“Mission accomplished, then.”
They came to one side of the grove, where it ended at a culvert. Merci could see the outline of the irrigation gate against the weeds. Past the culvert was a flood control channel lined with concrete. Overhead the moon was smudged by clouds. And just beyond the channel rose the tan stucco townhomes of some recent development, their backsides tall and flat and almost windowless. They reminded her of stuck-up people at a party, huddled together, looking away. When she came out of the trees the buildings always surprised her, how tall they were and unexpected, even when you knew they were coming.
“It’s like they can’t look at the grove behind them,” Merci said. “Because they’re too good.”
“The developers?”
“No, the buildings. Hardly any windows, like they don’t want to see. But that would go for developers, too, right? Not wanting to look behind, like at history and stuff.”
“Why look backward, when you’re driving to the bank?”
“All’s they do is pack in more people.”
“I never had much problem with that. People need places to live. I think if people don’t like it they should just leave.”
“Why not preserve some things? I never thought of that until I moved in here. And I only moved here because Dad knows the owner and the rent’s cheap. But some stuff, you just ought to save. Hess, check this.”
She led the way down the side of the culvert, shining her flashlight back every few steps to make sure he didn’t stumble. Then she cut diagonally across the grove, aiming toward the back of her house. The ice in her Scotch glass clinked and she heard Hess’s clink behind her and she drank more. Her ears felt warm but her lips tingled and there was a cool patch on her forehead.
“Okay back there?”
“Just plodding along.”
Approaching the last three rows Merci could see the back end of her house, the driveway that curved all the way around it, the ring of porch light active with cats, and the rat-happy garage dark against the trees.
She came out of the grove and started across the overgrown back lawn. The toes of her tennis shoes got damp. Hess had fallen back a few steps so she waited for him to catch up. When he did she heard the sharpness of his breathing and wondered if the chemo and radiation were getting it all. She banished that thought from her mind immediately. She rebanished Jerry Kirby from her mind, too. She felt strong again, in control. Probably the Scotch, she thought. So she turned and shined the flashlight at Hess’s chin — not quite into his eyes — laughed, and turned it off.
“Funny,” he said.
“Had to.”
“What’s the big attraction?”
“Over here.”
Behind the garage was a bare quarter acre of land that Merci had decided was once a vegetable garden. She had made the discovery digging there, trying to save money when the septic tank needed pumping. She was actually trying to sweat out a ferocious anger at Mike McNally and his diabolical little son for letting themselves in, eating her food, leaving the dishes unrinsed and letting the bloodhounds shit tremendously upon the lawn. For about the hundredth time.
She thought the digging might help. According to the owner’s drawing the tank lay about twenty yards south of the garage. The drawing was off by ten feet at least because she never did find the tank, or even a leach line. But the soil was soft and her anger diminished as her blisters grew. And she found what she found, proving to Merci that a will to locate the known could result in discovering the unknown. Her mother would call it serendipity, but she also called a vase a vawz.
She shined her light down through the dead tumbleweeds, saw the plywood. She’d secured the plywood with scrap cinder block, and tied the tumbleweeds to the wood with dental floss. The last thing she wanted was neighborhood kids or dogs into her discovery, or some eggheads from the university.
Hess was standing beside her now. She could hear the short precision of his breathing. He looked slightly forlorn as he stood there in his sport coat with his general’s haircut and stared down into the beam of his flashlight. But there was a good shine to his eyes when he looked at her.
“Nice tumbleweeds,” he said.
“Check it out.”
She set down her glass and flashlight and carried off the cinder blocks with both hands. The edges were sharp and dug into her fingers. She got under the plywood and slid it away. She pulled out the wadded newspapers.
Then she stood and aimed her light in.
“Meet Francisco. He’s real.”
He looked the same as last time, she thought, which was probably the same as he’d looked for about four centuries. The rusted, upswept horn of his conquistador helmet protruded out from the recessed skull like the prow of a ship. The bones were brown and, to Merci, disturbingly small. The skull still had some skin attached, which was black and thin as paper. The beauty of him was the way his old brown bones were still encased in the armor — the helmet and chest plate and belt buckle. He seemed to her a tiny man caught in the hard, oversized diapers of history. His sword with its deeply eroded blade lay to his side. It was the only part of him or his gear that didn’t seem small. In fact, it was gigantic compared to the frail, chest-crossed hands that had once wielded it.
“Is he cool or what?”
Hess was leaning forward at the waist, looking in, the light held out in front of him.
“I think he could have been some kind of law enforcement, but they took his harquebus because it was valuable.”
“No badge.”
“Maybe it rusted away.”
“Hmmm.”
“But he was probably just a soldier. Either way, four hundred years ago he came about halfway around the world and died right here in my backyard.”
She looked down at the small brown bones and pitted armature, feeling what she always felt when she looked at Francisco: that he was here on a mission far more perilous and important than any she would undertake, that there were many more important moments per year back then than there were now, that people had more courage. And they didn’t live very long, either.
Hess continued to stare in. “He looks awful... alone down there.”
“Not so alone, since I found him.”
“Well, whatever, Merci. He looks goddamned alone to me. Have you told anyone?”
“Who? Who are you going to trust with him? A scientist would take him. The health department would take him. A relative would probably say leave him right where he is, but where’s a relative?”
Hess had brought his hand to his face but was still looking down, thinking.
“I like everything about him,” said Merci. “Look at that helmet. And his hands, the way they fold over his ribs. And look at the way those ribs connect up around the back. I never knew the rib cage was so graceful. Plus, his teeth? Look how big and sharp they are, like he was used to eating wild animals.”
“Out here he probably did.”
“And check the belt buckle. I mean, that must have been one big belt he wore. I wish he had some boots on, but I’ll bet you he died with new ones and they took those along with the gun.”
“You’ve given this some thought.”
Merci didn’t answer for a long time. She just looked down at Francisco and tried to let her mind retreat through the centuries. The things about him that really bugged her were height and weight, what color his hair and eyes had been, if he’d had a beard or not — the kind of stuff you’d need for a solid suspect description. Sometimes she wished she could think different than a cop, just once in a while.
“You find a conquistador in your backyard and you’d think about him, too.”
Thirty-Five