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Authors: Tabor Evans
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back more coldly and growled, "No me jadas, muchacho. I don't want to marry your sister and these fucking boots are mine!"
The kid gulped and said, "I mean you no disrespect, senor. Pero you fit the description of an Anglo we were told to watch for here in Corpus Christi. We were wondering if by any chance you could be he."
Longarm moved casually to place his broader back against a 'dobe wall, and noticed nobody seemed out to edge around behind him as he replied, "Quien sabe? Everybody looks like somebody. Exactly who did you have in mind?"
The young Mexican said softly, "An Anglo lawman, a Deputy Long, known to our people as El Brazo Largo. He is said to despise El Presidente Diaz down in our old country as much as we do, despite his riding for Tio Sam. So La Bruja wishes him to know he is in danger he may know nothing about, and if you wish for to speak with her-"
"I'd rather you tell me here and now," Longarm cut in not too gently. "El Presidente Diaz is neither the first nor the last of your breed who ever tried to knife me in an alley, no offense. So I'll just pass on following you into any barrio for a powwow with a lady even you describe as what my folks call a witch."
The kid insisted, "La Bruja never comes out in the daytime. She seldom leaves her own residencia after dark. I do not know what it is La Bruja wishes for to warn you about. As you see, I am only her mozo de mandados. Pero she seemed most anxious for to have a word with you, and if you will not come with me I can only tell her I tried."
Longarm hesitated, then decided. "I ought to have my head examined for insufferable curiosity. But seeing it's broad daylight and you seem smart enough to know I'll take you with me no matter what your pals might hit me with... How far is this old witch of yours?"
The kid said the mysterious La Bruja lived on the far side of an old Catholic church across the plaza. So Longarm told the mozo to make sure his young pals didn't tag along too close, and repeated his warning with a thoughtful pat of his no-nonsense.44-40 as he let the kid lead the way.
As they crossed that plaza he got dust in his eye. The wind was really picking up now. It was the wrong time of the year for a hurricane down this way, if there was a right time to have a hurricane anywhere. But they did have summer storms along this coast that could qualify as mighty serious. So he hoped he wasn't fixing to get stranded here in Corpus Christi with good old Norma's trunk.
They circled the church, cut across a graveyard with some of the family tombs big enough to raise chickens in, and wound up in a maze of narrow walled-in alleys just crooked enough to make you wonder. Both the older and newer parts of Corpus Christi lay on flat enough coastal plain. But the old Spanish-speaking builders had been free thinkers, tossing up one casa wrapped around a pateo here and another there, then filling in the lopsided spaces between with smaller and cheaper tenement courts. It was tougher to tell, in such barrios, how high on the hog folks might live. For rich or poor, none of the property owners to either side sprang for proper sidewalks, and one flat stucco wall topped with broken glass set in the mortar looked much the same as any other, no matter what lay on the other side.
His young guide led him not through one of the more imposing oak- or cypress-wood street entrances, but into a slot between what looked like two separate properties. At the far end of the gloomy passageway a smaller but stout-looking door had been deep-set in thick masonry. The kid knocked and the door swung inward, as if they'd been expected. But there was nobody visible in the dimly lit vestibule or on the flight of stairs winding down and lit by one wall sconce. It wasn't too clear which of four possible fort-like properties one was under as the stairs gave way to a long candle-lit corridor that seemed to have been laid out by a drunk trying to build straight.
As they neared a darker
The kid gulped and said, "I mean you no disrespect, senor. Pero you fit the description of an Anglo we were told to watch for here in Corpus Christi. We were wondering if by any chance you could be he."
Longarm moved casually to place his broader back against a 'dobe wall, and noticed nobody seemed out to edge around behind him as he replied, "Quien sabe? Everybody looks like somebody. Exactly who did you have in mind?"
The young Mexican said softly, "An Anglo lawman, a Deputy Long, known to our people as El Brazo Largo. He is said to despise El Presidente Diaz down in our old country as much as we do, despite his riding for Tio Sam. So La Bruja wishes him to know he is in danger he may know nothing about, and if you wish for to speak with her-"
"I'd rather you tell me here and now," Longarm cut in not too gently. "El Presidente Diaz is neither the first nor the last of your breed who ever tried to knife me in an alley, no offense. So I'll just pass on following you into any barrio for a powwow with a lady even you describe as what my folks call a witch."
The kid insisted, "La Bruja never comes out in the daytime. She seldom leaves her own residencia after dark. I do not know what it is La Bruja wishes for to warn you about. As you see, I am only her mozo de mandados. Pero she seemed most anxious for to have a word with you, and if you will not come with me I can only tell her I tried."
Longarm hesitated, then decided. "I ought to have my head examined for insufferable curiosity. But seeing it's broad daylight and you seem smart enough to know I'll take you with me no matter what your pals might hit me with... How far is this old witch of yours?"
The kid said the mysterious La Bruja lived on the far side of an old Catholic church across the plaza. So Longarm told the mozo to make sure his young pals didn't tag along too close, and repeated his warning with a thoughtful pat of his no-nonsense.44-40 as he let the kid lead the way.
As they crossed that plaza he got dust in his eye. The wind was really picking up now. It was the wrong time of the year for a hurricane down this way, if there was a right time to have a hurricane anywhere. But they did have summer storms along this coast that could qualify as mighty serious. So he hoped he wasn't fixing to get stranded here in Corpus Christi with good old Norma's trunk.
They circled the church, cut across a graveyard with some of the family tombs big enough to raise chickens in, and wound up in a maze of narrow walled-in alleys just crooked enough to make you wonder. Both the older and newer parts of Corpus Christi lay on flat enough coastal plain. But the old Spanish-speaking builders had been free thinkers, tossing up one casa wrapped around a pateo here and another there, then filling in the lopsided spaces between with smaller and cheaper tenement courts. It was tougher to tell, in such barrios, how high on the hog folks might live. For rich or poor, none of the property owners to either side sprang for proper sidewalks, and one flat stucco wall topped with broken glass set in the mortar looked much the same as any other, no matter what lay on the other side.
His young guide led him not through one of the more imposing oak- or cypress-wood street entrances, but into a slot between what looked like two separate properties. At the far end of the gloomy passageway a smaller but stout-looking door had been deep-set in thick masonry. The kid knocked and the door swung inward, as if they'd been expected. But there was nobody visible in the dimly lit vestibule or on the flight of stairs winding down and lit by one wall sconce. It wasn't too clear which of four possible fort-like properties one was under as the stairs gave way to a long candle-lit corridor that seemed to have been laid out by a drunk trying to build straight.
As they neared a darker
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