by Doug Ball
In the kitchen the cute waitress, Trini, and the cook were yelling at each other. Tank could make nothing of it, but Abdul was all ears.
The food was good. The price was cheap. Trini asked them to return on a better day and really get a nice quiet meal. “Without those loco baboons.”
They left.
In the car, Tank asked, “What were you hearing in there?”
“The cooks brother was involved with some gang or something that was preparing to distribute lots of drugs as soon as some clown named Armado could get it over the border. They had picked up a small plane drop west of I-19 two nights before and one of their guys was stoned before they got it back to their meeting place. The cook wanted to turn them in, but Trini didn’t want to get involved.”
“Call Tan. He needs to hear this now. We’re due to call him anyhow.”
“I’m drivin’, man, you call.”
“Gotcha.”
#
Tan was happy; they had a name of someone who wanted the border opened up again. He started searching the name in his file.
11
As soon as the sun was down, Leon and Ray gathered their gear and started south along the bottom of a wash. Ray carried his rifle in a case to protect it from the dirt and had his S&W in a holster on his left hip for a cross-draw. Leon had his Kimber holstered right where he liked it, under his left arm in a shoulder holster and carried his AR-15 at the ready across his chest. Both had enough ammo to last for an hour or so of shooting.
Leon heard something clink behind him and turned. Ray stood still and asked, “What was that noise?”
“Sounded like something in your pack or you kicked a rock into a bottle.”
Ray dropped his pack as Leon checked his last few steps. In the back was a glass bottle of aspirin that he’d carried in there for years. “I’ll need this for pain on the way back, I’m sure. Any suggestions?”
“Got any spare socks in there?”
“No. I do have a tee shirt. I’ll wrap it in that.”
In moments they rattled the pack and heard nothing. They started again.
As they neared the border, Ray expected they would have to lay on the ground and make like a snake in order to cross the fence, but they just kept walking until they passed under the strands of barbed wire crossing the wash. A hundred yards later there was a branch wash that showed no footprints and Leon turned up it. It fizzled out a quarter of a mile later at the bottom of a slow drop in the land. For them it was going uphill, which they climbed to the top. The last twenty feet or so, they crawled on their bellies.
A few feet from the top, raising their heads gave them a nice view of the darkened terrain ahead of them. Nothing in sight. No lights. Leon checked his GPS against the map. “Right on track. Four miles to go.” He led out.
Ray was good to his word, every time Ray stopped, he was there. Ninety minutes later they were looking at a complex with multiple lights showing them all its features. “We have arrived and here I am, right behind you.”
“You’re doing great. Now all we have to do is move on by and check the airstrip for the chopper.”
As if on demand, they heard an engine start and rev up. At first Leon thought it was another diesel generator to power up the compound or a large truck, but then the familiar sound of a chopper spooling to higher revs identified the noise for both of them. “The chopper?” Ray asked.
“A chopper,” replied Leon.
They waited. Leon remembered the night vision goggles in his pack and got them on his head.
They waited. The noise grew until they both knew it was lifting. They watched it lift above the wall surrounding the compound and move in their direction.
“I hope the camies work.”
“Me, too.”
They watched as it flew directly over the top of them. The night vision goggles showed the chopper as a light color, but Leon could not tell what color. Ray said, “It’s light, but I can’t tell if its light gray like most or light blue, as in the one we want.”
“I can’t either. Everything is green with these things. Looks like we hike to the strip anyhow.”
They started crawling backwards until they were clear of the lights and then up on two feet and putting one in front of the other. “You could stay here and I’ll pick you up on the way back.”
“Look, Leon, I’m not that old. What, maybe ten years older than you at most? I’ve been hiking with Jack for the last five years and we’ve done some long range stuff. I may not be fast, or good on the uphills, but I can still walk. I feel fine. If there’s a problem, I’ll let you know.”
“Great.” Leon was a bit embarrassed, but took the lead and kept walking using the stars for direction.
#
Tan took all the info he had accumulated in his file that referenced Borrago and spread it out on the small table in the motel room. He started sorting it chronologically from the time Borrago graduated from being a lieutenant leading a group of soldados through his elevation to the district Patrón that he was now. Nothing leaped out at him, except the general idea that this man would do whatever it takes to get what he wanted. The idea that he might be vulnerable because of his wife and kids wandered across his thinking also. “I know I would,” he said to the wall.
He wondered how well he got along with his Patrón, El Trinchante, aka Umberto Villamontoya.
His Patrón must be hurting very bad financially due to the closure of the Southern Arizona border to only legal traffic. The capture and return law had sent many a group of illegal crossers back and the shoot-if-shot-at clause, had ended the life of many mules. The Hunters were making a name for themselves with the odds of capture very high and the odds of good treatment at the hands of the Hunters, very low.
Tan realized it was getting late and he had not called home in time for a chat with the boys, but Joan would still be up. He called.
#
Abdul looked at the sign on the motel, half the neon part was out on this side. “Shall we give the Dream Inn some business so’s they can fix their sign?”
“You think it’s safe?”
“Safe from what?”
“Safe from bedbugs and other creepy crawlers in the beds.”
“They probably charge extra for bed companions.”
“Let’s do the one across the road down there, the Cactus Garden Motel. At least their sign works.”
“You on my friend. I ain’t gonna go no more. I is tired.”
“Quit with the phony black English.”
“It ain’t phony. I read a book once that said that the English spoken by blacks in America today was just as much a language as French.”
“Yeah, and I don’t understand French, either.”
The room was small, too small for two big boys to share and not whine.
#
Forty minutes later Ray and Leon were at the air strip. No choppers were in sight.
“Now what? We can wait and see, do this all over again tomorrow?”
“I vote we wait until we have the time we need to make it back to the camp and then leave. I can speed up a bit after an hour or more rest here.”
Leon liked that idea, “Okay. About 4 AM we roll outta here, unless we have reason to leave sooner. That chopper may return to the strip instead of the compound of our Mr. Borrago.”
“And then?”
“We go back and start studying the compound of Mr. Borrago if it’s the right chopper, or we try again if it’s wrong. He might have more than one.”
“Wake me if you need me.” Ray curled up in a ball on the sand and closed his eyes.
“Four eyes are better than two.”
Without opening his eye, Ray said, “Nudge me if anything shows that I haven’t already seen.”
Leon laughed, “Like the tarantula walking by your foot.”
“I’ve see one of them before.”
#
Dawn peeked over the eastern rim of the world just as Ray and Leon entered their camp. Ray p
laced his rifle in its case while Leon stepped behind a rock to relieve himself.
“Quite the night,” said Ray.
Leon’s voice came around the rock, “Yeah, I’ve had worse. I just wish that damned chopper had come back.”
“Leon, that chopper is not damned. The people in it might be, but you and I have no privilege to judge that, only God can.”
“I don’t put a lot of value in that God stuff. Why would a loving God allow my daughter to die like that?”
“We all die, Leon. Only the time and the circumstances change. The supposed normal route is to go to sleep and not wake up, but how many do you know that have done that. Most of my friends and acquaintances have died of disease or accident. My son is the first one I’ve known that died of violence. He died honorably, but terribly. Somehow I think he died as quietly as going to sleep. He did not have time to register pain, and for that I am grateful.”
“A philosopher, a religious philosopher. You? I don’t know, Ray. It just seems to me like someone ripped my heart out and I want seriously to rip theirs out, one molecule at a time, to make the pain last as long as my heart hurts. I can never turn away from that goal.”
“Do you hate them?”
“Yes.”
“I do not. I have forgiven them. But, I intend to insure they cease to exist on the face of this earth. Deep in it maybe, but not on.
Leon laughed as he returned to the campsite. “I think I need a real meal and a day full of sleep. Tonight we’ll go back and watch the compound. Somehow I think that new chopper stays close to the boss. So, we’ll stay close to the boss.”
Ray knelt at the fire pit, “I could use about a dozen eggs, a pound of bacon, and a half gallon of coffee, not necessarily in that order.
Banging the coffee pot around a bit more than was necessary, Leon started filling it and preparing it for the fire.
#
Abdul awoke and went on a five mile run before returning to the room only to find Tank still blowing Z’s all over the room. Actually, Abdul could hear him twenty feet from the door. Tank rolled over on his side as Abdul headed for the shower.
Shower finished, Tank was back on his back, snoring even louder than before. Abdul calmly reached down at the side of his bed and swiftly grabbed a dirty sock, stuffed it in Tank’s mouth, and fell back into the arm chair behind him.
Tank came out of the bed ready to fight whatever, to find Abdul sitting peaceably in the chair reading the pizza menu of the joint across the street. Abdul calmly looked up and said, “Good morning. Do you always sleep with a dirty sock in your mouth?”
“Uuunngg.” Tank said, as he looked around, sock toe hanging down from his mouth, and with a startled look in his eyes, spit the sock on Abdul. “There ya go, pal of mine. You wear it. I can’t believe you would do that to me, you big ape.”
“I am not an ape, never have been an ape, and have no idea of becoming one. Therefore, get a shower and let’s go get some bananas.”
“Nevermind. I know where this place got the name, Cactus Garden.”
“Where?”
“The beds. They are like sleeping in a cactus garden. I hardly slept at all.”
“Must have been the cactus making all that noise I was hearing.”
Fifteen minutes later they were walking down the road looking for a restaurant that Abdul had seen on his run. Tank was swinging his arms trying to relieve a cramp in his back while Abdul laughed at him.
#
Tan’s phone rattled across the bed stand and stopped just before it went off the edge. He picked up the buzzing device and hit the send button. “Yeah.”
“What time you want to get started today, new boss?”
“How about twenty minutes? You pick me up.”
“I shall be there. We going out to eat or eat before we go?”
“Eat out.”
“10-4.
Twenty minutes later there was a knock at the door. He opened it, walked out, and said, “Where we gonna eat?”
She suggested an IHOP and Tan turned it down. His memory of the loss of Robert Jaegar, who was a friend, co-worker, and partner, stopped him. They had first met in an IHOP in Flagstaff. He asked, “Any place else will do. I’ll explain later.”
“Denny’s”
“Let’s go.”
As the car began to roll, his phone rang. “Yeah.”
“Hey, boss, Abdul. Whatchu want us boys to do? I noticed a couple of good looking babes serving breakfast. Would you like us to keep an eye on’em?
“No, although I’m sure you’d do a fine job, I want you to go to the cantinas and hangouts along our side of the border and see if you can get any more info on Armado Borrago or the drug lord El Trinchante. Do not ask openly. These guys can get you killed. Also, see what you can find on border patrol agents and how they are working according to the locals. Got that?”
“Yeah, we gone.”
The call went dead just as Sara pulled into a parking lot.
#
Armado Borrago climbed out of bed because the alarm clock was clanging on the other side of the room. He had made it a point to be up before his troops for all the years he had been in charge. Today he was exhausted.
One of the perimeter alarms had gone off a couple of hours after dark causing two men to be sent out to see what was going on. They had returned reporting nothing. At 4 AM the alarm had gone off again, this time on the other side of the hacienda. This alarm was closer in. He had not sent anybody out because he was sure some person or persons had tripped the alarms. Whatever it was had not come in close enough. If he had sent out men again, the intruders would have been gone before the troops could have gotten anywhere near them. Tonight would be a different story.
He smiled at the thought, as he wondered how the new chopper had done on its penetration exercise.
#
Ray looked at the brightening sky, trying to sleep. All he could think about was his lost son. How he had bravely gone after four men with automatic weapons while he only had a pistol. Or, was it foolish sacrifice. The women had already been shot.
‘Why did he have to die?’ he asked himself.
#
Bruce and Lenny finished their breakfast just as Tan and Sara were getting theirs. The town of Ajo was still alive even with the mine producing and suspending production on an irregular schedule. They had found nothing. The two men they were looking for based on a statement made by a Border Patrol agent, had produced nothing after their long drive across the Sonoran Desert country of the southern part of the state. The Tohono O’Odham Reservation and the town of Why had not been too exciting either.
“What now, Lenny?” Bruce was not too optimistic about another day in this heat. The AC on their car had died during lunch the day before. They had parked the car in front of the café, gone in and eaten, only to return to a car hotter than the gates of hell and no AC. Rolling the windows down had helped only slightly.
“Hell, I don’t know. Let’s see if there’s a decent garage around here and get the AC fixed.”
The waitress came by with the check and the coffee pot, “Anything else for you boys today? We got some nice pies back there.”
“How about a garage that works on AC? Got one of them?”
“Oh, yeah, my boyfriend works just four buildings down at the A-1 Garage. He’s a whiz at making things work. Not always cars, if ya get what I mean.”
“Just AC, that’s all we need.”
“I’m sure he can fix a little air blower. Just ask for Hector, Hector Valencia.”
“We’ll do that.”
They paid the bill, tipped big figuring they could be back here, and drove down to the garage. They asked for Hector.
“I am Hector. How may I help you?”
They told him the problem. He lifted the hood, hooked up a set of gauges, ran the AC that didn’t cool, and said, “Give me an hour?”
“You got it.”
They walked back to the café for more coffee.
&nb
sp; An hour later, they went back. The AC was kicking out a ton of cold air. “It was empty. I had to replace a seal that had split. This is an old car. I could sell you a newer one and give you a good price for this one. It will not last too much longer. I hear a small slap in the piston and the fuel injection is squealing. Only $3,000 and this car, and you have a completely rebuilt Hector guaranteed car.”
“This isn’t ours. We’re just borrowing it for a while. Do you know anyone that has been visited by helicopters, aliens, or angels, in this area? Maybe someone who had seen these things?”
“Oh, yes. My cousin, who lives outside of Why, he see angels that bring nice things to him. He like them very much.”
“Oh, what kind of nice things?”
“Things that make life more liveable, señors. Much good stuff.”
They found out where this cousin lived and said their goodbyes.
“Why you looking for these people?”
“We’re writing a book on the enchantment of the border country.”
“Oh, si.”
#
Rachel answered the phone on the first ring. “Hello, Special Investigator’s Office, this is Rachel. How may I direct your call?”
“You guys find Leon, yet?”
“No, Boss. His neighbor says he left right after the news on his daughter came and hasn’t been back. The mortuary where they took her body says he hasn’t been there and the father of the man, Jack, hasn’t been there either. Chuck and I haven’t been able to find the father, either. Chuck thinks the two of them are out hunting killers. Ray Lawler’s neighbor says that right after the officers left the first time, Ray loaded up his car with camping gear. He and another man, who matches Leon’s description by the way, left. The other man had arrived just before our pair got there. A car is now in the driveway. Waiting on a make on the car. Whoever owns it, had just bought it. Soon as the dealer opens, we’ll have the info.”
“So, you two think our Leon and the dad are killer hunting. Is that it?”
“Yup. The Governor says we need some action on this. The headlines this morning state, ‘KILLERS NOT FOUND’ in large, bold type.”