“Leave him alone,” Herman said.
“All of you shut up,” Irvin said. “Let me concentrate. Mexican Border Patrol, they spot us, they’ll take a shot at us. Had a bullet come through this ole rotten floor once, ran up my trouser leg, come out through the skin on my knee. Close call. Didn’t need any more than a Band-Aid. I got an iron plate under the seat here now, don’t want to catch one in the balls or up the ass.”
“How are the other seats fixed?” Leonard asked.
“Just cushions,” Irvin said.
“Hell,” I said to Leonard, “your balls are iron anyway, aren’t they?”
“You know, you’re right,” Leonard said.
We continued to fly low, trying to stay under radar, if there was any, trying to take a straight line to where we were going, which, according to Herman and Bill, was on the edge of the Great Plateau and the Western Lands, some of the most inhospitable terrain in all of Mexico.
We flew for some time. How long I can’t say. Couple hours at least. I nodded off to the hum of the motor, Brett and I falling together for warmth. When I awoke it was to a coughing engine.
“Is the engine playing out?” I said.
“No,” Irvin said. “I’m lowering us. I make a change up, down, or sideways, the engine farts. I got to get some work done on it one of these days. Everybody grab your asses, we’re going down.”
Irvin cranked the plane into a steep turn, and down we went at an angle so tight we were temporarily lying on the side of the plane, then suddenly we were straight, being tossed about the cabin like jumping beans. Next thing we knew, the ground was coming up fast. I took hold of Brett and tried to remember my plan about going out between her legs, but there was no time for that.
The plane sputtered and spat and leveled out. We came in hot as a flaming hard-on, the nose down a little too much. At the last moment Irvin righted us and we smoothed out and the wheels hit and the plane hopped a few times and came to a jerky stop.
We got off, pronto. I bent over and lost what I had last eaten, which only reminded me I was hungry. Or maybe what I felt gnawing in my stomach was fear.
Leonard gave me some water from one of the canteens Bill had brought. I rinsed my mouth, then drank a sip. I looked around. There was nothing. Just a flat expanse of land, some rolling night-shadowed dirt, some brush clumps here and there.
Bill came over, said, “What you do is, you walk five miles that way.” He was pointing to the west.
“Five miles?” Brett said. “Why the fuck not ten? Shit, you could have gotten closer.”
“They’d have seen us come in,” Irvin said. “May have already. I’ve run some stuff for them, and I don’t want to lose jobs in the future. More than that, I don’t want them to find me. I want to keep my balls, they give me ballast. You walk that five miles and you’ll come to a place where there are lots of things growing. That means you are nearing water. Next you will come to an oasis. At the oasis is The Farm. You can’t miss it.”
“And if we walk five miles and there’s nothing?” Leonard said. “We’re in the middle of the desert and you’ve got our money, and come morning our asses are burnt crackers. I don’t think I like this plan.”
Herman and Red came over. Herman looked very big in the moonlight. Red seemed oddly smaller than ever.
“Bill’s right,” Herman said. “This is the area. We go in, we get the woman, we go out.”
“You head southeast,” Irvin said. “You meet the plane there.”
“Seems to me it would still be easier to come back here,” Leonard said.
“It would be easier, but it will be easier for them as well,” Irvin said. “And like I said. They know this plane. I’m not putting myself or money I might make in the future on the line with these guys for your lousy money or your lousy asses. Though, lady, I must admit, you got an ass worth lining up for.”
“That’s enough of that,” I said.
Irvin held up his hands. “Hey! Peace.”
“This is rough country,” Leonard said. “How we gonna know we’re going the right way to meet you? What if they follow us? They’re gonna see your plane then, aren’t they?”
“They follow you that far then my ass is dead,” Irvin said. “But truth is, you’ll be lucky to make it that far. You’d be lucky to make it to the plane if I kept it where it’s sitting. You’ll be lucky you bring your asses out at all. I’m not sending you in there. You want to do it. It’s your problem, and it’s my rules for flying you back.”
“Bill knows his way around?” Brett asked.
“Hey,” Bill said, dropping one of the canteens and a small pack over my shoulder. “I’m not going. Me and Irvin will be waiting on you. I don’t owe you a fuckin’ thing. We’ll give you till tomorrow night, late, then we fly back to Texas. You don’t show up, may I now extend my best hopes and wishes that it all ends quickly.”
“I know the country,” Herman said. “I can lead you through it. I know where Irvin wants us to meet. It’s maybe ten miles on foot.”
“Ten miles!” Leonard said. “I say the goddamn plane waits for us here.”
“If you can find transportation, take it,” Bill said. “You people have a change of heart, I’ll take you back. Now. But no refunds.”
“I just want to get Tillie,” Brett said.
“That’s what we do, then,” I said.
“Red stays with the plane,” Herman said.
