The Luck of the Maya. Theodore Brazeau
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way out here in the desert!
I could talk, with difficulty, with María de los Ángeles. She spoke only Huasteco, with a little Spanish, and my language was, of course, Yucateco. It helped I’d had classes comparing the twenty-eight or so Mayan languages, when I was at the university in Mérida. If we spoke slowly and didn’t get too complicated, we could get along. The little girls, naturally, were bilingual, they had to be, so they helped out.
We shared a meal with the family and then got on our way again. We wanted to get somewhere before dark. At least we had a rough idea of where we were going, thanks to Esteban. We found the highway, got up on it, and made it into Matehuala. I was never so thankful to see gas stations and motels and restaurants. Especially gas stations. Carlos hadn’t said anything, but I knew we were almost out.
CARLOS
Lucy and María de los Ángeles moved off companionably with the little girls leading the way. They wanted to show Lucy the chickens and the dog and cats. All of them had names, and they cackled and barked and mewed appropriately. They also introduced her to the burro, who didn’t seem at all impressed.
Meanwhile, Esteban was explaining to Jeb and me just how we would have to go to get to a real road. He drew maps in the dirt with a stick, drawing out landmarks, showing us how we would have to circle around to keep on fairly level ground until we came to a particular dry arroyo. “With this truck, you’ll be just fine,” Esteban told us, “unless it rains, of course. If it rains, you’ll never make it.”
Well, it didn’t look much like rain and rain was not a regular occurrence around here, so we thought our chances were good.
Esteban and his wife insisted we have a meal. We didn’t want to take their food, as we knew they didn’t have much extra, but they would have been terribly insulted if we’d refused. We contributed our stash of car snacks, the like of which the little girls had never seen, judging from their reactions. They nibbled on them, liked some, didn’t like others. I hoped they wouldn’t get sick.
Finally we took our leave. It was getting late and we wouldn’t be able to drive after dark, nor did we want to inconvenience our new friends by staying the night. There would be no extra beds or hammocks, and they would insist on giving theirs to us and themselves sleeping on the dirt floor, if not outside.
Lucy kissed her little namesakes and hugged their mother. We all shook hands with Esteban and thanked him for his help. Without him we could easily have wandered around for days, running out of gas and reduced to drinking radiator water.
We drove off, waving. “What a great little family!” exclaimed Lucy. “What it must be like, living out here in the middle of nowhere. I saw books, and those little girls can read and write! Their Papá reads to them every night before they go to sleep.”
“I hid 200 pesos in the kitchen where they’ll find it someday.” She continued, “That’s not much, about 16 U.S. dollars, but it will be a lot to them. I couldn’t just give it to them, they’d be insulted. Just because I’m mad at Houston, I’ll charge it to the expense account, write it off under bullets.”
We drove on, circling around, following Esteban’s instructions. We found the dry arroyo, a streambed covered with gravel washed down over the years. It was narrow, but mostly flat and we could drive a little faster.
We were not at all sure how far we would have to travel, and I was getting worried about our fuel supply. We hadn’t gone that far in miles since our last fill-up, but much of it was in low gear, and continued to be. This truck, wonderful as it was otherwise, was not a gas saver under the best of circumstances, much less in low gear with the 4-wheel drive engaged. I shifted into 2-wheel drive when I could, when the terrain permitted.
The going was easy, if slow, and finally we came to a paved highway with a bridge over the streambed. Esteban had told us to drive to the right for a few hundred yards to a place where we could climb up onto the pavement. Then we were to drive east for about 40 miles and we would wind up in Matehuala, a big city to him, a small town to us, but one with gas stations, motels, restaurants and all sorts of welcome amenities.
We rolled into town with the fuel gauge showing less than an eighth of a tank. The first thing we did was fill up and, while we were at the garage, we made a deal with the mechanic to change the oil and leave the truck inside overnight.
We didn’t need an oil change, but we did need to get the truck off the street. There was no knowing where the bad guys were. For all we knew they could be cruising around in Matehuala looking for us. We kept our eye out for the big car, and were relieved that it was nowhere in sight. Maybe they’re stuck out in the desert, we thought hopefully, perhaps dying of thirst. We checked into a motel, explaining to the curious clerk that our car was in the garage down the street for repair—almost true.
Chapter Four / Capítulo Cuatro
VERACRUZ
CARLOS
The next morning, we swung south to San Luis Potosí and east toward Ciudad Valles. Then we headed for Tamazunchale, where we spent the night, getting yet another oil change. We had bought some tools in San Luis and had stopped to hammer and twist the nasty scars Archie’s poor truck had suffered. The result wasn’t pretty, but it no longer looked like it was riddled with embarrassing bullet holes. Worse, it looked more like it had been violated by someone with anger problems and a pickaxe.
The following day, we traveled through Hidalgo state on a rather slow, but very scenic, ride among the mountains through Ixmiquilpan and on to the capital city of Pachuca. The highway was good, but the curves slowed us down, as did all our gawking at the incredible mountain scenery. México is full of beautiful scenery and this is some of the best.
As we drove, Lucy complained about the Houston office, and speculated about what had happened to betray our movements. “I still think there has to be a traitor, a leak,” she said. “Now I am beginning to understand what happened before. That same traitor got my cousin Gonzalo killed, and your two friends, too. We didn’t know then how they found us, but now I do. There is going to be some payback for this. I don’t like my friends and cousins being made dead.”
She went on to tell us what had happened. “We started out, much as we did from Laredo, except we crossed the border at Brownsville and Matamoros, then went south through Ciudad Victoria to Tampico. We were twenty-five miles or so south of Tampico when we were ambushed by four guys in a sleek looking car.”
“It was similar to what happened to us, just now, except that they started shooting from behind. We were armed and returned their fire, so they dropped back a ways.”
“’Let’s not speed up’ decided Gonzalo, ‘That’s what they want and it won’t help.’ So we continued on at a moderate speed, taking an occasional shot at them to keep them from getting too close, hoping to reach Tuxpan. We thought we were going to make it, when suddenly they sped up and charged at us despite our shooting. They swerved and hit us on the left rear with the heavy car, spinning us around and sending us off the road!”
“We charged headlong down the embankment, Gonzalo trying desperately to keep us upright. Finally, he couldn’t hold it any more and we turned over. Thanks to Gonzalo, we hadn’t been going that fast and the ride down the embankment, even though downhill, had slowed us further because of the soft ground.”
“I was thrown clear, and briefly knocked out. My fingers seemed welded to that pistol and I kept a grip on it throughout my tumble. The others survived the crash, but then the four pursuers came running down from the road, firing as they came.”
“Gonzalo, or one of the others, got in a shot that stopped one of the attackers, but the others kept shooting and, by sheer volume, shot down all three of my friends.”
“I was just coming out of my daze at that moment, and realized where I was and what was happening. I aimed as carefully as I could and, despite being hardly able to see, was able to hit two of them. Then I was out of bullets. Fortunately,