It was raining a little. The windshield wipers went back and forth, providing the only noise inside the car. El Mago didn’t switch on the radio, and Elvis would never reach for the dial on his own, not in El Mago’s car, so he tucked his hands into his jacket pockets and stared ahead. It was early enough that there was barely any traffic, and the city looked different like this, with rainbows reflected in the large oil slicks by the side of the road and the rolling metal curtains of the shops shut tight. When they passed the fountain of the Diana Cazadora, her bronze arms raised to the heavens, El Mago spoke.
“What is the word of the day?” he asked.
“I didn’t pick one yet.”
“You should not forget your routines.”
“I won’t, sir.”
“What about your assignment?”
“There was no camera in the woman’s apartment,” Elvis said. “The priest didn’t have the camera either, though the girl stopped by his place, then left. He said she had a boyfriend and a sister. So she might be with them.”
“She’s not with her sister, and the boyfriend is a dead end too. Don’t approach them.”
“But the boyfriend, you don’t think—”
“Emilio Lomelí,” El Mago said. “His family is not only money, but they are also PRI supporters. No, you don’t go barking down that avenue.”
“And the sister, she also with the PRI?”
“Something like that. Did you find anything else?”
“The girl might have gone to a place called Asterisk, an art cooperative is what the priest called it. There’s a woman named Jackie there who was expecting her, but he didn’t think she’d made it there. Sounds like the place to look, though, if the boyfriend and the sister are out of the question.”
The cadence of the windshield wipers sliding against the glass filled the car for a few seconds as El Mago processed the information. “You will have to go to Asterisk, then, and keep tracing her steps. There is a man at the Habana who El Gazpacho worked with; his name is Justo. He has curly hair, wears glasses, and carries a cigarette behind his ear. He can get you into that place.”
“Then you’ve heard of it?”
“Some. He will know more. A nest of pinkos, at any rate. Justo will know them all.”
Elvis nodded. The Habana was notorious for that sort of crowd. Cops were always watching the place. It was almost a game; you couldn’t call it government surveillance. More like an old married couple, with the cops eating tortas outside and the reds inside having coffee. A placid relationship. Asterisk might be more of the same.
“There is something else for you,” El Mago said, pointing at a manila envelope that had been sitting on the dashboard this entire time but which Elvis had not touched until now, waiting for his cue.
He opened the envelope and took out the sheet of paper. Name, age, place of work, and address. No picture. It was a hastily put together file.
“This is the same building I went to,” Elvis said, frowning. “Same apartment?”
“Do not be a fool. Look carefully. It is a different apartment. She is a neighbor.”
“Maite Jaramillo. She know something?”
“That is for you to determine. She has been asking questions about Leonora, and she was seen at a shop that prints communist propaganda. I need you to tail her.”
“How long?”
“All day, for the next few days.”
Christ. That sounded like a full-blown operation. “It’s gonna be difficult with only three guys and this other stuff you have me doing.”
“That is what leading a squad means, Elvis. You must use your resources strategically. What do you think El Güero and the Antelope are for?”
“I know,” Elvis said. “But they don’t like me much.”
“How did they behave when you went to see the priest?” El Mago asked.
The question was neutral, but like most everything with El Mago this was some sort of test. Elvis stuffed the page back in the envelope. “They wanted to cut him,” he said, matching El Mago’s tone. Also neutral. “I told them no. You didn’t say nothing about gutting him.”
“Ever seen a cockfight, Elvis?”
“Not my thing, sir.”
“Not mine either, truth be told, but growing up in the countryside you are bound to see one at some point. With its spurs on, a rooster can be quite deadly. Yet it is not really the creature’s fault, is it? They are territorial, the birds. Put two together in a palenque and they will tear each other to pieces. It is in their nature. Tell me, what do you think is El Güero’s nature? Or the Antelope’s?”
He thought of El Güero, who was a complete asshole, a bully, and also a bit of an idiot, and the Antelope, who was annoying and a bit too chatty but not quite so bad.
“You saying they’re like roosters?”
“I am saying it is up to you to handle them. I cannot be there, asking those two to play nice. You either have the balls to lead them or they will cut your throat and I will not care.”
“I get it,” he said, still neutral, because El Mago was also neutral, his words impassive.
El Mago tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “You are one of many poor devils I have plucked from the street. Get working, really working, before I throw you back in the garbage where you came from. Are we clear?”
“Always, sir.”
El Mago stopped the car. It was still raining, and they weren’t anywhere near the apartment. Elvis stuffed the envelope inside his jacket, found the door handle and opened it, stepping onto the sidewalk.
“Try this word for the day: pawn,” El Mago said, before he rolled up his window and drove away.
In that brief sentence, said low and steady, Elvis read the most cutting scorn. It reminded him of his mother, who called him a useless burden, of the teachers who called him stupid, of the older American woman who had used and dumped him, and the cultists he’d befriended who saw in him nothing but free labor. It was all those hateful people and their barbs, distilled and concentrated into a single whole. And in that moment he felt a terrible, roaring anger, and his hands shook.
Water dripped down his back, under his jacket.
Elvis waited five minutes before he raised his arm and hailed a cab. It was still pretty early, so he went and had himself a coffee, then walked to the women’s building, a cigarette in his mouth. He had no idea what Maite Jaramillo looked like, so he stood on the other side of the street and watched people stream out of the building, some of them with briefcases in their hands, some of them tugging a child behind them. Office workers, first. Then came the housewives, who were going to the market or taking children to school. When he deemed a prudent amount of time had passed and everyone who had a job or an errand had left, he tossed away his cigarette and crossed the street. He took out his lock pick and opened the front door. Then he walked up the stairs to Maite Jaramillo’s apartment.