OIL FIELD SECURITY
The men there were of the same lot as those on the train and they drew up and became attentive when they recognized it was Doctor Stallings in the truck. They pulled up to the warehouse garage. Rawbone and John Lourdes followed Doctor Stallings to his office. It was Spartan: a desk, a half-dozen phones. Both men were asked for their security cards. When Doctor Stallings had them in hand, he tore them up.
'You no longer work for Agua Negra.'
He waited for either man's response. Something seemed to pass between the father and son. An unspoken sense to remain silent. Doctor Stallings took petty cash from a drawer. He slid the stack of bills toward John Lourdes. 'You're cut loose. Go to the Southern Hotel. Get a room where the both of you can bunk. Take the motorcycle. If anyone asks, you're not working for us.'
John Lourdes took the money and pocketed it. He glanced at the father.
'He's staying,' said Doctor Stallings.
When they were alone, Rawbone took out a cigarette and lit it. He removed his derby and set it on a wood filing cabinet. He went and sat in a chair by the window.
'Those oil fields,' said Doctor Stallings, 'they're not as big as Texas, but they stand to have a lot more influence. The companies here will be thought of as a country in the near future. And they are beginning to learn how to be one. The practicals and priorities.'
Rawbone set a leg up on the chair and rested an arm on his knee. 'You made a point of referencing Texas.'
'Your legal situation.'
'As Mr. Stars and Stripes is fond of saying ... this ain't Texas.'
'And that is the point.'
They heard motorcycle gears shifting and an engine whine. Rawbone could see out the window and past the wire fencing John Lourdes taking to the road through burned and trampled weeds.
'Do you fully trust him?'
Rawbone laughed inwardly. 'I fully trust myself.'
'You will ultimately have to come to a decision about that. You'll be given the truck. You can hire out. Someone I know will contact people on your behalf. I'll tell them they can reach you at the Southern Hotel. You're an independent contractor now.'
'To what end?'
There was not a blank in his thoughts, nor a gap in the response. 'An assassination,' he said.
Rawbone walked out into the fucking light with the foretaste of death thick in his mouth. He knew, now, with an absolute clarity that Doctor Stallings meant to see him and John Lourdes dead.
TAMPICO, THE OLD town, was built during the time of the colonial viceroys. Arches and wrought-iron balconies, French scrollwork and imported English brick. The town reminded Rawbone of New Orleans, right down to the pure honey of satisfying the most private of pleasures.
The Southern Hotel was a five-story affair with elevators. It was a money house with a mahogany bar and cafe tables where you drank cocktails from real Tom Collins glasses. Businessmen stayed there, politicos, reporters from magazines like Colliers and Saturday Evening Post, men from the Klondike gold rush who came to wildcat for oil along the Panuco.
A key had been left for Rawbone at the hotel desk. When he entered the room, he was intensely troubled. The room was empty, but he could hear the shower running. He threw his bindle down on a bed. On the other was John Lourdes's shoulder holster, his carryall, his clothes ... and that notebook.
In a flash of anger and resentment at having been gamed he grabbed the notebook and flung it. He did the same with the holster and carryall, even John Lourdes's clothes.
He realized that John Lourdes was besting him without even being in the room, without even being aware, just by being, just by ...
His silhouette in the lamplight stiffened. He could hear himself warning: Remain indifferent, dammit. Lay it out for him. Doctor Stallings ... all you sense. Mr. Lourdes could write it all down in that sorry notebook.
He gathered up John Lourdes's things and put them back on the bed as they were. Walk away from this and everything that went with it, that was one possibility. Or find a way, a swift, sure way, to sacrifice John Lourdes and so save himself.
As he threw the pants on the bed, the wallet fell from the back pocket to the floor. He cursed as he bent to retrieve it. Spotting this
