Chapter 6
Keith drove the five blocks to Cottonwood Mall rather quickly and found a relatively isolated spot in the shade of a tree in the huge south side parking lot. A fast thumbing of buttons put him back in the middle of the recently foreshortened phone conversation. “You’re here faster than I expected. When did you arrive in Los Lunas?” queried Keith of his former schoolmate.
Harrell Wade Harrison, a southern fellow, who invariably used both his given names when introducing himself, but preferred to be addressed by acquaintances as Wade, responded, “I got here yesterday, but remember I left a couple of days before you did. My old Spanish teacher would be appalled to see the local error, Keith. Luna is Spanish for moon and is a feminine noun – it should be Las Lunas!”
“I hate to ruin your day, Wade, but Los Lunas, the masculine plural, is properly interpreted as ‘the home of the Luna family’. Whether to fault the teacher or the student is your call. Assuming you’re looking at a map, you’ll see Los Chavez and Los Padillas nearby,” chided Keith.
“Duly noted, thank you! And I am lookin’ at a map and I see that Albuquerque is the seat of Bernalillo County and Bernalillo is the seat of Sandoval County. What’s your explanation for that one?” asked Wade in a somewhat mocking voice.
“Well, you’ve got me on that one, but one more thing. If you don’t want to stick out like a sore tongue, don’t roll the double L. Castilian is better left in Spain. Here it’s pronounced as a Y. Strangely enough, I’m told that in Argentina, it’s pronounced as a J. Vive le difference!” remarked Keith with just a twinge of condescension in his voice. “And while I’m on this tirade...you mentioned earlier that you were staying right next to the ‘Rio Grand River’. Rio Grande will suffice quite well. And be sure to sound the ending ‘e’. Adding the word ‘river’ marks you immediately as an outsider.”
Although a computer geek by choice, Keith felt that he had been rather well schooled in Spanish and French as well as English such that he could certainly hold his own in languages with any of his classmates.
“I’ve never been this far west before and I’ve come a rather circuitous route just to see more of the country. Yesterday afternoon, I passed through a one-horse town called Carrizozo, went across a humongous lava flow, climbed up and over a mountainous ridge, and then drove over a never-endin’ scrubby-lookin’ plain. Hardly did I see another soul; God forsaken! Near what purported to be a town called Bingham on the map, I saw a huge tarantula in the middle of the road that caused me instinctively to swerve,” offered Wade in response.
If the dropping of ‘g’s wasn’t a give-away, the seemingly interrogative, but emphatic, lilt to his voice on words with which he ended sentences certainly insinuated as to Wade’s birthplace. Four years in the South hearing a word like ‘before’ being pronounced as ‘befaw’ had Keith almost browbeaten into thinking that the speaking of English had been completely overhauled. Listening to Wade’s discourse reminded Keith of his first week in Tuscaloosa when a new acquaintance asked him if he was going to the ‘fair’. Keith’s innocent far western reply was ‘fire, what fire?’
Not really knowing why, Keith said, “Yes, I’ve seen that very tarantula. They grow big in that stretch. You skirted around Bell Ranch country. I’m sorry that I didn’t know you were coming that way. I would have directed you to the Owl Bar in San Antonio where you could have had the best green chile cheeseburger and fries in the Southwest. Then again, let me take that back. Remembering your reaction to that jalapeño pepper you tried at our group’s goodbye dinner at Nick’s, you wouldn’t be an aficionado of chile. On the other hand, you would have greatly enjoyed a beer at the Owl. The bar there is a one-of-a-kind original. It was hand-carried up the street by fifty men many years ago from the very first ever Hilton Hotel right there in the small town of San Antonio. I could have asked my grampa to call a long-time acquaintance who is the proprietress down there to give you first class treatment.”
“I suspect you’re right about the spicy burgers, but I am sorry I missed the beer. It was hot going across that plain they call the ‘journey of the dead man’ on the map. I have a genuine appreciation for deserts now. I think I’m beginning to understand what Death Valley might be like,” replied Wade. “What’s next on the agenda?”
Irrespective of the jalapeño incident, Keith was already well aware of Wade’s probable reaction both to the chile and the beer. In some of their intra-state travels during the school year, Wade would never indulge in ‘hot boudin’, the South’s answer to the need for a lip smacking (and thirst provoking) bar snack. It evened out, though, because Keith for some reason couldn’t or wouldn’t tolerate the South’s hot boiled peanuts. And Wade’s prize possession was a large metallic wall collage made from topless and bottomless flattened beer can cylinders of every brand name imaginable that he had sampled. He had mentioned to Keith before that he wanted to come west to locate a can of Moose Drool.
What was next on the agenda? Keith sighed slightly before answering. “I’m tied up with family this evening so come on up to Albuquerque and find yourself some reasonable lodging. If you need to kill some time, you might try the zoo or the aquarium or the botanical garden for entertainment. I’ll call you around 10:00 AM tomorrow and we’ll do lunch.”
Following the chat with Wade, Keith just sat in his car for a few minutes and looked across the cottonwood forest stretching along the river in front of him. It wasn’t all that wide, but its riparian length from Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico made it the largest cottonwood forest in the world. Here it was called the ‘bosque del Rio Grande’ and Keith experienced a quick taste of belonging for his hometown. Cottonwood in Spanish is ‘álamo’. Keith smiled to himself as he thought that that usually quite large, but frequently gnarled tree, not only provided a name for this shopping mall, but, in Spanish, provided names for numerous towns, like Alamosa (site of cottonwoods), Alameda (cottonwood grove), and Alamogordo (huge cottonwood), as well as the Bowie, Crockett, et alii historical spot in Texas, a rental car agency, and even a nuclear research facility.
Then his thoughts returned to Wade and the matters at hand. “What on earth have I gotten myself into?” muttered Keith aloud to himself.
Keith would have been far more worried had he known of Wade’s activities in Los Lunas last night. Wade was now starting to appreciate his pa’s admonition that ‘if you tell all your business, then you have none.’ Just like a spy novel, he was to have contacted a Jessica Gordon in Los Lunas and ask her to dinner at Teofilo’s Restaurant with the authenticating phrase, ‘our corn will probably mature early this year.’ If she were to accept and respond with ‘I’ll take all the corn you can produce,’ Wade was to give her the package from Ouachita Memories in the parking lot of the restaurant. Without the authenticating response, Wade was to figure out a safe place to stash the package and leave it. Jessica didn’t come up with the proper response and Harrell Wade dined alone not having the slightest idea as to his next move. This was the first real breach in his confidence. As he pondered his dilemma, Wade’s breathing slowly became shallow and his shoulders tightened. His first thought was an emergency call to his pa, but the instructions had obviously anticipated Jessica’s action – or rather inaction. A storage unit? A locker at the train station? Ignoring costs, either sounds a little risky for an extended time period. ‘And if it really is a painting, do I need to worry about temperature and humidity considerations? Albuquerque might provide more options for solving my problem,’ said Wade to himself. That thought and a couple of generous swigs of his beer seemed to calm his nerves.
His postprandial appointment, however, lifted Wade’s despair completely and how simple it was. He was to appear at the Coronado Car Wash there in Los Lunas precisely at its 10:00 PM closing and take the keys into the office and ask for Manny. Surprisingly, Manny was no older than Wade and greeted him with a warm “Que pasa? I’ve been expecting you.”
Wade thought his own Spanish was inadequate for conversationa
l purposes and replied in English, “Not too much; I’ve got a beautiful car to swap with you.”
“Si, it’s nice, but you haven’t seen real beauty yet, mi amigo.” Manny returned the keys. “Drive the Sable around in back next to the red convertible. I’ll meet you there.”
Wade couldn’t believe his good fortune. A great improvement in his love life was assured. He offered the best remark he could come up with, “Muy hermosa, es verdad!”
Manny grinned and said, “Let’s get your stuff transferred and it’s a done deal.”
Wade gathered up his maps and papers, his suitcase, and the Skip package and stashed them all in the backseat. “That’s it? asked Wade.
“Correctomundo, my friend. Take care of yourself.”
“Muchas gracias” replied Wade and he waved as he slowly rounded the building. The entire operation took less than ten minutes. He said to himself, ‘Wade, you could get real accustomed to this life.’ He returned to his motel over by the river.