Gabriela tenses.
I turn my head and stare back at her, urge her with my eyes to remain quiet.
The woman on the street speaks again.
“They are gone. You are safe now. You can come down.”
Is it a trick? Possibly. But after what just happened it doesn’t feel like a trick. The townspeople ran our pursuers out of town. No chance it was all a ruse. Besides, the woman who just spoke, she sounds like the woman who had started yelling in the first place. The woman who started the chant for the men to get out.
I look at Gabriela once more. She looks terrified. I take a deep breath, roll over, and raise myself just enough to peek over the edge.
The old woman with the cane stares up at me. She motions at the empty street.
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
Twenty-Seven
The old woman doesn’t move as we climb down from the roof. She just watches, leaning on her cane. Occasionally she’ll look up and down the street to ensure nobody is coming, but besides that she watches us with an almost bored expression. Then, once I’ve helped Gabriela to the ground, the old woman motions at us.
“Follow me.”
She turns and starts shuffling down the street and only goes several paces before she realizes we’re not following and turns back.
“Is there a problem?”
I survey the street to make sure it’s empty as I step forward.
“Why should we come with you?”
The woman leans all her weight on the cane, pursuing her lips.
“I’m trying to help you.”
“How so?”
“Did you not hear me tell those men to leave this town? Now they have left—I saw it with my own eyes—but there are other police still in town. They are already loading the bodies into trucks. I should be in the town square right now with everybody else mourning, but something tells me you two could use my help. So will you let me help you?”
I glance at Gabriela, who stands there uncertain, and I turn back to the woman and nod.
“Lead the way.”
Because of the cane, the woman doesn’t move very fast. She veers off the street at one point and takes us between houses to the next street, then between more houses to another street. I have Gabriela walk between us, keeping the gun in my hand just in case. At one point the old woman glances back, notices the gun, and chuckles.
Then we finally come to yet another house and the old woman opens the back door and motions us inside.
We enter a kitchen. The smell of food lingers, causing my stomach to growl.
The old woman lets the door close behind her as she walks past us through the kitchen and deeper into the house.
“You should be safe here. I don’t imagine those men who chased you will come back, but if they do, I guess we will just have to run them off again.”
She smiles at us, but then all at once her expression turns solemn. In the light it’s easier now to see the scars on her face. From her forehead to her chin, they streak her face like chasms.
“My name is Yolanda. What are your names?”
Neither Gabriela nor I say anything.
Yolanda nods as if she understands the reason for our reticence. She motions us to sit on a couch as she lowers herself down onto a chair.
Gabriela and I sit on the couch. Neither one of us speaks.
A brown cat pads into the room. It pauses to look at us, then slinks over to the chair and jumps up onto Yolanda’s lap.
Yolanda smiles down at the cat as she strokes its back.
“This is Dorado.”
Still Gabriela and I don’t speak. The house is silent, but we must not be too far away from the town square, because even inside we can hear the distant sobbing.
The silence in the house starts to become almost too unnerving, so I decide to break it.
“I’m sorry for what happened tonight.”
The apology is more than just perfunctory. In many ways, I’m responsible for those dead twenty-eight people, not to mention the others who had been wounded and have since been taken to a hospital.
Yolanda stares down at the cat as she pets it.
“It is not the first time tragedy has befallen this town, and it will not be the last. Every time we are able to bounce back from it.”
“Why is this town called La Miserias?”
Yolanda pauses to give me a sidelong glance.
“As I said, it is not the first time tragedy has befallen this town.”
She leaves it at that for a long moment, petting the cat again, before she rests her head back on the seat and closes her eyes. I think she’s going to fall asleep, but then her eyes snap open and she looks at us again.
“What did those men want with you?”
We say nothing.
“I sent those men away. I am hiding you in my home. I think the least you can do is be honest with me.”
I’m not sure what to say at first. I don’t quite agree that the least we can do for this woman is be honest with her, but before I can even argue that point, Gabriela opens her mouth.
“We are journalists.”
This clearly wasn’t what the old woman was expecting to hear. She sets the cat aside as she leans forward in her seat.
“Is that right?”
Gabriela nods.
“We came here to write about what happened. One of the men recognized me and tried to catch us.”
Yolanda’s gaze flicks from Gabriela to me.
“I saw what you did to those men. Based on how quickly you moved, you do not strike me as a writer.”
I say nothing.
Gabriela asks, “Is it true what they say happened?”
Yolanda says, “I suppose that depends on what they say happened.”
“They say that Fernando Sanchez Morales wanted retribution for what happened to Ernesto Diaz last night.”
Yolanda doesn’t answer right away. The cat sits at her feet, watching us. Yolanda leans down and picks up the cat and places it back on her lap and starts
