“Couldn’t have been that good a girl if she’s hanging with reds, no?” Elvis said. “Although I guess it matches the color of her lipstick.”
El Mago grabbed a glass ashtray and slid it to the center of the table. “Do not be overly amusing today, Elvis.”
“Sorry,” he said, taking a sip of his coffee.
“Talk to him, rough him up a bit and give him the treatment. See if he knows where she is.”
“Rough him? I don’t know—”
“This Jesuit needs a good punch in the mouth.”
“I don’t want to beat no priest,” Elvis said quickly.
“What, now you are a good Catholic boy?”
Elvis couldn’t remember the last time he’d gone to mass. Long before he joined the Hawks, that’s for sure. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t wary of messing with someone of the cloth or that he didn’t make the sign of the cross when he saw an image of the Virgin of Guadalupe. Even the fools in Tlaquepaque, with their healing crystals and their chants, believed in something. You had to be a bit afraid of a superior power. Those who weren’t were treading on dangerous soil.
“I’m not going to hell if that’s what you’re thinking,” Elvis said. “I’m pretty sure you’ll be toasty warm in hell if you go on hitting priests, whether they’re Jesuits or whatever.”
El Mago gave Elvis an icy look. The Antelope said some of the upper-level Hawks had been trained abroad, with the CIA and shit, to help keep the commies out of Mexico, out of Latin America, and they’d learned lots of interesting and useful tactics. Elvis wondered if it was those folks who’d taught El Mago to stare like that, all frost. It was like staring into an abyss.
That’s what El Mago was. This damn abyss, sucking you in. This damn fucking force of nature. You didn’t cross him. Not because you were afraid he’d pull out a gun and shoot you, but because he simply had that aura about him. The feeling that this was someone who devoured people, but never got his suit dirty.
The thing was, he wasn’t always like that. The rest of the time, he was very much all right, even nice. Elvis liked talking to El Mago. He didn’t fool himself into thinking they were friends, but he thought they might be associates. He wanted to do good work for El Mago. Hell, he wanted to make him proud. El Güero had even made fun of him about that, chuckling and saying Elvis wished El Mago would adopt him. That was a crock of shit—first of all because Elvis was a grown man, and second because he’d never particularly missed his stupid father, so why bother trying to find a second one—but it cut dangerously close to the truth.
He did think El Mago was darn cool, what with his excellent suits and fancy shoes and this very put-together image. He wanted to be like that one day. Only when El Mago looked like this, he wasn’t cool anymore, and Elvis tried to recall what the fuck he was doing hanging out with him.
“You talked to me about loyalty, Elvis; well, this is what loyalty means. Do not make me think I am wrong about you,” El Mago said, his voice low.
The voice of a gentleman, which was what he was.
A dangerous one.
He was Elvis’s god, but a dark god. The god of the Old Testament, that, as a good Catholic boy, he’d learned to fear.
“You’re not.” Elvis glanced down, fixing his eyes on the ashtray. “I’ll talk to him, don’t you worry.”
“Good. I want this done quick, you understand me?”
“Sure I do.”
“You do not need to type reports. I will call you.”
El Mago wiped his lips with his napkin, then tossed it on the table and stood up.
“Oh, and Elvis?” El Mago said, giving his cigarette one last drag before dumping it into the ashtray. “El Gazpacho is out of the unit.”
“What do you mean out?”
“Out. Gone. He did not have what it takes,” El Mago opened his wallet and tossed a couple of bills on the table. “Finish your cake and get your crew working.”
7
MAITE STOPPED BY the printer’s shop the next day right after work. She went because she was still holding on to the faint hope that she might get in touch with Leonora and obtain her money. If this proved to be the case, then she could hold off on asking her mother for a loan.
She couldn’t take the bus anymore. It was a cesspool of depraved monsters. When Maite chanced to get a seat, then she was safe. But if she had to stand, it was an invitation for every pervert in the city to rub himself against her or try to touch her ass. Every female from the age of twelve to sixty-five had to endure the same treatment, and there was no recourse, but Maite at least had the possibility of escape. She had her car. And it was stuck with the mechanic because Maite couldn’t pay her bill.
Maite had told herself that she would wait and in a month or so she would settle her account with the mechanic, but she was tired of waiting, and she couldn’t be taking taxis to work. It was very simple: she needed to pay.
Either her mother or Leonora would help her accomplish that. But her mother nagged her about everything, and the mere thought of having to phone the woman upset Maite’s stomach, threatening to give her an ulcer.
Maite pushed open the door of the printer’s shop and walked in. She had expected to find Rubén alone, like last time, but there was an older man at the register and a teenager. Rubén was stacking boxes on an old, red dolly. He was wearing his overalls and humming a tune.
“Hi,” she said, waving at the young man. “Hello.”
Rubén stared at her. He put his box down and came from behind the counter. “Hello,” he said. “You’re back.”
“Sorry to bother you like this, but I haven’t been able to get a hold of Leonora. I was wondering if you had any other contact information for her. Do you know any other friends who I might talk to?”
“You mean she hasn’t returned?” Rubén asked, grabbing a handkerchief that dangled from his pocket and wiping his hands with it.
“No.”
“What about her sister, what did she say?”
“She said Leonora wanted money and she wouldn’t give it to her, and that’s the last she heard from her. Look, I wouldn’t be bothering you if—”
“Rubén, I don’t pay you to be meeting with your girlfriends during your shift. Get those boxes ready. Mr. Pimentel is coming in fifteen minutes,” the older man said, resting both hands firmly on the counter and giving the young man a stern look.
“Yeah, one second,” Rubén replied, raising a hand without looking at the shop owner. His eyes were fixed on Maite. He seemed worried. “How long has she been gone?”