"The hand'll heal. Till then, you can shoot." He smiled, remembering. "I couldn't see much of what happened, but I saw the result. Brought the f.u.c.king heat, primo." heat, primo."

Happy shook his head. "I can't go back to the trailer. Don't wanna risk running into Tia Lucha. Don't want to explain, don't want any naggy f.u.c.king bulls.h.i.t, I just-"

With his good hand, G.o.do reached across the s.p.a.ce between them, touched Happy's wounded arm. The sleeve was crusty with dried blood. "She's at work."

"I can't look after you."

"I don't expect you to."

Happy felt like he was swirling down a drain. "You can't leave a note for Tia, neither. You leave a note, she'll just go off, you know how she does. Better she doesn't know."

G.o.do turned away, looking out at the barn pocked with bullet holes, the gra.s.sy hills beyond, the lurid downshaft of light. He began to whistle a gentle tune and after a second Happy recognized it, "Cancion de Cuna," a lullaby Roque had practiced d.a.m.n near to death when he was first learning guitar. It used to drive G.o.do bats.h.i.t. Funny, him thinking of it now.

G.o.do said, "They tell you in basic that, first time you're in combat, you're gonna experience this thing called battle distortion. Time comes to a stop. Or you see things so clear it's like they're magnified or some s.h.i.t. Maybe all of a sudden your memory goes blank. Some guys hallucinate, I f.u.c.king kid you not. Nothing like a squaddie with a SAW tearing up s.h.i.t that isn't there. But I had none of that. I had this weird disconnect between sight and sound, I could see okay but my hearing cut out, not entirely, but like I'd plugged up my ears real bad somehow. And in that, like, silence I heard the tune I was just whistling, the one Roque used to play. And you know what? It calmed me down. I told myself I wasn't gonna die, I couldn't die, I had to come home, tell Roque what'd happened. I had to come home for Tia and your dad. I didn't feel so scared then."

Happy remembered the ambush on his convoy, the numbness he didn't recognize as blind terror till after. He hadn't thought of the family at all. That only came later, death and its lessons, wanting to make things up to the old man, wanting to do good by him, show him he understood now, the sacrifice, the love. "Why tell me this?"

G.o.do turned, eyes like stones in the hamburger face. "I know you don't want me along, Pablo. But you can't leave me behind. Not with this." He presented the wrapped hand. "And no way I'm doing time, not on Vasco's ticket. Bad enough these scars, the f.u.c.king leg. But I was the one who got you sent away the first time. I can't face your old man again, tell him one more time, Hey Tio, your son's f.u.c.ked, guess who's to blame." He reached out again for his cousin's arm, laid his hand gently near the wound. "We'll meet up with your dad and Roque in some cantina before they cross the border, one last boys' night out, all of us together. We'll figure out if this haji haji friend of yours is for real. Right?" friend of yours is for real. Right?"

He withdrew the hand and slapped the old Ford's dash, lifting a whisper of dust.

"Come on, cabron cabron. Drive."

THE FOUR OF THEM ARRIVED ON THE BUS A LITTLE AFTER SUN-DOWN, caked with road grime, wobbly from hunger and thirst but with fewer bug bites than the last crossing. They took turns in a bathroom upstairs, splashing water around, faces, torsos, armpits, while Beto made it clear they were stopping only momentarily. They needed to make Juchitan as soon as possible; from there he'd know which route they would take north through Oaxaca and beyond.

Given Tio Faustino's exhaustion, Roque again a.s.sumed driving duties, Beto taking the seat beside him, the other three in back. He suffered a vague wish to say goodbye to Julio but he realized the sudden vanishings of strangers from Arriaga would be nothing new.

Checking his rearview, he saw the three of them-Samir, Lupe, Tio Faustino-in uneasy slumber, Lupe leaning against Tio Faustino's shoulder, her head sliding vaguely toward his chest, while his uncle protectively circled an arm around her shoulder. Roque felt grateful the two of them had grown closer, at the same time secretly wishing it were him back there.

They reached Juchitan a little before midnight and Roque was surprised by its sprawl. Beto gave him directions away from the old center of the city to a more industrial district near the bay, but before they veered too far afield of the nightlife they pa.s.sed several bars where astonishingly large women, dressed elegantly in traditional traje traje, sat in chatty cl.u.s.ters at outside tables, fanning themselves in the lamplight. Taking stock of one particularly hefty mamacita mamacita wearing a ballooning green pleated skirt, a white wearing a ballooning green pleated skirt, a white huipil huipil, even a mantilla, Beto chuckled. "You don't know about this, I'll bet. This town is famous for its h.o.m.os. There's like three thousand muxes muxes-that's the Zapotec word-who live here. It's a matriarchal society, queer sons are considered good luck, as long as you only have one. Mothers like them because they don't marry and go away. They're usually good earners too. And because virgin girls are still prized down here as brides, a lot of guys pop their cherries on muxes muxes."

He directed Roque into a nest of warehouses near the water and finally down a dark callejon callejon to a nameless bar. Opening the pa.s.senger-side door, he said to keep the motor running, he wouldn't be long. Roque switched off the headlights, threw the transmission into park and slid down in his seat, watching as Beto pulled back the bar's narrow tin door and vanished inside. to a nameless bar. Opening the pa.s.senger-side door, he said to keep the motor running, he wouldn't be long. Roque switched off the headlights, threw the transmission into park and slid down in his seat, watching as Beto pulled back the bar's narrow tin door and vanished inside.

A weather-worn poster for Zayda Pena, a singer, was tacked up to the bar's outside wall. Roque recognized the name from news reports. She was one of a dozen or so musicians on the grupero the grupero scene, Mexico's version of country-western, who'd been murdered the past few years. Some of those killed had recorded scene, Mexico's version of country-western, who'd been murdered the past few years. Some of those killed had recorded narcocorridos narcocorridos, ballads touting the escapades of drug lords, a surefire way to p.i.s.s off rivals. None of the murders had been solved. As though to drive that point home, somebody'd shredded the poster with the tip of a knife to where it looked as though a giant cat had come along to sharpen its claws on Zayda's face.

Glancing over his shoulder, he caught Lupe disentangling herself from Tio Faustino's arm, stretching, yawning, finger-combing her hair. You're such a sap, he thought, mesmerized. At the same time he realized he could be looking at the next Zayda Pena. You pay for the company you keep. And yet when somebody walks up, says he loves your act, tells you he wants to bankroll you, turn your dream into your future, knowing as you do how hard you've worked, how few musicians catch a break, how many give it up or lose their way, is it really such a sin to say yes? Is it really a sign of virtue to shrink away, turn down what, for all you know, is the last real chance you'll get?

The door to the bar opened again but it wasn't Beto who emerged. A wiry man with a burdened slouch and artfully slicked-back hair stepped out into the street and rummaged a cigarette pack from his hip pocket. As his match flared, Roque got a glimpse of his features: less Mayan, more mestizo, with strangely bulging eyes like the clown Chimbombin.

But that wasn't the troubling part. This wasn't California. The guy didn't need to step outside to grab a smoke.

Roque eased his hand toward the gearshift, ready to slam it into drive, leave Beto behind if need be, waiting for the bug-eyed stranger to make a sudden move.

Beto strode out of the bar and past the other man without a glance. The pa.s.senger door opened, the overhead light flared on, the door slammed shut. He just sat there in the dashboard glow for a moment, his exotically handsome face a mask.

Finally: "They've got checkpoints all over the inland roads. Strange. Usually they focus on one, the others are clear, switch it around every few days. We have to keep on the coastal route all the way through Oaxaca, past Puerto Escondido."

It took a second for the name to register. Roque said, "That's where the boats run by El Chusquero-"

"Tell me something I don't know." Beto leaned over, checked the gas gauge, then glanced up and finally noticed the bug-eyed man with the greaser hair. "What's this t.u.r.d want?"

Finishing his cigarette, the stranger tossed down his b.u.t.t, crushed it with his boot and shuffled back inside the bar.

Tio Faustino edged forward. "You think that gangster-Captain Quintanilla, El Chusquero, whatever he's calling himself today-you think he has something to do with closing down the inland roads? Maybe he's paid somebody off. Maybe he has connections inside the military here, or the police. There could be somebody waiting for us up ahead."

Beto stared at the bar's tin door. "No. f.u.c.king coincidence, that's all. Bad luck." Reaching his arm out the window, he slapped the side of the door hard three times. "Come on. Let's move it."

A FEW MILES OUTSIDE OF TOWN THEY ENCOUNTERED THE INFAMOUS wind, notorious for jackknifing trucks. The barrancas below were a graveyard, Beto said, not just the semis but the cars they dragged with them over the cliffs. Tio Faustino took the wheel. Despite a hairy sideways jolt now and then, he kept the Corolla on course, whistling under his breath to soothe his nerves, then asking Lupe to keep him awake with a song or two. Stirring herself from her inwardness, she resorted to the usual repertoire, "Es Demasiado Tarde," It's Too Late, coming first, sung sotto voce, almost a whisper, then "El Camino," The Road: De lejos vengo yo a verte a conseguir lo que quiero Aunque la vida me cueste.I've come from far away to see you to get what I long for Even if it costs me my life They pa.s.sed through Salina Cruz hours before dawn but the city was already stirring, the refineries bristling with light, bakery trucks roaming the streets. The road out of town followed the coastal hills for miles, the winds again rocking the car back and forth as Roque huddled against the door, trying to grab some sleep.

As they pa.s.sed a dirt lane a pair of headlights flashed on, then a pickup eased out onto the road behind them, followed by a second pickup trailing the first.

Beto turned around in his seat, looking back through the rear window. "If you can pick up speed," he told Tio Faustino, "it might be a good idea."

Samir wiped at his nose with the back of his hand, a fear reflex. Lupe glanced over her shoulder, her face both brightened and shadowed by the oncoming headlights. Following her eyes, Roque could make out the silhouettes of men standing in the first pickup's truck bed, clutching the railing along the sides with one hand, weapons in the other.

Tio Faustino accelerated, taking the switchbacks fast and tight, hoping to lose the pickups that way-they'd have to slow down at each sharp turn or risk losing the men holding on in back. But even with his best efforts, come every straightaway the two small trucks made up lost ground, though the second seemed to lag seriously behind the first. Finally the crack of gunfire, bullets whistling past.

"You gotta outrun them to the next roadblock," Beto told Tio Faustino.

"How do I do that? How far-"

"I don't f.u.c.king know"-Beto pounding on the dash-"just go."

The highway dropped toward the beach and they pa.s.sed into a sudden ma.s.s of fog. Tio Faustino braked, cranked down his window, leaned out to see the course of the pavement, guiding himself that way as he tried to maintain some speed. The road rose again suddenly, curving inland, the fog thinned and he hit the gas, hoping this was his chance finally to gain some real advantage. Then the road hairpinned back toward sh.o.r.e, he touched the brake as he entered the turn then accelerated, hugging the curve, only to see through the mist, once the road straightened, the outline of a something ma.s.sive in the middle of the road. He got out the words "pinche putos" "pinche putos" before everyone slammed forward from the impact and the cow barreled over the hood, shattering the windshield with the sound of an exploding bomb, continuing over the roof. The car fishtailed, careening off the road in a spin and nearly tumbling over as the wheels dropped into a rock-strewn culvert just beyond the asphalt, slamming hard to a stop. Every head snapped in recoil. Tio Faustino's face came away from the steering wheel b.l.o.o.d.y. before everyone slammed forward from the impact and the cow barreled over the hood, shattering the windshield with the sound of an exploding bomb, continuing over the roof. The car fishtailed, careening off the road in a spin and nearly tumbling over as the wheels dropped into a rock-strewn culvert just beyond the asphalt, slamming hard to a stop. Every head snapped in recoil. Tio Faustino's face came away from the steering wheel b.l.o.o.d.y.

Beto brushed off shards of gla.s.s with one hand while the other slammed the door, "Go! Go! Go!" But Tio sat there dazed, blood streaming from his nose, a deep gash along his cheek.

Gathering his wits, Roque said, "I'll drive," but he barely had his car door open before the first pickup cleared the bend. The cow's carca.s.s remained twisted across the road, the driver turned sharp to avoid it, almost tipped over, then overcorrected and this time sent the small truck tumbling, the men in back still aboard as the thing went over, crushed before they could jump free. The pickup rolled over and over, ending with its wheels in the air. An eerie stillness followed, just hissing steam, the wind rushing through the hillside gra.s.s, the surf below.

Jumping from the Corolla's backseat, Samir called out, "Their guns."

Beto and Roque followed, edging toward the truck, checking to see if anyone still alive might shoot. Only two of the men seemed conscious, they both moaned horribly. The other three, two in the cab, one on the road, were badly bloodied and still. There were two rifles scattered across the road, Samir picked up one, Beto the other, while Roque checked inside the cabin to see if either of the two trapped men were alive. Neither had worn a seat belt and they both lay tangled between the dash and their seats, b.l.o.o.d.y and dazed and frosted with shards of broken gla.s.s. Roque checked for weapons, saw none, then from behind Samir edged him aside. Lifting the rifle to his shoulder, the Iraqi fired two rounds point-blank into each man's skull.

Seeing the look on Roque's face, he said, "Better them than you," then headed for one of the two men sprawled out on the asphalt. "Or am I wrong?" There was an almost feral indifference in his eyes. "There's another rifle around here somewhere. Find it before the second truck shows up."

Near the Corolla, Lupe was tending to Tio Faustino, still dazed, head lolling on his shoulder, and she dabbed at his facial wounds with the corner of her shirt while Samir, with Beto looking on pa.s.sively, a.s.sured himself the remaining three men from the truck were dead, an insurance round to each skull. Roque felt like he might get sick, then caught the shrill grind of the second pickup downshifting into the bend. He scoured the ground, looking for the rifle Samir was sure lay somewhere nearby, while the Arab took up position in the middle of the road, shouldering his weapon.

The second pickup rounded the curve and Samir opened fire, at the same time circling quickly toward his right, the truck's left, leaving the cone of the headlights and making himself a moving target while aiming at the driver, head shots with his first two rounds, then taking on the men in back who'd begun to return fire. Roque, on his hands and knees, continued his frantic search of the ground until Lupe screamed, the sound torquing his head her direction. She stood there against the Corolla, trying to hold Tio Faustino up as he slid down the fender to the ground, shuddering visibly as he clutched at the blood streaming from his throat. Please no, Roque thought, while Beto-standing in the road between Roque and the car, firing away-had his head jerked back suddenly like he'd been head-b.u.t.ted, then he dropped hard to his knees, eyes glazed, brow furrowed as though he were contemplating some impossible thought, a portion of his skull drilled open just above the eye.

Roque knelt there paralyzed until Samir shouted, "Help me, grab a gun, shoot, shoot, f.u.c.king h.e.l.l ..." The Arab continued moving through the darkness in the same wide circle, muzzle flash like a flaming spark in the night. He'd picked off two of the gunmen in the truck bed, the third clung to the railing with one hand, the other clutching his shoulder. The man still alive inside the cab was shooting wildly out his window on the pa.s.senger side as the pickup drifted on, its driver dead. Roque lunged toward Beto's body-it lay in a strange lump, folded forward, as though he'd fallen asleep in the middle of a prayer-and pried the rifle from his hands.

He'd never held a gun before, never aimed one, never fired one. How hard can it be, he thought, raising it to his shoulder, aiming vaguely toward the pickup's windshield, pulling the trigger. The noise was ear-splitting, the b.u.t.t plate bit into his shoulder and ricocheted hard against his jaw even as the weapon almost jumped out of his hands. He nearly tumbled flat but collected his legs as the bra.s.s sh.e.l.l casing pinged against the blacktop. Jerking the weapon back to his shoulder, he re-aimed, forcing himself to ignore the bullets whistling past, willing himself not to look at his uncle or Lupe, not now, not yet. Following Samir's example he began circling to his right, crouching as he pulled the trigger, once, twice, again, aiming toward the pickup cabin, not seeing faces, just shapes, firing over and over with no idea if he was. .h.i.tting anything and then the rifle clicked helplessly. He was standing to the side of the pickup, dazed, his entire body cold with sweat. Only then did he notice the quiet: no gunfire. Just Lupe's m.u.f.fled sobs, the moans from one or two of the gunmen and once again the ocean wind, the swaying hillside gra.s.s, the surf below.

He threw down the rifle and ran to his uncle while the two-tap reports of Samir's coups de grace punctuated the stillness.

Holding his uncle's head in her lap, Lupe pressed hard against the wound, blood seeping up between her fingers as she murmured frantically, "No, no, no "No, no, no ..." A tourniquet was out of the question, no way to tightly bandage the wound and stay the bleeding without cutting off his air. His eyes rolled back behind fluttering eyelids, a mindless twitch in his hands. ..." A tourniquet was out of the question, no way to tightly bandage the wound and stay the bleeding without cutting off his air. His eyes rolled back behind fluttering eyelids, a mindless twitch in his hands.

-Here, let me, Roque said, nudging Lupe's hand aside, seeing the wound for the first time, lit by the glow from the pickup's headlights, an inch-long rip in the flesh of the throat, black and wet, the bullet having sliced an artery, the blood a throbbing stream. Only then did he see how soaked through Lupe's jeans were. He reached around the back of his uncle's neck, felt for the exit wound, fingered a tear in the skin twice the size of the one in front, the blood pouring out. He tried to press against both wounds at once but his uncle's eyes glistened whitely, his breathing was shallow, his skin waxy and cool. Lupe wept faintly, her face smeared with blood where she'd wiped away tears. She began whispering, "Lo siento," "Lo siento," I'm sorry, over and over and Roque whispered that it wasn't her fault but she merely shook her head, closed her eyes and pounded her head with her fists. I'm sorry, over and over and Roque whispered that it wasn't her fault but she merely shook her head, closed her eyes and pounded her head with her fists.

Samir approached from behind, dragging the b.u.t.t of his rifle against the pitted asphalt. Roque looked up over his shoulder into the Arab's face.

"We need to get him to a hospital."

"There isn't time." Samir's voice was soft and sad and strangely peaceful. "Pray for him. That is what he needs from you now."

Roque felt it then, the slackening of his uncle's musculature, the stillness in his chest. Lupe's whimpering grew louder, her eyes pressed shut and she pounded at her head even harder until Roque reached up, took her wrist.-Don't.

-He was so kind to me.

-He wouldn't want it.

He felt Samir's hand in his armpit, snagging a fistful of cloth, pulling him to his feet. He had to fight off an impulse to swing around, leading with his elbow, catch the Arab square in the face. What would that atone? Their eyes met. Samir said, "I need you to help me."

"You're quite the killer."

"I told you, I was in the army. Now-"

"My brother says the Iraqis were p.i.s.s-poor shots. You were like-"

"Your brother doesn't know everything. Now come, I need your help."

Roque wiped his b.l.o.o.d.y hands on his pants and followed Samir toward the second pickup, still relatively intact. He smelled the lingering stench of cordite, the salt off the ocean.

Samir shuddered from exhaustion. "We'll load the bodies into the Corolla."

"Why?"

"Set fire to the car, let them think it's us."

Roque turned toward a sudden rustling sound. Beyond the headlights' glow, he caught the vague outline of a zopilote zopilote rucking its wings as it planted itself on the edge of the kill zone. rucking its wings as it planted itself on the edge of the kill zone.

Turning back to Samir: "They'll figure it out sooner or later, the other truck-"

"It will buy us time. We're going to need it."

They set to work, dragging bodies from the truck, shoving them into the car, tossing in Beto too, a filthy business all around, the blood, the p.i.s.s, the gore, the s.h.i.t-men don't die in real life like they do in the movies, Roque thought. Twice, he needed to stop, walk to the edge of the road, hurl. Then they heard the distant grinding of gears, the whine of an engine downshifting into the approaching turn. A truck was coming. Samir took one of the rifles, waved Roque and Lupe out of sight, then knelt by the back of the second pickup, waited for the headlights to appear. He fired twice into the air. The truck lurched to a stop, the hissing shriek of brakes, the clatter of gears-the driver backed up, his rig vanishing back beyond the turn.

"Hurry," Samir said. "He may have a shortwave, a cell phone."

They finished packing the car with the dead, stopping at five, then collected their own few belongings from the trunk. Samir found a jerry can of gas behind the rollover pickup's pa.s.senger seat and he doused the Corolla while Roque and Lupe dragged Tio Faustino's body to the intact pickup and laid him out in the truck bed, covering him with a tarp they found bundled up there. Using matches he scoured from Beto's pocket, Samir set the Corolla ablaze, then collected all the weapons lying on the ground, tossed them in the back of the pickup under the tarp with Tio Faustino's body, jumped in at the pa.s.senger-side door and said, "Drive! Now!"

They were beyond the first bend when the Corolla's gas tank blew, the roar deafening and the plume of flame reaching high into the predawn darkness, rendering in harsh silhouette the intervening hills with their s.h.a.ggy crown of windblown gra.s.s. The buzzard rose into the sky, fleeing the fireball, visible only briefly at the edges of the rippling light. Roque pushed the truck as fast as he could, peering past the two holes in the windshield, a spiderweb pattern surrounding each one, reaching over when he could to console Lupe, telling her again it was not her fault, there was nothing she could do, until finally she fell still and sat there, staring out through the same shattered windshield.

IT WAS LUPE'S IDEA TO STOP AT THE CHURCH.

They'd driven for an hour, daybreak brightening a cloud-jumbled sky, but once they pa.s.sed the village of Barra de la Cruz they knew trusting their luck any longer was foolhardy. The Bahias de Huatulco lay ahead with their tony resorts; sooner or later they'd reach a checkpoint and it wouldn't much matter who manned it, the police or the army, vigilantes or paramilitaries, not with the ambushers' weapons and Tio Faustino's body in the truck bed.

The sign for the church pointed up a steep and rutted dirt lane shaded by majestic ceibas with their hand-shaped leaf cl.u.s.ters, the peaks of the Sierra Madre del Sur in the distance. There was a notice posted beneath the sign, a declaration from the local archbishop, warning of a con man working the area, impersonating a priest and performing sacred functions-confessions, deathbed absolutions, baptisms, even weddings-for a fee. Atop the hill, the church sat in a clearing surrounded by cornfields-a short steeple lacking a cross, walls the yellow of egg yolks, wood shutters painted an electric blue. Shaped differently, Roque thought, it might have pa.s.sed for an Easter egg.

Lupe gestured to Samir to let her out.-Let me talk to the priest.

Samir didn't move.-What will you tell him?

Her face was weary with grief.-I'll say we got attacked by bandits along the road. We have someone we need to bury. He was a good man ... good man ... She trembled, choking something back.- She trembled, choking something back.-He deserves to buried by the church, he deserves to be blessed and prayed for.

-Look at you. Samir eyed her blouse, her jeans, caked with dried blood.-He'll think you're crazy. Worse, he'll think- With the fury of a child, she began slapping at his head, his chest, his shoulder.-Let me out, a.s.shole. Now. Out of my way ...

Samir obliged, if only to escape the indignity. She slid across the seat into the gathering sunlight and stormed off, even her ponytail clotted with blood. Samir slid his hand around his face, chafing the stubble, eyeing her as she climbed the wood-plank steps to the church's front doors. They were locked. She rattled them hard, testing to be sure, then ventured around back, to an add-on section that looked as though it might be the rectory. A modest cemetery lay beyond.

As she vanished around the corner, the Arab leaned his weight against the pickup's open door, as though only that were keeping him upright.

"We can't drive this truck much farther." Roque checked the gas gauge, an eighth of a tank remaining, but that wasn't what he was getting at. "We get to a roadblock, it won't just be the bullet holes we have to answer for. Even if we bury my uncle's body here, ditch the guns-"

"You seriously want to continue without weapons?"

"The worst is behind us."

"Says who?"

"The truck's registered in somebody else's name. That alone, boom, we're done. And for all we know those men we killed were police, military, someone else we'll have to answer for."

Samir squinted against the dusty wind. "All this I already know."

"Fine." Roque opened his door, dragged himself out from behind the wheel and stretched his legs. His clothing, too, was crusted with dried blood. Turning to the truck bed, he checked the tarp covering the weapons and Tio Faustino's body, tugging at the corners. He lacked the nerve to peek underneath. "Since you already know everything, solve the problem."

"We'll catch a bus at the nearest town up the road, head for Mexico City. We'll catch another bus there for Agua Prieta."

"We're sitting ducks on the bus. If those really were cops back there, soldiers, paramilitaries, whatever, word will spread. They'll be looking for us everywhere. On a bus we have nowhere to run."

"You asked my solution, I gave it to you. You don't like it ..." He shrugged.

"We can call Victor, back in Arriaga, he might-"

"Who does he know we do not know ourselves? I bet he was bought off. They probably want his skin because we are not already dead."

"You think he betrayed his own, betrayed Beto."