The Return: A Novel (51 page)

*   *   *

Marder saw the punch coming and took it, not bothering to duck or slip the blow. It knocked him down and he struck his head, a violent blow against the tiles. Would this be the event that awakened Mr. Thing? Part of him hoped so; how tedious this waiting around had become! He thought of the line from
Ulysses
: she lived as if every moment were her next. Something his mother used to quote, and there she was in that Persian lamb coat she wore in the winter time, always with a little hat. She was playing gin rummy on Newkirk Avenue with Mr. Thing, at a folding card table in front of St. Jerome’s church. Marder was happy to observe that this experience was living up to what everyone said: you would see all those who had gone before, and the white light, and there would be the welcoming figure, Jesus or whomever, and that would be it, the beginning of the next great adventure, and here Mr. Thing looked up at him from his cards and threw them down, and his mother said, There was the king I needed, and, looking up at Marder, said, Look at the time! You’ll be late again, Ricky.

Marder opened his eyes and murmured, “Late again,” and looked into the face of Pepa Espinoza, and at other faces looking down at him, a circle of brown faces, all with worried looks. So—apparently not just yet.

*   *   *

Somewhat later, up on the roof terrace, Marder held a plastic bag of melting ice to his jaw and surveyed the situation on the causeway. The Templos had begun to stoke their troops with crank now and had launched one furious assault with crude Tovex grenades and a charge of massed automatic weapons. The Felizistas had managed to beat it back, but one PKM was destroyed, and four more men had been killed. Marder doubted they would come down the causeway again, at least not without another heavy vehicle to lead the way. He had six HEI rounds left and half a belt of 12.7 ammunition. He had men filling oil drums with fertilizer and fuel oil. He thought the Russian grenades they had would act as detonating charges, and he had an idea that they could place the drums on either side of the gate and blow them when the next narco-tank, or whatever, came through. And then what? They could keep building narco-tanks and he could not make the means to stop them, not indefinitely.

Except for the ache in his jaw, Marder felt numb, stunned, wrapped in invisible batting. Skelly was gone, it seemed; he’d taken Lourdes in the boat and disappeared, along with the three Hmong. The sky pressed down on him like the slats of a tiger cage; he couldn’t do this, not without Skelly, and he kept scanning the horizon, half expecting his friend to return with a wicked grin on his face, saying it was one of his jokes. He couldn’t get his mind around the occurrence: he felt the way he had when they told him his wife had died.

“Why?” he asked. “I don’t get it.”

Pepa Espinoza replied, “He’s an unstable homicidal lunatic. I know you cared about him, but his relationship to you was not a regular sane human relationship. I think you projected a lot of your good qualities onto him—kindness, responsibility … all that.”

“Pepa, forgive me, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. He was my friend, from when I was not much older than Lourdes. I can’t believe he just walked off in a fucking huff because I sort of lied to him about a girl.”

“Yes, and I wish I had a hundred pesos for every time I’ve had this conversation with a girlfriend. How
could
he have? I told you before—it wasn’t pals between you, old army buddies hanging out. It was a romance. You paid attention to a pretty girl. He took that girl. Because he loved her? Of course not—because he thought you might, and to show who was in control. You wanted to defend this land and the people on it, and he helped you. Because he gave a shit? Of course not—it was because it made you depend on him, need him. Now you break the rules, you lie to him to help the girl escape, and what happens? He acts like a hysterical betrayed
chingada
; he punches you out and takes off. See how well you do without him, that’s the message. It’s an old story, Marder, maybe the oldest story. It’s in the
Iliad
, for God’s sake.”

“The
Iliad
, huh? Maybe you’re the one who’s jealous.”

“
¡Ay chingate!
What am I doing here, talking to a man who won’t listen? Again, it’s exactly like talking to an abandoned woman, but the difference is that your
pendejo
friend really
is
essential to your survival.”

“You think so?”

“I know it. You didn’t see him down there when they attacked on the beach, but I did. My God, I have the most incredible video on the battle. They must have sent a hundred and fifty men against our thirty, and they would’ve blasted right through them if Skelly hadn’t been there. He was everywhere—exposing himself to fire, running back and forth, encouraging the men, stopping those poor kids from throwing their guns down and running away, directing the machine guns … He’s a one-man army. Are you?”

“No. Skelly is unique as a warrior in my experience. I have a different skill set. In any case, did you collect adequate footage?”

“Yes, but we don’t say ‘footage’ anymore, Marder. What is your skill set?”

“Patience, endurance, guile, and a cavalier disregard for my own survival. Wars have been won with those by people who never fired a shot. This is going to be another spectacular sunset.”

Marder looked out at the sea, and as he did he put his arm around Pepa Espinoza. She stiffened and then, after an uncomfortable moment, relaxed. It was lovely standing with her on the roof of his home and watching the sequential conniptions of the light: the scarlet, the magenta, cloud strips lighted with fire in sequence, the wonderful touches of eggshell blue still surviving amid the furnace colors, intensifying their violence, the perfect glowing ball sinking with increasing speed, throwing a red track on the metallic surface of the sea. And then the last spark gone and the whole sky suffused with a fleshy ridiculous pink, like the penultimate moment of a cosmic striptease act, after which the chaste curtain of the blue hour, twilight.

They were silent while this proceeded, and after it was over, Marder said, “I think they’ll try to come at us in the dark tonight, and if that happens I’m going to pull everyone back into the house, kill as many as I can with the claymores, and hold out for as long as I can. How long that will be depends on how the world sees what we’re doing, which means you have to get away with your story.”

“I can send it out via cellular.”

“No, you can’t. They’ve been shooting at our dish for hours. We can get local service, but I’m afraid sending a huge video file with the present equipment is out of the question. Besides, you have to be there, you have to do the talk shows, you have to collect your fame. ‘I only am escaped alone to tell thee.’ It’s a key part of the story. Also, I’d keep the khaki shirt and your hair the way it is, dusty and tangly and tied up with a bandanna. Your slightly battered beauty. You’ve even got a wound.”

She glanced at the filthy bandage on her forearm. “It’s from a rock chip. It’s nothing.”

“It’ll help sell the story and bring you international fame—lovely, spirited, brave, filthy, and suffering, just like our poor country. No, you have to leave. But before you go, there’s one favor I’ll ask of you, and it’s sort of in your line of work.”

“Ask.”

“I want you to record a meeting I’m going to have with a group of our people, late tonight, let’s say … eleven. I should be finished with what I have to do by then. And it’ll give you time to assemble your material and get it on a thumb drive for your escape.”

He hugged her and walked away without answering her string of questions.

*   *   *

It was not difficult for Marder to find, in the library of the late
abogado
Guzmán, the forms and the relevant chapters of Mexican law, which, while so often ignored in practice, retained the accessible rationality of French philosophy and the thirst for justice born of violent centuries. He worked in his office; the two men guarding their loopholes enforced silence upon themselves in deference to the
patrón.
At eight, Amparo knocked on the door and asked him if he was coming to supper. He asked for a tray, then told her to wait and wrote out a short list. He wanted those people assembled in the kitchen at eleven tonight. She looked at the list, nodded, and slipped out of the room.

The tray arrived, carried by a silent Epifania. He ate an enchilada and drank most of a pot of strong coffee. He typed, he printed, he revised and printed again. It was comfortable work with words, a memento of the life he’d abandoned, and it had a bittersweet resonance, like perusing a stack of ancient love letters. He finished just after ten-thirty, printed out copies, used some of the former owner’s creamy stationery to write out a document by hand, and descended to the kitchen.

They were all waiting for him, the big table had been cleared and scrubbed. He sat down at the head of it and bade the others sit. He’d invited the four military commanders Skelly had appointed, plus Amparo and Rosita Morales, the potter. Pepa Espinoza was there too, leaning against the big refrigerator, her camera in her hands. He regarded the faces around the table, all various shades of brown, all carrying a look of expectancy, perhaps trepidation too, but also a resistant dignity, a deep Mexican seriousness. They owed the señor a good deal, this look said, but they were not his creatures; they had fought for themselves against the
sicarios
and won, and they were wondering if they were now to lose, as their ancestors had won victories and still lost the fruits thereof. They glanced suspiciously at the paperwork he’d brought. In their experience, no good came from papers.

There was none of the joshing that always introduced an important meeting in America. Marder nodded to Pepa, who started her videocam, and began without preamble.

“In the event of my death, an event that is more likely than not given the current situation, I’ve made provisions for the survival of this community. This,” here he held up a thin sheaf, “is a document conveying the ownership of this property—house, lands, and structures—to a trust under Mexican law, this trust to be administered by seven trustees. You are those trustees. Why you? I chose the four commanders because they are men with good heads and are respected by the community, and also because I think they won’t be easily frightened. Señora Morales is here because she too is courageous and widely respected and because her pottery business brings in more income than any other. She will speak for the business interests of the community. I strongly recommend that you elect Bartolomeo Ortiz to be your chairman and Amparo Montez to be your executive secretary. Bartolomeo has been the natural leader of this community ever since I’ve been here. From what I’ve seen, he’s singularly free of corruption. Amparo, as you know, is educated; she has full knowledge of our accounting systems and is skilled with the computers and the Internet, which is going to be the basis of your prosperity. In a few days this place is going to be world famous and many people will want the things that are made here, and not only because they’re beautiful.”

He now distributed packets of papers to the others at the table. No one read what they were given. Their eyes were fixed on Marder.

“These are copies of trust documents for you to read,” he continued, “and here is a legal instrument setting up the trust itself. When it is signed and notarized, you will own this island and everything on it in trust for your families and their descendants, forever. Another document I’ve prepared is a handwritten instruction to my lawyer, ordering a transfer of certain funds to be used as an endowment for the trust, to tide you over until you become self-supporting through the work of your hands. Yet another document establishes a conservation easement, so that no big development can ever be built here. This is all I can do to ensure that this place can’t be taken from you by lawful means. You can still lose it in the old-fashioned Mexican ways, stolen by violence or wrecked by internal squabbling and envy. But at least you have a chance. Are there any questions?”

“This is an
ejido
, isn’t it?” asked Amparo.

At this well-known word, murmurs passed around the table. All of them knew the meaning of the ancient cooperative land-tenure system of Mexico, much raped and traduced but still dear to the hearts of the
campesinos
.

“Yes, that’s just what it is,” said Marder, “and in case you are wondering, in the unlikely event that I live, the trust goes through as written. I hope you will allow me to live out my days here as your guest, or you can throw me out on my ear. It’s up to you. Oh, one other thing—we will have to rely on Pepa Espinoza to carry these documents to safety, have them notarized, and tell the world what we’re doing here. My hope is that the publicity and the images she’s recorded will pressure the government to do its duty and protect us from these gangsters.”

Marder looked into the eye of Pepa’s camera as he said this.

*   *   *

Later, they were nervous with each other; neither wanted a passionate, tearful goodbye. She hugged him and gave him a formal kiss on both cheeks, as if he were a
Chilango
colleague and not a lover. “Don’t die, Marder,” she said. “I will never forgive you if you get yourself killed.”

“The same goes for you,” he said. “Do you think you can find your way?”

“Of course. Around the headland, across the mouth of the river, and I should see the lights of Playa Diamante. It’s not exactly a wilderness.”

“I was thinking about the human predators.”

“Oh, they won’t stop a woman in a kayak. I’ll just smile and talk kitchen Spanish with a gringa accent. I’ll be fine.”

“Yes, you will. You’ll be a famous television journalist. You’ll have your heart’s desire.”

She slid into the kayak, pushed away from the dock, and spun the craft on its long axis, so Marder could see that she knew what she was doing.

“And is there a place in all this devious planning for Marder’s heart’s desire? Are we to be allowed to know what it is?”