Гарри Гаррисон - Montezuma’s Revenge

“Stay here,” Tony ordered, stopping outside the door. “The contact will be a man in a black suit carrying a tightly rolled umbrella.” Where on earth had that idea come from? The hang-over must still be operating. “Allow him to come in. Then I will bring out the painting.”

“I will check inside,” Timberio said, starting through the door. “He may be there already.”

“No,” Tony said loudly, his voice cracking. One look inside and his whole plan was destroyed. “That will ruin everything.” As indeed it would.

Timberio withdrew reluctantly and took up station a few feet away as did his aide. Tony entered slowly and, as soon as he had passed from sight, burst into frenzied activity. He had to effect the change quickly or not at all. A button popped as he tore the shirt from his back, then stripped off the trunks. There was a startled grunt from an old man who was emerging from the last cubicle, the only other occupant.

“It’s a fine morning,” Tony said as he hopped about on one foot pulling on the white trousers. The old man watched in wide-eyed astonishment as Tony completed the rest of his metamorphosis, clapped the hat on his head, wrapping painting and clothes hurriedly in the crumpled paper and stuffed them into the morral which he hung over his shoulder, handle of the machete projecting upward as he started for the door.

He emerged with a slow shuffle, head down, the wide brim of the sombrero shading his face, shoulders bent to make him appear shorter. At the last moment he even managed a slight limp to aid in the transformation. He held his breath as he walked past Timberio, visible only as trouser legs and a pair of highly polished and pointed shoes. Then past the other agent—and still no cry of alarm. They were both looking outward for the dark-clad, umbrella-bearing messenger and paid no heed at all to the simple peasant who passed. Ten feet, then twenty, thirty, almost to the corner—when an anguished cry sounded. Tony took one look back to see the old man talking to the Italian agents, then he began to run. Around the corner and down the street, ignoring the hammers inside his head.

Faster still to escape the sound of pursuing feet.

Tony vanished in the crowd, another drop of water in the ocean of Mexican citizens, his clothes neutral, his wide-brimmed hat like all the others. A turn into a side street, a small market with stands along the sidewalk and in the road. When he stopped running, and even walking, slowed to a reluctant halt by the savage blows of his waning hang-over, his pursuers had vanished. A nearby stall dispensed the cooling drink of pineapple juice, papaya juice, coconut milk—no rum this time!—and orange juice all whipped to a froth in a blender. He ordered a large one of these and while drinking it thought he saw one of the distraught Italians run by, but it was only a glimpse and he couldn’t be sure.

Refreshed, his throat cooled, the hang-over under control, he penetrated deep into the market that he had visited the day before and followed his nose to the food stalls where a booming morning trade was in progress, sliding onto a stool as its previous owner vacated it. There was the quick gush of saliva in his mouth at the richness of the odors, accompanied by a stabbing pang of hunger. A brace of goat enchiladas smothered in rich red gravy and flanked by a healthy portion of fried beans did a good deal toward alleviating this sensation.

“The sauce if you please,” his companion at the narrow board said. They sat shoulder rubbing shoulder, leaning forward so that the parcels of the people pushing by behind did not jar into them. Tony slid over the requested dish swimming with fresh chopped chilies, tomato, garlic and onion, then helped himself as well as soon as the other had done.

“I am looking for the little town where my cousin lives,” he told his eating companion who was diligently pursuing the last drops of goodness around his metal plate with a half tortilla. He was a gaunt old man, somewhere between fifty and ninety years of age, with a few white wisps of beard. He nodded at the interesting information so freely given, but felt no real need to comment. “He said it is on the road to Chilpancingo just outside of Acapulco.”

“That will be Las Graces.”

“No, that is not the name I remember.”

The old man swallowed the last of his tortilla, wiped his finger tips gently on the side of his pants leg, then counted on his fingers, worn scarred and permanently hooked from a lifetime of labor.

“That is first. Then you find El Quenado and El Treinta. 5’

“The last, that is the very name. Do you know where the bus stops for this place?”

“Two blocks down and one to the right.”

“A thousand thanks for the information.”

Feeling a good deal better, Tony strolled the two blocks down and the one right and was greeted by the sight he had hoped to see. A small crowd of farmers returning from the market, parcels and crates of unsold chickens held high, milling slowly toward the entrance of the third-class bus, a venerable, rusty, dented, crack-windowed, smooth-tired veteran of a fading lifetime of service proudly bearing the name La Nave del Olvido. Tony joined the crowd and became a part of it, swimming with it toward the bus and aboard.

The life line of Mexico; the third-class bus. They went everywhere that there were roads, paved or unpaved, or a mixture of both. They connected every small town with the larger cities at infinitesimal fares to enable the farmers to bring their corn, eggs, chickens, pigs, beans to the markets and return with cloth, salt, rebozoSy coffee, nails. Given diligence and a great deal of patience, as well as a total indifference to discomfort, a man could travel the length and breadth of Mexico in these buses for their trails cross everywhere. What better way to leave Acapulco than in this manner! Lost in the crowd, one more simple farmer, rattling out of the city at a spanking twelve miles an hour, past the keen-eyed servants of the law who were searching for the murderou American, grinding up the hills in low gear and away.

Within the hour the bus squealed to a halt in El Treinta and Tony stepped shakily down. If there had been any police at the city’s exits they had been invisible from his position within the vehicle between an armful of pendant, fearful-eyed chickens, and two men who argued the entire time about the local football team and attempted to involve him in the discussion. It had indeed been an adventure and he walked with unsure step toward the nearest miscelanea that bordered the road. Bottles were ranked neatly on the shelves inside and he let his eyes flit quickly over the mezcal and tequila, enough of that, thank you, to last quite a while, to settle on the aguardiente. This is a transparent, dangerous distillate of sugar cane, potent beyond belief. He selected a medium-sized bottle sealed with a black cork, paid for it and sampled its fiery potential before leaving the premises, the storekeeper nodding with approval at his happy sigh and pleasurable wipe of the back of his hand across his lips.

Outside the April sun burned with the heat of August. The town was stretched along the highway on both sides, two-dimensional, two single rows of buildings. Glittering tourist cars and smoke-belching diesel trucks thundered by on the pavement; children played unheeding on each side on the packed dirt that was the only street of the town. A palm-leaf-covered stand sold bright tropical fruit and an American couple was haggling over the price of mangoes in high-school Spanish. They reduced the asking price considerably and carted their bargains away in triumph as Tony bought the same fruit at a quarter of the price; all parties concerned were happy. The machete carved sweet slices of the mango, w blended very well indeed with the aguardiente. The wait the next bus arrived was pleasant, the bus itself not crowded so that he actually found a seat. The man who joined him also joined him in drinking from the bottle and in return shared still-warm tortillas stuifed with beans from his bag. Upward, grinding in low about the turns, the jungle falling away on each side, plunging into the clouds that hung like fog across the road, they made i way. The bottle was soon finished and the two travelers slept peacefully, leaning one against the other. So did the morning pass and a good deal of the afternoon. Mountains and road and the stop at every village, or parada, where the waiting customers waved their hands. Over the highest pass finally and the steady drop into the immense bowl and high plain of the state capital, Chilpancingo.