Page 56 of A Long Con

Some slimy burgundy internal organs went sailing past me so fast they created a breeze. I tried to hug the wall as closely as I could and still keep an eye out for the pack, but I didn’t see one.

Had he shot himself after removing the pack, somehow as a gift to us at the top?

“Keep climbing!” I yelled. “I didn’t see the backpack, did you?”

“No! His stupid blue windbreaker just flew by, probably with some spine in it, and I didn’t see no backpack. Let’s keep going!”

“Okay. Just don’t fling that scalp on me.”

Berkeley lobbed the scalp in a wide arc. It bypassed me with almost an audible cry, a lonely whip-poor-will in some prehistoric setting. Or so Berkeley’s poetic nature told me.

Even more startling, I thought I caught a glimpse of some heads—attached to living bodies—bustling around over the rim.

We clambered with desperation now, uncaring how many pounds of sand splashed into our eyes and mouths. I was a man buried alive, dust filling my lungs and nose. Berkeley was above me, and hands reached down to help him up. Would they shoot him, too? Would Berkeley wind up as a hairless head on one shelf, a grasping, articulate hand on another? Would our faces be joined forever in godly matrimony?

The closer I got, the more I knew I was hearing jovial laughter. Men, maybe three of them, were heartily congratulating Berkeley on something. I was nearly choking on a mouthful of mud by the time Carlos and Levi of the famed Esperanza Para los Muertos group pulled me over the rim. I was soaked in sandy dust like an Aztec statue, and I tried to spit on the ground.

“Look, Royal!” cried Berkeley. “It’s the search and bury party!”

I shook hands with Levi too. He hadn’t hauled me up because he held a pistol in his hand. It made sense that a Diné, especially with his line of work, would be carrying.

Carlos gave me a bottle of water. I had to rinse and spit, rinse and spit before I could say, “So you shot Hogshead? I take it it’s more than a case of him being a bilagáana.”

Levi stuck his piece into his waistband. “Yeah. Myra Mains is my cousin. He was a bad influence. While he was with the kids last night we called her, to check out the lay of the land. She said he was delivering a stolen painting and a rug to some Golden Sleeve guy. She knew it was stolen. We looked out for her. When we saw you chasing Pighead, we knew whose side we were on, so we took a shortcut up here.”

“We know all the shortcuts,” said Tyler.

Wow. Kanapapiki. I wiped a palm full of sand and drizzled water on my face before taking a couple slugs. Now I probably resembled a wrestler, with tribal patterns on my shoulder and face. “That’s an amazing fucking story, brah! Respect. Speaking of . . . “ With gritted teeth, I sucked in my abs and gingerly removed the torn, waterlogged bearer bond from the small of my back. Would a bank still honor it in that condition? “That’s all great,” I said, looking forlornly at the soaked paper, “but what about his backpack? I didn’t see it falling down.”

Berkeley could barely contain his glee. “That’s the best part, Royal! They—” He held his hands to his mouth and looked at Tyler. The bilagáana finally busted out with a grin, stepped aside, and swung the backpack out from behind a rock. “We made sure to keep the goods.”

The painting, in its original FedEx tube, was glued to the frame with bungie cords. As could be expected, it was bashed in several places, but once it dried, it should be OK. The rug, inside the security of the rip-stop nylon, would have fared even better.

I laughed, handing Berkley the pathetic piece of paper. “Your call, brah. It’s your painting.”

“Half yours. Or forty percent.”

“I’ll live on thirty.”

Everyone swiveled their head at the sound of a remote chopper in the distance.

I asked, “You guys charter a chopper?”

“No.” “No.” “No.”

“Maybe it’s just some tourist,” suggested Berkeley.

“Or cop,” suggested Levi. “I’m outta here.”

As we shook hands and bro-hugged it out, Berkeley handed the bearer bond to Levi. “Cash this as soon as you can.”

Though he could hardly have known what it was, Levi flashed Berkeley a smile as the three men jogged for their pickup truck. As they peeled on by, I saw they had another body in the back, wrapped in a blanket.

“We can’t evade this fucker,” I said as the chopper lowered itself toward us. If it was the pigs, so be it. We couldn’t outrun a chopper.

When it landed, I bent over as I’d seen guys do in movies to run to the driver’s side. My hair was dried but coated in sand the color of flowerpots. My face was a mess. We’d obviously been through a lot. I approached the open chopper door where the pilot bellowed at me,

“You Ira?”