Dressed in khaki jumpsuits and straw hats, hundreds of laborers toiled beneath a blistering New Mexico sun in fields that stretched to the horizon beyond the main compound. Music blared from the loudspeakers. A ten-foot-wide irrigation ditch brimming with water bisected the maze of fields. Spears of sunlight reflected off the water.
No water rationing here, Diego thought.
Cutbirth was outside the Winnebago pumping diesel when a rack-of-bones Asian man darted past him, dashed through the motor home’s open door, then vaulted up the stairs. The man was wearing white boxer shorts. No shoes. No shirt. Bloody whelps crisscrossed his chest and back. Diego guessed he was about 30. His face was gaunt and the skin covering his shoulder blades was so taut it appeared the bones were ready to poke through. His lips were cracked and bleeding.
Standing at the top of the stairs, the man chattered loudly in some Asian tongue, his dark eyes darting from one person to the next, his hands making all sorts of chaotic gestures. Seated in the galley, Diego was reading the Chronicle online. He jumped to his feet at the man’s sudden appearance. The man pointed toward the main compound and shouted again.
Yong and Sam had been playing Scrabble on the sofa. They got to their feet and moved away from the man, who looked more dead than alive.
In labored English—his arms extended, palms up—the man cried, “Help me!”
Sissy and Emily had been puttering around in the kitchen when the man hurtled up the stairs and into the old coach. They now stood like wide-eyed statues, staring at the skin-and-bones man.
The man cried out again, raised one foot off the floor and pointed at it.
“What’s he saying, Kim?” Henry asked in an excited voice.
Yong Kim goggled at Henry. “How the hell should I know? I’m Korean, not Chinese.”
Adriana had been resting in the smaller bedroom. When she heard the man’s shouts, she emerged from the bedroom. Seeing the man, she gasped and stood in the hallway dumbfounded.
The man took a faltering step forward. He seemed unsure of what he should do next. His voice filled with desperation, a strand of spittle hanging from his mouth, his eyes swept over each of them. He screamed again. “Help me!”
“What can we do?” Diego asked, making eye contact with the frantic man. “How can we help you?”
“I think you’d better get off our motor home,” Henry told the man from his place on the sofa, milking his goatee. “We don’t want any trouble.” The pup growled from beneath Henry’s legs.
Diego said, “Can’t you see this man needs help, Henry?”
“He shouldn’t be here!” Henry blurted.
Diego turned back toward the man just as two uniformed Chinese soldiers boarded the bus. They wore olive-green uniforms and matching baseball caps with yellow stars above the bills. Screaming in what Diego guessed was Chinese, they made threatening gestures toward the haggard man with their long wooden batons. When the half-naked man failed to respond to the soldiers’ commands—he backed quickly from the front of the bus into the living room—the Chinese guards rushed over to where he stood, battering him about the head and shoulders with their batons and screaming furiously. One of the soldiers—he wore thick glasses that gave him frog eyes—battered the man’s thighs and legs. The other soldier took aim at the man’s arms and head. Their assault was perfectly choreographed.
Everyone scrambled to stay out of the way. Everyone except Diego. He stepped forward and raised his hands. “Stop! You’ll kill him!”
The frog-eyed soldier looked at Diego and raised his baton in a threatening manner. “He bad man! He run way! You sit down!”
From the hallway Adriana pleaded, “No, Diego! Do as the guard says!”
Rosie had been asleep in the back bedroom, but now she stood in the bedroom doorway, her mouth agape. All the blood had drained from her face. She brought her hands together, closed her eyes, and began praying.
Diego made eye contact with the cadaverous man. Diego saw something in the man’s eyes he could only describe as bona fide horror. When the man reached out, Diego did the same. Their two hands came within inches of touching. Diego withdrew his hand when the frog-eyed soldier swiped at it with his baton.
As the Chinese soldiers continued to pummel the hollow-eyed man with their batons—they were dragging him toward the door—the pup ducked out from beneath Henry’s legs and went on the attack. Bearing his milk teeth, the angry mutt dashed across the living room floor and attached his jaws to the pant-leg of the bespectacled soldier. With the fabric firmly gripped between its teeth, growling in anger, the pup shook his head furiously.
Startled, the soldier instinctively brought his wooden baton down upon the pup’s head. The swift deathblow made a terrible cracking sound. The pup uttered a short yip and dropped to the living room floor lifeless, eyes open, his tongue protruding from his mouth.
Henry went off like a stick of dynamite, leaping to his feet in an incandescent fit of rage. “YOU BASTARD!” he shrieked.
It wasn’t clear whether Henry sought to rescue the pup or attack the soldier, and as he approached, the frog-eyed soldier drew back his wooden baton and let loose a mighty, side-armed blow. The heavy club struck Henry squarely in the forehead. Blood splattered from the deep hairline wound—fire-red droplets spayed onto the ceiling—and Henry slumped to the floor unconscious beside the pup. His body striking the floor shook the Winnebago.
“Jesus!” Diego gasped.
The soldiers continued to beat the man as they dragged him to the front of the bus amid raucous yells.
Sissy had Emily by one arm and was pulling her down the hall toward the bedroom. Emily was wailing in frightened bursts.
As the withered man was pushed and pulled to the stairwell by the guards, the frog-eyed soldier looked at Diego and restated his case: “He bad man! He berry bad man! He run way! Bad man! Run way!”
Diego watched, helpless.
The soldiers and their prisoner exited the motor home, and Sissy and Emily rushed over to the pup. Diego went to Henry’s aid. He compressed the grisly wound with a wad of paper napkins. Adriana found a dishtowel in the kitchen, and used it to make a more secure bandage. She wrapped it tightly around Henry’s head and the bleeding stopped. Diego and Yong then laid him on the sofa. His breathing shallow, his pale face even paler, Henry remained unconscious. Yong tucked a pillow under Henry’s head.
Outside, kicking up dust in their wake, the soldiers had dragged the man across the compound to where a large wooden table occupied a space near the flagpole. Three other soldiers emerged from a small one-story building nearby and began speed-walking over to where the first two soldiers struggled with the famished man. One of the three men carried a long-handled axe.
“Dear God, no!” Diego whispered, peering out of the living room window, his posture as stiff as a metal fence post, his eyes fixed on the soldier with the axe.
Sam had also seen the soldier with the axe, and he slumped onto the sofa and buried his face in his hands.
Adriana and Yong stood beside Diego at the window and watched the four Chinese soldiers force the skeletal man facedown onto the wooden table. Each of the soldiers grabbed an arm or leg, and then stretched the man lengthways on the table. The man kicked and screamed, and it appeared to Diego at one point that he might work his way free. But his struggle was pointless, and in a few moments he was completely immobilized.
Rosie had retreated to the bathroom, and Emily continued to wail from the back bedroom, Sissy’s consoling murmurs underneath the crying.
The solider with the axe stepped back from the table and raised the blade above his head. Diego watched breathlessly. The axe remained poised above the soldier’s head for what seemed to be a small eternity. Finally, the blade came crashing down, severing the man’s right leg just below the knee. There arose such a crippling shriek of pain that Diego thought his own legs might give way. Even from a distance, Diego could see the blood gushing and spurting from the severed limb.
The m
an shrieked again—it echoed in Diego’s ears.
“My God! My God!” Adriana whispered, diverting her tired eyes away from the ghastly spectacle.
Yong sagged onto the sofa and laid his hand on the back of Sam’s neck. Sam’s face was still buried in his hands. He was sobbing quietly.
The soldier with the axe kicked the bloody appendage aside, and it was only then that Diego noticed other severed limbs in various states of decomposition scattered on the ground near the table.
The Chinese soldiers dragged the one-legged bleeding man across the compound and inside the building. A thick, dusty blood trail extended from the flagpole and into the building.
Outside the Winnebago, Cutbirth finished fueling the coach. He paid the terminal attendant and climbed aboard. He quickly pulled the door closed behind him.
Standing at the front of the motor home, Cutbirth said, “I saw what they did to that poor bastard, and I know what everyone is thinking. You’re thinking, ‘We should have done something to help the man.’ Put that foolish thought out of your head. I have no idea why they did what they did, nor do I care. He was most likely an escapee. Our future will be determined by what we accomplish in Missouri, not in New Mexico.”
“You should have—I don’t know—intervened,” Diego charged. “You should have fucking intervened.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Cutbirth said. “They have a stockade here and we would have all been thrown into it. We’re on China soil, not País Nuevo. The Chinese have total control. It’s governed by the same laws that apply to a foreign embassy. How’d you and Little Mother like to spend the next six months in a Chinese prison in Tucumcari, New Mexico?”
“You should have…we should have done something,” Diego said. “They killed the pup and brutalized Henry.” In a loud voice, Diego said, “We stood around and did nothing!”
“Sometimes doing nothing is smart.” Cutbirth climbed into his cab seat and drove away.
They stopped along the shoulder of I-40 a few minutes later—the Toyota Himalayan continued to cling to the Winnebago like a barnacle—and Cutbirth and Diego buried Rags Junior alongside the highway. Emily watched from the living room window, tears streaming down her freckled face.
13
By late Saturday afternoon, Texas was behind them and they were halfway across Oklahoma. Cutbirth had successfully greased the palms of immigration officials in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma on Adriana’s behalf. His sexual perversion satiated, Raul Perez had amended Diego’s Criminal Justice hearing with a “Postponed Indefinitely” postscript, which had spared Diego any further inquiry.
Yong had driven for several hours while Cutbirth pulled some sack time in the master bedroom, but Cutbirth was back behind the wheel when Adriana flipped on the satellite TV in the galley. Adriana was an incurable news junkie, much like Diego. Her day was not complete without periodic doses of the day’s events, regardless of the propaganda that seemed to be at the heart of every story. The screen blinked to life. Alex Frantz, PNN’s afternoon female anchor, was seated at her Dallas news desk, the chic País Nuevo Network logo in the background.
“...and as we reported in the last hour,” the striking brunette said, “a Fresno, California, girl was reported kidnapped Friday afternoon by a gang of suspected rabbits from San Francisco.”
Emily was rummaging through the refrigerator and watching the broadcast with mild interest. When her picture flashed on the screen, Emily’s eyes got round and she let out a squeal. “That’s me! That’s a picture of me!”
Everyone quickly gathered around the television screen.
“Turn it up!” Cutbirth ordered from his cab seat, his eyes on the highway ahead. He adjusted the mirror on the dashboard to reflect the TV screen.
Adriana turned up the volume. The TV anchorwoman went on. “Emily Frost was last seen leaving a Denny’s restaurant outside Fresno Friday around two p.m. Several customers reported seeing the girl board a coach-like vehicle, thought to be an antique motor home. Her father, William A. ‘Shorty’ Frost, owner of Shorty’s Bar and Dance in Fresno, says he believes his ten-year-old daughter was abducted by the girl’s mother, Sissy Frost of San Francisco. The father, who told PNN he was recently granted custody of the girl after a lengthy court battle, believes his ex-wife plans to smuggle the Fresno fourth-grader across the border for an experimental medical procedure.”
“It’s not experimental!” Sissy declared loudly, her eyes on the TV screen.
Alex Frantz continued, “Emily was thought to have been staying with a Fresno classmate the past two nights. When she didn’t return home this morning, Mr. Frost called the classmate regarding his daughter’s whereabouts. The classmate said she had not seen Emily in nearly a week, and Mr. Frost immediately contacted the National Police. It is believed Emily spent the past two nights with a friend of her mother’s. Emily is four-foot four-inches tall and weighs about 75 pounds. Her hair, which she recently dyed, is strawberry red. An immigration official with the Arizona Port of Entry, Raul Perez, said Friday that he had inspected the motor home and its passengers. Perez said the driver of the antique Winnebago told him they were headed to Missouri for a five-day camping trip. A half-million-dollar reward has been offered for information leading to Emily’s safe return.
“In other news, Israelis and Palestinians resumed peace talks Friday amid fears that—”
Adriana flipped off the television. She looked at Diego with terror in her eyes.
Diego felt his breath catch in his throat, his mind screaming at him. It said they would never make it to Missouri.
No one spoke. The only sound was that of the thunderous Cummins diesel pushing the motor home east on Interstate 40.
“Thanks for sharing, Sissy!” Yong blared, his eyes, like everyone’s, squarely on Sissy.
“It’s not what you think,” Sissy said, blinking nervously. “I’m not a kidnapper.” She went over to where Emily was standing and wrapped her arms around her daughter. “It’s not like they said. They’re always getting stories screwed up on TV.”
Cutbirth pulled the motor home off onto the shoulder of the highway and rolled to a stop in the shade of an overpass. The Toyota stopped a hundred yards behind them. Cutbirth left the engine running, and then climbed out of his cab seat. He stood quietly at the front of the vehicle, his eyes on Sissy Frost, his face drawn up into an ugly grimace. “Goddamnit, Hummingbird, talk!”
Looking at each of them, Sissy said, “They neglected to mention the fact that Emily has a rare immune deficiency disorder called Granulomatous Disease. It’s a disease of the immune system, but not a single insurance company in the entire country will help. I tried. She won’t see her 12th birthday if she doesn’t receive medical treatment.” Reacting to the surprise on Adriana’s face, Sissy said, “It’s okay. Emily knows her prognosis. She knows it’s not good, but there is a cure, there are drug therapies to control the disease, but they are very expensive. I can’t afford the therapies, neither can her father, and the insurance companies won’t pay. It’s that ‘preexisting condition’ crap. They’d rather see Emily die than have to pay. And when the disease gets bad, when the really bad pain begins in her final months, doctors won’t give her pain meds. Real pain meds. I heard a rumor that doctors give placebos to terminally ill patients.” Sissy looked at Adriana. “Is that right? Do you know if the rumor is true?”
“Yes, it’s true,” Adriana said, nodding. “It’s some secret government edict.”
“What’s it called again, Sissy?” Diego said, looking troubled.
“Chronic Granulomatous Disease. C.G.D.,” Sissy said. “It’s a disease that affects white blood corpuscles. Like I said, there is a proven medical procedure. It’s gene therapy along with some drugs, but none of the insurance companies will pay, even though I have health insurance. And not a single hospital will provide the treatment for free. And what’s worse, Emily’s father isn’t willing to fight for Emily.”
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