Borrego Springs is an oasis in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, 770,000 acres of some of the wildest terrain in the country. The town’s founders thought it was going to be the next Palm Springs, but that never happened, mostly because there are only two roads into town, both of them bad, both of them winding through miles and miles of tough, inhospitable desert. A dozen or somojados die every year trying to cross the desert from the Mexican side, and the Border Patrol has taken to burying water beneath thirty foot red-flagged poles to try to save lives.
So the town never really flourished, and now it’s mostly a small retirement community for snowbirds, along with a couple of thousand hardy souls who live there year-round, even in the summer, when the temps can reach 130.
Frank drives in from Route 22, which snakes in seemingly endless switchbacks down from the mountains onto the vast desert floor and becomes Borrego’s main street, which sports a couple of motels, a few restaurants and shops, and a bank.
The bank is what has brought Frank here.
It’s a “tame” bank, one of the many places that Sherm launders money, and the prearranged pickup spot for Frank to get cash in case of an emergency. He drives past it, though, looking for cars or people who look out of place.
He doesn’t see anything.
He parks the car outside Albierto’s, a little Mexican joint where he’s eaten before. The food is good, and cheap, and you get a lot of it, because Albierto’s caters to the local Mexicans, who work damn hard and want a good meal for their money.
Frank stops outside, gets aBorrego Sun from the newspaper machine, walks up to the counter and orders two chicken enchiladas with black beans and rice and an iced tea, then sits down in a booth and waits for them to call his name.
Not a lot happens in Borrego Springs. There’s an article about a new archaeological dig, another one about renovations to the high school gym, but the lead story is about the San Diego city council scandal and the grand jury indicting another councilman.
Frank skips over the article and finds Tom Gorton’s column. Gorton is the editor and an old-time newspaper guy, and a hell of a good writer. Frank reads his column every time he sees aSun somewhere. This time, Gorton’s writing about all the rain they’ve had this winter, and how it will bring a wonderful spring bloom.
I’d like to see that, Frank thinks.
It’s been years since there’s been a big desert bloom, the valley floor carpeted with a panoply (puzzle word) of wildflowers. Frank’s always found it moving, a miracle, when the sere desert becomes a sea of color and blooms with life. It’s anaffirmation of life, Frank thinks. It’s proof that redemption is possible, when flowers blossom from the desert.
I hope I get to see it.
I’ll bring Donna out here, maybe Jill, too. Maybe it’s a trip that the three of us can do together.
Yeah, right, he thinks. That’s going to happen, those two in the same car together.
“Bob.”
Frank lifts a finger, then walks over to the counter and gets his tray. The food smells great. He goes to another counter, picks two different salsas-averde and afresca -and some spiced carrots.
The food is as good as it smells, the enchiladas smothered in a rich mole sauce, and the rice and beans done perfectly. Frank notices that they have fish tacos on the menu and wonders who supplies their seafood. He thinks briefly about making a pitch, then does the math and decides that the drive out here and then having to deadhead back would more than eat up any profit.
He finishes his meal, tosses the plastic plate into the trash can, and walks outside. The rain is gentle, more of a mist, but the streets are quiet, as if the residents are hiding in their houses, waiting for the sun to come out again.
Frank goes into the bank, walks up to the nice lady teller, and asks for the manager, Mr. Osborne.
“May I say who’s calling?” the teller asks.
“Scott Davis,” Frank says with a smile.
“One moment, Mr. Davis.”
Osborne looks nervous when he comes out from the office. He has a big Adam’s apple, anyway, on a skinny neck, but it’s bobbing up and down a little more than Frank would like.
Don’t get hinky, Frank tells himself. This is just an otherwise-law-abiding citizen a little stressed about committing an illegal act.
Osborne sticks his hand out. His palm is moist, sweaty.
“Mr. Davis,” he says, loudly enough for the teller to hear. “Come into my office; let’s see if we can do some business about your loan.”
Frank follows him back into the office. Osborne opens a safe closet, then the safe, then takes out a canvas bank bag and hands it to Frank.
“Twenty thousand,” he says.
“Minus your three points,” Frank says. He puts the bag in his jacket.
“Aren’t you going to count it?” Osborne asks.
“Should I?”
“It’s all there.”
“I just assumed it would be,” Frank says.
Osborne is looking over Frank’s shoulder, out the window that faces onto the street. Frank pulls the. 38 and sticks it in the banker’s face. “Tell me.”
“These men,” Osborne says, his voice shaking, “they came to my house this morning. They said to give you the money. Please don’t kill me. I have a wife and two children. Becky is eight, and Maureen is-”
“Shut up,” Frank says. “Nobody’s killing anybody.”
Maybe.
Osborne starts to cry. “My career…my family…prison…”
“You’re not going to prison,” Frank says. “All you need to do is keep your mouth shut, capisce?”
“Keep my mouth shut,” Osborne repeats, like he’s trying to remember directions somebody’s giving him over the phone: Turn left on Jackson, second right on La Playa, keep my mouth shut.
“Is there a back door?” Frank asks.
Osborne looks at him. Frank repeats the question.
“You told me to keep my mouth shut,” Osborne says.
“Notnow, ” Frank says. “Is there a back way out?”
“I’ll have to unlock it.”
“What are you waiting for?”
The door is triple-locked and has a security bar across it. It takes a good minute for Osborne to get the door unlocked.
“Don’t open it,” Frank says.
What are you thinking? he asks himself. Any decent crew will have a guy or two out back. And they’ll have heard the door unlatching. You step out that door, you walk into a hail of bullets.
Then again, you walk out thefront door, you step into the same.
You’re trapped.
34
That’s certainly what Jimmy the Kid thinks.
Frankie M. is totally fucked.
Jimmy’s sitting in the car across the street. He’s in the passenger seat, rifle in his lap, waiting for the kill shot.
“You’re sure he went in?” Jimmy asks.
“I watched him,” Carlo says.
Carlo placed himself in the ice cream store across the road. He watched Frankie Machine drive by, then have lunch, then go into the bank. He could have taken the man out himself, except he had strict orders from Jimmy, who’d said, “You see him, you call me.” So Carlo called him, then got himself another ice cream-butter brickle this time.
Now Jimmy sits in the car, his foot tapping like a bass drummer in a heavy-metal band.
“Paulie, Jackie, and Joey are in back?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
“You can call them, you want.”
Jimmy thinks about it, then decides against it. It would be just like Paulie to shout into the phone and tip off Frankie M. No, we want Frankie nice and confident. Let him come strolling through that door with his money in hand and happy thoughts in his head.
Thenblam.
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow…
“What’s taking so fucking long?” Jimmy asks.
Carlo doesn’t have time to answer, because, just then, sirens start wailing.
Police sirens.
Coming this way.
Carlo doesn’t wait for Jimmy to tell him to get in gear and get the fuck out of there.