Wolf in the Shadows (37 page)

Which meant he’d require a fair amount of assistance during our crossing. I said, “We’ll get you something for your headache.
Try to rest now.”

“Where’re you taking me?”

“Tijuana, then San Diego.”

Hy glanced questioningly at me.

I shook my head. I didn’t want Mourning getting anxious about the way he’d have to cross the border yet.

Tim asked, “Where’s Diane?”

“In a San Diego hospital. Do you remember anything about her being shot?”

He was silent. “I don’t remember much of anything,” he finally said. Then he lay down and closed his eyes.

I looked at Hy. His expression was as puzzled as mine must have been. The man’s wife had been shot, but he didn’t ask about
her condition. Granted, he had reason to hate her, but wouldn’t that make him all the more anxious to know how badly she’d
been injured? And why wasn’t he interested in whether or not she’d been arrested?

“Still in shock?” I mouthed.

Hy shrugged and slumped against the door, his hand pressing his leaking bullet wound.

Half an hour later the lights of Tijuana formed a glowing dome in the post-midnight sky. Tourist cities—sin cities, in some
people’s opinion—never sleep. I said, “We’ll take Tim to Al Mojas’s house, get him some coffee and aspirin, maybe some food.
Then one of us can return the car and take a cab back there.”

“I’d better; it’s rented in my name. Besides, I want to check the border control. There’s still a chance we won’t have to
go over the fence.”

“You sure you feel up to that?”

“I feel up to it,”

“I don’t have to tell you to be careful.”

“You don’t have to, but thanks, I will.”

The streets of Colonia Libertad were as busy as if it were high noon. Children ran about, dogs barked, adults crowded the
food stands or stood around trading shots of liquor. Many had the bundled look of would-be emigrants, wearing layer upon layer
of clothing. I drove to the corner house with the palm tree and the statue of the Virgin Mary in its front yard, parked and
left the keys in the ignition. Then I went to help Tim Mourning on the next step of his journey home.

2:36 A.M
.

“I don’ know, I just don’ know.” Al Mojas sat across the rickety kitchen table from Mourning and me, shaking his head. The
room had a linoleum floor so worn that its original color was indiscernible; pink paint was peeling off the walls in scales.
On the iron cookstove, a pot of spicy tomato sauce simmered. Mojas’s wife, a heavyset woman named Nita, had been in and out
of the room half a dozen times to stir it and offer us food. I’d declined because I wasn’t hungry; Mourning had said he didn’t
feel well enough to eat. Nita fussed and kept pouring us more coffee until Al told her to get out and stay out.

“What don’t you know?” I asked him.

“You got a guy here”—he gestured at Mourning—“so stoned he can’t walk right. I’m all set to go when you get here, but now
where’s the others? I tell you, this whole thing’s looking fuckin’ iffy.”

“The other man’ll be here soon.” I glanced at Mourning, who leaned heavily on the table, mug of coffee in a death grip. I
wasn’t sure he comprehended the situation, although I’d explained it to him after we came inside the house. “This one will
make it just fine,” I added with far more confidence than I felt.

“I don’ know,” Mojas said again. “You knocked my price way down. And now I got this dummy.” He shot Mourning a disapproving
glance. “I think I better renegotiate.”

“Look,” I said, “we have a deal.”

He set his jaw stubbornly. “We got a deal, but I didn’t know about him. Somebody who can’t look out for hisself, it makes
it more dangerous.”

I’d promised him nearly all the cash I had, and coyotes didn’t honor Visa. “The deal stands,” I said flatly.

Mojas folded his arms and looked at me.

Mourning didn’t have any money on him. I was reasonably sure Hy had less than I did. Just how much
did
I have? I reached for my oversized purse, which Hy had retrieved from the beach in front of Fontes’s villa along with the
camera. The camera …

“Listen,” I said again, “I’ve only got about twenty dollars, but I can give you something valuable to make up for the additional
danger.”

Mojas looked at the purse, licked his lips. “What?”

I opened the purse and took out the camera. “You can sell this for quite a bit—the lens and mount alone retail for over four
hundred. Or you can keep it to use in your work. It’s not as good as the night scopes
la migra
use, but it’ll give you an edge.”

Mojas reached eagerly for the camera. He put his eye to the scope, sighted around the room. “Oh, man,” he said.

“Deal?” I asked.

“Deal.” He got up and placed the camera on a cabinet behind him. Before he turned, I saw his hand caress it.

I glanced at Mourning. He’d raised his head, was watching Mojas. For a man whose life was on the line, he seemed curiously
placid. Maybe he didn’t comprehend how much danger lay before us. Or maybe the placidity was a side effect of his long confinement.
Whatever the reason, this was not the man I’d read about in the newspaper and magazine profiles.

A car door slammed in the street. Footsteps came up the walk. Mojas left the room and returned shortly after, followed by
Hy.

“Sorry I took so long,” Hy said.

I asked, “Did you check the border control?”

“Uh-huh. I didn’t see Salazar, but there’s a guy hanging around near the corridor that goes into U.S. Customs; I could swear
I saw him coming out of his place on Island Avenue.”

I took a deep breath, exhaled slowly. On some level I’d still hoped we could just walk through the checkpoint like any returning
tourists.

Mojas was looking interested, but he merely asked, “Everybody here now?”

“Yes,” I said.

“What about the other woman?”

Hy and I exchanged glances. Mourning’s head was bowed over his coffee mug. Hy said, “She didn’t make it.”

Mojas stood. “Then let’s get a move on. You bring the dummy.” He motioned at Mourning. The whole time we’d been in his house,
he’d never once addressed Tim directly.

Mourning didn’t seem to notice what Mojas had called him. He looked at Hy, then nodded obediently. Hy went over and helped
him stand.

I rose, hefting my bag.

“No.” Mojas snapped his fingers, pointed at it. “Everything you need goes in your pockets. Stick the gun someplace where you
won’t get blown away if you fall.”

I set the bag on the table and opened it. Crammed my wallet and I.D. folder into my shirt pocket under Hy’s sweater. Stuck
the gun in the waistband of my jeans. The rest of the contents—makeup, address book, comb—were inessential. At the last
minute, though, I stuffed my Swiss Army knife and a piece of coral that I carry for good luck into the pocket of my jeans.

When I straightened, Hy and Mourning were already leaving the room. Mojas looked levelly at me, then turned. I followed him—the
man who claimed he always got his people through.

3:11
A.M.

We huddled together on the hard rock ground, only yards from the border fence. On the barren hillside behind us, fires had
hours ago been doused. It was a chill moonless night, and stone silent. No one moved, no one spoke, yet I could feel the presence
of the others who waited here. Their fear and urgency created a pressure that surged against the fence like floodwaters against
a dam; soon it would burst over the corrugated steel panels, and we would be carried on its tide down into the canyons—to
deeper darkness, danger, and, for some, death.

In a hoarse whisper, Mojas said, “Them panels, they’re easy to climb. You grab onto them posts, pull yourself up and over.
You”—he pointed at Hy—“better help the dummy.”

I glanced at Mourning. Tim didn’t appear offended by the way Mojas spoke of him; instead he studied the coyote coolly, a scientist
observing a member of a lower and somewhat repulsive order. He seemed more alert now, although I noted that this reactions
were still slow.

I asked, “Then what happens?”

“You stick close behind me. Canyon’s maybe twenty feet ahead. Case you lose me, stay put; I’ll find you. Keep low. Those scopes
la migra
’s got, they pick up every move you make. A guy told me we glow on them—yellow, like gold.” He laughed bitterly. “Gold. That’s
a good one, ain’t it? ’Course in a way we
are
gold to you people. You can’t do without us.”

Mourning was still staring at Mojas. Now he asked, “Why do you say that?”

“Hey, the dummy can talk! I’m sayin’ it because it’s true. We go over that fence, we work your fields, take care of your kids,
do any kind of shit work you throw at us. Or you send your goods down here to our
maquiladores
, we sent them back finished. Where’d you be without our cheap labor?”

“A damn sight closer to full employment for Americans.” Tim was showing some spirit, thank God.

“Shit, man, don’t give me that. What you people do, you build a goddamn fence to keep us out, hunt us down like dogs in the
canyons, but you sure don’t make any fuss when one of us buses your table in some fancy L.A. restaurant.”

Mourning shrugged.

“Okay, you don’t want to believe it, that’s your business.”

We continued squatting there in silence. A cold wind whipped across the barren hillside, and I turned up my collar. Hy was
pressing his hand to his arm, face pained. Bleeding again?

Suddenly there was a stir farther down the fence line to our left. Running footsteps and then the clang of metal as dark figures
scaled the panels. Mojas stood, looked. Shook his head as he squatted again. “Damn fools.
La migra
’s got a guy right over there on horseback.”

“How can you see him?” I asked.

“You make this crossing as many times as I have, you know where to look, what to look for. Piece of good luck for us, though.
Most nights they don’t have more than eight or nine agents out here. Guys who just went over, they’ll keep that one busy for
a while. What we’re gonna do is go the other way down the fence toward Smuggler’s Gulch.”

He stood and began moving in a crouch, motioning for us to follow. When we got to the fence, we turned east. I brought up
the tear, reaching out to touch the steel panels; they were icy and unyielding. My fingers felt scarcely warmer. I crossed
my arms and hugged myself, tucking my hands against my sides.

“More activity behind us. More clashing of metal back where the others had crossed. I started to look over my shoulder, but
lost my balance and almost fell on the uneven ground. After that I kept my eyes straight ahead, focused on Mourning’s shoulders.

The commotion behind us escalated. Feet slapped and stumbled on the other side of the fence now. I heard someone curse, someone
else cry out. There was a thud and a child began to wail. The dam had burst; an unchecked stream of bodies spewed across the
border and flooded the canyons. Propelled by fear, by need, by sheer recklessness, they surged forth and inundated the forbidden
territory.

Mojas held up his hand and we stopped, squatted again. “Let’s give
la migra
a chance to get real busy.”

I looked at Hy; he was still pressing his wound. When he looked back at me, his smile was edged with pun. Mourning squatted
to Hy’s right, myopic gaze unfocused. He might have been getting his fear under control or contemplating his own mortality
or merely zoning out. There was no way to tell what he might be thinking, no way to tell how he’d handle himself once we made
our move.

The commotion on the hillside was dying down. Someone shouted in the nearby canyon, the unintelligble words echoing as they
rose. Mojas stood.

“It’s time.”

I shot to my feet, adrenaline pumping. Hy rose more slowly, grasping Mourning’s arm and helping him.

“Up and over,” Mojas told us. “When you hit the ground, keep going downhill. You’ll come to a clump of bushes. Wait there.
When I know it’s okay, we’ll run into the canyon. It’s real steep. Halfway down, there’s a buncha rocks. We’ll stop again,
then move slower. I click my fingers, you follow. I stop, you stop. No talking till we get through to this big drainage pipe
off Monument Road. Got it?”

“Got it,” I said.

Hy and Mourning nodded.

“Then let’s go.”

Up and over: not so easy as Mojas claimed. Fence posts icy, panels slick. A foothold gained, lost, regained. Halfway up, I
slipped. Slid back to the ground, wrenching the arm that grasped the post.

Mojas was already on the other side. Hy straddled the top, hauling Mourning up. I grabbed the post, started climbing again.
Lost my footing and gritted my teeth in frustration.

Clinging to the post, I planted my right foot more securely. Brought the left up. Climbed carefully. Finally my fingers touched
the top. I got a good hold, pulled with every bit of my strength.

Palms flat on the top now, pushing. Torso rolling forward, legs following. For a moment I teetered there, then lost my hold
and plummeted downward. Onto American soil.

Home, yet not home. In a no-one’s-land full of dangers both known and unknown. Bandits didn’t discriminate against American
citizens; neither did crooked coyotes and Tijuana cops.

I’d hit hard on all fours; now I pushed up, looking around for the others. Nothing but darkness, the night so black I couldn’t
see more than five feet in front of me. I ran downhill blindly, stumbling over stones, skidding on pebbles.

Shadows ahead now, the slope steeper. I fought for balance, pitched forward. Put my hands out and plunged into a stand of
dry, prickly vegetation.

A hand grasped my arm, kept me from falling. Hy: I couldn’t see him, identified him by the rough weave of his wool jacket.
My breath came in gasps. I got it under control as I waited.

After a moment I heard Mojas snap his fingers. He moved out—a blur darting downhill. A second blur followed: Mourning. I
nudged Hy; he went ahead of me.

Another stop: the rocks. Another wait. Another snap of the fingers.