No Job for a Lady (32 page)

“But you like me anyway, don’t you?”

“But I like you anyway, yes. That’s my problem and the problem so many women have—there’s something about a handsome rogue that makes our hearts flutter. And”—I shake a finger at him—“it will only flutter from afar, because I took one look at you and knew immediately you were born to hang.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he says. “I took one look at you and knew you would never be broken to the saddle. But I’ll tell you, Nellie girl, if you were a cowboy, I’d say you were a man to ride the river with.”

“Thanks, but what does that mean?”

“The most dangerous job driving cattle is getting ’em across a river. Good chance you’ll slip off your horse and get kicked in the head or gored by a panicked steer. You want only the best wranglers riding the river with you. Men you respect and can trust to watch your back when things get down and dirty.”

I leave, glowing with pride over the compliment he paid me. I know, of course, that he lied about Thompson and El Paso. The two have something going between them, and they obviously aren’t always in agreement.

“Nellie!”

It’s Gertrude. She is in front of our tent, staring at me with wide eyes. She looks as if she has been frightened out of her wits, and I run to her as fast as I can.

“What’s the matter? What happened? Someone hurt you?”

She shakes her head, unable to speak.

“Gertrude, tell me what happened? I’ll get your uncle—”

She lets out a cry.

“He’s dead!”

“Oh my God, what happened?”

“His heart.”

“He had a heart attack?”

“No! Someone took it, Nellie.” She screams,
“They ripped out his heart!”

55

“They found his body on the pyramid,” Gertrude says after I get her calmed down enough so she can speak, “draped backward over the stone where sacrifice victims were taken to be—” She chokes up.

We hurry up the boulevard toward the Pyramid of the Sun, where the body is located. She hasn’t seen it and has spoken only to Traven, who came by her tent just long enough to give her the bizarre news.

I wanted her to stay behind because she’s in shock and distress, but she wouldn’t do it. I think in a way she is fooling herself and hoping that it really isn’t Don Antonio who’s been murdered.

“Traven told me not to come. He said it’s ghastly. But I have to see it and make sure Don Antonio is treated with respect. And witness everything I can. His wife is dead, but he leaves grown children. They will want to know all the details. Some arrangements must also be made for the body. It’ll deteriorate quickly in this heat.”

She shows amazing knowledge and fortitude for her age. And she’s the same as I am when I get orders I don’t agree with—told to stay away, she disobeys. She’s determined to pay her respects to her uncle and ensure his remains are treated properly. And she wants to get to the bottom of what happened and who did it. Both of us are the type who would whip the horse out from under a man with a rope around his neck if he had harmed someone we cared for.

She goes on, grim but resolved. “Traven told me the workers spotted the body on the pyramid when they were leaving his dig.”

I remember the large stone block on top of the pyramid is positioned close to the edge of the steep stairs. The reason for the proximity to the edge is simple: If it wasn’t there, people on the ground who gathered by the thousands to watch the sacrifices would not have been able to see the gory, violent act.

“Symbolic,” I mutter.

“What?”

“Someone is sending a message.”

She stops abruptly and faces me. “You know something. Tell me—
tell me now!
”

Her voice is controlled, but she is close to hysteria.

“It’s nothing, Gertrude, just those crazy thoughts I get.” I take her arm and continue to walk.

“Nellie, stop it. Please tell me what you know about Don Antonio or who would want to kill him. Something has been going on with you; that’s apparent. What you say isn’t going to hurt me. He is—was—a lovely man, very kind to me, a friend of my father at university ages ago, but I barely knew him. I met him for the first time in El Paso. I’m grateful for his hospitality and horrified that something terrible has happened to him, but he’s not family to me.”

That is pretty much how I had sized up her relationship with the consul general. “I don’t know anymore about his death than you do, but you’re right, it’s time I told you what I do know. It all goes back to Howard, the old prospector on the train, who had some sort of map leading to Montezuma’s treasure.”

“But Don Antonio said the maps are a joke. You can buy them for a peso.”

“Well, Howard’s wasn’t a joke.” I stop and lock eyes with her. “Look who has gathered here at Teo. Frederic Gebhard says he’s in Mexico to buy horses, but he immediately heads for Teo and doesn’t appear to be in any hurry to leave. And the cowboys are definitely the type who rustle more cattle than herd them. They’re roughnecks and gunfighters.

“Something else struck me as strange. The cowboys have come here with a heavy-duty hauling wagon drawn by big workhorses—and it’s not even half full of their gear, saddles, bedrolls, and the like.”

“Things that don’t weigh much,” she adds. “I saw it, too. Are you suggesting its purpose is to haul away Montezuma’s treasure?”

“The notion has occurred to me. Gebhard also has one of the world’s finest collections of Aztec artifacts. Can you imagine what a sensation the golden disk would be? The gold value alone would be astronomical.”

“That man Thompson.” Gertrude gets us walking again. “Do you think he’s in on it?”

“I’d bet on it. He claims to be a border patrol agent investigating whether Gebhard is buying expensive horses in Mexico and paying minimum customs fees by calling them workhorses.”

Gertrude scoffs. “And he followed Gebhard all the way to Mexico City? And managed to befriend the millionaire and world-famous actress along the way—when Lily and Gebhard weren’t even on the train with us? Not to mention Thompson’s rather vulgar personality. We’d be ruddy fools to believe that one. They had to have had something going between them before they left El Paso.”

“I agree. I think that the prospector had enough proof to interest Gebhard. Whether he went to the rich New Yorker directly or was steered there, I don’t know. Considering that the prospector wouldn’t have made a good impression, it was probably Thompson who approached Gebhard with the idea of getting the golden disk. It takes money to get everyone to Teo and pave the way for the treasure back across the border, and Gebhard would have it.”

“Do you think Don Antonio found out about the scheme and has been murdered because he tried to stop it?”

I avoid her eyes.

“Tell me, Nellie. Please, no secrets.”

“Okay, but remember, this is all guesswork. If you’re going to take a treasure of historical significance out of Mexico, you would need the help of an influential Mexican official to give you the necessary paperwork.”

“So Don Antonio was in on smuggling the treasure out of the country.”

I take a deep breath. “Gertrude, I’m just putting two and two together. Thompson’s a border agent on the American side. Don Antonio was the consul general at the place where the artifact would most likely have to be slipped through. From what I’ve heard, the notion of an official being paid for things that are unscrupulous is not unheard of in this country.” A polite way of saying her old family friend was a typical bureaucrat collecting “the bite.”

“
Mordida.
My father said that Don Antonio bought his position as consul at El Paso. The only reason he would have wanted to leave Mexico City for that miserable little place would have been because it was profitable. You’re right. You’d need a Mexican official to provide the export permit and an American customs official to pass it through as something besides a priceless treasure stolen from the Mexican people.”

Pieces to the puzzle fit together: the source of the money to finance the scheme, a tough gang to get it to the border, the officials on each side of the border to grease its way across.

We walk in silence until we are nearing a wagon where a group of men have gathered at the foot of the pyramid.

Workers from Traven’s dig are carrying down the pyramid steps what appears to be a make-do stretcher composed of long tree limbs tied together to hold a body that is wrapped in a blanket. Their progress is slow because the steps are narrow and steep.

Traven is coming down behind them. He looks in our direction and raises his hand in greeting.

“Why cut out his heart?” Gertrude asks me, choking on her words. “You called it ‘symbolic.’ What did you mean?”

“Remember what you told me back on the train about the Cult of the Jaguar? How the cult arose after the conquest to protect Aztec treasures and drive out the Spanish?”

“That was hundreds of years ago.”

“Look at the villagers we’ve seen. Off the beaten track, they don’t live much differently than their forebears did over the centuries. Most of them still have Aztec looks because their blood is pure. And some of them don’t act too different, either.”

I tell her about my encounter with La Bruja.

She looks at me in horror. “You think this witch thought Don Antonio knew where the treasure was and tortured it out of him? Or killed him by performing some bizarre ritual? Feeding the gods?”

“La Bruja struck me as a local terror who had the audacity to try to grab me, a foreigner, but I don’t see her as trying to intimidate a man of Don Antonio’s stature. I have the feeling there is something else going on here. I’ve sensed an undercurrent of malevolence since I arrived. I think some of it has surfaced.”

I tell her about the difference between the jaguar mask on the train and the one I’d seen after confronting Traven over the mule.

“So one looked like a carnival prop and the other looked real?”

“Not real, at least I hope it wasn’t. But different. Infinitely more menacing. Much more like the were-jaguar images created during Aztec times and before.”

I think about it for a moment, trying to focus my thoughts on what I had seen. “I don’t believe there are men who can change into jaguars in Mexico any more than I believe there are European werewolves. But I have to say, there was something truly spooky about the thing in the bush. I felt danger down to a chill in my bones when I saw it.”

We close in on the people at the bottom of the pyramid and I whisper to Gertrude. “There’s also another possibility we have to consider. If there was a falling-out between Don Antonio and a gang of thieves, his coconspirators might have killed him in a bizarre way to throw suspicion on La Bruja or whoever else is carrying on Aztec traditions in Teo.”

She stops and meets my eye. “Nellie, if you are correct, either an ancient cult has started murdering again or one or more of our traveling companions is a murderer. Has it occurred to you that we are a long ways from the city and surrounded by people who are all conspiring to steal a national treasure?”

“It has occurred to me.” I just didn’t want to think about it.

56

Thompson, Gebhard, his coachmen, and half a dozen other men I take to be local villagers are standing by the wagon that is waiting for the body. Another carriage, which I assume to be Traven’s, is also here.

Roger is here, too, off to the side. It strikes me that he never has shown a connection to the other Americans in Teo. I’ve never seen him speak to any of them.

Maddox, the foreman of the cowboys, comes up from behind us with Sundance. They are on horseback.

“These ladies should be sent back to camp,” Maddox says. “This is no business for women.”

“This is my business and I’m not leaving,” Gertrude says. “Neither is Nellie.”

“Suit yourselves.” He leans over his horse and spits out an ugly brown wad of chewing tobacco. “But don’t expect me to pick you up if you faint.”

Sundance gives me a grin. He’s chewing on something, too. He maneuvers it to between his front teeth to show it to me: gum.

When the men and stretcher reach the ground, Travis instructs them to put it on the back of the wagon.

“I want to see it,” Gertrude says.

“No, you don’t,” Traven tells her.

“I appreciate your consideration, but it is my duty to identify the body and report to his family. We also have to discuss transportation arrangements. It needs to be transported back immediately. I’ll need the coach and a wagon to carry the body.”

Gebhard clears his throat. “Actually,
el presidente
loaned Lily and me—”

“Sir, you can come with me, or you will have to make other arrangements. My uncle is a high government official and I’m sure the president would not want his body packed on a donkey.”

Good girl! I wonder how Gebhard would like running a donkey back to Mexico City.

Traven addresses both Gebhard and Gertrude: “There are coaches in the area that can be used, including mine.”

“Have the police been informed?” Gertrude asks him.

“Not yet. There’s a constable about half an hour from here. I’ll send a man to notify him.”

He pulls down the cover from Don Antonio’s face. I take in a sharp breath as Gertrude gasps.

His body is shockingly gray except for blood smears and a gaping wound on his chest—a wound big enough for someone to have stuck their hand in and pulled out his heart while it was still beating.

The body is quickly re-covered.

“Does anyone know how this happened?” I direct my question to Traven. “Any witnesses?”

He shakes his head no. He looks grim, even depressed. No doubt the murder of Don Antonio will probably result in his dig’s being shut down.

“A couple of my workers spotted it on their way home from the dig. They never saw anyone around and never went near the body. I went immediately out to investigate and was staggered to find Don Antonio.” He wipes sweat off his forehead with his handkerchief. “It’s shocking to have found anyone, but seeing someone I know…”

“Has it ever happened before? Someone being killed like this?”