Dillinger - Jack Higgins [35]
Dillinger set her on her feet gently and a woman moved out onto the steps and gathered the child to her. 'Juanita, how many times have I told you?' She looked up at Dillinger. 'My thanks, senor.'
She was a slender woman with greying hair and a black dress buttoned high to the neck. She wore no jewellery and her face was lined and careworn, the eyes moving ceaselessly from place to place as if she was continually anxious about something.
As Dillinger removed his hat, Rivera appeared on the porch. He stood there looking at his wife, saying nothing, and she took the child by the hand and hurried inside.
Rivera turned to Dillinger. 'I'd intended coming with you to the mine, but there are matters I must attend to here first. Rojas is already there. He'll show you over the place. I'll be along later.'
He went back inside.
Too bad, Dillinger thought. If he'd known, Rose could have driven with them instead of taking the horse. She could have sat between him and Fallon up front, her left thigh against his right thigh.
Dillinger drove away, following Fallon's directions up out of the valley. The heat was increasing. He could feel the sweat from his back soak through his shirt.
Finally, they came over the crest of a hill and saw a valley below. Dillinger had seldom seen a more dismal sight in his life. There were perhaps twenty or thirty crumbling adobe houses with a dung heap at one end and what appeared to be an open latrine running straight through.
There was a well in the centre of the village and a woman was in the act of lifting a pitcher of water to the ground as they approached. She was in an advanced state of pregnancy, her belly swollen. She paused, obviously tired, and Dillinger got out of the car.
He took the pitcher from her and said, 'Donde su casa?', surprising himself at the bits of Spanish he had picked up by just listening.
She pointed silently across the street. He walked before her and opened the door. There was only one room and it had no windows. It took several moments for his eyes to become accustomed to the half light. When they did he saw an old woman stirring something in a pot over a smouldering fire. A few Indian blankets in the corner were obviously used for bedding, but there was no furniture. He put down the pitcher, his stomach heaving at the smell of the place, and went outside.
'That place isn't fit for a dog to live in,' he said as he climbed back into the car. 'Isn't anyone doing anything for these people?'
'Rose does what she can. So does Father Tomas. He's the best friend they've got, but they're like zombies. Rivera has the men doing a fourteen- or fifteen-hour day. They're worked so hard they don't give a damn about anything anymore.
Rose's horse was tethered beside a buckboard outside a house at the other end of the village and Dillinger braked to a halt.
'Is the mine far from here?'
'Just over the rise, three or four hundred yards.'
'You walk on up. I'll join you later.'
Fallon trudged away up the street and Dillinger approached the hut just as Rose, hearing the car, came out. She looked tired and pale and there was sweat on her face. Dillinger took the canteen from the Chevrolet and handed it to her. 'You don't look too good.'
'There's not much air in there, that's all.' She poured a little water into the palm of one hand and rubbed it over her face.
'Who's inside?'
'Father Tomas. I'd like you to meet him.'
Dillinger followed her in. The place was exactly the same as the other, the room half filled with acrid smoke from the fire of dried dung. A man lay on a filthy blanket in the corner, an Apache woman crouched at his feet.
A white-haired old priest sat beside him on a small stool, gently sponging the damp forehead. Dillinger leaned closer. The skin on the man's face was almost transparent, every bone clearly defined. He was obviously very ill.
The priest clasped his hands together and started to pray, his face raised to heaven, a single shaft of sunlight through the smoke hole lighting upon the white hair.
Dillinger made