The House of Wolfe Read Free Page B

let everybody have one on the house when we got back from the resaca. The Professor gulped down his shot and thanked him and said he was going home. Lila asked if it’d be okay if she took off too and Charlie said sure, and she gave Eddie a little wave and left with the Professor. The other four of us have been nursing our drinks, but we’ve stretched out the pleasure of the evening’s excitement long enough and we don’t really mind getting run out when Charlie says, “Time, gentlemen. You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.”
    We’re all heading for the front door when the old rotary wall phone at the end of the bar starts jangling.
    That phone’s been there since before I was born. Nineteen times out of twenty, a call on it is either from some Landing resident looking for some other one, or from somebody in Brownsville asking about the weekend supper specials. Neither’s likely at this hour.
    â€œThe hell with whoever it is,” Charlie says and goes to the door with the keys in his hand.
    â€œWhomever,” I say. I’m not really sure if I’m right, but nobody but Frank would know, and he and I like to get a rise out of Charlie by flaunting the benefits of our B.A.s in English. He gives me a look.
    The phone keeps ringing.
    â€œMaybe Lila forgot something,” Eddie says, and goes over and picks up the receiver and says, “Yeah?” as if expecting Lila. Then he loses his smile and says, “Who wants him?”
    â€œI ain’t here, hang up,” Charlie says, and gives me another look and silently mouths the word “ain’t.”
    â€œOh Christ . . . Sorry, sir, didn’t recognize your voice,” Eddie says. “Eddie, sir, Eddie Gato . . . Yessir, he’s right here.”
    He covers the mouthpiece and holds the receiver out toward Charlie and says, “Harry Mack.”
    That gets everybody’s attention. As the eldest of the Three Uncles, Harry McElroy Wolfe is the head of the Texas family. He’s also Charlie’s dad, and it’s unheard of for him to call the Doghouse phone. Whenever he calls Charlie he calls his cell, and if Charlie’s got it turned off, he just leaves a message. He’s probably tried the cell already. That he’s calling the cantina phone at one-thirty in the morning implies an extraordinary circumstance.
    Charlie takes the phone and says, “Yes, sir?”
    I’ve never heard Charlie address his father by any name but “sir,” and whenever he refers to him in conversation it’s always as we do—Harry Mack.
    Charlie listens for more than a minute without saying anything other than “right” and “yessir” a couple of times. His face is unreadable.
    â€œYessir, we can,” he says. “Just need to get clothes and passports. We’ll be there in less than an hour.”
    Passports? I exchange looks with Frank and Eddie.
    â€œYessir, I do,” Charlie says. “Of course. Yes, I agree. . . . We will, sir. Thank you.”
    He hooks the receiver back into its wall cradle and just stands there a minute with his hand still on the phone and his back to us.
    Then he turns and says, “They’ve got Jessie.”

I
    1 — ESPANTO AND HUERTA
    Mexico City on a chill Sunday evening. A pink trace of sundown behind the black mountains. An oblong silver moon overlooking the city’s sparkling expanse and bright arterial streams of traffic. Black clouds swelling in the north.
    A gray van exits a thoroughfare into the opulent residential district of Chapultepec and makes its way into a wooded hillside neighborhood. The van glides along winding arboreous streets of imposing residences fronted by high stone walls and wide driveways with iron-barred gates manned by uniformed attendants. Before long it is passing through several long blocks whose curbs are lined with chauffeur-attended vehicles bespeaking some sizable social