Dancing with the Tiger (10 page)

Thomas turned cool. “I am sure you're familiar with funereal arts.”

Ever so sweetly, Anna said that she was. “How long have you been collecting?”

“I used to collect what other people found valuable. Now I create value by what I collect.” His gaze scalded her skin. The implication was that he could do her a similar favor. Anna smiled and thought,
Fuck you.

“How long are you staying?” he asked.

“It depends if I find work.”

“Mid-March, I'm having the first public showing of my collection. More than a hundred works. Carved masks and antiquities. The gallery guide will be quite simple, a synopsis of each mask. History. Materials. Dimensions. Origin. Associated dances. An introduction to the exhibit. But we're behind schedule. The printing deadline is coming up quickly.”

“How many masks do you own?” Anna knew this was like asking an alcoholic how many drinks he'd consumed. A collector would always equivocate, underestimate, lie.

“There are three kinds of masks. Masks made for tourists, masks made to be danced, and very old masks that circulate the antiquities market. I started collecting the second kind, but have moved on to the third. Basically, I appreciate, acquire, then let what I acquire appreciate. The castoffs I ship to my gallery in El Paso. Love and money should work together, don't you think?”

Anna met his gaze, daring him to act on what he was implying. A squirrel hopped across the lawn, tail swishing like a happy paintbrush. Constance chucked a dog toy at it, missed.

“Don't be modest,” she said. “You drag things to the border every month. I worry about the bandits on the highways, but Thomas carries a gun. So do I.” She pointed to a wood armoire. “In case some undesirable washes up from the city. My father is Texan. Guns are his pets. Darling, tell her about Reyes,” Constance purred. Her pale skin had blotched in unattractive patches.

“Screw Reyes.”

“Who's Reyes?”

“Óscar Reyes Carrillo, a fraud,” Thomas snapped. “A drug lord who
dabbles in art and antiquities. The press, the prestigious art world of Oaxaca, likes to call him my rival. It's true we often go head-to-head for a piece. He likes to send me taunting postcards of his latest purchases. Doesn't sign them, but I know damn well who they're from. Where's the latest?”

Constance got up, went inside, came back, handed Anna a crude postcard of a strange red clay figure, part snowman, part demon.

“Chupícuaro,” Thomas said. “Fertility figure. Five hundred
B.C
. Found in an archaeological site now under water from the Solis Dam. Last year, they lowered the water enough to salvage a pair of church towers, long enough for a resourceful entrepreneur to snap up a few treasures. Sotheby's sold a comparable piece recently for $185,000. Private collection. ‘Provenance unknown.' In the art world, no one knows where anything comes from.” Thomas flicked his hand, poof. “Things magically surface.”

The figure didn't do much for Anna, but you couldn't argue with passion. “It must be hard to compete with a mobster,” she said, filling her voice with sympathy. “This Reyes has underground connections and you're stuck playing fair.” Anna handed back the postcard, stole a glimpse at the chapel. Maybe Soledad cleaned in there occasionally. Maybe she left the door unlocked.

“For years I've kept a low profile, but Constance talked me into curating this show, and what does the great and powerful Reyes do? Schedules an opening
the same day
. Rents a gallery across town and says he's showing
his
mask collection. Let Oaxaca decide who's the more discriminating collector. The showdown is March fifteenth.”

“Beware the Ides of March.”

Thomas forced a grin. “If someone stabs Reyes, I rule Rome.”

“How do you actually win?”

“The critics will decide, and the public.” Thomas sniffed. “But there will be no contest.”

Constance patted Thomas's thigh.

Anna asked, “Does Reyes know what you have?”

“
No one knows what I have.
Or what I'm getting. Publicity has never interested me. It interests my wife.”

“It's time you were properly celebrated.”

“Constance wants to impress her father.” Thomas sipped his cocktail with a contemptuous expression. “Dicky Senior wants his son-in-law to
come
to something.”

“No worries, dear, you're already something.”

Anna smiled, smiled, smiled. Thomas Malone was earning in-law goodie points with a mask he'd stolen from her father. “But how can I write about the collection without seeing it?”

“You'll work here, and I'll bring you the masks. One by one—”

“I keep telling Thomas the guide could be expanded into a book,” Constance said to Anna. “The definitive book on Mexican masks.”

“There's nothing like that already?” Anna asked, innocent, breezy.

“There
was
.” Constance dropped her chin. “But it's become a laughing—”

Thomas interrupted. “The author was a nice enough bloke, but drank too much. Bought any schlock that carvers offered him. I tried to warn him. Now Constance wants me to prove to her Texas relatives that I can write a better book
and
vanquish the
narco
.”

His eyes circled Anna's shirt. It was hard to pretend nothing was happening. Constance gazed over the wall at the neighbors' knot of electric lines. Either she was oblivious of her husband's wandering eye or she had accepted what she could not change.

Thomas concluded his lament. “Call me Superman.”

This was more than even Constance could take. “
Oh, please.
All I am saying is, Daniel Ramsey's downfall is your opportunity.” With a frown, Constance rose. Her matchmaking was done. She grabbed the pitcher. “We're out of beverages.”

The screen door banged. Thomas's expression grew lighthearted, mocking, as if they had both endured a comic ordeal.
Poor Constance,
Anna thought.
He's cruel.

“So what do you think?” he asked. His expression was inscrutable.

“Is that an offer?”

Thomas stabbed an olive. “It's an offer. Come be my personal assistant.”

“When would I start?”

“When you're ready.”

“I came here ready.”

“I could tell.”

She wondered if she was going to have to sleep with Thomas Malone to get into his chapel. Anna Bookman ran her hand down her thigh. Fact:
Waitresses who wear red lipstick earn bigger tips.

“Are you offering benefits?” she asked.

“You need insurance?”

“I had insurance once, but it made me sick.” Anna spun her melting ice. “Have you had other assistants, or am I the first?”

“None that worked out. Collaboration is a tricky business.”

“Not with the right partner. I'm a model employee.”

“Should I check your letters of reference?”

“Just give me a minute to write some.” She challenged him with her eyes. If Thomas insisted on references, the game was up, though she'd bet the only opinion he valued was his own.

“Did you come here alone,” he asked, “or is some boyfriend straggling behind you?”

“I don't have a boyfriend, here.”

“It's good to have a boyfriend who's not here. I don't imagine you suffer from a shortage of male company.”

“I have been known to do some collecting.”

Constance blew open the screen door. Her wrist sagged under the weight of a full pitcher. Anna pulled her shirt away from her chest to let in some air. Patio sex. A first.

“Thomas,” Constance huffed, setting the pitcher down. “I'm blotto. It's the damn heat.”

“Take a nap, puppet.”

“I should really be going now.” Anna put down her glass. “Thank you for everything.”

Thomas stood. “So we'll see you Monday—”

Just then, a dog jumped over the wall and made a beeline toward the bench.

“There's that goddamn mutt—” Constance turned, muumuu billowing. She reached into the armoire and grabbed a rifle. “I've had it.” The dog pushed its snout under the bench and growled. Thomas and Anna jumped up. Constance pointed the gun at Anna as if in a trance, her willowy body swaying. Thomas yelled his wife's name and lunged at her, but this only made her grip the rifle more fiercely. She fixed her aim on the dog.

Soledad stood behind the screen door, her face as blank as stucco.

The rifle went off. Anna jammed her fingers in her ears. The bullet missed the dog, but pierced the watering can, embedding itself in the woodpile. The dog scurried back over the wall. The watering can bled
from its wound. Constance righted her muumuu, chambered another round.

“I have to do everything around here.” Her voice rose. “Even the plumbing. Hugo's been banging all day—”

“Well, well. That was exciting.” Thomas cleaned his hands in the air. “Anna, it's been a pleasure. Leave your number with—”

The rifle fired a second time. A squirrel collapsed in a bloody sack in the middle of the lawn. Its flesh resembled a human kidney or heart, some organ you couldn't live without. Anna's ears were ringing. Nobody spoke. The wounded air pieced itself back together.

“Thomas,” Constance commanded, each word taking aim, “toss the squirrel over the Mendezes' wall.”

Thomas tightened his mouth. “Hugo will handle it.”

“He's gone. I am asking you.”

“It's not their squirrel.”

“It
is
their squirrel, their dog, their country.”

All at once, Anna understood. Constance was an heiress. Texas oil money. Something. Thomas was a kept man. A kept man who kept other women.
Everyone picks someone smaller to dominate,
like a set of Russian dolls.
I am the last doll. The hard one that can't be opened.

Constance held out a dustpan. Thomas retrieved it. Each step cost him. He'd made this walk before. Constance demanded the occasional concession. She knew her husband was unfaithful, and this was her way of reminding him who held the gun and who bought the bullets. It was hard not to feel pity for a man so compromised. Thomas knelt before the squirrel, his pressed pants wrinkling. Blood smeared the white dustpan. The air smelled like iron and compost. With outstretched hands, he scooped up the mess and chucked it over the wall.
Under the spigot, he washed the dustpan. Blood mixed with water. Soledad's face pulled back from the screen door.

“My pants . . .” Thomas turned toward the house. “Excuse me.”

Constance collapsed in a chair. Anna crouched next to her, offering to fetch her water. Somewhere, a firecracker exploded. Constance grasped Anna's hand, interlocking fingers. This intimacy made Anna uneasy. Having decided the woman was nuts, she didn't want to muddy the waters with sympathy. Still, they had a few things in common: unfaithful men, Mexico, ambition—its disappointments. Anna could imagine Constance as a young woman, twenty-five, in white sneakers, tennis racquet in hand. Thomas had wooed her. Constance had been glad to share her money and long limbs with such an elegant man.

Constance blinked. “Do you know why they shoot firecrackers?”

Anna said she didn't.

“Each explosion is a call out to God. They are trying to crack open the sky and wake Him up. They want God to
do
something, but of course, He never does. Poor people. The wind just comes and blows the smoke away.”

—

Walking up the drive,
Anna weaved between piles of fresh dog shit. For the second time that week, she'd nearly been shot, but she was more exhilarated than scared. The death mask was in the chapel. She'd talk her way in there soon enough. After turning on the main road, Anna passed a
miscelánea
that sold soda and chips, passed an empty lot of debris and rusted cars, passed a ragged donkey, unmoving, passed an
abuelita
wrapped in a black shawl. When she reached the newsstand, she heard a third shot.

Reyes was dressed like a '70s porn star. Fake tan. Baby-blue leisure pants stretched tight over his muscular thighs. Nylon shirt, four buttons open. Blond wig, flopping like a palm tree. His grubby eyes darted among the objects on his desk: laptop, cell phone, assault weapon, video monitor, Coke can, cigarettes, sausage sandwich stinking of chili, porn magazine, dead rose. Hugo told the story long because as long as he was talking, he was still alive. Besides, the story
felt
long, like he'd driven to Tepito one man and come back another. He turned the debacle into a parable of Good and Evil: faithful Hugo had trusted unfaithful Pedro, his childhood friend, who had double-crossed Reyes out of greed. Hugo ended with an apology.

Reyes held up a hand.
“Le cagaste, pero el problema no es insuperable.”
You fucked up, but the problem is not insurmountable.

The gardener quickly agreed.

“Pedro will be back.” Reyes's voice was hoarse, as if he'd been screaming for days. “When our Pedrito returns, you ask him nicely to return the mask. Then you kill him.”

This was better and worse than Hugo had expected. The gardener shifted his weight, right foot to left. “
Con todo respeto, patrón,
I am a runner, not an assassin.”

“Your job just changed.”

“I don't even know where he is. He could be in Yucatán or Juárez.” Hugo spread his arms, illustrating the distance.

Reyes massaged his chin. Pancake makeup came off on his thumb. “Remember, this is not an intelligent man. He's an animal who walks on two legs. It's February. He lives for his
fiestas
. He does what his father does, what the
pueblo
does. When do village boys return to the mother's teat?”

Hugo kicked the fake Oriental rug. The
patrón
was vicious but not stupid. He handed Hugo a wooden tiger mask. “Wear it to the dances. The carver said it was powerful. Are you superstitious? All the same, take a machete.”

“But—”

“A tiger must earn his stripes.”

“Someone with more experience—”

Reyes puckered his lips, a wedge of rotten fruit. “I need to write a letter today. Maybe I'll stop in that paper store by the viaduct. Shopgirls make such a tight fuck.”

“Patrón—”

Reyes's face went apoplectic, fake hair bouncing. “You and that shitty pool cleaner are working together.”

“I would not be here if that were true. I came to make things right. Out of loyalty to you.”

Reyes pounded his desk. His gun shook. His sausage quivered.

“If that mask is not back to me by the end of Carnival, I will cut out your heart and hang it from a tree and watch the turkey vultures feast, and I will screw your little girlfriend and rape your ugly wife and kill your dog and cook your cat and burn down your house and blow up your car and throw your carcass in the Pacific, where the sharks will rip you apart and shit you out in pellets on the ocean floor. Have I left anything out? Do you have a mother? Or did she die from shame at having raised an incompetent? Gonzáles called. That was Montezuma's death mask. Do you know who the fuck he was? That American junkie stole that mask from
me
, and now that chlorine-head stole it from you
and
me. No one steals from Reyes. Not if they like to breathe.”

Hugo kept his eyes on his boots. All a man ever really had were his heart and his shoes. How did Reyes know about the girl? How did Reyes know everything, show up everywhere? Hugo's hands tightened into fists. “I will bring you the mask by Ash Wednesday. I will kill Pedro, but please don't harm the girl. She is innocent.”

He dared to look up.

Reyes was eating his sandwich. The guy was always eating. How much energy did it take to work a cell phone, arrange the next decapitation? Reyes gave his gun a friendly wave. “As the Americans say,
Halve a nize day
.”

—

That night,
Hugo dreamt a fisherman approached him holding a dead crane. The bird's crest resembled a mirror, and when Hugo peered into it, he saw a dark field where night warriors rode on white-tailed deer, galloping, galloping, their hooves like heartbeats. The horsemen wore
warrior masks, black holes where mouths belonged, black holes instead of eyes. Terrified, Hugo threw the crane into his bag and raced home, but when he opened it to show Soledad, the bird was gone.

When Hugo jerked awake in the wee hours, his dream did not fade as normal dreams did. He left Soledad sleeping and went to the kitchen. Self-pity overcame him. He had lost the mask and his best friend. He would soon lose the girl. Everything he'd done, he'd done for love, and now El Pelotas had his balls in a sling. Hugo pressed his lit cigarette into his forearm, seeing how much pain he could endure. A pink circle formed. The universe's tiniest planet. The burn stung. He fetched butter, which melted over the wound.

If one sin led to another, how could anybody turn back to grace? Maybe the world would be better without him. He listened to the darkness, a cacophony of creaks and chirps and twittering branches. At night, whatever you reaped came back to you. If you were at peace, the night felt peaceful. If you were wretched, so was the night. Nature didn't think much of man, didn't hold him in high regard. Why should it?

Where was Pedro with the pinche mask?

Hugo crawled back to bed, wrapped his cold arms around Soledad's waist. He longed to confess, but the list was growing unwieldy.
I am making money in ways that I shouldn't. I love a young girl in a yellow dress. I must kill my childhood friend. I don't know whether to leave you.
How much easier it was to watch his wife breathe, her nightgown soft as summer air, her skin smelling of lavender. How much easier it was to plant bulbs and wait for yellow flowers to grow.

Out the window, in the gray dawn, he made out the silhouette of the neighbor's donkey, motionless, tethered.
What freedom there is at the end of a rope.