Captains Outrageous

20

Next day we were out. I don’t know what Veil did, but we were out. Basically, I think it was because they didn’t have the evidence to hold us and Veil was one persuasive, smart sonofabitch. But I knew in Mexico, they can hold you anyway, so I figured some money had changed hands.

It didn’t help Billy any. He was there when we left, looking like a friendly dog in the animal shelter, hoping someone would pick him before they came with the needle.

Although Veil and I had known each other for years, in an off and on sort of way, I couldn’t quite figure Jim Bob being in Mexico. We weren’t bosom buddies. Me and Leonard had only met him once before. But he’d apparently taken a liking to us, or maybe he was just bored with hogs, or owed Charlie a favor.

All I knew for certain was once, when the chips were down, and my balls were literally on ice, Jim Bob saved my life. It was a tense situation, punctuated with gunfire and death. But the way Jim Bob acted, you would have thought he had shown up to have a manicure and a massage.

I don’t know I’d vouch for it being true, but Charlie once said Jim Bob was so cool and tough he made Leonard look like a sissy.

One thing for certain, those two ever went at it the sparks would fly so high and hot the moon would catch on fire.

We gathered at a table in the hotel where Jim Bob, Veil, and Charlie were staying. Charlie and Jim Bob were sharing a room. Veil had one of his own. That’s the way Veil is. On his own. Even when he was with you he was on his own.

We bought some food at a cafe, had it wrapped, brought it up to the hotel. Tamales and fish stewed in some kind of sauce, tortillas and sodas.

We ate while we talked.

“So can we go home?” I said.

“Sooner the better,” Veil said, eyeing me with his good eye. The tan Armani suit he was wearing looked as if it might have been previously worn by one of Jim Bob’s hogs. “Mexican law officials have a way of changing their minds.”

“Or they run out of the money you gave them,” Charlie said.

“So money was paid,” I said. “Jim Bob, was it you?”

“Why the fuck would I do that? I don’t even know you.”

“Oh.”

“It was Charlie,” Veil said.

“Sorry, Charlie,” I said. “It’s just you’re so tight with money I wouldn’t have guessed.”

“Yeah,” Charlie said. “It was my money, and I’m missing it already. I had plans for it. I was gonna do some work on my trailer. Maybe get me a blow-up fuck doll and a refrigerator with an ice maker.”

“They’re nice,” Leonard said. “John’s got one.”

“A doll or a refrigerator with an ice maker?” Charlie asked.

“The refrigerator,” Leonard said. “You got me, you don’t need no blow-up doll… Besides, those male dolls, the dick doesn’t hold air worth a damn. And the balls collapse right away.”

“Don’t suck so hard,” Jim Bob said. “Besides, Charlie gets one, he’ll want a ewe or a heifer. Right, Charlie?”

“Eat shit,” Charlie said.

“Thanks again, Charlie,” I said. “Seriously, we appreciate it.”

“Jim Bob paid for the rooms,” Charlie said. “I only go so far.”

“Thanks,” Leonard said.

“Shit,” Jim Bob said, “I didn’t have nothing to do. Divorce cases lately, and I’m sick of that. I had to sneak around last week and take photos of a fat husband cheating on his fat wife, and he wasn’t even porkin’ some kind of blond bimbo. Had him another porker. It was like I was back at my place, sittin’ in the backyard watchin’ the hogs fuck. Gettin’ that on film, that was ugly. I think there ought to be some kind of law against it.”

“I think there is,” Veil said.

“What the hell were they doin’?” Leonard said. “Fuckin’ out in the open?”

“They had them a picnic spot,” Jim Bob said. “I’d tracked them to it before. It was night. They thought they were safe. But I have an infrared camera. I snuck up on ’em, first I thought two hot air balloons had come down in the park and were bouncing together. But nope, it was just two really fat, ugly people.”

“Your friend, Veil, here,” Charlie said, “you owe him some money too. He put up some of the air flights.”

Veil grinned at me. It was the kind of smile barracudas are famous for. I knew he didn’t want the money, but he sure wanted to make me think he did. It was his idea of a joke. Veil didn’t travel in humor circles much so he kind of laughed at what amused wolves.

“So you all helped us,” Leonard said.

“I brought everygoddamnbody,” Charlie said. “I didn’t have any idea what you two morons might be into. It’s usually pretty deep shit. Actually, I think you got out easy this time. They could have held you until Mexico had a solid economy. In other words, for life.”

“And I want you to know it’s appreciated,” Leonard said. “On the other hand, that appreciation is going to have to go a long goddamn ways. I haven’t got any money to pay you back with. Hap does, though.”

I sighed. “Yep. And it seems to be disappearing faster than sweat on an Eskimo’s lip.”

“I don’t believe they call themselves Eskimos anymore,” Charlie said. “They’re Inuits. Eskimos is not an accepted term anymore.”

“Yeah,” Leonard said, “and the name of the black race isn’t nigger anymore either, but I still hear it.”

“Actually,” Charlie said. “Black is passe. You are now an African-American.”

“Charlie,” Leonard said. “You can kiss my woolly black African-American ass.”

We got transportation to Cancun up the way, flew out of there that afternoon, caught another flight in Mexico City, then headed to Houston Intercontinental. Veil didn’t go with us. Next thing we knew he was gone. We neither saw nor heard him slip out. He was at the airport with us one moment, then he wasn’t.

It didn’t worry me. That’s the way he operated. Showed up when you needed him, disappeared like the Lone Ranger. Or the Patched Ranger in this case.

Veil had his own agenda.

The flight from Cancun made me sick. It was a prop. It was all we could get. It bucked and weaved and threatened to strike the ground. Out of Mexico City it was a jet and a better flight.

Charlie and Leonard sat together, along with a red-faced man in a plaid jacket that liked to talk. I could hear him all the way in the back of the plane where I sat next to Jim Bob. Or almost next. The seat between us was empty. It was occupied by Jim Bob’s hat.

I talked to Jim Bob about the events that led up to Beatrice’s death. I figured I owed him as much of an explanation as possible, considering he’d left his hogs at home with a farmhand and had come all the way down to Mexico to help spring us.

I said, “They let us off easy as they did, I guess they feel certain we didn’t do it? You talked to them. Do they have any idea who did it?”

“No. They sort of like your blond friend for it, but they don’t sound real convinced. I speak damn good Spanish, amigo, and believe me I quizzed them. I’m always curious, even if it isn’t any of my business. Especially if it isn’t any of my business. They just think you guys are gringo assholes down there for Mexican poontang. They think Beatrice was whoring. Did you know she was a call girl?”

“What?”

“That’s right. An expensive one. Or at least had been.”

“Are you positive?”

“According to them. They say they knew her. But, keep in mind, those boys might lie to an old cowboy.”

“Drugstore cowboy.”

“Hogs may not be cattle, but they got to be tended to.”

“I can’t believe it.”

“Really, hogs are a lot of work.”

“I mean about Beatrice.”

“Oh, well, as I said, that’s what I was told. Said she usually worked pretty high-end, but in the last few years they hadn’t heard from her. Then this. They think she tried to pull a trick, pick up a little extra, got the wrong man, someone who wanted more than a ride in the tunnel, and he did her in.”

“Did they say why?”

“Because he wanted to. Bad hombre.”

“So they don’t really think Billy did it?”

“Being honest, I’m not sure what they think.”

“Yeah, they were fairly inscrutable.”

“I hate to perpetuate a stereotype, but those fellas were about as crooked as a dog’s hind leg. Enough money and they’d think Walt Disney did it.”

“He’s dead.”

“See what I mean.”

“I guess it could have happened that way. But it would have been just what Beatrice feared. This Juan Miguel.”

“Yeah. It could have been revenge against her father.”

“What I’d like to know is where in hell was Ferdinand.”

“The police would like to know too. That way they could pistol-whip him and have him explain a few things. I reckon you guys weren’t Americans, you’d have gotten the bad end of a rubber hose. Irritating the American consulate, though, is not something they like. Pees in the tourist water.”

“Ferdinand took off? That seems odd, considering what happened to his daughter.”

“Maybe he could see the handwriting on the wall, Hap. He knew this Juan Miguel would want him next, and him being killed wasn’t going to bring his daughter back, so he took off in his boat.”

I stewed over these revelations the rest of the way to Houston. At the airport, we caught a shuttle to airport parking. We rode back to LaBorde in Jim Bob’s near-thirty-year-old, blood-red Cadillac, festooned with curb feelers. Inside, fuzzy dice and baby shoes dangled from the mirror, and on the windshield were silhouettes of dogs and people with slash marks through them.

“You fix this car up like this?” Leonard said. “Or is it some kind of punishment you got to bear?”

“This sonofabitch can outrun the Concorde,” Jim Bob said.

“But does it stay on the ground?” Leonard asked.

“Sometimes,” Jim Bob said.

“Jim Bob,” Leonard said. “Thy middle name is class.”

“Veil ride down with you guys?” I asked.

“Nope,” Charlie said. “I called him, and he just sort of showed up at the jailhouse in Mexico. How long you known that guy?”

“Long enough,” I said. “I don’t see him that often, but trust me, he’s aces with me.”

“Seems it’s the same with him,” Charlie said. “I called him like you said, said you were in trouble, and he didn’t even wait to find out what kind of trouble. He said, Yes, and where is he?”

“He’s kind of an asshole, actually,” Leonard said. “But he’s an asshole worth having on your side.”

“You’re an asshole,” Charlie said.

“I know,” Leonard said.

“You too,” Charlie said to me.

“I know.”

“Don’t even say it, Charlie,” Jim Bob said.