Earl,” I said, then hung up.
I walked down to the bluffs above the river and threw rocks at a beached, worm-scrolled cottonwood until my arm throbbed.
Jeff Deitrich didn’t return home that morning or even by that afternoon. Hugo Roberts and his deputies begansearching the county for Cholo Ramirez’s 1949 Mercury, questioning truck stop and filling station and motel operators, cruising through Val’s Drive-in and camp-grounds and the wooded promontory high above the river, called the Cliffs, where teenage kids smoked dope and made out.
Hugo Roberts and his deputies were obviously grunts for Earl Deitrich and would exercise damage control for him, but unfortunately for Earl the Texas Department of Public Safety would not. When the homosexual whom Jeff beat at Shorty’s filed charges against Jeff, the highway patrol picked up the description and license number of Cholo’s car.
At dusk on that same Sunday Jeff was asleep in the passenger seat of the Mercury when a highway patrolman parked in a roadside picnic area saw Esmeralda roar past him on the two-lane. The patrolman hit his flasher and siren and chased the Mercury for five miles through hills and a one-red-light town, the two of them sweeping onto the shoulder to pass a poultry truck, careening around a wide gravel turnout on the river’s edge, showering rocks like bird shot into the water.
She crossed a narrow concrete bridge at ninety, the backdraft blowing bait cups and fish-blood-stained newspaper into the air like confetti. Then the road straightened along the river and Esmeralda got serious. The Mercury’s engine roared with a new life and pushed the car’s body back on the springs. Rocks from her tires broke car windows on the opposite side of the road and rang like tack hammers on metal road signs.
The highway patrol cruiser slowed behind her but not out of defeat.
Up ahead, just inside the county line, Hugo Roberts and his deputies had set up a roadblock.
Around a bend, behind bushes and a signboard, so that a driver approaching it at high speed from the south could not see it until the driver was right up on it.
Esmeralda swerved onto the shoulder and was air-borne going across the irrigation ditch into a tomato field. The Mercury slid sideways for a hundred feet, scouring clouds of cinnamon-colored dust into the air, trenching a path through the tomato vines like the tail of a tornado.
The engine killed and the hood crackled with heat. As soon as Esmeralda opened the car door Hugo’s deputies were on her like flies, pinning her across the hood, pressing her cheek into the hot metal, running their hands like spiders down her sides and hips and thighs.
One of the deputies leaned his mouth close to her ear. “You just wrote our names on your ass,” he said.
None of them had paid attention to Jeff Deitrich.
Not until he came around the hood of the car and tore into them with both fists, hooking one deputy in the eye, knocking another to the ground with a bloody nose.
Hugo’s deputies, joined by two highway patrolmen, wrestled him against the grille, kicked his ankles out from under him, and jerked his chin up with a baton.
“You spoiled fart, we’re trying to help you. This woman damned near killed people,” Hugo said.
“That’s my wife. One of you put your hand on her again and my old man will have you cleaning litter boxes at the animal shelter,” Jeff said.
“Your wife?” Hugo said.
“We got married in Mexico.”
Hugo Roberts laughed and lit a cigarette. He removeda piece of tobacco from his tongue and looked at it and started laughing again.
“Let him up and see if you can get his daddy on the radio. Tell me this job ain’t a toe-curlin’ sidesplitter,” he said.
10
Just before noon on Monday morning Ronnie Cruise and Cholo Ramirez came through my office door. Ronnie threw a white envelope wrapped with a rubber band on my desk. “What’s that?” I said.
“A down payment, a retainer. Whatever it’s called. A
I walked down to the bluffs above the river and threw rocks at a beached, worm-scrolled cottonwood until my arm throbbed.
Jeff Deitrich didn’t return home that morning or even by that afternoon. Hugo Roberts and his deputies begansearching the county for Cholo Ramirez’s 1949 Mercury, questioning truck stop and filling station and motel operators, cruising through Val’s Drive-in and camp-grounds and the wooded promontory high above the river, called the Cliffs, where teenage kids smoked dope and made out.
Hugo Roberts and his deputies were obviously grunts for Earl Deitrich and would exercise damage control for him, but unfortunately for Earl the Texas Department of Public Safety would not. When the homosexual whom Jeff beat at Shorty’s filed charges against Jeff, the highway patrol picked up the description and license number of Cholo’s car.
At dusk on that same Sunday Jeff was asleep in the passenger seat of the Mercury when a highway patrolman parked in a roadside picnic area saw Esmeralda roar past him on the two-lane. The patrolman hit his flasher and siren and chased the Mercury for five miles through hills and a one-red-light town, the two of them sweeping onto the shoulder to pass a poultry truck, careening around a wide gravel turnout on the river’s edge, showering rocks like bird shot into the water.
She crossed a narrow concrete bridge at ninety, the backdraft blowing bait cups and fish-blood-stained newspaper into the air like confetti. Then the road straightened along the river and Esmeralda got serious. The Mercury’s engine roared with a new life and pushed the car’s body back on the springs. Rocks from her tires broke car windows on the opposite side of the road and rang like tack hammers on metal road signs.
The highway patrol cruiser slowed behind her but not out of defeat.
Up ahead, just inside the county line, Hugo Roberts and his deputies had set up a roadblock.
Around a bend, behind bushes and a signboard, so that a driver approaching it at high speed from the south could not see it until the driver was right up on it.
Esmeralda swerved onto the shoulder and was air-borne going across the irrigation ditch into a tomato field. The Mercury slid sideways for a hundred feet, scouring clouds of cinnamon-colored dust into the air, trenching a path through the tomato vines like the tail of a tornado.
The engine killed and the hood crackled with heat. As soon as Esmeralda opened the car door Hugo’s deputies were on her like flies, pinning her across the hood, pressing her cheek into the hot metal, running their hands like spiders down her sides and hips and thighs.
One of the deputies leaned his mouth close to her ear. “You just wrote our names on your ass,” he said.
None of them had paid attention to Jeff Deitrich.
Not until he came around the hood of the car and tore into them with both fists, hooking one deputy in the eye, knocking another to the ground with a bloody nose.
Hugo’s deputies, joined by two highway patrolmen, wrestled him against the grille, kicked his ankles out from under him, and jerked his chin up with a baton.
“You spoiled fart, we’re trying to help you. This woman damned near killed people,” Hugo said.
“That’s my wife. One of you put your hand on her again and my old man will have you cleaning litter boxes at the animal shelter,” Jeff said.
“Your wife?” Hugo said.
“We got married in Mexico.”
Hugo Roberts laughed and lit a cigarette. He removeda piece of tobacco from his tongue and looked at it and started laughing again.
“Let him up and see if you can get his daddy on the radio. Tell me this job ain’t a toe-curlin’ sidesplitter,” he said.
10
Just before noon on Monday morning Ronnie Cruise and Cholo Ramirez came through my office door. Ronnie threw a white envelope wrapped with a rubber band on my desk. “What’s that?” I said.
“A down payment, a retainer. Whatever it’s called. A
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