by Jerry eBooks
“But this is September.”
Colonel Ortega nodded. “I know. The country to the south will be impassable till spring.”
“It is not impassable now.”
Colonel Ortega leaned forward. “Man, I am going to talk truth to you. In the meantime, have a beer. We Mexicans are proud of our beer.”
“Sure, chief.”
The colonel pressed a button. An Indian boy in a clean white suit stuck his head in.
“Two beers,” the colonel said, and turned to Jim, “Listen to me,” he said in English. “I am not kidding now. This Howard is a bad man—a menace to good government. As you say, he will head south. They will tell him the road is no good, but he will pay no attention. It is impossible for a citizen of the United States to believe roads could be as bad as they are south of here. He will get to Carmichael’s ranch. But, my friend, once south of there, he will do well to make twenty miles a day. A horse is faster than a car and a man may be faster than either. I don’t know. I’m from Sonora myself. This country is new to me.”
The Indian boy came back with the beer. The colonel poured the beer carefully and handed Jim his glass. “Here’s to Harkness,” he said. “Here’s to old Baldy Putnam.”
“He isn’t headmaster any more. He retired.”
“I know,” Colonel Ortega said.
Jim started all over again. “Colonel, I appreciate your kindness.”
Colonel Ortega smiled. “We are both cops, both Harkness men. I was going to have a little fun with you. After all, you gringos amuse me, coming down here in such a hurry, wanting to make us hurry. Your affairs are always so important, so very pressing. But you are a Harkness man. I’ll forget my fun. You want to find Howard. What do you think is going to happen to him?”
Jim waited for the chief to go on.
“Within a month he’ll be a skeleton in the brush. The buzzards will have picked him clean. In the spring you come back. We’ll take a couple of shotguns and a plane. We’ll fly south until we find that skeleton. Then we’ll fly back to Carmichael’s for a little shooting. Nature will have done your work for you.”
“Colonel Ortega,” Jim said, “are you forbidding me to go south?”
The chief shook his head, with a gesture of displeasure. “Do you have to be official?”
“What does that mean?”
Colonel Ortega frowned. “If you insist, I will tell you. My government wishes to remain friendly with the United States. I would not forbid an American Federal officer access to the south, or authority to carry his gun and shield.”
“I may go?”
“I am asking you to be reasonable. Surely you have heard what the country to the south is like.”
“I have heard that the country to the south is not altogether the desert it is supposed to be.”
“True,” Colonel Ortega said. “There is gold and silver and copper and tungsten and mercury and antimony. There are virgin forests of pine and incense cedar and fir. There may be much more—who knows? Half of it has never been truly mapped.”
“How about La Paz? It’s down there, isn’t it? A big city?”
“Not a big city. An old city. One of the oldest cities of white men on this continent. But what of it? La Paz is more than eight hundred miles from here, and even if there were a road all the way, there are no gas stations.”
“When I run out of gas I will buy a horse.”
Colonel Ortega’s sad eyes grew sadder. “It is true that a horse does not require gasoline. But he requires to eat. And the same is true of you, my friend. There are no hotdog stands between here and La Paz.”
“The Mexicans are always kind to strangers.”
“You may travel for days in that country without seeing a Mexican.” Colonel Ortega leaned forward, “Why not go over to Al Masoni’s bar and fill yourself with good liquor and blow your brains out? It is a more agreeable way to die.”
“But you will give me permission to go south?” Colonel Ortega shrugged wearily. “I am not refusing. You will have to sign a paper saying you recognize the risk; that I have warned you.”
Jim nodded. “Draw up your paper.”
The chief rang for a stenographer and began dictating. “Don’t bother about a pistol,” he said, interrupting himself. “Take a shotgun—to eat by.” Jim Howard took the paper and shook hands with Colonel Ortega, concealing his satisfaction.
“Go with God,” the chief said.
“Thank you,” Jim said, and hurried out.
But he paused in the anteroom in spite of himself. The blond girl who sat there “waiting looked cool in a beige cotton sports dress with a narrow leather belt. And the stare she gave him as she glanced up from under her rather wide-brimmed straw hat was cool also—as if she did not see him. He turned to look back when he got to the outer door. She was walking into Colonel Ortega’s office and he noticed, without reason, that the seams of her stockings were straight as a movie star’s. He found himself picturing her and remembering her eyes and the pale gold tan of her skin and wondering why she was there—as if he hadn’t important things to think about.
He had to find Fitz Jordan. He had no idea where to look. He had only his belief that an American traveling south would leave a trail. Every Mexican who saw Fit® would remember him. The real problem was to keep ahead of Solid Man Johnson. If Johnson caught up with him he would never have a chance to catch up with Fitz.
THE Fiore di Alpíni is a dingy restaurant, Italian, except for an American juke box. But genius goes into the food. To eat lobster at the Fiore di Alpíni is to eat the Pacific Coast crayfish at its best; and the wine, from Santo Tomás, is good.
Jim Howard ordered dinner there. He told the anxious little waiter to have it ready in fifteen minutes, and went into the bar.
He saw five men, all but one dressed in the breeches and high-laced boots of engineers. Four of them were Mexicans. The fifth, the one in uniform, was a bright blond man who didn’t look Latin at first glance, but was. They were celebrating something.
Jim ordered a Martini and leaned on the bar, knowing for the first time how tired he was. It was wearing to be trailed by Johnson. Almost as broad as he was tall and completely without the glamour they liked over at the Justice Department, Johnson was just a secret-service man with a shield, a gun, a pair of handcuffs and two flat feet—just a guy who put those two flat feet ahead of each other until he found the man he was after. It was less than two days since Jim had got away from Johnson. Since then he had driven a hundred miles up into the mountains and exchanged his big car for a four-cylinder roadster of the kind Johnson always used, explaining that he had to go into the tough country south of the border, where a light car was so much better. He had driven then from somewhere north and east of Los Angeles to San Diego and on to Ensenada, seventy miles into Baja California. He hadn’t had much sleep.
The Martini came and he drank it quickly and shoved the glass back at the barman for another. The drink exploded gently within him and the warmth spread to his head.
The blond man said in Spanish, “Another round, Lazaro. To our return!”
One of the other Mexicans said loudly, “To our return to Mexico!”
The barman set Jim’s second drink in front of him and said, “They do not annoy, Señor? They are celebrating.”
“It’s all right,” Jim said.
But the Mexican next him had overheard. “You with have a drink with us, Señor? Tomorrow we go home to Mexico and we are celebrating.”
“And where are you now?” Jim asked.
“Ah,” the blond one said, “we have been in the Sahara, in Mongolia, in Tibet. This Baja!” He spat. “They tell me you gringos want to buy it. I, E! Tigre, I give it to you.”
Jim could feel his smile getting a little thin. The man who called himself The Tiger was not trying to be pleasant. He looked tough, too, with his thick neck and his heavy shoulders.
“We thank you, Señor,” Jim said.
“It is perfect for gringos, this Baja,�
� El Tigre said. “It is hell. I give it to you.”
“My Tiger, you are perhaps a little drunk,” the Mexican next to Jim said. “There’s the waiter. Now we shall eat.” The polite little waiter had come in. He said to Jim, “The dinner awaits you, Señor.”
The man who called himself The Tiger turned. “But the gringo is still sober. We must make him drunk.”
“Sí, Señor.” If nothing else had warned him, the waiter’s manner was enough to tell Jim that this Tiger was a known bully.
“I thank you, Señor, for your kindness,” Jim said, “but I must eat.”
“Liquor for men,” El Tigre said, “food for women—and gringos.”
Jim felt himself tense, like a dog about to fight, and tried to relax. He wasn’t here to fight in barrooms. He managed a smile and turned toward the dining room.
El Tigre put out his hand and caught Jim’s shoulder. Without turning, Jim threw the hand off and walked on, his spine as stiff as a wire drawn down his back and pulled taut. Then it came.
El Tigre’s hand fell harshly on his shoulder, biting through the cloth, insistent, challenging. El Tigre spoke one of the few real insults known to the good-natured Mexican tongue.
Jim turned and Set him have it, a straight left to the jaw and a right to the belly.
To his astonishment, the blond Mexican ducked the left, took the right on his hip, and came boring in. His left was like a whip. Jim ducked enough to catch it on top of his head and knew it did El Tigre’s hand no good. He crossed with his right as El Tigre swung, and caught him on the point of the jaw as he came in, with the luckiest punch he had ever thrown in his life—perfectly timed, in exactly the right place. The Tiger went down as if he’d been hit with a baseball bat and lay there, glassy-eyed.
Jim straightened up. He took three quick steps to the partition between the bar and the dining room and got his back against it. Then he looked from El Tigre to the four men at the bar. Two of them stared at their drinks; one of them looked at Jim and shook his head; the fourth raised his glass and nodded, as though toasting Jim, Jim Howard grinned and went into the dining room.
THE little waiter was solicitous. He insisted on dipping his napkin in a glass of ice water and bathing Jim’s right hand. Bending over the swelling knuckles, he said under his breath, “You should not have done that, Señor. El Tigre is a dangerous man.”
“Is he?”
“He is no good. But he is very strong, very quick. It is not without reason that he calls himself El Tigre. He has been a fighter for prizes.”
“I see,” Jim said. He had been even luckier than he knew with that right to the jaw.
“There, Señor, your hand will get better. I will bring your crab-meat cocktail. I have fixed it myself—very delicate. The thing is, Señor, this being a fighter for prizes is not so fortunate for El Tigre. He goes to New York, announcing he will kill every fighter of his weight in the United States. But it appears they do not fear tigers in New York. Some yanqui fighter is too good for him. He knocks out El Tigre.”
“So El Tigre doesn’t like gringos.”
“But naturally,” the waiter said. “I get the crab meat. You will enjoy it.” Jim saw a little khaki-clad soldier lounging on his rifle in the doorway to the street. If El Tigre wanted more trouble, the police would take care of him. The thing for Jim Howard to do was to eat his dinner in peace. Then he could start south and find Fitz Jordan. Fitz had been too clever for him once. He would never be too clever again.
The waiter was bringing the lobster when the soldier in the doorway moved aside to let someone in. Jim half rose out of his chair. If El Tigre was coming back, he preferred to be on his feet. But it was not El Tigre. It was the girl he had seen half an hour before in the anteroom of Colonel Ortega’s office.
She came straight down the room to Jim’s table, smiling as she came. Jim stood up.
“Hello,” she said, as if he were an old friend with whom she had a date. Under her breath she added, “Act as if you knew me.”
“Darling,” he said, “I was so hungry I ordered my dinner. You really are late, you know.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, as she sat down in the chair he held for her. “I couldn’t help it. I’m hungry too.”
She laid her purse, a large envelope of soft brown leather, on the table and with the gesture of a woman who knows the man opposite her well enough to feel quite at home, she took off her hat and put it on a chair. Jim saw that she had a head of blond curls, much too good to be the work of a hairdresser. Her eyes were a deep blue against the golden tan of her face.
She leaned toward him and said in a low voice, “My name is Hope Graham. You’re Mr. Johnson, of the Treasury Department, aren’t you?”
He nodded.
“Please don’t mind putting on this act with me,” she said, “I don’t want anybody to know that we’re strangers.”
He saw that she wasn’t as much at home as she was pretending to be. She was trembling.
“Take it easy,” he said.
He ordered a cocktail for her and told the waiter to serve the lobster for two and to have another one broiled. The girl picked up her purse, glanced at the chair that held her hat, decided against it. Then she sat on the purse. Jim guessed it held something she was afraid of losing.
“How did you come out with the chief?” she asked.
“All right.”
“You are going south?”
Jim nodded.
The girl took a deep breath. “I have a great favor to ask of you,” she said.
“Doing favors for pretty girls is my specialty.”
She made a little gesture of distaste. Her eyes looked coldly into his. “Don’t think because I’m putting on this act I mean it,” she said.
“Drink your cocktail,” Jim said. “You need it. And don’t forget your act. You’re being stared at.”
The girl raised her glass and smiled at him over the rim. When she smiled she was ever so charming and desirable. But he knew the smile was for the benefit of the other people in the café and not for him.
“Colonel Ortega refused me permission. He said it was absolutely impossible for a woman to go south alone.”
Jim smiled. She was an American girl, without fear, who had been brought up to believe she could go anywhere and do anything. Colonel Ortega must have thought her mad.
“I can imagine,” Jim said.
“He told me that he had given you permission to go, against his better judgment, because you insisted. He said he had no right to refuse an American official. So I told him that you were an old friend of mine; that we went to high school in Los Angeles together.”
“That was not so good,” Jim said. “I told him that I went to Harkness, which is a school in Connecticut, three thousand miles from Los Angeles.”
“Ouch!” she said.
“Eat your lobster. You will feel better when you have eaten.”
She began obediently to eat.
But presently she paused and looked up at him.
“You’ll take me with you?” she said.
Jim told himself that he could not take this girl with him. He was tempted. If he didn’t take her with him he might never see her again. Under other circumstances he would thank his stars at finding her. But he could not handicap himself with a girl, no matter how much he liked her. He’d have to kid her out of it. If he made a couple of passes she’d be afraid to go with him.
“It would be a pleasure to take you anywhere,” he said.
She gave again that gesture of impatience and distaste.
“You’re an American. Please act like one. Colonel Ortega wouldn’t understand my asking to go with you, but you do. You know I’m not asking you because I like your eyes—or anything else about you. I am asking you because I have to go south and you are my only chance. It is business and nothing else.”
“You know how men are.”
Her eyes looked straight into his and they were colder than before. “Couldn’t you skip it?
I have a job to do. Otherwise I shouldn’t have spoken to you. I have to go to a place between Carmichael’s ranch and Rosario. You can drop me off there and forget about me. I will pay half the expenses and a hundred dollars.”
The waiter brought the second lobster and proceeded to serve it. She was plainly as hungry as Jim was. For a few minutes they ate in silence. Then she looked up at him.
“You’re going to take a chance,” she said.
“An officer of the Treasury Department can’t take a girl with him when he’s hunting a criminal.”
“No,” she said, “not ordinarily. But this is different. We are not in the United States. We are south of the border. You can trust me. I shan’t interfere with you in any way. And your superior will never hear that you did a favor for a stranger.”
“How do I know that your errand is legitimate; that I wouldn’t be getting mixed up in something?”
“Oh,” she said, “you needn’t worry. It’s perfectly all right. My boss came down here last week about a mine up in the Sierra. He wrote me from San Diego to bring him some papers.”
“He asked you to come down into this country atone?”
“Why not? He knows I can take care of myself. I’ve been as far as Ensenada before. He has often driven two or three hundred miles farther south. He says it isn’t too bad. You have to be satisfied with averaging ten miles an hour. You have to know how to handle a car in bad going. But then, I do. I began driving around my father’s ranch when I was twelve.”
“You can’t drive a car into the Sierra.”
No, she said. “I may have to get a horse for the last twenty or thirty miles. There’s nothing but a pack trail to the mine.”
“How do you expect to find your way?”
“I have a map.”
“Let’s see your map.”
She smiled. “Would you mind if I don’t? After all, it’s a mine no one else knows about. I’m not supposed to tell anyone where it is.”
“I see,” Jim said, though he didn’t. Under the new Mexican laws, a mine was little good to the man who discovered it, especially if he was not a Mexican citizen.
“All you have to do is drop me off when we get to Carmichael’s. I’ll do the rest.”