Cities of the Plain (16 page)

I speak spanish.

You come with the mordida.

Billy took out his money and laid it on the bar. I got eighteen dollars. That's all I got.
And I aint paid for the drinks yet.

Pay for the drinks.

What?

Pay for the drinks.

Billy left a five on the bar and put the thirteen dollars in his shirtpocket along with
his cigarettes and lighter and stood.

Follow me.

He followed him out through the lounge past the whores in their whore's finery. Through
the kaleidoscope of pieced light from the overhead chandelier and past the empty bandstand
to a door at the rear.

The door was covered in winecolored baize and there was no doorknob to it. The alcahuete
opened it anyway and they entered a corridor with blue walls and a single blue bulb
screwed into the ceiling above the door. The alcahuete held the door and he stepped
through and the alcahuete closed it behind them and turned and went down the corridor. The
musky spice of his cologne hung in the air. At the farthest end of the corridor he stopped
and tapped twice with his knuckles upon a door embossed with silver foil. He turned,
waiting, his hands crossed before him at the wrist.

A buzzer buzzed and the alcahuete opened the door. Wait here, he said.

Billy waited. An old woman with one eye came down the corridor and tapped at one of the
doors. When she saw him there she blessed herself with the sign of the cross. The door
opened and she disappeared inside and the door closed and the corridor stood empty once
again in the soft blue light.

When the silver door opened the alcahuete motioned him inside with a cupping motion of his
thin ringed fingers. He stepped in and stood. Then he took off his hat.

Eduardo was sitting at his desk smoking one of his slender black cigars. He was sitting
sideways with his feet crossed before him propped in the open lower drawer of his desk and
he appeared to be examining his polished lizardskin boots. How may I help you? he said.

Billy looked back at Tiburcio. He looked again at Eduardo. Eduardo lifted his feet from
the drawer and swiveled slowly in his chair. He was dressed in a black suit with a pale
green shirt open at the neck. He rested his arm on the polished glass top of the desk, he
held the cigar. He looked like he had nothing much on his mind.

I got a business proposition for you, Billy said.

Eduardo held up the little cigar and studied it. He looked at Billy again.

Somethin you might be interested in, Billy said.

Eduardo smiled thinly. He looked past Billy at the alcahuete and he looked at Billy again.
My fortunes are to change for the better, he said. How very good.

He took a long slow pull on the cigar. He made a strange and graceful gesture with the
hand that held it, turning it in an arc and holding it palm up. As if it cupped something
unseen. Or were accustomed to holding something now absent.

Do you care if we talk alone? Billy said.

He nodded and the alcahuete withdrew and closed the door. When he was gone Eduardo leaned
back in his chair and turned again and recrossed his boots in the drawer. He looked up and
waited.

What I wanted, said Billy, was to buy one of these girls.

Buy, said Eduardo.

Yessir.

How do you mean, buy.

I give you the money and take her out of here.

You believe these girls are here against their will.

I dont know what they are.

But that's what you think.

I dont think anything.

Of course you do. Otherwise what would there be to buy?

I dont know.

Eduardo pursed his lips. He studied the end of the cigar. He doesnt know, he said.

You're tellin me that these girls are free to just walk out of here.

That is a good question.

Well what would be a good answer.

I would say that they are free in their persons.

In their what?

In their persons. They are free in their persons. Whether they are free here? He placed
his forefinger alongside his temple. Well, who can say?

If one of em wanted to leave she could leave.

They are whores. Where would they go?

Suppose one of em wanted to get married.

Eduardo shrugged. He looked up at Billy.

Tell me this, he said.

All right.

Are you principal or agent?

Am I what?

Is it you who wishes to buy this girl?

Yes.

Do you come often to the White Lake?

I was here one time.

Where did you meet this girl?

At La Venada.

And now you wish to marry her.

Billy didnt answer.

The pimp pulled slowly on the cigar and blew the smoke slowly toward his boots. I think
you are the agent, he said.

I aint no agent. I work for Mac McGovern at the Cross Fours out of Orogrande New Mexico
and you can ask anybody.

I think you are not here on your own behalf.

I'm here to make you a offer.

Eduardo smoked.

Cash money, Billy said.

This girl has an illness. Does your friend know that?

I didnt say I had a friend.

She has not told him that, has she?

How do you know what girl it is.

Her name is Magdalena.

Billy studied him. You knew that because of what I said about La Venada.

This girl will not leave here. Perhaps your friend thinks that she will but she will not.
Perhaps even she thinks it. She is very young.

Let me ask you this.

Ask it.

What is wrong with your friend that he falls in love with whores?

I dont know.

Does he think she is not really a whore?

I couldnt tell you.

You cannot talk to him?

No.

Because she is whore to the bone. I know her.

I expect you do.

Your friend is very rich?

No.

What can he offer this girl? Why would she leave?

I dont know. I reckon he thinks she's in love with him.

Heavens, said Eduardo. Do you believe such a thing?

I dont know.

Do you believe such a thing?

No.

What are you going to do?

I dont know. What do you want me to tell him?

There is nothing to tell him. He drinks a great deal, your friend?

No. Not especially.

I am trying to help you.

Billy tapped his hat against the side of his leg. He looked at Eduardo and he looked
around the room that was his office. In the corner against the far wall there was a small
bar. A sofa upholstered in white leather. A glasstopped coffeetable.

You dont believe me, said Eduardo.

I dont believe you dont have some money invested in this girl.

Did I say that?

I thought you did.

She owes me a certain amount. Money that was advanced to her for her costumes. Her jewelry.

How much money.

Would I ask you such a question?

I dont know. I guess I wouldnt be in a position to be asked. You think I am a whiteslaver.

I didnt say that.

That is what you think.

What do you want me to tell him. What difference does it make?

I guess it might make a difference to him.

Your friend is in the grip of an irrational passion. Nothing you say to him will matter.
He has in his head a certain story. Of how things will be. In this story he will be happy.
What is wrong with this story?

You tell me.

What is wrong with this story is that it is not a true story. Men have in their minds a
picture of how the world will be. How they will be in that world. The world may be many
different ways for them but there is one world that will never be and that is the world
they dream of. Do you believe that? Billy put his hat on. I thank you for your time, he
said. You are welcome. He turned to go. You didnt answer my question, said Eduardo. He
turned back. He looked at the pimp. His cigar in his gracefully cupped fingers, his
expensive boots. The windowless room. The furniture in it that looked as if it had been
brought in and set in place solely for the purpose of this scene. I dont know, he said. I
guess probably I do. I just dont like to say it.

Why is that?

It seems like a betrayal of some kind. Can the truth be a betrayal?

Maybe. Anyway, some men get what they want.

No man. Or perhaps only briefly so as to lose it. Or perhaps only to prove to the dreamer
that the world of his longing made real is no longer that world at all.

Yeah.

Do you believe that? I'll tell you what.

Tell me.

Let me sleep on it.

The pimp nodded. Andale pues, he said. The door opened by no visible means or signal.
Tiburcio stood waiting. Billy turned again and looked back. You didnt answer mine, he
said. No? No. Ask it again. Let me ask you this instead. All right.

He's in trouble, aint he?

Eduardo smiled. He blew cigar smoke across the glass top of his desk. That is not a
question, he said.

IT WAS LATE When he got back but the light was still on in the kitchen. He sat in the
truck for a minute, then he shut off the engine. He left the key in the ignition and got
out and walked across the yard to the house. Socorro had gone to bed but there was
cornbread in the warmer over the oven and a plate of beans and potatoes with two pieces of
fried chicken. He carried the plates to the table and went back and got silver out of the
dishdrainer and got down a cup and poured his coffee and set the pot back over the eye of
the stove where there was still a dull red glow of coals and he took his coffee to the
table and sat and ate. He ate slowly and methodically. When he'd finished he carried the
dishes to the sink and opened the refrigerator and bent to scout the interior for anything
in the way of dessert. He found a bowl of pudding and took it to the sideboard and got
down a small dish and filled it and put the pudding back in the refrigerator and got more
coffee and sat eating the pudding and reading Oren's newspaper. The clock ticked in the
hallway. The cooling stove creaked. When John Grady came in he went on to the stove and
got a cup of coffee and came to the table and sat down and pushed back his hat.

You up for the day? said Billy.

I hope not.

What time is it?

I dont know.

Billy sipped his coffee. He reached in his pocket for his cigarettes.

Did you just get in? John Grady said.

Yep.

I reckon the answer was no.

You reckon right, little hoss.

Well.

It's about what you expected aint it?

Yeah. Did you offer him the money?

Oh we had a pretty good visit, take it all around.

What did he say.

Billy lit his cigarette and laid the lighter on top of the pack. He said she didnt want to
leave there.

Well that's a lie.

Well that may be. But he says she aint leavin.

Well she is.

Billy blew smoke slowly across the table. John Grady watched him.

You just think I'm crazy, dont you?

You know what I think.

Well.

Why dont you take a good look at yourself. Look at what it's brung you to. Talkin about
sellin your horse. It's just the old story all over again. Losin your head over a piece of
tail. Cept in your case there aint nothin about it makes any sense. Nothin.

In your eyes.

In mine or any man's.

He leaned forward and began to count off on the fingers of the hand that held the
cigarette: She aint American. She aint a citizen. She dont speak english. She works in a
whorehouse. No, hear me out. And last but not leasthe sat holding his thumbthere's a son
of a bitch owns her outright that I guarangoddamntee you will kill you graveyard dead if
you mess with him. Son, aint there no girls on this side of the damn river?

Not like her.

Well I'll bet that's the truth if you ever told it.

He stubbed out the cigarette. Well. I've gone as far as I can go with you. I'm goin to bed.

All right.

He pushed back his chair and rose and stood. Do I think you're crazy? he said. No. I dont.
You've rewrote the book for crazy. If all you are is crazy then all them poor bastards in
the loonybin that they're feedin under the door need to be set loose in the street.

He put the cigarettes and lighter in his shirtpocket and carried the cup and bowl to the
sink. At the door he stopped again and looked back. I'll see you in the mornin, he said.

Billy?

Yeah.

Thanks. I appreciate it.

I'd say you're welcome but I'd be a liar.

I know it. Thanks anyway.

You aim to sell that stallion?

I dont know. Yeah.

Maybe Wolfenbarger will buy him.

I thought about that.

I expect you did. I'll see you in the mornin.

John Grady watched him walk across the yard toward the barn. He leaned and wiped the
beaded water from the window glass with his sleeve. Billy's shadow shortened across the
yard until he passed under the yellow light over the barn door and then he stepped through
into the dark of the barn and was lost to view. John Grady let the curtains fall back
across the glass and turned and sat staring into the empty cup before him. There were
grounds in the bottom of the cup and he swirled the cup and looked at them. Then he
swirled them the other way as if he'd put them back the way they'd been.

HE STOOD IN THE GROVE Of willows with his back to the river and watched the road and the
vehicles that moved along the road. There was little traffic. The dust of the few cars
hung in the dry air long after the cars were gone. He walked on down to the river and
squatted and watched the passing water murky with clay. He threw in a rock. Then another.
He turned and looked back toward the road.

The cab when it came stopped at the turnoff and then backed and turned and came rocking
and bumping down the rutted mud road and pulled up in the clearing. She got out on the far
side and paid the driver and spoke briefly with him and the driver nodded and she stepped
away. The driver put the cab in gear and put his arm across the seat and backed the cab
and turned. He looked toward the river. Then he pulled away out to the road and went back
toward town.