Oh, hush, says Ruby. Nobody's shooting anybody.
You have to do it, says Lord God. He coughs blood again and struggles to breathe.
Ruby asks him what happened to the water jugs.
I gave them to the migrants. They were thirsty.
But you don't have any water yourself. There's barely a trickle left from the well.
Lord God makes a noncommittal motion with his bloodshot eyes. He starts to raise his hand and lets it drop. What does it matter anyway? Soon I don't think I'm going to need anything to drink.
Don't say that. You're going to get better. You're just under the weather.
We're all under the weather, says Lord God. Some more than others.
S t a n d i n g a t t h e s t r e a k e d and dusty windows of his pawnshop, watching the traffic rumble and roll down Northern Avenue, Hiram Page is in a blue funk, experiencing a crisis of belief. The iron bars that protect the shop windows from vandals and thieves cast shadows across Hiram's white hair and dignified face, as if he's staring out the windows of his own Folsom Prison.
He's always believed in his inherent superiority. Always thought he was top dog. Not the kind of seer or genius whose quotes he memorizes to trump whatever scant knowledge his customers might presume to attain, but savvy enough.
His intellectual competition includes the strays who wander through a pawnshop on any given day. That's not a high bar to clear. Consider the sad sacks, burnouts, disgruntleds, lowlifes, snaggletooths, and food- stamp misfits among whom he mingles. Bottom feeders. Most of them are lucky to button their shirts in order. If they can pay their power bill it's an accomplishment of note.
But of late a pack rat of worry has crept into his brain and made a nest.
For one thing he has come to suspect it may be time for the Wagon. He rejects the idea that alcoholism is a disease. Dylan Thomas had it right: An alcoholic is someone you don't like who drinks as much as you do. Of course Thomas was a famous drunk who died in a tavern, falling off his bar stool dead. A happy man you might say.
Hiram is not an indiscriminate, wayward sort of tippler. He likes his bourbon. It makes him feel good. It loosens up the bolts that keep him in place. When it wears off, the bolts are still there, still as tight as ever. He thinks the fools who attend AA meetings and make a public spectacle of themselves are losers and deadbeats. Any man with a strong sense of discipline knows when to stop, when he's had enough.
Lately Hiram does have his suspicions. Could be his time to call a dry spell is nigh. He worries that some of his decisions may perhaps have been made with a clouded mind. This kidnapping caper with Cousin Jack is not an action of which he should be proud. He takes another drink from his silver flask of Maker's Mark and savors the warm mist in his mouth. Still. If all had gone well the plan would have been a stroke of genius.
He rinses the smell with mouthwash and spits into the sink, telling himself that it's time to turn over a new leaf. Tomorrow will be different. The cobwebs are thick. At times his mind is cloudy. He forgets things.
What he does remember is that he instructed Cousin Jack Brown to waylay the child of that preacher's daughter. Which may or may not have been a wise move. But after repeated and unreturned calls to that hillbilly's cell phone he has come to the conclusion that said cousin is slightly more unreliable and incompetent than he imagined. He hasn't made his monthly payment and he refused to do what Hiram asked? A simple favor that any nitwit could accomplish? Who does he think he is? A nobody who can defy Hiram without retribution?
At the end of the business day Hiram asks Gracie Benavidez, his store manager, for a ride to the east side of town.
I have an unfortunate errand, he says. A client is several months behind on his payments. I believe I have to take custody of a vehicle under loan.
Gracie is too soft for this job. A motherly Hispanic woman in her forties, she gets a look of tender sadness on her face as she stares at her boss.
You're going to repo it?
I'm afraid so, Gracie. I'm afraid so.
I don't have to do anything, do I?
Hiram closes his eyes and shakes his head. He's a little unsteady on his feet, and perhaps he shouldn't be bothering with this errand at the moment, but he has a busy day planned tomorrow. His second wife, Honey, has a doctor's appointment. It ap pears the nubile young woman is with child again. And Hiram insists on doing the right thing and attending the doctor's visits, sitting beside her in the waiting room, holding her hand if need be.
In his deep Gregory Peck voice he says, If you can see fit to drop me off at the home of said vehicle, I'll be on my way and you on yours.
Well, okay, says Gracie. She gets her purse and heads for the front door. But I feel sorry for him, you know? No one wants his car to be taken away. What do you do without a car? You're like a nobody. Like less than nobody.
A man has to pay his bills, says Hiram. That's one of those unfortunate facts of life. If not, they come and take away what you have.
Still, says Gracie, I don't like it.
It's not the end of the world. He comes up with the payments, he gets the truck back.
Gracie says nothing on the drive to Jack Brown's house. Sitting in the passenger seat, Hiram feels emasculated and out of sorts. He's not used to the right side of a vehicle, to not being in control. The odd position, plus the bourbon fuzz on his brain and tongue, takes him back in time.
He remembers riding the bus to school, so many years ago, sitting next to a red- haired girl named Gail. He floats off on the currents of that memory, how they had a caterpillar exhibit in their sixth grade classroom, a gallon jar full of leaves and green caterpillars, how he liked to stand next to the comely teacher as she explained the life cycle of a moth— the pupae, the larvae, the cocoon, the big unfolding.
What was Gail's last name? McCarthy? Gail McCarthy? Yes, that's it. Red hair like soft copper. Hair the same color and luster as that of the preacher's daughter. Who doesn't want a thing to do with him. Whom he wanted to marry and keep in his bed and home. Who thinks he's disgusting no doubt and makes fun of him to her friends. Can you believe that old fart? That's what she says. What a lech he is. I wouldn't touch him with a ten- foot pole. That's what Ruby Cole says to her friend. Ruby Cole, who reminds him of Gail McCarthy. Who deserves to be taken down a notch. Who is unworthy.
Where do I turn? asks Gracie.
Hiram blinks out of his reverie as the car idles at a traffic light before the concrete pillars of I- 25. Out his window a shantytown with cardboard- box people scuttling among the pigeon flutter and whine of tires on asphalt. Grimy hard- luck lost souls stare and hold makeshift signs asking for food or work.
Mr. Page? I know it's not my business but I can't help saying something. You shouldn't be doing this. It's not right.
Hiram turns away from the overpass denizens and their reenactment of Christ's birth night in Bethlehem. He looks in the visor mirror and smooths his white hair beside his ears.
It's not a matter of right and wrong, he says. The boy has failed to make his monthly payments. He's three months in arrears now. Three months.
Yes, well. I understand that, says Gracie. But this is America. A man needs his car. Needs wheels to get around.
He could have paid me on time. I don't like doing this either.
In this country, without wheels you're not even a man. And you're about to take them away.
Hiram says nothing to that, watching the world go by from this odd spot on the passenger side. East of I- 25 Pueblo takes on a dilapidated and dusty look. Tumbleweeds cluster against weathered storefronts. Spanish signs advertise Coca- Cola and bread. Beneath the billboard proclaiming Se compra casas feas, Hiram directs Gracie to pull over.
The white pickup sits in front of Jack Brown's shotgun shack just asking to be reclaimed. A German shepherd gets to its feet and heads toward them, barking, chain rattling as it scrapes on the wooden porch steps.
Don't do it, Mr. Page. Gracie shakes her head. It's going to come
back to haunt you. I'm warning you. It's bad mojo.
Don't you worry, Gracie. Hiram steps out of the car and takes the keys from his pocket. Things like this happen every day.
She frowns and says good- bye, her expression pained and flinching. A shrug as she rolls up her window. Hiram stands on the road shoulder, waiting for her car to move so he can cross the street. He watches his distorted reflection in her window glass, a stretched- out image of a white- haired man alone in a bad neighborhood.
Maybe she's right. Maybe he should just let this one go. But if he did that, no one would respect him, right? He needs to make an example with Cousin Jack. You don't miss payments and leave your vehicle parked in the drive without a guard. A dog on a short chain isn't good enough.
The cold November air cuts through Hiram's linen shirt. A white coral reef of clouds casts a pall of chill. At a break in the traffic flow Hiram hurries across the street, reaching into his pocket for the keys. Jack Brown's cur barks and scrabbles at the end of his chain, cutting side to side like a snagged sailfish. The curtains are drawn. Hiram unlocks the truck door, slides into the driver's seat, and has the engine running in a heartbeat, expecting Cousin Jack to come running out in his underwear, waving a gun most likely, shouting all their business to the low- life neighbors in hope of a sympathetic mob.
It isn't until Hiram has pulled onto the road that he allows himself to glance back. The front door is closed, the dog still barks. At the stop sign a block later, he checks the rearview and sees no movement behind him.
Still his heart pounds and he guns the truck through a series of yellow lights, feeling short of breath and light- headed, feeling as if he's stealing the coffin for his own funeral.
I s r a e l J a m e s s i t s n a k e d in the back of the buffalo head's office. He watches out the windows through a gap in the Venetian blinds, pensive and guilt- ridden. Down inside where it matters, he knows his soul is corrupt. He even suspects that one day, perhaps in the not- too- distant future, he will burn in the everlasting fires and torments of hell. But seeing how he's not exactly a saint to begin with, the underworld might be full of compadres.
The motel manager, Denise, aka Fufu, sits beside him on the
worn dog- brown sofa, her dirty- blond hair mashed flat on one side and a mess of split ends catching the late- day light like an alcoholic halo. She wears a loved- up look on her pie- pan face, half a lazy smile on her lips, sweetly swollen now and asking for more. Elray tells himself that he has to quit this woman but he just can't. She won't win a mother- of- the- year award but then, nobody's perfect. Her virtue is prickly as cactus but her nipples are like velvet sombreros.
He knows himself to be a career criminal, lovewise. When he sauntered into the lobby an hour before, he was all business. He rang the bell on the counter and when she appeared, he said, Afternoon, ma'am. Sheriff said there were municipal violations taking place in the Buffalo Head and told me I better ride over to do some undercover work.
He did, did he?
He did.
But Fufu was the one who pulled his belt loops and led him toward the inner office, walking backward, unbuttoning her blouse, saying, Perhaps I was going over the speed limit, Officer? She licked her lips and slid her hand down her shirt, popping the snap buttons one by one. Is there anything we can do so that little old me doesn't have to pay some nasty old fine?
O, sweet Lord, he said. You do make it hard to uphold the law.
From the lobby came the babble of Diego, Fufu's eighteen- month- old, penned in a plastic crib with mesh walls. He tugged at an electronic mobile of airplanes. The batteries were dead and, after a few minutes of batting the arms of the mobile in a circle, he yanked it loose. Soon he busied himself with methodically taking apart the wings. Meanwhile, in the back office, on the ratty brown sofa, his mother bit Elray's ears and squirmed in his lap like she was getting a tooth pulled without anesthesia.
That afternoon Elray is called to investigate the firebombing of an adult bookstore. He walks out to untie Apache, drowsy with the late- afternoon heat and the lingering of Fufu in his blood. The wind has picked up since morning. A high- pitched whine follows his every move as he puts his boot in the stirrup and swings onto Apache, patting her neck and telling her he's sorry to be moving in weather like this but he has a job to do and he can't sit on his ass in the back office of a motel fornicating all day.
The air is colored a dim brown, a khaki haze making the sun up high no stronger than a streetlight at dusk. The wind buffets a wall of grit and paper trash into which Elray rides, down the alley behind the Buffalo Head Inn, beside the train tracks. Apache nickers and bucks her head, cantering sideways as he urges her into the stinging murk. Migrant squatters living in the boxcars go about their business, some of the children waving, the women pretending not to see him. A couple of kids not more than nine years old each push a shopping cart full of recyclable cans and bottles, an old desktop computer monitor atop the mess, its cables and wires hanging like robot tentacles.
He skirts a newly formed shantytown of illegals and refugees, labeled by a bright red, white, and green banner stretched between two telephone poles that sports the legend aquí empieza la patria. The squatters are mainly Latinos from the East and South, construction workers and laborers who have left the suburbs of Georgia and Florida. Left or been chased out. The South is driving out its Mexicans, by hook or by crook. All the extra work has dried up, the locals saying it's now returning to a place that looks halfway like home. Or a halfway home for a fallen world. A small crowd of smiling boys trots beside Apache, chanting, Monedas, por favor! Monedas, para comida! Por favor, señor! Tenemos hambre!
They want coins for food.
Lo siento, says Elray. Apache clops on the pockmarked pavement. Sorry, kids. I got a job to do here.
They don't respond. A half- dozen boys reach up their hands, pleading, Por favor! Monedas! Monedas! One of the boys shouts, A dónde va? He stands in Apache's way. The boy is maybe thirteen years old, his hair cut short and jagged, one eye swollen as if from a punch. He wears a bandanna over his mouth, a Texas Tech hoodie. Dame la pasta! he shouts, scampering backward, holding a tree- branch spear, its tip whittled to a sharp point. He makes as if to stab Apache, shouting, Le falta permisión pasar! The horse doesn't stop but slows, raises her head, and nickers. Elray gives a slight tug on the reins. He pats her neck as she sidesteps, avoiding the boy.
Escuchame, muchacho, says Elray. Soy la policía.
No me importa, says the boy. You listen to me, he adds in English. I am king of this street. Soy el rey. Give me five dollars and you pass.
More boys gather as he speaks, massing behind him. All wear ragged clothes and hold baseball bats, pool cues, or tire irons. They wear bandannas as face masks, like a ragtag group of child outlaws with no trains or banks left to rob.
Apache flares her nostrils and pins her ears. Elray strokes her neck and pauses, staring down the little gang. He tells them he can't be paying five dollars to pass every street. It's his job to patrol this road. They're in his way.
You little gang o' pissants had better move, he says. Now. While I'm still smiling.
It's early evening, a bite of coolness already in the air. Behind the boys a woman burns scrap two- by- fours in a campfire, the orange flames casting the boys' shadows across Apache. The tang of wood smoke smarts in Elray's eyes.
No puede tocarnos, says the boy. Five dollars or you do not pass.
Elray asks his name. Dime tu nombre, rey.
Me llamo Balthazar Cardenas. Eres estupido si no lo sabes.
Some of the other boys laugh. Most don't. Apache shakes her head and does not want to go forward. The crowd is over twenty strong. Some have machetes.
Pues, Balthazar. Quieres conocer la carcél?
He shrugs. No tengo miedo. Tengo amigos allá! The campfire flares as the cooking woman stokes it. The sharp air smells of diesel exhaust and wood smoke. One of the boys takes off running and several are talking so softly Elray can'
t make out what they're saying. Balthazar's face is lost in shadow. Somos reconquistadores, says Balthazar. Tenemos hambre, he repeats. You got some food, horse cop? he adds in English.
Claro, says Elray. Hay tortas en los cojones de mi caballo.
Balthazar jabs his spear and strikes Apache's nose.
The horse flinches and snorts. A boy grabs at the reins as another leaps into the air and reaches for Elray's pistol in its holster. Apache veers to the right, knocking one of them to the ground, and the boys scamper backward. They hurl rocks at horse and rider. Apache rolls her head back and twists to turn around. Elray struggles to control her, and before he has time to pull his sidearm, he hears a sharp sound and suddenly feels dizzy.
The boys are shouting, throwing chunks of loose asphalt from the potholed road. Elray's forehead is wet and warm, and his right eye feels funny, buzzing and gone dark. Apache wheels around and bolts away from the group, into the shaggy lawn of an abandoned apartment complex, before Elray manages to regain control. Sitting astride Apache with only one eye working, he pats her neck to calm her, passing a Dumpster littered with old mattresses and stinking plastic bags of trash. His heart pumps wild and fast. Right eye swollen shut and face streaked with blood from a scalp wound. Like a cyclops he is, and will be, and will have to explain how he's been bested by a gang of junior high reconquistadores, bless their black hearts.
The Bird Saviors Page 23
