Wolves At Our Door
Page 20
”Bajense secuestradores, hijos de la chingada," Kane shouted into the car. "You kidnapping sons of fornication, get out of the car."
"¡Viejo cabrón! Old cuckold!" the driver shouted and stared up at Kane's face. The passenger in the front seat raised his Uzi. Kane stuck a .32 automatic into the driver’s ear and blew the side of his head into the passenger's face. The passenger dropped onto the floorboard on top of his weapon. Kane stepped back and emptied the automatic’s magazine into the backseat. Vogel and the Lion poured fire into the car from their side. Kane stuck the empty pistol into his back pocket and stooped to pick up a .3o-3o carbine.
"Whoosh," said the wind from the muzzle blast of an Uzi as a burst rushed by his ear. He stepped out into the headlights and levered .3o-3o bullets into the windshield.
A thug fell out of the backseat at Vogel’s feet. "Don’t shoot me, I’m not a Muslim," he cried.
"Good, you can go straight to hell then," Vogel said, but he hesitated to shoot the man. Kane walked up and shot him in the head.
The Lion dragged a bloody Lobo off the floorboard in the back and dumped him on the ground. "I think I killed this sawnawmahbeechi," he said.
The thug looked bloody enough to be killed, but he sat up. Kane raised the rifle to his head. "No, no, no, no," the thug said. He scurried away from the rifle on his knees and tried to hug Vogel’s legs. Vogel stepped back, disgusted.
"We didn’t do anything," the thug wailed. "We didn’t harm anybody."
"Tell us what you did," Kane said.
"We didn’t harm your girls."
"Never mind what you harmed. Tell us where they are, or you’re going to die."
"No, no, no, no."
"That’s not the right answer," Kane shot that one in the head too.
He turned back to question the passenger in the front seat and reached for the door, but it flew open in his hand. The thug scampered clear of the car on his hands and knees, then raised his hands in supplication.
"Please don’t kill me, Mr. Kane," he said in English. He wailed like the other one. "We didn’t hurt the girls. They’re all right,"
The man found himself in a plight and his upturned face was covered with blood, tears, and slobber. Kane liked that.
"Wipe the blithering slobber off your chin," Kane said. "I can’t look at you."
"Just don’t kill me, patrón. I have the information you want. I can tell you about the little girls. I beg you, no me mates."
"Calm down. We won’t kill you. Where did you take them?"
"To El Molino ranch on the road to Altar. I’ll tell you everything you want to know."
"You mean the Caballero family at El Molino has a part in this?"
”No, no, no. We don’t know anybody at El Molino. We only met the other car there, because it is a landmark. Our boss took the girls away in another Hummer."
"Away where?"
"¿Cómo?"
"Where did they go, man?"
"To the Wolf Cave in Huatabampo."
"The Wolf Cave? What’s that?"
"It’s a nightclub at the harbor of Huatabampo where Los Lobos meet."
"And from there, where?"
"Only there. That’s as far as they have to go."
"You’re sure?"
"Si, patron. I won’t lie to you. I don’t want to die."
"Who’s your boss?"
"What?"
"You said your boss took the girls away in the other Hummer. Who is he? What’s his name? Don’t lie to me. Tell the truth and I’ll let you live."
"Who else but Güero Rodriguez."
"The truth?"
"He’s our boss. We have no other. I’ve never given that man’s name to anybody and I only give it now to save my life."
Kane shot him in the forehead.
The partners searched the pockets of the dead men. Kane opened the driver’s wallet and found his license. His name was Armando Mendez, his address, #10 Calle Embarcadero, Nogales, Sonora. Kane kept the card to count coup.
The partners laid the four Lobos on their backs side by side by the Hummer with their arms crossed on their chests, their pockets turned inside out, and their cards and papers scattered on the ground. They took their money, gold chains, and watches, because the Lion insisted that booty should never be left behind. Kane gathered what he could and laid it on the hood of the Hummer for the Lion. He saw no reason the old bandit should not have his plunder. Kane had known all his life that he was an old pirate.
The partners took their time and pulled the shoes off their horses, wiped out all the shod tracks on the Mexican side, then rode their barefoot horses three miles down the road toward the valley. They rode back to the Hummer on a different track in the road so anyone might think the killers of the thugs had come up from the valley and returned the same way. They put their horses back across the line and wiped out all their tracks between themselves and the Hummer.
The partners tied the girls’ shod horses head to tail. The Lion would lead them behind Kane and Vogel so their tracks would obliterate all other tracks on the Manzanita trail, including the tracks Los Lobos had left. The last touch they added before they mounted their horses to leave was to bless themselves and set the Hummer on fire so the corpses would have a vigil light.
When the partners led the girls’ horses away from the border fence toward home, their tracks said that an undetermined number of riders on shod horses had stopped at the fence on the American side and turned back. The tracks on the Mexican side said that the four Lobos had climbed the mountain from the Altar Valley in the Hummer, had paused at the border for too long a time, and had been overtaken by three men on horseback and murdered. At least that was the way the partners hoped they would be read. They would feel a whole lot better if a good rain came along and wiped everything out.
Kane felt a chill as soon as he started his horse on the trail toward home. By the time he and his partners reached the corrals at the 7X, his teeth chattered. Before he unsaddled, he put on a lined jacket that he kept in the saddlehouse. After the horses had been fed and he and his partners were on their way to the house, he put his hands in the jacket pockets to warm them and felt Dolly Ann’s rubber boxing mouthpiece. He had taken Dolly Ann to a dentist to have it custom fitted to her mouth. He remembered that he had taken it out of her mouth at the end of the last sparring match with Cody Joe. She had not been out of breath after out-boxing her big old brother. The mouthpiece had been real wet when he put it away in his jacket, a sign that his granddaughter had no fear or anxiety in a fight, a sign of her poise. He squeezed the mouthpiece with fondness, as he would a good friend. His little granddaughter had been all over the thing and had depended on it to keep her safe. He squeezed it again and put it in the pocket of his Levi’s. He would carry it, squeeze it, and appreciate its presence until he could put it back in her mouth. Lightning had begun to strike at the partners' heels on the trail.
Now, a high wind bashed a cloudburst into their faces before they reached the house and they ran for the front door. Inside, Vogel slapped his wet hat against his leg, grinned, and said, "There comes the water we asked for."
To find someone who could run interference for him in Huatabampo, Kane phoned Beto Montenegro in Rio Alamos. Beto knew the Huatabampo underworld. He came wide awake when Kane told him what had happened to Dolly Ann and Luci and asked for his help.
"You know I’m with you, Jim," Beto said. ”Those poor little girls. What’s your plan?"
"First, recruit ten men and arm them."
"I’ll have my brother Manuelito and ten more men ready to go by ten o’clock tomorrow morning. Then what?"
"Get them to Huatabampo tomorrow, get rooms at the hotel nearest the airport, post a man or two at the airport, and wait for us. We’ll be there before dark tomorrow night, or before noon the next day. If you have friends or people you trust in the underground, get in touch with them. The girls might be at La Cueva del Lobo, a nightclub."
"I know the place. I know that the L
obos gang hangs out there, and I know a man who can help us, Jim. He used to own the Wolf Cave and might still have friends among the employees. I take it we’re dealing with Los Lobos gangsters?"
"That’s right. Güero Rodriguez and Los Lobos kidnapped our girls."
"I wonder how that bastard thought he could get away with it. We’ll be in Huatabampo early tomorrow afternoon and we’ll be well armed. Then, I’ll go nightclubbing with my brother Manuelito." Beto hung up. The three partners held council while they ate breakfast. Kane felt like leaving for Huatabampo that minute, as did Vogel, but nobody could fly at night in Mexico. The law prohibited it. He called the Tucson hospital and was told by the night nurse that Cody Joe was still being treated for dangerous infection.
No matter how much the partners were in a hurry to overtake Güero Rodriguez, they would have to plan an operation. They needed to find out how much help the Rio Alamos and Huatabampo police would give them. Huatabampo was under the jurisdiction of the municipality of Rio Alamos.
"There’s a way to find out about the Huatabampo police, Jim," Vogel said.
"How, compadre?"
"Silverio Garcia is the municipality’s prosecutor. Remember? You met him at the hospital in Tucson."
"De veras. You’re right, compadre."
"If we stop and think from time to time, more solutions will show themselves."
"You know you have to stay here and take care of the ranch, don’t you, Andres?" Kane said to the Lion.
"It goes without saying," the Lion said. "We can't all run away and leave the gate open."
"We don’t want anyone to know what we’re doing."
"That also goes without saying."
The three partners decided to take one careful step at a time. When they were young, all their horses had been bronco and all the cattle wild. As they grew older they were amazed to find how much horses and cattle had gentled down. When they were young they tested everything to see if it would come apart, a bronco horse, a downhill run, a bull on the end of a rope. Now, they found that they did very well when they worked within the limits of their old tools and old carcasses, and they did not need to put stress on everything to see if it would come apart. They would think this problem through, gather all the help they needed, and do what had to be I done. They would not weep and wring their hands, or worry about the way they felt. They would try to bring devastation to the kidnappers and not get any of their blood, tears, or slobber on the little girls.
The next morning Kane and Vogel went to see Cody Joe. The boy was having an awful fight of his own. Ali said that in a cattleman’s terms, his wounds were septic. His system fought a strain of septicemia, a germ like the one that caused shipping fever in cattle, the same infection that killed bullfighters when they were gored by the bulls.
"The garlic," Kane said to Ali. "Do you suppose that the garlic on the bullets caused the trouble?"
"It could, I guess. I don’t know enough about it. I’ll do a study."
A priest named Paul Garcia walked in to see Cody Joe. Kane was happy to see him. Spiritual medicine might help the boy. Ali’s hospital medicine did not seem to work. Ali took one look at the priest and fled the room as though the owls were after him, as though he was the devil and Father Garcia the Archangel Michael.
After Kane and Vogel shook Garcia’s hand, Kane said, "What got into Ali Lupino? He left here like a coyote leaves a chicken house. Doesn’t he know you?"
"Oh, yes," Father Garcia said.
"Well, why did he leave without even an adios?"
He smiled. "He doesn’t like me."
"Why not?"
"Maybe he’s a Philistine," He laughed.
"That’s for sure. Historically he comes from Philistine stock, doesn’t he?"
"Sure. You know what else? I only tell you this because it’s a belief that’s not well known. I've read that in Biblical times the people of the Arab countries, the countries that were known as Egypt, Babylon, and the land of the Philistines, were all called Egyptians. Have you heard that?"
"No," the partners said.
"Well, somewhere in the Bible, I think in the story of Joseph who took his cattle to Egypt in search of pasture, it says that to the Egyptian, the cattleman is an abomination. You two men and I are the sons of cattlemen. Besides that, we’re Christians. So, from what I've read, we can expect that most Arabs probably don’t like our kind."
"Ali’s from cattle people and he’s always been friendly to us. Do you count him among the ones who don’t like Christians, Father?" Vogel asked.
"When Ali and I first met, we had many interesting conversations, until he made it clear that he could not be my friend because of my faith. To him, I’m a Christian devil, an infidel. I suspect he and his brothers have no Christian friends. In business, Christians are free game to them. Business is war to them, no holds barred."
"We would like to talk to you about Huatabampo, Father," Kane said.
"I was born and raised there."
"Do you know anything about a gang of criminals called Los Lobos?"
"Everyone from Mazatlan to Nogales knows about them."
Kane steered the priest outside to a bench where the three men could speak privately. Kane and Vogel had known Father Garcia for twenty years, ever since he had been assistant pastor of Sacred Heart Church in Rio Alamos and had served as chaplain to the Charro Association of which Kane and Vogel were officers. The priest was a good horseman and an artist with a lariat. He liked music and wine too. Now he served as pastor of a congregation in the tough Embarcadero barrio of Nogales, Sonora. He had been there seven years and knew everybody in Nogales from the mayor to the shoeshine boys. Kane had walked down the main Calle Obregon in Nogales with Paul Garcia and seen his popularity. Anyone would have thought he was Cantinflas, the popular Mexican movie star, by the attention, smiles, and cheery greetings people gave him.
"You probably can’t tell us a whole lot about Los Lobos, but we need to find out all we can," Kane said.
"Why would you think that I can’t tell you about Los Lobos? My brother Silverio knows more about them, but I can tell you a lot."
"I thought you might not be able to tell us anything because of your vow to guard the secrets of the confessional."
"Válgame. What secrets? I know a hundred Lobos and not one has ever come to me to confess his sins, or for anything else. They’re worse than any godless pagan. They're mercenary devils who cause more fear, suffering, and violence in my barrio than the VD."
Kane told the priest the details of the kidnapping, but left out the partners' ambush of the kidnappers.
"This is nothing new," Father Garcia said. "Rodriguez and his Lobos have raided on both sides of the border for over a year. Simply put, they catch young girls and boys and sell them. Any child, from a toddler to a teenager, can be sold to an illegal adoption agency, a chain of whorehouses, or into abject slavery. Los Lobos have also found a worldwide market for young people who are used as subjects for rape and snuff movies. One of the main clearinghouses for the market is rumored to be in Huatabampo, and the Lobos gangsters are its main providers of subjects, or victims."
"What’s a snuff movie?" Vogel asked.
"A film in which the subject is raped or put through some other act of torture. His or her life is slowly snuffed out for the pleasure of the audience."
"But who would buy such a film?" Vogel asked.
"My brother Silverio tells me that a lucrative market exists for them. The Lobos have also found a black market for human organs. It is said that some of the young people they kidnap are sacrificed to provide organs for transplant."
Father Garcia told Kane and Vogel that Los Lobos also killed for hire. They kidnapped for ransom. They were burglars. They had taken over Nogales’s world-renowned pickpocket school. They cruised the border to mug and rob families who tried to cross illegally in search of jobs. The families seldom reported the crimes. Los Lobos also preyed on these vulnerable people for training and practice.
"I would never have believed they were so competent or ambitious," Kane said. "The Lion and I jump some of them from time to time and handle them easily." He decided again that he better not tell the priest that he, Vogel, and the Lion had just slaughtered a whole pack of Lobos who had taken their girls.
"The Lobos who rustle cattle are apprentices. They rustle and mug cattle and people for drill, for practice. Rustling entails stealth to catch the animal, efficient killing ability, and intelligence, strength, and stamina enough to transport a heavy product to the market. To rustle, Los Lobos go out on the ranches barehanded and afoot. They are given a few bullets and a small caliber weapon so they can stun a beef enough to cut its throat. On a kidnapping run, or to kill, they have sniper rifles and Uzis and all the ammunition they need. Rumor has it that they are given commando training in hidden camps in the Sierra Madre and in the heavy brush country of the coastal desert."
Silverio Garcia, the ministerio publico of Rio Alamos, walked out of the hospital with his wife while the partners and his brother were talking. The priest went to greet them and bring them to Kane and Vogel. Silverio must have sensed that Kane and Vogel wanted to talk about something he did not want his spouse to hear, because he took her back inside and returned alone. The four men strolled on the hospital grounds while Kane told Silverio about the trouble.
Silverio had changed a lot since the day Ali had introduced him to Kane, before his first radiology treatment. His face was drawn and wasted, his skin much darker. He had black circles under his eyes. His movements were aged and slow.
"How do you feel, sir?" Kane asked.
"Not good. But I was warned that the radiology would sap my strength," Silverio said.