Wolves At Our Door

by J P S Brown

  "If it’s not found to be cancer in the biopsy, it’s not cancer, as far as I’m concerned," Vogel said.

  The partners sat by Cody Joe’s bed for a while. The nurses were loading him with antibiotics.

  Captain Cunningham, the commanding officer of Tucson’s Marine Corps Reserve unit, came to see Cody Joe after Kane called him. By telephone from Cody Joe’s bedside, the captain notified his commanding officer at Camp Pendleton, California, that the boy was laid up so he would not be listed as AWOL.

  Ali found the partners again and promised that he would have the result of Vogel’s biopsy in two or three days. Still, regardless of the results of the biopsy and por las dudas, he wanted Vogel’s permission to order radiology treatments. Vogel said that he would think about it, and he and Kane left for the 7X.

  The Lobos bodyguards and Güero Rodriguez led Dolly Ann’s and Luci’s horses to a Hummer on the Mexican side of the border. With black sacks over their heads, trussed hands and feet, and ropes around their necks, the girls gave the Lobos no trouble. If they tried to speak, someone jerked on the choke rope. Holes in the sacks allowed them to breathe, but not to see. The sacks kept the choke ropes from chafing their necks, unless someone jerked on them, so they kept quiet. They were helpless as cargo on packhorses. They were Güero Rodriguez’s payload of a lifetime.

  Luci cried, but Dolly Ann did not. Dolly Ann knew that worse treatment probably awaited her, so she counted herself lucky for the time being. This was what her Pappy referred to as "The Plight". You do wrong, you find yourself in a plight. Disobey orders and you become an unfortunate person. Every time Dolly Ann got herself in a plight of some kind, her Pappy said, "How unfortunate you are."

  A plight is a misfortune a kid suffers that is all her own fault. She just had to take Luci for a ride on the Manzanita Mountain trail, even though her Pappy had forbidden it. What had she found on the ride? She found the very kind of plight her Pappy had foreseen. It most certainly would get worse, but it still was not too bad, so she did not cry. Dolly Ann knew when they rode through the wire gate into Mexico. They rode another fifteen minutes and stopped and her choke rope tightened. "Now I’m going to get even for being whipped and trampled by this one’s old man," Armando the thug said.

  "Don’t jerk on that choke rope again," Güero shouted. "It’s counter-productive. Whose idea is it to use the choke ropes anyway?"

  "My idea," Armando said. "It’s the way I lead a slave"

  ”You can’t vent your anger on the merchandise. The girl’s grandfather ran his horse over you? Get even in other ways. You have Kane’s whole family where you want them now. Act in a professional manner and forget your anger. Help me get the packages to market. Look at them. They're packaged whole and healthy. This is merchandise we handle here. Don’t jerk them off their horses onto their heads, and don’t put rope burns on their necks. Help them down, load them in the car, and let’s get going before a posse of sheriffs catches up to us."

  "When do we get to screw them?" another captor giggled. "Packages of this quality should be unwrapped upon receipt."

  "Yes, unwrapped naked," another captor said.

  "Don’t think about that now/' Güero said. "Untie their feet. Get them off the horses and into the vehicle. Let’s move. I don’t know how far ahead of pursuit we are."

  "Will they pursue us?" the fourth captor asked plaintively. "Are they close?"

  “No use taking chances," Güero said. "You don’t want the viejo to lay more latigazos on top your head, do you?"

  "He didn’t lash my head," the plaintive captor said. "He knocked me down and ran over me with his horse."

  "Ah, Armando was the one he whipped upon the head and shoulders?" Güero laughed. "I’ve been admiring the tracks of the latigazos on his head. Look, we don’t want the two viejos to catch up to us, but you have your Uzis and have my permission to kill them if they do."

  "They find the girls gone, they might arm themselves too," the plaintive captor said.

  Güero helped Dolly Ann off her mare. The horse stood a moment, as good servants do, and when the people paid her no mind, lowered her head and began to graze toward home.

  "I’m ready for the gringo viejo, this time," Armando said. "I hope he comes, because I crave him. I’m going to kill him and rape his females."

  He brandished his Uzi. "This time I'm armed."

  Güero chuckled. "Can you hit anything with that? Are you sure you can get close enough to the target? Don’t you think it would be better if you carried a banana? A banana will be easier to swallow when the gringo viejo shoves it down your throat/’ He put his hands around Luci’s waist and helped her off the horse. He raised his voice. "All right, let’s move now. Let’s go."

  They sat Dolly Ann in the backseat with three captors. Armando and Güero sat in the front seat with Luci between them. Armando drove the Hummer.

  When they were underway, Güero said, "Armando, what happened to the other Lobo who went with you the day the viejo gave you your latigazos?"

  "The big Mexican viejo must have chased him away," Armando said. "We didn’t see what happened to him."

  "We didn’t see anything, only the big horse of the gringo viejo when he ran over us," the plaintive captor said, but he knew what had happened. The comatose Lobo they had carried back to Mexico had expired. The other three Lobos had buried him under the bank of a wash. The two old cowboys had given them that idea.

  "I wasn’t acquainted with your other partner. What do you think happened to him?" Güero said.

  "Saaabe," Armando said. “Who knows? He peeled off and ran away in the high grass. We didn’t see."

  "If the gringo viejo didn’t impress you enough, and you feel that you can someday get even with him with that cuerno de chivo weapon with which you are no expert, think about that other viejo who rides with him. They call that one the Lion. Now, that is one big man you better be ready for. I’ve studied those people many hours at their home with my binoculars. Let me tell you, the gringo viejo loves these girls, but the Lion adores them. You don’t want either of those old men on your trail. That’s why the farther we get away from them right now, the better off we’ll be."

  The Hummer was crowded and the five men and two girls sat close together. Güero knew his thugs would try to give him trouble over the use of the girls, because they believed it was their Godgiven right to commit rape. They were in Mexico where they had little respect for the law and were fast leaving behind all possible pursuit. What would be the use of having pretty girls under their power if they could not screw them until they quit breathing and their hearts stopped? Güero did not intend to allow that. He intended to sell two whole and healthy girls. He would make an example of the first thug that tried to rape them. He did not care when they decided to do it, or how bad they wanted it. He would not allow it.

  Güero’s word was good. When he told a trader that he had two sixteenyearold virgins for sale, it was because he had guarded their virginity as he would his own sister’s, if he had a sister, Lord forbid. Traders paid a lot more money for virgins than for sixteen-year-olds with black eyes and holes poked in them. The thugs might roar their discontent, but this was business.

  Güero’s thugs did not believe they had become criminals to serve Güero and make him rich. They had become criminals so they could have all the sex and drugs they wanted. They were not businessmen or merchants. They were hoodlums with the appetites of animals. That was the reason they called themselves Los Lobos, The Wolves, and the unfortunate reason, the only reason, Güero used them.

  Just then the Hummer reached the bottom of the mountain and Armando looked at Güero and said, "You think we helped you pick these posies so you can sell them as virgins?"

  "Yes, and I expect you to obey my orders. These ’posies’ are not for you to play with, or even to smell. You can have your fun elsewhere. Right now, business. Get me and these females down the road. We can’t be late for our meeting with the other Hummer that will take us on to Rio Alamos."<
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  "That’s what you think, Güerito," Armando said. "I’m going to screw this one right now." He stopped in the middle of a sandy wash, grabbed Luci by the wrist, and dragged her out of the car.

  Güero walked around the back of the car, drew a .22 Beretta, switched off the safety and prepared to put its tiny ball of lead through Armando’s skull. Now was a good time to show the Lobos that they had no say in the fate of these girls. Armando had acted as a leader of the bodyguards and now believed he was Güero’s leader too. Güero would not tolerate bullies who thought they were smart. He stopped at the back of the Hummer and waited for Armando to forget about everything except rape. He took a cigar from a handful in his shirt pocket and lighted it.

  "I warn you, Armando. You won’t like what happens if you try to rape this girl," Güero said in an even tone. "I can’t sell damaged goods for the kind of money I want. This day’s work has been good business until now. You have a lot of money coming. Don’t ruin it for yourself."

  "I don’t see how I can damage the goods. The things women carry for our use are indestructible. I’ll show you. After I get through with her, she’ll be healthier and much more satisfied with her situation."

  "Don’t tear her clothes, either," Güero said.

  "Don’t tear her clothes? All right" Armando stepped away from Luci, but held her by the choke rope. "Take them off," he ordered. He tugged on the rope. "Get naked."

  Luci unbuttoned her shirt and dropped it on the sand, then unbuttoned her jeans, let them fall, and stepped out of them.

  ”Naked," Armando ordered.

  Luci pulled on the choke rope for slack. Armando gave it all to her and dropped the rope. After all, she could not run far with a sack over her head.

  Luci stepped out of her panties and sat on the sand. Then, while a grin spread over Armando’s face, she spread her legs. Armando began to unbutton his pants. Then, to everyone's disbelief, Luci filled both hands with sand, raked up a pile between her legs, and carefully began to put it inside herself.

  "What are you doing?" Armando shouted as he tried to bat her hands out of the sand.

  Güero howled with laughter and relief that he did not have to kill the man. The girl had come up with a much better solution to the problem. Armando’s ardor extinguished. The bodyguards could get back to business and forget about rape, maybe even get on the way to becoming an efficient unit, He helped Luci back to her feet and stood by while she tidied herself, then climbed into the Hummer behind her and ordered Armando to drive on.

  At a ranch called El Molino in the Altar Valley Armando delivered Güero and the girls to another Hummer manned by two more Lobos bodyguards. He then turned around and took his partners back the way they had come.

  Güero took the girls to see a doctor that night in Altar. He posted his new bodyguards at the front and back doors, then sat down to wait. After a while the doctor came out of his examination room. "You brought fine specimens this time," he said. "I see the little one fitted herself with a special devise for the repulse of rapists."

  "She told you what she did?" Güero asked.

  "She had to submit to my examination. Her little thing looked like a bat cave."

  "She’s not damaged is she?"

  "Not a bit. They are both in excellent condition."

  Güero waited for more. "And?"

  ”Yes, their hymens are intact. They’re both virgins."

  "Isn’t that unusual for girls who ride horseback a lot?"

  "Not in my experience."

  "I thought horseback riding ruptured hymens. That’s what everybody says. The blonde rides more than any girl I know."

  "In my experience it’s not true that girls who ride horseback have to lose their hymens. I believe it depends a lot on the kind of animal a girl rides. As far as I know, the animal that walks on two hairy legs is responsible for most ruptured hymens."

  TWELVE

  As Kane and Vogel neared the 7X in the pickup on the way home from the hospital, they saw the smoke from the cedar tree that Güero had set on fire and picked up the pace. When they arrived, they saw that the Lion and two U.S. Forest Service rangers had contained the fire, but there was no sign of Dolly Ann or Luci.

  Before Kane lifted a tool to help snuff out the last of the smoke, he asked the Lion where the girls were. The Lion told him their horses' tracks in the yard pointed toward the Manzanita trail.

  Ranchers sometimes set small trees on fire as emergency signals. Kane examined the ground around the burned tree and found Güero Rodriguez’s tracks. He already knew those tracks. He told the rangers the reasons the tracks worried him and since only an hour of evening light remained, he wanted to take the Lion and Vogel and search for the girls. The rangers understood and said they had the fire under control and the partners should go on.

  Kane’s and the Lion's encounter with Güero and the illegal Arabs had fixed the look of Güero’s boot track in their memories. The girls were in danger. The partners armed themselves with pistols and rifles’ and ammunition, saddled horses, rode out on the trail, and found Güero’s track following the girls’. The tracks were contained on the trail and easy to follow, so the partners spurred into a high lope and soon arrived at the place where the girls had been ambushed.

  The partners still had light enough to read the trail, so they ran the rest of the way to the Mexican line. The girls’ horses nickered and came to them on the Mexican side of the fence. The partners led the horses through the gate, tied them, and followed the tracks to the spot where the girls had been loaded into a vehicle that used thick, cleated tire treads. They did not know the tracks belonged to a Hummer, but they knew Los Lobos used Hummers on both sides of the border. They had seen them parked in that spot more than once, and the Lion had seen a Hummer that left the same track pick up the Arabs at the abandoned Vincent mine on the north end of the 7X. They hurried south on the vehicle’s tracks until they saw that it had turned west and gone down off the mountain. They could see twenty miles into the Altar Valley and the car was long gone.

  As Kane and his partners sat their horses and watched the light fade in the valley, he felt a constriction in his throat. It spread to his jaws and ears, then into the top of his chest. What is this, he thought. Anxiety from the loss of my little granddaughter. Will I he able to stand it? He looked into the empty valley and knew she was gone. How could he quit and ride home? He wanted to keep his blood up for the chase. He began to feel lightheaded and the tightness in his chest started to hurt.

  "¿Qué tienes?" Vogel asked. "What’s the matter, compadre?"

  "Why do you ask? You already know," Kane said.

  "You look like you just lost half your blood. You want to get down and rest a minute?"

  "l don’t feel that bad. Nobody could look good, the way I feel."

  "We’ll get the girls back, compadre."

  "Not today, though."

  "Bueno," Vogel said. "We’ll just have to find another way to run them down."

  Kane felt his friend’s gaze, but did not meet it. The chest pain spread to his back and his left arm began to ache. A pain in the little finger of his left hand became an agony. He thought, Well, I having the heart‘ attack my doctor warned me about. He would not turn toward his partners, because he knew his trouble would show. It scared him and he did not know what to do about it. He did not want to have to worry about it I right then. He took a deep breath and made himself relax. He was on his horse. That had always been a remedy for his ills. He would sit his horse and wait and see what happened with the pain. The tightness in his chest began slowly to recede. The constriction in his jaws, ears, and throat let go. His arm still ached, but the pain in his finger eased to a tingle, and he knew the spell would probably pass.

  A vehicle’s headlights appeared at the foot of the mountain. Its engine growled as it crawled toward the partners. Vogel said that he hoped it was the car that had taken the girls. Nothing in the world would move the partners from that spot until they found out if that car wa
s a Hummer. It came on, and when it turned broadside to them after it rounded a switchback, they saw it was a Hummer.

  The partners put their horses away where they would be safe from gunfire and took cover behind thick boulders beside the road. They chose a place where the Hummer would have to go slow because of big humps of bedrock in the track. The Lion and Vogel made ready to ambush the right side of the car. Kane hid on the driver’s side. They agreed not to wait to be sure the Hummer contained Lobos. As soon as it came in range, they would shoot the tires out on both sides and stop it on the bedrock.

  The partners still had time to wait. Kane still felt tightness in his chest and thought, I might die of a heart attack any minute. If I get Dolly Ann back and Cody Joe gets well, how can I leave them to deal with these border thugs? After me, they’ll only have the Lion and he’s even more ancient than me. K this Hummer carries the sonsabitches who stole my little granddaughter, after they tell me what they did with her, I can’t let them live. I could die within the next few minutes, so this is my last stand, whether I get shot or my heart quits. The Lord knows, my compadre Juan won’t be able to stop thugs on this border. He has his Sierra to look after. He’s brave, but not mean enough. He’s tough, but he’s the gentle husbandman of his ranches. That’s why I put him over there with the Lion and not here by me. The Lion will pull the chain on these sonsabitches, ir they’re the ones who took our kids, the same as he'd pull the chain to flush a potfull of turds. My compadre Juan is a lot different. He’ll first have t make sure that he doesn't know the sonsabitches, then make sure he doesn’t like their faces.

  The Hummer crawled over the brow of the mountain toward the ambush and lurched along in time with rock music from its radio. Kane turned away so the headlights would not blind him, then rose up when they had passed, and shot the front and rear tires flat. Then he jerked open the driver’s door. The explosions of Vogel’s and the Lion’s rifles made both doors fly open on their side. The Hummer could not negotiate the humps of bedrock on its rims, so it settled into deep cracks between them and stopped. The door light illumined the faces of two men in the front seats for Kane.