The Frighteners (17 page)

“Oh, just one more thing.”

I restrained a grimace. There’s always just one more little thing. “Shoot,” I said.

“This Mondragon. As I have said, we must not harm him, and we certainly cannot allow him, a Mexican national, to be harmed by foreigners. But if General Mondragon should come to grief in some way that could not be attributed to either of our nations, I can guarantee that the person responsible would not regret it.’’

The city of Hermosillo, some hundred and fifty miles south of the border, is the capital of the state of Sonora. It has a population of roughly a quarter-million people, a university, and a towering new Holiday Inn. At least it was new to me. Just beyond it is the old Hotel Gandara.

Failing to recognize it at once in the shadow of its unfamiliar neighbor, I drove past and had to U-turn to get back to the entrance. I seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. Actually, I’d been looking for the pleasant little hostelry I remembered from years ago, set in the middle of large, well-tended lawns and gardens. I’d never stayed there overnight, but from time to time I’d used it as a lunch stop on the way to Guaymas and points farther down the west coast of Mexico—it was just the right distance if you’d spent the night in Tucson, Arizona. I remembered it as having a wonderful, quiet dining room with white tablecloths, an elegant headwaiter, and excellent food, a true oasis in a desert of shabby enchilada parlors.

Now they’d built sprawling, one-story motel units all over the lovely, unprofitable lawns. In the middle of this clutter, the main building still stood, but inside it the formal dining room was gone, replaced by a bunch of casual tables in a kind of sunken passion pit with a fountain. What they’d done, of course, was to turn a first-rate Mexican hotel into a second-rate Holiday Inn. I had a hunch that, given a choice, I’d have done better to patronize the genuine article next door, where they really knew the Holiday Inn business.

I had to hand it to the man at the desk, however; he didn’t let himself show any curiosity when I let him know that I’d come on my honeymoon without my bride, but I’d take the suite I’d reserved for us anyway. He checked the list, deadpan.

“Mr. and Mrs. Horace Cody?
Si
, it is here, guaranteed, but we were expecting you last night, Señor.”

No rude curiosity, but a hint of reproach. I apologized for my tardiness and said that I appreciated their holding the accommodations for me, and of course I was prepared to pay for the fall two days of the reservation even though I’d arrived one day late. This put me back into favor; but I could see that some interesting theories would be circulating among the hotel help concerning the elderly
gringo
who’d claimed the honeymoon suite so belatedly, alone. A newlyweds’ spat, perhaps, and it must have been a spectacular conflict considering the beat-up state of the gray-bearded one’s face; his señora must be quite a tigress,
amigos
. . . .

Unexpectedly, in view of my getting-lost record on this Mexican jaunt, I drove straight to the right unit without any detours or misadventures. I pushed the button on the Subaru’s dashboard to unlock the tailgate—my newly acquired heap had almost as many power conveniences as the demolished Cadillac, surprising for a fairly rugged little wagon with four-wheel drive. My worldly belongings, as far as Mexico was concerned, were contained in a light blue canvas carryall with piping and handles of some kind of darker blue plastic that was supposed to look like leather and didn’t. Well, the canvas didn’t look much like canvas either.

As I approached the motel door, bag in hand, I found that I was relieved not to have the girl with me, although it was a waste of a perfectly good honeymoon suite. Still, I missed her in a way, and I hoped I hadn’t left her too worried and frightened after Ramón and I had worked it out over tortillas and beans and coffee brought us by a dark-faced commando.

“I would rather hear your thoughts on the subject,
amigo
,” he’d said when I asked him just how big an assortment of what kind of arms he was hoping I’d help him keep out of the hands of the would-be
insurgentes
. “Let me see if your reasoning parallels ours.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know a hell of a lot about military hardware,” I said. “But if you want me to kick it around . . . four truckloads? What kind of trucks? Big semis?”

“No, they were not the large articulated vehicles. Those could not have been maneuvered on the small dirt road on which they were found. With the bodies of Jorge Medina and the four drivers lying nearby.”

I said, “They killed the drivers, too? Interrogation?”

“Yes, they had also been questioned brutally, like Medina. But apparently Medina had been clever and changed drivers after hiding the shipment, so those men knew nothing. Either that or they were very heroic, which seems unlikely. In any case, we know that they did not talk, or Mondragon would already have the arms.”

I wanted to ask the dimensions of the trucks involved, but he was obviously testing me to see if, perhaps, my brains had atrophied since we’d last met. I worked it out in my head and, for four moving-van-type vehicles, not too large, got the rather startling answer of roughly six thousand cubic feet of merchandise weighing, if the drivers didn’t mind straining their heaps a bit, around one hundred tons. This translated to something like three thousand assault rifles, a million rounds of ammunition, with space left over for some heavy machine guns and missile launchers and a reasonable quantity of grenades.

I said, “Wow, we’re getting into some pretty impressive figures here! I didn’t realize you could fight a war from just a few lousy trucks.”

“It is what we fear,” said Ramón.

I drew a long breath. “Three thousand guns is a lot of guns. Can the underground arm of this National Liberty Party come up with three thousand men to use them? And if so, can three thousand men take Mexico?’’

“Fidel Castro took Cuba with eighty-two men,
amigo
.”

“Well, for a start. As I recall, he picked up a few reinforcements as he went along. But Mondragon is no Fidel, from what I saw of him. And your government may not be run by perfect angels with shining wings, but they’re no Batistas. At least I don’t think you have the heritage of oppression and hatred that makes instant armies spring out of the ground like mushrooms.”

Ramón sighed. “But there is inflation and poverty and dissatisfaction, although I will deny that statement if you ever quote me. And this is Mexico, my friend. Traditionally, in bad times here, an ambitious
politico
who has a plausible cause and some rifles to offer has always found men to shoot them.” He shook his head. “No, the PLN can probably not find that many men at the start, but more will come to them if they have any kind of success. And, no, it is not likely that they can take Mexico, although Mondragon does have a considerable following among the people. I do not, myself, think these men can win, but I have been wrong upon occasion. Even if they lose, however, they can tarn my country into a battlefield, at least the northern part of it. Wounds can be inflicted that will bleed for generations. But it will not happen without the rifles.”

I was beginning to think that my companion might really belong to that rare, endangered species called patriot. Well, there are still a few of them around, even in our dark and dirty business.

I said, “So let’s find the lousy guns and remove them from circulation, one way or another. How are you planning to explain releasing us to search for them, a subversive Yankee arms smuggler and his moll?’’

“The young lady stays,” Ramón said. “I require her with me so that I can display her as a hostage for your good behavior. I will report to those who must be informed that I have made a bargain with you. I have promised you that your crimes, to which your wife must be considered an accessory since she accompanied you willingly, will be forgiven if you carry out this mission successfully. Mr. and Mrs. Cody will simply be escorted to the border and sent back into the Estados Unidos with a warning never to return.”

I regarded him for a moment. It was pointless to ask what would happen to us if I was not successful. It would depend entirely on his political power and his political position. He wasn’t a vindictive man, but he wasn’t a sucker for friendship, either, if friendship was what we had. Faced with a failure that threatened his career and an armed revolution that could destroy his country, I didn’t think he’d risk very much to save me or my female associate, in spite of his promises, if somebody, say Captain Aleman in his role of political officer, demanded our blood.

All this was between us, unspoken, as he asked, “Where do you intend to start?”

“I can give you a better answer after you’ve told me what you know.”

Later, when he’d finished briefing me, and I’d made some suggestions to which he’d agreed, I said, “Okay, let’s put the show on the road. I’m the doting older bridegroom terrified by the threats you’ve made against my young bride. How could I bear to let you stick her into one of your filthy Mexican dungeons, you lousy greaser bastard?’’ I drew a long breath. “Let’s go see her so I can explain it to her.”

We found her eating her lunch at Ramón’s desk. She finished her coffee with a gulp and rose to face us. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said. “I never was much of a picnic girl; I don’t like eating off my lap.”

“It is perfectly all right, señora.” He smiled. “I apologize for the crude facilities of my camp, but you seem to have made good use of them.”

Actually, the improvement was startling. She’d discarded the forlorn remnants of her wedding costume and cleaned herself up carefully. She’d even washed her hair. Still damp, and stripy with the marks of the comb, it was beginning to return to gold at the ends as it dried. She was wearing a new gray chambray work shirt, stiff new blue jeans and blue-and-white jogging shoes over white gym socks. The damp hair, and the tape on her cheek—and another patch on the heel of her right hand—not to mention the other scrapes and scratches, made her look like somebody’s kid sister, a tomboy brat who’d just been washed off and patched up after getting mauled in a game too rough for her. It was hard to reconcile the rather wholesome picture she made now with the image I carried in my head of the disheveled but seductive glamour girl who’d conned me, not altogether against my will, into a violent moment of passion on the mountain.

She licked her lips. “What. . . what’s going to happen to us now?” she asked.

“I’m going out to save the world,” I said. “Well, at least the Mexican part of it. You’re staying here as hostage for my good behavior.”

“You will be quite safe, señora,” Ramón said.

After a doubtful moment, she gave him a slow smile that had nothing tomboyish about it. “Oh, yes, I am sure I will be, Mr. Cacique. .. . ."

Now, in Hermosillo, I realized that I was stalling at the motel door. There’s always that sense of foreboding as you enter a new phase of an operation: you’ve survived the early threats and traps, now what’s waiting to kill you? I drew a long breath, turned the key, slammed the door back, and threw my little canvas bag into the room, hoping that the carpet that received it, and the pajamas in which I’d wrapped it, would preserve the expensive bottle inside.

Inside the honeymoon suite a gun fired.

The girl was wearing a rough
serape
thrown back over her left shoulder, leaving her gun arm free. There was something familiar about her, but I didn’t take time to make the connection, although she hadn’t shot again.

Figuring that no pro of any competence would let himself be tricked into shooting at a decoy bag, I’d made the kind of tumbling dive and roll into the room that can work when you’re up against amateur opposition; the amateur will shoot behind, always. You hope. But there had been no more shots. I’d come up into a crouch with the .38 ready, and there she was, holding a small automatic pistol awkwardly. If it had been aimed anywhere near me I’d have fired, but it was pointing in a vaguely upward direction, as if she didn’t quite know what to do with it. Responding to the threat of my gun, she held it away from her gingerly as if she’d picked up a dead rat by the tail. I saw her fingers start to relax.

“No!” I snapped. “Don’t drop it, dammit! Put it down on the big chair, gently.
Pone la pistola
. . ."

Hollywood to the contrary, you don’t go around dropping loaded automatics unless you’re looking for an interesting variation on Russian roulette—when they bounce they tend to go off in any direction. I was still trying to figure out the Spanish for lay that pistol down, baby, when she reached behind her to place the weapon on the seat of the chair in which she’d presumably been waiting when I startled her to her feet. She did it without looking, without taking her eyes off me. I knew her now; she was the girl of the shabby black dress and the high-heeled red shoes I’d seen, with an older male companion, in Cananea.

She licked her lips. “It is as I thought before! You are not . . .” She paused, frowning. “I was told the reservation was in the name of. . . But you are not that Cody, señor!”

“Maybe not,” I said, “but let’s not shout the news all over Hermosillo.”

I maintained a poker face, and I hoped a poker voice, but her voice had given her away: it had been louder than it needed to be. She was pretty good, she didn’t once look toward the door leading into the other room of the suite, but she might as well have. It seemed unlikely that she’d jacked up the volume because she thought I was hard of hearing. On my feet now, keeping her covered, I sidled toward the outside door and listened to make certain nobody was charging up to ask who was shooting whom in here. No one seemed to be interested, which is often the case with a single, muffled, small-caliber report that could be a backfire or somebody slamming shut the trunk lid of a car.

I closed and locked the door. I motioned the girl aside and moved past her cautiously to gather up the pistol lying on the chair cushion. It was a cheap little weapon; a nickel-plated, hammerless auto so trashy that the manufacturer hadn’t even had enough pride in it to stamp his name clearly on the slide— perhaps he was afraid of bending or cracking the flimsy metal if he hit it too hard. The caliber had come through in readable fashion, however: .22 L.R., for Long Rifle, the little rimfire round I’d once discussed with Gloria. I found the catch, released the magazine, and pulled back the slide to eject the round from the chamber. I stuffed it into the top of the magazine, returned the magazine to the gun, and pocketed the weapon with the chamber empty.