Dead Men Don't Lie. Jackson Cain

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      Then came the diagnosis: terminal abdominal cancer.

      And her children were down in Mexico—incommunicado.

      Katherine secretly feared that all she and Frank could do was hope that their children were safe and wait the disease out—until finally Frank’s suffering came to its inevitable end.

      Katherine, however, was not good at “waiting things out,” which was why she’d come up to the San Carlos mountains to meet with her lifelong friend and mentor, Spirit Owl.

      * * *

      Seated earlier that morning in his heat lodge—a brush wickiup filled with aromatic smoke and scorchingly hot steam—Spirit Owl had spoken to her of her children:

      “Everyone is an individual with a different destiny. You have to learn to leave people alone—Frank as well as your children. You have to learn to let them choose and follow their destinies. You have to stop manipulating everyone.”

      “If I had adopted that attitude twenty years ago, there would be no Rancho del Cielo. It has survived and thrived precisely because I have, when necessary, told people what to do, even when they resisted. It’s survived because I have run it with an iron hand.”

      “But you run the lives of those you love with that same iron hand even when they need kindness and understanding.”

      “I can’t help interfering in their lives if they are hurting themselves and those around them. Noninterference in such situations isn’t love.”

      “You came to me because you’re depressed. That’s because, in truth, you don’t do good deeds for their own sake. You do good works because you live to control people. Now you feel that control slipping through your fingers. Frank is ill, your children are in Mexico, you can’t manipulate them, and you mourn the loss of your power.”

      “Richard and Rachel went down to Mexico and into the heart of hell. You’re saying I shouldn’t have tried to stop them. I should have let them go—let them get tortured and killed?”

      “Did it ever occur to you that they did the right thing? The Rancho knows nothing about Sinaloa. It was time you learned what you’re up against.”

      “But our spies are my children.”

      “Oh, I get it. It’s okay to send someone else’s children down there but not your own.”

      Katherine buried her face in her hands. “Spirit Owl, I’m losing my grip.”

      “You mean you’re losing your control.”

      Katherine raised her head and stared at the Owl angrily. “Richard and Rachel kept their trip a secret from me. Had I known, you bet I would have ‘controlled’ them. I would have locked them up and tied them down till the insanity passed.”

      “That’s because you’re a miserable person, Katherine, and you aren’t happy unless you’re making those around you miserable. Grow up and learn to stop meddling.”

      * * *

      His advice depressed her even more. She’d brought her Colt .44 army-issue pistol, ostensibly to fight off pumas, javelinas, and diamondbacks, but as of late she had increasingly considered another use for it. A little voice said inside her head:

      I’m sorry, Frank, Richard, Rachel, Owl, I just can’t take it anymore.

      She put the pistol to her temple.

      And after a moment of silence pulled the trigger.

      * * *

      Suddenly she saw Spirit Owl in a vision. She said to him:

      “Am I dead?”

      “No,” the Owl said. “Just in Arizona.”

      “I’m supposed to be dead.”

      “You’re supposed to stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

      “I don’t care. Everyone else gives up,” Katherine said. “Why shouldn’t I?”

      “You have to care,” Spirit Owl. “You have work to do. Anyway it’s not your time.”

      “How do you know?”

      “Because I’m the Owl.”

      * * *

      The vision faded and she heard the hammer dry-snap on a dead round.

      “Click!”

      The Owl was right.

      The bullet told her.

      And a bullet always knows.

      PART I

      How about un abrazo?

       All you gringos like the abrazo.

      —MAJOR MATEO CARDOZO

      Chapter 1

      Rachel Ryan stood at the Hermosillo cantina bar, staring into her glass of tequila. Glancing around the crowded taberna, she absently noted the two dozen tables with their quartets of straight-backed chairs. Coal oil lamps were bracketed against the walls, and twenty or so hung randomly from the ceiling.

      In a corner, a mariachi band played all the great plaintive Mexican songs—“Corrido,” “Dormir Contigo,” “Te Desean,” “La Incondicional,” “Mi Terco Corazón,” “El Son de la Negra,” “Algo Tienes,” “La Cárcel de Cananea,” “Tu Amor,” “Vive el Verano,” “La Paloma” as well as hers and Richard’s personal favorite, “La Golondrina.” The band included a trumpet, an accordion, a violin, a high-pitched, round-backed vihuela guitar, and its big, bulky, bass counterpart, a guitarrón. The cantina featured a large dance floor. Since Sonora’s main fort was nearby, half the clientele were soldiers in gray uniforms. A dozen or more cavalry officers had on brown, roweled riding boots, which clinked on the wood floor when they walked. The other half of the clientele were civilians. White cotton shirts and faded Levi’s were popular among the civilian men, white cotton dresses among the women. Since La Paloma was an upscale cantina, even the putas sported white cotton dresses.

      Fluent in Spanish, Rachel and her brother, Richard, both understood the song lyrics around them. After three months in this country she was even dreaming in Spanish. Rachel listened to “La Golondrina,” absently taking in the song’s words:

      A donde irá

      veloz y fatigada

      la golondrina

      que de aquí se va

      por si en el viento

      se hallara extraviada

      buscando abrigo

      y no lo encontrara.

      Ever СКАЧАТЬ