Cities of the Plain (29 page)

The captain raised one hand and let it fall again. He has already made his visit. This
morning.

He saw that?

Yes. Before we knew the identity of the girl. Thehow do you call him? The practicante. The
practicante told my lieu?tenant that he spoke excellent spanish. He has a cicatriz. A
scar. Here.

That dont make him a bad person.

Is he a bad person?

He's as good a boy as I ever knew. He's the best.

You dont know where he is.

No sir. I dont.

The captain sat for a moment. Then he stood up and held out his hand. I thank you for
coming, he said.

Billy rose and they shook hands and Billy put on his hat. At the door he turned.

He dont own the White Lake, does he? Eduardo.

No.

I dont reckon you'd tell me who does.

It is not important. A businessman. He has nothing to do with any of this.

You dont consider him to be a pimp, I reckon.

The captain studied him. Billy waited.

Yes, the captain said. I do so consider him.

I'm glad to hear it, Billy said. I'm the same way.

The captain nodded.

I dont know what happened, Billy said. But I know why it happened.

Tell me then.

He fell in love with her.

Your friend.

No. Eduardo.

The captain drummed his fingers lightly on the edge of his desk. Yes? he said.

Yes.

The captain shook his head. I dont see how a man could run such a place if he fell in love
with the girls.

I dont either.

Yes. Why this girl?

I dont know.

You told me you only saw her once.

I did.

You think your friend was not such a fool.

I told him to his face he was. I might of been wrong.

The captain nodded. I'm not a fool either, Mr Parham. I know you would not bring him to
me. Even if his hands were dripping. Especially not then.

Billy nodded. You take care, he said.

He walked out up the street and went into the first bar he came to and ordered a shot of
whiskey and carried it to the pay?phone on the back wall. Socorro answered and he told her
what had happened and asked for Mac but Mac was already on the phone.

I guess you'll tell me what all this is about.

Yessir. I Will. If he shows up there dont let him leave if you can help it.

Maybe you'll let me know how you propose to keep him someplace he dont want to be kept.

I'll be there quick as I can get there. I'm just goin to check a few places.

I knew there was somethin about this that didnt rattle right.

Yessir.

Do you know where he's at?

No sir. I dont.

You call me back as quick as you know somethin. You hear?

Yessir.

You call me back anyways. Dont leave me settin here all evenin.

Yessir. I will.

He hung the phone up and drank the shot and carried the empty tumbler to the bar and set
it down. Otra vez, he said. The barman poured. The place was empty save for a single
drunk. He drank the second shot and laid a quarter on the bar and went out. Walking up
Ju‡rez Avenue the cabdrivers kept calling out to him to go and see the show. To go and see
the girls.

Joan GRADY drank one whiskey neat at the Kentucky Club and paid and went out and nodded to
the cabman standing at the corner. They got in and the cabdriver turned and looked at him.

Where are you going my friend?

The White Lake.

He turned and started the engine and they pulled away into the street. The rain had
settled into a steady light drizzle but the streets were flooded and the cab moved out
slowly and went up Ju‡rez Avenue like a boat with the garish lights reflected in the black
water dishing and wobbling and righting themselves again in its wake.

Eduardo's car was parked in the alley under the dark of the warehouse wall and he crossed
to where it stood and tried the door. Then he raised his boot and kicked in the doorglass.
The glass was laminated and it spidered whitely in the light and sagged inward. He put his
boot to it again and it caved down into the seat and he reached in and laid the heel of
his hand on the horn and blew it three times and stepped back. The sound echoed in the
alley and died. He took off his slicker and took the knife out of the pocket and he
squatted and tucked his jeans into his boottops and stuck the knife and sheath down into
his left boot. Then he laid the slicker across the hood of the car and blew the horn
again. The echo had barely died when the door at the rear of the building opened and
Eduardo stepped out and stood back against the wall away from the light.

John Grady walked out from the side of the car. A match flared and Eduardo's face leaned
in the flame with one of his little cigarillos in his teeth. The dying match arced out
into the alley.

The suitor, he said.

He stepped forward into the light and leaned on the iron railing. He smoked and looked out
at the night. He looked down at the boy.

You could have just knocked at my door.

John Grady had taken the slicker from the hood of the car and he stood in the alley with
it folded under his arm. Eduardo smoked.

You have come to pay me the money you owe me, I suppose.

I come to kill you.

The pimp drew slowly on the cigarillo. He tilted his head slightly and blew the smoke
upward in a thin stream from his thin lips.

I dont think so, he said.

He turned and slowly descended the three steps into the alley. John Grady moved out to the
left and stood waiting.

I think you do not even know why you are here, Eduardo said. Which is very sad. Perhaps I
can teach you. Perhaps there is still time to learn. He drew again on the cigarillo and
then dropped it and twisted it out with his boot.

John Grady never even saw him reach for the knife. Perhaps he'd palmed it in his hand the
while. There was a sharp little click and a wink of light off the blade. And then the wink
again. As if he were turning it in his hand. John Grady drew his knife from the top of his
boot and wrapped the slicker around his right forearm and caught the loose end in his
fist. Eduardo walked out into the alley so as to have the light behind him. He stepped
carefully to avoid the pools of rainwater. His pale silk shirt rippled in the light. He
turned and looked at the boy. Change your mind, he said. Go back. Choose life. You are
young.

I come to kill you or be killed.

Ah, said Eduardo.

I didnt come to talk.

It is only a formality. Because of your youth.

You dont need to worry about my youth.

The pimp stood in the alleyway. His shirt open at the neck. His sleek oiled head blue in
the light. Holding the thin switchblade knife loosely in one hand. I wanted you to know
that I was still willing to forgive you, he said.

He had come forward by steps almost imperceptible. He stood. His head slightly cocked to
one side. Waiting.

I will give you every advantage. Perhaps you have not been in so many fights. I think you
will find that often in a fight the last one to speak is the loser.

He put two fingers to his lips to caution silence. Then he cupped his hand and gestured
the boy forward. Come, he said. We must make a beginning. It is like a first kiss.

He did. He stepped forward and feinted and passed the knife sideways at the pimp and
stepped back. Eduardo arched his back like a cat and held his elbows up that the blade
pass beneath them. His shadow on the wall of the warehouse looked like some dark conductor
raising his baton to commence. He smiled and circled. His sleek head shone. When he moved
in it was very low and from left to right and the knife passed before him three times too
fast to follow and almost too fast to see. John Grady fended the blade away with his
wrapped right arm and stumbled back and recovered but Eduardo was circling again, smiling.

You think we have not seen your kind before? I have seen your kind before. Many and many.
You think I dont know America? I know America. How old do you think I am?

He stopped and crouched and feinted and moved on, circling. I am forty years old, he said.
An old man, no? Deserving respect, no? Not this fighting in alleys with knives.

He moved in again and when he stepped back his arm was cut just below the elbow and the
yellow silk shirt was dark with blood. He seemed not to notice.

Not this fighting with suitors. With farmboys. Of whom there can be no end.

He stopped in his tracks and turned and started back the other way. He looked like an
actor pacing a stage. At times he hardly seemed to notice the boy.

They drift down out of your leprous paradise seeking a thing now extinct among them. A
thing for which perhaps they no longer even have a name. Being farmboys of course the
first place they think to look is in a whorehouse.

The blood dripped from his sleeve. The slow dark gouts vanished in the dark sand
underfoot. He swung the knife back and forth before him on his slow clockwise walk. Like a
man hacking randomly at weeds.

By now of course longing has clouded their minds. Such minds as they may possess. The
simplest truths are obscured. They cannot seem to see that the most elementary fact
concerning whores

He was suddenly very low before John Grady. Almost kneeling. Almost like a supplicant. The
boy could not say how he got there but when he stepped away and commenced his circling
again the boy's thigh was laid open in a deep gash and the warm blood was running down his
leg.

Is that they are whores, said Eduardo.

He crouched and feinted and circled again. Then he stepped in and with the knife backhand
made another cut no more than an inch above the first.

Do you think she did not beg me to come to her? Should I tell you the things she wished me
to do? Things beyond a farmboy's imagining, I can assure you.

You're a liar.

The suitor speaks.

He lunged with his knife but Eduardo stepped aside and drew himself up so small and narrow
and turned his head away in disdain in the manner of toreros. They circled.

Before I name you completely to myself I will give you even yet a last chance to save
yourself. I will let you walk, suitor. If walk you will.

The boy moved sideways, watching. The blood had gone cold on his leg. He passed the sleeve
of his knifehand across his nose. Save yourself, he said. If you can. Save yourself,
whoremaster.

He calls me names.

They circled.

He is deaf to reason. To his friends. The blind maestro. All. He wishes nothing so fondly
as to throw himself into the grave of a dead whore. And he calls me names.

He had turned his face upward. He held out one hand as if to display the vanity of counsel
and he seemed to address some unseen witness.

This is quite a farmboy, he said. This is some farmboy.

He feinted to the left and cut John Grady a third time across the thigh.

I will tell you what I am doing. What in fact I have already done. For even knowing you
will have no power to stop it. Do you wish me to tell you?

He says nothing, the suitor. Very well. Here is my plan. A medical transplant. To put the
suitor's mind inside his thigh. What do you think of that?

He circled. The knife wafted slowly back and forth. I think it may be there already. And
how is such a man to think? Whose mind has undergone such a relocation. He still hopes to
live. Of course. But he is becoming weaker. The sand is drinking his blood. What do you
think, suitor? Will you speak?

He feinted again with the switchblade and stepped away and continued his circling.

He says nothing. Yet how many times was he warned? And then to try to buy the girl? From
that moment to this all was certain as dark and day.

John Grady feinted and slashed twice with the knife. Eduardo twisted like a falling cat.
They circled.

You are like the whores from the campo, farmboy. To believe that craziness is sacred. A
special grace. A special touch. A partaking of the godhead.

He held the knife before him at the level of his waist and passed it slowly back and forth.

But what does this say of God?

They moved simultaneously. The boy tried to grab his arm. They grappled, hacking. The pimp
pushed him away and backed, circling. His shirt was sliced open at the front and there was
a red slash across his stomach. The boy stood with his hands low, the palms down, waiting.
His arm was laid open and he'd dropped the knife in the sand. He did not take his eyes off
the pimp. He was cut twice across his stomach and he was reeking blood. The slicker had
come unraveled and hung from his forearm and he slowly wound it up again and caught the
end of it in his fist and stood.

The suitor seems to have lost his knife. Not so good, eh?

He turned, he circled back. He looked down at the knife.

What are we going to do now?

The boy didnt answer.

What will you give me for the knife?

The boy watched him.

Make me an offer, said Eduardo. What would you give at this point to have the knife back?

The boy turned his head and spat. Eduardo turned and paced slowly back.

Will you give me an eye?

The boy feinted to bend and reach for the knife but Eduardo warned him away and stood on
the blade with his thin black boot.

If you let me pry one eye from your head I will give you your knife, he said. Otherwise I
will simply cut your throat.

The boy said nothing. He watched.

Think about it, said Eduardo. With one eye in your head you still might kill me. A
careless slip. A lucky thrust. Who knows? Anything is possible. What do you say?

He paced away slightly to the left and returned. The knife lay crushed into its mold in
the sand.

Nothing, eh? I'll tell you what. I'll make you a better offer. Give me one ear. What about
that?

The boy lunged and grabbed for his arm. He spun away and passed the blade twice more
across the boy's belly. The boy made a lunge for the fallen knife but Eduardo was already
standing over it and he backed away, holding his stomach, the warm blood running between
his fingers.