Steven Havill - Scavengers

She tucked the flashlight under her arm and shook both hands to ease the tension. The eastern sky was showing signs of life, the inky black overhead still star-studded but fading toward the horizon. Estelle closed her eyes and took several long, deep breaths.

“Okay,” she said aloud. She skirted off to the left toward the two-track, counting the paces from the azote as she went. At twenty-two steps, she found the car tracks, a graceful crescent carved in the sand as the tires sprayed gravel and churned their mark. Because the vehicle had been cranked into a hard turn, the imprints of all four tires were distinct. One set was heavily treaded, the others showing scarcely more than a smooth, slightly dished imprint.

The scuff marks of several pairs of boots were clear…not enough to cast or photograph for detail, but distinct enough to mark passage until the next howling desert wind or late winter storm shifting things around again, smoothing the traces.

Estelle stood quietly, looking off to the north, flashlight turned off. Had the smooth rise of the hill not been in the way, she might have been able to see the sodium vapor light in front of Wally Madrid’s gas station in Maria. Over the other shoulder, several miles toward the east, the highway would be visible. Once the job was done, had the thugs opened the back of the station wagon and enjoyed a little tailgate party, oblivious to Eurelio’s agonizing escape?

She stood on her tip toes, trying to calculate the distance that Eurelio Saenz had crawled. Counting the long minutes when he floundered in the arroyo before stumbling upon the cattle trail, his tortured crawl could have taken hours.

If they had remained in the area, Eurelio Saenz’s attackers would have seen the bob and weave of headlights from Noel Jones’ big rig, the Christmas tree of its running lights clear and sharp before the rolling terrain hid it from view. They wouldn’t have seen him hit the brakes, but had they held their breath and listened hard, they would have heard the big truck sigh to a stop. And, had they been patient enough, they most certainly would have heard the wail of the ambulance siren as it screamed down toward them from the north.

There was no reason for them to wait. They would have bailed out of the car, Eurelio Saenz terrified that his ride home wasn’t turning out the way he’d hoped. They’d beaten him, flogged him, and then shot him…in unknown order. With the satisfaction of a job well done, they would have heard the sickening thud of his body as it hit the sandy gravel of the arroyo bottom. And then they would have left, driving off to whatever place they called home to celebrate another accomplishment.

Estelle turned the light back on, moved a step, and swept the desert. The light bounced off an aluminum can so bleached by the sun and weather that it was impossible to tell what the original product had been. A bit of rope, no more than three feet long, was half buried in the sand under a cholla that hadn’t won the contest for selection as the azote . She pulled it loose, saw that it had been desert detritus for years, and left it in place.

The next instant, she sucked in her breath and her pulse jumped. The single shell casing was so bright in the gleam of the flashlight that it appeared illuminated by its own light source. Estelle looked at it in place for a long time before kneeling down.

“There you are,” she breathed. She slipped the ballpoint pen from her pocket and hooked the point into the casing. It was large enough to slide easily over the pen, and she held it to the light to read the head-stamp. “You’ve become a favorite, haven’t you,” she said aloud, and brought the casing to her nose. The aroma of recently burned gunpowder was pungent.

She carefully pulled the lip of her left breast pocket open and slid the casing inside, then patted the pocket closed. For another long minute, she stood and listened to the air. Then she pulled the radio from her belt. She turned the volume knob off, then advanced it two clicks.

“Three oh one, three ten.”

The reply was immediate. “Three ten, go ahead.”

“Are you in town yet?”

“Negative. I’m still parked here behind your car.”

Estelle felt a flash of irritation. “Who’s with Eurelio?”

“The sheriff said he’d take care of it. He told me to stay down here. He’s on his way.”

“Any word from Naranjo?”

“Not yet.”

“Okay. I’ve found the spot. I’d guess that it’s a good three hundred yards from the border fence. Maybe more. There’s a place here where an old dirt road skirts an arroyo. It looks like they stopped here. I found a fresh shell casing.”

“Forty-four?”

“Yes. I’m going to flag the spot somehow and take some photos. I don’t know what they’ll show.”

“Can you see our vehicles from where you are?”

“That’s negative. There’s a small knoll in the way.”

“You be careful.”

Estelle smiled. “There’s not much out here, Jackie. A big open desert with a few tracks. That’s it. I’m going to take some photos, then I’ll head back. I found the whip, by the way. I’m bringing it, too.”

“Ten-four.”

Estelle turned off the radio so there was no risk of a sudden burst of squelch rattling the quiet of the night, and slid the unit back into its belt holster. After marking the spot where she’d found the shell casing with a half sheet of paper from her notebook weighted with a fist-sized rock, she turned to back away from the tracks, camera in hand. She froze. The sound drifted to her, muffled and guttural. Off in the distance, a single glint of amber light flashed. She snapped off her flashlight and dropped to a crouch even though a thousand yards still separated her from the vehicle that was making its way along the dirt trail.

Estelle waited. The vehicle appeared to have a single parking light illuminating its way. In a few minutes she could hear the crunch of tires, and the occasional ping of a stone spitting against the undercarriage. She eased the radio off her belt and turned it on.

“Three oh one, three ten.”

“Go ahead.”

“There’s a vehicle headed this way, an older model of some sort.”

The car surged as the driver gassed it over a small rise. The engine was rough, hardly the silky whisper of Naranjo’s government truck. “I’m going to make my way back your way.”

“And quickly,” Jackie Taber said.

“You bet,” Estelle said. “I don’t think I’m going to risk any photos just now.” She holstered the radio. The growing light in the east was doing a fine job of illuminating Texas, but the desert under her boots was a mass of indistinct shapes and hazards. She cupped her hand over the flashlight, trying to direct just a tiny stab of light in the direction of the azote . With a sigh of relief, she was able to retrace her steps, and the battered cactus plant felt heavy in her grasp when she picked it up, like a huge, heavy, awkward broom.

Holding it out away from her legs, she walked as quickly as she dared along the arroyo edge until she estimated that she was close to the cattle trail. Without using the light, she was unable to avoid the indistinct shapes as they rose in her path, snagging either her clothes or the heavy cactus. Turning her back to the direction of the methodically approaching car, she turned on the flashlight, holding it close to the ground and shielded with her body. The arroyo edge yawned smooth and sheer in front of her. In the distance, she heard voices. The cattle trail remained hidden. She stopped, flashlight in her left hand. If she had gone too far, the trail down into the arroyo would be to her left. If not far enough, to her right. She crouched again and turned, watching the car.