He could not fathom it any more than the girl. She put out her hands uncertainly as if to ask what he was doing here. Realizing the danger, he quickly gathered himself and came down the train steps scrambling for his notepad and pencil. He began to write furiously. Then he tore the sheet of paper from the pad and handed it to her: You mus4 say no- L ij abou4 wl,o / am, or I,ow you know me. /4 is ompor4a114. 14 m~i4 mead my /Se, if you do. / wd( explain /a4er.
Rawbone watched as the girl regarded the note wide-eyed and frightened. She wanted to ask questions, for she pointed to the notepad and pencil and scribbled on the air, but John Lourdes motioned no, and pointed to the word-/a4er-.
He took the page he'd written on and tore it up as he started back to the train. Climbing the steps, he tossed the pieces in the air. He stood with Rawbone as Teresa was taken in tow by another woman and prodded back to work. John Lourdes was decidedly troubled.
'That wouldn't be the girl you told me about, would it?'
'It would.'
'The one whose father you killed?'
'The same.'
'Well, I hope she takes the news as well as her father did.'
BY LATE AFTERNOON the great Mastodon whistle blew. Along the creek birds struck from the treetops skyward in a frenzy. The battalion of roustabouts and thugs ran along the rail line and jumped the car steps or leapt to the flatbed. The truck had been chained down and braced to the last flatcar.
John Lourdes sat with his back against the cab tire facing the sun, hoping it would ease the chills and fever that were beginning to overcome him. Rawbone stood nearby, arms folded, and watched Doctor Stallings and his committee of security officers pose for a last photo before they embarked. The Mexican with the camera was animated and lively as he posed the men before the steaming wheels of that black monster engine. They then boarded and the photographer ran to the first flatbed and put out a hand and was hauled up with legs kicking wildly.
The boiler chest flooded with steam that entered the cylinders through valve sleeves and the pistons were driven backward and the wheels began to turn. That metal and wood chain of hulls groaned and creaked and steam escaped through the exhaust port and there was a long low huff followed by another and then another and the train labored forward. The trek to the Gulf and what awaited had begun.
TWENTY-THREE
3E PLACE FROM whence they came disappeared in the heat like a mirage. John Lourdes still sat with his back against the cab tire. He was trying to write down all that had transpired since the funeraria, but fever left his hands trembling and eyes unclear. He looked toward the passenger car coupled to the flatbed where all the women traveled together.
He once saw the girl Teresa in the door window like a lonely portrait, watching him. In the paling light she put a hand to the glass and with a finger traced a cross with rays coming from it. He remembered that was what she had written in his notebook that night at the church and he pulled that notebook from his coat pocket and opened to the page and held it for her to see.
The night winds came with the dusk. The men bundled up in their coats to contend with the cold desert dark. The one with the camera was making the rounds from car to car flashing a business card and trying to hustle up commissions. John Lourdes whistled to him and weakly waved the man over his way.
He leapt to the car all lithe and smart. He wasn't much older than John Lourdes and spoke in a blaze of Spanish and sawed-off English and he flashed his business card.
TUERTO FOTOGRAFIA EXTRAORDINARIA
John Lourdes pointed up to the truck cab. 'The gent up there brooding.' Tuerto glanced at Rawbone. 'He saw you posing Doctor Stallings today and it got him pretty jealous 'cause there's nothing he'd like better than having a photographer primp him while he had his picture taken. I'll even pay for it.'
The father, in fact, had been brooding, till Tuerto overwhelmed him with compliments about his verdadero hombre features. It was an inspiring hustle and he let Rawbone handle the folding pocket Kodak. As part of his pitch he began to instruct him on its use. He showed how to open it, explained what the maroon leather bellows was for, demonstrating the metal tool to steady it for longer horizontal exposures.
Tuerto pulled out a deck of Kodak penny postcards. 'The newest rage,' he said in English. 'Take a picture, Kodak will have it printed on a penny postcard. Mail it anywhere in the world, to anyone you want. A loved one, perhaps?'
