“Mostly, he’s on his cell phone, delivering orders to his people, making contingency arrangements. He’s very organized that way. Ruthlessly so. He talks with Peter, they argue. He talks with me. We argue.”
“Do you argue about me?”
“Nothing to argue about. You’re my husband. Wholly, completely, truly.”
I kissed her, long and deep, and once more, we parted. After they’d gone, I got in my truck and continued south to Sulfur Springs, where I hoped I might find a few more pieces to fit into the puzzle.
CHAPTER 35
* * *
I drove to Sylvester’s place on the hill above town. His truck was there, but when I knocked on the door of his odd adobe house no one answered. There may have been nothing unusual in this, but considering that his mule, Franklin, had been killed and Marian Brown had been murdered, I was concerned. I tried the knob. Locked. I circled the house, attempting to peer through the windows, but every shade had been drawn.
Inside Rosa’s Cantina, I found Sierra wiping down a table. She looked up when I walked in and she frowned. “Here comes trouble.”
“Not my fault,” I said.
“Goes with you everywhere like dog shit on the sole of your shoe.”
“Are you talking about anything in particular?”
She fisted the rag she’d used to clean the table. “I heard about Marian.”
“I didn’t do it.”
“Maybe not, but since you came here, there’s been nothing but a landslide of bad. What do you want?”
“I haven’t eaten today. How about a little breakfast?”
“I’ll get you a menu,” she said but not graciously.
“No need. I’ll have the huevos rancheros.”
She disappeared into the kitchen, and I sat at a table next to a window that overlooked the main street of Sulfur Springs. I could see all the way to Gallina Town, and I was struck again by the profound difference of everything south of the narrow bridge, which felt in so many ways like its own, separate community. I thought about the music I’d heard playing, the dancing in front of the taqueria, the brightness with which the homes, even the shabby trailers on cinder blocks, were decorated. Many of these people worked hard at jobs that no one else wanted and were poorly paid, I was sure. But it seemed to me that there was something resilient in their spirit, some essential quality that kept the music and the dancing and the color alive. I thought about the people of my own heritage, the Anishinaabeg, who’d been lied to and cheated and herded onto reservations, who fought against poverty and all the ills that came with poverty. But the Ojibwe I knew well, my family and those I counted as friends, had in their spirits the same resilience I saw reflected in Gallina Town. And I thought, as I had so many times before, that what’s important to a human being, any human being, isn’t the wealth that comes from money, but the richness that comes from community, a sense of connectedness to family and to friends and, as Rainy and Henry would probably have said, to the spirit of the Great Mystery that runs through all creation.
“Sorry I ragged on you earlier,” Sierra said, setting the plate of eggs and beans in front of me. “Things have been rough here lately. Unsettled. I don’t like unsettled.”
“I get that. Have you seen Sylvester today?”
“No.” She stood there looking down at me. “We all heard about Franklin. Should I be worried about Sylvester, too?”
“Not necessarily. But like you say, things are unsettled here. It’s not a bad idea to be a little worried.”
“If something’s happened to that wonderful old coot, I’m taking to the warpath myself.”
“Who would you go after?”
She hesitated, then said, “Mike Sanchez.”
“Why?”
“There’s a man without a heart or a spine. The only reason he got that badge was Marian. And now that she’s gone . . .” She finished with a shrug.
“Is he involved in something a man wearing a badge shouldn’t be?”
“Anything that goes on in Sulfur Springs that’s not on the up-and-up, Sanchez is involved. We all know it.”
“Drugs?”
“Hell, yes.”
“White Horse?”
“If we had the Ku Klux Klan here, he’d be wearing a hood.”
“But his heritage is Mexican.”
She shook her head. “Spanish. He’s very clear on the distinction.”
“Have you seen him today?”
She shook her head. “Hasn’t been in yet. But he will be. He always comes in.”
“The sheriff’s been looking for him. Can’t seem to find him.”
That gave her pause. She stared down at me. “Like Marian, you think?”
“Maybe.”
Her eyes went to the empty street outside the window. “Is anybody safe?”
That was a question I couldn’t answer.
Outside, after I’d finished my breakfast, I discovered a note slipped under the wiper blade of my pickup: If you want answers call me. There was a number with it. No name. I’d been watching my truck through the cantina window the whole time I’d been inside. No one had come anywhere near the pickup. I figured it must have been put there the night before, and I’d been so intent on other things that morning that I simply hadn’t noticed it. I stood in the late morning sunlight and made the call.
“About time.” The voice at the other end was surly and familiar.
“Been busy. But I’d like answers.”
“Not over the phone.”
“Where?”
“The El Dorado Mine.”
“When?”
“Now. Come alone. I’ll be watching. If you’re not alone, no answers. I may even shoot you.”
I got into the truck and started down the street toward Gallina Town. I hadn’t gone far when I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw a dusty, little ATV swing around the corner behind me, a familiar figure gripping the handlebars. I braked to a stop and rolled down the window as Sylvester pulled up beside me.
“Is that your alternative to Franklin?” I asked.
“It don’t give me the companionship that old mule did, but it gets me to the same places in these mountains and a hell of a lot faster.”
“I just talked to Sierra. You’ve been scarce.”
“Been trying to track down Mike Sanchez since I lost Franklin. Figured that like everything else rotten in Sulfur Springs, he had a hand in it. Him and Marian.”
“Marian’s dead.”
“I heard. So that leaves Sanchez.”
“I’m on my way to see him.”
He shoved the bill of his ball cap up and sat back in the seat of his ATV. “You got business with that snake?”
“More like he has business with me,” I said and filled the old prospector in.
“I don’t know what he’s got up his sleeve,” Sylvester said, “but it ain’t gonna be good. Could be he killed Marian and maybe he’s got it in his head to do the same to you.”
“I don’t think so. He’s scared, but not of me.”
“Still, best you got backup.” He dropped a hand to a leather scabbard he’d affixed to the ATV in which a lever-action rifle was nested.
“He made it clear, Sylvester. Just me.”
The old man chewed on that, then said, “Take your time getting up to that mine.”
“Any particular reason?”
“You’ll know it when the time comes.”