by Billy Kring
Adan said, “Where do you live?”
He indicated south with a casual movement of his arm, “Across the Rio. That’s is where my mother works, in a small café. She also pushes a small boat into the river and sells tacos and tamales to the people playing golf, if they walk the sand bar to her.”
“And your father?”
“He’s dead. They found his body downstream in the river.”
“He drowned?”
“After someone shot him in the back.”
“I am sorry. Was it the Harts?”
“No one knows.”
“Do you feel like continuing your story?”
“Yes, my father has been dead for five years.”
Adan nodded.
Dario said, “The original Hart worked for Milton Faver as a cowhand, but often hunted gold and silver in the mountains around here and in Mexico.”
“Did he find any?”
“Not for years. But after the Apaches were gone and border raiders were not so prevalent, he found a vein of cinnabar near the Christmas mountains, and that led to other finds, and more land for his ranch and under his control. He found silver and a little gold not far from here, and more cinnabar.”
“What is cinnabar?”
“Have you seen the liquid metal the color of silver?”
“Yes.”
“It is called mercury, or quicksilver. That is what it looks like when they process the cinnabar rock.”
“Is the rock silver?”
Dario smiled and shook his head, “No, it is red, in various brightness. The ones I saw that my father showed me were from a vein he found. It was on Hart property, and was as red as the reddest, brightest sunset. It was beautiful.”
“Is that why he was killed?”
“I think so, yes. That is why you have to be careful if you go to the Harts. They are rich and dangerous. They have a man working for them, I do not know his name but I’ve heard whispers among the Mexicans across the river that he is a smuggler of men and drugs and guns, and a killer when the need arises. He is called by people south of the border, La Parca.”
Adan felt a chill along his spine. He said, “The Reaper.”
“Yes.”
“I will be careful.”
“Good. Now, we should go find some food and eat.”
“And you can tell me how to locate the Hart hacienda.”
Yes, I can, or at least about where.” He looked at Adan, “Why do you want to know so badly?”
“My father is American, and his name is Hart.”
“Who told you this?”
“My mother, before she died last year.”
Dario leaned back and said, “That’s an interesting thing to hear. Do you know which Hart it is? There are two.”
“I don’t. My mother never told me, and she kept this hidden from me until she became ill and knew she would die. She was so sick she couldn’t think straight. But he called my mother, mi jollita, his little jewel. She told me that.”
“Maybe you can ask them when you walk up to the front door and tell them you are the heir to their fortune. I’m sure they will like that, and you with your skin, you should fit right in to the family of blond haired, blue-eyed devils they are. I am being sarcastic on that, as you can tell. You will be lucky if they don’t put you up against an adobe wall for saying such a thing.”
“I have it to do. There is nowhere else to go for me.”
Dario said, “We should celebrate with a fine meal from the restaurant where my friend works.”
“What is the name of this place?”
“La Kiva. It’s partly underground.”
“Like a mine?”
“No. You’ll have to see for yourself.”
“Are we going to eat in the restaurant?”
“No, we might get reported, or there may be a Border Patrol Agent eating there. We’ll get the food and find a safe place outside, somewhere we can be out of sight.”
“Then you will show me the white hacienda?”
“I will.”
Dario and Adan found a place at the edge of the parking lot by several tall oleanders with boulders as perimeters that they could use as seats. Adan waited while Dario went to the restaurant and returned twenty minutes later with hamburgers, fries, and two cold Dr. Peppers, the condensation already beading up and running down the sides of the bottles by the time Dario reached their eating place. They didn’t talk while eating, and Adan hadn’t realized how hungry he was until the first bite of the burger.
They finished the meals in a short time, making sure to eat every French fry and drain the soft drinks. Satisfied, they lounged in the meager shade and let the food settle before Dario led them out of town and toward the home that had loomed so large in Adan’s mind. He said, “It’s a long walk, so we need to take water with us.”
They stopped at the store and Dario bought two plastic bottles of water and two packs of salted peanuts, giving one bottle and one package of the nuts to Adan before they walked out of town into the desert and angled toward the arroyos and hills in the distance. There were houses and small mobile homes dotting the desert as they went, but after an hour, there was only the desert, the sky, and an occasional crude road.
“Where is this house?” Adan asked as he wiped sweat and dust from his forehead.
“It is beyond a place called the Christmas mountains. The ranch is large, hundreds of thousands of acres, and the house is in the middle, in a small canyon. We won’t see it until we get to the edge of that canyon. And then we will be careful and hide while we watch it.”
“I’m going up to the door and tell them who I am.”
“I know, but first, to be safe, we will watch a while. People have been shot out here before.”
“Shot?”
“What I heard, is the sheriffs said they were rustlers and had a shootout with one of the ranch hands, but I don’t think that is true.”
“True or not, after hearing your story I’ll be careful.”
Dario pointed ahead, “On that flat-topped hill we can stop and rest in the shade of the rocks.” They walked another hour before reaching it, with both youths knowing distances were deceptive in the clear desert air.
While they sat and talked, two men in camo watched them with binoculars from across the canyon, a little ahead of their position. One, whose name was Ben Zambrano, said, “They’re kids, way out here on foot. That’s not right.”
His partner with the large scar on his cheek, Anselmo Ancira said, “I’ve ranged them already. Six-hundred-twenty yards. It’s a doable shot, you want.” He patted the scoped Remington rifle beside him.
“Then we have to drag them away and bury them. Lot of work when we don’t know what they’re doing here.”
“So, we catch them, take them in?”
“I think so.”
Anselmo looked at the two youths and their position on the small hill in the middle of desert terrain dotted with cactus and spidery ocotillo showing the red blossoms at the tips because of recent rains. “That small bend in the canyon. I think they’ll go down in the bottom and make that turn. We can catch them there.”
Ben looked it over, “Looks like that canyon we set up on over in Tora Bora.”
“It does. Smoked ‘em that day, didn’t we?”
“Roger that.” They watched as the two boys started to angle down into the canyon floor.
“Told ya.”
“Let’s go.”
Chapter 3
The two camouflaged men moved along a narrow ravine that angled down to the canyon floor and would keep them hidden from the two boys. The best thing about the ravine was that it ended on the smooth canyon floor not thirty feet from the bend where the boys would pass. It took no time for the men to hide themselves among the large boulders. They had to wait for a minute, and then Dario and Adan walked into view.
One boy seemed startled, the other one stepped toward the two armed men. Ben said, “You’re on private property, you’re tresp
assing.”
The boy who stepped forward, Adan, said, “We are going to the great white house out this way. I have heard much about it.”
Anselmo grinned and said to Ben, “You hear that? He’s heard much about it.”
Ben said, “What’s your name, kid?”
“I am Adan Villa.”
Ben said, “Well now, señor Villa, the people in the white house don’t want any Mexicans there.”
Anselmo said, “You two just head back the way you came.”
“But I need to talk–”
Ben hit him in the face with the stock of the rifle, knocking Adan to the ground and opening a one-inch gash in his cheek that showed wet and red. “You don’t need anything except to get the hell off this property, entiendes? You understand?”
Dario nodded, his eyes big and frightened. He helped lift Adan from the ground and they walked away, with Adan staggering every few steps.
As they disappeared around the bend, Anselmo said, “You believe that bullshit?”
Ben shook his head and spat, “We know why they’re here, and it ain’t because of a desire to see the home.” He thought a moment, remembering Adan’s face and those dark brown eyes, which made him doubt his initial thoughts. He said, “You don’t think he’s a relative, do you?”
“Just out of the blue, walking across the desert? Nah.” He glanced at Ben, “You think?”
Adan held his palm against the cut because it was the only thing he had. Dario looked pale as he walked close, keeping a hand on Adan’s elbow in case his new friend fell again. He said, “That scared me, him hitting you like that. How do you feel?”
Adan’s face and jaw were swelling and it looked like he had a small plum in his cheek. He talked with a mumble, “Hurts.”
“Heck, I guess so. He really let you have it. Let’s get you back to town.”
Adan shook his head, “No.”
“You’re bleeding. That cut looks bad, and your face is swollen on that side.” He ran an index finger along his own jaw to show where.
“Help me find some nopal, some prickly pear.”
“What for?”
“It’ll help with healing and the pain.”
It took them only a few minutes to locate a small patch in an arroyo, and Adan cut off two pads, then scraped the sides with a piece of flint used as a crude blade until all the thorns were gone. Then he split the pad to expose the wet center and held it to his cheek over the cut.
“I wish we had something to tie it on for you.”
“It will be fine. I’ll hold this on the cut for a while, and that will be enough to make it clot and start a scab. It will still be sore, but I can live with sore.”
Dario sat down and leaned back against the gravel wall, “Okay, then what do we do?”
“You don’t have to go with me, you’ve shown me where I need to go.”
“I haven’t shown you the big white house yet.”
“Okay.”
“So, when you’re ready, we can make a circle and see it from the far side where there aren’t any guards.”
“We hope.”
That got a small grin from Dario. “Here’s to hoping,” and he led off, checking back every few minutes to see if Adan still kept pace and held the cactus pad to his jaw.
They didn’t notice the small drone, flying silent and high above them as Dario led the way, making sure to stay on the far side of the hills and mountains to keep out of sight. As they walked, Adan checked the cut every few minutes to see if it had stopped bleeding, and after ten more minutes he dropped the cactus pad and continued after Dario, although his jaw and cheek appeared swollen. It didn’t slow him down, and he said, “Can we pick up the pace, get us to where we need to be?”
“Sure,” Dario said, “You up to it?”
“Uh-huh.”
“All right, let’s double time it.” He sped up to a shuffling trot and stayed to the more level areas to travel. It was another hour before Dario said, “Just over that big hill up ahead, you can see it then.”
Adan notice several small mines in the hills they passed, with talus slopes from the tailings. He asked “Are those cinnabar mines?”
“My dad said those were exploratory shafts, showed a little mineral, but wasn’t rich enough to keep digging there. There’s two big mines about a mile from the ranch house, and they’re still being worked after all these years.”
Where are the gold and silver mines he found?”
“Those are around Shafter on another ranch he owns.” They stopped and rested several minutes before Dario said, “Do we keep going?”
“I don’t want to make another trip out here with those guards around.”
“Come on, then.” They started up the big hill at an angle, not wanting to try it straight up because of the steepness.
A mile away, Anselmo watched them through a Swarovski spotting scope, checking their progress. Ben had received the text from the house earlier, saying to bring the two boys there. That changed things because he wanted to shoot somebody with the sniper rifle, so he was in a sour mood. Anselmo said, “They’re almost where we can get them.”
“I don’t care. I hope they fall off a cliff.”
“Don’t be a grumpy ass, we may get them yet.”
“Yeah.”
“And at least we can bruise them up a little while we take them in.”
The thought made Ben smile, if only for a few seconds. “Let’s get in position.” They went off the back of the ridge and drove slow so they didn’t raise much dust as they made a curving path across the desert. They came to the big hill as Dario and Adan reached the crest. The men drove up a long, sloping bench that took them to within fifty yards of the peak. A cluster of dark, sharp-edged boulders crowned the peak and the two men trotted to them, positioning themselves on the opposite side where the two boys would reach the top. Ben said, “Do we show our pistols?”
“You stay out of sight and I’ll step out, try to talk them into the vehicle. If they run, shoot in front of them.”
“And if they don’t stop?”
“Well, the jefe said we can’t kill ‘em because they’re kids. If they run, we ‘ll figure out what to do when the time comes.”
Ben scratched his chin stubble with a pinky fingernail so filled with grime it looked like a black crescent moon, “Sweet talk them good; I don’t feel like running up and down these hills like a goat. Too many rocks underfoot around here that make my ankles scream. This hill is covered in them.”
Anselmo said, “It’s like God scattered all the leftover rocks here.” Ben nodded as the boys appeared at the crest. They stopped to rest.
Ben said, “It’s showtime.” He talked loud as he stepped around the boulder to face them, “Hey, amigos, sorry about the little misunderstanding earlier.” Both boys backed away, “Wait! We have orders from our boss to treat you good and take you to the hacienda. That’s where you wanted to go, right?” He smiled to be disarming.
Dario and Adan glanced at one another, still uncertain, nervous as skittish deer. Ben said, “We have some lemonade at the house, some cookies, too. Then the Jefe would like to visit with you, maybe give you two a tour of the house. How would that be?”
The boys continued to back away, edging to the slope of the hill. Dario stepped on a round stone that rolled under his foot. He twisted his ankle, falling and yelping when he hit on one hip.
Ben moved fast and grabbed Dario’s arm as Adan lifted him from the other side. Anselmo stepped from behind the boulder and said, “He’s hurt. We need to get him to the paramedics at the hacienda.” He hurried and joined Ben, nudging Adan away as the two men moved Dario in the direction of their vehicle. Adan stepped back, mouth open. They outmaneuvered him, and now, unless he wanted to abandon his friend, he was as good as captured. He lagged behind, deliberately slipping and dropping to his hands and knees as they walked, and while down there palmed two round stones the size of golf balls, slipping them into his baggy pockets.
Ben came back for him, but Adan shrugged off the hand and continued on foot, staying close to Dario. He didn’t see the men glowering at his back, but Dario caught it. He whispered, “Careful. They’re planning to do something to you. I’ll help you watch.”
Anselmo cuffed Dario on the head, “Stop that whispering. Talk loud enough for us to hear, or shut up, you understand?” Dario nodded.
Adan said, “He was telling me you two looked like war heroes, that’s all.” The two men’s demeanors seemed to lighten at that. They reached the vehicle and Ben drove them off the hill, then followed the caliche road in a winding path through smaller hills and across dry washes. When they popped over a low rise, the great white adobe house sat before them. The house had a six-foot high adobe wall surrounding the backyard, enclosing three acres, and ending against the base of a small hill some hundred feet in height, and almost conical in shape. Next to the home was a farmed area with vegetables and fruit trees.
Bright green peppers showed clearly, as did the red tomatoes. Adan noticed the blue glimpse of a pool in the back yard.
They parked in a circular driveway in front of massive, carved double doors of dark wood. A maid opened one side and ushered them inside where an elderly man with fierce eyes and a scowl looked at the boys. He was very tall, well over six feet, and rangy in his build, like a gaunt wolf. “So, you want to see the white house, do you?”
Adan said, “Yes sir, if it isn’t too much trouble.”
“Why?”
Adan didn’t feel comfortable telling him the real reason, not with armed men behind him. “I heard great stories about it all my life.”
“Like what?”
He thought fast, “Rooms full of red crystals, red like the most beautiful sunset in the world.”
“What else?”
“Golden halls and statues, great rooms with tall ceilings, and a magical wind that keeps the house cool in the summer and warm in the winter and blows all the time.”
That made the tall man crack one corner of his mouth. “How about that.” He looked at the two men, “Let’s show these boys the AC.” As he led the way, he said over his shoulder, “My name is Winston Hart. What are your names?”