The Secretary leaned back. He looked undersized and frail in the formidable suit, like a photo of a face superimposed onto someone else’s body.
“Ah, Méndez. An elegant way of asking if I will betray you.” He raised a hand to cut off the protest. “Please. You are in the line of fire. I admire your courage, your commitment. Nothing would make me happier than seeing Junior Ruiz Caballero in handcuffs. But I have to worry about institutionality. About questions of state.”
Méndez leaned forward, his forearms on his thighs, feeling as if he were in a confessional.
“Fine,” he said. “But when you talk to the presidential palace”-the Secretary grimaced-“tell them this. If we don’t stop these people now, it may come back to haunt us. As you know, there is a worrisome political dimension.”
The Secretary’s eyes widened expectantly. Méndez went on in a low voice: “If the Ruiz Caballeros sustain this alliance with the South American mafias, they will have enormous resources flowing in. This goes beyond the border. The Colonel is just the latest example: They are using murders of politicians and policemen to send terroristic messages. I think the Ruiz Caballeros are moving on two tracks. The presidential elections will be next year. The Senator’s group already has a preferred potential candidate, does it not?”
“Absolutely.”
“So you have the Senator operating at the political level. And Junior on the mafia level, supplying money and firepower. All that money, all that firepower. They could overwhelm everyone: here and in Mexico City. That is a real question of state.”
The Secretary interlaced his fingers on his midsection with an expression that combined discomfort and paternal approval.
“A gloomy and paranoid analysis,” he said. “But I happen to think you are right.”
They spent another twenty minutes talking. A waiter from the airport restaurant appeared with tea for the Secretary and coffee, which revived Méndez, though a hot drink was not ideal in the sweaty confines of the office.
When they descended the circular metal staircase to the floor of the hangar, they were met immediately by Athos and the Secretary’s personal assistant, Gregorio. A subtle young man with silver-rimmed glasses and a gaunt scrubbed face, Gregorio had a knack for gliding ahead of the Secretary and anticipating his wishes. Gregorio was usually as stolid as Athos, but both of them looked preoccupied. The Secretary’s bodyguards and aides milled around whispering.
“What’s up?” Méndez asked Athos, who deferred with a raise of his goateed chin to the Secretary’s assistant.
Gregorio spoke in a breathy Mexico City accent full of rising o’s and a’s. “Mr. Secretary, I’m sorry but this is really peculiar. While you were upstairs, an individual who works for Senator Ruiz Caballero presented himself. He said the Senator happened to be at the airport and heard you were here. He said the Senator apologizes for the imposition, but he would appreciate it if you could make time for him to invite you to lunch.”
“He happened to be at the airport?” Méndez asked Athos, who had a battle gleam in his eye.
Athos’s airport sources had told him the Senator and his nephew had showed up earlier in the morning to fly to Nevada in their private jet.
“Then they delayed the departure,” Athos said. “This monkey, eh, their people started nosing around asking when the Secretary was expected. The Senator has been sitting in the VIP lounge waiting for you to finish. Junior drove off somewhere.”
“What do I tell the man, sir?” Gregorio asked anxiously.
The Secretary lit a cigarette with studied nonchalance. He glanced at Méndez, who shrugged. There was no doubt that the Ruiz Caballeros knew the Secretary was meeting with Méndez. It was a typically brazen gambit. Méndez remembered what Araceli had said the night before: The enemy weren’t taking him for granted. They were worried.
“Tell him…” The Secretary took a drag on the cigarette. “Tell him I don’t have time for lunch. I’m hurrying back to the D.F. But with great pleasure I can say hello to the Senator on the way to my plane. If he’d like.”
Gregorio dispatched an emissary. The Secretary blew a stream of smoke from his nostrils. Méndez decided that he looked pretty tough for a bookworm in a fancy suit from the Distrito Federal (Mexico City).
“You will accompany me to the plane,” the Secretary told Méndez.
“Very well.” Méndez wished he weren’t so grubby.
“If I say no outright, it might look like we are hiding,” the Secretary said, eyes narrow against the smoke. “Moreover, I’ve known the Senator, on the inevitable level of government affairs, for twenty-five years. Your presence sets the right tone.”
“I leave the political nuances to you, sir,” Méndez said. He thought he detected a smile on the corners of the bloodless lips. This wily old bastard is enjoying himself, he thought.
“Shall we, fellows?” the Secretary said.
Men in suits picked up briefcases and radios. The Secretary dropped his cigarette and stepped on it. He frowned at Athos.
“Is it necessary for the commander to carry that elephant slayer?”
Athos looked chagrined, cradling the AK-47 protectively.
“You know something, sir?” Méndez said, giving the Secretary an unintentionally broad smile. “Usually I’d be the first to agree. But right now, I think it helps set the tone, as you put it.”
“Very well. The gangster semiotics I leave to you.”
The sun fell hard on the tarmac. The Secretary’s jet, guarded by uniformed officers of the Diogenes Group and the federal police, was half a soccer field away from the hangar. The Ruiz Caballeros’ Learjet was to the right of the Secretary’s plane. Beyond the planes was the fence separating the airport from the border highway and the border fence.
The group strode across the tarmac: Méndez and the Secretary accompanied by Athos, Gregorio on their heels, and a loose diamond of bodyguards and aides around them.
Two GMC Yukons parked near the terminal came to life and glided forward. They stopped about halfway between the two planes. Two men got out of the lead vehicle and approached briskly.
Méndez had interviewed Senator Bernardo Ruiz Caballero several times, but he had not seen him up close for years. The Senator was in his early sixties, his face froglike and dissipated beneath shiny, well-coiffed white hair. He looked chesty in a black linen suit with an open collar that revealed gold chains and medallions. He walked with a horseman’s roll, elbows wide. The heels of his black boots banged the tarmac.
Méndez recognized the other man, a portly sweating flunky in a guayabera shirt, as the Senator’s administrative assistant.
“My dear Luis,” the Senator said. It was the first time Méndez had heard anyone call the Secretary by his first name. It reminded Méndez that, though Senator Ruiz Caballero might come off as a crude clown, he had converted provincial power into exponentially greater national power without losing his provincial ways. He was one of the select old hands who controlled their political party’s ancient and arcane machinery.
Méndez watched in alarm as the Senator opened his arms for a hug. The Secretary thwarted him adroitly; he transformed the greeting into a handshake in which their free hands patted each other’s biceps.
Disconcerted, the Senator regained composure with a volley of words. His voice was croaky and weathered by tobacco and alcohol. “You must come to Baja more often, my friend. I was set to invite you to lunch, I dropped everything and made reservations. Let me know next time and we’ll go to Las Leñas. We haven’t been there in years, eh?”