“ The worst thing that ever happened to him. He got a taste of treasure, and he became obsessed. He was always dabbling in mining, but for the next twenty years, it was buried gold, not mined gold, that consumed him.”
“ And you don’t believe treasure exists.”
“ Look, I’ve done some reading. Simmy’s personal library has just about everything ever written about buried treasure in the West. Four hundred years ago, Coronado set out with five hundred conquistadors and a thousand Indians from Mexico looking for the Seven Cities of Cibola. What they found were Zuni Indians growing corn in a dusty village in what is now New Mexico. Then an Indian guide tells Coronado of the fabulous city of Quivera where the streets were paved with gold, and a marble palace was hung with golden bells, and the royal canoes had oarlocks of solid gold.”
“ Gold seems to be the operative word.”
“ Right. It drives men mad. All Coronado had to do was take his men north, the Indian tells him. Of course, the Indian just wanted to get Coronado the hell out of New Mexico where he was taking slaves and doing the traditional macho conquistador stuff. So Coronado falls for it and sets out with his army in plumes and shining armor with a thousand mules to carry back the loot.”
“ That’s optimism.”
“ Verdad, or stupidity. Anyway, they get all the way to Kansas, and all they see are hot, dusty plains. But Coronado believed till the day he died that there were cities of gold out there somewhere.”
“ And Cimarron does, too. Is that what you’re saying?”
“ Who knows? He studies mining claims and trappers’ maps as if they’re holy works. He’s bought diaries from the families of frontiersmen and borrowed family Bibles with crude drawings of mines and graveyards. He’s scoured the files of newspapers from western towns that don’t even exist anymore. He’s spent months in museums, and he’s filled a hundred notebooks with his plans. He’s not willing to admit he’s chasing legends. He figures if one in twenty is legitimate, it’s still worth the search.”
“ So he believes in Rocky Mountain Treasures. To Cimarron, it’s not a scam.”
“ Either way, it’s a good deal for Simmy. He’s got all these leases, and other than the ranch, that’s about all he’s got left. It doesn’t make any sense to dig for gold that costs more to extract than to sell. But they can form a company with suckers’ money, take fees as consultants and managers, and sell Simmy’s maps to the company at a price they set. If they find the Caverna de Oro of Marble Mountain, then everybody’s happy. If not, Blinky and Simmy still make money. Unlike Coronado, it’s a no-lose situation.”
I was dreaming of conquistadors in heavy armor and helmet plumes when I awoke suddenly without knowing why. Next to me, Jo Jo was breathing deeply, a slight whistling sound accompanying each exhalation of warm breath. Outside, crickets made their night music, and overhead, a lone jet made its way toward the airport. I looked at the digital clock and watched 3:13 magically become 3:14.
Before we turned in, I had called Cindy, my loyal secretary, and asked if she would extend her baby-sitting through the night. She whined and said she was meeting Dottie the Disco Queen at a South Beach bar, and I told her to take Kip along but make sure he got home by one a.m., because I promised he could watch Burt Lancaster in The Killers on the all-night classics channel. How’s that for parental guidance?
Now I was awake, and Burt Lancaster had long since been plugged by William Conrad, and I hoped Kip was sleeping soundly and Cindy was sleeping alone.
I lay there a moment, wondering why I had awakened. No indigestion, despite putting away three plates of Jo Jo’s picadillo. Cooking was not a skill passed down from her mother. Jo Jo dried out the ground beef, and the raisins were as moist as BBs. The flan was fine. It came from a local bakery.
And then I remembered why I woke up. The groan of the pine floor planks did all the remembering for me.
Someone was in the house, someone besides the sleeping woman and me.
In the depths of sleep, I had heard a noise, and there it was again. Or was it? Old houses are full of sounds. Pipes clang, walls moan, floors…
Creak.
Again, the sound. It seemed louder, or was it my imagination?
I swung out of bed, my bare feet touching the cool floor. The rest of me was bare, too, and it did not inspire the fighting parts-arms and legs, hands and feet-to know that another part of me was exposed to the air, useless and vulnerable. I tried to take a step without making a sound, but it didn’t work. The floor gave under my feet, too, with what sounded to me like a wail, but was probably no louder than a yawn.
I stopped and listened again.
Silence.
Except for me. My breathing chugged like a locomotive. My heart was running a marathon.
I tiptoed toward the closed bedroom door. No light shone from beneath it. The night had cleared, and moonlight streamed in from outside the window, casting my shadow across the floor and up the door. I took another step toward the door, heard a sound from the other side…
I spun backward.
Not of my own accord. The door had opened with a rush, catching me across the shoulder, surprising me, bouncing me, hop-skip-lurch toward the window. My knee sideswiped the dresser, and when I was off-balance, teetering like a drunk, an anvil caught me on the side of the head, just above the right ear. Okay, so it wasn’t an anvil, but a fist that felt like iron, and it dropped me to the floor.
I yelled something unintelligible, and Jo Jo woke up screaming, and then I tried to get to my feet, but a knee came up and just missed my dimpled chin and caught me on the shoulder. It did no damage, but set me down again.
I came off the floor, adrenaline flowing. Before I could get off a punch, he threw a looping left hook. I blocked it with my right forearm, and he came at me with a right. Now I was in the defensive position of the double forearm block, sort of like Floyd Patterson’s peek-a-boo defense. His punches kept coming, landing like concrete blocks on my triceps and forearms, and so far, I hadn’t even swung.
I backed up a step and tossed a jab. So did he, and his reach exceeded mine. He peppered my face with two more stinging straight lefts. I wanted to get a clear shot at him, but unlike almost any brawl I’d ever been in, he was bigger and stronger, and for all I knew, could beat me in the forty-yard dash.
I feinted with the left, came across the top with a right and hit him on the side of the nose. I heard cartilage splinter, and I was showered with blood. His eyes would be closed and watering now, so I came in close, tucked my head into his chest, and shot upward, butting him under the chin. I heard a snap and hoped I broke his jaw. He grunted and gagged.
I took a step back and went for his chin again, this time with a long left hook. I had a lot of hip behind it, but I was too slow. Story of my life.
He stepped to his left and hit me squarely in the solar plexus with a short right I never saw. I doubled over and fell to the floor, gasping for breath that wouldn’t come. I dipped a shoulder and rolled into him just as he lifted a foot to kick me. The foot was encased in pointed burgundy cowboy boots that shimmered in the moonlight. The toe skimmed the top of my skull, and the heel slammed me in the forehead. Still, the weight of my body pinned his other foot to the floor. I kept rolling, trying to hyperextend his knee and tear his anterior cruciate ligaments into strands of spaghetti. It would have worked, too, if he hadn’t had the legs of an ox.
I weigh two hundred twenty-two pounds, and I didn’t budge him. This left me at his feet. He locked his hands and brought them down hard on the back of my neck, and I saw the Milky Way and Orion, with Betelgeuse particularly bright. I reached into the dazzling light to fight my way into the next galaxy, but just floated for a while. I tried to grab him behind one knee and buckle his leg, but I couldn’t have squeezed the breath out of a kitten.
I heard Jo Jo screaming.?Que demonios haces aqui? Vete ahora mismo! ” She came off the bed at him, but he lifted her effortlessly and tossed her across the room.
I was on my knees, now, vaguely aware of a voice above me and warm blood dripping onto me. “Where is he?”
I was dazed and didn’t get it. “Who he?”
