Fifty Grand

by Adrian McKinty

  “Ok, a deal. You will have these and I will take the rest to Denver.”

  “Made a wise choice, friend,” the American says.

  In a dizzying two minutes we’re bought and paid for and led outside to a new black Cadillac Escalade.

  We get in the back.

  The old lady and the Guatemalan kid wave.

  Blub, blub. Never see them again. Have a good life.

  Paco puts his hand up to the window.

  “Get your greasy paws from the goddamn glass,” the American says from the front seat. “Should have put the fucking sheet down. Forgot. Esteban normally does this.”

  Paco’s hand falls.

  We drive away from the warehouse and down a gravel slope to the highway.

  The American flips the stations on the radio until he finds seventies rock.

  We join the highway and head west into a sinking sun.

  More mountains. Light snow. Dry air. Paco’s jittery. Not talking. Nervous. Jesus, what about? The worst that can happen to you is the INS and a one-way back to Juárez. I’m the mark who’s all in.

  The snow comes on wetter and changes to rain.

  “Ach,” the man says and doubles the wiper speed.

  The window shows Rockies. Never seen mountains before. Unreal. Hypercubed. Landscape by Henri Rousseau. Absurdly overblown. Too much. Aspens, firs, pine. Jagged peaks, crazy high.

  Paco starts biting his nails. Fidgeting. But not for long. His eyes are drooping and soon he’s dozing next to me like a big dead bird. I wonder how old he really is. Certainly a lot younger than I am. Kids need more sleep.

  We follow the highway for an hour and then turn off on a two-lane road winding its way deep into the mountains.

  The spine of America.

  The same mountains that run from the Arctic Ocean all the way to southern Mexico. “Rockies” is a juvenile name. Doesn’t do them justice. In Spanish they’re called the Montanas Rocosas, which is much more dignified.

  Paco starts whimpering. Hair over his eyes. Lips pouting. Bad dreams. I look away. Trouble, that boy. Corrupter of nuns and babysitters.

  The rain stops and the sun comes out.

  “Are you ok back there?” the American asks.

  “Yes, we are fine.”

  “Not far now, look around, useful to learn a few landmarks.”

  Power lines. Telegraph poles. The occasional house between trees. And then the outskirts of the town.

  “That’ll do us,” the man says.

  The Escalade slows.

  I nudge Paco. “We’re here,” I tell him.

  We stare through the tinted glass.

  A long street with huge sidewalks on either side. A lot of wealthy-looking people walking, talking on cell phones, window shopping. White, tall, healthy. Blond wives, older guys, but mostly women at this time of day. The stores are names from magazines: Gucci, DKNY, Versace, Dior, Prada. The restaurants are black, minimalist affairs with big windows. There are a few ski apparel shops but no fast-food restaurants, no bars, no lottery vendors, nothing messy. It looks different from Ricky’s photographs. Smaller. Much smaller than Havana or even Santiago. It’s not much bigger than a village. The main street, a few side streets, parking lots, and then trees. Five thousand people in the town and outlying districts, Ricky says. But he also pointed out that Fairview has doubled its population in just three years and it’s supposed to double again in another three. Huge tracts of forest have been zoned for condos and a new ski resort.

  We turn at a large bookstore and park outside a police station.

  Panic. What is this? Have we been turned in to the feds already? Who is this guy?

  “Out,” the American says.

  “Señor, what—”

  “Get the fuck out!”

  We unclick the seat belts and open the door. The sunshine is deceptive. It’s very cold.

  “Follow me, don’t say a fucking word, just do as I tell ya,” the American mutters, and then, with a sympathetic shake of the head, “It’s going to be ok.”

  He leads us up marble steps into what a sign says is the Pearl Street Sheriff’s Station.

  Inside. Computers, laptops, fax machines, phones—and it’s painted white. No one would paint a police station white in Havana. Wouldn’t last five minutes.

  “Sally, gather the staff,” the man says to a pert woman in a pink dress.

  A minute later three uniformed cops are scoping us. Note the badges. A. J. Klein, M. Episco, J. Crawford. All of them around forty. Crawford, a brown-haired skinny cop with a scar on his lip, is probably the oldest, probably the second in command, for I realize now that the man who drove us here must be the sheriff or the chief of police.

  “Get a good look, boys. These are the newbies. Couple of Mexes. This one’s called María, from the Yucatán, the other one’s called . . . What’s your name again, son?”

  “Francisco.”

  “Francisco—from Juárez, he says. She won’t be whoring, so if she is, I want to know about it. Both of them will be living with Esteban and he’s responsible for them. If either of them fuck up, you tell me.”

  “Yes, Sheriff,” the men respond.

  The sheriff turns to us. “You two, these are my deputies. You do everything they tell you to do, always. First step out of line and it’s the fucking federal detention center in Denver. Get me?”

  “Sí, señor,” we say in unison.

  “My name is Sheriff Briggs. This is my town. It’s a peaceful little spot. We got our problems but we ain’t had a murder in five years and if it wasn’t for teen suicide we wouldn’t ever make the papers. That’s the way I want it. Either of you step out of line, cause me the slightest fucking headache, you’re history. Understand?”

  I nod and Paco says, “Yes, sir.”

  “We got a sweet deal and it’s only going to get sweeter if we play our cards right. I ain’t telling no secrets if I let you all know that certain parties are eyeing Fairview as the Clearwater of the Rockies. And if the Scientologists do move in en masse we’re all going to make a lot of money. That’s why we don’t want any trouble from anyone.”

  “No, señor.”

  The sheriff turns to his deputies. “Burn them into your retinas, boys, I don’t want you relying on no crib sheet, I want you to know instantly who belongs and who doesn’t in my patch.”

  The deputies examine the pair of us. Crawford winks at me.

  Yes. Look hard. Do you know what you’re seeing? Ask your boss, he saw it too.

  “Did you get a good gander, boys?” the sheriff asks.

  They nod.

  “Good, then get the fuck back to work.”

  They scatter. Briggs smiles and then clouds as he spots an empty Starbucks cup lying there in broad daylight next to, but not in, the trash can. He grabs the unsuspecting cup from off the pristine floor tiles and throttles it into a paper tube.

  He tosses it in the trash can and shakes his head.

  “Oh, one last thing,” he says, and he takes a quick photograph of us with a digital camera.

  The sheriff leads us outside to the Escalade. The sun has set behind the mountains and I notice that the streetlamps on Pearl Street are ornate wrought-iron affairs like the ones you used to see in the Vieja. These are fake old, though. Brand-new fake old.

  “How do you like my sheriff’s station?” Briggs asks us.

  “Very beautiful.”

  “Proud of it. Special bond issue to get it built. I hope that’s the last time you’ll ever be inside it.”

  “Sí, señor.”

  We drive back along Pearl Street. Hermès, Brooks Brothers, Calvin Klein, another Versace. A Scientology drop-in center with a golf cart parked outside. Small dogs, a few more men, but still mainly women. Stick women, pipe-cleaner women, women with great heads on rail-thin frames. If this were Havana they’d be tranny whores. But in Fairview they’re überblondes and trophy wives with money. Here and there a dark-skinned man is emptying the trash bins or a very young foreign girl
is pushing someone else’s child in a stroller. The dark-skinned men step onto the road to let the whites pass; step into the gutter while the tall ladies talking on cell phones keep their straight line. Cuba is no racial paradise—the Communist Party is 1 percent black while the prison population is 80 percent black—but even so, I’ve never seen anything like that before.

  It makes me feel good.

  Good because I’m going to need anger to carry out this plan of ours.

  “Ok, busy day, next stop Wetback Mountain,” Briggs says as we turn left at the traffic light.

  Five-minute drive out of town. More trees, narrower road. We stop at a shit-color two-story building not far from what is obviously a major highway. Before the sheriff pulls into the parking lot a large man with wild salt-and-pepper hair and a black beard waves him down.

  Sheriff Briggs double-clutches the Escalade and the man gets into the front passenger’s seat.

  “Drive,” the man says.

  “What?”

  “Drive. Away from here.”

  “What’s going on?” the sheriff asks.

  “INS.”

  “Christ.”

  “Yeah, but we’re lucky they came now. Everyone’s still working.”

  “You get a tip-off?”

  “Hell, no. We just got lucky. Did you listen to the radio? Raids in Denver, Vail, Boulder, Aurora, the Springs.”

  Sheriff Briggs accelerates out of the lot and drives down to the highway.

  “Where to?” he asks.

  “Just drive. It’s finishing. Two INS guys and a couple of FBI to back them up. Bastards. They got three of my girls and that kid from Cabo. I hope to God they didn’t make it to the construction site.”

  Sheriff Briggs nods at us. “Well, I got two replacements for you, Esteban.”

  So this is Esteban. Ricky’s sheet: Mexican parents but born here. University-educated. Big guy but athletic. Plays soccer in a Denver Mexican league and even rugby—a violent game I only have vague notions about.

  Esteban turns. “What are you talking about? Where are the others?” he asks in perfect English with no trace of an accent at all.

  “I just took these, the others didn’t look good,” the sheriff says.

  “Are you fucking crazy? We’re shorthanded as it is, we need every hand we can get. There was supposed to be five coming in. We need them all.”

  “I said I didn’t like the look of them.”

  “You didn’t like the . . . Shit, you fucked up, Briggs, the INS has grabbed God knows how many of my men and now you—”

  But before he can finish the sentence, Sheriff Briggs takes a 9mm out of his pocket.

  He doesn’t point the gun at Esteban. Drawing it is enough, and face red with fury, he can barely speak. “Listen to me, you wetback motherfucker. This is my town. You’re here on fucking sufferance. I can fucking disappear you anytime I fucking want. Never talk to me like that again. Do you fucking understand, bitch?”

  “I’m an American, Briggs, I’m a citizen just like you, you can’t—”

  “I can do anything I damn well fucking please,” the sheriff says. Veins throbbing. Knuckles white.

  Esteban looks at the sheriff and the gun. He doesn’t flinch. Makes me think that Briggs has pulled this one before or else Esteban is made of sterner stuff. Hasn’t been a murder in five years, he said. I wonder if that includes dead Mexicans?

  Finally Esteban smiles. “You want an apology? Of course. I apologize. We’re friends. We work together.” He even forces a laugh. “Oh, Sheriff, why do you have to be so dramatic?”

  Briggs puts the gun back in his coat pocket, satisfied. “Good. Now take a look at what I got ya at the auction block.”

  Esteban turns and smiles at the pair of us. “Two hard workers, I can tell,” he says.

  “We’ll see. They better work hard. I make this a tough town for slackers. Now let’s circle back to your motel and deal with these fucking feds and see what’s going on,” Briggs mutters.

  “Welcome to Fairview,” Esteban says, and adds with a grin, “Don’t worry, it’s not always this exciting. It’s normally very dull.”

  Yeah, I’ll bet, but I’ll do my best to change that.

  CHAPTER 5

  WETBACK MOUNTAIN

  W

  hen we got back it was all over, the feds high-fiving it back to Denver with a couple of little fish for the TV news. As we got out of the Escalade half a dozen people besieged Esteban, waving their arms and venting in fast, barely intelligible Mexican Spanish: “Sudden raid. No warning. They took Susanna, Juanita, Josefina, two others.”

  “Where did they take them?” Esteban asked.

  “Who knows?”

  “I’ve got other things to do. You got this under control?” Briggs asked.

  Esteban nodded. “I’ll get my lawyer on it.”

  “Then I’m gone. You two, nice to meet you, remember everything I told you, keep your noses clean,” he said to us.

  We got out of the vehicle and we were glad to see the Escalade depart.

  The remaining population of the motel had surrounded Esteban now. “They took my money. They broke my door. Josefina’s daughter is at day care . . .”

  Everyone talking at once and pantomiming particular parts of the events in case Esteban didn’t quite understand.

  Esteban’s phone rang in the middle of it. He turned to Paco. “Keep them away from me,” he said in Spanish.

  Paco took charge like he was born to it and herded the petitioners back to the motel.

  Esteban answered the call. His English was as fast as his Spanish. “Yeah, I know. . . . I’m here right now. . . . Page them, call them, whatever it takes, and if they come to the construction site remind them that it’s a violation of safety regulations to allow anyone on-site who does not have a warrant from OSHA. . . . Doesn’t matter if it’s the fucking pope. . . . Yeah, keep ’em working.”

  He made two more phone calls and then turned to Paco and me.

  “Names?” he asked.

  “María.”

  “Francisco.”

  “Ok, María, Francisco. I’ve got a room for you upstairs. You’ll have to share for a couple of days but if we really have lost some people then I suppose you’ll have your own room.”

  I nodded and looked at the dreary motel. It wasn’t pretty but at least it had a roof and four walls, which was more than you could say for some of the apartment buildings I’d lived in.

  Ricky had taken a few photographs of the place but they didn’t quite square up in my head. It wasn’t that important, anyway. As far as we know Dad had never lived here.

  Most of the illegals in Fairview, however, either stayed here or at another motel farther up the mountain.

  Esteban was still talking, selling us on the gig. “Yeah, you’ll be living high on the hog. Your own room. Money. Maybe even get you a car. Can either of you drive? Juanita had a car, won’t be much good to her now.”

  I looked at the collection of ratty pickups and junk cars in the lot. These were as bad as Cuban vehicles, maybe worse.

  Esteban flipped open his cell, took another call.

  “Yes? . . . Now? . . . Who for? . . . Ooh, yes, he’s an important client. . . . No, never say no, no matter what the circumstances. . . . I’ll be right up. I got two right here. They just got in. You got uniform requirements? . . . Ok, tell them I’ll be there in ten.”

  Esteban smiled at us salesmanlike, grabbed a gray-haired little man lurking by the door, and gave him a bunch of keys. “Lock the rooms, don’t let anybody touch the stuff of the arrested, we might yet be able to get some of them back out. Ok?”

  “What if the federales come back?” the gray-haired man asked.

  “I doubt they’ll come back. They never hit the same place twice.”

  “Not yet,” the man said.

  “What do you want me to do? Tell everybody to go live in the fucking woods? Just lock up their rooms and make sure nobody takes their stuff, ok?”

 
“Ok.”

  Esteban turned back to us. “Ok, folks, look, things only appear fucked up. They’re not. There’s absolutely no reason to panic, everything’s fine, we’re fine, they didn’t hit any of my crews downtown, they sent a small team, and I think that’s it. The main raids have been in Denver metro.”

  “Good,” I said, unclear what this meant for us.

  “And look, guys, I know you’re tired, but I’m shorthanded. You gotta go straight to work, ok?”

  “Ok,” we said.

  “Excellent. Excellent, that’s the spirit, now follow me, quick tour, shower, and then out.”

  He led us inside the motel.

  Red concrete walls, tiles, seventies American TV vibe. Nothing broken, though, and cleaner than even Ricky’s place in Vedado.

  “Shower’s to the right, María. In and out in ten minutes tops. When you’re done you’ll find a uniform on the hook. Put it on. I’ll find one for you, too, Francisco. Hey, is it ok to call you Paco?”

  “Everybody does.”

  “Good, we don’t have much time. Have a shower and I’ll get you something to eat. Think I’ll take one myself, it’s been one of those days.”

  The shower felt good. Hot water. High pressure.

  I soaped and cleaned and got out the smell of Sheriff Briggs.

  I put on the clothes Esteban had found for me: a white blouse, a pair of black slacks, black shoes a size too big.

  Paco came out of his shower in the same getup. White shirt, black pants. He’d shaved and slicked back his hair. He looked handsome and I told him so.

  “I knew you’d succumb to my wiles, they all do,” he said with a grin.

  After Paco, Esteban came out of the shower fixing his shirt.

  The big winter coat had concealed his true bulk. Six foot something, nearly three hundred pounds. He looked small next to the sheriff but he was bigger than all the Mexicans. Powerful arms and chest, a pale yellowy pallor to his skin. Not an unattractive man, and I imagined he could turn on the charm when he wanted.

  He buttoned the shirt, smoothed out his beard.

  “That’s better, eh?” he said. “Now, follow me, my car’s around the back.”