temperament for it, war can be a blessing.'
'What were the medals for?'
He tossed the cigarette away. 'Killing, of course.'
THE VIEJA ADUANA was a block-long building with a clocktower above the main entryway. The facing was all Palladian windows and the interior lit so bright the Customs House seemed to be on fire. Son and father could see the lobby was crowded with men, so many they were spilling out into the street where frontier customs guards stood at the watch. Most of the men, be they nationals or foreigners, were of the business and mercantile class, suited and without guns. But there were also rough verdaderos hombres, 'real men' as the Spanish liked to call them.
Around the entryway John Lourdes picked up on runs of conversation flush with panic. There were reports alleging Madero, the duly elected president forced into exile by Diaz and living in the United States, was about to declare himself president pro tem and issue a decree for the overthrow of the government. This was fed by rumors rebel armies were already forming to the west in Sonora and Chihuahua to the south. And from the way small armed bands of peons could be seen riding the roads, this had more than just the feel of a rumor. One thing was for certain, Ciudad Juarez would be put under siege. The war would be brought to the border of the United States, for the United States was the world. And U.S. companies, along with British companies, controlled near all the wealth from oil and mining in Mexico.
Rawbone kept on through the crowd, but John Lourdes had stopped at the Customs House entryway. Inside that vaulted lobby booths and tables had been set up by business organizations so concerns could be addressed and pamphlets handed out. On a makeshift stage men took turns speaking from a podium while others waited. Some were met with applause, others excoriation. It was a war of words dedicated to self-proclaimed interests.
Rawbone realized John Lourdes was not with him and went back to the entryway where he stood. 'You know what you have here, Mr. Lourdes ... the practical application of strategy.'
Each table had across it a flag naming the organization or association it represented. One read ALLIANCE FOR PROGRESS.
'Mr. Lourdes, this country is gonna burn. So let's get this done and be gone out of here.'
John Lourdes heard the father well enough, but his mind was turning like the earth as he took dogged inventory of the facts at hand, trying to distill an answer-how one pawn of a truck, moving through a conspiracy of allegiances, meant to affect the world at large.
'Mr. Lourdes?'
The son stared into the Customs House. 'This is where we're going,' he said.
The father grabbed his arm. 'What for?'
'The cause of things.'
SIXTEEN
ITH THAT RAWBONE gravely followed. The air in the Customs House was a heady reek of tobacco, nervous sweat and body tonics. John Lourdes led them through a swell of arguments over how these men might best preserve their financial world, till he got close enough to the ALLIANCE FOR PROGRESS table that he could spy unnoticed.
A cadre of businessmen stood around the booth. A flier was being handed out while a poised gentleman, with hands folded and a face near expressionless as a piece of paper, calmly spoke.
'As a member of the American consulate I can speak clearly to the one issue I am constantly asked about. If there is to be a revolution, and it certainly looks as if there will be, what can America do to maintain stability here? Of course, by that you mean, beyond diplomacy, military intervention. Now I know what I'm going to say you don't want to hear, but it's exactly what I have expressed to Mr. Hecht.'
The consul looked to the man handing out the fliers in acknowledgment. This Hecht fellow, the one to whom the truck was to be delivered, was old and slightly hunched but had fierce eyes in an otherwise stagnant face.
Rawbone whispered, 'He doesn't look much more than a cadaver.'
'America is not now, nor should ever be, in the business of nation building,' said the consul. 'And that is what American military intervention here would mean. It would be a great calamity. And in the end all other nations would stand to reap the advantages, whatever the outcome. And I warn you, our country would end up bearing all the expense only to reap the crop of resulting hatred and revenge unlike anything you could imagine.'
The agitated men forced questions but the consul made an officious movement with his hand to signal he was continuing.
'Consider what military intervention would symbolize. What it might foment amongst certain sections of the citizenry. The destruction
