Illegal Read Free Page A

surface, like corpses afer a shipwreck.
    Snitch.
    Rat.
    Shyster.
    If word got out, no client would ever trust him. And word always got out. Gossip was the coin of the realm in the kingdom of justice.
    He drained the sour-mash whiskey, slipped a small vinyl folder from inside his coat pocket, and removed a business card,
     
    J. ATTICUS PAYNE, ESQUIRE
     
    Rigney had nailed it. Not even the name was real.
    Payne bummed a pack of matches from the bartender, set the card on fire, watched it disintegrate, ashes drifting into a bowl of peanuts. No ashtrays. You had to cross into Mexico to smoke legally these days. He lit a second card, stared into the orange flames. Why not burn them all?
    The only other patron at the bar was a TV writer who had been unemployed since they canceled Gilligan's Island. Camped on his stool as if he had a long-term lease, the guy's faded T-shirt read: "Say It Loud. Say It Plowed."
    Payne hoisted his glass, saluted the fellow, and took a long pull. The liquid gold delivered warmth without solace. He struck another match. Immolated another card, inhaled the acrid smoke, let the flame burn until it singed his fingertips.
    Two hundred miles southeast of the tavern where Payne planned to drink the day far into the night, just outside a cantina in Mexicali, Mexico, a wiry twelve-year-old boy named Agustino Perez stood with his mother as city traffic clattered past. The boy had caramel skin and hair so black and thick that women on the street grabbed it by the handful and cooed like quail. Tino's eyes, though, were a startling green. A teacher once said he reminded her of verde y negro, a local dessert of mint ice cream topped with chocolate sauce. Boys at school started calling him "verde y negro" with a lip-smacking nastiness. It took a flurry of fists and a couple bloody noses to convince the boys that he was not a sweet confection.
    Marisol, the boy's mother, was sometimes mistaken for his older sister. The same smile, the same hair with the sheen of black velvet. But the boy did not inherit his light, bright eyes from her. Set above wide cheekbones, her eyes were the color of hot tar.
    Glancing from side to side as if someone might be spying on them, Marisol handed her son a business card. He ran a finger across the embossed lettering and read aloud, "J. Atticus Payne, Esquire. Van Nuys, California."
    "That is Los Angeles. Mr. Payne is a very important man. One of the biggest lawyers in the city."
    "So?"
    "Put the card in your shoe, Tino."
    The shoes were new—Reeboks—purchased that morning for the crossing.
    "Why, Mami ?"
    "If anything bad happens and I am not there, go see Mr. Payne. Tell him that you are a friend of Fernando Rodriguez."
    "But I am not his friend. I don't even like the cabrón ."
    His mother raised an eyebrow, her way of demanding: "Do as I say." The stern look would carry more weight, Tino thought, if she weren't the prettiest woman in Caborca.
    He was used to men complimenting his mother on her adorable son. He knew it was their way to get close to her, smiling wicked smiles, panting like overheated dogs.
    "Fernando Rodriguez sits on a stool at La Faena, drinking tequila and bragging about things he has never done," Tino said.
    "And what were you doing at La Faena, little boy?"
    "¡Mami!"
    Why did she have to baby him? Maybe that's how it is when you're an only child, and you have no father to toughen you up, often at the end of a leather strap.
    Tino decided not to tell his mother that the barman at La Faena was teaching him to mix drinks, and that blindfolded he could already identify several tequilas, both reposados and añejos. They were going to try some blancos next week, but then, Tino's life changed in an instant. What his mother called "nuestro problema."
    Our problem.
    Even though he caused the problem. It all happened yesterday, as quick as the chisel that drew the blood. Then, last night, they packed everything they could carry and ran for the bus, traveling north from