The Return: A Novel (33 page)

Major Naca was silent for a moment, perhaps thinking of what this might be, then he smiled—not the tight official grin he’d been using but a far more boyish and charming expression. “Well, I would like this campaign to succeed and to reap honors and promotion. I am in intelligence, and promotion is very slow in intelligence.” He tapped the colored insignia flashes on his uniform that supported his major’s star. “They think we are all
maricónes
in intelligence, and the very
macho
guys who run the army don’t trust us. But I would like very much to be a colonel. Could he arrange that, do you think?”

She smiled back at him. “
Narcoviolencia
suppressed? Consider it done. But, really, there’s something I’ve been wondering. Why exactly is it so hard to round up these guys? I mean, they’re pretty open, and surely it shouldn’t be that hard to disrupt their operations, the meth labs and all that, when you have essentially a free hand.”

“Oh, we round them up all right, but their soldiers are easily replaceable from our infinite supply of
ni-nis,
and the leaders are in deep hiding. And, of course—”

“Servando Gomez isn’t in deep hiding. He spends all day in the back room of Los Tres Hermanos in the middle of Playa Diamante.”

“Yes, I know. And if I launched an assault with heavy weapons on that cantina, I might be able to kill him, along with a few dozen civilians. The problem is that shooting a leader is nothing. Another leader arises and is challenged and then there’s even more violence. If we could sweep all of them into a football arena at once, that would be wonderful, but we can’t, and soldiers are not undercover cops, after all. We can chuck them out of a town or village that they’ve taken over, but when we leave they come back and suborn or terrify the local police. Also, Mexico is always on the verge of an insurrection of some kind, and we are close to such a tipping point now, with all this violence. More than forty thousand people dead—and it would not take a lot to turn this country into something more like Afghanistan, with drug gangs posing as popular movements controlling big swaths of country. Some might say we’re there already.” He let out a self-deprecating laugh. “This is why I don’t pursue a career in the tourism industry. I have a deep pessimism of my native land.”

“
No importa madre
,” she said.

“Just so. But one does what one can.”

Statch couldn’t think of anything to say to this but had a strong sense, almost a déjà vu, that so far every single man she’d liked, sexually or not, had evinced this attitude toward the generally crappy mess mankind had made of the world. She now became aware of a private soldier standing at attention a few feet behind Major Naca, waiting to be noticed, hesitant about moving into his superior’s field of view while he was putting the make on the gringa, a situation apparently not covered in whatever passed for the Mexican Soldier’s Guide.

She motioned to the man, who trotted forward, saluted, and informed the major that brigade was on the radio and wanted to talk to him immediately. Naca dismissed the private, who saluted again and disappeared.

“I must go now,” the major said. “It’s been a pleasure, this conversation, and I hope to have another—that is, if you are staying in the area.”

“I will be here for a while, I believe. And I would hope so too.”

He reached into his tunic pocket and brought out a leather-covered notebook.

“Here is my card. Please call me at any time.”

She took the card and smiled. A charming smile from the major in return. She extended her hand; he took it, kissed it, and turned to leave then back to face her again, now no longer smiling.

“There is one thing I should tell you, in the nature of ‘lie down with dogs, get up with fleas.’ Do you know who Salvador Manuel García is?”

She did not.

“Well, then, you know who Melchor Gabriel Cuello is. El Cochinillo?”

“Yes, I do.” She felt a brief chill and a strong desire to tell the major about what had transpired in the street near the market, but she suppressed both.

“Then you must know he’s not a pleasant fellow, but he does have friends, of a sort, and the closest of these friends is Salvador García. For the past month or so, Señor García has been trying to seduce Lourdes Amparo, perhaps with success, perhaps not. Our intel goes only so far. But I’m sure he’s heard the rumors about Lourdes and your father, and he’ll not be overly concerned whether or not they’re true. The world must acknowledge that the girl is his to take. Quite to one side is the possibility that, having seen the big world now and having this splendid opportunity before her, she might not be as interested in a provincial villain with a grade school education and a short future. García has not been brought up to deal well with rejection. Perhaps you should be on your guard.”

“Thank you. I’ll tell my father,” she said. For an unknown reason she felt like weeping for an instant, but this passed. She said, “‘Mexicans, at the cry of war, make ready the steel and the bridle!’”

The major sang the next lines of the national anthem in a fine baritone: “‘And may the earth tremble to its core at the resounding roar of the cannon!’” Then he departed, still singing.

*   *   *

Marder awoke from his siesta that afternoon to what sounded like automatic-weapons fire. He fumbled for his pistol, slipped into huaraches, and was halfway down the stairs before he correctly identified the percussive bangs as coming from nail guns. He recalled Statch asking him about buying a compressor and guns to speed up construction, and he must have agreed. Or maybe Amparo had asked him. He was not sure who was in charge of what anymore, and that was fine with him. He was not running a corporation, precisely, but something older and more Mexican. He imagined that the
latifundistas
of old, including Chole’s ancestors, had dealt in this way with the details of the vast estates.

He descended to the kitchen and had a few words with Evangelista, the cook, who pressed on him a glass of cold fresh orange juice. He drank it, smiled, said it was good; she beamed in delight. Everyone was happy when the
patrón
was happy. Marder could see how easily corruption might seep into the soul through this pleasant path, until one became a petulant monster, and resolved yet again that this would not happen to him.

He went toward the small room at the back of the house that Amparo used as her office. When he walked in, she was talking on a landline phone and peering at a laptop screen, looking very much like an executive. But when she caught sight of Marder in her doorway, she immediately became a servant again, terminating her call abruptly and standing up, awaiting orders.

Marder sighed. He had no talent at this, navigating through the fogs of class and status. Chole had done it naturally, but he did not; they didn’t teach that in America, because in that nation class had to be concealed behind a scrim of hypocrisy—the waiter, the domestic, the nanny; were they not all equal, all pals?

“You don’t have to stop what you’re doing and stand up when I come in, Amparo. I’m not the president.”

She sat down, obedient; the mask dropped and she waited passively for his command. He asked her what she was doing, and after a few moments the intelligence lit up in her face again and she enthusiastically described how she was working with Statch to set up a website for the Feliz co-op and establish accounts to sell goods via Etsy. The nail guns were apparently in use to set up a prefab warehouse and office. When Amparo finished this account, Marder complimented her work and asked if she knew where Don Eskelly and Statch were now.

She pointed upward. “They’re in the tower, installing the cell-phone machine with the man from Telmex.”

They were indeed. The man from Telmex was a pudgy pale-for-a-Mexican fellow in a short-sleeved striped shirt, a big-knotted tie, and—was it possible?—a plastic pocket protector and rack of pens. He was in the small tower room with Carmel and Skelly and a collection of gray metal cases wired to one another and to the tower above. They were deep into techland and not happy with Marder’s interruption. He motioned to Skelly, who came out to the terrace.

“What’s going on?”

“We’re rolling good. We should have service supremo by dinnertime.”

“Who’s the guy?”

“José from Telmex. He’s being very helpful. Statch’s nerdar lit up the minute he walked in, and, as for him, he’s putty in her hands. He says no problemo, there’s line of sight between us and a Telmex array up on the nearest ridge of the Sierra. You can just about see it from here. So we’re fine.”

“Does Telmex know about this?”

“In a manner of speaking. Elements of the Telmex company are aware.”

“
Elements?
What does that mean?”

Skelly made an impatient gesture. “Stop
worrying
, Marder! Everything’s been smoothed out. I mean, it’s Mexico, you know? Speaking of which, Statch ran into Major Naca out on the beach. He said Lo’s ex-boyfriend is a big gun with La Fam. He said this gentlemen has a beef with you now that you’re enjoying her luscious young body.”

“Do you think there’s any way we can suppress that rumor?”

“I don’t know. Leaflets, maybe, from a light plane. A TV ad? Or you and I could start kissing and feeling each other up in public. That, by the way, is an entirely independent rumor that’s going around.”

“Wonderful. ‘The idiocy of village life’—Marx. What’s this
guapo
’s name?”

“Salvador Manuel García.”

“We know what he looks like, I presume.”

“I’ll check, but he’s probably on Facebook.”

“I’m sure. My interests: long walks on the beach, travel, dismembering enemies. But you’ll tell your boys to keep an eye out, yes?”

“Right. And you might want to have a conversation with young Lourdes about the ‘ex’ status of Salvador. Statch thinks she might be using her new career ops to stick the knife in a little. Before that, he was the big shot offering her a boost, and now it’s she who’s going to go off and be a star. Not a good position for Lourdes to be in, given we can presume Salvador is a vengeful decapitator type of person. I’m concerned about her face, specifically.”

“We’re in a telenovela, Skelly.”

“To an extent, yes. I have to keep reminding you it’s Mexico.”

“Speaking of which, how’s the security thing going? I haven’t been keeping track.”

“Pretty well, considering it’s early days and we don’t have most of our weapons. My guys are in fair physical shape—a little underweight maybe, but that’s better than starting with fatties. They can shoot pistols, and I’m working on basic hand-to-hand. They don’t know how to move worth a shit, but that’s hard to teach. As you know. On the other hand, we’ll be on defense for a while, until…”

Marder saw that Skelly had been about to say something and then thought better of it. “Until what?”

“Oh, you know—until I can work them up a little more,” he replied smoothly. “I should get back and see if I can help Statch and José,” he added, and headed toward the tower, forestalling the inquisition that Marder clearly had in mind.

Am I the last to know anything around here? Marder thought. Are they protecting me from the burden of command or manipulating me? Is there a difference? He had a good deal of paper and computer work to accomplish, but he didn’t feel like going to his office just yet and, being the lord, he could do as he pleased. He walked down through the house and out through the grounds of the
casa
and through the gate that led to the
colonia
.

School had obviously let out and the bus must have deposited the children some minutes ago, because the street was full of kids in uniforms. Among them was Lourdes, surrounded by her court of devotees. Since the triumph of Mexico City, Lourdes had been punctilious about attending school, good as gold was our Lourdes, a girl who could keep a bargain. Marder paused and watched the girls run past, their slim brown legs flashing under hems hoisted by rolled waistbands far higher than their mothers had sewn. It was like having a flock of birds of paradise on the place, and Marder enjoyed the aesthetic pleasures of watching them, without—so far as he was aware—the lecherousness attributed by his community. One of the girls caught sight of him, and there passed a flurry of whispers and loud giggles. Lourdes, however, kept her head, did not join in the giggling, but met his eye and delivered a courtly inclination of her head, which he returned. Then they ran down the gravel path to the servants’ house.

Marder continued past that to the main street of the
colonia
. This had been graded and graveled, and a crew of men was ditching on the side of the road and laying fat white plastic piping. Marder didn’t recall authorizing any of this, but he imagined he was paying for it. No one seemed to be in charge, but the work was being done anyway. The houses along the road looked neater, less like favela shacks and more like little homes. They had put up poles for running current from the diesel generator.

As he strolled along, he noticed that the people paused in their work when they saw him and took the time to nod or wave or call out a greeting, nothing embarrassingly deferential, but they were happy and knew that it was his doing and they wanted him to know that they knew it. He recalled how similarly the villagers in Laos had responded to Skelly and the other soldiers and felt a pang. Here, too, a simple and reasonably happy life was surrounded by demons who wanted to destroy it—there politics, here greed and the need to dominate and control. Somehow he had acquired the responsibilty for preventing that from happening in this domain. In that instant he felt the true weight and a blast of pathetic self-pity: he wanted to be back in his comfortable loft, in his nice leather chair, with a thick galley his only task, a thousand pages about North Korea, so easy to grasp compared with the current tangle, and no lives at stake.

He shook himself out of this—physically shaking, like a horse, drawing looks. Moving on, he observed the start of local commerce. There was a tiny bodega selling canned goods, beer, candy, sweet drinks, and flour and a place that washed clothing and a woman with a sewing machine and a man with piles of used clothing, tires, and batteries. And a cantina consisting of a scatter of miscellaneous plastic chairs and tables, a sunshade of corrugated green fiberglass on posts, and a flush door set across oil drums, the bar.