Aragon said, “That cart could use some oil.”
The boy shrugged. “It’s old. My mother used to push me around in it when I was little.”
“How old are you now?”
“Thirteen. Next year me and my brother are going to the U.S. to get a job, make lots of money.” He glanced back at Aragon’s Chevy. “You don’t make lots of money like Mr. Shaw does.”
“Not like Mr. Shaw does, no.”
“He’s pretty important, I bet. He can’t waste time taking people for rides. Racing the wind, that’s a crazy idea. Nobody can race something they can’t see.”
“I’m sorry you missed your ride, Pedro.”
“I don’t care,” the boy said. “I never expected nothing anyway.”
Aragon knocked on the door of the cottage, softly at first, then more loudly when there was no response. The windows were closed and the blinds shut as if the people inside were trying to avoid the light and noise of morning.
He knocked again. “Mrs. Shaw?”
Another two or three minutes elapsed before Miranda’s voice answered, hoarse and sleepy. “Who is it?”
“Tom Aragon.”
“Go away.”
“I went away. Now I’m back.”
She opened the door. She wore a large loose pink-and-orange-striped robe that made her look as though she’d taken shelter in a tent that wasn’t quite tall enough and she’d had to cut a hole in the top for her head.
Her eyelids were swollen and blistered by the heat of her tears. She said, almost literally, “I’m not seeing anyone.”
“Are you feeling all right, Mrs. Shaw?”
“Close the door. I’m cold.”
“Let me order you some breakfast.”
“No, thank you. I know you’re trying to be kind but it’s quite unnecessary. I’m quite — quite fine.”
“Where is Grady?”
“Grady is fine, too, thank you.”
“I asked where.”
“Where? Well, I’m not really sure. He took one of the boys from the café for a ride in the Porsche. I wish he wouldn’t get so friendly with the hired help, it’s not dignified. He must learn to—”
“The boy is still waiting for him, Mrs. Shaw.”
She sat down on the edge of the bed, her tent collapsing around her. “So am I,” she said in a whisper. “But he won’t be back. He left in the middle of the night. I’d been very upset by the news you brought me, so Dr. Ortiz gave me a capsule and I went to sleep. When I woke up Grady was gone. There was a note on the desk.”
The note was still there. Though it had been crumpled and partly torn and marked by tears, it remained legible. The letters were large and uneven, the lines slanted downward:
Miranda
Things are beginning to close in on me and I need to get away fast and figure it all out how to do something and be somebody. I thought it was funny at first being called Mr. Shaw but then suddenly it wasn’t. Maybe I’ll see you in the U.S. after I get established and no more of that Mr. Shaw crap.
Please don’t go to pieces over my leaving so sudden. We both agreed it wasn’t going to be permanent, nothing is, how can we beat odds like that.
Take care Miranda and maybe I’ll see you in the U.S. and we can have fun like we use to.
Your friend
P.S. Don’t let the doc pump any more of that junk in you. You look OK as is. Why do you want to be young again anyway. Being young is hell.
The note ran true to form. Grady had told no lies, made no promises, expressed no regrets.
“Let me take you home, Mrs. Shaw,” Aragon said. “We can leave as soon as you’re packed.”
“Dr. Ortiz won’t like it.”
“Did you pay in advance?”
“Yes.”
“What about refunds?”
“He doesn’t give any.”
“Then he’ll probably be able to absorb the shock of your departure.”
“But what if — what if Grady comes back and I’m not here?”
Aragon didn’t want to play any what-if games, but he said, “It would serve him right, wouldn’t it, to find you gone? Now pull yourself together and we’ll head for home.”
“No.”
“I can’t leave you here, Mrs. Shaw. I feel responsible for what happens to you.”
“Why? You only met me yesterday afternoon.”
“Some people you get to know very fast.” Much too fast, Miranda.
He waited outside while she packed her bags. Fog still clung to the beach, so he couldn’t see the surf. But he heard it, loud and with a slow steady rhythm. Grady claimed every wave was different, every single one, but these sounded exactly alike.
Miranda came out of the cottage in about twenty minutes. She’d put on a white straw hat, oversized sunglasses and a sleeveless blue shift. Her arms were very thin and pale, as though they’d been tucked away in some dark place, unused.
“I’ll call a boy to bring out my luggage,” she said. “There are two suitcases and a garment bag.”
“Don’t bother calling anybody. I can do it.”
“I hate to put you to any trouble.”
“No trouble.”
She didn’t travel light. The suitcases were the size of trunks and too heavy to manage more than one at a time. There was no place in the Chevy to hang the garment bag, so he laid it across the back seat. It looked disturbingly human, like someone stuffed, head and all, into a sleeping bag.
She said, “Grady is very strong.”
“Is he.”
“He can lift almost anything.”
Including a Porsche. He almost said it. There was a possibility that she was thinking the same thing and being deliberately ironic, but he couldn’t tell for sure. Her expression was hidden by the brim of her hat and the dark glasses and a layer of pride thicker than her makeup.
When he turned the Chevy around he saw the boy, Pedro, watching from the corner of the carport. He waved goodbye. Pedro didn’t wave back.
For the first few miles she sat tense and silent, her hands folded tightly in her lap. But gradually she began to relax. She took off her hat and ran her fingers through her hair, she removed her glasses and rubbed her eyes, and now and then she spoke.
“It’s awfully hot. Could you turn on the air conditioner?”
“I don’t have one.”
“I thought all cars came with air conditioners.”
In her world they probably did.
Later she talked of Grady. “He left his toothbrush behind. Not that he’ll miss it, he’s quite careless about personal hygiene. Did you know that?”
“No.”
“It didn’t seem to matter. Every female in the club had a crush on him anyway, even Ellen, who’s a cold fish where men are concerned.”
He didn’t know that either.
“I wonder what’s going to become of me. I can’t earn a living. All I ever learned at boarding school was French and ballet and etiquette.”
She seemed to have forgotten some of the etiquette. While he was explaining the workings of the probate court she went to sleep, her head resting between the doorframe and the back of the seat.
She woke up at the border to answer questions put to her by an immigration official. Yes, she was a United States citizen, born in Chicago, Illinois. She had nothing to declare. She’d gone to Mexico for treatment at a health resort and was now returning home to Santa Felicia.