"Doctor-"
"Please. If we are going to work together, you must call me Jesse."
"Jesse. And I'm Lindsay Byrne from Boston. So you work weekends?"
"I do not play golf." He smiled a moment but the smile didn't last long. "The truth is, I have nothing else to do."
They soon turned off Mines Road and onto the dirt road that led to the border wall. When they arrived at the big gate, no Border Patrol agents were in sight.
"They're not here to let us in," Lindsay said. "How will we get through?"
"Key code."
Jesse got out. She fought the wind and followed him to the gate. On the wall was a key pad.
"Wait," she said. "An American citizen has to enter a key code to travel from this side of the wall to the other side? From this America to that America?"
"Uh… yes."
"How does that work?"
"It is easy. See, I punch in the code-six, three, one, nine-"
"No. How does it work when the police need to come to the colonias? They have to get out and punch in the key code?"
"Oh. The police do not come to the colonias."
"What about ambulances?"
"They also do not come."
"Fire trucks?"
"No."
"Oh. Well then, I guess a key code works just fine."
"You love her?"
"I'll always love Lindsay."
"Mandy."
" Mandy? I'm old enough to be her… It's not like that."
"She know that?"
Bode assumed she did. Why would a gorgeous twenty-seven-year-old girl fall in love with an older man? An older man had an affair with a younger woman for one reason.
"My wife doesn't want to have sex with me."
"Hell, Bode, if you wanted sex, why'd you get married?"
Jim Bob was amused by his own words.
"When I vetoed that children's health insurance program," Bode said, "she moved out of our bedroom, sleeps on the day bed in the sitting room."
"Yep, that was a mistake. She's got a blind spot when it comes to kids."
"You told me I had to veto it, to stand up to Washington's unfunded mandates."
"True, but it was a mistake if you wanted sex with Lindsay. Course, Mandy's not a bad replacement player."
"I had lots of opportunities, but I never cheated on her, till she left our bed. Now I can't stop."
"It is habit forming."
"My wife stops having sex with me because of politics, but I'm not supposed to have sex with anyone else because I'm married? Why's that fair?"
"It's not."
"Why should I feel guilty?"
"You shouldn't."
"Then why do I?"
"Because that's what women do to men. But, hell, Bode, you don't have to feel guilty anymore-she knows about Mandy."
The man's twenty-seven-year-old mistress had been discovered by his wife, and she had run off to the border. What would happen when the politician's twenty-seven-billion-dollar budget deficit was discovered by the voters? Would they run off, too?
"Why would she do that over politics?"
Jim Bob puffed on his cigar. "It's the hero syndrome."
"The what?"
"Hero syndrome. You've been her hero since high school. Now you're not."
"I'm not?"
"Hate to be the one to break the news."
"Helluva lot easier to be a hero on the football field. Now she wants me to fix up the colonias for a bunch of Mexican squatters."
"You can't do that. You gotta take a hard line on immigration or that tea party wave will drown you."
"That's what I told her. She said it's not about politics, it's about the children. Can you believe that?"
"She's always been a bit naive."
"What if she doesn't come back?"
"She'll be back. She'll get tired of the border and come crawling back home."
"What if she doesn't come back because of Mandy?"
Jim Bob didn't answer for a time. Then he said in a soft voice, "Peggy had an affair… I still would've taken her back."
Bode did not look at his old friend. Instead, he felt old.
"My dad got prostate cancer at my age, died at fifty-five. Every year I get my physical, I sweat out the PSA results."
"All men do. I had a biopsy two years ago."
"On your prostate?"
"PSA was elevated. Turned out to be a false alarm."
"You never told me."
"Did you want to know?"
"Well, hell, yeah, I wanted to know. You're my best goddamn friend." He shook his head. "Shit, Jim Bob, you don't tell me nothing anymore-John Ed's bill, your biopsy… What was it like?"
The Professor puffed on his cigar.
"It wasn't the most fun I ever had."
"That's how it is for men-a finger up your butt, an elevated PSA, and all of a sudden you're pissing your pants and holding a limp dick the rest of your fucking life. Or the cancer kills you."
The two middle-aged men rode in silence for a time, pondering life and death, mistresses and wives, budget deficits and deceived voters, past infidelity and future impotence… until Jim Bob Burnet finally said, "Shit, let's kill something, see if that'll perk up our spirits."
The children stood in a circle in the middle of the main dirt road in the colonia. Lindsay and Jesse got out of the pickup and walked over. The children parted to reveal a coiled-up rattlesnake hissing and shaking its tail.
"?Aguas! " Jesse yelled."?Quitense de la vibora! "
He herded the children back. The snake slithered around on the hot dirt.
"There are many snakes in the colonias," he said. "I really hate snakes."
"We must kill it," Lindsay said. "Before it bites the kids."
"Yes. We must."
He put his hands on his hips and studied the snake, which hissed and spit at its tormentors.
"If I had a gun, I could shoot the snake, but I do not have a gun. Perhaps I could drop a cinder block on the snake, that would certainly kill it. Or perhaps I could drive the truck over it several times. Or perhaps I could…"
Lindsay looked around. She spotted a shovel leaning against a nearby shanty. She walked over, grabbed the shovel, and picked up a brick. She returned and threw the brick at the snake, striking it and giving her just enough time to raise the shovel and slam the sharp edge down on the snake, cutting its head off. The children squealed with delight. Jesse gave her a look.
"Yes, well, I suppose that is also an effective method."
"I grew up in the country."
Bode sighted in the African lion. It was a majestic creature, four hundred pounds of muscle and mane. He almost hated to kill it. Almost.
"What do you figure?"
They sat positioned on a ridge overlooking a low valley set against a tree line where a spring creek ran. Bode had propped the rifle on a rock formation; Jim Bob had the binoculars on the beast. Ranger Hank stood guard. Manuel again held the reins to the horses.
"Six hundred yards. We need to get closer."
"We'll spook him. With this scope, I can see the fly on his nose from here."
"But can you shoot him from here?"
"Reckon I'll find out."
Testosterone and adrenaline and the anticipation of the kill coursed through Bode Bonner's body. Hunting was almost as exciting as sex, and he never pulled the trigger too soon. He ran his hand over the smooth custom-fitted English walnut stock of the AHR Safari 550 DGR (Dangerous Game Rifle) as if it were Mandy's smooth thigh. He fingered the bolt then worked the controlled-feed action and chambered a 270-grain, 375-caliber H amp;H Magnum cartridge from the four-round magazine. He flicked off the safety. He touched his left index finger to the single-stage trigger set at exactly 3.5 pounds. When he squeezed the trigger the hammer would release and drive the firing pin into the back of the cartridge igniting the primer which in turn would ignite the gunpowder inside the cartridge which would create sufficient gas pressure to propel the bullet down the barrel, turning to the right two full twists before exiting the twenty-four-inch barrel, and through the air at 2,690 feet per second, closing the distance to the lion before Bode could blink, and, if his aim were true and the lion didn't move, slamming into the beast's head and boring through its brain and blowing out a chunk of skull on the other side, killing the creature instantly. The taxidermist would patch up the lion's skull and mount the head-or maybe Bode would get the entire lion stuffed, as if it were about to pounce on anyone entering the Governor's Office. That'd give a lobbyist a fucking heart attack. Bode inhaled then exhaled slowly and gently squeezed the trigger and "What the hell?"