The Bird Saviors

by William J. Cobb

  Becca nods. Sure. That would be great.

  The woman smiles and leans forward, holding out her hand. I'm sorry. I'm Joy, Sonny's sister.

  Oh. Becca shakes her hand. You must think I'm some kind of skeevy woman.

  Skeevy?

  A floozy. A tart.

  Joy shrugs. Sonny is a good man, so why not? I've opened my eyes in a few strange places myself.

  I'm not a tramp. It was just, you know.

  Joy waves her hand like Becca should forget it. She walks away, down the hall. From the kitchen she calls out, How long have you known Sonny?

  Becca pushes her hair out of her face. I just met him, actually.

  What?

  Becca gets out of bed and pulls on her clothes. She shouts this time. I just met him.

  As Joy moves in the kitchen, making the coffee, Becca hears her laughing.

  Okay. You're not a floozy, she calls back. But you must be easy.

  H i r a m P a g e m e e t s an unsavory acquaintance at a highway pull-off near Lake Pueblo, a windswept half moon of beaten- down prairie from which a body can see for miles in every direction. It's late in the day and the sky is hazy blue with summer heat. Their only company is a pair of mountain bikers who ride up and dismount, stand there chugging Gatorade, wearing sports sunglasses and helmets. Page leaves his diesel engine running and the windows rolled up. The cyclists give the pickup dirty looks as they load their bikes.

  Hiram's friend runs a lucrative chop shop, goes by the name of Porter. Long hair and sideburns, a windburned face. He's the one who arranged the cattle- rustling caper, the one whose brother works for the Pueblo County sheriff's department.

  I'm sure it's risky, says Porter, but it just might be worth the trouble. BP must have insurance out the wazoo. Look at what's going on with all those pirates in Africa? All the companies do is write off the losses and keep on truckin'.

  What about tracking devices? asks Page. Some kind of GPS gizmo? They probably have something on each and every rig to know where it is.

  My friend says he knows where it is, how to unhook it.

  How are we going to sell this black gold? All the stations must keep records.

  I've got that covered. We slap fake plates on it and haul the rig to Utah, and some locals there will do all the paperwork and sell to a few independent stations in Colorado City. We give them a discount and still make a bundle.

  Hiram Page sits and stares west. The dried prairie grasses look burnt orange in the late- afternoon light.

  Who do you plan on taking with you on this caper? he asks.

  Well, I think Ezra for one. He's got a pair of balls and needs the money. We'll need three, four guys besides me. I'm sure I can find somebody. Probably Ezra can scare up a couple of his buddies who know enough to keep their mouths shut should something go wrong.

  Which it better not.

  Agreed. Which it better not. But if it does, we want some of our own on this.

  What about the driver?

  We drug him, says Porter, mimicking an injection in his neck.

  He wakes a few hours later and hitches a ride home. You're long gone?

  That's what I'm thinking. You like the idea? asks Porter.

  Page purses his lips and nods. One condition. I want a cousin of mine to ride along, a kid named Jack Brown. He's a cheap date. We'll pay him enough to keep him happy, which won't have to be much.

  Is he up for this kind of work?

  Hiram makes a face. He's young, dumb, and full of cum.

  I don't like the dumb part. Dumb gets people hurt.

  Tell him what to do and he'll do it.

  Porter watches another Jeep pull in and skid to a stop, raising a cloud of dust that drifts onto Page's pickup. Teenagers in Lycra bike outfits get out, laughing. Okay, then, he says. I'll nursemaid your cousin, long as he doesn't get a dime from my cut.

  Deal, says Page.

  Sounds like we've got a plan.

  Page nods. As the great ear- biting boxer Mike Tyson once said, Everybody's got plans, until they get hit.

  When the day comes Porter meets his motley crew at a scenic pull- off in the Bighorn Canyon, beside the legendary Arkansas River, former boundary of the Louisiana Purchase, former divid ing line of Arapaho and Comanche territories. Now it's a hot spot for commercial float trips, whole families bobbing along in orange life vests, taking pictures with digital cameras as the water splashes and they squeal.

  Porter is in a bad mood, glaring as Mosca and Ezra Page stand jawing beside a red pickup. In the cab are crammed three polyg flunkies, with Jack Brown sitting bitch in the middle, looking squashed and put out. Porter looks the chop- shop mechanic that he is, with a pit- bull face and sideburns, long hair in a ponytail.

  A red pickup? I thought I told you to be low key?

  I told them you wouldn't like it, says Ezra Page, Hiram's blood nephew.

  Porter shakes his head and sighs. Well, goddamnit, you might as well put up a sign that says, Remember Me. But whatever. We're here now and we got a job to do.

  We're cool, says Ezra. No one will see a thing.

  You better hope they don't. Meanwhile, listen up. I'm going to hang back and get behind the tanker once it passes. Ezra, you get in place in front and block the road with the trailer once I give the word. I'll call and tell you when he's headed your way. You, he says, pointing at Jack Brown, try not to wet your pants or stutter too much.

  I don't stutter, says Brown. I mean, sometimes I can stumble on a word or two like anyone else, but that's normal, isn't it? I mean—

  Better yet, don't open your goddamn trap. We don't need chatty patties on this job.

  I'm not—

  Are you stupid or what? Just shut your fucking mouth, okay?

  Okay.

  No use putting a trucker in his grave without he deserves it. Now if he goes and tries something funny, all bets are off. Rodriguez, you ride with Ezra.

  Why me? asks Ezra. I thought I'd be riding with you.

  You're second in charge. I want you to keep an eye on Mosca. In my book, a loose- lip Mexican can't be trusted 100 percent.

  Ezra frowns but takes out his keys and points Mosca toward his dirty white pickup hitched to a flatbed trailer stacked with hay bales. Ezra Page is thin as Ichabod Crane, with small eyes and huge Adam's apple. He wears a cowboy hat with a short, straight brim. Mosca smirks. He thinks it looks old- timey, like this is a Saint who fancies himself living in an Old West comic book. While they're talking Ezra takes off his hat to adjust it. Just above his hairline is an awkward gauze bandage the size of a man's palm.

  You always wear a new hat to a bushwhacking?

  Ezra frowns and settles the hat back in place. It's not new.

  Right, says Mosca. I bet you've had it at least two weeks.

  They climb into the cab without another word. Ezra drives. He looks to be no older than nineteen or twenty. You sure you're old enough for this? says Mosca. I mean, you do have a valid driver's license, don't you?

  I'm old enough, don't you worry, says Ezra.

  Mosca stares out the window, his pinched face stiff, eyes squinting out at the rocky canyon walls. A half mile down the road he says, Fucker better watch who he calls a Mexican.

  Ezra grins. You're the one who should watch what you say.

  That's Porter you're talking about. I wouldn't fuck with him, no way nohow.

  I'm just saying—

  I know. Just leave me out of it. Let's just do this and make a ton of money, okay?

  The sky fades to violet and lavender, then deep purple, with a stencil silhouette of the Sangre de Cristo mountains to the south. Mosca watches the taillights of the pickup ahead and imagines bushwhacking Porter, having George Armstrong Crowfoot hold him down as he cuts out his tongue. That would be hard to do, to grab a squirmy thing like that and cut it free. Maybe his ears would be a better target. Smug sumbitch. He thinks he can make fun of mi familia he's got another thing coming.

  Mosca chatters to pass the time. H
e says he's heard some ski resorts might close this year. Frankly, I don't give a shit. I mean, what's the point in skiing? A sport for rich assholes. Sliding down a mountain on a couple skinny boards? Sounds pretty damn silly if you ask me.

  The Lord is punishing the rich for their hedonism and profligate ways, says Ezra. That's why the cost of everything is so high. It's a great reckoning. It is. You mark my words. This is just the beginning.

  If this is just the beginning I'd hate to see the fiery adios.

  You will. A time will come when the one true prophet will emerge and all the evils and sins of the world will be made right.

  Except for this fuel appropriation, right? Mosca grins.

  It's not a sin to take what doesn't belong to anyone to begin

  with. It's our right and ability. The oil lay below the holy land, occupied by sand monkeys.

  The headlights shine on jagged cliff faces that loom over the road. Highway 50 follows the Arkansas River like an asphalt shadow. Mosca says this is a famous stretch of road. Stagecoaches had regular routes here in the 1880s. I'm a history buff, he adds. I like to know where we been and where we're going. I won the head of Black Jack Ketchum in a card game. I might auction it off to the highest bidder sometime, if you know anyone might be interested. Aren't you Saints keen on the past, Brigham Young's wives' petticoats and all that?

  Don't blaspheme the worthy.

  I was just saying.

  Some things you don't kid about.

  On State Highway 69 south of Texas Creek they wait at a tight bend on an uphill slope. Porter calls on his cell to tell them the turkey is on its way.

  Mosca rolls his window down and smokes a cigarette. The night air is cool and smells of pine and juniper. He says he loves this country and can't imagine living anywhere else. He doesn't blame the other Mexican migrants for wanting to come north. I mean, there's work here for them. Everybody wants to make a living, no matter where they might be born.

  That head you say is Black Jack Ketchum's. You say you won it in a card game, right?

  It's the Lord's truth. I had two aces buried in a hand of Texas Hold 'Em. I was sweating it all the way till the last man called. I figured someone might have a full house.

  When was that?

  Two months back.

  Had a big mustache, didn't it? Funny because I knew of a Saint by the name of Morris Dinwoody who had a bad car wreck about a year ago. Decapitated, he was. Ezra smiles. Can't get any worse than that.

  Mosca jabs out his cigarette. And the point is?

  I'm willing to bet more money than you won at the card table the head was Morris Dinwoody's, formerly of Florence, Colorado.

  Goddamnit. No one believes me. When Black Jack Ketchum was hanged in 1901 his head popped clean off. The man I won it from said he knew some archaeologist types who dug up the coffin to do some kind of DNA test and—

  You weren't playing a man named Curtis, were you? Red- haired son of a bitch? With a high voice?

  Mosca doesn't answer. He flicks his cigarette out the window. Fucking DNA test proved it was Ketchum, he says. I don't give a shit what you say. I know what I got and that head is worth some money.

  Curtis works for the mortuary that handled Dinwoody's corpse. He didn't have any people who cared for him and he was a turncoat polyg, so they'd just as soon spit on his grave. I heard Curtis had the head dried and cured as a joke.

  Mosca says, That trucker should be coming soon.

  Well, not a joke, adds Ezra. More like a curiosity object I suppose.

  Long as we're shooting the shit, what happened to your head?

  Ezra takes his time answering. What happened is not the question. Or the issue, you might say. What's going to happen when I catch that redskin motherfucker, that's the issue.

  In the dark he can't see the smirk on Mosca's face.

  A cell phone buzzes on the dashboard. Ezra answers it and listens. Okay, we're ready, he says. He folds it shut and digs under his seat for a machine pistol. Lock and load, amigo. It's showtime.

  They pull the truck into the middle of the road and cut the wheels hard to the left, getting the front wheels just off the edge of the shoulder, blocking the way of both lanes with the hay trailer. Mosca jumps out of the cab and climbs onto the flatbed, kicks off a stack of hay bales. A few minutes later they see the headlight beams of the fuel tanker shining on the pines and junipers. Ezra tells Mosca to stay on the flatbed trailer and don't do anything stupid. They pretend to be reloading the hay as the tanker approaches.

  Remember, says Ezra, I'm in charge here. Got it?

  No problema, says Mosca. You the man.

  From their spot in the middle of the road all they can see of the tanker are two bright headlights. Ezra waves his hands for it to stop, a machine pistol tucked into the back of his jeans. He smiles as he walks up to the cab, the diesel engine throbbing above him, and as he steps in closer he realizes he's forgotten to grab his flashlight. He can't see the trucker behind the wheel. He stands there ready to give his spiel about it being just a minute while they load the hay back onto their trailer. The cab door does not open.

  The semi's diesel engine throbs and rattles. The headlights shine on Mosca in the flatbed of the hay trailer. He holds his hands up to block the blinding light.

  Knock on his door! yells Mosca. He sees Ezra lean in to bang on the side of the cab door, and in the same moment it swings open. Ezra snaps back and falls to the shoulder of the road.

  The gears shift and the engine throb drops to a deeper growl. The truck starts to reverse.

  Mosca jumps down from the trailer and lands badly, feeling a lightning bolt of pain shoot up his ankle. He cusses and limps forward. Ezra is getting to his knees now, his machine pistol in his hands. Behind the truck are two pair of headlights, blinding Mosca. He limps forward a few feet, stops, and takes a shot at the receding truck headlights. He misses. In the red glare he sees the two pickups park sideways. The truck doesn't stop or slow, smashing the passenger- side door of the first truck and knocking it backward.

  Ezra runs and shoots at the cab windows. The bullets spiderweb glass. He keeps shooting and black holes of broken windshield appear, sparks flying where bullets hit metal. The truck slows and jackknifes. The cab door opens, the driver jumps down, backlit by the pickup headlights. He runs for the pines beyond the road shoulder, tumbles into the ditch, scrabbles up the rocky embankment.

  Stray bullets kick up dust around him. He slips and grabs at his back, flinches, and stumbles. He turns and in the headlights his face is clearly visible, looking back. Mosca and Ezra come up with their guns drawn and pointed.

  The trucker is a heavy man with a beard and black- framed glasses. You had no cause to shoot me, he says. You did that just out of meanness, didn't you?

  You started it, says Ezra. You're the one who smashed that door into me. I bet you anything I'm having a black eye and bruises in the morning.

  The trucker coughs raggedly and struggles to breathe. Mosca tells Ezra it looks like he's lung- shot. If he don't get to a doctor fast he's a goner, he says.

  Shut your trap, hisses Ezra.

  The trucker inhales raggedly to speak, spits up blood.

  Porter and the others approach, casting long shadows across the embankment as they pass before the headlights. They wear hats and bandannas. Porter walks up to Ezra and stands close. Who did the shooting? he asks.

  Boy genius here, says Mosca.

  Who are you sonsabitches? wheezes the trucker. I didn't do anything to you. I'm just driving a goddamn truck and you fucking shoot me.

  Ezra shakes his head and says, You started it. All I was trying to do was—

  Porter cuffs his ear. Goddamn you. That man's blood's on your hands.

  Listen, says the trucker, I'm getting cold here. Just take me—

  He stops in midsentence and slumps, his body settling into the dead grass.

  Goddamnit to hell, says Porter. He cuffs Ezra again. You stupid, stupid son of a bitch.

 
; Jack Brown is busy tossing the hay bales off the road. He shouts that they need to get a move on, cars could come by any minute.

  Ezra stands dumb, staring down at the dead trucker and wiping his hands on his jeans. Porter turns and jabs a finger against his chest. Enough of this, he says. You drag his body into the woods, then drive the flatbed home. And don't you say a fucking word to a soul, you got that?

  Ezra nods, stumbling as he climbs up to the road, falling to his hands and knees for a moment, then getting up and brushing himself off.