Warren Murphy: Date with Death

"We don't say nothing," Miguel said finally, asserting his authority over the family. "What you say, it don't go no farther than this room, okay?"

Donner made a point of staring at the Mexican for a moment, as if trying to decide. Then, once the tension was unbearable, he nodded. "All right," he sighed. "You're a tough negotiator, you know that?"

Miguel grinned proudly. The women looked at their brother with adoration.

"It began in the early days of television with an American show called 'The Millionaire,'" Donner said.

One of Consuela's sisters clapped her hands together. "Oh, yes! Our uncle's friend in America wrote to him about it before he died. A rich man gave away money to strangers."

"Is that what this is?" Consuela asked. "A gift from a millionaire?"

Donner shrugged. "I can say no more. Just bear in mind that there are many, many wealthy people in the Untied States."

"It is the land of opportunity," Miguel said stolidly. "In America, it is every man's right to be rich. Even if a man does not work, the government gives him a hundred times more money than we make here, just so he can be rich. It is called welfare."

"You'll do even better than the folks on welfare do if you come with me," Donner said.

The family went into a huddle again, switching back to the local dialect. Donner's stomach pitched and heaved. He really was going to have to get some fresh air soon. The bullcrap he'd been handing out was piling up so thick and fast, he could barely see his way through it. "The Millionaire," for God's sake, he thought. These dodos would believe anything.

A hovering jijene landed on his arm. Donner crushed the sand fly with a slap and then flicked the miniature corpse away with a snap of his fingers. What in hell was taking them so long? As if to make the waiting less tolerable still, the family dog sauntered in, hoisted a leg, and decorated the wall with an aromatic yellow stream. Donner suppressed an almost overpowering urge to reach out and snap its scrawny neck.

He shifted his attention back to the family. Consuela and her mother were talking in a barely audible whisper. The old woman's face remained expressionless. She looked more Indian than Mexican, with angular features and hooded eyes that never stopped looking at Donner. It gave him an uneasy feeling. The old lady almost looked as if she knew what he was up to. Maybe there was something in the blood, he thought, something passed on from that long-ago time when the first conquistador slipped the short end of the stick to one of her ancestors.

Out of long habit, Donner slid his hand beneath the table just to make sure that the Ruger Blackhawk was still nestled comfortably in his ankle holster. He liked to play things safe, to always have an edge, even though he rarely had to use it. Donner gave his Rolex a meaningful tap. "It's getting late," he said good-naturedly. "I don't want to rush you, but…" He grinned and spread his arms. "If you're not interested, I'll have to get some other family. The rules, you understand."

"We're coming with you," Consuela said firmly. Her mother continued to eye Donner suspiciously, but the old man squeezed Donner's shoulder and exposed two yellowing teeth in a smile. The two younger daughters started giggling. Miguel's eyes brightened at the prospect of unlimited Ring Dings. Even the dog looked pleased.

"I applaud your good sense," Donner said. "You're really going to love it in America. I'll be waiting outside." He rose unsteadily to his feet. "Don't take too long packing. And no saying good-bye to the neighbors," he warned them. "They would only be envious of your good fortune and might tell the wrong people." With that final cautionary note, he groped his way out of the shack, gulping down air to quell his heaving stomach.

He leaned against the van, smoking a cigarette while he kept a watchful eye on the Maderas' shack. Three in one, he congratulated himself. Consuela was perfect, just what his employer demanded. The face of a queen, and the body of a harlot. It was a damn shame she was Mexican.

For as long as he could remember, Donner had hated all things even remotely Mexican. Just looking at a bag of Doritos nauseated him. He cringed every time he drove by a Taco John's. Mexicans were, as far as he was concerned, the scum of the earth. This negative national bias was particularly unpleasant for Wally Donner because he was, in fact, half-Mexican himself. Even his real name was half-Mexican. José Donner. He hated it.

He had no real memory of his father, a gaunt, smiling blond man who disappeared one night a few months after Donner's birth. For years the man's silver-framed portrait sat on top of the TV. José's mother began each morning by dusting the portrait, after which she started on her ironing— shirt after shirt after shirt, all belonging to the wealthy men who lived up on the hill. While she ironed, Donner's mother spoke to her infant son in a constant flow of softly accented Spanish. She told him stories and legends, bits of folklore and gossip, anything to relieve the tedious repetition of her work.

Young Donner never played with the neighborhood kids. Few visitors came to the family's peeling stucco bungalow. It was rarer still that mother and son ventured outside. As a result, Donner was a full five years old before he found out that English wasn't just a language spoken on TV. He learned the lesson the hard way— on his very first day at school. He looked so American, with his blond hair, blue eyes, and rosy complexion, but all that came out of his mouth was "beaner" talk.

The white kids hated him. The Mexican kids hated him. The handful of blacks and Chinese just thought he was too funny for words. Young Donner spent the whole day fighting one kid after another. At the end of the day, he dragged himself home determined to learn American even if it meant that he never spoke to his mother again.

His teacher was the television set. In a way, it became his home, too. Every evening he escaped into the ordered, happy world of "The Donna Reed Show," "Father Knows Best," and a dozen other similar shows. People had whole families on TV. They lived on pretty, tree-lined streets and washed their hands before dinner. The mother, regardless of the show, always wore earrings and high heels. Best of all, nothing really bad ever happened on TV sitcoms. Sure, the characters had their problems, but no matter how dire they were, everything seemed to turn out all right before the last commercial.

Donner's favorite was "Leave It to Beaver." No one on earth was more wholesomely American than Wally Cleaver. Wally was a charmed soul. Donner could remember thinking that Wally Cleaver could have beaten an old lady over the head with an ice axe, and everything would still have been all right as long as he shuffled over to his father, hands in pockets and looking toothy and cute, and said, "Gee, Dad."

So Donner watched, and learned. The years passed quickly, undistinguished by their sameness. Young Donner continued to fight by day and watch television by night, tuning out his mother's incessant babbling as he concentrated on the tiny flickering screen. It didn't take him long to learn American. He knew even then that the language had always been inside him. It was just a matter of getting his tongue to shape the words. He tried desperately to forget Spanish at the same time, but he just couldn't force it out of his mind. He finally had to admit defeat. It was with him for life, like some hideous birthmark that only he could see in the mirror.

At fifteen he left home, slipping quietly away one Sunday morning while his mother was at church. It wasn't anything he'd planned. He just woke up that morning knowing that it was time to go. He packed a few things in his gym bag and headed up the street, not bothering to close the door behind him. He didn't bother with a note, either. His mother would know he was gone for good when she saw the shattered picture frame on the TV and the smiling blond man's face torn and distorted under the shards of broken glass. And if she was dumb enough to think that was an accident, she only had to check the old Whitman's candy box where she kept the household money. Once she looked inside it, she'd know the truth for sure.