Dillinger - Jack Higgins [50]
Rivera thought for a moment.
'I warn you,' Dillinger said, 'don't bargain with me about the price.'
'It is agreed. You can trust me, Senor Dillinger.'
'I'm not a fool, Rivera. The kid and Rose come with me to the border. They go back if I cross safely over.'
'What if Rose decides to go with you?'
Dillinger looked at Rose.
'Nachita can come with us. He can bring the kid back.'
'I accept your proposition,' Rivera said, approaching Dillinger, extending his hand.
Dillinger ignored the offered hand. 'Come on, Rojas,' he ordered. 'Let's get the guns.'
The child Juanita sat in the sand and listlessly played with an old doll, pretending not to be frightened by the Apaches sprawled around her. They were as uncomfortable with the Spanish child in their midst as she was with these strangers with painted faces. Behind them the foothills dropped steeply to merge with the desert. To the west, a great canyon sliced into the heart of the mountains.
Ortiz went up the slope above them, a vivid splash of colour as he moved through the brush. He climbed onto a pillar of rock and looked east. In the far distance he looked for the tracer of dust that he was expecting.
Below, away from the others, Chato and Cochin were whispering. Chato said, 'I know how much Ortiz hates Rivera, but now that we have killed Federal troops, it will be like war. We will be killed if we fail, and even if we win for a while, there are thousands of them and they will drive us into the mountains.'
'You speak the truth, brother,' Cochin said. 'I had hoped that with the coming of better times, to go north into New Mexico, to find some kind of work, to send my own son to school. Now all that is fleeing on the wind because of Ortiz's lust for revenge.'
'If we leave, brother,' Chato said, 'we will be deserters.'
'If we stay,' Cochin said, 'I may become an assassin.'
'Of whom?' said Chato in alarm.
Together they turned, because Ortiz had come down from the mountain.
Rose said to Rivera, 'I wanted to see you privately, uncle, to tell you that despite the angers that have crossed us with each other over the years, I am pleased that you are letting my friend try to find Juanita for you.'
'Sometimes a tragedy brings people together,' Rivera said. 'After this is over, do you plan to go north with your friend?'
'Nothing has been decided, uncle.'
'Thank you, my dear, for coming to talk to me after all these bitter years,' Rivera said.
As she turned to go away, Rivera thought, once Juanita is back in my hands, there will be no one for Rose to go north with. Dillinger will be dead and no one will miss him. Not even Rose after a time.
Rivera led Dillinger, Rose, Chavasse, Villa and Fallon to the company office, fifty yards up the street from the hotel. The sign over the door said 'Hermosa Mining Company'. He unlocked the door. The main room was furnished as an office with a desk and filing cabinets. In one corner was a metal cabinet, which when unlocked by Rivera, revealed an assortment of arms.
Dillinger pointed to an all-steel door toward the back. 'What's that?'
Fallon, who knew damn well what was behind the door, flicked Dillinger a look that said maybe he shouldn't have asked the question.
'Oh,' Rivera said, 'the gold from the mine, after it has been processed, is stored there before being shipped to Chihuahua. There will be enough in there for your fee, and Fallon's, when the time comes.'
The very way he put it made Dillinger uneasy. But he had no time for such thoughts now. On the top shelf of the metal cabinet he found his favourite weapon, the Thompson sub-machine gun. He picked it up, as if shaking hands with an old friend, and loaded it with one of the hundred-round circular magazines.
'Nice to get this back,' he said. 'I can recommend that shotgun if anybody