Remember The Alamo (5 page)

"Huh," Dave said. "The way to get rid of tension is to tell
Mexico to shape up and take care of its own problems,
instead of blaming the U.S. for everything."

Constance frowned. "Don't forget, I'm still a Mexican
citizen, Dave. That's my country you're talking about"

"Yeah, but you're still planning on getting naturalized.
You're already an American except in name"

"Are you saying that I shouldn't have any more loyalty to
Mexico? That's where I was born and raised, you know."

"Well, sure, but you're not gonna go around waving the
Mexican flag in this country."

"I would if I thought it needed to be done"

Dave sat back and frowned at her. "What are you telling
me? That you agree with all this Reconquistar crap?"

"No, of course not. This is Texas, not Mexico. But my
people do have some legitimate concerns"

"Your people? I thought I was your people."

"You know what I mean" Constance stood up. "I have to
get those enchiladas out of the oven" Her voice and manner
were noticeably cooler now.

Dave sighed as his wife left the living room. There wouldn't
be any fooling around tonight. He squinted at the TV screen, pointed an accusing finger at the president, and said, "This is
all your fault."

As if she were talking back to him, the president said, "I
plan to visit San Antonio tomorrow to speak with Mayor
Alvarez."

Great, Dave thought. Just what the traffic in the city needed,
a visit from the president.

"We must reach out to our neighbors and mend the fences
between us, whatever it takes"

Dave had never paid a whole lot of attention during English
class in high school, but at that moment, a line from a poem
he had been forced to read back then popped into his mind.

Good fences make good neighbors.

It was a damned shame some people still couldn't understand that.

Joaquin Alvarez was only halfway listening as the Secret Service agent explained the procedures that would be followed for
the president's visit to City Hall. He was thinking instead about
what a boost this would be to his political career. Imagine, the
president of the United States was coming to see him, to ask his
opinion about what should be done to ease the growing friction between Anglos and Hispanics.

That was the way Alvarez saw it, black and white-or rather,
brown and white, because in his mind it was all the gringos on
one side and his people on the other. Oh, there were a few whites
infected with liberal guilt, like the president, who tried to paint
themselves as being on the side of la raza, but in the end they
didn't really matter. In time, the minority would be the majority,
and then everything would change.

Tall, handsome, well-educated, with a successful law practice, Joaquin Alvarez had moved smoothly from a City Council seat to the mayor's office in the last election. From there he
had his eye on either the governorship or a United States senator's job. Either of those would serve as a launching pad for
his presidential bid, which he had penciled in for ten years
down the road. He would be in the Oval Office by the time he was forty-five. A bachelor, he had been looking around for
a white woman to marry, which would broaden his appeal to
the electorate, but recently his chief advisor George Menendez had told him to forget about that. It wasn't necessary anymore. His Hispanic base would be enough to get him what he
wanted as long as he didn't lose his grip on it.

"What you need to do, Joaquin," George had told him, "is
to start dating that telenovela actress again, you know, the one
with the big butt. How come you broke up with her, anyway?"

George could be crude at times, but he knew everything
there was to know about seizing power and hanging on to it.

"She's stupid, George. I can't talk to her about anything that
matters."

"Talk to her? Talk to her? What the hell's wrong with you?
She's a knockout, and all our people know her. You don't have
to talk to her, for Christ's sake! Just get her to smile and wave
at the campaign rallies. I guarantee you, she'd be worth six to
eight percentage points at the polls."

"All right, all right, I'll think about it."

"In the meantime, you can keep humping that black chick
you got stashed away. Just be careful and don't get caught"

Joaquin didn't like George talking about Miranda that way,
but he shoved it aside and didn't make an issue of it. He and
George had been together for a long time, and they still had a
long way to go before they got to where they wanted to be.

"Excuse me, Mayor Alvarez?"

The Secret Service agent broke into Alvarez's thoughts. Instantly, the trademark dazzling smile appeared on the mayor's
face. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm afraid my mind wandered. I
want to be sure I give the president my very best input on this
problem"

"I'm sure you will, sir, especially if we can get her in and
out of here smoothly." The agent glanced at his watch. "Now, we don't have much time. Air Force One will be touching
down at Brooks Air Force Base in half an hour."

Alvarez forced himself to concentrate as the agent continued explaining the security procedures.

But at the same time a small voice in the back of his head
was saying, Someday soon the Secret Service will be protecting you, Joaquin. Its only a matter of time.

The president sprang a surprise, bringing the Mexican ambassador with her, and George Menendez didn't like it. No one
had told him that Carranza was coming. Nothing irritated
George more than being out of the loop.

The meeting was held in Joaquin's office. It was crowded,
because about half of the City Council had horned their way
in on it. The Hispanic half, of course. Sometimes the Anglo
politicians got frustrated because they didn't seem to have
more than a token say in the city government anymore.

They didn't know how right they were.

With the help of some friends, George had taken over three
of the largest auto dealerships in South Texas, and they had
made him a rich man. Money mattered less to him than power,
though, and he got a huge rush from knowing that all the
major deals in San Antonio had to go through the mayor's
office-an office that, by and large, he controlled, not Joaquin
Alvarez. Joaquin was pretty smart for a pretty boy, but he
wasn't nearly smart enough to succeed on his own, without
George pulling his strings. The best part of it was, Joaquin
didn't even know that he was George's puppet. He thought
they were working together.

"I appreciate you seeing me on such short notice, Mayor,"
the president said as she sat down in the plush, red leather
chair in front of Joaquin's desk and smoothed her skirt over
her knees.

"Please, Madam President, the pleasure and the honor are
all mine," Joaquin said. "Let me welcome you to our city."

The president nodded to the man seated on her left. "You
know Ambassador Carranza, of course?"

"Of course" Joaquin turned the full wattage of his smile on
the pudgy, balding ambassador. "How are you, sir?"

"Distressed," Carranza answered. "Something must be
done"

"I agree completely" Joaquin frowned. "Done about what?"

George gritted his teeth. Pretty boy. His brains were all in
his smile. If Joaquin ever did marry that telenovela bitch, the
children they produced would probably be imbeciles. Goodlooking imbeciles, though.

"What we had in mind," the president said, "is some sort of
symbolic gesture to show the close bond between Mexico and
the United States. Now, the Reconquistar movement-"

"The ones who have been killing people?"

The president was miffed that Joaquin had interrupted her.
George could tell that. But she just said, "Naturally, while we
don't condone tactics that could be construed as terroristic in
nature, we do believe the underlying problems that are the
cause of such resentment should be addressed. In order to do
that, we believe that a symbolic gesture of some sort is just
what is needed."

Yeah, terrorists had always been impressed with symbolic
gestures, George thought. That was why, ever since this president had been elected and had started making nice with them,
attacks around the world had gone way up. There hadn't been
another big one here, but it was only a matter of time.

But Joaquin and the president belonged to the same political party, so whatever they wanted to do was all right with
George. He just wanted to be let in on it, preferably ahead of
time so there wouldn't be any surprises. Joaquin's speeches didn't write themselves, after all, and-Dios miol--he couldn't
be trusted to speak off the cuff except on rare occasions.

"Ambassador Carranza has made a suggestion," the president continued. "I believe you have a celebration coming up
here in a couple of weekends?"

Joaquin nodded. "Yes, the Paseo de Marzo. Lots of food
and music, dancing in the streets, things like that. Everyone
enjoys it very much."

"Then what better time, during such a celebration of Hispanic pride, could there be for the United States to return the
Alamo to Mexico?"

Everybody in the room, with the exception of Ambassador
Carranza and the Secret Service agents guarding the president,
stared at her as if they could not believe what they had just
heard. George knew that he couldn't.

Joaquin recovered first. "You said ... give the Alamo back
to Mexico?"

"Yes, and the area of downtown surrounding it," the president
said, unfazed by the surprised reactions. "The City Council will
pass a resolution, and you will sign a proclamation, Mayor Alvarez, ceding that territory to Mexico for the duration of the
Paseo de Marzo weekend. Which happens to coincide with
March 6th this year, the anniversary of the fall of the Alamo to
General Santa Anna. Of course, at the end of the weekend, control of the area will return to the United States"

Joaquin looked around, obviously searching for advice. The
wheels of George's brain revolved so fast the room seemed to
spin around him for a second. He wanted to grab Joaquin's
shoulders, shake him, and exclaim, "That's fuckin' brilliant!"

He couldn't do that, of course, but he did give Joaquin a tiny
but emphatic nod, signaling him to go along with the president's suggestion.

"I think that's an excellent idea," Joaquin told her. "It will
demonstrate in no uncertain terms that we acknowledge the le gitimacy of the Reconquistar position without condoning their
violent behavior."

"Precisely," the president said.

And it would do away, George thought, with any idea
among his base that Joaquin was a coconut, brown on the outside but white on the inside.

"There's only one thing that worries me," Joaquin said. He
ignored the widening of the eyes with which George tried to
signal him to shut up, and went on. "The City Council and I
don't have the legal authority to turn over the Alamo to
Mexico, do we?"

"That's why it's symbolic, and only for the weekend"

"Oh" Joaquin nodded, still a little puzzled, but on board
with the idea if that was what the president wanted. "Fine.
When should we announce it?"

"As soon as possible," the president said.

"And you think this will put a stop to the troubles?"

"Of course"

George didn't know about that, but he knew publicity when
he saw it, and this would be a bonanza.

By the time Pasco de Marzo was over, everybody in the
whole frickin' country would have heard of Mayor Joaquin Alvarez.

Maybe they could skip the whole governor/senator part of
the scenario. Maybe it was time to start thinking about the
White House now.

And if all it took was giving away the Alamo, that was fine.
Hell, Mexico could keep it as far as George was concerned.

The only famous building he was interested in was the one
at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue....

The phone in Ramiro Carranza's pocket vibrated. The Mexican ambassador to the United States was on a plane heading
for Mexico City. He hadn't returned to Washington with the
American president on Air Force One, telling her instead that
he needed to return to the Mexican capital to begin working
out the details of the ceremonial handover of the Alamo.