"I try to make my workers' lives more bearable. Ice water in the coolers, hot water in the showers. I give loans without collateral. I take care of my people."
A feudal lord, looking after his adoring peasants. Nagging thoughts tugged at Payne.
Why's he greasing me?
Why does Simeon Rutledge care what I think of him?
And where the hell is Marisol?
In the distance, a small plane flew low over a field, dropping a billowing cloud of white flaky pesticide. Payne wondered if the migrants, enjoying cold drinking water and hot showers, were downwind.
The horses picked up speed, cantering past fields popping with red and yellow peppers. They approached an apple orchard, the fruit nearing ripeness. To their right was a spillway. Water poured into an irrigation culvert. They neared a concrete-and-steel structure that looked like a dam, rising above the culvert, which disappeared behind an earthen levee twenty-five-feet high. A chugachuga sound came from unseen machinery. A sign read, Pump Station Three.
Near the top of the levee, a bizarre sight. The grille, bumper, and headlights of an old car peeked out of the dirt.
"What the hell is that?" Payne asked.
"A '56 Chevy."
"What's it doing there?"
"A memorial to Hector."
"Hector?"
"Javie's father."
"Cardenas? The chief who calls you his uncle?"
"His old man saved my ass when we got hit by three Pacific storms, back-to-back in '79. Worst flooding in a hundred years. We ran out of sandbags, and the levee was gonna breach. I was damn close to owning a hundred-thousand-acre lake instead of a farm. Then Hector Cardenas came up with the craziest idea. Reinforce the levee with scrapped cars. We called every junkyard from here to San Francisco, got three thousand chassis for scrap metal prices. All the braceros pitched in, tough little fuckers, working in mud up to their chests. Townspeople, too, women making coffee and sandwiches. Worked seventy-two hours straight through storms and gale-force winds, but we saved the levee. Saved the farm."
Payne could picture it. Simeon Rutledge standing knee-deep in muck atop the levee, shouting orders. If he couldn't command the rain to stop falling, he would push men and machines to reconfigure the earth where the rain fell.
"But we couldn't celebrate," Rutledge continued, his voice dropping a notch. "One of the cranes toppled over and pinned Hector underwater. Drowned before we could get him out."
"Jeez, that's awful." Payne figuring this was the "long story" Cardenas referred to, the source of Rutledge becoming Tio Sim. "So you raised Javier?"
"His mother raised him. I just made their lives a little easier."
The horses followed a straight path that ran in the shadow of the towering levee. Gesturing toward the levee, Rutledge said, "Where do you suppose that water comes from?"
"Wells, I suppose," Payne said. "I saw some back by the vege table fields."
"Not up here. I dammed a river and diverted the water for the orchards. Now I got state and federal agencies crawling up my ass. Some crap about not getting permits and polluting the water with fertilizers."
"You must have some high-priced legal talent working on it."
"Whitehurst and Booth in San Francisco."
"They're good."
"Good and expensive. Long on bills and short on balls. They want to negotiate fines that'll cost me millions."
"That's what deep-carpet firms do."
"What would you do, Counselor?"
"O.D.D. Obstruct. Delay. Distract." For the next five minutes, Payne gave his theory of pettifoggery. Hang tough, he advised. Outlast the bureaucrats. Only a matter of time until they jump to the private sector or just get so damn tired that they'll dismiss charges or settle for pennies on the dollar. He told Rutledge to file counterclaims. Sue for inverse condemnation, claim the government has destroyed the value of the land. Seize on little mistakes like missed filing periods.
"Always bring a contingent of your workers to court," Payne said. "Let them track mud into the gallery. Hard workers who'll lose their jobs if the government prevails. Put a human face on the billion-dollar corporation."
Rutledge scratched at his brushy mustache with a knuckle but didn't say a word. They entered a fragrant-smelling orchard of peach trees, the horses slowing to a walk. The earth had become a rich, sandy loam. Workers carried totes, plastic boxes slung around their necks, just like peanut vendors at Dodger Stadium. Rutledge greeted a crew chief by name, then allowed as how it was time for lunch.
They started back, the horses picking up their pace. Like human folk, they enjoyed going home.
Rutledge guided his black stallion alongside Payne's horse. "Been thinking about your legal strategy. I could use someone with your brains and balls."
"You're joking."
"You want to make some real money?"
He's not joking, Payne thought. Rutledge's strong suit was not his sense of humor.
"I want you to cocounsel with Whitehurst and Booth," Rutledge continued.
"They hire the brightest lawyers around. I doubt they need my help."
"They do if I say so. Charlie Whitehurst has gone soft."
"And you think I'm a better lawyer?"
"I think you're a tougher lawyer. You got a hard bark. You'll go to jail for your clients."
"Went to jail for some migrants. Doubt I would for you."
"You're proving my point." Rutledge allowed himself a crooked grin. "I don't scare you. You got bigger balls than Whitehurst."
Rutledge slowed the stallion and said, "How about a retainer of two hundred thousand. When you need more, you let me know."
Payne's mouth opened but nothing came out. If the devil had been perched on his shoulder, the offer could not have been more tempting.
"That's a lot of money," Payne said, finally.
"There's just one condition."
Of course there is, Payne thought.
"You gotta stop poking your nose into places where you got no business."
Payne didn't need to be a tough, hard-barked, big-balled lawyer to figure that one out. He'd been offered a bribe. Rutledge wanted his disappearing skills, not his lawyering skills.
"I'm not going to stop looking for Marisol Perez," Payne said.
"Nothing but trouble down that road. A real patch of quicksand."
Rutledge glared at him, waiting for a response.
After a moment, Payne said, "That trouble down the road. That patch of quicksand. Would that be a problem for me? Or for you, Rutledge?"
SIXTY-FIVE
Sitting ramrod straight astride his stallion, Rutledge felt like knocking the wiseass shyster off the Appaloosa and straight onto his skinny ass. "Goddammit, Payne. I offer you two hundred grand and you give me guff?"
Payne leaned on the saddle horn, taking pressure off his bad leg. "That's the thing. The money's way too rich. So I'm asking myself, what are you afraid of? What's the harm to you if I find Marisol Perez?"
"For once in your life, Payne, be smart."
"By dancing with the devil?"
"This devil don't dance. This devil calls the tunes."
"Just so we're clear, Rutledge. If I stop looking for Marisol, you make my life comfortable. What happens if I don't?"
"No need to go there."
"Bullshit. You're threatening me."
"I know your life's crap," Rutledge barked. "You lost your son. You lost your wife to that asshole on TV. You'll probably lose your law license. Maybe you don't believe it, but I feel for you."
"You're right. I don't believe it."
Rutledge's glare turned cold as a frozen lake. "I've taken enough of your shit. What'll it be, yea or nay?"
"Keep your money. I promised a boy I'd find his mother."
Rutledge hadn't expected this. In his experience, most men buckled at sweet pussy or fast money. But this two-bit shyster, prickly as a bale of straw, was saying no, and saying it loud. "You know what you are, Payne? You're a dishonest man with principles. That makes you dangerous. Believe me, I know."