Outside the law enforcement center, I turned my cell phone back on. I had two missed calls. One was from the car rental insurance guy, who’d left me a message requesting in no uncertain terms that I call him back to discuss the blown-up Cherokee. The other was from Michelle Abbott, just checking in to make sure I was okay. I also had one text message, which had come from Mondragón. It read: Safe. Everyone. Which was a relief on so many fronts.
I headed first thing to the hospital in Sierra Vista to check on Jocko. I felt responsible for the beating he’d taken, although I knew it was something he wouldn’t blame me for. It was just one of the risks of doing the good work of the Desert Angels, which I understood. The faces of Juan and the women and the children stayed with me. Maybe they weren’t innocent in the eyes of the law, but there’s something more important than the law, and that is simply compassion. That might sound strange coming from a man who’s spent a good deal of his life behind a badge, but laws are made by human beings and human beings are not infallible. We make laws for all kinds of reasons, and not always the right ones. One of the most powerful motivations for the enactment of legislation is fear, and when you act out of fear, you risk becoming exactly the kind of monster you’re trying to bar the door against. I couldn’t help thinking that we were putting those women and children—and the men, too, who came looking for nothing more sinister than a job and a quiet life—through a monstrous ordeal. And I understood why Peter and the other Desert Angels were willing to risk everything to help them.
I found Jayne Harris at Jocko’s bedside, which surprised me. Frank had led me to believe Jocko’s condition was too difficult for her to deal with. Clearly, she was stronger than either of us had given her credit for. She was reading to him. When I came in and she closed the book, I saw that it was West with the Night.
“Bush pilot,” Jocko said, looking and sounding so much better than the night before. “If I had it all to do over again, that’s what I would’ve been. A bush pilot.”
Jayne hadn’t seen me since I’d been worked over. She studied my face. “Frank told me you’d had a run-in with someone.”
“I survived.”
“Who was it?”
“I can’t say for sure. Out here, the possibilities are numerous.”
“Rodriguez?”
“I’ll know soon enough.”
That intrigued her. “You’re onto something?”
“I’ve got a better handle on a few things.”
She nodded toward my face. “I hope you get there before someone kills you.”
There was another chair in the room, and I sat down. “Where’s Frank?”
“Seeing to the vineyards. Harvest isn’t far off and there’s plenty of work to be done. Especially now that both Peter and Jocko are out of commission. Any word on your wife or Peter?”
“Nothing official,” I said.
“I’m sorry.” She looked down at Jocko, lying beat up on the white hospital sheet. “I told you and Frank that getting involved with those people would end up badly.”
“Those people?” I said.
“The Desert Angels.”
“You knew?”
She laughed, but there was a brittle edge to it. “You can’t keep secrets from someone you share a bed with.”
Which hadn’t been true for Rainy and me, but maybe Jayne and her husband were different.
“I’ve known about Frank and Peter and Jocko from the beginning. I just didn’t want to get involved. One of us needed some dispassionate distance.”
“You don’t sympathize with the people they’re trying to help?”
“Of course I do. Who doesn’t? But just look what’s happened.” She held out her hand, indicating the bandaged Jocko.
“I’d do it all again,” Jocko said. “You close your heart off, Jayne, and you’re as good as dead.”
“You go right ahead then and get yourself killed.”
He smiled weakly. “Not dead yet.”
“Just remember who’s minding the store while you and Frank are off playing Mother Teresa. You think it’s easy? If it wasn’t for me, we’d be no better off than those people sneaking across the border.”
Although she’d addressed this to the man in the bed, I had a sense it was a conversation she’d probably had with her husband on more than one occasion.
“In this hard country, Jayne darlin’, we all gotta stick together.”
“Family, Jocko,” she said. “I’ll do everything I can for family. Everyone else is on their own.”
Which seemed to me to be almost an echo of Mondragón’s outlook.
“I’ll leave you to your reading,” I said. “I just wanted to make sure you’re doing okay, Jocko.”
“Don’t waste your worry on me, son. You got enough on your shoulders. But I appreciate your concern. Vaya con Dios, amigo.”
I said good-bye to Jayne, and her response was bitter and enigmatic.
“You’ve wakened sleeping dogs in Coronado County. I just hope to God you find your wife before they tear her apart.” Then she echoed Jocko’s final words, “Vaya con Dios.”
But like an echo, they sounded distant and unfelt.
CHAPTER 31
* * *
On the way back to Cadiz, I paused at a little wayside, and spent a moment looking at the mountains to the west, the south, the east, the north. The blue sky was mottled with white and gray clouds, and along the horizon the buildup had begun for another monsoon rain. The whole rolling plateau was spotted with stunted, desperate-looking trees and covered with yellow grass rippling nervously in the breeze. In so many ways, this was a different country than I’d anticipated. I didn’t know how to read this land. I didn’t understand its people. And I gave myself over to a terrible homesickness for the North Country of Minnesota.
In the months since our marriage, Rainy and I had settled into a comfortable routine. Breakfast together in the early morning, sharing so much in that quiet hour before Jenny and Daniel and Waaboo were awake. It wasn’t that we talked a lot. Rainy says I’m about as talkative as a rolling pin. But sharing isn’t necessarily about words. I missed her. Missed us. I felt desolate and alone in Coronado County.
When I thought of Rainy, I couldn’t help thinking that she was with Mondragón, that together they’d worked to rescue their son. This sharing of effort was something I was sure would bridge whatever divide had existed between them, something that couldn’t help but lace their hearts together.
Trust, I tried to tell myself. In Coronado County, trust was the rarest of commodities. And if I didn’t trust Rainy, who could I trust?
As if in answer, the words from the Pueblo prayer came to me: Our love is the promise that is never broken.