Tortoise Soup (2 page)

Wildlife smugglers and traders don’t share my delicate sense of what gives a critter its charm: reptiles are the species
du jour
when it comes to the illegal trade. A poached rattlesnake can fetch up to four hundred bucks, while scorpions bring in a quick seventy-five smackers. Even chuckwallas, the most common lizard in southern Nevada, will ring in at one hundred thirty greenbacks apiece. The mastermind who was operating this scam clearly had it down to a fine science, turning a fast buck by cleaning out the buckets every few days.

I straightened up and watched the phantom pickup disappear in a cloud of dust over the distant mountains, as the last scorpion to be released scuttled under a rock.

My stomach growled, reminding me I hadn’t eaten breakfast yet. Getting back in the Blazer, I plunked myself down only to curse out loud as my rear end hit the blistering-hot seat and my fingers sizzled against the steering wheel. A tiny antelope squirrel seemed to chuckle in response as it scampered over a rock, trailed by a red-tailed hawk eyeing the critter for a quick breakfast McNugget.

I turned the key in the ignition and the Blazer groaned in protest. I had inherited the vehicle from the last agent assigned to these parts. He’d survived a full six months before calling it quits. Rumor had it that his breaking point came when he found himself stuck in the desert with no bathroom and a bad case of overindulgence in chili. All that’s known for sure is that he turned up in the hospital that day with a dead rattlesnake in one hand, its fangs firmly attached to his butt, and a letter of resignation in the other hand. I was the latest replacement.

I’d requested a transfer from my first job as a rookie wildlife agent in Slidell, Louisiana. I felt the change of scenery might do me good. Actually a change of senior resident agent was more like it. I’d begun to chafe under the southern-fried wisdom of my boss, Charlie Hickok. When I’d asked for a transfer, Charlie had hit me square between the eyes with his I-taught-you-everything-you-know routine.

“Goddamit, Bronx. I just broke in your scrawny ass. Who knows what they’ll send me next?”

The fact that he viewed my ass as scrawny almost made me decide to stay. But I also knew that the man would say whatever it took to avoid the trouble of breaking in another rookie.

I held firm against Charlie’s tactics and applied for a place bigger than a duck blind and dryer than a bayou. I should have known there would be a catch. There was none of the shit-kicking, boot-stomping, wolf-yelping “How dare you ask for a new assignment?” that I expected from the upper echelon of the Service. Rather, the old boy network of Fish and Wildlife honored my request in their own inimitable way: I quickly found myself transferred to Las Vegas.

I could live with that. It has bright lights, like my hometown of New York, and almost as many porno theatres. Besides, the median age in Las Vegas hovers at around seventy-four. I like that. It tends to make me feel young. Las Vegas also comes alive at night, giving me an endless array of places to go when my routine insomnia kicks in. The only problem is that the wildlife in town is of the human variety.

Getting onto I-15, I headed south in the direction of Searchlight. The sky was the kind of blue that makes you feel the earth is topsy-turvy, like the sea is over your head instead of under your feet. The El Dorado range stood off to the side, the mountains protruding like the spine of a giant prehistoric beast slouching its way toward Mexico.

So far, the best thing about being out here was the speed limit. Seventy-five miles an hour in the slow lane and cruising. I had already developed a game where I’d see how far and how fast I could go before even catching sight of another car. More often than not, I’d glance down at the speedometer to find myself flying down the road at one hundred miles an hour, singing with Bonnie Raitt at the top of my lungs.

When Bonnie wasn’t warbling the blues, the garnet and onyx rosary beads that were slung around my rearview mirror played their own tune, counting off time like a metronome. Each click of the beads reminded me of its original owner, Jake Santou—a homicide detective with the New Orleans Police Department. If there’s anything I’ve learned from my past it’s that the more attracted I am to a man, the more trouble I get myself into. I was head over heels where Santou was concerned. I had needed to gain some distance and allow myself to come up for air. The problem was, I hadn’t expected to miss him so much.

The rosary beads clacked together in a frenzy as I suddenly slammed on my brakes.

Searchlight is just a pimple on the map, like most towns in Nevada. If you’re driving too fast, there’s a good chance you’ll miss it. Once again I almost had. Named after a popular brand of match, it was a booming gold-mining community in its heyday, with forty-four mines and a dozen saloons. Now it’s a one-horse town consisting of a few streets dotted with the occasional shack and an array of broken-down motor homes. Ironically, the main drag is named Broadway. But unlike the Broadway of New York, with its neon lights and razzmatazz pace, the primary landmark in this town is a white mobile-home trailer, which houses both the courthouse and the justice of the peace. Holding that position is a lot like a game of musical chairs. Each new justice of the peace inevitably dips his hand into the communal till. And just as in the game Monopoly, he or she lands in jail. The turnover is amazing, even by New York standards. Yet oddly enough, it seems to be a necessary step in making one’s way up Nevada’s political ladder.

Harold Ames, the town historian, gave a stab at explaining it to me one day. “Some of our most prominent politicians have done time around here. It’s sort of a badge of merit.”

Considering the fact that the town is only an hour from Vegas, it somehow made sense.

Shifting into reverse, I backtracked and pulled into the Gold Bonanza, the only place in town to grab a bite to eat. A large neon sign flashed its $1.99 breakfast special, and there were enough cars and pickups to make you think they were giving food away. But in Nevada, there is no such thing as just a restaurant. The Bonanza was part casino, part coffee shop, and part karaoke bar. I’d also discovered the food was only partly edible, but I was rarely, if ever, given the opportunity to eat.

Opening the door, I was immediately enveloped in a cloud of smoke as I squeezed past the crowd at the slot machines, already busy at eight in the morning. The
ching, ching, ching
of slots swallowing coins accompanied the rumbling of my stomach as I pushed my way over to the hostess, Lureen. A relic who’d been working here as long as the Bonanza had been standing, Lureen had to be at least seventy years old. It seemed to be the required age to obtain employment in the place. Lureen’s scrawny arms poked out of a sleeveless tiger-striped top. This morning her legs, the width of small chicken drumsticks, were encased in bright purple spandex pants. Rhinestone eyeglasses matched dangling earrings, while her hair, tinted cotton-candy pink, was swept up in a creation that defied definition.

I received my usual friendly greeting. “We’re full up.”

And as usual, I looked out at a sea of empty tables. “I see a table over there.”

Lureen took a deep drag on her cigarette, blowing the smoke out through her nose in a slow, steady stream as she contemplated me through her force field of rhinestones. “It’s reserved.”

I tried my best imitation of Little Orphan Annie, only to remember why I had given up my career as an actress in the first place. “Come on, Lureen. I’m starving this morning. How about an exception, just this one time?”

Letting loose a deep, phlegmy cough, Lureen wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Listen, kiddo, why do you keep coming in for the abuse?”

“Heck, Lureen. It reminds me of home. Besides, you keep calling me kiddo. Who can resist that?”

Lureen crushed the butt of her cigarette into a coffee container while she reached into her breast pocket and removed a pack of Marlboros, the official cowboy cigarette. Taking her time, she flicked open a lighter encrusted with knockoff garnets and pearls. The fresh cigarette twitched between her lips in anticipation of that first lung-wrenching gulp of smoke.

“Don’t matter what I call you, kiddo. We’re still full up.” Plucking at her hair, she pulled out what appeared to be a dead fly that had become enmeshed in her heavily lacquered helmet. “You keep coming back like a bad case of heartburn, girl. You’re lousy advertising for our place. Do yourself a favor and eat somewhere else.”

I knew it was a hopeless battle. As a Fish and Wildlife agent, I tend to be looked upon with all the affection given pond scum. Of course, there’s a reason for that—one with four legs, a hard shell, and a neck with as many wrinkles as Lureen.

It all started when the desert tortoise landed on the endangered species list. Biologists claim the critters are dying because of stress from rampant development, grazing, and mining. Locals argue that God just decided it was time to do them all in. What it’s led to are restrictions on federal lands where the tortoise exists—which is just about everywhere in southern Nevada.

Except nobody tells a cowboy what he can do. Certainly not the damn government.
Especially
not some greenhorn girl from back East. It’s been war ever since, with me as the latest target.

I felt a body brush past me and watched as Clayton Hayes seated himself at one of the open tables. A local rancher, Clayton had recently sold his land to an environmental group, which turned around and converted it into a tortoise refuge. While the sale had made him the richest man in town, it hadn’t changed his contempt for environmentalists one damn bit.

Clayton dressed as if he were still out riding the range. A plaid shirt and dust-bitten jeans were his daily uniform. Old, scuffed-up boots declared that he was still a cowboy at heart, even if some secretly whispered he’d gone soft and sold out. His face and hands, a rich, dark brown, were as tough and resilient as cowhide from years of working outside in sun, sand, and dry wind.

Walking over to Clayton, I pulled out a chair and sat down.

“How you doing, Clayton?” I asked, plunking my elbows down on the table.

Hayes gave me a sidelong glance before spitting a hunk of rancid tobacco into his water glass to create a brown sludge. “Go to hell, Porter.”

“I’ll buy you breakfast.” I had learned the fine art of bribery in Louisiana. Besides, I figured $1.99 a pop wouldn’t break the bank, meager as mine was.

But Clayton wasn’t taking the bait. “You better save your pennies for that plane ticket of yours back home. Unless you want to hang around and join us for our barbecue, that is.”

Invitations didn’t come my way all that often. I decided to forego common sense and take the plunge. “What barbecue is that?”

“When we set the desert on fire and roast all these damn tortoises out of here.” Clayton slapped his knee and broke into a cackle. He spat another slug of tobacco into his glass, and the liquid balanced precariously on the rim before sliding down onto the table to form a thin puddle of mud.

My stomach rumbled again, this time from the stench of chewing tobacco. “Better be careful, Clayton, or I’ll have to cite you for polluting a public place.”

Rolly Luntz, another local with a grudge, sauntered over to join in. Having retired after working forty years in construction, Rolly had become a resurrected cowboy. Today he was garbed in a denim shirt and jeans complete with a belt bearing a fist-size silver and turquoise buckle. High-heeled, pointy-toed boots that definitely weren’t made for walking gave him more swish than swagger. Topping off the ensemble was a cross between a cowboy hat and Abe Lincoln’s stove pipe chapeau. He was determined to look like a cowboy if it killed him. If he wasn’t careful, it might.

“Hey, Rachel. Do you know how to get a tortoise off the road when it’s crossing?” Rolly asked, a grin sneaking to first base across his face.

This just wasn’t my day.

“If you catch ’em just right with your tire, they’re like a hockey puck. You can shoot ’em straight across the road.” Rolly chortled, his grin sliding to home.

This was the latest joke in a popular local game known as tortoise tiddlywinks.

“That’s very clever, Rolly. Your jokes are getting better,” I said in an attempt to improve cowboy–federal agent relations.

Rolly grinned in delight at the praise. “Heck, Rachel. I got another if you like.”

I held up my hand, cutting him off at the pass. “That’s okay, Rolly. I’m trying to limit myself to one laugh a day.”

“Hey, Rolly. I’ve invited Porter to the barbecue we’re having. Why don’t you tell her what’s on the menu?” Clayton asked with a wicked gleam in his eye.

Rolly tucked his thumbs inside the waistband of his jeans and made an effort to puff out his chest. “It’s gonna be real good this year, Rachel. What we’re having us is a whole lineup of crispy critters, including some rigor mortis tortoise and shake ’n bake snake.”

“Don’t forget about our chunk of skunk and swirl of squirrel,” Clayton chimed in.

But Rolly wasn’t to be outdone. “Yeah. And there’s our smear of deer and poodles ’n noodles.”

The two men convulsed into a fit of the giggles.

“That’s great, boys. I wouldn’t miss it for the world. I especially want to be there so that I can serve you up something real special after I land your rear ends in jail. How about a helping of three-hundred-and-sixty days Hayes along with a serving of twelve-months Luntz? Sound good to you?” I asked.

The two men stared at me a moment before breaking out into a roar of laughter. Rolly pounded on the table with his fist, causing Clayton’s lethal concoction to spill over. The river of tobacco juice made a beeline directly for my lap. Jumping up out of my seat, I decided to forsake a down-home western breakfast and opted instead for my regular: a cup of coffee, a bag of barbecue chips, and a Snickers bar to go. If possible, my eating habits have gotten worse: my idea of good nutrition now is Taco Bell Lite.

But before heading out, I went to the pay phone to check the answering machine at work. I entered my code, and a mechanical voice with all the warmth of Lureen informed me that I had one message. The call was from the Desert Tortoise Conservation Center just outside of Vegas.