El Gavilan

by Craig McDonald

  “She’s out of harm’s way,” Tell said.

  “But what of you?”

  “I’m vigilant,” Tell said.

  “Right …” The mayor said, “You’re sure? Really sure you want to me to set this in motion?”

  “Dead sure.”

  “Wish you’d chosen your words more judiciously just there,” Mayor Rice said. “Okay. I’ll do it.”

  “Any idea who you’ll tell?”

  “My opposite number in Vale County, Mayor John Fitzgerald of Janssenville. He’s very tight with Walt Pierce. I’ll be seeing him later this evening. We’re judges for the New Austin Latino ‘Little Princess’ contest.”

  * * *

  Shawn pushed the power button of the new laptop the hospital had found for him. When it powered up, with his left hand, he pulled down the Applications menu and opened Microsoft Word.

  Across the room, Billy Davis said, “Going okay for you, brother?”

  Shawn shot him a thumbs-up with his left hand.

  “Give ’em hell, Shawn,” Billy said.

  Shawn winked and typed: “A Portrait of Law Enforcement Incompetence.”

  * * *

  Able pushed his new couch to its third position in the sitting room. “Better?”

  “Perfect,” Sofia said.

  “I can see it—your vision, I mean.” Able slapped Amos’s back. “Once my painter here gets this room finished, it’s going to look great.”

  Able’s cell phone vibrated. Two callers were listed on his missed calls log. The first was from Tell Lyon. The other was from Walt Pierce. Pierce rarely made direct calls. Able decided to return Walt’s call first, figuring to get the potentially bad news out of the way first.

  * * *

  Tell was watching a talent show. Eleven- to fifteen-year-old girls were taking their best swings at lip-syncing and dancing to Shakira singles. Tell told himself he wouldn’t let any daughter of his participate in such a contest. He felt his cell phone vibrate in his left breast pocket.

  He checked the caller ID panel: Patricia. He said, “So you’re okay?”

  “Wonderful,” Patricia said, calmer-sounding now. “We’re fine. Of course I wish you were here.”

  Tell said, “No more signs of gangs? I mean, apart from the ones you two cowboyed off the road?”

  “Nada,” Patricia said. “All is well. How are you?”

  “Frustrated,” Tell said. “Nothing is going to plan.”

  “Your voice carries,” Patricia said. “Chris says he’s offering a last time to come out and bunk with you. He’s been reading old Louis L’Amour paperbacks in what he calls ‘an unseemly spasm of sentiment.’ Citing ‘contrition,’ he says he feels like you and he should ‘do an Earp’ on New Austin.”

  “That’s Chris’s synonymous terms for a ‘killing floor,’” Tell said. “Let Chris know I’m going for subtle, or else I’d take him up on that offer. We haven’t budgeted body bags in bulk this year.”

  Patricia said, “Chris says that ‘subtle’ would be a first from you.”

  “He should talk, after shooting out tires,” Tell said. “But, no, I’m fine. Really. Plans aren’t going right, that’s all.”

  “I so wish you were here. Then it would be perfect.”

  “I wish I was too,” he said.

  “So you and El Gavilan shut this thing down, now, right? End this and get to me, Tell. Our future is right here.”

  * * *

  Shawn typed with his left hand, picking out characters:

  “It’s time to take it all back from them.

  “Since my last column, I’ve been falsely accused of a terrible crime and I’ve been fully exonerated.

  “Upshot: The cops can’t be trusted.

  “Since my last column, I was nearly beaten to death by Mexicans.

  “Upshot: Illegals are killing our city.

  “These Mexicans beat me with impunity. Beat me so badly I can no longer speak or have children.

  “As I lay in my hospital bed—missing most of my teeth, missing my kneecap and rendered infertile … missing most of my nose—as I lay here in bed, I was attacked by another Mexican. I was attacked in my sick bed because of the incompetence of the Horton County Sheriff’s Department, and New Austin police who didn’t have the brains to post a guard on me. Because of that, this Mexican strutted into my room and broke the middle finger of my right hand. So I slowly type this short column with my left hand.

  “I indict Able Hawk for not seeing that I’m protected.

  “I indict New Austin police chief Tell Lyon for not seeing that I’m protected.

  “I live in New Austin. I edit New Austin’s newspaper of record. Yet I’ve learned I can be attacked in my hospital bed by some illegal scum.

  “With all these young illegal Mexican gang members running amok, how safe can any of you be in your own homes?

  “I repudiate Able Hawk for hypocrisy; for talking a big game, then taking an illegal into his own family.

  “I repudiate New Austin police chief Tell Lyon and the politician who hired a Border Patrol thug with no prior municipal policing experience or training—a vicious incompetent.

  “I urge you to think hard when making your vote this November. I urge you to vote for change. We don’t need the likes of these losers. We need change, and we need hope.

  “And I say it’s time to take it all back—to drive out all these illegal Mexicans. Arrest them, deport them—I don’t care which. These taco munchers have to go before they foul our city further. That’s the bottom line.”

  THEN

  Bing Crosby crooning on the radio: “White Christmas,” then a jaw-dropping duet with David Bowie on “The Little Drummer Boy.”

  Their Christmas plans had changed; Marita’s mother had come down with a virus, so Marita had decided to stay home the extra couple of days. She’d wait for Tell to finish his hellish work week, then together they would drive to her folks’ home for the holiday. Burl Ives on the radio now: “Holly Jolly Christmas.”

  “You’ve been parked on that station for a week,” he said.

  “It’s wall-to-wall to Christmas music,” Marita said. She stroked his cheek and said, “I love this season. Feliz Navidad, sweetheart.”

  “And to you, mi corazón.”

  Marita was finishing packing his lunch; Claudia was sleeping in.

  Tell said, “She’s still out? She never sleeps this late.”

  “It was staying up late last night to watch ‘Rudolph,’ I think.” Marita folded down the top of the lunch bag and taped it closed.

  “I hope that TV special didn’t give her nightmares,” Tell said, watching Marita and wishing he had an extra hour. “I was four, maybe five when I first saw Rudolph on TV. The Abominable Snowman terrified me.” Christmas—it didn’t feel that way out here in the West for a Midwest boy, not even after several years. The holiday had felt hollow since he’d left Ohio with its cold and snow and all the seasons in all their fury.

  Marita bit her lip, thinking. “I don’t remember that monster doing that to me. Mostly, I remember thinking Santa Claus seemed very mean in that one.” She smiled. “Last night didn’t change my mind about any of that.”

  He smiled back, shook his head. He looked up at the ceiling. “I should go up there and say good-bye. She hates it when I don’t do that.”

  “Just try to be home early tonight instead,” Marita said. “She sleeps lightly, like you. I don’t want her taking a nap today or she’ll be up late again tonight, and I have other plans for us.” Marita began to fill his thermos—his most recent Father’s Day gift. “You will be home early, won’t you?”

  “I aim to be.” He always did aim for that. Maybe tonight he could really pull it off. After all, they had Angel Valenzuela on the run; his organization was in tatters.

  There was already more talk of another promotion in the offing for Tell. He hadn’t confided that to Marita yet; he didn’t want to get her hopes up. The position also opened up the possibility of reloca
tion. Of course none of those prospects offered the possibility of snow, either.

  Tell stared at their Christmas tree—something he’d assembled a week ago. He thought again of home. Ohio, often as not, offered at least a dusting of Christmas morning snow.

  Marita hoisted his thermos. “You want some cream in this?”

  “Not this morning. I’ll take it black, please. Going to be a long day and I need to stay sharp.”

  Sharp? By noon his hands would probably be shaking. His skin would be itching. He’d been running on high-test java for at least two weeks.

  “Think you might have time to hit the mall? I have Claudia’s Christmas list.”

  Marita’s car was in the shop … and anyway, they were between babysitters.

  Tell took the folded sheet of paper as she kissed him. He stuffed the letter to Santa in his shirt pocket. Later, he’d throw it away, still never having read it. He couldn’t bear to see what his little girl dreamed of finding under that artificial tree.

  Marita kissed him, said, “Remember, try to come home early tonight.”

  “I will. I swear.”

  Marita said, “Isn’t the Christmas season wonderful?”

  She had always lived in the southwest, never even seen snow in person. Little Claudia had pointed at all that white stuff on TV last night and asked, “What is it?”

  At least he wouldn’t have to try to explain to her how Santa could get into a house with no chimney.

  Tell kissed Marita a last time. He said, “Please tell Claudia I wanted to say good-bye.”

  He let himself out quietly. The engine on the Crown Vic rolled over; he’d had to turn in the SUV for reissue to some incoming field agent. He backed out, simultaneously fiddling with the radio. He settled on Mickey Newbury’s “Let Me Sleep.”

  His mind full of work, he missed seeing Claudia waving to him through the living room picture window.

  FIFTY

  It was half past nine and Tell was watching a young man trying to upend a Coke bottle by lifting it at the neck with a rubber ring secured to a string dangling from a wicker stick. It wasn’t enough just to get the Coke bottle upright. The bottle also had to be brought into standing position within a circle painted on the wooden platform supporting the bottle.

  The game, like most carnival games, was rigged. Tell thought about calling the operator on his scam, but decided against it. He’d chosen a bigger battle, or rather, it had chosen him.

  Tell checked his watch: ten P.M. One more hour to go.

  There had still been no contact with Able Hawk. That worried Tell.

  He had reached one of Able’s deputies and put in a request that Horton County post a guard on Shawn O’Hara. The deputy instead arranged for Shawn to be quartered with another recuperating Horton County deputy.

  Shawn was moved into a shared room with Deputy Troy Marshall, who had been shot in the leg arresting Shawn’s chief attacker. Marshall was already ambulatory—“Marine tough” as his co-worker put it.

  And Marshall was eschewing pain medication. The deputy who spoke with Tell said he would therefore run Marshall’s sidearm to the hospital. “It’s win-win,” he told Tell. “Who better to watch this reporter than his ex-Marine-turned-sheriff’s deputy bunkmate?”

  Tell agreed and asked the deputy if he had heard from his superior.

  The deputy said, “Nah, Sheriff Hawk’s been scarce. Kind of unusual, although since his grandson married, everything has been kind of unusual, I guess.”

  Tell made a last circuit of the festival grounds. As he walked around the fair, he rubbed his naked ring finger, thinking of Patricia. He imagined that she’d probably be sitting out on the back porch with Chris and Salome, talking about their hypothetical cabin’s construction.

  He watched the twirl and blur of the carnival. The field was full of fireflies and they looked like little bits of lights flung free from the Ferris wheel and merry-go-round. The air smelled of sugar, popcorn and sweat.

  The last band was playing “La Pistola y el Corazon.” He checked his watch again: a quarter to eleven and everything was quiet. He headed back to his command cruiser, wary of tails. But he saw no one, friend or otherwise.

  Time to bag it, he thought.

  As he pulled into the parking lot of his apartment complex, Tell thought about where he would sleep. He still had his own apartment. And the prospect of sleeping alone in Patricia’s place, in her bed—their bed—depressed him.

  Tell keyed himself into his own place and cranked up the AC He stripped and showered and climbed naked into bed, tucking his gun under the adjacent pillow before quickly falling asleep.

  * * *

  They were parked in the back lot of the high school, up against the football field, sitting with the lights off.

  Able Hawk sat in the passenger seat of Walt Pierce’s cruiser, staring off into the dark. It was drizzling now and raindrops trailed down the windshield and pattered softly against the roof. The windows of the cruiser were cracked and the air smelled of rain and earthworms.

  Walt said, “I’ve got you and your grandson nailed on manufacturing and selling false driver’s licenses. That’s a federal felony, as you well know, Hawk. A Homeland Security beef. But more than prosecuting you myself, I’ll hand you up to the fucking ACLU for an ass-reaming of unending vigor. I watched your grandson play ball on that field many times, Able. Remember when we’d come and watch Friday night games? Who’d have thought I’d be the one to have to put him in prison? If you survive your sentence, you’ll come out, oh, I figure about eighty. Your grandson will be long past his prime too.”

  Able tasted blood and realized he’d bitten through his lip. “How’d you get onto it?”

  Brusquely—annoyed to be knocked off his agenda—Walt said, “You were fucking sloppy, Hawk.” Walt then described a circumstance almost identical to Tell Lyon’s uncovering of Able’s scheme. Walt had arrested two Mexican teens. The duo had handed up Trent Paris. Just as he had with Tell Lyon, goddamn Trent had rolled over on Amos.

  Able should have known to threaten Trent out of town after handing over the business to those two Italian thugs. He should have severed the only loose end that might lead back to himself.

  “So what’s the fucking upshot, Pierce?”

  Walt smiled. “I’ve got me a copy of that fucking baseball film I hear Lyon is trying to use to take down my deputy, Luke Strider. I’ve watched that film several times with my key men. Like me, they see a fuckin’ red Isuzu in that film. A red Isuzu like them spic gangbangers who beat up that reporter drove. Them spics you’ve already got in custody. You’re going to close ranks with me, Hawk. We’re going to close this case together. We’re going to hang the murders of Thalia Ruiz and them three others on them that did it—those vicious spic gang members who you’re holding. Them that ain’t owed due process. God evidently don’t care what happens to them, so why should we, eh?”

  “But they didn’t do it.” Able licked his bloodied lip. “That’s Luke Strider and his truck on that piece of film. We both know that.” Able looked at Walt’s hands and something clicked. He was suddenly cold all over. Able said, “And looking now at your hands and all those damned rings, I’ll be a sorry son of a bitch if I don’t think you’re the other man on that tape. I think you’re the fat main man in that film—the one who beat my Thalia to death. It’s you, isn’t it? It’s always been you. I’ll be a sorry son of a bitch if I’m not right.”

  Spraying spittle, Walt snarled obscenities and went for his gun, struggling in his seated position to draw clear, his arm bumping up against the car seat—fouling his draw. Able grabbed Walt’s head with both hands and slammed his face into the steering wheel. The cruiser’s horn blared and Walt screamed, tasting blood in his mouth.

  Walt raised his right hand and waved it in Able’s face. Able saw the can of mace in Walt’s hand, but too late to try to take it from him. Able screamed as the mace hit him in the eyes and nose and sprayed into his open mouth.

  Screaming
himself—his own eyes burning from the mace he’d released in the tight confines of his cruiser—Walt emptied the can in Able’s face.

  “Jesus fuck!” Able bellowed. He got his hand on the door release and fell out of the Vale County sheriff’s cruiser onto the damp pavement. It was raining steadily now and Able scooped rainwater from a chuckhole and washed his burning eyes, clearing them just enough to see Walt lumbering around the back of the cruiser, one hand working at his own eyes and the other reaching again for his gun.

  Able pulled his back-up gun from his ankle holster. Waving their guns, blinking back tears and rain, the sheriffs stared one another down. “What I guess you’d call a fucking Mexican standoff,” Able said, his voice raw from the mace.

  “You fucking take back what you said, Able!”

  “I can’t do that, Walt, not thinking as I do. And I’m thinking it more with each damned second.”

  “You goddamn take it back, Able! Then we go before the cameras together and declare them gang members guilty.”

  Able sneered. “And then what? As you point out, they ain’t legal, none of them. So we can’t try them here, Walt. And hell, if we could, they’d fast slip out of your lame fucking frame and you and Luke’d end up indicted anyway.”

  Walt slowly lowered his gun and holstered it. “That’s why you’ll hand them over to me, Hawk. Let me carry the weight of cleaning up that end. I’ll do the right thing.”

  “The ‘right thing’?” Able spat blood. “You mean kill ’em, like all the others you’ve killed in your custody.”

  “You fucking bend to my will, Hawk,” Pierce said.

  “No.”

  “Then you kiss your ass goodbye. And your grandson’s ass too. Before you take me down, I’ll see you two up on them federal charges. Can you imagine what’ll happen to you in prison for twenty, maybe thirty years if some old collar of your department’s doesn’t shank you first? Least you won’t last long enough to see what it does to that bookworm grandson of yours.”

  Blinking, Able raised his gun and pointed it at Walt’s head. “I shoot you now, I only kiss my ass goodbye.”