“Berto? You said his name is Gilbert. What kind of name is Gilbert for a Mexican?”
“He’ll tell you he’s Spanish, not Mexican. And he’s only half Spanish. His mother was an American citizen, which makes him a citizen, too. She loved Gilbert Roland. Some old movie star. Do you remember him?”
“Maybe,” I said. “Vaguely.”
“So that’s what’s on his birth certificate. But he prefers the Spanish name Gilberto. Or Berto. I was eighteen when we met. He was twenty. We fell in love. I became pregnant with my first child, Chantelle. I thought when you were pregnant, getting married was what you did. So we married.”
“Catholic wedding, apparently.”
“A quiet one. He didn’t want his parents to know.”
“Why?”
“They had another bride picked out for him. His family is powerful, Cork. They wanted him to marry the daughter of another powerful family.”
“A political union?”
“Something like that. For a while, we lived a quiet life. Peter came along. Berto finished his undergraduate degree. Then we entered hell.”
“Your husband and a drug habit. That’s what you’ve always said.”
“That’s how I’ve always explained it to people. It’s easier than the truth.”
“What’s the truth?”
“The marriage his family had in mind was to have been a union of business interests, Cork. Not the kind of business you’d find listed on the New York Stock Exchange.”
“Drugs?”
“And everything that goes with drugs. But that wasn’t Berto. Do you know what he majored in at U of A? Social work. He wanted to help people, not prey on them.”
“So what happened?”
“While he was in graduate school, he began to get a lot of pressure from his family to return to his home in Mexico.”
“Which was where?”
“Outside Hermosillo.”
I gave her a blank look.
“It’s in the state of Sonora. A hundred and fifty miles south of the border. Things were getting difficult. The family was under attack from groups who wanted control of those particular business interests.”
“Berto resisted the pressure?”
She nodded. “But he kept being called back. First for short visits, then longer. He’d return looking grim. He never shared the details of what was happening. Which was fine with me. I had enough to worry about. I was practically raising the children alone. Then one night a man showed up at our door. A stranger to me, but Berto knew him. The family rancho had been attacked. Some of Berto’s family had been killed. His father had been shot. It didn’t look like he was going to make it. Berto had to go. The situation down there was dangerous, so I stayed with Chantelle and Peter. The stranger, a man whose name I only knew as El Perro, remained behind. For protection.”
Rainy sat back and breathed deeply. It was stiflingly hot in the sanctuary, and I watched sweat trickle down her temple and fall drop by drop onto the white blouse she wore, turning the fabric there a wet gray.
“Berto was gone all the next day. I heard no word from him. That night, El Perro told me he’d received instructions. He was to take us into the desert, where Berto would meet us. I asked him what was going on. Revolution, he told me.
“I gathered the children and we left with El Perro. I wasn’t sure what we might run into, so I took the Ruger Berto had given me.”
“What? An anniversary present?”
“When he began making his trips back to Hermosillo, he insisted on taking me out to a gun range. He taught me how to use firearms. First a handgun, the Ruger. Then rifles. He made me practice until I was very good.”
“Thoughtful of him,” I said.
“I wasn’t happy about it. But . . . it was a good thing in the end. El Perro drove us south and west, far into the desert. Then he stopped and told me we should get out and wait for Berto. The children were asleep in the backseat. I asked if it was all right not to wake them. He said to let them sleep. Nothing about this felt right. I couldn’t understand why Berto hadn’t contacted me directly. Why had the message come through El Perro? As I got out, I slid the Ruger from my purse. El Perro walked ahead of me. I remember there was a full moon that night. The whole desert was silver and cut with black shadows. I saw El Perro’s right hand move up toward his chest, where he wore a shoulder holster. He had a big silver ring on his pinkie, and I still remember how it flashed in the moonlight as his hand rose. He turned around suddenly. His gun was in his hand. But I’d had the Ruger aimed on him from the moment we left the car. I fired that gun until it was empty.”
She stared at the candle awhile. I waited.
“The children slept through it. I took his wallet so that he couldn’t be identified. There were a thousand U.S. dollars in it. I drove the car back to Tucson, directly to the bus station. I bought us all tickets to Hayward, Wisconsin.”
“And Berto?”
“It was, as El Perro said, a revolution. Berto and his father, who, in fact, survived, along with two of Berto’s brothers, somehow managed to hold out and hold on. It took him a while to find me. I’d already started divorce proceedings. He didn’t fight it. My safety, the safety of our children, he put those things first, I’ll give him that.”
“You haven’t seen him since?”
“We’ve communicated over the years. I’ve sent him photos of the kids. He stayed out of our lives, remarried, began another family. But I needed his help when Peter went through treatment.”
“Ah,” I said, finally understanding how Rainy could afford to send her son to a rehab center that charged $35,000 a month. “And what did that buy him with you, Rainy?”
She lifted her eyes to mine, and the deep despair I saw in them made me ashamed of my words.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “That was uncalled for.”
“The Berto I married, he was such a good man, Cork. This Berto I hardly recognize.”
The church door opened. Mondragón stepped in.
“So, preciosa, does he know all now?”
“Not all,” I said. “I’d like to know what happened at Jocko’s.”
Rainy’s first husband sat on the altar rail, next to the candleholder. Only a couple of years must have separated us in age, but he looked a decade younger than I felt. Except for his eyes. There was something old and tired about them.
“After Rainy’s call last night, I came as quickly as I could,” he said. “I caught up with you in Sulfur Springs.”
“I didn’t see you,” I said.
He smiled, perfect white teeth. “I’m good, huh? I followed you far enough back to keep off your radar. When you pulled into that old-timer’s ranch, I found a good place to watch with my binoculars. After you took off in the biplane, and the other man left in his pickup truck, Rainy was alone. I was going to show myself and discuss Peter’s situation. But I caught sight of someone sneaking through the tall grass south of the ranch house. He surprised Rainy. I could see he had a gun on her. When they started off in the direction he’d come from, I called Rainy. She talked him into letting her answer. I told her to drop the cell phone and bend to pick it up. When she went down, I took him out.”