by Storm, Buck
Paradise looked at Doc and sighed. “I need time, Arnie. A few days, maybe a week.”
“For what? If Burt will back down, then why …”
“I have to go, Arnie.”
“Paradise, I …”
Paradise hung up.
“A few days?” Doc said.
“I don’t know what to do.”
Doc shrugged. “We’ll work it out.”
“We?”
“Yeah, we. Let’s find this Lan guy. If he can get us across the border, it shouldn’t take long to get to Dia Perdido. We’ll find the answer to the puzzle and then see how LA’s looking. If things have blown over, we can go back.”
“Why do you keep saying we?”
“You think I’m gonna let you tackle Burt by yourself?”
“Why are you doing this, Doc? It isn’t your concern.”
“I told you, I have your back, that’s all.”
Paradise sighed.
Pump jacks bobbed, silhouetted against the evening sky.
Jesus smiled.
“Don’t say a word,” Paradise said.
Jesus gave her a thumbs-up.
The hours rolled on as the Olds reeled in mile after mile of Texas highway. Evening caved in to a night filled with stars. Paradise slept, then woke again to a preacher on the radio. The man pontificated with a slow, southern drawl, sounding bored with his own voice.
“What time is it?” Paradise said.
“Around two.”
“How much longer? Do you want me to drive?”
“I’m hanging in there. You just go back to slee—”
Doc’s foot hit hard on the brake, sending Paradise’s body forward and her heart to her throat as the Olds, tires screeching, went into a slide.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Hallelujah, Jesus Saves
Doc woke to a faint knock on the car window, and squinted against the early morning light. Two bloodshot, hound dog eyes peered through the glass at him from beneath the wide brim of a cowboy hat.
Doc cleared his throat. “Paradise, wake up. Somebody’s here.”
Paradise stirred as Doc rolled down the window.
The eyes were set in a deeply lined face of a man about sixty. He removed the cowboy hat, revealing thin, sweat-dampened gray hair, and wiped his brow with a faded, red bandanna. Tiny purple veins laced his faded roadmap of a face. He replaced the hat, spit a stream of tobacco at the ground, and spoke with a slow, Texas drawl. “You two all right? Looks like you had yourself a long night.”
“Only a few hours,” Doc said. “A truck crossed the line into our lane last night, and we slid off the road to miss it. He just kept going. We weren’t hurt, but it trashed one of our wheels. Car won’t budge. We decided to sleep for a while till somebody came along. Pretty empty out here.”
“Uh huh. It’s them trucks comin’ up from Mexico. I seen ’em bump a car from behind and push ’em right through an intersection to hurry things along. Ain’t no manners anymore. So you sure you ain’t hurt? Both in one piece?”
“Yeah, we’re fine.”
The man straightened, removed the hat again, and scratched his head. His eyes traveled the length of the car and back. “Don’t reckon you’re wrong about your car. From the angle of that tire, I’m guessing you got yourself a busted axle. Lucky I was out this way. You could’a sat here a while.”
“Axle? That doesn’t sound good,” Paradise said.
The man’s words rolled out slow, laced with gravel and sun. “It ain’t, ’less you’re in the mechanic game. Then I guess it might be a mortgage payment.” He spat again. “Maybe two, dependin’ on the house. Three, if it’s a dirt-lot trailer.” He held out a gnarled left hand to Doc. “Name’s Cal Sloan. Why don’t you two hop on in the truck, and we’ll run ourselves up to town. We’ll get ol’ Elwood down to the Texaco to come pull you outa the ditch. He’s just the man to patch her up, if we can drag him away from his biscuits.”
“Sounds good. I’m Doc Morales, this is—”
“Elizabeth,” Paradise interrupted.
“How long do you think it’ll take? To fix the car?” Doc asked.
Cal squinted out toward the horizon line. “No telling. You’re on South Texas time down here. But let’s go rustle up Elwood. He’ll give you an idea.”
Doc climbed out of the car and stretched his stiff muscles. “Thanks, we appreciate the help.”
“Hey, you bet.”
The mild, rolling hills of South Texas spread around them, dotted with brush and low trees. Power lines paralleled the two-lane road, fading into distance in both directions.
“Cal, you have a ranch around here?” Doc asked.
“Used to, long time ago. Was my old pop’s, and his afore him. His pop’s afore that, too. Family fought off banditos, red Indians, grasshoppers, and dust storms just to keep it. Had a bad spell a while back. So dry the Baptists were sprinkling, the Methodists were spitting, and the Catholics were giving rain checks. Couldn’t make the taxes no more. Developers—worse than any bandito, let me tell you—they dropped out of the sky like a flock of vultures. I’d have shot ’em if I could. We live in town these days. Me and Mary Martha—that’s my wife. Hate everything about it, too.”
Cal moved with the comfortable rolling limp of a man long acquainted with injury. He opened the passenger door of his rusty Ford pickup for Paradise. “In you go, girl.” He used only his left hand and arm. His right hung at his side like a dead weight.
Doc set his duffle and Paradise’s suitcase in the bed of the truck and climbed into the cab next to Paradise.
Cal walked to the driver’s side door and hoisted himself in, tossing a half-empty tequila bottle onto the floor as he did so. “You know what they say, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”
“You want an honest reply to that?” Doc asked.
Cal shrugged. “That old bottle’s been drinking out of me a long time now. I’m an old dog, amigo. Not much for new tricks.”
Doc gazed out at the country. “Been through this way a couple of times back when my brother was rodeoing.”
Cal started the truck. “Your brother rodeoed? What’s his name? I remember most of ’em. ’Specially if it was around here.”
“Jake Morales, out of Arizona.”
“Ah, that Morales kid. Saddle bronc rider. Good cowboy, really something. I thought he had a future in it. He ain’t ridin’ no more?”
“He retired. Became a priest.”
“No kidding, a priest? Huh. Well, we all got to skin our own buffaloes. I’d say you got the better time of it, driving Texas with the prettiest girl I seen around here in a year’s worth of Sundays … If you don’t mind my saying, miss.”
Paradise smiled. “I don’t mind at all. Thank you, Mr. Sloan.”
“Call me Cal. Everybody does. That way, I’ll know who you’re talking to. And don’t you tell my wife about that little compliment either. I won’t get dinner for a month.”
“My lips are sealed.”
“Atta girl.”
“Can I ask what happened to your arm?” Paradise said.
Cal grinned. “Ain’t pretty, is it? Used to rodeo myself ’bout a lifetime and a half ago. Bull rider. Made of rubber and leather and pure bulletproof, ain’t no lie. Got so hung up on my last ride, I thought I never would get free. Old arm’s just hung there ever since like a dead piece of meat. Nothing the docs could do.”
“Hung up?” Paradise said.
“Yup. Bull rope. That’s what you hold onto for dear life, trying not to die when that old rascal comes out of the chute like a ton of dynamite. Took a third wrap around my hand that day. Suicide wrap, they call it. Wanted an extra edge, and I was feelin’ lucky. But feeling ain’t being. Bull threw me, and I couldn’t get my hand loose. Banged me around like a rag doll till I was out cold. Tell you the truth, I don’t remember much of it. Wish I could take it back, but there ain’t no rewind button on life, know what I mean?”
“I’m sorry,” Paradise s
aid.
Cal smiled. “Thank you for that. My day just got brighter. So, you two picked a danged empty part of the world to be driving through so late at night. Where y’all headed?”
“On our way to Brownsville,” Doc said.
“Ain’t many people on their way to Brownsville come this a’way. Interstate’s a whole lot faster. You get lost?”
“Let’s just say we were taking the scenic route,” Doc said.
Cal eyed him. “All right, son, let’s just say that, then. I ain’t one to hang my wash on another man’s line. Can’t say the same about everyone in Agua Loco, though. People down here grow some real long noses when strangers show up. ’Specially when they look like the young miss here.”
“Agua Loco?” Paradise said. “Is that where you live?”
“Home sweet home. It’s Mex for crazy water. Used to be a bad spring around here. Cow drank from it, she’d lose her mind. Run till she dropped and died. No good for people neither. Dry now, though, thank the good Lord.”
The road ran straight for several miles, then twisted and turned through a series of sandy washes. They passed a sand-blasted double-wide trailer sitting lower on one side than the other. A couple of kids, one still in diapers, kicked up dust as they chased each other around a car mounted on blocks. A little farther on, a tract of single-level, stucco ranch homes huddled together, their generic facades the same brown as the dirt lots they sat on. On the horizon, a water tower took root and sprouted, growing taller with each mile. Eventually, a town appeared beneath it, the buildings the same dull brown as the tract homes.
Doc had seen a hundred main streets of a similar bent. Dirty and windswept, waking up to a sun-drenched day. The place appeared deserted, except for a man sleeping on the sidewalk beneath a barroom window. On the building next door, an unlit neon sign proclaimed Hallelujah Jesus Saves. A rancher and a Mexican man with a truck full of irrigation pipe chatted over the gas pumps at a corner Circle K—the only other sign of life.
It didn’t take a genius to see that Agua Loco was no tourist mecca.
Cal drove through the small downtown, then turned right. A quarter mile later, he swung into the gravel parking lot of the Busy Bee Diner. “Elwood’ll be here at the Bee sure as shootin’. I imagine you two could use a bite to eat as well.”
“Sounds good to me. I’m starving,” Doc said.
Paradise smiled and took Cal’s hand as he helped her down from the cab.
Doc pointed at the dozen or so cars that filled the small lot. “Looks like the whole town is here.”
“Most, usually. Least this time of day,” Cal said.
The Busy Bee lived up to its name. Of the ten booths laid out in an “L” shape along the walls in front of the plate glass windows, nine were full. Several patrons sat on stools in front of a counter as well.
“Elwood. Got a couple of customers for you,” Cal called.
A fat man with a Caterpillar cap pushed back on his head swiveled his stool with effort, then grunted as he stood, cup of coffee in hand. His gut spilled over the front of his belt-line between a pair of thick suspenders struggling to hold up his jeans. “Hey’a, Cal. Shop’s closed till I finish my coffee.”
“You bet. But when you’re done, these two have a car stuck in a ditch with a busted axle ’bout twenty miles or so out on Meyer Road. Doc and Elizabeth, meet Elwood. Only grease monkey in town, so he’s what you get. Good news is, he ain’t half bad at it.”
“You have time to go out and get the car?” Doc asked. “We’d appreciate it.”
Elwood finished his coffee with a long swallow. “I’ll head out. Coffee’s cold anyway. What kind of car?”
“It’s a 1949 Olds Eighty-Eight,” Paradise said.
Elwood narrowed an eye and nodded. “No kidding, ’forty-nine? Ain’t fresh off the showroom floor, is she? Busted axle might take some time. I’ll have to order parts from San Antonio. Maybe even Houston.”
“How long do you think?” Paradise asked.
“No telling. If I had to guess, a day or two to get the parts, maybe more. Then another couple to get her back on the road. Let me go get the old girl, and we’ll see where we stand.”
“Fair enough,” Doc said.
“Well then, let me ride.” Elwood waved as he waddled out of the diner. Doc watched through the plate glass as the fat man hefted himself up behind the wheel of a tow truck, started it, and rumbled out of the parking lot onto the road.
The food was the kind of good that can only be found in small-town diners. Doc offered to buy Cal breakfast, but the rancher said he’d eaten and accepted a cup of coffee instead. Once it arrived, he stirred in a package of Sweet’N Low, then spent the next hour entertaining them with good-old-days stories of ranch life, rodeos, and mean bulls. When they finished, Doc paid the bill, and the trio headed back toward Cal’s truck.
“Reckon you two can camp out at our place till we get word on your car. Mary Martha would be glad for the company,” the old rancher said.
“We’d appreciate it, thanks,” Doc replied. “But we wouldn’t want you to go to any more trouble. We can find a motel.”
Cal fished his keys from his pocket. “Uh huh. You sure can. Be lookin’ for a good spell, though. Only motel around here closed about ten years back.”
“Your place it is, then. Thanks again,” Doc said.
The parking lot had emptied substantially. The day offered deep-Texas quiet, and the sun warmed Doc’s shoulders. Since they had time, maybe he’d go for a run. The sound of tires on gravel and loud country music pushed into his thoughts as a lifted, late-model Chevy pickup dusted by him and skidded to a stop in front of the diner. The music stopped with the truck’s engine, and the air went quiet again as three laughing young men climbed out.
The driver ogled Paradise and whistled. “Hey, Cal, who’s your friend?” He was tall, with wide shoulders and an arrogance that usually comes with too much alcohol. The other two laughed.
“You Callaghan boys have beer for breakfast, or ain’t you been to bed yet?” Cal said.
“You’re one to talk, Cal. Let’s just say we had us a good night in Old Mexico,” the driver said.
“C’mon, King Jr. Let’s go in, man.”
The driver threw a mock punch, and the boy ducked, laughing.
“Knock it off,” Cal said. “King or no King, you ought to be getting to work. Your old man’d have your skin if he saw you here in town,”
King Jr. grinned. “King’s at a stock show in Dallas. What he don’t know won’t hurt him. So you gonna introduce me to the lady or what?”
Cal pointed a finger at them. “You can call me Mr. Sloan. And you boys has been spoiled since you stepped out of the womb.” Cal addressed the driver. “King Jr., my sweet hind end. You ain’t no King Jr. You don’t hold a candle to your old man. This lady’s out of your league. Go on home and get you some sleep. Sweat Old Mexico out of your bloodstream.”
King Jr. grinned. “You sure talk big for a little old man livin’ in a townie trailer.”
One of the others, tall and freckled, slapped King Jr. on the shoulder. “C’mon, King Jr. Leave the old boy alone. Let’s get us something to eat. I’m hungry.”
Irritation flashed across King Jr.’s face. “Go on ahead, then. I’ll catch up.”
Freckles kicked at the dust with his boot but didn’t leave.
Doc gauged King Jr. carefully. Well over six feet. Wide shoulders. Used to getting his own way. Cock of the walk.
Well, it’s a small walk.
“Doc, why don’t you two hop in the truck?” Cal said.
King Jr. moved to his right, blocking the way. “Nice dress, girl. Looks just right on you, too. You want to take a ride with me? See some real Texas cowboys?” He reached for Paradise’s arm, and Cal slapped his hand down. Surprise registered in the young man’s eyes. He shoved the rancher and laughed as Cal stumbled back, then reached again for Paradise.
Doc took King Jr. in the gut with his shoulder, and they both went do
wn hard onto the gravel lot. Doc scrambled up first and watched the dazed King start to his feet.
King Jr. spat and looked at Doc as if he were a cockroach. “You’re a dead man. You think you can—”
Doc punched him in the mouth, and King Jr. doubled over, hand to his face. Blood streamed through his fingers and dripped into the dust.
When King Jr. didn’t straighten, Doc turned quickly to check on Paradise.
Her eyes widened. “Look out, Doc!”
Lights flashed behind his eyes, and the Texas morning went black.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
All Hat and No Cattle
Doc struggled to put his thoughts together. Sunrise? Where was he? Light seeped through his eyelids in increments. It started out dull purple, then orange, then yellow, then crashed with the full weight of the sun.
He cracked a lid.
Not the sun. A bare light bulb surrounded by a metal cage glared down at him, giving a boost to the pain throbbing through his brain. With effort, he lifted his head and felt the back of his skull with careful fingers. He winced, finding a knot the size of an egg.
“You awake there, Mike Tyson?” Cal’s drawl reached him through the haze of pain.
Doc turned his head. The rancher sat on a bunk across from Doc. The room was small and colorless. A wall made up of thick metal bars separated him from an office furnished with a few industrial looking, gray metal desks. Sunlight filtered through dirty windows.
A sheriff’s office—and a jail cell.
Through another wall of bars to his right, a second cell sat unoccupied.
“Where are we? What happened?” Doc said.
“In the hoosegow, amigo. We been picked up on a dual charge of disturbing the peace and generally irritating a Callaghan—King Jr. being one of ’em. Irritating Callaghans is pretty much a capital offense around here.”
“Are you kidding? That guy assaulted you. What are you doing in here?”
“Like ol’ King Jr. said, I’m a trailer park townie. Not to mention, I got me a reputation for dancing with the bottle. He’s the son of the biggest rancher in South Texas. Clear-cut case of wrong place, wrong time. Plain truth of it is, what Jr. wants, Jr. gets, and what he wants right now is for me and you to have us a luxury vacation here at Hotel Graybar. You embarrassed him.”