32. Doors of a Worried Man

The Kodiak sped away but had to stop at the intersection with Trasviña y Retes Boulevard behind several vehicles, as traffic had picked up from when they passed the intersection hours earlier. Once there, it backed up slightly and parked at the Jumanos Restaurant and Bar. Ervey and Lilo got off the truck and walked in and saw the restaurant was completely empty. A waitress promptly came to them and sat them a booth beside a out a window that looked out to their truck. She handed them menus and asked if she could fetch them drinks.


"Yes, coffee and two hamburgers for me," said Ervey.


"Me too," said Lilo.


The waitress, a middle-aged woman with dark skin and dyed blonde hair, nodded and smiled and turned and walked away.


"What time do you think we'll get back to Chihuahua," said Ervey.


"About ten tonight," said Lilo.


They both sat in silence. Ervey looked down at his hands, occasionally shaking his head slightly. Lilo looked out through the window stoically. A long while passed before anything was said between them.


"Estúpido," said Ervey, "the güey was just assumed he was going to bully us into letting him steal from Don Carlos. And you went crazy on him."


Lilo hissed loudly but otherwise kept looking out the window without saying a word.


"You had him twittering with fright," Ervey said, and burst out laughing.


Lilo turned to him and gave a slight smile.


"Would you really have hit him?" asked Ervey.


"If he was going to get me into trouble, I was going to make him pay for it right there and then," said Lilo, turning back to the window.


Ervey continued laughing.


"And when you called his bluff about having friends ready to jump us?" said Ervey, laughing harder.


"I have no doubt he had friends, but they were not right there with him at the time," said Lilo.


"And if they had been there?" said Ervey, no longer laughing.


"Then their partner would have gotten it real bad as an example of what awaited them," said Lilo, "there were clay pots ready at hand after all."


The waitress returned with the meals. Both men ate in silence.


As soon as they were done, they rose from the booth and paid their bills. Ervey walked out of the restaurant ahead of Lilo then hesitated in front of the truck before climbing back into it.


"You want to drive back to Aldama?" asked Ervey.


"Está bién," said Lilo.


He backed up the truck and and accelerated up the highway. On the way out of town, however, he turned left on the road to Camargo. Ervey turned to him inquisitively.


"Going back on the toll road?" asked Ervey.


"Sí," said Lilo.


"Probably a good idea," said Ervey, "probably faster and we won't be in the mountains when the sun sets."


Lilo nodded.


A short ways down the road, he turned right onto the toll road. With the road flat from there to the twenty kilometer customs stop in La Mula, Lilo shifted quickly into top gear. The signs of Ojinaga quickly dissipated as they speed on the highway.


"I wonder what all those door jamb kits in the bundles were for," said Ervey, "and if that's all that was in them."


Ervey looked over at his partner, but Lilo did not respond.


"What you think?" asked Ervey after a long pause.


"Heavy duty jambs for the doors protecting a worried man," said Lilo, "but it they won't do him a lot of good because the pot thief's the one who's going to install them."


"You're right. That's what he said," Ervey said, raising his eyebrows but not turning away from the open road ahead, "wolf guarding the door to the chicken coop."