“Never been much for cats,” Lee said noncommittally, wondering what that was about. He was right, the damned ghost cat was too nosy. He moved on into the cabin, glancing back as Jake crossed the yard and disappeared inside the house. He could see through the lighted windows beyond Lucita’s lace curtains where Delgado sat at the dining table, the lamp lit and a thick ledger before him as if he had already started on the payroll and expenses. On the wall behind him where the lamplight shone, a painting of white roses made Lee think sharply of Lucita.
While he was cleaning up he thought about her, about being in her house surrounded by her little touches, her books, her flowers, her scent. He showered, put on a clean shirt, guessed he’d better wash the other one in the sink tonight. Feeling strangely nervous, he went on over.
The house was just as much Jake’s house as Lucita’s, Navajo rugs, leather chairs, agricultural and cowman’s magazines, but with Lucita’s touches everywhere, brightly jacketed books, potted violets, the lace curtains, the dining room furnished with an intricately carved Spanish table long enough to accommodate a dozen chairs, creamy walls, and above the dark, carved buffet the white roses as showy as Lucita herself. She loved roses, though he hadn’t seen any out in that pitiful, dry yard where roses were never meant to grow. The painting made Lee uncomfortably aware of her, the petals as soft as her cheek, as creamy as the pale silks she liked to wear, Lucita in tight Levi’s, a creamy satin shirt, fancy boots, her black hair sleek and shining, her dark eyes laughing.
Jake had folded back the lace table runner, out of the way, one end covered with a heavy mat, with bowls of beans, rice, and good Texas chili that a Mexican woman brought in from the kitchen. Lee took the empty place Jake indicated, accepted the cold beer Jake passed to him. As they dished their plates liberally, Delgado looked across at Lee.
“McNeil wasn’treal hard time?” he asked casually. “More freedom than, say, Leavenworth or Atlanta?” The big man leaned back in his chair, sipping his beer from the bottle.
Lee nodded, taking in Delgado’s bold, square features. Ramon Delgado might be a hard worker, but he was a man who lived well, treated himself well. What did he know about McNeil? What did he know about solitary, if you came in with a bad attitude, how you were stripped naked and locked into a pitch-black cell, five feet by five, cold as hell, no toilet, no sink, no bed to lie on, and what sleep you got was on the cold, damp concrete. They gave you one thin blanket, took that away in the morning, brought you a dinky little bowl of gruel, and you had to pick the cockroaches out of that. Lee had been in there only once. After that five-day stretch he was real careful, he stayed out of trouble, didn’t make a move or say a word to draw the attention of the guards or, as much as possible, of the other inmates. If he had a beef with someone, he took care of it in a way that couldn’t be traced back to him. After thatstretch in solitary, he’d been a model inmate despite the hazing that was laid on him, and pretty soon he got what he wanted. “I worked the farm,” he said shortly. “That part was easy time.”
Though he hadn’t lived in the farm complex like most of those who worked there, he’d gone back to the cell block at night. Even with Lee’s attention to good behavior, he guessed he’d still made the warden nervous. But Delgado didn’t need to know the whole story, the fancy bastard. What did he know about prison, anyway? Delgado’s interest made Lee’s temper flare but he did his best to swallow back his anger.
“What were you in for?” Delgado continued. “Jake mentioned bank robbery.”
Lee nodded, drew his thumbnail down his beer bottle, crumpling the label away from the glass.“A job I messed up on.” He had to try harder not to show his anger. He was, after all, working for the man, he guessed Delgado had a right to ask questions. “It was the first bank robbery I ever tried,” Lee said, keeping his voice mild, trying to act like they were having a normal conversation. “And it was sure as hell the last.”
“You liked the trains better,” Delgado said, smiling.
Lee nodded.“The old steam trains. Those days are gone.”
“Not many big shipments of gold, either,” Delgado said. “All bank drafts or paper money, marked money, not like it used to be. And the diesels too fast for a man on horseback.” His blue eyes burned into Lee. “You’re thinking to stay straight, now? Thinking not to cross the law anymore?”
“That’s my plan,” Lee lied. “I’m getting too old for that life. My lungs are too sick, I can’t take the abuse anymore.”But not quite the last job, he thought, looking steadily at Delgado. As he watched this man, with his riches, with his great spreads of land and hundreds of men working for him, men under his complete control, Lee’s dark urge pressed in at him, wanting part of what Delgado had, no matter who he hurt. If the other three operations, plus the date groves at Hemet, were as large as this ranch, that could total over six hundred workers. Say each man averaged aroundtwenty-five dollars a week, depending on how much he picked, that would add up to some fifteen thousand dollars. Add in the salaries of Jake and the other ranch managers, and their foremen, and that still wouldn’t be enough to retire on, even in Mexico, for whatever time he had left.
But then when he thought about betraying Lucita and Jake, he felt his face heat with shame. The cat was right, if he stole from Delgado he’d put a knife in the hearts of his friends. Shaken, not knowing what he wanted, he soon left the two men to their account books, the dirty dishes and empty beer bottles piled at one end of the table. Crossing Lucita’s comfortable living room to let himself out. Looking at the deep leather sofawith its tumble of soft pillows, he had a sudden vision of lying there with her, holding her close, a thought that brought heat again.
But which dominated? The heat born of lust? Or of shame? He’d never known himself to be so uncertain. Was this a part of getting old? Old, and too weak to know what he wanted? Too old and uncertain to resist whatever notion might, at any given moment, pass through his aging brain?
Dark of mood, he pushed out into the night, the day’s searing heat vanished but the evening air still warm. A thin moon was rising over the melon fields, silvering the tamarisk trees beyond, along the riverbank. He could hear coyotes singing off in the distance, somewhere this side of the mountains. Looking out across the desert toward the wide Colorado River that fed the vast rows of crops, he had a sudden sense of what Jake had told him about Ramon Delgado, about how Delgado had built up this land by backbreaking hard work, and a sudden sense hit Lee of what Delgado might, in fact, feel for the land; and Lee felt a hint, deep inside, thatwhat he had chosen to see in Delgado might be warped, twisted by the way he wanted to see it.
His cabin windows were black, but moonlight touched the porch. A tall shape stood waiting in the shadows beside the door, sending goose bumps up Lee’s arms, a fear flashing through him that made him grip the switchblade in his pocket. The same fear he’d known back at McNeil when the dark wraith moved in through the bars to stand at the foot of his bed. He told himself itwas only a shadow, that it had no power over him except that which he allowed it to have. He moved on up the steps and past it, stepped on in through his unlocked door, closed the door, and switched on the overhead bulb.
Nothing in the room seemed disturbed, everything looked as it should, his folded clothes and towels, Mae’s picture on the white-painted dresser, the straight-backed purple chair standing where he’d left it, the quilted coverlet rumpled on the iron bedstead where he had sat to pull on his boots, the coverlet made by Lucita’s hand. The yellow tomcat lay curled in the middle of the bed, blinking up sleepily at him. Again he was surprised at how glad he was to see Misto there, so pleased that Lee almost spoke to him, then thought better of that idea. He didn’t feel like a lecture. Stripping off his boots and socks, his pants and shirt, he turned the quilt back as best he could without disturbing the beast, turned out the light and slid under the covers leaving most of the space to the cat. If, tonight, the dark spirit slipped into the room to torment him, so be it, he was too tired to care; he was too conflicted by the devil’s hassling to deal with it tonight, he wanted only to be left alone, except for the ghost cat. He badly wanted Misto to stay. Though the big feline, who had taken solid shape tonight in all his shaggy glory, was damnably heavy as he stretched out across Lee’s feet. Amused, but eased by Misto’s boldness and warmth, reassured by the cat’s presence, Leedrifted off into sleep, into dreams that made the dark spirit seem less threatening. That made Satan seem less powerful, tonight, than the spirit of the wily yellow ghost who lay wakeful, watching over Lee, though much of Misto’s attention turned now, as well, to Georgia, to the dark spirit’s keen interest in the family of little Sammie Blake.