Mexican Hat kk-2 Page 4

Her father smiled back at her. His gray hair was thick and curly, cut short and combed with a severe part, and his eyes were as blue as her own. Edgar Cox was a big, lean man with a strong chin, a deeply lined face, and an easy grin. He reached over and patted her hand.

  "I know you'll do a damn fine job."

  She smiled at the compliment.

  "Thanks. What's on your schedule for the day?"

  "I'm going to put out fresh salt licks, patch a hole in a water tank, and round up a cow I spotted that looks like it has a touch of foot rot."

  "You need to slow down. Daddy."

  "Why should I? I only turn seventy-five this year, and God willing, I got another good ten or fifteen years left in these old bones."

  "Well, I think you need some more help. Two hired hands aren't enough."

  Edgar laughed at the suggestion.

  "Find me somebody who knows just a little bit about ranching, is willing to work in bad weather, and doesn't expect to get paid more than he's worth, and I'll consider it."

  "Sell the place." Karen's smile was devilish.

  "We've had this discussion before. The ranch stays in the family.

  That's what I want, and that's what your mother wants."

  Karen laughed.

  "In that case you'd better make sure that Cody and Elizabeth learn everything you forgot to teach me, so they can help me run this place after you and Mom finally decide to slow down. Think of it as home schooling."

  "Touche," Edgar replied.

  "Oh, I almost forgot. You had visitors yesterday."

  "Did Phil and PJ stop by?"

  "No." She reached in the pocket of her shorts, took out an envelope and a business card, and put them on the table.

  "A poacher killed a black bear on the mesa. A ranger wants to talk to you about it.

  Charlie Perry was here too, asking the same questions."

  Edgar shook his head sadly, picked up the card, looked at it, turned it over, and read the scribbled name.

  "Kevin who?" he asked.

  "Kerney." "Don't know him. He must be new. This card says he's working out of the Luna station. I wonder what he's doing in Charlie's neck of the woods." He put the card on the table.

  "I'll talk to Charlie." He picked up the envelope.

  "What's this?"

  "A young Hispanic man left that for you. Very polite and well-spoken; based on his accent, I'd say he was from Mexico," Karen added.

  "Nobody we know?"

  Karen shook her head.

  "I never saw him before.

  He was with an older man."

  "Were they looking for work?"

  "I don't think so."

  Her father tore open the envelope, read the contents quickly, and grunted to himself. The smile in his eyes faded.

  "Is anything wrong?" Karen asked.

  Edgar shook his head.

  "No. Nothing. Some old business, that's all."

  "Is it something I should know about?"

  The smile on her father's face was forced.

  "Don't worry. Peanut. It's not important."

  She wrinkled her nose in distaste at the childhood nickname.

  He stuffed the letter and envelope into a shirt pocket, pushed his chair away from the table, and stood up.

  "Your mother is sleeping in," he said.

  "She had a long day."

  Karen didn't know that her mother might have cancer. It wasn't going to be discussed until the test results came back. Margaret had made him promise.

  It would be an anxious wait before their next appointment with the doctor.

  "I'm going to town to see Charlie Perry and pick up supplies," Edgar announced.

  "Do you need anything?"

  "No, but I'm sure Cody would love to go along with you."

  "Not today. Tell him I'll take him and his sister horseback riding before dinner." He came around the table, put his hands on her shoulders, and kissed her gently on the cheek.

  "It's good to have you back home. Peanut."

  "You and Mom are going to be stuck with us for a long time. Daddy,"

  Karen answered, patting his hand.

  "That's just what we want to hear." He kissed her again and walked into the living room. When she heard the front door close, Karen got up and followed, watching him through the window. He got behind the wheel of his truck, took the letter from his shirt pocket, and read it again before driving away. It worried Karen. Something in that letter had upset him, and she didn't have a clue what it might be.

  She returned to the kitchen, rinsed out the coffee cups, and quietly left the house. There were still tons of books to unpack.

  Edgar Cox absentmindedly waved back at the folks he passed on the highway, his anxiety growing.

  When he turned off at the Slash Z sign at Old Horse Springs, his heart pounded in his chest and his mouth was dry. He stopped in the middle of the ranch road and looked at the Mangas Mountains. It had been sixty years since he'd been back to the Slash Z. Six decades since he rode his horse to the old highway, left it at the gas station-now boarded up and abandoned-hitchhiked to Albuquerque, lied about his age, and enlisted in the Army. He shook his head in disbelief. A lifetime. A fifteen year-old kid running away as fast as that damn pony could carry him.

  He knew what was waiting for him. His nephew, Phil Cox, kept him informed, even brought him snapshots from time to time, trying hard to keep some family ties going-at least on the surface. But Edgar suspected that what really interested Phil was getting first crack at the Triple H if he ever decided to sell it.

  Hands sweaty, he took a deep breath, touched the gas pedal with his toe, and started down the ranch road. It felt as if he had stopped breathing when he coasted to a halt in front of the two-story ranch house. The old trees around it were gone, replaced by young willows and a row of poplars in the front yard. Painted white, with green trim, a pitched roof, and a small covered porch that served as a balcony for the second floor, the house looked the same as when he was growing up. The red brick chimney on the north side with wild ivy still clinging to it; the old wooden sash windows; the rosebushes bordering the low rock wall that surrounded the front yard; the picket fence and gate painted white to match the house-all the same.

  Slowly, Edgar got out of his truck, turned, and looked across the large horse pasture where, half a mile away, the home Phil Cox had built for his family stood. A low adobe structure with a portal across the front and lots of windows, it faced the Mangas Mountains. Phil's pickup truck was parked outside. Edgar wouldn't have much time alone with his brother. Phil would come running out of sheer curiosity once he spotted Edgar's vehicle.

  He walked quickly up the wheelchair ramp and entered the house without knocking. It was quiet inside. He went down the long hall past the closed front-room door and staircase. In the kitchen he found Eugene with his back turned and his arms propped up on a table. He was reading a magazine and drinking a cup of coffee.

  "Is that you, Phil?" Eugene asked, without turning around.

  "It's Edgar."

  The man in the wheelchair froze, the muscles of his neck tightening.

  "Get the fuck out of my house," he said harshly without turning around.

  "Not this time," Edgar said evenly.

  "Not until you read what I've brought."

  "You've got nothing I want to see," Eugene replied.

  "Turn around, Eugene," his brother demanded.

  Eugene's hands dropped off the table, and he swung the wheelchair in Edgar's direction.

  "What do you want to show me, little brother?" he asked sarcastically.

  For the first time in six decades, Edgar looked at his identical twin, older by three minutes. Eugene's pasty complexion and the stubble of a day-old beard made him look ill. His watery pale blue eyes were filled with loathing. His hair flopped over his ears, white, shaggy, and uncombed. He's old, Edgar thought. We're both old. He took the letter out of his pocket and handed it over.

  "Read this."

 
Eugene read it quickly and gave it back, his outstretched arm shaking.

  "So what? Jose Padilla wants to talk to you about his dead daddy. It doesn't mean anything," he snapped.

  "Don't be stupid," Edgar replied.

  "He wants to know the truth."

  Eugene laughed.

  "The truth. That's something now, isn't it? Tell you what-you write him back and tell him anything you damn well please. There's nobody left alive except you and Jose Padilla that gives a rat's ass."

  Edgar put the letter away and stared at his twin brother. The nastiness was still there. The bullet in his spine that had crippled him hadn't subdued the bully in Eugene.

  "You've turned into a mean old son of a bitch," he said.

  Eugene pushed the wheelchair suddenly in Edgar's direction. His laugh was as violent as the movement.

  He stopped short of running into Edgar, and looked up at him.

  "And you're still a weak-kneed pussy," Eugene retorted, color rising in his face.

  "Jose Padilla sends you a letter and it puts you in a tailspin." "He's here," Edgar explained, "and he wants to talk to us."

  "So send him over to see me if you don't want to handle it. Now get the fuck out of here and don't come back."

  Edgar Cox, Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army Retired, a man with two wars, six major campaigns, and more than enough military decorations under his belt to prove his courage, bit his lip for a long, hard moment, turned on his heel, and walked out of the house. He got back on the ranch road just as Phil started the short drive over to his father's house, and tore the hell out of there, throwing up a smoke screen of dust behind him. Of one thing he was certain: Eugene wouldn't say a damn thing to Phil about what had made Uncle Edgar come to visit after all these years.

  He stopped at the highway, got out, shredded up the letter, and burned it. When the last charred fragment curled and turned black he ground the remains under his boot and scattered the ashes.

  Amador Ortiz watched Kerney remove the horse from the trailer, run a string line between two trees, and snap a come-along on the chestnut's halter.

  Kerney walked toward him with a stiff gait and nodded a greeting. Amador wiped the vexation off his face with a tight smile. What in the hell was Carol Cassidy doing sending him this busted-up seasonal who couldn't pull his own weight? He needed an able-bodied man on this job, not a reject from some police department.

  He nodded curtly when Kerney drew near.

  "Anybody else coming?" he asked hopefully.

  "Not that I know of," Kerney replied.

  Amador grunted with displeasure.

  "Too bad.

  What did Carol tell you to do?"

  "Whatever needs doing," Kerney answered, looking over Amador's shoulder.

  A crew of four Hispanic men stared back at him from a half-completed trench that ran from a wellhead to a water spigot. He didn't know any of them. Eight-inch plastic water pipe lay in a line next to the trench. A small backhoe idled nearby. Off to one side of the construction site a temporary chain-link enclosure protected construction supplies, bags of concrete, a stack of cedar fence posts, and some new picnic tables.

  Amador looked down at Kerney's leg.

  "What can you do?" he demanded.

  "Whatever," Kerney repeated.

  "Get a pest hole digger from my truck," Amador Ortiz said flatly.

  "I need fence posts set in concrete every eight feet. It's all staked out where I want them." He swung his arm in an arch.

  "From the well to the trailhead. Can you handle that?"

  Kerney smiled.

  "I think so."

  Amador's expression remained skeptical. He scratched his armpit and grunted. A stocky man with arms that were too short for his body, Ortiz was broad in the chest and sported a beer drinker's belly.

  "I need the posts in by lunchtime," Amador said in an ill-tempered tone.

  "That's three hours from now. Be finished by then."

  "Okay," Kerney answered, walking away, counting the small red flags that marked the locations for the pest holes Twenty-four holes to dig, two feet deep, a like number of posts to set, and three hours to do it. He poked the ground with the toe of his boot. Not much topsoil to speak of. Mostly hard packed gravel and basalt. There was no way it could be done by one man in the allotted time.

  When Amador and his crew quit for their noon meal, Kerney worked on.

  There was no order to help and no suggestion that he break for lunch.

  The men were grouped in the shade of a stand of trees, speaking softly in Spanish, but loud enough for Kerney to hear the insults and the jokes about how much fun it was to watch the crippled gringo sweat like a pig.

  The day was hot and getting hotter. Kerney stripped to the waist and kept working. Grunting with every thrust of the digger, he kept a steady rhythm, finished a hole, and moved on while the ridicule behind him continued. The group was debating his sexual preferences as he started digging the last hole. Ortiz walked slowly toward him, checking the depth of each hole with a tape measure.

  He made a rude comment over his shoulder about Kerney screwing sheep that got a laugh from the men, and approached with a smirk still on his face.

  Thoroughly pissed off at the unnecessary ill-will from Amador and his boys, Kerney stopped digging and waited for the foreman. His back ached and his arms were sore.

  "I needed those posts set by now," Amador said, looking at the nasty scar on Kerney's gut. Kerney's stomach was flat. His chest and arms were muscular.

  There was no fat on the man. Self-consciously, Amador sucked in his beer belly.

  "I'll get it finished," Kerney said flatly.

  Amador smiled thinly.

  "Take your meal break.

  My crew will set the posts. You get that in Nam?" he asked conversationally, nodding at the ugly scar.

  Carol had told him Kerney was a Nam veteran.

  "No."

  "What happened?"

  "It's a long story."

  "Don't like to talk about it?" "Something like that," Kerney said.

  Amador shrugged.

  "Go eat. The boss wants for you to get familiar with the area. I'll mark the new trails on a map."

  Kerney nodded in reply and dropped the posthole digger on the ground at Amador's feet.

  "Do you need me back here today?"

  Amador looked at the tool with half a thought to tell Kerney to pick it up, and decided against it. The gringo's smile was somehow challenging.

  "Come back in the morning," he said, retrieving the tool.

  "We've got to pour footings for the picnic tables. If they aren't set in concrete and bolted down, they get ripped off." "I'll be here,"

  Kerney said.

  "Anything else?"

  "That's it."

  "Another six inches and this last hole is done," Kerney remarked, kicking some loose dirt back into the opening and covering Amador's boots with dust.

  It was a childish thing to do, but it felt good anyway.

  He grinned at Amador, barely containing a desire to bust the man in the chops, hoping Ortiz would give him an excuse. He didn't like bigots of any nationality. Amador looked at his boots, raised his glance to Kerney's face, and said nothing.

  "Think you can handle it?" Kerney asked.

  Amador didn't answer. Watching Kerney walk away he thought maybe the gringo wasn't somebody to fuck with.

  It was midmorning when Hector returned with his grandfather to the Mangas Mountains turnoff.

  Jose's insistence that they stop every so often so he could reminisce made the drive through the mountains slow but enjoyable. Hector relished listening to Grandfather's stories of his childhood and youth in the vast and beautiful land of western New Mexico.

  And today there was no mention of murder.

  The road was good, there was little traffic, and Hector had no trouble pulling the trailer up the grades and around the turns. They passed a campground construction site and paused at a beautiful lake
to watch fishermen casting for trout on the shore and trolling from small boats on the water.

  After leaving the lake, they traveled in a wandering circle that took them to a mountain village called Quemado, which was Spanish for "burned," then east through a hamlet named Pie Town. Hector found the names amusing.

  It was afternoon when they arrived in what had once been the village of Mangas. To the east, a high, lone peak, at least ten thousand feet in elevation, rose in the distance. To the west, mountains filled the skyline. The narrow valley where Jose had been born was thick with grass. A small herd of cattle grazed along a fence line near an abandoned adobe church with a wooden spire. A single cross was nailed on the cornice below the steeple.

  Hector parked well off the road and walked quickly to catch up with Jose, who had left the truck when Hector had paused at the church. Most of the mud plaster on the building was gone, exposing eroded adobe bricks. The roof drooped crookedly on the melting walls. Near the church a small cemetery, shielded by a row of cottonwood trees, sat enclosed by a rusted wrought-iron fence.

  In the cemetery Jose stopped at a tombstone, obscured by weeds and tall tufts of grass. He stared silently at the grave before dropping to his knees to clear away the vegetation. Hector helped. Soon the name of Don Luis Padilla appeared. Grandfather ran his fingers across the chiseled letters, a strand of wispy hair falling down his forehead as a light gust of wind rolled across the valley.

  Finally, Dr. Jose Luis Padilla rose, smiled at his grandson, and spoke.

  "It is a beautiful valley," he said, his eyes fixed on the mountains.

  "Yes," Hector responded.

  "It is sad to see it abandoned."

  Jose looked at the little row of buildings across the road, all in various stages of decay. Someone had nailed chicken wire over the empty doors and windows of the old schoolhouse to protect the structure.

  His father's hacienda was gone; only the thick rock foundation marked its location. He took Hector to the site and described the layout of the old hacienda, room by room.

  "None of this was given up willingly," Jose remarked.

  "After my father's death, the government took much of the land for the national forest. There is a high, wonderful valley where I would tend sheep each summer when I was old enough to be left alone."

  "Mexican Hat?" Hector asked.