6. / Unholy Business
When they return to the compound, Lisiado retrieves the site plans and suggests to Esteban that they look over the place he's proposed for the mass grave. Just as well, the senior man thinks a short while later. Nothing on the map indicates contours, and what looks like available space is, in fact, a steeply sloping hillside. Fortunately, there are still hours of daylight left in which to find a more suitable location.
Ché accompanies the two men, running back and forth. The nature of their errand doesn't seem to touch him, or perhaps he's just happy to get out of the house and away from Marisol's carping. Ché has not complained at all, and Lisiado is proud of his son.
"Papa! Papa! Come here, look!" shouts the boy, and his father picks up his pace to see what the excitement is for. They are on the far side of the garage, where there was a fueling depot before the December raid. Now there are several acres of level space in which spring grasses and wildflowers have sprouted.
"Here, Papa!" says the boy firmly. "This is a good place to rest. There's lots of space and the flowers will cover them and it's nice and quiet."
Lisiado is humbled. His son does understand the task at hand, and his solution is both practical and beautiful. It won't disturb the wells or the plumbing. Yes, it is a bit farther than from the morgue than he'd hoped, but this is a good place in which to rest.
Esteban nods. He's been quiet since their talk outside the cathedral. A lot for him to think about. Lisiado remembers him as a boy barely older than Ché's is now when he first arrived in the household. His brothers were much older - Eduardo by twelve years and Ernesto by fifteen. They hadn't taken much notice of their father's new "advisor". Esteban was scared to death of him. Not surprising, Lisiado thinks, remembering how gaunt - almost skeletal - he'd become in his struggle for life.
When they return to the house to change into the protective suits and begin work, Philomena informs him that she has nothing to prepare for dinner unless they want tinned beans or peanut butter sandwiches. He must take her to market, now, if you please!
"Why didn't you tell me this before?" he demands. It's an effort to control his tone. In his prime, he wouldn't have. Is he at the end of his days, to suddenly think so often of the time when he was young and strong?
"You left so quickly!" she scolds him. "The cleaning supplies were only part of what I needed."
"You can take the truck," he tells her, but Philomena shakes her head, convinced that the moment she sets foot in Culiacan, a gang of armed bravos will target her. There's no reasoning with the old woman, and finally he tells Esteban and Ché to set out stakes in the field. That will keep them occupied for at least part of the time and delay the moment when he has to try to figure out how to work the backhoe. Fortunately, Marisol is upstairs in her room listening to music loud enough that she doesn't hear about the trip she won't be making.
After a trip to the market square, Lisiado is loading the provisions into the trunk of the sedan when Philomena gasps. "It's him! It's him!" She shrinks behind Lisiado as if the menace is charging in her direction.
"Where? Point him out to me."
"Over there, by the jeep."
Lisiado leans around the trunk lid. There is a battered jeep on the far side of the plaza from them. He notices a boy, about the same age as Ché, he thinks. Beside him... "In sunglasses?" he asks her.
The old woman peeks and draws back. "No, no! Him! In the black jacket!" Marisol mentioned a black jacket, he recalls, and looks again. His guts clench in shock, and he ducks back out of sight. For a moment he can't breathe; his lungs struggle for air. His heart is pounding suddenly.
"Philomena," he wheezes. "Here are the keys. I want you to go back to the hacienda. You're safe as long as he doesn't see you."
"But, Señor Lisiado -"
"I'm going to follow him, to find out his business. If I haven't returned by this time tomorrow, take the others and go back to Guadalajara."
The sedan departs at last, and Lisiado leans against a telephone pole, learning to breathe all over again and studying the man Philomena has pointed out to him. He's tall. Self-possessed. Not swaggering, but he displays the confidence of a man who has frequently emerged unscathed from danger. Not a man to cross. He hardly looks a day older than he did on the afternoon his bullets almost claimed Lisiado's life.
The man in the black jacket is talking to his companions. The second man projects watchfulness with little shifts of attitude. He scans the area, ever-mindful of threats. Where does he fit into his? Is he one of the ones who raided the hacienda? Who are they affiliated with? The man in sunglasses cuts short whatever the tall man is saying. He and the boy walk away from the jeep, and Philomena's intruder shrugs. He goes in the opposite direction.
Once in ten years, and now twice today, thinks Lisiado with grim amusement, following at a cautious distance as the other man swiftly mounts the steps to the cathedral. (Perhaps his quarry, too, has a grave he plans to piss on?) His heart races as he pushes open the door. This time, being struck down doesn't seem like such an unlikely possibility, but by a bullet, not a thunderbolt. But as his eyes adjust to the stained glass splendor of the church, he sees the scorpion on the back of the black jacket disappearing into a confessional.
How appropriate. He has at least two dozen sins on his conscience that Lisiado can think of. Quietly, the older man strolls toward the row of booths and amends the prayer he made earlier.
"Did you wish to confess, my son?" asks a passing priest.
"No, thank you, Father, I'm just waiting for someone," answers Lisiado politely. The gun he selected for guard duty last night is tucked under his shirt, digging into the small of his back as he leans against a pew.
When the door to the confessional opens, he is not surprised to confront a pair of pistols leveled at his heart.