The Dogs of Mexico

by John J. Asher

  “Divorced. A long time ago.” He saw by her one raised eyebrow that she doubted him.

  “Children?” she asked.

  He said nothing, but gazed down the highway ahead.

  “Well,” she said after a moment. “That rang your bell.”

  Still he said nothing.

  “I went into the Peace Corps right after college,” she offered. “I was in Guatemala for a time.”

  He wondered if she and Helmut were affiliated with the Company. The Peace Corps, working for Fowler—it was a logical assumption.

  The countryside grew more rugged. More primitive. A smoky haze blanketed the mountains from the slash-and-burn farming.

  “Look at that,” he said, gesturing at a mountain slope where a man struggled behind an ox-drawn plow. “How can anybody make a living farming those little patches? We waste more than that along the turn-row.”

  She gave him a quizzical look. “Turn-row?”

  “You’ve got to get in and out of the field, turn around, get from one side to the other with tractor and equipment. You go around the fence line, the turn-row.”

  “How do you know about farming?”

  “I worked a little land once.”

  Ana studied him across the seat. “You don’t look like a farmer.”

  “No? What, you expect some barefoot hayseed munching on a straw?”

  “How long have you been selling boats?”

  “Not long. Why?”

  “Your hands. They don’t belong to a salesman.”

  “I don’t look like a farmer. I don’t look like a salesman. Actually I’m a Krispy Kreme representative down here to undermine the tortilla industry.”

  She lightened, a trace of a smile. “I think you’re a standup comedian.”

  “Where are you two staying in Acapulco?”

  “We haven’t any plans, not that I know of.”

  “You live a hell of a life.”

  She was about to reply, but Helmut stirred and began to stretch awake. Ana gazed down the road ahead, silently fingering the buttons on her shirt.

  Robert glanced in the rearview mirror as Helmut took his glasses from his pocket and polished them on his handkerchief. Without glasses his eyes looked small and weak, unrelievedly sad. Robert wondered whether he might have been awake, faking sleep, listening all along.

  IN LATE AFTERNOON they began to see coconut palms. The air freshened with the smell of the sea. They drove into Acapulco, sunlight slanting sharply through the palms.

  “So, where can I drop you?” Robert asked.

  Ana looked over the seat at Helmut.

  Helmut shrugged at Robert. “Can you recommend a hotel?”

  “I don’t know this town at all.”

  “Really? Where are you staying then?”

  Robert smiled inwardly. “Acapulco Princess. I bet you’d like it there. Right?”

  Helmut shrugged again. “Sounds agreeable.”

  “Sounds expensive,” Ana said.

  “It is only one night,” Helmut said. “We will take the bus to Tapachula tomorrow.”

  Ana looked at Robert, a small frown. “That okay with you?”

  “Why not?” He nodded at the glovebox. “There’s promo material from the Acapulco Princess with directions. If you’ll be good enough to navigate.”

  She took the folder out and they followed the highway around the bay. Flashes of the azure-blue Pacific glimmered between Miami-style hotels and Spanish Colonials. Coconut palms shot up around them like lazy explosions.

  The Acapulco Princess stood silhouetted against the sea in the shape of an Aztec pyramid. Robert drove in and stopped on the tarmac under the entrance canopy. Half a dozen uniformed bellmen rushed forward, opening doors, snatching up their luggage. Robert removed his two carry-ons and the military document case with its projector from the garbage bags in the trunk. A valet took his keys and tore off a receipt for the parking.

  The hotel’s interior boasted a vast pyramidal atrium. Balconies around each of fourteen floors tiered up over the concourse, converging at the top in a spectacular skylight. Intricate streams and waterfalls gurgled throughout the enormous complex. The guide’s promotional material declared: there are three Aztec-inspired buildings on 480 acres overlooking Revolcadero Beach, a wide choice of restaurants and bars, five freeform swimming pools, and a golf course. Not to mention gardens with swans, flamingos and tropical birds. Only the reception desk looked even remotely businesslike.

  Helmut stopped near a canister ashtray and lit a cigarette. One of the bellmen waited nearby with their luggage cart while the other went with Robert and Ana to check in.

  “It’s impressive,” Robert said. “But I like the old Hotel Victoria better.”

  “This is so glitzy,” Ana said, gazing about with an amused expression.

  Robert laughed. Then, studying her intently, “I’m glad you didn’t insist on the bus.”

  Her smile faltered. She turned quickly and began the business of signing in. The registrar handed the bellman their keycards.

  “Any messages?” Robert asked.

  The registrar glanced at the name he had signed on the ledger—Otis T. Baker—checked it on his computer, then took an envelope from under the counter and handed it over. Robert glanced at it, laid a five-dollar bill alongside the ledger and put the envelope in his pocket.

  He followed Ana, Helmut, and the bellmen past a row of boutique shops to an annex where they all took an elevator up to the fifth floor. One of the bellmen opened a door off the hallway for Ana and Helmut. Robert took out his wallet but Ana placed her hand on his. “No,” she said. “I’ll get the tip.” Her hand felt hot.

  “No way,” Robert said. “You already bought the gas.”

  Helmut took a last drag, his gaze lingering on them a moment before burying his cigarette butt in a hall canister.

  Ana released Robert’s hand and unzipped her purse, but he had already pressed a few bills on the bellmen.

  “Well, good-bye then,” Ana said. “And thanks again for the lift.” She paused in the doorway. “Oh, and good luck with your client,” she added, and disappeared inside.

  Helmut loomed toward Robert with a thick grin, the solid mass of his body disturbing Ana’s faintly lingering woman-scent in Robert’s personal space. “Danke schön. Alles Gute,” Helmut said. He pumped Robert’s hand energetically. Victoriously, Robert thought.

  13

  Contact

  THE ENVELOPE CONTAINED a yellow Post-it note, the number 627 printed on it with a ballpoint pen. Nothing else. Robert tossed it on the table, ordered a bottle of brandy from room service, then unpacked and hung up his clothes.

  Now that he had a chance to check the equipment for a transmitter, he looked the camera over. He took the rear plate off the projector. At first he saw nothing. Then, at the bottom, attached to the inside of the case alongside the lens, a disk twice the thickness of a quarter caught his eye, a thin wire soldered to the housing. Good old Duane Fowler. Well, there was nothing to be gained by removing it. Not at the moment anyway.

  When the bellman arrived with his brandy, Robert tipped him, poured an inch into one of the water glasses and drank it down. He showered and dressed, then washed the clothes he had worn from Taxco in the bathtub and hung them up to dry.

  The red snapper he ordered downstairs in the Beach Club Restaurant and Bar was only so-so and overpriced. He realized he was watching the concourse through the restaurant’s windows for Ana and Helmut. He wasn’t sure whether it was because he felt vulnerable with them out of sight, or whether it was something more to do with Ana. After coffee and a nicely caramelized flan, he returned to his room and dialed the number, 627.

  A man answered. “Ye’llo?”

  “Otis T. Baker here.”

  “Good, boy. Good. C’mon up.”

  Robert clipped the holstered gun under his Hawaiian shirt, hung the haversack containing the gutted projector over his shoulder and made sure the door locked on his way out.


  A young girl wearing low-rider cutoffs embroidered with flowers, hearts, and rainbows opened the door to room 627. Her camisole was armored with tin buttons: Kiss a Toad, I’m Almost Famous, Vote for Coke. Her chopped green and orange hair looked like a bad shag rug from the ’70s. Her eyes were heavily outlined in black, some goth thing. A half circle of earrings decorated the perimeter of one ear; a brass key hung from the lobe. She wore a clutter of costume jewelry, cheap beads and bracelets.

  “Otis Baker,” he said, rechecking the Post-it.

  The girl chewed gum, smiling with her mouth open. “Hey, chill.” Calling him chill. She jerked both thumbs up in an A-okay gesture of approval, nails lacquered black, sprinkled with silver glitter. The upper half of an angel tattoo stood up behind the top button on her cutoffs; a gold ring in her navel served as its halo.

  On the bed behind sat a middle-age man in cargo shorts and a guayabera shirt. He squinted at Robert from under the bill of a Houston Astros baseball cap, the stub of an unlit cigar in his mouth.

  “C’mon in,” he said, getting up, coming across the room, taking the cigar out of his mouth. He grinned, exposing an uneven row of yellowed teeth, eyeing Robert closely as they shook hands. “Soffit here. Nice t’meet you, boy. Nice t’meet you. Mickey, say hello to Mr. Baker.”

  The girl swayed and dipped her chin, looking at Robert from under a lowered brow. “Ace,” she said, holding forth her hand with a jingling of bracelets. “Strokes.”

  Robert shook her hand, a quizzical glance at Soffit.

  Soffit laughed, a series of big ringing bursts. “That’s the kinda talk they learn ’em in school these days. Takes awhile to ketch on.”

  “Strictly Waldo,” Mickey said, jerking her thumb at Soffit in an affectionate manner, smiling her openmouthed, gum-chewing smile.

  “Mickey,” Soffit said, “there’s money on the dresser there. Go downstairs and get yourself a milkshake or something.”

  “Split.” She took a bill from several on the dresser, then hesitated in the doorway, giving Robert another once-over. “Bootylicious,” she said, snapping her gum. Then she was gone, jingling like a Gypsy.

  Robert gave Soffit a questioning look.

  Soffit laughed again. “Compliment. Can’t get no better’n that.”

  “What does she have to do with this deal?”

  “Picked ’er up down in Colombia. Crazy kid, run off down there on a lark and couldn’t get back. You know kids.” He laughed the big laugh again.

  The apprehension that had overtaken Robert grew. He wondered again if Fowler might be slipping a little, working with drunks like Helmut and loose cannons like this Soffit.

  “Hey, don’t worry bout it,” Soffit said dismissively. “She’s been a help, crewing on my boat, but she’s getting off here, going home to mama.”

  “I don’t like it.”

  Soffit’s grin dried up. “You ain’t getting paid to like it. You’re getting paid to deliver.”

  Robert narrowed his eyes on Soffit, a moment of studied silence. “Since when do you know what I get paid for?”

  Soffit’s demeanor changed again. “Aw, hell now. Let’s don’t be getting off on the wrong foot here.” He took a bottle of Wild Turkey from on top of the room refrigerator. “See that big backpack over yonder? That’s ’er stuff. She’s on the road, back home to Berkley.” He poured an inch into each of two plastic glasses. “Here. Have a drank. It’ll lighten you up a little.”

  “I don’t want a drink. I want to get that canister and clear out of here.”

  “Well, now. That’s something else.” Drink in hand, Soffit pulled his cap low over his eyes, squinting from under the bill as he moved back near the bed. “There’s been a little alteration in plans here. I want you to make a little side trip to Oaxaca. Deliver something to a feller name of Valdez at the Hotel Camino Real there. There’s twenty big ones in it for you.”

  Robert stared. “Twenty big ones? You are kidding, right?”

  “Well, shit. I don’t know what kinda money you get then. I thought it was fair enough for a couple a day’s work.”

  “What’s the delivery?”

  “Pitchers.”

  “Pitchers?”

  “Yeah. Buncha fuckin A-rabs. This guy Valdez, he says they’re terrorists.”

  “Photos?”

  “Yeah. Fuckin A-rabs.”

  “Who’s this Valdez?”

  “Beats me. I don’t even know how he knew I had them pitchers anyhow.”

  “How did you get them?”

  Soffit darkened. “That ain’t important.”

  “The hell it’s not. Deliver them yourself.”

  “I would but I ain’t goin that direction. Besides, I think I’m being watched.”

  Robert felt his pulse jump.

  “Well, I ain’t sure of it,” Soffit added.

  “You want me to drop everything and go off to the middle of nowhere to deliver your pictures because you can’t do it? Because you’re being watched?” Robert studied him in disbelief. “Do I look that stupid?”

  “Aw, shit, now. Don’t go getting your panties in a twist. Tell you what; how ’bout I give you ten myself, then you get another twenty from Valdez when you deliver in Oaxaca. Hell, that’s thirty-thousand smackers, all told.”

  “Our man Flax, he know about this?”

  “Naw, shit, I come by it on my own. This is just between us. You’n me.”

  Robert set his fists on his hips. “Listen, I’m taking that canister and you and your pitchers can go to hell.”

  Soffit darkened, a sharp intake of breath. “No, you listen. I gotta get back to Costa Rica. You don’t deliver them pitchers, them sons-a-bitching terrorists are gonna walk.”

  “That’s your problem.”

  “What, you got no sense of patriotism?”

  “I look like a Boy Scout to you?”

  “Hold on here. Let me show you something.” Soffit turned and snapped open an oversize aluminum briefcase on the bed. The case was wall-to-wall with paper-strapped bundles of hundred-dollar bills packed tight around a rectangular package taped in blue plastic—probably the canister. By the time Robert realized there was a handgun in the case, Soffit had swung it around, jacking the slider back, cocking it in the same motion.

  “Here,” Soffit said, casually taking a pack of money in his free hand, holding the gun on Robert with his other. “One hunnerd hunnert-dollar bills. Ten big uns.”

  Robert looked at the semiautomatic, at Soffit. “So, I don’t take your pictures, you’re going to shoot me. Right here. The entire hotel will come pouring in here in about two seconds, then what?”

  “You not only got a chance to rack up some easy cash, you can do something for the good old US of A. This Valdez feller, he’s gonna run them pitchers through some kinda face-and-eye-recognition-scan deal and post em internationally so they can nail them sons a bitches.”

  “Last time. Give me the canister.”

  Soffit took out a cell phone. “I’ll call this Valdez. Talk to him yourself. He’ll guarantee the twenty on his end.”

  “How about I call Flax and you tell him your troubles.”

  Soffit withdrew the phone. “Okay, I’m gonna level with you. I don’t get them pitchers delivered, this Valdez, he’s gonna give me a serious case of headache.”

  Robert turned to the door.

  Soffit followed. “I’m telling you, goddammit. I’m hauling ass outta here come morning. You want that container, you take them pitchers to Valdez in Oaxaca.”

  Robert neither looked back nor answered but went directly to the elevator.

  “You know where to find me,” Soffit shouted after him.

  A THIRTY-SOMETHING woman and a sixtyish man, both wearing black trousers, red vests, and crisp white shirts stood elbow to elbow behind the registration desk in the Princess’s lobby.

  “You two on duty all night?” Robert asked.

  “Yes,” said the woman. “How may I assist you?”

  Robert took out his wal
let. “You have a Mr. Soffit in room six-twenty-seven.” He placed two hundred-dollar bills on the counter, holding them in place with the flat of his hand. “Please, will you call me immediately if Mr. Soffit decides to check out? I’m Baker, room five–zero–five.”

  The registrars looked at the bills. They exchanged glances. The man checked his computer. “It is no problem,” he said. “We will take care of it.”

  Robert slid the bills across the counter, one to each. “The minute he checks out.”

  “Yes. Of course.”

  “Gracias, señorita, señor. Right now, I’m going back there to the Laguna Bar.”

  THE LAGUNA, an open-air bar of rattan and bamboo, bordered a lagoon at the rear of the hotel’s concourse. Working on a Jack Daniel’s, Robert was only vaguely aware of the piped mariachi music blending softly with the murmur of designer waterfalls.

  He realized he was again keeping an eye on the concourse, looking for Ana and Helmut even as he reflected on Fowler’s duplicitous nature and Soffit’s cash. It rankled him that Soffit was playing the patriot, claiming the moral high ground. Soffit’s yellow grin brought to mind the crocodile on the restaurant wall back in Mexico City, how it had struck him as a bad omen.

  He looked at the drink on the bar, thinking the beggar back in Mexico City could live several days on what this one drink cost. He recalled the beggar’s child, and then Nick—Tricia wrestling him into his winter jacket that last morning, chasing after him when he broke away and ran to Robert in his eagerness to be off to the pasture in the pickup to feed the sheep. That was the last time Robert remembered Trish smiling. Occasionally he tried to recall what she was like before, but he had thought on it all so much he was no longer sure what was real and what he might have imagined. The only inescapable reality was that Nick was dead. That was the one unalterable fact. And he, Robert, was responsible. There was that. Always.

  Robert sighed. He knew now what he was going to do. He would call on Soffit, take the canister and Soffit’s cash as well. Two revenges were better than one.

  Serve Soffit right, pulling a gun like that.