He showed up with a gun on his hip and a badge on his belt, no uniform. Driving a rust-tagged Cutlass twenty years old, he took them east out of town toward the Mule Mountains, the peaks stitching north across the border, then pulled off the highway onto a rough dirt lane that trailed away among jagged rocks crowned with creosote bushes and paloverde, parking on a bluff in the middle of nowhere.
He glanced left and right, ahead and behind.-I don’t know what Pingo promised. But everything has changed up here. You don’t have coyotes working the border solo like before, they’re either dead or they’ve signed on as guias with the cartels, who use the gangs as enforcers. A man I know, a cop like me, he and his family were tortured and killed the other night-what he did or didn’t do exactly I don’t know, but everyone in the corridor heard the news. There was a boy, seven years old, the stories of what they did to him… I have a family. I will not let that happen to them.
– I’d never ask such a thing, Roque said. He glanced sidelong at Lupe sitting alone in the backseat. He doubted he had ever felt so tired.
– Life means nothing to these fucks. If you’re lucky you just get used as decoys. The others, they take your money, make you a promise, then disappear, or take you into the desert and leave you there. Even the decent ones shake you down for more once they get you across.
– But isn’t there some way, without dealing with this El Recio, that we could make the crossing?
– I know this El Recio-know of him, I should say. If you owe him? Pay.
– We did pay. Now he’s claiming we didn’t. He won’t let Lupe cross regardless.
Melchior shook his head.-I don’t envy you. But I don’t know how to help you, either.
– What if we cross somewhere else? Farther west. Nogales. Maybe California.
– It’s harder there than here. And ask yourself, can you outrun word from El Recio’s spies if you get spotted? If there’s a price on your head, you can bet there are people looking for you. Bus drivers, street vendors, cabbies, bartenders, you don’t know who’s taking the money, playing along. More than you can imagine, believe me.
With her chin, Lupe gestured to the mountains straight ahead.-There has to be a way across through there.
– Sure, there’s a way. And you can take your chances. But once you reach the border they have hidden infrared cameras, thermal sensors that pick up your body heat, seismic sensors that hear your footsteps. They’ve got border guards with night-vision goggles stationed every half mile in places, not to mention the fucking fence. At the end of this road right here, about a mile or so up the canyon, there’s a pass that runs along the western slope of those hills, straight ahead, not too steep, not too difficult, but cold as fuck at night and that’s when you have to cross. That’s also when the snakes come out, rattlers and sidewinders, the tarantulas, the scorpions. The pass disappears into those trees, then winds down on the far side beyond the border. The fence doesn’t reach that far up the mountain, that’s how you get through. But remember, most people who cross reach a designated snatch spot, get scooped up and taken to a safe house. You don’t have somebody waiting. You’ll be stranded over there with miles and miles to walk and the border patrol will be onto you before you even get to a major road-if you’re lucky. If you’re not lucky, you walk until you die. Your only chance is to reach someone’s house, break in and hide, maybe steal a car, head for Tucson or Phoenix. Or you can try to find a church, beg for someone’s help. But your chances are slim. The gringos have lost all pity. Ask for so much as a drink of water they’ll turn you in. Or shoot you.
Lupe leaned forward in the backseat, gripped Melchior’s shoulder.-It can’t be as impossible as you say. Thousands get across every year, every month.
– Because the cartels have millions for bribes, they corrupt the border guards. Those guards leak word about when and where a spot will be clear. Yes, thousands get across. But thousands get caught, too. The cartels determine who gets lucky, who gets screwed. And the screwed will be back, paying over and over.
Lupe moved her hand from Melchior’s shoulder to Roque’s.
– Come on. We’ll walk. He says there’s a pass at the end of this road. It’s still light enough, we can find it. What good will sitting here do us? The longer we-
Glancing up into the rearview mirror, she saw Melchior’s eyes flare with dread. Spinning around, she saw the headlights in the twilight, the churning plume of dust.
Melchior turned to Roque and raised his hands.-Take my gun, hold it on me. When Roque just sat there baffled, Melchior shouted:-Take my fucking gun and hold it on me!
Roque did as he was told, glancing through the rear window at the approaching vehicle-a black Chevy Suburban with tinted glass, lurching as it hit the rocks and ditches along the unpaved road. Melchior reached around behind him, opened his door, stepped out of the car with his hands held high so everyone in the approaching Suburban could see.-There is a flashlight in the glove compartment. You’ll need it-but be careful not to use it too much, they’ll spot you from twenty miles away coming down the mountain. Now get behind the wheel, drive like hell to the end of this road, then run for the trees up the hill. He stumbled backward in the dusty gravel.- If you ever see Pingo again? Tell him to forget my name.
The crack of a pistol shot, then the bullet whistling overhead: Melchior dove for the ground, Roque lurched across the center console, got behind the wheel, turned the ignition, lodged the gearshift into drive and shoved the gas pedal to the floor just as a second shot pierced the back window. Lupe screamed. Roque ventured a quick over-the-shoulder glance and spotted blood as the car fishtailed up the soft rutted road.
– Are you all right? He palmed the wheel, righting the car.
She didn’t answer, crouched down on the seat. The back window was webbed with fissures spiraling out from the bullet hole. The Cutlass lurched into a rut, dug out again, chewing up rocks, veiled in clouds of dust as it continued up the impossible road. Roque glanced back again, saw her right hand grabbing her left shoulder, threads of blood between her fingers.-It’s all right, she hissed.-Hurry, go!
He considered some sort of evasive back and forth but, given the ruinous condition of the road, the vagueness of the path, he feared he might just as easily wander into a bullet’s path as out of one. Speed, he thought, get away from them, create distance so you have time to run.
He gunned the engine, steering around the worst craters and biggest rocks but otherwise barreling straight ahead, checking his mirror from time to time, trying to see if, through the shifting clouds of dust, he was managing any real separation. The sound of more gunshots but only one bullet landed, hitting the trunk with a pinging thoont. He soared over a sudden crest, a brief gut-fluttering weightlessness, then the chassis crashed down again, first the rear, then the front, tires biting into the rocky sand as he regained control, accelerated out of another fishtail and charged forward.
In the backseat Lupe was breathing fast and shallow but made no other sound, lying flat to keep from getting shot twice. Roque thought of his uncle, wondered what advice he’d give, thought about Godo too, Happy and Samir, vowing to himself he wouldn’t punk out now, wouldn’t shame them, then saw ahead the pine and oak trees marking the first ascent of the foothills. A low outcropping of marbled rock loomed a mere hundred yards ahead, he reached for the glove compartment, slapped it open, rummaged around for the flashlight, all the while gripping the wheel with his left hand, steering straight ahead at full speed. Over his shoulder, he shouted at Lupe: “?Listo!”
As he approached the road’s end he fishtailed the car around so that it faced the way they’d just come. He shouted for Lupe to get out, waited for her to shove open the rear door and flee the car, then got out himself, found a rock the size of a melon, lodged it onto the gas pedal, threw the gearshift into drive. Following Lupe, he scrambled up the rocks toward the tree line. The Cutlass lumbered off, picking up speed as it lurched downhill, forcing the approaching Blazer to stop, turn, dodge the huge bouncing downhill missile until it slammed into a sprawling jut of scrub-nested saguaros with a dusty clanking thud.
Lupe faltered as Roque came up behind and he caught her sleeve, dragged her upright as still another shot rang out, the bullet whistling past them into the trees-a snapped branch, a shower of dry pine needles. He pulled her roughly after him, the rocks beneath their feet razor-edged in places, in others soft and flinty, powdered with dust, littered with pellet-shaped acorns. As they reached the edge of the forest he caught the welcoming tang of
