Mr Majestyk (1974) (13 page)

"You're not going to be here, so don't worry about it."

"Now you're mad."

"I don't have time to worry about it."

She said then, "I'll tell you something, Vincent. I've been in a car that wa s s hot at and the man sitting next to me killed. Another time, a truck chased a b unch of us down a road, trying to run us over. And once I was in a union hal l w hen they threw in a fire bomb and shot the place up. I don't need anybod y l ooking out for me. But if you want me to leave, if you don't want me here , that's something else."

He had to say it right away, without hesitating. "All right, I don't want yo u h ere."

"I don't believe you."

She was holding him with her eyes, trying to make him tell what he felt.

"I said Larry'll drop you off. Get your bag and be ready when he leaves." H
e s tared at her, fought her eyes, until finally she walked past him, out of th e s hed.

They were lifting the battered portable toilet onto a flatbed truck with a hois t w hen Lieutenant McAllen arrived. He had them set the toilet back on the groun d a nd looked at it, not touching it or saying anything until he turned to Harold Ritchie.

"How's it written up? Hit and run?"

"That's about all we can call it for the time being," Ritchie said.

McAllen nodded. "What're they going to do with it?"

"Scrap it, I guess. 'Less the road people want to bump it out."

"You think maybe it ought to be dusted first?"

"Well, we could. But there's people been handling it."

"I'm interested in the door," McAllen said. "Like maybe someone pulled it open , at the time I mean, to see if the man was alive or dead. There could be som e p rints along the inside edge."

"I guess there could be at that," Ritchie said.

"Let's bring it in and do it at home," McAllen said. "I think that'd be bette r t han having a lot of people hanging around here, don't you?"

Ritchie was looking past McAllen, squinting a little in the glare. "Here come s h is truck." As McAllen turned, Ritchie raised his binoculars. "Pulling a t railerload of melons. Going to market, like he didn't have a goddamn trouble i n t he world. No, it ain't him," Ritchie said then, as the truck reached th e h ighway. "It's his hired man, Larry Mendoza, and looks like . . . some Mexica n b road."

Mendoza paid attention to his driving, concentrating on it, and would keep bus y l ooking at the trailerload of melons through the rearview mirror, because h e d idn't know what to say. The girl, Nancy, didn't say anything either--staring ou t t he side window, her suitcase on the seat between them--but he was aware of her , could feel her there, and wished she would start talking about something.

He tried a couple of times to get it going, asking her if she thought she would run into her friends. She said probably, sooner or later. He asked her if sh e t hought all the migrant farm workers would ever be organized and paid a livin g w age. She said again probably, someday.

It was too hard to make up something, to avoid thinking about Vincent and wha t w as going on. So Mendoza didn't say any more until they crossed the state roa d i ntersection and he pulled to a stop opposite the cafe-bar.

He said then, "You don't mind waiting?"

"No, it's all right. I can get something to eat," she said, opening the door an d p utting a hand on her suitcase.

"Sure, get a beer, something to eat. The bus always stops there, so don't worr y a bout missing it."

She said, "Thanks, Larry, and good luck."

"Good luck to you, too."

She closed the door and walked around the front of the truck. As she starte d a cross the highway, Mendoza said, "Nancy--"

She paused to look back at him.

"If he didn't have this trouble going on--"

"I know," she said.

"Come back and see us, all right?"

She nodded this time--maybe it was a nod, Mendoza wasn't sure. He watched he r r each the sidewalk and go in the cafe-bar.

He drove on, into Edna, thinking about the girl and Vincent, the kind of girl Vincent ought to have. Especially Vincent. He didn't refer to Chicanos as Latin s o r look down at them in any way. It was easy to tell when someone looked down , even when he pretended to be sincere and friendly. Mendoza didn't busy himsel f w ith the trailerload of melons now, looking through the rearview mirror. He thought about Vincent and the trouble he was in, wondering what was going t o h appen. He didn't notice the Oldsmobile 98 following him.

Just past the water tower that said EDNA, HOME OF THE BRONCOS, Mendoza turne d o ff the highway, crossed the railroad tracks, and drove along the line o f p roduce warehouses and packing sheds. At a loading dock, where a man was sittin g e ating a sandwich, his lunch pail next to him, Mendoza came to a stop and sai d o ut the side window, "Where's your boss? Man, I got a load of top-grade melons."

The man on the loading dock wasn't in any hurry. He took a bite of his sandwic h a nd chewed it before saying, "He's out to lunch. You'll have to wait till h e g ets back."

"What if I unload while I'm waiting?"

"You know he's got to check them first," the man on the dock said. "Go sit dow n s omewhere, take it easy."

Well, if he had to. But he wasn't going to wait in the hot sun, or in the picku p t hat would get like an oven. And he wasn't going to sit with the guy on the doc k a nd have to talk to him--he could tell the guy had it against Chicanos. So Mendoza got out of the truck and walked around the corner of the warehouse wher e t here was a strip of shade about five feet wide along the wall.

He sat down with his back to it, tilted his straw hat down over his eyes an d s ettled into a reasonably comfortable position. He pictured himself there a s s omeone might come along and see him. Goddamn Mexican sleeping in the shade.

Make him wait and then call him a lazy Mex something or other. He yawned. He wa s t ired because he had gotten only about four hours sleep last night at Helen'
s m other's house, all of them crowded in there, two of the kids in bed with them.

He wouldn't mind taking a nap for about a half hour, till the broker got bac k f rom his lunch.

His eyes were closed. Maybe he had been asleep, he wasn't sure. But when h e o pened his eyes he saw the front end of the Olds 98 rolling toward him--creeping , like it was sneaking up on him--from about thirty feet away.

Mendoza got up so fast his hat fell off. What the hell was going on? The whol e w all empty and a car coming directly at where he was standing. Like some kind o f j oke. Somebody trying to scare him.

But he knew it wasn't a joke when he saw Bobby Kopas, the skinny , hunch-shouldered hotshot guy, coming along the wall toward him. He knew ther e w ould be another guy coming from the other side. Mendoza turned enough to loo k o ver his shoulder and there he was. It was too late to run. The car kept comin g a nd didn't stop until it was only about three feet from him. Kopas and the gu y o n the other side came up to stand by the front fenders. He could smell th e e ngine in the afternoon heat.

Kopas said, "Larry, I believe you were told to shag ass and don't come back.

Ain't that right?"

"I was just helping out my friend a little bit, deliver some melons," Mendoz a s aid.

"We give you a chance to run, you don't even take it."

"No, listen. I'm just doing this as a favor. I get rid of the load I'm gone, yo u n ever see me again."

"Larry," Kopas said, "don't bullshit me, okay?"

"Honest to God, I'm going to drop the melons and keep going."

"In the Polack's truck?"

"No, I told him I leave it here, so he can pick it up."

"Is that a fact? When's he coming?"

"I don't know. Sometime. Maybe tomorrow."

"How's he supposed to get here?"

"Hitchhike, I guess. He don't worry about that."

"Larry, you're shittin' me, aren't you?"

"Honest to God, ask the man in the warehouse, around on the dock. Come on, let'
s a sk him. He'll tell you."

"You aren't going nowhere," Kopas said. "You had your chance, Larry, you ble w i t."

The man behind the wheel of the Olds 98 hit the accelerator a couple of times , revving the engine. Mendoza looked at the car and at Kopas again quickly.

"Listen--what did I do to you? I worked for the guy that's all."

He saw Kopas step away and knew the car was coming as he stood with his bac k a gainst the wall and no room, no direction, in which to run. He had to d o s omething and jumped up, trying to raise his legs, but the car lunged into him , the bumper catching his legs and flattening him against the wall, holding hi m a gainst it as he screamed and fell against the hood and then to the ground a s t he car went abruptly into reverse. He remembered thinking--the last thing as h e t ensed, squeezing his eyes closed--now the wheels were going to get him.

The hospital in Edna had an emergency room and eighteen beds, but it was more a n o utpatient clinic than a hospital and looked even more like a contemporar y y ellow-brick grade school.

For almost a year Majestyk had thought it was a school. He had never been in th e h ospital before today--before the squad car picked him up and delivered him, blu e l ights flashing, to the emergency entrance where an ambulance and another squa d c ar were waiting. Inside, the first person he saw was Harold Ritchie, the deput y c oming toward him from the desk where a nurse's aide sat typing.

"Where's Larry?"

"Round the corner. I'll show you."

"What'd they do to him?"

"Guy at the warehouse--there was only one guy anywhere near where i t h appened--didn't see a thing. Not even the car."

"What'd they do to him?"

"Broke his legs," Ritchie said.

He was lying on a stretcher bed covered with a sheet, his wife with him, a c urtain drawn, separating them from the next bed where a little boy was crying.

A nurse, with a tray of test tubes and syringes, was drawing a blood sample from Mendoza's arm. Majestyk waited. Helen saw him then and came over and he put hi s a rms around her.

"Helen . . . how is he?"

He could feel her head nod against his chest. Her voice, muffled, said, "Th e d octor say he's going to be all right. Vincent, you know what they did?"

He held her gently, patting her shoulder. "I know." He held her patientl y b ecause she needed his comfort, letting her relax and feel him close to her an d k now she was not alone. He heard Mendoza say, "Vincent?" and went over to th e b ed.

"Larry--God, I'm sorry."

"Vincent, I left the melons there."

"Don't worry about the melons."

"That's what I was going to say to you. Staying alive is more important tha n m elons. Did you know that?" He seemed half asleep, his eyes closing and openin g s lowly.

Majestyk leaned in close to him. "Larry, who were they? You know them?"

"I think the same car as last night, the same people. And your friend, Bobby Kopas, he was there. Vincent, they not kidding. They do this to me, they goin g t o kill you." Mendoza's face tightened as he held his breath, then let it ou t s lowly before relaxing again. "Jesus, the pain when it comes--I never fel t n othing like it."

"You want the nurse?"

"No, they already gave me something. They getting ready, going to set my legs."

"Larry, you're going to be all right. The doctor said so."

"I believe him."

"You go to sleep and wake up, it's done. You'll feel better."

Mendoza kept his eyes open, staring at Majestyk. He said, "You want me to fee l b etter, Vincent? Tell me you'll go away. Hide somewhere. There's nothing wron g d oing that. Or, sure as hell, you going to be dead."

Harold Ritchie was in the waiting room, arms folded, leaning against the wall.

He came alive when he saw Majestyk going past, heading for the door.

"Hey, what'd he say? He tell you anything?"

Majestyk kept going, pushing through the door.

Outside, he saw Lieutenant McAllen getting out of a squad car. He heard McAlle n s ay, "Wait a minute!" And heard himself say, "Bullshit," not looking at the ma n o r slowing down until McAllen said, "If you will, please. Just for a minute."

He waited for McAllen to come to him.

"Where you going?"

"Pick up my equipment."

"We'll drive you."

"I can walk."

McAllen paused. "I'm sorry about your hired man."

"He wasn't my hired man. He was my friend."

"All right, he was your friend." McAllen's tone changed as he said it, becam e d ry, official. "I believe you know a deputy was killed last night, run over o r b eaten to death possibly, about the same time your migrants left. We'd like t o l ocate them, talk to them."

"Why don't you talk to Frank Renda instead?"

"Because if we brought him in for questioning he'd be out in an hour, and w e w ouldn't be any farther ahead."