Natural Causes (34 page)

"Revolver or automatic?"

"Automatic," I said.

He took a blued Colt Commander out of the display
case. I checked the magazine lips and the trigger pull. It had a
five- or six-pound pull--a little heavy compared to my Gold Cup.

"That'll do," I said. "I'll need a box
of .45 ACP, too."

"Twenty-five or fifty?"

"Twenty-five."

He took a yellow and green box of Remington 230 grain
hardball off the shelf behind the counter. "I'll need some LD."

I got my F.F.L. out of my wallet and handed it to
him. "You're a collector, huh?"

"Something like that," I said.

"This ain't really a collectible," he said
and winked. "But we'll make an exception."

I bought the gun and the ammunition and a belt
holster, too. When I got back to the car, I drove down one of the
sleepy Mesilla streets and pulled over in a gravel turnaround.
There was some sparse shade in one corner of the turnaround, beneath
a palo verde. I parked under the green-barked tree, undid my belt,
and slipped the holster onto it. Then I got the Colt out, loaded the
clip with seven rounds, and dumped the rest of the bullets in my
pants pocket. I put the gun in the holster and pulled my shirt out of
my pants. The shirttail covered the holster, or, at least, it would
when I was standing.

I redid my belt, started up the car, and headed east,
toward the El Capitan mountains.

It was about four when I got to the ranch. The Pueblo
house looked grimier and more rundown in the light of day than it had
at twilight. I drove past the abandoned horse trailer and the broken
wagon into the yard. The jeep was parked by the house; the Chevelle
was gone.

As I cracked the car door open, Ramirez stepped out
of the Pueblo house. The vigas cast blunt, saw-toothed shadows
over the doorway. He stood in the shadows-his hands at his side-and
watched me walk up to him. He wasn't armed, or if he was, the gun was
tucked out of sight, like my own.

"Senor," he said. His face looked sad and
impassive. He hadn't shaved that morning and the day's growth of
beard gave him a played-out look, although that could have been the
way I was seeing him. He was wearing a collarless undershirt, stained
yellow at the armpits and around the neck, and dirty blue jeans.

"We've got a problem, Jorge," I said.

"Yes?"

"The car that was parked here last night--the
Chevelle? Where is it?"

"It's gone," he said. "I got rid of
it."

I looked over Ramirez's shoulder into the house.
There wasn't anyone else inside--no sign of his wife or his children.

"Did your wife take it?" I said, looking
back at him.

He nodded. "She drove down to Juarez."

"I know about the car, Jorge. I know whose car
it is. And I know that Dover wasn't going to sell his ranch. Whose
story was that--yours or his?"

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I
knew you were gonna come back. I tol' my wife you were gonna come
back."

"Is that why you sent her away?"

He nodded again. I stared at him for a moment.

"Don' worry, seiior," he said with a polite
smile. "I ain't gonna give you no trouble. I ain't gonna lie,
either. It just don' work out. That's all. Not for Senor Dover. Not
for me. He didn' wanna get nobody hurt."

"Sure he didn't," I said to the man.
"Where's Ruiz?" Ramirez pointed toward the mountains. "Up
there. I got a lean-to. I let him stay there."

I looked over my shoulder at the mountain range. It
looked gray in the late afternoon light. Gray and brown where the
scrub pines grew below the timber line.

"Why did Ruiz come here?" I asked.

"He say he got no place else to go. They killed
his woman and her kid. He thinks they were gonna kill him, too. He
come down here 'cause that's where Senor Dover tol' him to go, if
things didn' work out right. He's pretty scared, man."

"What about you? Aren't you scared?"

He shrugged. "What good's it gonna do? I ain't
so happy about my life I care one way or 'nother. You know? I just
don't want my old lady to get hurt. And my kids."

"What actually happened on Saturday?" I
said.

"Like I tol' you--I picked Senor Dover up and
took him to the ranch. Some men come there, up from Juarez maybe. I
don' know for sure. He tol' me they were gonna buy the house. Only I
knew that wasn't true. He just didn' want me to worry about him. He
was scared, you know? He never done nothin' like that before. I tol'
him I wasn't gonna let him down no matter what. I did what he said to
do and pretended I didn' know what was really happenin.' But I kept
my eyes open, you know, in case they tried something."

"Did they try anything?"

He shook his head. "They gave Senor Dover a
suitcase. He had it with him when I took him back to the airport. He
gave them some money, I think."

"The men Dover gave the money to--who were
they?"

"I don' know. I never seen them before. Maybe
Jerry knows."

"Did they see you?"

"Yeah," Ramirez said. "They seen me."

I stared at him again. He was a brave man--a good
friend. And he deserved better than he was going to get.

"All right," I said. "Let's go."

"I ain't gonna say nothin' to the cops about
Senor Dover."

"I'm not taking you to the cops." I pointed
to the mountains.

"Up there. I want to talk to Ruiz."

"He ain't gonna talk to you, man. He's young. He
don' wanna die."

"I'm not going to kill him. I just want to talk
to him."

"He's gotta gun, man."

"I'll take my chances," I said. "Now
let's go."
 

40

There was no road--at least, none that I could see.
But Ramirez drove across the open desert as if he were navigating a
familiar channel. The jeep filled quickly with dust thrown up by the
tires. The dust was hot from the sun, like the sand of a beach. About
ten minutes out, Ramirez pulled up in front of a talus at the base of
one of the mountains to the east of Las Cruces.

"We gotta walk from here," he said.

I got out and followed him up the talus, picking my
way through the hot rubble of stones. When we got about fifty yards
up the hillside, the ground flattened out a bit. A narrow trail was
cut into the hill, wide enough for two men to walk on. It ran
parallel to the desert floor, a hundred and fifty feet up. I couldn't
see where the trail led, because it snaked around the mountain into
the shadow on the north face. Beneath us the desert stretched for
miles. Las Cruces looked like a spot of green and adobe white from
where I stood.

"How much farther?" I asked Ramirez. "Not
far."

I looked at the sun. It was about forty-five degrees
above the horizon, just beginning to set for the day. I wanted to get
to Ruiz before it was too dark to see what he was doing.

I followed Ramirez down the trail, toward the north
slope. We walked for almost ten minutes. Then the trail stopped and
we came to a small clearing about thirty yards square, like a tiny
plateau in the rock face. The clearing was surrounded by the mountain
on each side. A small cabin was built into the west wall--the one
facing the trail. The cabin was made of wood planks, with a
corrugated tin roof and a stovepipe chimney. A trickle of woodsmoke
was coming out of the chimney, grayish blue against the washed-out
sky. There was one window and a door in the front of the cabin. I
couldn't see into the window because the sun was glaring off the
panes.

"You stay back," Ramirez said. "If he
sees you ..."

"I'll stay back," I said. "Tell him
it's Harry Stoner. He knows me."

Ramirez started across the clearing and I sat down in
the shadow of an overhang at the end of the trail. I could see the
cabin clearly from where I sat, but I doubted if Ruiz could see me in
the shadows.

I took the pistol out, cocked it, and locked it. Then
I stuck it back in the holster beneath my shirttail.
I
watched Ramirez go in the front door. He came back out a few minutes
later and waved his right arm at me to come ahead.

"Keep your hands up, so he can see them,"
he called out.

I raised my arms and started to walk across the
clearing. Something was gleaming in the sunlight in the doorway to
the cabin. It wasn't until I got close that I realized it was a rifle
barrel. I hesitated for a second when I saw it, then walked up to the
door. Ruiz was crouching on one knee just inside, holding the rifle
on me. Ramirez was sitting on a plank bench across from the door.

"Put the rifle away, Jerry," I said to him.

"How do I know that you didn't come to kill me?"
he said nervously.

"Why would I want to kill you?"

"To get rid of me," he said. "Just
like they got rid of Maria. So there won't be anybody around who knew
what that fucker was doing."

"You're just going to have to trust me."

"I don't trust nobody." He stood up and
waved the rifle barrel at me. "C'mon."

I stepped through the door onto the plank floor. It
was hot and dark in the cabin. The place smelled like an attic. There
was a wood-burning stove on the back wall, beside the bench that
Ramirez was sitting on. A table by the door. A couple of ladderback
chairs with broken rungs on the north wall. And a cot with a thin
mattress on the south. It was a far cry from the Belle Vista Hotel.

The kid looked like he'd had a rough time. His hair
was dirty; his handsome face was ragged with a five-day's growth of
beard. His clothes smelled. He kept blinking his eyes, as if someone
were shining a light in them. His eyelids were swollen and ringed
with purple flesh.

"When's the last time you slept?" I asked
him.

"I don't need to sleep." He wiped his brow
with the back of his hand. "I'm all right."

"You're not all right," I said. "You're
in trouble, and you know it."

He looked at me as if he wanted to cry.

"Whoever killed Maria Sanchez is going to try to
kill you, too."

"Shut up!" he said. "How do I know
that you're not one of them?" He looked wildly at Ramirez.

"He could be one of them."

"He's not," Ramirez said.

"What do you know? You stupid beaner."

Ruiz was clearly paranoid with fear and fatigue.
After five days on the run and a few nights in that deserted cabin
with nothing to think about but Maria and her son, it was inevitable.
It was also scarey.

"You should have seen what they did to her,"
he said with horror. "My God, my God."

"Who did it?"

"Some guys. From L.A. The ones that Dover sold
the dope to."

"There may be a way out of this, Jerry. But I've
got to know what happened before I can help."

"Why?" he said with a laugh. "So you
can turn me over to the cops as an accessory? You're just trying to
protect him, man. I know that. If you hadn't gone to Maria's house on
Thursday, she wouldn't be dead. And I wouldn't be in this shithole."

I felt sick. "What are you saying?"

"They saw you, man. What do you think I'm
saying? They know you've been snooping around. They were following
you, you asshole. They're onto you."

"How did they hear about me," I said. "Did
you tell them?"

"You think I'm crazy!" he shouted. "They're
paranoid, man. They don't take any chances. When they thought Maria
had been talking to you, they killed her. Then they came after me."

"Listen to me," I said. "How did they
know about me?"

"Dover's pal," he said. "He told
them."

"What pal?"

"The one he was doing the deal with!" he
shouted again. "Don't you know anything? Big deal fucking
asshole detective!"

"Who was he doing a deal with?" I said.

"The guy, man. The guy in L.A. The one who
picked him up on Sunday."

"You didn't pick him up on Sunday?"

"Shit, no. He said he didn't need me."

"Did you see this guy?"

He shook his head violently. "No! How many times
do I have to tell you? I heard them talking on the phone when I come
to give him the key on Friday. He tells me he's doing a favor for his
buddy. That it's gonna get him off the hook. But he has to get out of
the hotel, you know, without anybody seeing him. I went along, that's
all. For a few bucks." He started to sob. "That's all I
did, man. Get him the key and pick up his fucking car."

"Then why did they kill Maria?"

"I don't know," he moaned. "They
thought she knew something, I guess. Maybe, I told her something. I
don't know."

"What did you tell her?"

"I overheard the call. And he's got maybe a
hundred grand on his bed, for chrissake. You don't have to be a
genius, you know?"