Candy Kid (19 page)

She removed the hand as if it were a bug. She said nothing, walked away. The laughter from the near tables wasn’t accidental. Nor the jeers. He ignored both, sidling through the aisle to reach Adam at the bar.

“What you doing with that outfit, son?”

“That’s my blonde,” he responded. Not happily.

Adam rumbled, “Give him a Bromo, Bob. He’s got a headache.” He laid a sympathetic paw on Jose’s shoulder. “I was referring to the cowpuncher.”

“He’s border patrol.”

“What the hell’s he doing so far from the border?”

Bob made it a beer not a Bromo.

“He’s trying to pin a murder on me.”

Adam waited for the punch line. When there wasn’t any, he began to snicker. “Who’d you murder? Her husband? You ought to be careful about these things, Jo. Always knew you’d get caught some day.”

“Bail out,” Jose advised dourly.

“You mean to tell me you are mixed up in a murder?”

“Finish your drink,” Jose directed. “Let’s go to the house. I’ll tell you the whole sad story.”

“I can’t. I’ve got a date.” He shook his head. “No blonde. Business. Come out for dinner at my place.”

Jose hesitated.

“Bring her along,” Adam urged.

“I’ll bring Beach,” Jose said. “I’m off women.”

“If I know you, sonny, that won’t last till dinner time.”

Jose left him there at the bar and took himself out to the Plaza. It didn’t differ in appearance from any Saturday afternoon. The usual shoppers ambling on the streets, the usual flower-skirted and faded-jeaned teenagers blocking the door of the Botica, the usual battered cars squaring the park where black-eyed children played and the old men, their faces made browner by their white heads, nodded under the shade trees. It didn’t differ much in appearance from Juarez or any Mexican town. It was a little patch of Mexico or old Spain here in the United States. He lifted his eyes to the blank windows of Tio Francisco’s office across the narrow street. He had a report to turn in on the ranch; Uncle Frank was away on a South American junket during the congressional holiday but the office was fully staffed. Not on a Saturday afternoon. He sighed faintly. Work with clean mathematical figures would have driven away the megrims. He started to plod homeward, following the road past the Archbishop’s garden.

He felt lost, the way a man did after he’d been away and before he was again settled in routine. He could have sunned himself on the tiled rim of half a dozen swimming pools; he could have called a dozen fellows, worked up a game of tennis or golf, made plans for the evening with as many charming senoritas, all of whom would be delighted to hear that Jose Aragon was returned from the ranch and in need of friendship. He didn’t want any of it. It wasn’t wholly because of a nagging anxiety over the hiding place of perfume and candy. He was headed home because he was too troubled in mind to face the town’s summer trivia.

He saw no one he knew after leaving the Plaza; he saw no one at all after he began to climb el Camino de la Casa. On the shallow slope where the small adobe houses pricked the sandy waste, there were sounds of children and dogs; here on the hillside only the silence of the big places. Even in a town as small as this one, it would be simple to cause a man to disappear, much too simple. He picked up a bit more speed. This was not the hour to be walking abroad, this was the solitude time of siesta.

The blazing white thunderheads which accumulated daily at noon over the Sangre de Cristos had not yet piled high enough to discharge the coming storm. The blue blaze of sky, the white blaze of clouds gave a peculiar intensity of heat to the yellow-brown earth. Yellow-brown like Dulcy’s hair.

When he reached the gate he saw that Juana and the girls had gone for the day. They always left the gate standing open. He closed it after him and walked around to the back patio. None of the family except great-aunts ever used the formal front door.

He was overheated from the climb and dropped into a canopied swing to cool off. He set it stirring. The only thing wrong with this picture of a patio dappled in sunlight and cottonwood shade was that he’d have to fetch his own beer. If Beach hadn’t got stuck with those two characters, they could toss for it. And he admitted that a good part of his gloom was apprehension over Beach being with them. Visitor restrictions at Los Alamos had been tightened again this summer. He didn’t understand why Beach would plan to take the Farrar up there. Except that they’d manipulated it without Beach being aware. That didn’t hold water; Beach was keen. Despite it increasing his apprehension, Jose faced the fact that Beach had acted deliberately and for a reason. Placed in juxtaposition with Harrod’s cryptic remarks about the border and the hill, Jose didn’t like any part of it. What he wanted to do was get in his car and start for Los Alamos right now, find Beach, and remove him from the picture. The trouble was that he didn’t have his car; Beach had it on the Hill.

He bolted upright. Against the screen of the door, a shadow had formed. “Who’s there?” There was no answer and it took a moment looking from sun into house shade to realize that it was one of the girls. “Nan? Rosie?” he called. “How about bringing me a beer?”

For once, whichever one it was didn’t giggle at him. She merely slurred a
“Si”
and disappeared into the depths of the house. Luck had slanted a bit in his direction. He’d wished for a beer and a beer was coming. He settled himself full length in the swing, pushing the cushions under his head. If he could prevail upon Rosie or Nannie to stick around this afternoon to answer the phone or warn of approaching callers, he’d know the saints were with him. He might be able to make up some lost sleep while waiting for Beach to return.

It was the first time he’d been peaceful for forty-eight hours. He closed his eyes, wallowing in the gentle cradle of the swing, until he heard the door open and the girl announce in her accent, “Here is the beer.”

For the second time he sat bolt upright. She was holding out to him the bottle of
Tecate
he’d expected but she wasn’t the girl he’d expected. She was the
sorbita.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Automatically he grabbed the bottle from her. He needed it.

She wasn’t insulted or hurt by his lack of welcome. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t anything. She stood there with that impassive blankness on her face, looking at him out of those unblinking black stone eyes. “I come to see you,” she announced.

“My God, don’t I have enough troubles?” He drank a third of the bottle in lieu of answer. “How did you get here?”

“I hitch-hike.” She’d evidently enjoyed that. She became almost cheerful.

“How did you get across the bridge? Do you have a work permit, a visitor’s permit—”

“I do not come across the bridge. I come another way.”

He’d known it, he needn’t have bothered to ask. She’d come wetback. There wasn’t a kid in Juarez who didn’t know a dozen ways to cross the border without squandering centavos at the barrier. They crossed whenever they pleased, for any reason, to go to the movies or a parade or merely to behold the magic of the Five-and-Ten. It didn’t worry anyone; it had nothing to do with the economics of immigration.

But Francisca was something else again. If it were known that she’d skipped over the border, there’d be trouble. Senor Praxiteles was her
abuelo.

“Are you crazy?” he asked. “Do you know what they can do to you for that?”

“I know. Deport me.”

They could throw her in the juzgado but he didn’t bring it up. She’d know well enough that she wouldn’t go to jail unless Praxiteles so demanded. She might prefer jail to his house.

“But first they must find me,” she stated. She didn’t bother to add that he wouldn’t give her away. She knew darn well he wouldn’t. He was one of those foolish Norte Americanos who had kindness in their hearts for poor people.

“It’s going to make you very happy to know that Captain Harrod is already here.”

She swaggered, “Who is this Captain Harrod?” but she knew the answer. She began to back toward the house.

“He isn’t right here but he’s in town. And he doesn’t know you’re here unless somebody down below talked.” He was pretty sure that no one down below would know her whereabouts; she wasn’t one for idle chatter. “He came up with me last night.”

She didn’t like the implication. She said, “What do you want with that one?”

“What does he want with me is a better way to put it. And the answer to that one is easy. It’s the dead man in the river.”

“This is all over,” she said.

“That’s what you think,” Jose muttered. “You can’t bury some guys deep enough.” He finished the beer. “Your turn now. You came to see me. Why?”

She must have discarded a dozen reasons, it took her that long to answer. She finally announced, “I have come to help you.”

“A big help,” Jose said. “The border patrol is already hounding me. Now they’ve got a real reason. Hiding out a Mexican national.”

“You will not hide me. I will hide myself.”

“And how are you going to help me?”

She stated, “You are in danger of death, Senor.”

It wasn’t news, although it did sound a little startling to hear it cold, against the dapple of sunshine and shadow, against the mild creak of the swing, against the hum of bees in the climbing roses, and the flavor of chilled beer on the tongue. “Who has decided I must die? The
abuelo
?”

She nodded. The brittle black hair swung away from her shoulders. Her levis and her ragged T-shirt were filthy, her bare feet encrusted with layers of dirt.

“You went back home and he told you,” he said sarcastically.

“I hear it in the street.”

“You hear it in the street,” he mimicked. “So you hitch-hike three hundred miles, after sneaking across the border, to tell me something you hear on the street. Without finding out if it’s true.”

“It is true.”

“I’m not doubting it. But you didn’t have to hitch to Santa Fe to tell me. I knew it when I was in Juarez. You knew I knew it. What’s the true reason you came here?”

Again she was silent. Finally she muttered, “I hate him.”

“I know that too. Did he send you up here to get back the stuff?”

The first rumble of thunder came from the castellated white clouds. She looked at the sky curiously and then she shivered.

“It’s the rainy season,” he informed her. “It rains every afternoon.”

She didn’t appear to have heard him. She said, “I am afraid of him. He will kill me if he finds me.”

Reluctantly he climbed out of the comfortable swing. “Come on.” Maybe el Greco had sent her to get the stuff, and maybe she’d come running here because for her there were no more hiding places on the border. One thing sure, he wouldn’t turn her over either to the old man or to the patrol. He’d give her a chance.

He headed to the house. A second growl of thunder went with him. She continued to stand motionless staring up at the sky. “Come on,” he repeated. “If you’re going to hide, you’ll have to look like a Norte Americano.”

There was no way to hide her except openly. The first thing was to get the jungle dirt off. He led her to his sister’s room. “Take a bath, use a lot of soap,” he directed. He opened the door of the clothes closet, grabbed a handful of peasant skirts and blouses. In the bureau he rummaged for underclothes. He flung all on the bed. She stood warily half-in, half-out of the room, watching him. “Take a bath,” he repeated. “Wash your hair, you’ll find shampoo. When you’re clean, get dressed. By then I hope I’ll have figured out what we’re going to do with you.”

He left her there, hoping she understood shampoo. The sky was darkening fast; a first fork of lightning stabbed at it and the thunder repeated. Time for the usual afternoon routine of closing windows and doors before the downpour. The first large splatters of rain hit the patio outside. He speeded up the casements, the downpour was in full force before he’d made the rounds. The thunder no longer muttered, it roared with deafening impact after each white-hot jab of lightning. The weather makers were putting on a real show today.

He hadn’t heard a car stop, it was a wonder he heard the hammering at the front of the house, the shouting with it. Even without the thunder, the violent rain eliminated most sound. He lifted the iron bolt, tugged open the heavy door, and began to laugh.

The size of Adam made him appear twice as soaked as an ordinary guy. He was like a half-drowned whale. “Laugh, damn you,” he bubbled, pushing in and dripping all over the polished tiles of the hallway.

“Did you swim up from the hotel?”

“I thought I could make it before the storm broke. Knew I couldn’t get out home in time. If you didn’t keep your goddam gates closed, I could have driven in.”

“Mother likes it neat.”

“Don’t you tell me. She’s told me often enough.” He was peeling off his sodden jacket.

Jose mused, “If I had a tent, I’d offer it while you dry out. I might supply you with a blanket. You could make like an Indian.”

“Make like a barman and get me a drink.” Adam dropped the jacket and squushed to the dining room. He poured himself a straight one while Jose loaded a tray of ice, seltzer, bottle, and glasses. “Got to ward off pneumonia, don’t I?” Adam glowered.

They returned to the comfort of the library. The electricity was muttering out of the air, the rain was slashing steadily now, the temperature had dropped at least fifteen degrees. Jose put a match to the kindling crisscrossed under the pinon logs in the fireplace. “Try that on your pneumonia. Want to shack up here tonight?”

“You’re coming to dinner at my place, remember?”

“Not if the arroyos are running. Catch me pushing your truck and you out of the mud.”

“What’s the matter with driving your own swell car?”

“Beach has it at Los Alamos.”

Adam scowled. “Crazy bastard. What’d he want to go up there for? In rainy season yet.”

He wouldn’t pass on his alarm. Beach knew what he was doing. “He’s conducting a tour for the Farrars.” He managed to smile. “Only the one he wanted pulled a swiftie and he drew the brother and his pal. You haven’t met the men in the party yet, have you?”

“I haven’t even met the dame,” Adam grunted.