Bringing the water back to Miguel, seeing his brother again, was so much harder. Now he understood why the Yankees had kept Miguel so long. Miguel sat in a U.S.-issue military wheelchair. He would never walk again. So said the letter that came with him, and Jorge believed it. His body was twisted and ruined. So was his face. U.S. plastic surgeons had done what they could, but they couldn't work miracles.
The shell that didn't quite kill him damaged his thinking, too-or maybe he was trapped inside his own mind, and his wounds wouldn't let him come out. The U.S. doctors had kept him alive, but Jorge wasn't even slightly convinced they'd done him any favors.
He gave Miguel the cup. His brother needed to take it in both hands; he couldn't manage with one. Even then, Jorge kept one of his hands under the cup, in case Miguel dropped it. He didn't, not this time, but he did dribble water down what was left of his chin. Jorge wiped it dry with a little towel.
How long could Miguel go on like this? Ten years? Twenty? Thirty? Fifty? Would you want to go on like this for fifty years? If somebody took care of you, though, what else would you do?
Pedro came in and looked at Miguel, then quickly looked away. What had happened to his brother tore at him even worse than it did at Jorge. And what it did to their mother…Jorge tried not to think about that, but he couldn't help it. She'd be taking care of and mourning a cripple for as long as she or Miguel lived.
"Those bastards," Pedro said savagely. "Damnyankee bastards!"
"I think they did the best they could for him," Jorge said. "If they didn't, he'd be dead right now."
Pedro looked at him as if he were an idiot. "Who do you think blew him up in the first place? Damnyankee pendejos, that's who."
He was probably right-probably, but not certainly. Jorge had seen men wounded and killed by short rounds from their own side. He didn't try to tell his brother about that-Pedro was in no mood to listen. He just shrugged. "It's the war. We all took chances like that. What can you do about it now? What can anyone do?"
"Pay them back," Pedro insisted. "Seсor Quinn says we can do it if we don't give up. I think he's right."
"I think you're loco," Jorge said. "What happens if you shoot somebody? They take hostages, and then they kill them. They take lots of hostages. They've already done it here once. You think they won't do it again?"
"So what?" Pedro said. "It will only make the rest of the people hate them."
"Suppose they take Susana or her kids? Suppose they take Lupe Flores?" Jorge said, and had the dubious satisfaction of watching his brother turn green. Yes, Pedro was sweet on Lupe, all right. Jorge pressed his advantage: "Suppose they take Mamacita? Will you go on yelling, 'Freedom!' then? It's over, Pedro. Can't you see that?"
Pedro swore at him and stormed out of the farmhouse again. Jorge noticed his own hands had folded into fists. He made them unclench. He didn't want to fight Pedro. He didn't want his brother doing anything stupid and useless, either. The Army had taught him one thing, anyhow: you didn't always get what you wanted.
Miguel had listened to everything. How much he'd understood…How much Miguel understood was always a question. It probably always would be. He struggled with his damaged flesh and damaged spirit, trying to bring out words. "Not good," he managed. "Not good."
"No, it isn't good," Jorge agreed. Just how his injured brother meant that…who could say? But Miguel wasn't wrong any which way. If Pedro went and did something stupid, people for miles around could end up paying for it.
Miguel tried saying something else, but it wouldn't come out, whatever it was. Sometimes Jorge thought Miguel knew everything that was going on around him but was trapped inside his own head by his wounds. Other times, he was sure Miguel's wits were damaged, too. Which was worse? He had no idea. Both were mighty bad.
If Pedro really was planning on doing something idiotic…Whatever Jorge did, he would never betray his own flesh and blood to the occupiers. If you did something like that, you might as well be dead, because you were dead to all human feeling. But that didn't mean he couldn't do anything at all.
The next time he went into Baroyeca, he did it. Then he went into La Culebra Verde and drank much more beer than he was in the habit of putting down. He didn't walk back to the farmhouse-he staggered. If the electric poles hadn't marched along by the side of the road to guide him back, he might have wandered off and got lost.
His mother looked at him with imperfect delight when he came in. "Your father didn't do this very often," she said severely. "I wouldn't stand for it from him. I won't stand for it from you, either."
"Shorry-uh, sorry-Mamacita," Jorge said.
"And don't think you can sweet-talk me, either," his mother went on. "You can call me Mamacita from now till forever, and I'll still know you've come home like a worthless, drunken stumblebum. I told you once, and I'll tell you again-I won't put up with it."
Jorge didn't try to argue. He went to bed instead. He woke up with his head feeling as if it were in the middle of an artillery barrage. Aspirins and coffee helped…some. Pedro eyed him with amused contempt that was almost half admiration. "You tied a good one on there," he remarked.
"Sн." Jorge didn't want to talk-or to listen, for that matter. He poured the coffee cup full again.
"How come?" Pedro asked him. "You don't usually do that." Miguel sat in the wheelchair watching both of them, or maybe just lost in his own world.
"Everything," Jorge said. "Sometimes it gets to you, that's all." He wasn't even lying, or not very much.
Pedro nodded vigorously. "It does. It really does! But I don't want to get drunk on account of it. I want to do something about it."
You want to do something stupid about it, Jorge thought. He kept that to himself. If you got into an argument when you were hung over, you were much too likely to get into a brawl. He didn't want to punch Pedro-most of the time, anyhow.
The Bible said a soft answer turned away wrath. No answer seemed to work just as well. When Jorge didn't rise to the bait, Pedro left him alone. He wondered whether he ought to remember that lesson for later. A shrug was all he could give the question. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't.
He went on about his business. Even in winter, the farm needed work. He tended the garden and the livestock. He went into Baroyeca once more, and came back sober. Magdalena Rodriguez nodded to him in somber approval.
Then Pedro went into town a few days later. When he came home, he was wild with rage. "The Yankees! They've taken Seсor Quinn!"
"I was afraid of that," Jorge said.
"But how could they know what he stands for?" Pedro demanded.
"He talks too much," Jorge answered, which was true. "And too many people know he was the Freedom Party man here. Someone in town must have blabbed to the soldados from los Estados Unidos." Most of that was true, but not all.
"What can we do?" his brother cried.
"I don't know. I don't think we can do anything. The Yankees have machine guns and automatic rifles. I don't want to go up against them. If you do, you have to be out of your mind."
Pedro frowned; that wasn't what he wanted to hear. "I hope nobody decides to inform on me," he said. "All we've got here are a couple of.22s, and you can't fight anybody with those."
"Of course not. That's why the Yankees let us keep them," Jorge said.
Then his brother brightened. "Maybe we could get some dynamite from the mines, and we could-"
"Could what?" Jorge broke in. "You can't fight with dynamite, either. What are you going to do, throw sticks of it?"
"Well, no. But if we made an auto bomb-"
"Out of what? We don't have an auto," Jorge reminded him. "Besides, do you know how many the Yankees shoot for every auto bomb that goes off?"
"We've got to do something for Seсor Quinn," Pedro said.