked the cruiser and unchained the pedestrian gate on the horse lot and walked toward him with a big brown paper bag hanging from her right hand.
Are Gaddis and Flores up yet? she said.
I didnt notice.
Did you eat?
Nope.
I brought you some melted-cheese-and-egg-and-ham sandwiches and some coffee and a couple of fried pies.
I have a feeling youre going to tell me something.
Talk to the state attorneys office. Get somebody on your side.
Wars of enormous importance are always fought in places nobody cares about, Pam. This is our home. We take care of it.
Thats what this is about, isnt it? The outside world came across the moat.
Hackberry propped the push broom against a stall and took two folding chairs out of the tack room and set them up on the concrete pad. He took the paper bag from Pams hand and waited for her to sit down. Then he sat down and opened the bag but did not remove anything from it.
Some of the Asian women had eight-ball hemorrhages. I see their eyes staring at me in my sleep. I want Collins dead. I want this guy Arthur Rooney dead and this guy Hugo Cistranos dead. The feds are after a Russian out in Phoenix. Their workload is greater than ours, and their priorities are different from ours. Its that simple.
I doubt theyll be that tolerant.
Thats their problem.
Flores seems like a nice kid, but hes a five-star fuckup.
Yall talking about me? Pete said from the doorway.
Pam Tibbss face turned as red as a sunburn. Pete was smiling, silhouetted against the sunrise, wearing a T-shirt and a pair of fresh jeans he had tucked into his boots.
We were wondering if you and Vikki would like to have breakfast with us, Hackberry said.
Theres something I didnt pass on yesterday, Pete said. I dont think its a big deal, but Vikki did. When Danny Boy picked us up, he had to stop for gas at that filling station run by Ouzel Flaglers brother. I just thought Id mention it.
Pam Tibbs looked at Hackberry, her lips pursed, her eyes
lidless.
Some people say Ouzel is mixed up with Mexican dope mules and such, but I dont set a lot of store in that. He seems pretty much a harmless guy to me. What do yall think? Pete said.
THE FIRST MORNING that he woke in Preachers tent, Bobby Lee could feel the difference in the temperature. He pushed open the flap and felt a great cushion of cool air rising off the earth, glazing the mesas and monument rocks and creosote brush and spavined trees with dew, even staining the soil with dark areas of moisture, as though an erratic rain shower had blown across the land during the night.
Preacher was still asleep on his cot, his head deep in a striped pillow that had no pillowcase and had been stained by the grease from his hair. Bobby Lee went outside and used the chemical toilet and started a fire in the woodstove. He filled a spouted metal pot with water from the hundred-gallon drum Preacher had paid four Mexicans to mount on eight-foot stanchions; he poured coffee grounds into the pot and set it on the stove. When the sun broke above the horizon, the wood framing of Preachers new house, constructed by the same Mexicansall illegals who spoke no Englishstood out in skeletal relief against the vastness of the landscape, as though it did not belong there or, if it did, it marked the beginning of a great societal and environmental change about to take place. The wind came up, and Bobby Lee watched the burned books from Preachers house that had been bulldozed into a pile of debris blow away in gray and blackened scraps of paper. Was a change of some kind taking place before Bobby Lees eyes? Was he witness to events that, as Preacher constantly suggested, were prophesied thousands of years ago?
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