Down Among the Dead Men

2

They drove out to the desert in Ainsworth’s F-150, a couple of dusty red dirt bikes chained to its bed. Ainsworth had taken one look at Vargas’s rusted ten-year-old Corolla and offered to drive.

“It’s these goddamn long legs,” he said. “I need all the room I can get. Besides, I don’t really want to leave these bikes out here.”

Vargas didn’t mind. He figured he’d save on gas, and Ainsworth had said the truck was air-conditioned, a luxury the Corolla hadn’t been blessed with. It was late October, but the Southwest was in the middle of a massive heat wave, and by the time Vargas had reached the cafe this afternoon he’d been drenched in sweat.

He rode up front with Ainsworth, while the son, Junior, sat in the extended cab behind them. Junior was a lean, twentyish version of his old man, but there was something seriously off about the guy. He spent a lot of time staring at nothing and spoke about as much as he ate. The few words he had said had been accompanied by a loopy half-there smile as if he were hooked up to an invisible morphine drip.

Ainsworth, on the other hand, seemed to enjoy talking.

“Me and Junior get down this way just about every couple weeks. Nice to get out of Paso, you know? Just load up the bikes, hop in the truck, and drive.”

“Why Chihuahua?” Vargas asked. “There’s plenty of desert up in Texas.”

Ainsworth shrugged. “Something about this place, I don’t know, everything’s slower down here. Everybody pretty much minding their own business. Never in a hurry to get in your way.” He paused. “Besides, you can’t beat the price of that sweet Mexican chocho. Right, Junior?”

“Chupamelo, mamacita,” Junior said.

The words, which roughly translated to “ suck it, baby,” surprised Vargas. Junior seemed too simpleminded and innocent for such a vulgarity, let alone in Spanish.

Ainsworth, however, chuckled, glancing at his son in his rearview mirror.

“Your mother was still alive, she’d wash that mouth out with industrial-strength Ajax.” He looked at Vargas. “You’ll have to pardon my boy’s manners.”

“I’ve heard worse,” Vargas told him.

“And I’ve probably said it. I gotta admit I haven’t been the best influence on the kid. Took him to his first whorehouse when he was fifteen. You shoulda seen how big his eyes got when he saw all them cute little bare-assed chiquitas lined up just for him. I swear to Christ it took him longer to make up his mind than it did to do the deed.”

“Slow draw, quick trigger,” Junior said. “That’s what Big Papa told me.”

Ainsworth summoned up a deep, lusty laugh this time.

“That I did, Son. That I did.”

Twenty miles down the highway, they took the turnoff past a battered, bullet-riddled road sign that read: DUNAS DEL HOMBRE MUERTO. Dead Man’s Dunes. Vargas thought this was both ironic and appropriate, considering what the Ainsworths had found here.

A narrow dirt road took them to an abandoned PEMEX gas station that looked as if it hadn’t seen business since the early sixties. The windows had been boarded up decades ago, the plywood now gray and dilapidated, covered with layers of crude spray-painted graffiti written in both Spanish and English. puta and joto and fuck were featured prominently.

Ainsworth pulled onto the asphalt next to the pumps and killed the truck’s engine.

“This is it.”

He gestured beyond the station to a wide expanse of beige, dusty earth, dotted with dunes and yellowing desert scrub. Nothing unusual. You could find miles of the stuff from here to Texas.

What set this particular piece of land apart was the house that sat in the distance. The one that had been featured on the local news and in the Chihuahua newspapers just two months ago, a crumbling adobe box with broken and missing windows and only half a roof.

Despite the heat, Vargas felt a faint chill. And a small tug of excitement.

“Take me through it,” he said to Ainsworth. “Step by step.”

“That should be easy enough. Right, Junior?”

But Junior wasn’t listening. He was staring at the house, his dopey smile gone. He looked as if someone had just ripped out his soul.

“I wanna go home,” he said.

“Come on, now, Son, we talked about this.”

“I don’t care,” Junior said. “I wanna go. Now. I don’t like this place. I don’t like it at all.”

Ainsworth showed Vargas a tight smile.

“Boy hasn’t been right in the head since the crash. Caved in half his skull. Almost joined his mama in the morgue.” He returned his gaze to Junior. “I told you, Son, I’m not gonna let you pussy out on me. We made this man a promise and by God-”

“It’s not that big of a deal,” Vargas said. “He can wait for us here if he wants.”

Ainsworth turned sharply. “Did I ask you to butt in?”

“I’m just saying, if he doesn’t feel comfortable…”

“If God had put us on this planet to feel comfortable, Pancho, we woulda all been born with La-Z-Boys stuck to our hindquarters.”

Vargas stiffened.

“The name is Ignacio,” he said. “I told you that. Most people call me Nick.”

“Fine, Nick. But we’re doing you a favor here, so I’d appreciate it if you didn’t try to get between me and my own goddamn son. He may be a half-wit, but he’s twenty-two years old and it’s about time he grew some motherfuckin’ balls.” He eyed his rearview mirror. “You hear me, Junior?”

Junior didn’t answer, lost somewhere inside his own head.

“You hear me?”

“I wanna go home,” Junior said. “What if they’re still in there?”

“Who?”

“Them people. The dead ones.”

“Now why would you think that?”

“I seen ’em. Laying there all shot up. They kept looking at me with them dead fish eyes.”

Vargas expected another flash of anger, and was surprised when Ainsworth softened, a genuine warmth in his voice.

“Listen to me, Son. You’re mixed up, is all. I promise you, they’re not around anymore.”

“How do you know?”

“The Mex police came and tidied the place up, remember? We were here when they came.”

Junior thought about this a long moment, looking thoroughly confused; then the sun slowly rose somewhere inside his brain, shining light across the memory.

He nodded. “They asked us questions.”

“That’s right,” Ainsworth said.

“And I didn’t say nothin’ wrong.”

“Right again. You made your papa proud.”

“And they put all them people in big black bags, threw ’em in the back of a truck.”

“Every single one of ’em. And we’re here to show Mr. Vargas what we found and where we found it. He’s gonna write you up in a book, make you famous. What do you think about that?”

Junior’s smile returned.

“Like Elvis the Pelvis?”

“Just like Elvis,” Ainsworth said.