“Later, until he died himself, the old Hungarian would slip me money and pretend that it came from my father. But it came from him — my father never gave me nothing. Well, maybe he gave me two things, both of them by mistake. And if I get lucky maybe I’ll use those two things to outfox the madrinas. They’re only hired killers, after all, but I’ve got the blood of Toltec warriors and mad Irishmen in my veins.”
He lapsed into silence. She slept some, came awake, slept again. But always he was awake and staring out into the starry night and his mind was working, working. She could almost feel it trembling within him like a motor. But what it grappled with — the madrinas or the past that had brought him to this place — she could not know.
Once he spoke again, more to the night than to her. “I don’t miss it — the bright new car we had to get rid of because the madrinas were sure to spot it, the hard American dollars. I don’t care to be a saint, but at least I understand now why they went out into the desert. To free themselves, hey? Well, I’ve done the same thing.”
Then she heard it on the edge of her dreams — and he heard it, too, and touched her and woke her. An engine growling along in low gear. He got to his feet and she rose up, too. He stood there, chuffing his breath as if someone had hit him a great blow. Then his wits seemed to remember who their master was.
He grabbed the burlap bag and dumped part of its contents on the ground, just cast them there like a sign. Then he thrust the bag into her arms and gripped her shoulder.
“Remember the place I showed you above the village? The depression beyond the lip of the hill?”
“I remember.”
“Go there and lie low. Here, take the jug of water, too.”
“What if it’s not them?”
“Then it’s somebody else. What difference does it make? You must be out of here. This is my affair alone.”
“No. I’ll stay. I’ll help you.”
“You help me best by getting out of sight. If they find you they’ll use you. Don’t you understand? They’ll use you against me. And afterwards God knows what they’ll do to you.”
“Rape? Do you think I’m afraid of that when they might kill you?”
“Ah, rape — that’s not their style. But who can repair a bullet in the brain? Now do as I tell you — I beg you. This is difficult enough.”
He turned away, and after a moment she turned away, too. She found the path up the hill and followed it in the starlight. Far down the track she could see the red wash of the brake lights of the vehicle. And amber too sometimes. They were driving up on their parking lights so as not to alert them — as if the sound of their engine wasn’t enough. Ai — it was them all right. Who else would trouble to come out here? And what other vehicle but a four-wheel drive Cherokee could climb the steep track? Certainly not that joke of a Fiesta.
When she reached the top of the hill she paused to look back at the village. Patricio’s dark figure was moving among the abandoned houses, doing this thing and that, she didn’t know what. Then he was at the door to the church. He went inside, and a moment later the first candle flared. Then more candles — a perfect blaze of them. She had a premonition then that he was going to lie down amongst them like a corpse — just as she’d imagined him — and wait for the madrinas. That would be his gesture, the way he would be remembered in the ballads.
She stood there trembling. She wanted to run back to the village and pull him out of there. Then the Cherokee arrived at the top of the track and there was no more time.
She found the depression and dropped into its shadow. Then she peered out over the rim. Down below, the madrinas had already climbed out of their vehicle. They stood on either side of it, alert, but sure of themselves as well — as if they owned this place. One of them had his teeth clamped around a small cigar. He puffed on it and the tip glowed red.
Their coats were open, and now the one on the left took a big, gleaming pistol out of his belt — yes, even in the starlight it shone silver and deadly, like one of those movie guns that Schwarzenegger and Stallone carry. The other one took out a similar pistol and worked the receiver and chambered a round. The awful, metallic sound it made — she wanted to stop her ears. This was real, this was happening.
Her eyes swung back to the church. Patricio had closed the door and no light showed. But if you were high above, as she was, and could look down somewhat, you could see a faint interior glow.
The two men spoke to each other in low tones. They might be confident, but they still didn’t like this place. There were too many spots for their quarry to hide and all the dark hills in the world for him to run away to. But Patricio had chosen to stay, and now he made that point clear by sending something to the ground in one of the abandoned houses.
Instantly the two men were moving. One crouched beside the Cherokee and thrust his weapon straight out in front of him. The other flattened himself against a wall near the stone bench. Patricio had left the church then, but where in all those shadows was he?
The men were listening to something — a rustle of cloth maybe — at any rate, some faint sound of movement. They made hand gestures to each other. Then in another moment they were in motion again. They went through the doorway of one of the houses, one high, one low, their pistols covering different portions of the single room beyond. Nothing — for an instant, two instants — nothing at all. Then a flash at the glass-less window and the whang of a shot — like a hammer coming down on a metal sheet.
Her heart stopped. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, it seemed to stop for an entire minute. Then a dark figure moved like a shadow between two of the houses. The madrinas boiled out of the doorway. One circled left, one circled right. Now the houses hid them from her, and they hid that shadow she’d seen as well.
She tried to remember a prayer — any prayer — but her mind was as dry as her throat.
Shuffling sounds amongst the houses. Feet sliding sideways without lifting themselves from the ground. Then silence. Absolute silence. She could feel the blood pounding through her head. Feel it in her eyes so that they seemed to throb with the strain of watching.
I should’ve got my own pistol, she thought. I should’ve killed those dogs in the street the first time I saw them and spared myself this.
And still no sounds in the village below as the seconds attenuated themselves like wires being stretched to the snapping point.
Then there was the whang of a shot. Then two whangs in quick succession. The flash of the muzzles threw brief light into the dark spaces between the houses. Flash and gone — like that. Then flash-flash and the metallic echo carrying across the hills.
A figure detached itself from the shadows. It ran crookedly across the open space before the church. When it reached the door, it more or less collapsed against it. One hand went to the adobe wall for support and left a splotch there like blood. The door was shoved aside, and the tiny flames of the candles — dozens and dozens of them — threw light out against the darkness. The figure rolled inside, disappeared. And now the madrinas came loping — dark hunters with silver weapons in their hands. They threw themselves up against the wall on either side of the church door. One of them pointed out the splotch and said something. The other nodded. They went through the door — same as before — high, low, pistols pointed in opposite directions. They fired almost instantly, but this time the flashes were lost in the candlelight. Each shot brought a sob of pain from Barbara’s throat.