Paul Levine: Illegal

Her father tried raising grapes, but there was not enough water. He looked for work. Roofer. Carpenter. Handyman. But the villagers were poor and did their own repairs, if any at all. Even worse, they seemed to resent the Perez family.

"Aristocracia," they called them, with contempt. Thinking the family put on airs along with their freshly washed clothes.

Only in Mexico, Marisol thought, could a fired factory worker with no money in the bank be considered haughty for keeping a clean house and making sure his children finished secondary school.

The roar of an engine stirred her from thoughts of the past. Tino leapt up and looked out the broken window. A red pickup truck with dual rear wheels and a long cargo bed kicked up dust as it slid to a stop in front of the adobe house.

El Tigre wiggled his belly out of the cab, shouting instructions for the pollos to hop into the back.

Tino whistled. "A Ford F-350, Mami. Brand new. Did abuelo make these?"

A note of hopeful pride in his voice, Marisol realizing yet again that her son needed a man in his life.

"I don't think so," she said. "Your grandfather built cars. Lincolns and Fords."

The ten travelers piled into the bed of the shiny red pickup, Marisol thinking, Why not just paint a sign on the doors, Illegals Here!

Standing on the running board, El Tigre counted his passengers. "Tonight, you walk in the desert," he proclaimed, like a Mexican Moses. "Tomorrow, you walk in Los Angeles!"

Marisol and Tino sat with their backs pressed against the rear of the metal toolbox that ran the width of the cab. They each wore one backpack. Before they left home, Marisol fought back tears as she told Tino they could only take what they could carry. Not the plates or silverware that had been her grandmother's. Not the kitchen table handmade by her father from mahogany scraps.

Just three changes of clothing each. Tino's baseball glove. Photographs of his abuela y abuelo, both gone now. Everything else they left behind.

They each wore jeans and their new Reeboks, purchased in Mexicali along with "travel kits." Tins of sardines and crackers and gallon jugs of water. Band-Aids, blister cream, and sunblock. Everything for the aspiring pollo except a green card. Still, Marisol could not shake the feeling that disaster faced them at every bend in the road.

"And what do you do, Agustino, if anything bad happens and I am not there?"

"Call J. Atticus Payne. But don't worry. I will take care of both of us."

"All right, my little valiente. "

"I am not so little, Mami. "

The truck headed west through a mountain pass on Federal Highway 2, then across a rocky, barren landscape, over bridges that traversed ravines and dry washes, finally curling up a mountain road through narrow canyons, dangerously close to steep cliffs. It was a moonless night-helpful for crossing undetected-the only light the twinkling stars overhead.

"It's okay, Mami, " Tino said. "Everything will be okay."

Marisol hadn't realized it, but she was squeezing her son's hand. Squeezing so hard, he had to pry her fingers loose.

"Of course it will," she said.

They came to a mountain town called "La Rumorosa" — named for the winds that whistled through the canyons-and stopped outside a small house of sand-colored rocks. A threadbare sofa and two living room chairs, springs sprung, sagged in the front yard, facing a fire of mesquite wood. Three young men lounged on the furniture, one cleaning what looked like a sub-machine gun, the other breaking down a handgun. The third man smoked a joint. He waved in the general direction of the truck but didn't get off the sofa.

El Tigre banged his horn. "Let's go, Rey!"

Rey, the pot smoker, looked to be about twenty years old. Baggy pants, shaved head, his body all cords and wires. A muscle-tee displayed his tattoos: Aztec symbols, Mexican flag, and a green snake that crawled up his neck. His goal in life appeared to be to spend as much time as possible in prison.

Heavy-lidded, Rey jammed a handgun into the front of his pants, lazed his way around the truck, and peered into the bed.

"Who are you?" Tino asked, before Marisol could keep him quiet.

"You ever hear of the Avenue 57 Chicos?" Rey's smile showed yellow teeth and undisguised malice.

"No."

"You will, chico."

Great, Marisol thought. A gangbanger. Or, at the very least, someone who wanted to be.

El Tigre hit the horn again. He must like the sound. Then he swung his bulk out of the cab, stood on the running board, and said, "Rey's my nephew. He'll watch for bandits until we cross over. But stay out of his way. He is a terrible shot."

"?Chingate, Tio!"

Rey telling his uncle to have sex with himself. The family must be very proud of the young man, Marisol thought.

El Tigre plopped back into the cab, and his nephew slithered into the passenger seat. With a final toot of the horn, El Tigre gunned the engine. Spitting up dirt, the truck bounced onto the mountain road and into the darkness of the Mexican night.

Payne called 911 and was immediately cross-examined.

"Yes, I'm sure it was a gunshot."

"No, I'm not at the judge's house."

"No, I'm not armed! Jeez, get the paramedics over there!"

A woman at the other end of the line asked him to hold a moment.

Payne paced in a tight circle. Fully awake now, wound tight, filled with regret. Judge Rollins was corrupt, but he didn't deserve this.

"Is this Mr. James Payne?" asked the woman on the phone.

Oh, shit.

He hadn't given his name.

The woman recited his home address and the fact that he had three unpaid parking tickets and two citations for failing to clear brush from his property.

The L.A.P.D.'s enhanced caller I.D. The city can't fix the potholes, but it can snoop into our living rooms.

Technology would lead the cops straight to his front door. They would ask all those nosy cop questions about his visit to the judge. They probably wouldn't do a Rodney King on his skull, but who wants another Grand Jury looking into his affairs?

Payne clicked off without saying good-bye. He needed time to think, and this wasn't the place. He dressed hurriedly, grabbed the envelope with the five grand he had skimmed, and hopped into his car. Headed west on Oxnard, hung a right on Van Nuys, and parked on Delano, two blocks from his office. Payne was seldom in his office between nine and five, much less in the middle of the night. Still, no use advertising his presence with his Lexus by the door.

The chambers of J. Atticus Payne, Esquire, solo practitioner, occupied a one-story, wood-shingled bungalow built in the 1920s and not updated since. The paint was peeling, the porch sagging, and the siding tearing loose. A California Craftsman gone to seed.

Rent was cheap, and the place was close to the courthouse, bail bondsman's office, and the police station. The small backyard had been paved over to provide parking for three cars, even though many of Payne's clients arrived by bus, walking the last few blocks from the Van Nuys Civic Center.

The shelves were lined with law books that Payne never read, the desk cluttered with mail never to be answered. Atop his first-generation fax machine, a single slice of pepperoni pizza looked alarmingly like a chunk of plasterboard with skin cancer. He tossed the envelope with the hundred-dollar bills into a desk drawer and opened a cabinet that was intended for litigation files but contained vodka, bourbon, Scotch, tequila, and coffee liqueur. Payne had not been much of a drinker until the accident. After his surgery, he sought relief from the pain by washing down Vicodin with white Russians.

He contented himself now with some Maker's Mark, neat, in a dirty cup. He kicked some files off an old corduroy sofa and stretched out. He did not know what he would do in the morning, though he vaguely recollected that he had an eight a.m. hearing in Superior Court, just down the street.