“How did you find her? It doesn’t matter, she’s alive. Is she all right?”
“Yes, she’s fine.”
“And the girl?”
“They’re both fine.”
“I’m so proud of you. Your father would be proud of you. And your bisabuelo, all proud of you. Was it dangerous?”
“Not really …”
“Not dangerous. I bet it was. You have to tell me the whole story.”
“I will, when I have time.”
“Time. You’re always so busy. But I’m glad you found them. It’s like the movies! You rescued your sweetheart. Qué mas quieres, hijo? Marry her. Settle down.”
“I think I will.”
“Good! When?”
“I said I’ll think about it,” he teased.
“Ay, malcriado. She’s a good woman. So beautiful, and she has her own business. You need to settle down, you need children.”
“And you want nietos.”
“Of course I do. Look, this heart attack I had taught me one thing. Life is short. I want grandchildren, and Armando is never going to get married. He’s too busy running around with those flashy women. Ay, Dios, I don’t know where he finds them.”
“At used-car conventions.”
“Ay, pobrecitas. Don’t they know Armando will promise the world but then … He can’t help it, that’s just the way he is. Anyway, bring Rita over as soon as you can. You don’t know how much I’ve prayed. All day long, every day, I was even talking to your papa.”
“Talking to Dad?”
“Talking to his spirit. ‘Keep Rita safe, keep Sonny safe.’ I told him, and he did. Will you come over? With Rita?”
“I will. She’s resting.”
“Yes, she needs to rest. Gracias a Dios. Now I can rest.”
“I’ll call you.”
“You say you’ll call, but when? I worry, Elfego. Bring her as soon as you can. I want to see both of you.”
“I promise.”
“Promises, promises. A mother is a woman who gets promises.”
“I really promise.”
“Stay out of trouble. Marry her.”
“I might. Adiós.”
“Que’l angel de la guardia te cuide.”
A blessing that the guardian spirits, the saints, take care of him, watch over him, deliver him from evil.
“Gracias,” he said, and clicked the off button on the phone.
He drove toward the balloon field. El angel de la guardia, his guardian angel. Who was his guardian angel? Once it had been St. Christopher. Patron saint of travelers. Did the angels of the church have anything in common with the coyote spirit? Was the coyote spirit like the guardian angel spirit? Like the saints who could be called to watch over things? But the church would call anything that smacked of Lorenza’s knowledge witchcraft.
Two worlds so far apart, and yet both were worlds of the spirits. His mother had prayed to her saints and to his dead father, asking for help. Don Eliseo had asked the spirit of his wife for help. The world was full of spirits. All those who had died were spirits in the wind that swept around the earth. Soul energy gathering on the mountaintops. Could they affect the life of one on earth? Could they return? Or did they speak only in dreams?
He had been filled with the coyote spirit, of that he was sure. In the dark of night, he had met Raven on an equal footing. A transformation had occurred. Could it happen again?
Yes, both don Eliseo and Lorenza had hinted there were many ways to enter the world of spirits. He had only scratched the surface.
“What’s the next step?” he asked Lorenza.
“Dreams,” she replied. “To enter your dreams.”
Dreams, he thought. The most common element. His dreams had always been rich with images, complex stories, prophecy. And so dreams were the next path into the world of spirits.
Traffic was thick and slow. The West Mesa was burgeoning, growing like mad, houses sprouted like tumbleweeds after a rain, and the new Cottonwood shopping center already attracted thousands. People traveled back and forth, from the east side of the river to the west, and vice versa, and today the usual rush was slow as people gawked at the balloons.
Hundreds of balloons hung over the valley like colorful Chinese lanterns. In an hour most of them would be down.
The balloon field was nearly empty. The chase trucks had moved out to follow the flights; the crowds that had come early to attend the ascension milled around the grounds, buying souvenirs at the midway tents. Buses full of tourists from the downtown hotels roared away, leaving clouds of dark diesel smoke in their wake.
Madge’s red Vette was parked outside the Fiesta Control building. He had half-expected a Mercedes to be parked alongside her car. As he got down, he glanced at his face in the side mirror. The image startled him. He saw a different person.
Something in him had changed, matured overnight. There were thin wrinkles around his eyes, something he had not noticed before. He looked serious. Why? Rita was safe—that was the important thing—but he wasn’t smiling. The muscles of his face were set.
“Qué pasa?” he asked the reflection in the mirror.
The image in the truck mirror stared back at him. The eyes were slightly different. Like Lorenza’s eyes! One was the eye of Sonny Baca, the other was the eye of Coyote!
What did it mean? Was he on the road to becoming a curandero? Like Lorenza, a shaman, a good brujo?
He shook his head and started toward the building. It was strange how a bright fall day could have hanging over it an impending sense of danger. Fall was the most beautiful season along the Río Grande, but he couldn’t shake the ominous feeling.
Rita’s safe, he thought, and tonight you’ll propose to her, set the date. So why did he need to bother with Madge? Maybe he should just tell Garcia what he knew and let him handle it.
Madge couldn’t lead him to Stone. Stone was an untouchable, his operation was making millions from the dope traffic, but hell, it was going to take federal prosecutors with a lot of guts and information to ever do anything. And what if someone, somewhere, finally pointed the finger at Stone? It didn’t matter, because the present William Stone would be replaced by a clone, someone like him with a lot of power who would step right in and take over.
Just like when the cops took one pusher off the street corner and then found two replacing him. As long as those like William Stone fed the need, the dope poured in.
But it didn’t have to be like that, maybe that’s why he had to shake the truth out of Madge. The drugs, he was convinced, had not left town. The bulk of the shipment was still here. They were too smart to have tried distributing it when the shit hit the fan. They were sitting on it, and that meant it was being stored somewhere in town.
The front door was open; he walked in. The lobby was deserted. No assistants running around, no zebras. The door to Madge’s office was ajar, he could hear her talking on the phone. He walked to the door and pushed it open softly. A startled Madge Swenson looked up.
“I’ve got to go. I’ll call you later,” she said into the phone, then, “Sonny!” She got up quickly, came around the desk. “I heard the news! Thank God Rita’s safe. But how are you?”
“I’m okay,” Sonny said coldly. She drew back and looked at him.
“It’s over, then. Can I pour you a drink?”
“No.”
“Once the balloons go up, I pay myself with a brandy in my coffee,” she said, opening a desk drawer and drawing out a bottle. “You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
She poured a double shot into the steaming coffee cup on her desk. “I can’t tell you how relieved I am Rita’s safe,” she said, and sipped. “What happened?”
“It’s a long story,” Sonny replied. “But that’s not why I came.”
She was wearing a dark turtleneck sweater and dark pants. Her bright eyes stared intently at Sonny. She brushed back her short blonde hair.
“So what’s on your mind?”
“Y
ou. And dope.”
Madge frowned. “You’re still thinking about the dope deal? It’s done, Sonny, and there’s not a damn thing we can do about it. Rita’s safe, that’s what matters.”
“People are dead.”
“So what am I supposed to do? Feel guilty? I wasn’t involved!”
“You were with Gilroy the night he was killed!”
“So what! He had me over a barrel! I told you that!”
“You lied to me! There was somebody else with you!”
Sonny reached out and grabbed her wrist, spilling the coffee cup on the desk.
“You’re crazy!”
“Stammer was there!” Sonny shouted, drawing her close, looking into her bright blue eyes, which radiated anger.
“You’re out of your mind!” she protested.
“Stammer was there! It was his deal all along! Wasn’t it?”
Sonny twisted her arm, and she groaned in pain. Tears filled her eyes. “You sonofabitch,” she cursed.
“Stammer killed Gilroy!”
Madge cried out, then suddenly relaxed. Sonny let go of her wrist. She fell back into the chair.
“You figured it out,” she whispered.
Sonny nodded.
“I didn’t know what was going on, I swear I didn’t. Jerry told me Gilroy wanted to see me. I had no choice.”
“Stammer put the squeeze on you?”
“Yes.” She held her wrist, then tossed back her hair. “He’s crazy, you know. He put his money in the baboon lab, convinced himself that he could put baboon hearts into people. He went broke setting it up. Then when everything fell apart, he started—” Her voice broke. “He met Gilroy, learned I used to buy dope from him. It was Jerry who threatened me if I didn’t play ball with them. But he was trying to double-cross us both, and when Gilroy pushed back, he killed him.”
Yeah, Sonny thought, Stammer had been in it all along. With the dope coming up the Río Grande, he saw it as a way out of his problems.
“I didn’t want any part of their deal! You’ve got to believe me!”
“Let’s find out,” Sonny replied.
Madge shook her head. “You won’t believe it until he tells you to your face.”
Sonny nodded.
Madge smiled and stood. She straightened her sweater and ran her hands down the front of her pants.
“I figure the dope’s still in the city,” Sonny replied.
Madge arched an eyebrow. “You said yourself the balloon fiesta was being used as a cover. You found a tankful of the stuff, but the rest must be long gone.”
“Then why haven’t the cops in a four-state area intercepted a single gofer? A shipment cut that many times is going to draw a few discontents, bad blood. Someplace or other a cop’s going to run into a piece of the action. But no, it’s been quiet, nobody’s said a word. Nobody’s made a mistake. The dope must still be here.”
“And you think Stammer has it?”
“Juan Libertad has it,” Sonny whispered.
“Who?”
“I have a photograph of a man standing in front of a cartel building in Bogota. Some people thought it was John Gilroy. For a while I thought it was William Stone. But, no, now I see the man is Jerry Stammer.”
“Jerry in Bogota? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah,” Sonny said. “Your boss played compañero with the Colombian cartels. And with the CIA. I read through old files at the library. It started out as a heart surgeon going on a mission of mercy. Then the American doctor began to teach at the Bogotá med school. He needed a reason to go there, and he found the perfect alibi. But he left a paper trail, and a very quiet but wonderful librarian found it.”
“We knew he was going to Bogota,” Madge said. “It had to do with a medical exchange. I never thought—”
“That Dr. Stammer would be involved with the drug cartels? Yeah, he’s the man in the photograph. At first he just brought in enough coke for himself, enough to share with friends. Then Juan Libertad learned about him, and they figured he was the perfect man for this big shipment.”
“Juan Libertad?” Madge asked.
“CIA. Why should they use their men and the normal supply route? Now they had a ‘respected’ doctor they could use. Jerry Stammer was in Bogota the day the photo was taken. I checked the dates. My friend, a journalist, was confused. But why not, she didn’t know Jerry Stammer. Strange how Gilroy, Stone, and Stammer bear a resemblance to each other. Same build, same features.”
He reached into his jacket pocket for the faded photo Alisandra Bustamante-Smith had given him and tossed it on the desk.
“You tell me. Is that Stammer?”
Madge looked at the photo. “It could be, but the photo’s too faded. It could be anybody!”
He picked up the photo and looked at it. For him the faded face of the man looking at him was Stammer, but she was right. It could be anybody. When you wanted something bad enough, you saw it. He wanted to nail Stammer, so he began to see him in Alisandra’s photo. Alisandra had wanted to finger Stone, so that’s who she saw.
“Yes, it could be anybody.”
“You’ve concocted a wild story, Sonny.”
“Why don’t we show the photo to the doctor?”
“You want me to take you to him—”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“And it’s the only way I’m going to clear my name,” Madge said.
“Call him.” Sonny handed her the phone. She hesitated. “Go on, call him! Tell him you need to see him!”
She dialed, lit a cigarette as she waited, then spoke. “Jerry. No, things are fine. No, the liftoff was smooth. I need to see you. Yes. Right away. No, I’ll come there. No, it’ll be safer. I’ll come there.” She hung up the phone.
“Let’s go!” Sonny said, took her arm, and hurried her to his truck. He swung out of the parking lot and sped up the road toward the freeway.
29
So he was going to get to Stammer, but where in the hell was Raven? Had he withdrawn for the day and left the field to Sonny? Had he already gotten his cut and flown? Had Lorenza’s bullet hurt him? But no, Sonny knew he would meet Raven again.
“How well do you know Stammer?”
“I wish I’d never met the bastard,” Madge replied, and lit a cigarette. “He was supposed to be a genius, a whiz kid of the heart. He and a very young team were working on a mechanical heart, but it wasn’t working out. Members of the team moved on to other research, Jerry grew bitter. He moved out here and worked with the group here. This city has some of the most talented heart surgeons in the country. Jerry tied into the hospital and promised to put Albuquerque on the map as a heart transplant center.”
“But he wasn’t satisfied with transplanting human hearts.”
“He always wanted more. He wanted to be a hero, make a name for himself. He knew the transplant industry couldn’t depend on donated organs, so he turned to baboons. He got obsessed with the whole thing, tried to force a baboon heart transplant on a patient, but the Human Research Committee at the hospital stopped him. By that time the doctors really had doubts about him. Then his wife left him.”
“He needed money,” Sonny said, as he brought his rattling truck from seventy down to sixty to exit on Martin Luther King Avenue. The giant heart complex Jerry Stammer had built sat on a hill overlooking the city, right above the old Dog Town barrio.
Sonny drove into the deserted parking lot. Near the south entrance stood the only car in the lot, a black Mercedes.
“He’ll be waiting for me,” Madge said.
“Yeah, but not for me. Let’s surprise him,” Sonny said, and drove around the building to the back lot. “Come on.” He pulled her out of the truck and to the back door of the building. It was best to go in unexpected. Somewhere in the lab warehouse, he was sure, sat the drugs.
On the delivery dock a large sign warned the public: STAY OUT DANGEROUS ANIMALS. Sonny tried the door.
“The baboon lab,” Madg
e said. “You can’t go in there.”
“Watch me,” Sonny replied, and jiggled the door again. Inside, a loud squealing and rattling sound responded to his presence at the door.
So this was the famed baboon laboratory, Sonny thought as he took out his jimmy set and tried the lock. Here Jerry Stammer was breeding and raising baboons for the heart transplants of the future. From here he planned to revolutionize the heart transplant business of the country. Next it would be baboon livers, then kidneys, then …? Where would it end? No wonder the Alburquerque medicos had turned away from Stammer. He was crazy.
Sonny’s pick turned the pins, and he turned the knob. He opened the door and turned to look at Madge. Her face went pale from the putrid animal smell that came through the open door.
“No,” she said, cringing.
“Afraid of baboons?”
“I can’t.” She squirmed. “I can’t stand those animals!”
Maybe she would only make noise, warn Stammer. It was best to go in alone.
“Stay put,” Sonny commanded.
She nodded and Sonny entered the large warehouse. He was assaulted by the strong smell. “Yuck,” he whispered, and shut the door behind him.
The huge warehouse was brightly lighted. He hadn’t expected the number of cages that filled the building, rows upon rows stacked three high. In each small four-by-four wire cage sat a dark creature. All turned to look at Sonny, their piercing eyes dark and ominous. A human in the building meant food, and so they rattled their cages and cried shrilly.
The smell of excrement and urine was overwhelming. The warehouse hadn’t been cleaned recently, nor the animals fed. Stammer was too busy with the deal, Sonny reasoned. Or just didn’t care. The animals were thin, nervous. They cried out, pounded on their cages, reached out through the bars to grab at him. The farther he walked, the more animals joined in the screaming, until the entire building was one screeching, pounding zoo.
So much for the element of surprise, Sonny thought.
He was near the door marked OFFICE when the lights went out. The fluorescent ceiling lights and white walls had given off a harsh glare; now the dark was intense. There were no windows or skylights in the building, just a broken-down ventilation system. The baboons quieted down.