Candy Kid (8 page)

Having so decided, all he had to do was drop in at every perfume shop on the street. And to long for the cool, clean smell of beer. You couldn’t fool a dame on perfume. Why the blonde wanted such blatant-smelling stuff wasn’t his business. Her package was going to contain the right one if he had to sample every bottle in Juarez. The small matter of locating Beach would have to wait until this mission was completed. There was no sense in wasting his strength combining the two; the shops were laid like dominoes on this side of the street, the big saloons were on the opposite side.

He tried two more shops without any luck. In the third, which was given over to guaraches and sombreros and glittering Chino Poblano skirts, his spirits soared. The girl who flirted over to assist him reeked of the right stuff. She was too plump for her flimsy blouse and teetering red heels, too old for the flower, artificial, stuck in her thick black hair. Her hair was oily, it smelled dirty. Her red lips breathed garlic. But the overall smell was the perfume.

His manners were those of a gentleman, he tempered enthusiasm with courteous dignity. “Would you be so kind, Senorita, as to tell me the name of the perfume you wear?”

The question surprised her. Certainly no turista had asked this before and no one of Juarez would inquire, they would know. Her mouth opened, emitting garlic more strongly. “It is La Rosa.” She tilted her head flirtatiously. “La Rosa del Amor.”

“I wish a bottle.”

She shook her head. “We do not sell it here. We do not sell the perfumes.”

“Where can I find it?”

“Any place,” she shrugged.

“Not at the Paris.”

“The Paris!” She sniffed. “You can buy it any place on the street, I think, not at the Paris.” The Paris was for
los ricos.

He thanked her and hurried out. He found what he wanted at one of the open booths. La Rosa del Amor. He bought the big bottle in its cheap cardboard box, a bright pink rose decorating the label, the name wiggling around in gold letters. Made in Mexico. Made for the Five and Ten. It cost five pesos, possibly because he was North American. About a dollar. He insisted on having it wrapped, brown paper for this one. And dirty white string. Dulcinda Farrar wouldn’t know about the wrapping; she’d know only she had the perfume she was expecting. Her nose would know.

He carried it openly, there was nothing else he could do. Now he could take up the problem of Beach. It would be a problem to get his charming primo-hermano steered back to El Paso. Yet unless he wanted to leave Beach on the loose here, which would mean they wouldn’t get started home in the morning, he’d have to cozen him into calling it a day. You’d think Beach would want to call it a day. The six o’clock start from the ranch this morning was too long ago. With the strain of this night piled atop it, Jose was ready to flop.

He cut across the street, making his way in and out of the noisy palaces and their reek of music, booze, and jabber. He didn’t stop for a drink at any of them, a drink would make him fall on his face the way that the weariness was eating through him. He wasn’t discouraged. The Cock and the Central were just ahead, the biggest and best. Beach was a true Aragon; he preferred the best.

Jose was leaving the Caballo when he ran smack up against Tosteen. He could have said, “Excuse me,” and gone around him, the man wouldn’t start anything in a crowd. But Jose didn’t. By then he was sick of the sight of anyone connected with Senor el Greco. This time he blocked Tosteen and with mocking courtesy said, “I keep running into you, Senor.” Out of contempt for the man, he put on a Mexican accent.

The big, sagging man looked twice as tired as Jose. He also looked startled, as if the last person he expected to run into was the man he’d been following, Jose Aragon. Or Jose Aragon carrying a bottle of rose perfume.

“Or is it you seem to keep running into me, Senor?” Jose showed his nice white teeth. “I do not like it. I do not like you. Remove yourself.”

He might not have been so bold in a dark alley but here in the safe din of the Caballo with the police only the roar of a fight away, he swaggered. Tosteen didn’t say a word. He didn’t move his hand to his armpit. He wasn’t interested in Jose, only in the package Jose carried. His eyes were damp on it. Almost eagerly he stepped aside.

The encounter had revived Jose. He strode next door to the Cock. The old Cock had been a small place, away from the hurly-burly, a favorite spot. The new one was as popular, it coined money enough to live up to its name, but it was a Christmas tree not a comfortable beer parlor. Through the rhythmic shoulders of the rumba dancers he found the one head he was seeking. He started directly for it, gesturing aside the waiters who would have led him. It wasn’t until he reached the other side of the dance floor that he saw what ringside party Beach had joined. Actually he saw only one member of the party, Dulcinda Farrar. Beach wasn’t there by accident.

It was too late to retreat. Beach was calling across the intervening space, “
Mira,
Jose! I found your blonde!” With a firm hold on the brown-paper parcel, Jose reluctantly put one foot in front of the other until he reached the table.

After what had been transpiring, he was more critical in his study of the blonde than he had been in the gay noon-day sun. But she was just as lovely as she’d been then, the patrician face wasn’t marred by the rigors of a night in Juarez, the eyes were as golden-brown, the mouth as bold. She was wearing something filmy in gray, something that dived daringly when you stood, as he did, above her. The mist color accentuated her suntan and she wasn’t wearing La Rosa. There was something about her that stirred his pulses, something that made the poetry he’d woven about her earlier no longer a joke. And it wasn’t the provocative dress.

Her glance flecked over Jose as it would over any stranger. Beach made offhand introductions, “My cousin, Jo. Dulcy Farrar, Tim Farrar, Rags …?”

“The name is Harvey Ragsdale.”

“Jose Aragon,” Beach concluded. “Pull up a chair, Jo. Where have you been?”

Dulcy continued to appraise Jo as if she’d not seen him before. “Your cousin has been searching everywhere for you,” she commented with faint amusement.

A scrawny waiter had brought up another chair, inserting it between Beach and the girl. While Beach was ordering a new round, Jose slipped into it. “Make mine beer,” he put in. He set the package on the table, keeping it near hand touch. “I know,” he told Dulcy. “He has searched in every glass and in the eyes of every pretty girl. And he couldn’t find me.”

Beach was sailing high and would be happy to soar higher. If he’d been drunk, Jose could have walked him out of here; if he’d been sober, a word under the breath would have been enough. Unfortunately, being neither flesh nor fowl, it would take some figuring. Unless Jose could procure allies. The two men with Dulcinda weren’t happy about the Aragon cousins.

Tim Farrar must have been a younger brother. His face was very young, what he hadn’t buried in a yellow-brown beard. His features were hers but the supercilious sneer descending the slender nose, burying itself in the beard, was his own.

Ragsdale was a big brute and he didn’t need to get to his feet to prove it. No fat, brawn and muscles; Tim was a matchstick stacked beside him. A Tim would need a Rags. Ragsdale’s window dressing was okay, the right clothes and the right crop to his curly hair, dark as Jose’s own, but he was out of his class. He belonged in the ring or in the oil fields or on the docks, not with the Farrars. Nor the Aragons.

Beach, the order given, demanded cheerfully, “Where did you disappear to, Jo? All of a sudden, you’re gone. Without a trace. Adam went on home.”

“I ran into some old friends,” Jose explained easily. “I left a message, didn’t you get it?”

“No messages.”

“You probably didn’t miss me until that senorita ran you off. Or was it she had a husband who objected?” He told Dulcinda, “My cousin was very busy with a young lady when I left him.”

Beach managed to glare. “Don’t you believe anything he says, Dulcy. He has a pretty, lying tongue, beware of it.”

The three of them might have been doing a scene on a stage with Tim’s sneer and Ragsdale’s square blank face for audience. Dulcinda’s companions were that interested and that disinterested. Rags was drinking tequila straight, out of a tumbler. Unless it was pulque. His tastes would have developed before he latched onto the Farrars.

Dulcinda tilted her eyes at Jose. “Why has your cousin insisted that I am your blonde? I’ve told him we never met, can you convince him?” There was no hidden message in those clear eyes; she was clever.

“Convince me,” Beach grinned. “If she’s not your blonde, she’s mine.”

“Perhaps then I do not wish to convince him,” Jose said softly to her. He didn’t like it that he could have meant what he was saying.

“But he has a blonde stached out somewhere,” Beach warned. “That’s why we’re not in Santa Fe tonight.”

“You are from Santa Fe?”

Jose said, “I am. Beach is the California branch.”

“We’re headed for Santa Fe,” Dulcinda said casually. “Perhaps we’ll run into each other up there.”

“We will.” He looked deep into her golden eyes, as if he were just another guy bowled over by her fascinations. Not one who didn’t intend to be. As if he didn’t know that she’d known where he was from and that somehow it was important to her. It was after the Fernandez brothers had yelled their nickname that she’d returned to hire him.

“I’m warning you to pay no heed to him,” Beach insisted. “You can’t trust this
burlero.
Women have learned that to their sorrow from Cape to lonely Cape. Isthmus to Isthmus. Peninsula to Peninsula.” He was enjoying his tongue trouble with the words.

Jose lighted her cigarette. It was natural to bend his head to hers. “Perhaps we will run into each other before then?”

She smiled. “Quien sabe?” It must have been her special smile. Despite decision, Jose’s heart or whatever it was in the mid-hollow gave a special bump. Dulcinda could be dangerous.

Beach was paying off the waiter. Neither Farrar nor Ragsdale had made a pass at their wallets or said thanks for the drinks. Jose told him, “Drink up, chum. We’ve got to get back to the hotel.”

Beach opened his eyes boy-wide. “What’s your hurry? The night hasn’t begun.” He ogled Dulcinda pleasantly.

“It’s ended for me. I’m out on my feet.” He didn’t have to strive for a convincing sigh.

The beard murmured, “Don’t let us detain you.”

Beach hadn’t noticed or he was used to Tim’s distaste: “Run along,” he told Jose. “I’ve got work to do.”

“No.” He was firm. “Your sainted mother told me to watch over you. Besides we’re taking off early for Socorro and I don’t intend to drive it alone.”

“Socorro?” Dulcinda’s eyebrows were curious, too curious. “Not Santa Fe?”

He outlined it. “We return a truck to the ranch. We pick up my car—and then homeward bound.” He promised, “Where we will meet.”

She gave him a hint of the smile again. Just enough to keep him hopeful. If she’d been an innocent, she wouldn’t have spent it on him. Not with Beach around. It was Beach the dames went for. For tonight he’d had enough of Dulcinda’s game, whatever it was. He set to work on Beach, a stubborn Beach.

The only interruption was from Tim Farrar. “Perhaps if we were to leave,” he suggested in a thin, cold voice, “you would have no trouble.”

Dulcinda warned her brother sharply, “Don’t be ridiculous.”

It looked to Jose as if he’d have to give up. It looked as if Dulcinda Farrar preferred him to go over the bridge alone. It wasn’t too farfetched, not with all the other oddities he’d run into tonight. Because he was too weary to think straight, it took far too long to think up a way to convince Beach. When actually it was so simple. Beach was an Aragon, the Aragons were gentlemen. He whispered, “Lou expected us to return after dinner for a visit with her. She is our hostess….”

Beach sighed to Dulcinda, “We must go.” He sighed again. “He’s right. Usually he’s wrong but this time he’s right.”

If she were disappointed, she didn’t let it show. She didn’t even display curiosity. She said, “Until we meet again?” She said it to Jose not Beach.

“Until Santa Fe,” Jose replied. He tugged Beach’s arm. “Come on, amigo.”

Reluctantly Beach got on his long legs. From under the table he pulled out two jugs of rum. “Bet you thought I’d forget,” he told Jose. He made a teetering bow to Dulcinda, “Until Santa Fe.” Dulcinda’s escorts had nothing to say, not even goodbye.

“Wait,” Dulcinda called to Jose. “You’re forgetting your package.” She didn’t touch it.

He’d left it there deliberately, it seemed an easier way to make delivery than hocus-pocus at the Chenoweth desk. It seemed however that she wanted it her way. He said, “Oh?” and “Thanks.” He picked it up as if it weren’t important and hurried after the weaving Beach.

As they made their way to the door, Jose returned his glance to the table. None of the three had moved. He couldn’t help wondering who or what they were waiting for. Certainly they weren’t enjoying each other’s company. They were three empty shells.

The exit doorway was always cluttered but as they reached it now, it was barred. Clanking his band, gesticulating vociferously, and cursing with imagination and bile was Canario. He broke off when he spied Jose. “Senor Aragon,” he doffed his dirty hat and bowed metallically, “it is a pleasure to see you once more.” He didn’t say if it was a surprise, but returned to his tirade. “They are so fine here. They will not let a poor man enter their doors. Come, throw me out!” He yelled, “Come!”

Beach was crying out in tipsy pleasure, “Look who’s here! Good old Canario. Give us a tune, Canario!”

Canario’s bird-bright eyes cocked a villainous scowl at the manager. The manager did not budge. Canario decided against complying with Beach’s request. “Come to my cafe and I will play for you.
Una linda piada!
” He backed out of the entrance, allowing Jose and Beach to follow.

His cafe was the street. He struck up his discordant jangle the moment they were outside. It wasn’t possible to accuse him of detaining them, Beach was too eager an audience for that. Yet they were being held here, held just as securely as if he were still blocking their path. They were held by his desire to entertain them, held because a gentleman would be as particular regarding the artistic pride of a street musician as of the merits of a concert master. No song of warning was sung although Jose waited for it. Canario seemed to have no purpose in making music this time beyond the pesos which would be reward. Nor did those who gathered about him from the cafe and the street seem to have any purpose but to listen to the
piada.