Ground Truth (8 page)

Chapter 15

June 20

9:15 a.m.

JACK’S TAXI RIDE to SFO was uneventful except for the uncomfortable feeling of being ridden out of town on a rail. He checked in at a computer terminal and passed through security.

“Hey,
compadre,
did you think I’d let you go without saying
adios?”

The question came from a woman wearing a gray business suit. Her black hair flowed from beneath a floppy red sombrero with yellow fringe around its perimeter that concealed her face. But he recognized Debra’s voice, and his sour mood evaporated.

“You’re on this flight?” He couldn’t believe it.

“No such luck,” Debra said.

“Then how did you get all the way to this gate?”

“The Airport Authority is one of my clients. I have more than enough pull to get a gate pass.” She gave him a firm handshake, then laughed. “Oh, what the hell.”

She dropped the sombrero on the floor, wrapped her arms around him, stretched up on her toes and kissed him soundly.

Wow
! That caught him by surprise. He was eager to continue, but she stepped back, head cocked a little.

“I came bearing an apology,” she said. “At dinner, I let some of my old stuff about you jump up and bite me. I shouldn’t have walked out. I’m sorry about that.”

He was still off balance, so all he could manage was, “What ‘old stuff’ are you talking about?”

She smiled, shook her head. “We don’t have time to go into that now. Listen, while you’re exploring Aztec ruins and drinking margaritas, think of me working my tail off in the salt mine.”

She scooped up the sombrero, walked briskly away, and waved without looking back.

As the 747 lifted heavily into a slow southbound arc a short time later, he looked through the window into the night sky. The morning after Debra walked out on him at Boulevard, he’d gone to her office to find out why. Her assistant said she’d just left for a trial in Miami. Not wanting to deal with it by phone, his question had remained unanswered.      It still was, but the effort she’d made to meet him at SFO lifted his spirits. And made him sorry he was leaving.

He signaled to the flight attendant. “Scotch, single malt please.” He slipped out his MP3 player and listened to the melodious voice of the teacher refreshing his rusty Spanish.

3:15 p.m.

A mid-afternoon haze shrouded Mexico City—a bad omen for getting a fresh start. After his luggage was X-rayed to check for guns, he quickly wheeled it through immigration, customs and security. Unlike their American counterparts, Mexican officials seemed only mildly interested in what entered their country.

He had less than an hour before his four o’clock meeting with Fidelio Ramos, managing partner of the local S & S office. Given the traffic, he had to go straight to the meeting. Confronted by a dozen shouting taxi drivers, he chose a man wearing a San Francisco Giants cap. The moment the driver spotted a tiny opening in traffic, he swung his old Buick Century full speed into the six-lane destruction derby. Looking out the cab window, Jack already missed the steep hills and sea breezes of San Francisco.

When the taxi jolted to a stop, double-parked at a busy corner in the central business district, a chorus of horns blared from behind. Jack stepped onto a sidewalk crowded with well-dressed men and women trying to maneuver around beggars and street musicians.

Three young girls closed around him holding up watercolors for sale. Their shirts were worn; their bare feet black with street grime. He’d read there were thousands like them around the city trying to earn a few pesos on the streets.

“Señor Americano.”
The youngest held a painting high over her head.
“Compra de mí.
Buy from me.”

About a foot square, the painting was a Spanish galleon drawn with the sparse lines of Picasso. The price on the small tag was cheap, but he didn’t want a painting at any price. He pulled out his wallet, took out thirty pesos, less than three dollars, and replaced the wallet. Keeping his luggage in front of him so it wouldn’t disappear, he handed her the money as a gift. She threw her arms around his waist and the others crowded in, laughing and clapping.

He grabbed his bags and set off toward the skyscraper in mid-block. It was show time.

On the thirty-eighth floor, the elevator door opened into the firm’s private reception area. Beyond a discreet fountain in the center of the room, the receptionist sat inside a semicircular counter of clear glass. Behind her, spotlights focused on two-foot-tall words in raised brass letters. “SINCLAIR & SIMMS.”

Designers had spent a fortune to recreate the affluence of the home office, but the result had neither the elegance of San Francisco nor the soul of Mexico.

“Good morning, I’m Jack Strider.
Señor
Ramos is expecting me.” He reached to get a business card from his wallet. It wasn’t there. He checked all his pockets. His wallet was gone.

The young woman watched impassively and then called Ramos. A portly man with a Pancho Villa mustache immediately strode into the reception area.

“Buenos días,
Señor
Strider. A pleasure to meet you.” Ramos took Jack’s hand in both of his. “Join me in my office for coffee.”

“Thank you, but I have a problem. My wallet is missing. I had it five minutes ago when I paid the taxi driver. And then I gave some money to a little girl selling a painting on the street.”

“Were there several kids, and did they crowd around you?” Ramos asked.

The receptionist covered her giggles with her fingers.

“I guess they did.”

“Then you’ve just been introduced to street crime in Mexico City. Soon as they saw where you keep your wallet, one slipped in and—” He shrugged. “—you know the rest.”

“I’ll go back down there right now.” Then his brain caught up with his anger. “But I have no proof, and the wallet is probably already blocks away. Damn it, that wallet has my ID, credit cards, money—”

“My secretary will handle cancellation and replacements, including IDs, and I’ll send you ten thousand pesos. So, shall we have that coffee now?”

No point in staying angry; time to get down to business,
Jack told himself.

After coffee was served, Ramos said, “We’re a young office, but we have some of the best lawyers in the city, twenty-six altogether.”

“Having Justin Sinclair at the top of the letterhead must help with recruiting.”

“Yes, everyone knows the firm is very successful in the U.S. But—” Ramos paused, as if choosing his words carefully. “—some older lawyers won’t join us because they disagree with certain of his actions when he was Secretary of State. I certainly understand their feelings.”

“Certain actions?”

“It was a long time ago, not worth going into. Naturally, I meant no criticism of Mr. Sinclair.”

“Naturally.”

Ramos changed the subject. “I’ve been told you’ll be working on the legal affairs of one American client doing business in Mexico. I regret Mr. Sinclair wasn’t confident that one of my lawyers could do the job, but—” He shrugged. “—that’s the way it is with foreign ownership.”

Ramos had just taken two quick shots at Sinclair. So there was resentment on this end of the equation, distrust on the other.

Ramos leaned forward and spoke more softly. “I’m afraid I have something unpleasant to tell you.” His eyes suddenly became hard. “One of your San Francisco partners told one of our lawyers about your father and the young girls he stole from Mexico.”

Ouch.
Simms had sent his vendetta south. Jack felt his face flush, but that was the only reaction he was going to let Ramos see.

“What my father did was reprehensible, but I knew nothing about it. Maybe while I’m in Mexico I can do something to—”

“Maybe, maybe not.” Ramos’s tone was hostile.

So much for the new beginning. Was this place going to be a another snakepit?

Chapter 16

June 25

9:30 p.m.

THE TROUBLED EYES and turned down mouth reflected in the bar mirror beside Jack’s table looked like they belonged to a stranger. But it was his own face, reflecting his aggravation after days of trying to pin down the lawyers from the Office of the Attorney General for Protection of the Environment—known as PROFEPA—to a meeting time.

After each frustrating day of reviewing paperwork and generally spinning his wheels, he started the evening at Café la Selva, sitting alone among hip artist types who either had no worries or, if they did, blew them off after sundown. The server set down a generous shot of Zacapa Centenario, a rum aged for 23 years in oak barrels. After four days of experimentation, he could taste the vanilla, cloves and cinnamon, and appreciate the aromas of the different brands.

As soon as the rum had begun to take effect, he walked down Calle Michoacan to Fonda Garufo, an Argentine steakhouse where he ordered dinner for a little ballast. The sidewalk tables were fenced in, and an armed guard stood at one end to protect patrons from thieves looking for prey. Toward the end of his meal, he noticed that his taste buds were no longer aware of the spices on the Redfish Veracruzano.

After watching the parade of streetwalkers for a while, he moved on to Bar Nuevo Leon where foreign correspondents gathered to mix alcohol with gossip, sharing stories about exotic places.

He sipped his Drambuie slowly, stretching out the night, delaying his return to his penthouse condo in La Condesa Colonia that S & S had provided for him.

How had he wound up in Mexico, his bright future jerked away? Was representing Palmer Industries the first step on the slippery slope to becoming the kind of lawyer he detested? Maybe Peck had started going bad just like this, sacrificing his principles to pursue a goal he considered worth it. Everyone chases something, not watching their footing, not noticing what they step in—or on. Would that happen to him?

Before he could come up with any answers to his questions, a very tan
gringo
walked in, tilting slightly off center, a few sheets to the wind. He scanned the room, obviously looking for someone. Spotting a free chair at Jack’s table, he came over.

“Hey, mate, mind if I fill this chair for a couple of minutes until my friend shows up?”

Jack nodded that it was okay. He wasn’t in the mood for bar chat, but the newcomer was. In a syrupy Louisiana drawl he talked about a favorite restaurant and Mexican women.

“I’m a freelance pilot based in the Copper Canyon. Lots of action up that way.” He tossed a card on the table that read, “Gano LeMoyne” and bore a photograph of a P-51 Mustang fighter.

“That your plane?” Jack asked, to be polite.

“Just for air shows. I have another one for deliveries. If the money’s right, I’ll deliver anything, absolutely, positively anywhere.”

After a few minutes of conversation, Gano saw his friend arrive, shook hands with Jack, and walked away.

Jack was relieved not to have any more company. He had to figure out an ethical way to stay in the law business and get back on track for the Supreme Court of the United States, or SCOTUS as most lawyers called it. If he couldn’t do that, he’d say “to hell with you” to Sinclair and go sailing in the Caribbean, which would be a one-way trip for his career. If he pissed off the elders of the law tribes, they’d never let him back in.

Impulsively, he left Bar Nueva Leon and walked back to his La Condesa
neighborhood, inhabited by rich pseudo-hippies and home of the local bureau of the
New York Times
. He’d heard it called the Greenwich Village of Mexico City. When he reached the entrance to the condo he still felt restless, so he kept walking until he was in a low-income
colonia
where he stopped at a tiny open-air restaurant under a grove of dusty elm trees. As he sat enjoying a Bohemia beer, a wiry man wearing a pair of sunglasses walked slowly up to his rickety table.

“Pardon me,
señor
. You are American?”

“Yes. California.”

“I lived in California for many years,” the man said in heavily accented English. “I picked grapes near Fresno. Maybe we could talk for a minute? I hear so little English in this
colonia
.” He pulled off the dark glasses.

“Please sit. Have a beer?” Jack turned to wave for service.

“No,
señor
. No beer. Thank you.” He sat tentatively in the other chair. His khakis were bleached white. The red and green stripes on his shirt were faded. His eyes were deep set, cheekbones sharp. Hard to tell if it was Indian blood or . . . hunger.

“My name’s Jack Strider.” He stretched his hand across the table.

“I am Luis-Felipe Ibanez. In California they called me Lou.” The way he said “Lou” made it clear how he felt about the Anglo nickname.

After listening to some of Luis-Felipe’s experiences in the semidesert of southern California, Jack asked, “These people,” he gestured at the men and boys standing in groups near the side of the road or idly kicking a scuffed soccer ball among themselves, “how do they earn a living, pay for food and a place to stay?”

“No real jobs around here. Some have never had a job. Others get paid, not much, for breaking their backs for a few days. Some have sisters who go to the border to work in
maquilas
and send money home. But now some women forget their families and save up to get into the U.S. Then their families go hungry, maybe nothing but beans and some corn.”

What a contrast with the States with its safety net of homeless shelters, public housing, food banks, Medicaid, welfare, and the rest.

Luis-Felipe went on. “Some turn bad. That one,” he said, barely nodding toward a hawk-faced man in a flashy L.A. Lakers warm-up jacket, “comes here to hire mules. They make a delivery for him, they get five dollars. They get caught, they go to jail. He doesn’t even bail them out.”

Jack knew there were plenty of that type in many low-income neighborhoods in the States, vultures who preyed on despair and addiction. He stared hard at the L.A. Laker fan as if that would let him know how he felt.

“I have no right,” Luis-Felipe said quietly, “and it shames me, but I have a favor to ask.”

“Of course. What is it?”

“Water. One liter to take with me? Where I live, we have none.”

“Good Lord!” Jack shook his head in disbelief.

Luis-Felipe stood. “I have offended you. I’m sorry.”

“No. No. I’ll get plenty of water.” He waved toward the bartender and placed the order.

When the plastic bottles of water arrived at the table, Luis-Felipe examined the neck of each.

“What’s the matter?”

“Sometimes this man sells water that came out of the tap, not pure. It makes everyone sick. These are all right because he knows I will check the seal. Now
Señor
Jack, you must leave here. The later it gets, the more dangerous it is, especially for outsiders.
Con muchas gracias.”
He touched his heart with his right fist, picked up the bottles with wrinkled hands and walked across the road with dignity.

Luis-Felipe hadn’t wanted conversation. It had been about water from the start. Jack realized the man had no choice.

He watched Luis-Felipe disappear into a cluster of one-story, mud-brick dwellings. Thinking about the man’s dignity, Jack was ashamed that he’d just blown enough money on liquor in one night to pay for water for a large family for weeks.

When he looked back, he saw the hawk-faced man in the L.A. Lakers jacket staring at him with a scowl.