Brett cocked the hammer back on the pistol and put the gun to Red’s head. “This is it, short stuff. The moment of truth. Where’s Tillie?”
Red rolled his eyes toward the gun barrel, said, “Seems, that as punishment for helping me, Tillie had to service most of Big Jim’s bodyguards. Except for Franklin because he seems to have trouble getting it up. He claims it’s a psychological ailment, but we all know he takes too many steroids.”
“We don’t care about Franklin and his dick problems,” Leonard said. “For heaven’s sake. I’m going to have a nervous breakdown here. Will you just tell us where Tillie is?”
“Good-bye, shit sack,” Brett said, and pushed the revolver hard against Red’s temple.
“Tillie was passed around, then sent to The Farm,” Red said.
“What’s The Farm?” I asked.
“Ever heard of the Bandito Supremes?” Red asked.
“I take it that isn’t one of the orders from Taco Bell,” I said.
“Certainly not,” Red said.
“Banditos are a Texas biker gang,” Leonard said. “They’re known to be in the drug business. The whore business. What have you.”
“No,” Red said. “Not the Banditos. The Bandito Supremes. They’re bikers too, or some of them are, or were. But they’re not even associated with the Banditos. They consider those guys sissies. They’ve fucked tougher guys than the Banditos behind the Catholic church. Could you take the gun from my head, lady? It makes me nervous.”
“It should,” Brett said, and eased the hammer down and pulled the gun back.
Red let out a deep breath. “The Bandito Supremes are modern Commancheros. Survivalist Nazis. Mostly they travel about, but they have headquarters in South and Southwest Texas, and Mexico. They have a farm, or what they call a farm, not far across the Mexican border. They do some work for Big Jim now and then. At certain types of work they can’t be beat.”
“I have a feeling that the work they do at this farm isn’t about growing vegetables,” I said.
“You are most correct,” Red said.
15
After we got Red’s story we sat around and thought about it awhile. As is usual with Leonard and me, we couldn’t think of anything clever. We either needed to do it or not do it.
Brett had just one thing on her mind, of course, and that was go for it, with or without us. That meant we could leave her to her fate, or we could go along. So there was really only one actual alternative. Head for Mexico and The Farm.
Brett gave Red an ultimatum. Either take us there or end up a maggot hotel. Red, being the practical sort, decided to be our guide once we got into Texas.
We hit some back roads, and finally broke out toward Amarillo, Red riding in the trunk. All the time we drove I hoped the little bastard wasn’t getting carbon monoxide fumes, and every so many miles I made Leonard stop so I could check on him. Each time I opened the trunk and asked Red how he was doing, he’d give me a little wave.
Finally Brett and Leonard wore out with that method and moved Red into the back seat next to me and replaced his position in the trunk with suitcases. Brett rode up front with Leonard, and for most of the trip to Texas the two of them talked about country music. Red even had some opinions. He seemed to favor the Roy Acuff era and thought the rock sound was fucking up country music and he didn’t like the way modern country and western singers danced around on stage. He thought they ought to just sing and go to the house.
One thing about Red, he was highly adaptable.
We arrived in Amarillo late that night. The town stank of slaughterhouses and stockyards. The air was absolutely thick with it. Sometimes breathing was like snorting a cow turd. It made me a little ill.
We stopped just outside of town and put Red in the trunk again, the suitcases in the back seat. Red was resigned by now and crawled inside without complaint, curled up next to the spare tire like a child crowding in close to his mother. He held his hat to his chest like a teddy bear.
We rented a cheap motel, because it had become part of our nature to do so, parked close to our rooms, and carried Red and his hat into Leonard’s room with the guns and the luggage.
Inside the place looked pretty much like every other cheap motel room we’d rented. I felt as if I was in an episode of
Leonard went out then, came back about a half hour later with some groceries, a bottle of aspirin, and some children’s Band-Aids with Superman on them.
Red took about six aspirin and chased them with a Coke. I dabbed his bloody forehead with toilet tissue, slapped on a few Band-Aids. I stuck a wad of toilet paper to the head wound under his hair and left it there to dry.
“This is the sort of thing we have to deal with,” Red said.
“What?” Leonard asked.
“Little people. We deal with this all the time.”
“Getting pistol-whipped?” Brett asked.
“Abuse in general. And humiliation.” Red turned his focus to Leonard. “You thought of getting me Band-Aids,
