In The Shadow of a Rosary
 by Trey R. Barker

"Hombre, you should come."

"Who is this? What do you want?"

"This is Miguel. I think Hector is dead."

* * *

Two days later, Diz stared at the bones.

Picked clean by west Texas vultures, bleached white by the west Texas sun.

Except vultures didn't put bullets in a man's skull.

Bones. And the wooden rosary.

"Well?" Nix asked, sitting in Diz's '56 Ford truck, fanning herself. A lock of red hair stuck to the side of her face, plastered there by the heat and sweat.

Gathering the bones, Diz deposited them in the truck. The skull and rosary he set on the front seat. "Let's get outta here," he said. "Before we get shot."

Tight-lipped, Diz followed Farm-to-Market road 213 to I-20 until Grift rolled into view. Roadside stands whizzed past -- fruits, vegetables, cider -- blurred by speed and Diz's grief.

"Stop at that chile stand," Nix said. "Please?"

Diz obliged, waiting while Nix bought a handful of green chiles and popped one in her mouth. "Flat," she announced. Then her eyes went wide and she coughed.

"Those'll kill you someday," Diz said.

"What won't?" She caressed his cheek. "Whose bones, honey?"

He said nothing until they were back at the six-room motel. "My brother's."

* * *

A rusty swamp cooler sat in the room's window, unable to keep up with the dry, dusty, west Texas heat. Diz held a tattered wet rag to his forehead while he stared at the only family picture he had: an eleven year-old wallet-sized snap. His parents wore proud smiles, he and his brother goofed for the camera.

"That's a fun picture," Nix said. She snapped off a photo from the hotel room doorway toward the highway. "I wish I'd taken it."

"I gave him that rosary for Christmas. Couldn't afford it so Father Juan bought it for me. My brother was a good man, Nix, maybe even noble. You don't steal refugees away from chaos without some kind of nobility." Diz took a long pull from his Lone Star. "Pirating software don't help many people, does it?"

"Diz, don't--"

"He asked me to help him I don't know how many times." A hot tear burned Diz's cheek. "We were both breaking the law but I was too busy making money. Now's he gone."

Nix hugged him. Her kiss was gentle. "We found him."

Diz snorted. "Yeah, some jailbird wetback has to call and tell me he's dead because I haven't talked to him in two years."

"Diz, you're not his keeper," Nix said quietly.

"I should have been ... it was my turn."

"I'm sorry this happened, Diz, but it's over now. We can take him to Dallas and bury him."

"Dallas?"

"Big city? Six hours east of here?"

Bury his brother. With both parents buried in their home village in Mexico, that would leave only Diz. A family gone except for the black sheep.

"Diz?" At the open door stood Sheriff Toby Pagel. The scars of days in the sun and nights in the honky-tonks crisscrossed his face.

"Toby," Diz said.

A smile softened Toby's hard face as he sauntered in. He handed Diz a small lapel button. White with a red stripe across the top and a blue one at the bottom. In the middle, Toby's face. "Gonna vote for me?"

"I don't live here, Toby," Diz said.

"Vote early and often, I say." He wiped a large hand across his brow. "Hot one today. Could get hotter." His eyes held Diz tightly.

"Weatherman says different."

Toby snorted. "Spent my whole life here, I know when things are changing."

"They changing now?"

"You guys out on FM 213 today?"

Diz caught Nix's green and gold eyes. "Some reason you want to know?"

"It's private land."

"Road isn't private," Diz pointed out.

"Might as well be. Dangerous land out there, Diz. Cattle, drilling rigs, slush pits from the oil derricks. Wetbacks get dead out there all the time out there."

"Like my brother, Toby?"

"What?" Surprise etched across Toby's face like the west Texas wind across the empty landscape. "Dead?"

"How come you didn't call me?"

"What are you talking about? He ain't dead," Toby said. "I ain't seen him in a year, since he found himself a senorita, but gone don't mean dead."

Gritting his teeth, Diz gazed outside. The highway wiped side to side in the frame of the window. Beyond that, a one-pump gas station, old man and old dog equally oblivious to everything. Diz thought he could almost hear their snoring.

Just as he thought he could hear Hector's bones dancing inside the box sitting on the stained bathroom floor.

"Stay offa FM 213, ain't nothin' for you to see."

Anger bubbled through Diz like asphalt heated by the summer sun. "Can't do it, Hector is dead. I need to know why."

"Dammit, Diz," Toby said. "Somebody's got your head full of crap. Hector ain't dead. Hell, he's probably in Puerto Vallarta with that Mexican chickee, sweatin' up the sheets." With a curt nod, Toby left. Without a word, Diz went to the bathroom, held his brother's skull tightly, and cried.

* * *

"...federal border, the feds ought to foot the bill when good folk have to stand against illegals."

Diz watched Toby's re-election rally from Kimber's Patio Cafe across the street. The sheriff sat next to a county commissioner and an INS man. Joshua Herlin, red-faced, arms waving, dressed in a cowboy suit, stood on the dais and spoke rapidly. Diz hadn't seen one of Toby's rallies in nearly a decade, but they hadn't changed: red, white, and blue bunting, patriotic music from a local cowboy band, supporting speeches, a full INS bus parked nearby.

Nix emptied a bowl of jalapenos onto her nachos.

"Those'll kill you," Diz said.

"We're all dying anyway, aren't we?" Nix paused. "Jeez, I'm sorry, Diz, I didn't mean it like that."

"Yeah, we're all dying, but some of us get helped along." He sighed. "We do good things and we die. We do bad things and we live. I used to sit in front of my computer and think about being my brother. Thought I could be a good man."

On stage, Herlin finished his speech and motioned for the INS bus to head out. The small crowd cheered.

"You are a good man, Diz," Nix said quietly.

Diz shook his head. "Hector was a good man. You know he got beat up in school once. Some kid was shoving me around and he came to make the kid stop. Kid whipped his ass and I was so scared I couldn't do a damn thing."

"Diz, please, don't--"

"Well, Diz," Toby said loudly. He towered above their table, smile cracking his marbled face. His badge glinted in the sunlight. "Did you ever meet Joshua Herlin? Dizzy Ramos is an old homeboy, Mr. Herlin. His family moved up -- legally -- from Mexico when Diz was ... what ... five or six years old? Came back for a visit."

Herlin inclined his head slightly. "Ramos? Your brother worked for the church. Getting illegal aliens over our border, I believe."

"Helping people is how I look at it."

Herlin wiped a smudge from his boots. "One man's smile is another man's frown. Good to meet you, Mr. Ramos, y'all have a fine day."

"Thanks again, Mr. Herlin," Toby called. When Herlin was out of earshot, Toby said, "He's the power, Diz. You name it and he's into it."

"That why you got him on the podium, huh?"

Hot, sweaty tension fell between them. "You saying something, Diz?"

"Not a thing, Toby. West Texas politics."

"Yeah, well ... whatever. Back to the grind, I guess."

Toby left, melding into the growing shadows. The sun fell toward the horizon, its glare catching Grift's buildings in silhouette.

"My Papa named me. Gabriel Dizzy Ramos. He loved Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis. Hector Miles Ramos. Hector loved to listen to me play."

"I heard you at that little jazz dive; open-mike night, remember?"

Diz smiled. "I can't play for squat, but it's relaxing. You know, my parents used to have a little mariachi band." His smile faded to a frown as he stood. "They used to volunteer at school, too. And Hector drove refugees. I guess honor isn't genetic, is it?"

Diz dropped a ten-spot on the table and tried to meld into the shadows himself as he headed for the motel.

* * *

That evening, Diz parked the Ford near the county jail and read a newspaper. While he read, the whoosh whoosh of a broom and the bang of a trash can got steadily closer. When the sweeper was near him, Diz glanced at the armed sheriff's deputy nearby, and spoke quietly. "I found him, Miguel."

Miguel kept sweeping, kept his head down. "I knew you would. Hector brought me over, told me you were a good man, just a little confused."

"How'd you know he was dead?"

"I found him, nino."

"Who killed him?"

Miguel shrugged as he pushed the tattered broom around the sidewalk. "Didn't hear the shot, Mr. Diz. I just found him. I comforted him. The rosary comforted him."

"Comforted him," Diz said quietly, fingering the rosary he'd put around his neck.

"What you see me doing right now, Mr. Diz?"

"Sweeping the sidewalk."

"And the only time you'll see us in jailhouse orange is when the sheriff is talkin' to voters and he's got that INS bus. Rest of the time, we're at the ranch, always guarded."

A few feet away, the deputy watched them.

Toby's re-election spiel was always illegals. His speeches were hyperbolic screeds that made it sound as if the border were just outside the town limits instead of four hundred miles south.

"Toby always rounds up illegals to look good."

"Politicians do what they gotta do. But I thought after you looked in the trailer, you'd figure it out, smart boy like you."

"Get back to work, Miguel," the deputy called. His hand lingered near his nightstick.

"I went to the ranch, I found my brother, what else do you want?"

Nervous sweat dripped from Miguel's face. "That land ain't all Joshua Herlin's. The sheriff owns some, about five thousand acres."

Diz whistled. "Pretty good for a sheriff's salary."

"Land ain't always bought with money, Mr. Diz. Pancho Villa never paid a single peso for land."

"Wait," Diz said. "I didn't look in the trailer."

"Nombre de Dios. Then you don't know anything. You better look in that trailer and you better do it quick, nino, 'cause we ain't got much time left."

"What's that mean?"

"Dammit, Miguel, get back to work," the deputy demanded.

* * *

In the west Texas desert at night, everything spreads like a river filling a floodplain. Sound, lights, wind; they all seem endless and unavoidable. Nearly twenty miles from Grift, Diz and Nix still felt the bleed from the town's lights. With the truck's windows down, they heard every groan and grind of the pumpjacks.

At the abandoned truck, they killed the Ford and climbed out. With a quick snap from the boltcutters, the rusty chain locking the door fell to the ground. Diz swung the boltcutters against the door's handle. Metal shrieked and the handle busted free. The door popped open.

Hot, musty air rushed at them like prison escapees. Diz coughed and snapped on the flashlight. The yellow beam stabbed into the darkened trailer.

Bones filled the trailer. Skulls. Femurs. Clavicles. Ribs. It was a confused pile, each handful of bones becoming part of a greater whole. The dead had tried to climb over each other to get out and still, they seemed to climb. A few bones, long since escaped from their flesh, fell to the ground.

"Jesus Christ," Diz said.

"Oh, God," Nix muttered. She turned and threw up, the gagging loud in the night air.

Under the glow of Diz's flashlight, the scratches and dents on the interior of the door came alive. Some of those scratches were streaked with brown, some gouged with bits of fingernails still embedded in the aluminum. The dents matched the boots still on feet.

"Nix?" Diz asked. He held her gently. "It's okay."

She heaved again, her belly straining beneath his hand. Finally, she wiped her mouth. "I'm sorry, I just...."

"I know," Diz said, closing the trailer door. A bone caught between the door and trailer and snapped with a dry crack.

"What happened?" she asked.

His answer was lost in volley of shots. Bullets peppered the ground, tore through the trailer's side.

They ran, stumbling, toward the Ford. Nix dove into the floorboard while Diz got the engine screaming. Bullets shattered the back glass, plunked holes through the tailgate as Diz sped for the gate. The truck bounced along the broken trail, bullets thunking the side. They came to FM 213, hung a hard right, and fled, gravel kicking up behind the rear wheels.

When they came to I-20, the bullets had stopped, though Diz imagined he could still hear them. They banged around inside his skull. Or maybe, it was the dead looking for a way out.

* * *

"Political refugees wouldn't be on Toby's land."

Nix hugged Diz. "No, I don't think so."

"He was driving for Toby." Hot tears stained Diz's cheek. "Hector drove to Mexico, got a load of illegals, and brought them back for Toby's re-election."

"Oh, man," Nix said. "We should have stayed in Dallas."

Diz pulled her to the bed. His long arms wrapped around her shoulders, his lips pressed against her neck. "I'm sorry, Nix, I shouldn't have brought you."

"You shouldn't be here, either. I want to go home. I miss my friends. And I miss you."

"I'm right here, Nix."

"No, you're a thousand miles away, back at that trailer."

He took her hand. "I'm sorry, Nix. Just as soon as I know what happened, we'll be back in Dallas, gorging ourselves on Dickey's brisket, okay?"

"He puts a pretty big shadow over you, doesn't he?"

Large enough so that I don't even know where it ends, Diz wanted to say. Did she know he cried late at night? Did she know he couldn't even begin to think of himself without a brother? It was how he defined himself, by having someone else next to him. At this moment, in this crappy hotel room, Diz wanted nothing more than to play his dented trumpet for Hector and relish the sound of Hector's laugh when Diz missed a note or three.

"You know, when I think of his shadow, I think of him, yeah, but I think mostly of this cheap rosary." Diz let it bang against his chest. "He did all this stuff, you know? He did the right things and believed the right things, all the things I couldn't be bothered with. And he always wore this thing ... this cheap, wooden piece of junk. Whatever happened at the end -- whatever he was doing for Toby -- he started out as a good guy." Diz fell silent for a moment. "It's my turn to be the big brother."

Diz strode the room, his boots clacking, then thumping as they moved between the carpet and the tile near the bathroom. "Dammit, Hector. Why were you smuggling illegals for Toby?"

"Wrong question. The why doesn't matter, does it?

"It does to me."

"But there's nothing you can do about the why. Maybe you can do something about the who. And I guess we know that answer."

A pause, brittle with night heat, slipped between them. The oscillating fan tried valiantly to kick up a breeze.

"Toby." Diz's teeth ground together and his heart banged against his chest like boxer's punches. "He killed my brother. I'll--"

"You'll what? Beat him up? That won't get you anything except a roomie up to the Huntsville penitentiary. Go to the Midland County D.A."

It made perfect sense, but his heart screamed for action, for something more visceral than going to the D.A. His heart screamed for simple revenge. As simple as an apple pie or a day spent fishing or sitting on the porch drinking a cold beer.

"What would we take him?" Diz said. "There's no proof of anything."

"A trailer full of dead people on the sheriff's land is nothing?"

"You proposing we hitch it up and haul it to Midland?"

"No, I'm saying--"

Nix was interrupted by a bang on the door. Quickly, his breath fast and his heart pounding, Diz opened it.

Toby's mouth opened and at the same moment, Diz's fist crashed into it. It was an eternity of skin and teeth. Toby staggered backward, tripped over the edge of the parking lot, fell to his butt. Diz was on him instantly, his fists hitting and missing.

"Diz, damn it all," Toby yelled. He waved a hand, tried to ward off blows.

"You killed him, you son of a bitch!"

Toby grabbed Diz's fist as it headed for his face. With his free hand, he jabbed Diz in the stomach. Diz gasped and fell backward. Toby jumped to his knees, crawled to Diz, wrapped him in a bear hug.

"Let go," Diz shouted.

"Calm down," Toby answered. "I didn't kill him."

"He was driving for you," Nix said from the motel room.

Toby held Diz more tightly, twisted him around to bind him, and shook his head. "He was driving for Herlin."

Diz stopped suddenly. "That truck is on your land."

"That's Herlin's land, mine's further west. Why would I need your brother to bring me illegals?"

"Re-election," Diz said.

Toby chuckled. "I don't need to ship 'em in, they're all over the place. Besides, if I need any, I just get 'em from Joshua Herlin."

"Who killed my brother?"

Toby sighed. "Hector and Herlin had something going, I don't know what, Herlin don't tell me much. My guess would be Herlin for the trigger."

Diz's head swam in the evening's heat. Stories and lies, bits and pieces, all swirled around him. Whose land? Whose illegals? "Why didn't you call me?"

"Where in hell were you, Diz? I didn't know. Besides, Herlin is it around here, I tried to tell you that earlier."

"What's Herlin use them for?"

"Labor. He takes money to mule them across the border, then once they're here, he just locks them up. Tells 'em they gotta work off the debt and maybe, if any ever did, he woud let 'em go, but I don't think so. He's got free labor for as long as he wants it. Who's gonna know? Maybe a family member wonders where their son is or what happened to Mama, but they don't know anything and what could they do anyway?"

"Holy Christ," Nix said quietly.

"And that ain't the half of it," Toby said. "He's got stuff going on at that ranch that'd make your head spin."

"Why are you telling me this?"

Toby stared hard at Diz. "Your brother was my friend. I owe him."

Silence descended on them. Finally, Diz nodded.

"Fine," Toby said.

"I'll get my camera, Diz," Nix said.

"Yeah," Diz said, his glare still hard on Toby.

* * *

Diz's foot, impatient, urged the Ford along. They slipped from Grift's yellow streetlight embrace into the arms of a darker countryside.

"Diz, I'm scared." Nix checked her camera for the millionth time.

"I know," Diz said again, softer this time. Somewhere in the back of his head, he heard his trumpet, wrong notes and all, and Hector's laugh. He stopped the truck.

"Diz?" Nix said.

When he turned to her, her face was just a shadow, just a dark spot in the middle of a dark night. He leaned in close and kissed her. "I love you," he whispered.

Toby said, "Park it here, we'll walk the rest of the way."

"Why?"

"Because Herlin's working tonight. I don't want him to hear this beast."

Diz nodded and shut off the truck. Together, the three of them climbed out and began walking. Ahead of them, an arc of white light grew.

"That's it," Toby said.

"Wait here," Diz said. He continued and topped a small rise. Beneath it, the land rolled away into a large depression. The truck was on the far side, just as he had found it earlier that day. Near the back of the trailer, Herlin stood with two guards, Miguel, and a handful of workers. The workers, faces scared, fists clenching, stood inside the trailer. Their feet were lost in the piles of bones.

As Diz watched, Nix at his side, Joshua Herlin turned and waved them down. "Evening, Mr. Ramos," he called pleasantly. "Now we can get busy."

"Dammit, Toby," Diz said urgently. "He knows we're--"

Toby stood with his gun pointed at Diz's face. "Go on down, Diz."

"You son of a bitch."

Toby's eyes cracked. "I'm sorry, Diz, there ain't nothing I could do."

Fury pounding in his veins, Diz led Nix down to Herlin.

"Well done, Sheriff," Herlin said. "Justice or vengeance. Which are you looking for, Mr. Ramos?"

"I'll let you know." Diz turned toward Toby. "Was it all a lie?"

"None of it was a lie."

"You sold us out for what? A chunk of land? Some money?"

Herlin laughed. "Toby likes his job. He knows certain things have to happen to keep that job. Sometimes I have to remind him who's el jefe. And sometimes I have to remind them." Herlin jabbed a finger toward the workers. "That's what this truck is for. But it didn't seem to do any good." He nodded toward Miguel. "He's thinks he some Latino activist savior. Rights and pay and all the rest. Your brother infected him."

"So now you'll kill us."

"My choice is what?"

Diz grabbed the camera from Nix. "I've already got the pictures."

Toby went pale while Herlin shook his head.

"You shot Hector," Diz said.

"No, but I should have."

"He was driving for you."

Herlin nodded. "Damned right he was; best driver I had, too. Brought a load of greasers once a month and never got caught."

Diz kept his eyes on the men and women inside the trailer. Their eyes were riveted on Herlin, on the guards. Diz could see them wanting to make a move, to save themselves. But the fear in their faces was equally clear.

"My brother thought he was doing something noble, he didn't know they were your slaves. When he found out, he wanted to free them."

Herlin's laugh burst into the night air. "That's it, boy. Good and true, that what you're saying? Try this: Hector had quite the gambler's heart. Debt got a little big so I helped him work out a payment plan."

Land don't necessarily need to be bought, Mr. Diz.

Diz looked suddenly at Toby. "You lied to me. You murdered my brother because Herlin ordered it. Herlin paid you with land." His hands clenched to fists and he took a step toward Toby.

"You got it wrong, Diz," Toby sputtered. "I didn't kill nobody."

"Mr. Ramos," Herlin said. "I've got no time for people convinced they have some moral failing." He took a step closer to Diz. "Your brother wanted to rescue that truck load of wetbacks. He wanted to get them out. I wanted him dead. Someone took care of that problem for me. Not Toby, though, Sheriff Pagel doesn't have the balls for wetwork."

Diz raised a fist. The guard slapped his head. "Watch it, buddy." He motioned toward the trailer. "Inside."

They stood at the open doorway, the workers moving back to allow them in. Feet and wide brooms shuffled against the metal bottom of the trailer. But their soft whoosh could not drown out the sound of bones; hitting each other, tumbling over each other, a perverse kind of macabre maracas.

"Diz," Nix whispered, "Oh, God, help us."

"What do you think, Toby?" Herlin said. "You think we oughtta shoot Mr. Ramos in the cab, like his brother?"

Diz was dry-mouthed, scared and wishing he was at Father Juan's side, listening to the man tell his Bible stories. He held Nix's hand desperately. "I'm sorry, Nix," he whispered. He glared at Toby. "You were a good man, Toby. What happened?" His voice boomed inside the aluminum trailer.

Toby remained silent, his jaw set and tight.

"Well, that says it all," Diz said. He held the camera by the strap. "Guess I can't use this for pictures. How 'bout this?" Diz swung the camera and slammed it into the guard's face. The man gasped in surprise and slumped to the floor of the trailer.

"What the hell--" Herlin snapped.

Everyone moved instantly, as though jolted from sleep by some terrifying dream. Illegals hurled themselves out of the trailer and overran the three or four guards standing watch. Guns fired, fists swung. Miguel lunged across the narrow trailer, launched himself from the edge, and slammed into Herlin. Herlin's head snapped back and they tumbled to the ground. Miguel dragged the man to the trailer and slammed his head through the thin aluminum side. Herlin's scream was short.

Gunfire filled the air, countered by the screams of the dead and dying.

"Dammit," Toby shouted. He took a hysterical step, brought his pistol up, and fired wildly. The shot tore through the trailer's skin.

Diz yelped, grabbed Nix, and shoved her to the ground. Then he ran at Toby. Fists and feet landed and missed blows. Toby's gun fired and something tore at Diz's arm.

Diz stared at the gash. "You shot me. You son of a bitch!"

Slamming into the sheriff from behind, Miguel knocked the gun free. Diz jumped for it and then stood over Toby, breath hard and angry, gun shaking his hand.

"Please, Diz," Toby said. "It's not what you think, it's just--"

"Shut up." He pulled the hammer back and relished the metallic click. He gently tucked it against Toby's temple.

"Please," Toby pleaded.

"Shut. Up."

"Diz," Nix said quietly. "What are you doing?"

Sweat covered Diz's forehead, dripped into his eyes, blurred everything.

Standing near him, over Herlin's body, Miguel nodded. "Go ahead, nino."

"No, Diz," Nix said. "You're not a two-bit sheriff in a pisshole town."

"He killed my brother."

"And this'll bring him back? Would your brother do this?"

Diz clenched his jaw. "Hector ran illegals to pay gambling debts."

"Maybe at the end, but not at the beginning, Diz."

Diz looked up at Nix, at Miguel, at the terrified illegals. On each of their faces he saw his brother. Handfuls of Hectors, each holding his or her breath. The guards were dead, their guns in the hands of some of the illegals.

"I didn't kill him, Diz, you heard Herlin say that." Toby's face ran white and scared, wet blood a ragged smear across his lips.

"You set him up." Diz pressed the gun harder into Toby's temple.

"No, I didn't do anything." Toby's voice slipped up an octave. "I didn't-- It wasn't like that, it was Miguel. We had a deal and he went back on it. He was supposed to--"

"Nino, the man lies."

Toby waved his arms. "No, Diz, you gotta listen. We were going to have you kill Herlin. Nobody would have thought it was you. Then I was gonna take the land. Miguel was gonna take the illegals away from here. Denver or L.A. or God knows where, but--"

"No," Miguel said quietly.

"Dammit, Diz," Toby begged. "Miguel decided he wanted everything. The land and the money and everything. He did this."

"Why would I kill Hector?" Miguel asked. "I heard the gunshot and found him. I comforted him. I gave him the rosary upon which he confessed his sins before going to God."

Diz fired.

Toby screamed as Miguel slumped to the ground, the bullet hole just under his jaw. Blood soaked the dry ground. Miguel's eyes bulged, his mouth worked, but he said nothing.

One of the Mexicans took a step toward Diz.

"Whoa," Diz said, leveling the gun at the man.

"Diz," Nix said. "Oh, God, what did you do?"

Toby stood carefully, his eyes on both Diz and the Mexicans.

"He killed Hector," Diz said simply. "He didn't give Hector that rosary. That was my rosary."

"Thank you, Diz, thank you," Toby whispered.

Diz stared at Toby. "If I had any guts at all, you'd be dead."

Minutes later, Diz and Nix were in the Ford, headed toward the border.

* * *

"He'd have liked this." Nix laid a white rose on Hector's grave.

"I think so." He laid a white rose on the second and third graves, those of his parents.

The growing night gently cradled the Mexican countryside. Sierra Mojada, Mexico lay ten miles to the south. It was the closest town of any size. Across the dirt trail behind them was his parents' birth village. Father Juan, saddened by Hector's death and its circumstances, had donated the plot and headstone.

"That was a great thing you did, giving all that money to the church."

Diz snorted. "Yeah, illegal money from pirated software, they'll love it."

"Doesn't matter where it came from."

"It does to me."

"Is it still there?" she asked.

"What?"

"His shadow? You did the right thing. Do you still feel his shadow?"

"Yeah," he whispered. "Always will."

Her arms slipped around his neck, played with the slight curl of his longish hair. "I like it here. Do we have to go back to Dallas right now?"

As a small breeze danced among the headstones, he touched the rosary around his neck. "Come on, I've got my trumpet, maybe I can find a place to play. We can try the local cerveza, maybe have some chiles."

"Jeez, I thought we'd never get to it."

TREY R. BARKER's work has appeared in nearly 80 venues, including Dark Terrors 6, Desperadoes, Noirotica 3, and many others. He co-edited the critically acclaimed Crime Spree (December Girl Press) and his short collection, Where the Southern Cross the Dog, (Fairwood Press) appeared in April, 2002. His imagining of Edgar Allan Poe's last hours, Veil of the Soul, (Yard Dog Press) came out in May, 2002. Among other jobs, Barker has worked as a phone solicitor, a karaoke salesman, and a doll assembler. He lives near Chicago with his wife LuAnn and two Canine-Americans.

Copyrights (c) 2002 Trey R. Barker

--//--