Bad Country: A Novel (6 page)

Rodeo fed and watered the dog and gave him his vitamins and medicines. He pulled the bean pot off the stove and let it sit while he took a short tepid shower, then he re-dressed in Wranglers and a white T-shirt and ate his dinner, drank one Tecate and then spent the rest of the evening reloading spent shotgun shell hulls at his workbench. At ten o’clock he took a spoonful of Eagle Brand for dessert, then brushed his teeth at the kitchen sink and read the Bible in bed until he fell asleep.

*   *   *

The next day Rodeo got up well before dawn, took a sink bath, dressed in tub-washed, line-dried clothes, packed a big duffel including the ten-gauge riot gun with rubber ordnance, the Colt .357 revolver in a perforated leather sidearm holster, a two-shot derringer in a chamois-lined ankle holster, ammo, a Kevlar vest, metal and plastic handcuffs, two Tasers and an adjustable neck brace and stowed these all in the stainless-steel gear box of his truck. Rodeo also carried away from his casita a pair of creased Wrangler bootcuts and two heavy-starched Larry Mahan snap-button shirts on hangers and in plastic dry-cleaning bags, a tooled leather belt with
RODEO
embossed on the back and his Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association National Finals trophy buckle on the front, a pair of alligator Luccheses and his 100X Beaver riding hat, both in plastic form-molded cases. Into his El Paso Saddleblanket Company saddlebags went his Toughbook laptop, an assortment of regional maps, his camera, eavesdropping and recording gear, binoculars, pepper spray, a sap, a Tony Hillerman and a Little Green New Testament. In his toiletries kit was a chunk of Ivory in a silver-plated soap travel dish, Crest and a toothbrush, a twenty-tooth comb and a bottle of Porter’s Lotion.

Rodeo loaded the dog in the truck, checked the Ford’s oil, topped off the radiator with coolant and slammed the hood of the pickup closed. He checked the load in his 9mm and slipped the Glock under the driver’s side of the bench seat, inserted an eight-track cassette of Bill Monroe into the tape player and drove to Tucson, arriving there just in time to encounter the second wave of morning work traffic.

To strains of “Y’all Come!” Rodeo pulled off I-19 and drove east on Valencia Road, steered the pickup into the parking lot of Denny’s, settled the dog, grabbed up his saddlebags and then went into the restaurant, ordered a Grand Slam and an “endless-cup-o’” coffee and for most of the next hour used Denny’s free Wi-Fi to double check Luis’s research.

*   *   *

He found stories about the death of Samuel Rocha in the archived Web editions of The
Tucson Citizen
and The
Arizona Daily Star
but these were the same reportage as in the file Luis had assembled for him. Carillo’s Funeral Home had provided the memorial services for Samuel Rocha but no next of kin for the young man were listed. In a minor way Samuel Rocha’s death had also figured in a larger piece in the local liberal rag, The
Tucson Weekly,
which article also came up in a Boolean search for “gangs
and
Tucson.” In this extended report, Samuel Rocha’s death was only mentioned as “another recent victim of South Tucson gang-related violence,” a violence that, according to the
Weekly
writer, “had become a chronic epidemic stealthily creeping north of Twenty-second Street, the historic demarcation of South Tucson from Tucson Proper” and that was indicative of “the spread of the Drug Wars from the lawless borderlands of Sonora, Mexico, into the very heart of middle-class America that is downtown Tucson, Arizona.”

The name “Samuel Rocha” also achieved one hit from the Web site of
SandScript the Journal of Creative Writing from Pima Community College
where his poem, “Burn What Will Burn,” had achieved publication. But otherwise he didn’t learn anything Luis hadn’t already told him.

Rodeo paid his bill, exited Denny’s and continued west on Valencia.

*   *   *

Rodeo passed several strip malls, a trailer park, scattered San Carlos Indian Reservation housing and then pulled his truck to a stop in front of the Circle K on Mark Street a half mile from Casino del Sol and less than a quarter mile from the house in which his mother had killed herself. A blue-and-yellow on white Chevy Tahoe tribal cop car occupied the handicap spot. Rodeo parked between two pickups in worse shape than his and stepped into the convenience store. The big, flat-faced Indian clerk behind the counter looked aslant at him.

Is Mark Street around here pretty close? Rodeo wanted to start a conversation but the clerk was not interested.

There’s Tucson city maps for sale right over there. The clerk pointed at a magazine rack. We’re not supposed to give out directions. Management’s orders.

Rodeo glanced around the convenience store. A Bud man stocked beer into a cooler and two men in work clothes assembled their breakfasts of burritos and coffee. A big cop walked out of a room behind the counter marked
PRIVATE
with a men’s magazine in his hand.

What’s up, Gilbert? the cop said. This guy giving you some grief or something?

The clerk shrugged as if that might be a possibility. The cop brushed past Rodeo to reinsert the
Maxim
into the periodical rack near the door, turned back to glare at him.

You looking for something around here, guy?

Katherine Rocha? asked Rodeo. Samuel Rocha?

You got some ID or something, guy?

Rodeo pulled out his huge billfold and extracted his Arizona driver’s license and handed it over. The cop flipped the card back to front.

This is what you got, guy? A ten-year-old driving license?

It’s good for another fifteen years, said Rodeo. Do you need a passport in Arizona now?

The big cop slipped the license into a flap pocket of his shirt.

Why don’t we step outside and have a talk, guy? the cop asked. And let Gilbert get back to his business.

Rodeo followed the cop out of the store to stand near the phone kiosk. The cop stood very large on widespread feet as if ready to deliver or repel a blow.

So, what’s up, guy? You a comedian or something?

I’m a PI hired to investigate the murder of the kid that got killed over on Starr Pass Road near A-Mountain a little while back, said Rodeo. The victim’s name was Samuel Rocha.

I know who the kid was, the policeman said.

How do you know him? You related?

His dad is Alonzo Rocha, a cousin. What’s it to you, guy?

You know his abuela, Katherine Rocha? She lives nearby here on Mark Street.

What do you think you’re investigating around here, guy?

Just to see what’s up with Samuel Rocha’s death, said Rodeo.

Drive-by is what’s up, the cop said. Open and shut. The punk’s gang name was Smoke so what do you expect? The lowlife probably pissed somebody off on a bad drug deal and got shot for it. Happens every day, doesn’t it, guy.

Just looking for some local information, Officer.… Rodeo glanced at the name tag badge of the tribal policeman. The tag simply read
MONJANO.
Rodeo asked, do you have a first name, Officer Monjano?

I probably do and you probably don’t want to know it, guy. The policeman pulled the driver’s license out of his shirt pocket and tapped it against Rodeo’s chest. Rodeo stood very still. I heard about you but I don’t know you, guy, said the tribal cop. So watch yourself around here on my Res.

The policeman let go of the license which fell to the ground, went to his SUV, entered the vehicle and spoke for a minute on his cell phone. He jerked his head at Rodeo then drove off. After the cop drove off in the direction of Casino del Sol, Rodeo picked up his driver’s license and returned into the Circle K and selected from a freezer a “Giannormous Gigantor” and placed the burrito supremo in the extra-dirty microwave. He pressed a button on the stove, and while he was waiting poured and drank an extra-large cup of Colombian coffee and then tossed the Styrofoam cup into a trash can and used his credit card to pay for only the burrito. The clerk processed the purchase but said nothing.

Rodeo walked out of the store, resettled in his truck, peeled back the wrapper from the burrito and fed his good dog a bad breakfast.

*   *   *

Katherine Rocha’s house on Mark Street was a small, red-brick ranch on a single lot.

Rodeo parked on the hard-packed dirt that served as sidewalk in the neighborhood. He exited the pickup and let the dog out and they both walked to the six-foot-tall adobe fence. Rodeo tipped up on his toes to look over the solid fence. Bright white gravel covered the yard. Attached to the house was a prefab carport. In the shade there was parked a 1980’s-era Buick LeSabre. The car had an incongruous aluminum spoiler bolted amateurishly to the trunk lid and a new paint job. There was nothing alive in the yard but for the old lady who raked the gravel into neat furrows.

Rodeo moved to the gate, which was composed of lengths of barbed ocotillo branches wrapped in baling wire. As the old woman backed toward the concrete walk that led from the house to the gate, she raked meticulously over her own footprints until they had completely disappeared. She hung the yard broom tines-up on a nail in the front wall of the house, brushed her hands together and disappeared inside the little house. She came back out in three minutes and walked slowly and somewhat unsteadily down the concrete walkway, unlatched the gate and stood aside as the man and his dog entered her space. She closed the gate behind Rodeo. He smelled alcohol vapor around the woman’s head.

He estado esparandote.

Yes ma’am, said Rodeo. Thanks for waiting for me.

You don’t speak Spanish.

I get it mostly, but don’t speak it much, Rodeo said. My daddy didn’t allow any Spanish at home.

Buck liked to play at being an Indian and a Mexican when it suited him, but he was White, wasn’t he?

I’m not really here to talk about my daddy, Mrs. Rocha.

That’s why your mother married him, you know. She married Buck because she wanted to be White. His potential client appraised Rodeo from top to bottom. You’re taller than I thought you’d be. Take after her, I guess. Your father was pint-sized and mean.

Rodeo did not comment.

Katherine Rocha shrugged. Apples don’t fall far from their tree, do they? she asked.

If you say so, Mrs. Rocha. I don’t know much about apples.

The woman squinted at him. And I see you still dress up like a cowboy even at your age. But you looked better as a little kid dressed up like that for the Tucson Rodeo Parade than you are as a grown man dressed up like that. Little Indian kids in cowboy outfits are always so cute in parades but then they grow up, don’t they.

Some do, Mrs. Rocha.

You don’t remember me, do you? she asked.

No ma’am.

But I remember you, the woman said. San Xavier kid. Went to Mission School then Tucson High then got some college scholarship for rodeo later on, didn’t you?

Yes ma’am. I went up to Highlands in New Mexico for a while and then to Ranger College, out in West Texas.

But you never graduated, did you?

No ma’am. Not yet.

Little late for you to do it now, idn’t it?

Depends on how you look at it, Mrs. Rocha.

The old woman looked at Rodeo’s dog. Don’t you dare let that dog off the concrete or in my house, she said. He’s your responsibility to clean up after if he messes. I am tired of cleaning up after dogs. And cleaning up after men with dogs.

He’s a good dog, Mrs. Rocha.

Every man in the world says that about his dog. Katherine Rocha shook her head at the mongrel. That dog looks like every other dog I ever saw or worse.

The dog circled a spot on the polished concrete porch several times and laid himself down. The old woman entered the house, directed Rodeo into a folding lawn chair in the front room and left. She came back in a little while with a coffee mug in her hand and settled deep down into an ancient Barcalounger that was parked five feet from a giant TV. Rodeo moved his lawn chair sideways in order to be in the woman’s range of vision.

I knew your mother, Katherine Rocha said. I was in Food Service with her at Mission School. That is your mother, idn’t it? Grace Peña?

Yes ma’am. Grace Peña Garnet. But she passed six years ago.

I know all about it. The woman said this surely. She stared at the TV. Rodeo looked at the screen and saw his reflection there beside the woman’s. I always wanted to meet his son grown up and now here he is. The woman said this to herself. Rodeo waited for her to explain this statement but she did not, only stared at the television.

How you been then, Mrs. Rocha?

The woman shrugged. I was a lunch lady at Mission School for a long time after your mother was fired for stealing from the library. I never heard from her again even though she lived just a little ways from here. But then we never had anything in common. She always thought she was above the rest of us because she had some sort of schooling. I guess that’s why she killed herself. Just too smart for this life, she thought. But then she didn’t have much real sense at all, did she. I remember she spent all her money on that worthless trailer lot down there in Los Jarros, thought that was a good investment, then died penniless without a soul around. She hung in that cheap trailer house for days and days with nobody to cut her down. It was like an oven in that trailer house they said.

Rodeo flinched.

What did you do after Mission School, Mrs. Rocha?

I went to the casinos and cleaned up after other people until I could retire. Now I go back to the casinos and let people clean up after me.

I guess all that worked out for you then, Rodeo said.

Nothing worked out, the woman said. She drank her coffee as if it were bitter. They built those casinos on our land, but you know Yaqui don’t get any cut of the casino money. Just build firehouses and worthless … The old woman stopped and took a long drink from her cup. And I am Yaqui. Pure bred from Sonora on both sides, one of the Fourteen Thousand Registered up here. But your mother never had you registered did she. This was a statement and not a question from her.

My mother did have me registered, said Rodeo. I am Pascua Yaqui.