He turned to Homer and Wyatt and cupped his hands.
“Back inside!” he shouted. “Get everybody to stay out of sight and stay down unless you hear different. Let the riders pass on through!”
“What’s that?” Wyatt cried. His hearing wasn’t too good.
“Go back inside!” the sheriff shouted as loud as he could. Homer gave a signal that he understood and the men retreated back into the courthouse building. Twenty seconds later, all the faces had just about disappeared from the windows.
The rumbling machines, mostly stripped down Harleys flashing chrome, were half a block away and showed no signs of slowing or stopping at the sight of a lone man in the middle of the street, standing astride the center line. Franklin scrutinized the outlaws, but they were still too far away to make out the faces of the front four.
All wore polished motorcycle chains, skull earrings and nose rings, wraparound shades, bandannas, and greasy Levis. On their bare torsos, the leather gear of the Para Salvados. Each massive-armed and bearded rider wore the white death’s head symbol plainly visible on the front of his black helmet. They all maintained a very precise formation, with at least three feet separating the bikes, and they kept to a speed of around ten miles an hour.
When the choppers entered the courthouse block, he could finally make out a few of the riders. Most of them he’d seen that night at the Plaza del Toros. Then he made eye contact with the rider on the far right. It was Tres Ojos himself, Tiger Tejada. El jefe, the gang leader, riding low in the saddle, reached down with his left hand and pulled out a sawn-off shotgun from a fringed holster below the seat of his bike.
Tejada was maybe a hundred yards away. He aimed his stubby weapon directly at the sheriff’s midsection. Out of the corner of his eye, Franklin saw Homer re-emerge from the courthouse doors. He was carrying a pump action riot control shotgun. Franklin couldn’t wave him away because any sudden movement at this point was a very bad idea. He looked quickly to the rooftop where Roy waited, found his eyes and shook his head “no.” He could only hope the man understood his desire not to provoke a fight. It was then that Tejada suddenly raised his own gun over his head, pointed into the air, and fired twice.
It was a signal for everyone on a motorcycle.
Guns came out. Rifles. Shotguns. Riders in the middle of the pack fired their weapons into the air. Between shots, they shouted “Viva Mexico! Reconquista! Viva Mexico!” It seemed like everybody was shooting. The sound of their shouting, even their gunfire, was almost lost in the deep heavy rumble of a hundred or more growling machines. Franklin held his gun in his right hand, hanging loosely by his side.
He left it there as he stared at Tiger Tejada, shaking his head from side to side as the first row of bikes bore down on him.
He never raised his weapon or took his eyes off Tiger. No, he just stood there in the street and prayed that Homer or Roy up on the roof with his shotgun didn’t do any damn fool thing to disrupt their protest ride or parade or whatever you want to call it. He wasn’t trying to be a hero, a man alone standing his ground or any of that kind of nonsense. He knew he was going to die. He was just pretty sure this wasn’t the way he was going to do it.
Anyway, the bikes were on him before he’d had a chance to move out of the way. Suddenly, Tiger’s right fist shot into the air and all the bikes braked to a stop in unison, kicking up a choking cloud of dust, but staying in formation.
Tiger had stopped a foot away.
“Ola,” he grinned.
“How you doing today?”
“Not bad, man. You know.”
“What can we do for you?”
“Nice town you got,” he said, looking around, the sun glinting off the silver bangle hanging from his ear.
“You’re here illegally.”
“You come to my town, I come to yours. I do what you ask, huh? Return the stinking putas. The next thing I know, a little Mexican boy dies of thirst while in your personal hands. You Anglos place so little value on our lives, eh? Well, this will be a warning to you. No place on this border is safe. Never safe for us. Now, not for you, Mr. Tex-Ass Ranger.”
“Reconquista!” the riders shouted, fists in the air. “Reconquista!”
It was the secret war cry of the millions of illegal aliens crossing the border. Dixon, like a lot of border lawmen, believed the illegals were in fact an invading army, bent on reconquering the American Southwest. Their swelling number included actual armed members of the Mexican Army, mercenaries from North Korea, Russia, and other communist lands. Increasingly brazen, they fired on American Border Patrol officers and terrorized American ranchers. Reconquista was the title of the little speech he’d written for Key West.
“The boy’s blood is on your hands, Sheriff. Remember that in the days to come.”
Tejada twisted the throttle and popped the clutch, roaring away. In seconds the other riders accelerated, and the waves of Harleys roared past the lone man on the centerline.
The first wave brushed him pretty close on both sides, the first few rows of bikers keeping to their tight formation, once again firing into the air. After about five or six rows had passed him by, clipping his arm or his leg, some of the gangbangers started getting cute, swerving their bikes toward him and then avoiding him at the last second. He figured if he moved in any direction, he’d get hit for sure, so he just stood his ground.
It took a long time for the bikes to rumble past him.
Wyatt, Homer, and the rest of the officers stayed put until the last of the big choppers had almost disappeared up Main. Then they came down the brick walkway, weapons at the ready. The deafening roar of the engines was already becoming a distant rumble moving north and out of hearing range.
“You all right, Sheriff?” Homer said, quickly crossing into the street to where he stood.
“Homer, to tell you the God’s honest truth, I reckon we’re about one funeral away from a border war.”
Then he turned and started to walk away, go back inside and finish his lunch.
“Put that in your Key West report, Sheriff!” Homer called out after him. “I mean it!”
DIXON HEARD TWO more bikes coming toward him, big Harleys moving very slowly up the now empty street, headed the same direction as the departed Mexicans. He recognized the two boys he’d chased off the Brotherwood ranch the day the child died. Hambone and Zorro.
The two bikes rolled to a stop a few feet shy of Dixon. The riders stayed in the saddle, Hambone picking his teeth with his knife, both men grinning at the sheriff.
“Thought I told you two to move on,” Dixon said.
“We did,” Zorro said, “Just a couple of scouts, passing through. Keeping an eye on things for you, Sheriff. Looking for Mexicans. Seen any?”
Hambone laughed out loud.
Dixon craned his head around and saw the last bit of dust settling up the road. “You two roughriders are keeping a pretty safe distance, I’d say. You don’t want them to get away, you get on after them.”
Zorro said, “We ain’t necessarily looking for trouble, Sheriff.”
“Leastways, not yet, we ain’t,” Hambone added. “Still rounding up recruits. Getting sizeable, Sheriff. Two or three hundred riders in this county alone. I hear there’s a thousand over to Laredo. You let us know, come time for the last stand.”
“Take your gang violence elsewhere. This is a peaceful community. Now git out of it.”
“You might want to watch your ass, old man. Shooting war starts with Mexico, which side you want us on?” Zorro said.
“Yeah, Sheriff,” Hambone said. “Texans got to stick together in times of war. You need us.”
Dixon looked at him.
“Ain’t gonna be no Mexican war, son. We did that once already. Remember the Alamo?”
He turned and walked away to the sound of laughter.
“He fucking kidding?” he heard Hambone say to his back.
“Hey, Sheriff!” Zorro called after him.
“Yeah?”
“What the fuck do you think this is, if it ain’t war?”
