Brian Garfield by Tripwire Page A

course.”
    â€œMaybe,” Boag said.
    â€œYou have an idea?”
    â€œHow much is that gold really worth, in pesos?”
    â€œYou mean if it were clean, if it could be sold in the open market without fear of discovery?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œApproximately three and one half million pesos.”
    Boag said, “So Mr. Pickett has more than five million pesos to spend. You could almost buy this whole province for that.”
    â€œWell hardly, Señor. But it is an impressive sum.” Don Pablo’s pale hands came together in a prayer clasp. “You said some part of the gold was yours?”
    â€œYes.” Boag refused to be drawn. He was thinking, if I had all that money where would I take it? But it was hard to think like Mr. Jed Pickett. He didn’t have the background for it.
    He said, “He left about a week ago?”
    â€œToday is Monday. They left here Wednesday evening. It is five days.”
    â€œYou didn’t send anybody after them?”
    â€œI had no one left to send,” Don Pablo murmured. He roused himself, shaking his head as though to clear it. “I was obligated to inform my men that I had nothing left with which to pay them, that my estate was under mortgage which could not be repaid, and would be taken from me in due course. I gave them what little I could and dismissed them. The aged one, Miguel, chose to remain with us without pay. He is the only one.”
    Well it wasn’t the way Boag would have done it. At least you could give them a choice. If you want to get paid you have to go after the son of a bitch and get my money back for me. But that wasn’t realistic, was it; not when you were talking about Mr. Pickett’s rawhiders. They had been fighting Yankees and Apaches and Mexicans for twenty-odd years while Don Pablo’s vaqueros had been chousing cows.
    Miguel appeared. “ La comida. ” Miguel helped Don Pablo out of the chair and half carried him. Boag trailed them down the stairs and across the courtyard in the dusk. There was the rasp of cicadas, a cool dry wind, light clouds scudding by.
    You could see where there had been paintings and candelabra in the dining room; now there was only the table and a few chairs which probably had been brought up from crew’s quarters. Señora Dorotea served the meal on chipped Indian pottery plates; the Don ate soup while the rest of them ate the meat of a rabbit Miguel had shot. The cattle herds, it was explained, had been sold along with everything else to raise money to pay for Mr. Pickett’s gold. It had been Don Pablo’s plan to sell the estate to the men in Monterrey and Durango who held the mortgages; then he would have been able to take Dorotea to a mountain resort for the cure. The cure seldom worked but it was worth the attempt; what else was there? There would have been money enough to buy their own resort.
    â€œNow it is all ashes,” Don Pablo whispered into his soup.
    It was as if he was already dead; it was just taking him some time to quit breathing. Boag said, “How long do they give you?”
    There was a sharp glance from Miguel. The señora did not look up. Don Pablo said, “A few months, perhaps a year, perhaps two years or five. No one knows, really.”
    â€œThen maybe you’re giving up a little early.”
    Don Pablo cackled. It made him cough.

6
    He lay on a straw tick in a small room off the veranda.
    A light rapping at the door; he looked up and it was the Señora Dorotea. She rested her shoulder against the door-frame. “I was lonely,” she said.
    He looked into her eyes; she gave a little smile as if to say she knew what had not been said and was not going to be said.
    When he touched her cheek he felt her tremble. He ran his fingertips up into her thick dark hair, surprised by the cool smoothness of her skin. Her woman-smell filled him.
    She sat on the cot beside him; the heavy rope of her hair swung