The Mongolian Conspiracy Read online

  “Who, Marta?”

  “Everybody . . . Santiago, Mr. Yuan, everybody . . .”

  “And you, Marta?”

  “I’m not afraid anymore.”

  They drank their coffee with cognac. Filiberto García delicately raised his pinky as he lifted the cup. Like a goddamned faggot. Pretending I’ve come courting, but with a stiff in the middle of the living room. More like a wake. But I never go to the wakes of my dead, of my faithful departed. Because the departed are always faithful to the one who sent them on their way. They always stick real close to me, and I’m always checking to make sure they’re still really dead, that they’re staying faithful to death. And here I sit, acting like an English lord.

  “Don’t worry about it, Filiberto.”

  “About what, Marta?”

  “We both know it’s wrong to kill, but you did it out of necessity. That man forced you to kill him. I know you’ve never killed a man except when you had to, for your work . . .”

  “Yes, Marta.”

  “I’ve seen a lot of killing, killings for no reason, because they could, without ever getting punished. Do you want another cognac? I’ll pour you some more.”

  “Thank you, Marta.”

  “Do you want me to heat up a little more coffee for you?”

  “No, Marta, no thank you.”

  “Your suit is covered in blood.”

  “It is.”

  “You should take it off and let me get the stains out.”

  “Later, Marta.”

  “We women are so foolish. I was afraid of you. I thought you were going to turn me in so they could deport me to Canton. Mr. Liu told me that if they found me, they would definitely deport me. That’s why I never left his shop and he always hid me whenever you came . . .”

  “Yes, Marta, that’s what fear does to us.”

  “No, you couldn’t be bad. You said things that made me laugh and laughing is a good thing, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, Marta.”

  “You aren’t married?”

  “No.”

  “That’s why you’re always alone.”

  They sat in silence. Now is when I should make my move. Fucking stiff! It’s in my way. But it doesn’t seem to bother Marta. Like she’s getting used to it. Or she’s got something else up her sleeve. Any other gal would be crying, acting hysterical and going on about her honor and her virginity. Fucking virginity! With this one, it’s me who’s acting like a chump. But the truth is, things have gotten complicated. I’m not one to get spooked by my own shadow, but I’m not used to making love with a dead body in the room. Well, not usually. You’ve got to respect the dead. I make them dead and that’s why I respect them. As far as I’m concerned, the night’s already a lost cause. And things were going so well. Maybe all Chinese gals are like this one, spending the whole night talking. But then there wouldn’t be so many Chinese. And then there’s her idea about laughter being so good. That’s one thing I don’t understand. I’ve never thought very highly of laughter.

  “Are you going to tell the police, Filiberto?”

  “Don’t you need to get home, Marta? It’s almost two in the morning.”

  “I live alone. What are we going to do, Filiberto?”

  García stood up and looked out the window. The black Pontiac was still parked out in front. It was the only car on the block. As long as that car was there, there was no way he could take Marta home. But Marta didn’t ask what the dead man was looking for in my apartment. That’s strange. Women are curious.

  There’s that rat again.

  “Filiberto, I’ve been thinking . . . I don’t think he was just a robber. He was following you, from Mr. Liu’s shop . . .”

  “He was in the restaurant, too.”

  “Why was he following you? And who’s that man in the car outside?”

  “I make a lot of enemies in my line of work, Marta.”

  “But you said you don’t know him.”

  “No, I don’t. Sometimes you have enemies you don’t even know about. Go into the other room, Marta. There’re some things I have to do.”

  “Are you going to call the police? I don’t mind if they find me here and I can tell them . . .”

  “Go into the other room and turn on the light. After a few minutes, turn it off, but don’t close the curtains, so they can see that it’s off from the street. And don’t look out the window.”

  Marta hesitated. García took her gently by the arm and led her into the bedroom. He turned on the light and saw that the curtains were half open.

  “I’m going to go out for a few minutes. If anybody knocks on the door, don’t open it and don’t make a sound.”

  “Your clothes, they’re stained.”

  “I’ll be back soon. Turn off the light in five minutes.”

  He left the room, switched off the light in the living room, and by the dim glow coming through the window, he wrapped the body in the sheet and threw it over his shoulder. Good thing this dead guy wasn’t a big eater. Fucking stiffs! You don’t only have to make them, you’ve also got to carry them, as if they were children.

  He went silently down the stairs and left the body next to the front door of the building. Nobody’s going to be coming or going at this time of night. All my tenants live quiet lives, and even if somebody does come down, they’ll just think it’s a bag of laundry.

  He went down a hallway near the staircase to the back of the building, through an inner courtyard. There, he opened another door and came out onto Revillagigedo Street. He walked slowly around the block and returned along Luis Moya. The car was still there. He’s probably getting nervous, wondering what happened to his friend. It’s strange, his friend being gone for so long, but he doesn’t check on him, or take off. Maybe he thinks I haven’t gotten home yet? But he must have seen the lights go on and off. Very strange.

  He took off his hat, pulled out his .45, and put it in the hat. He looked like a peaceful citizen returning home late. The man in the car was smoking with his window open. García came up alongside him and stopped.

  “Excuse me, can you tell me . . .”

  The man looked up and the .45 came down hard on his head. The man disappeared inside the car. García opened the door and pushed him to the other side of the seat. Then he opened the door to the apartment building, picked up the corpse, and threw it in the back seat. He put on his hat and put away his gun. The lights in his apartment were off. He got in the car, started it, and parked it three blocks away. Then he walked back slowly.

  Together in life as in death, the way it should be. It would have been better to take the sheet, but it’s got no markings, and there’s no way for anyone to trace it to me. And even if they do think I killed them, that’s why they hire me — to kill people. Fucking people! I figure these particular dead won’t have many mourners and they’re not going to stir up much of a scandal. But if they manage to knock off the president of the gringos . . . Holy shit! What a difference between one dead body and another, between a proper corpse and a stiff. They keep me around to make stiffs when they need them. That’s what I am — a stiff factory. And Rosendo del Valle’s so honorable, so gullible. And the colonel’s an ass-licker. He must think del Valle will be top honcho one day. At your service, Mr. President. Here’s your stiff factory. And then there’s this business with Marta. She must realize what a chump I am. And here I am with her false passport, and that’s all I need to get her where I want her. They didn’t even think to change the fingerprints. With that alone, Immigration could nail her. Fucking Marta!

  He stopped under a streetlamp to look at the passport. Marta Fong García, born in 1946 in Sinaloa. For all I know she’s a relative. But I don’t have relatives in Sinaloa and anyway García just kind of stuck to me along the way. Passport issued in 1954, by the Mexican Embassy in Japan. This passport replaces number 52360, issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on April 11, 1949. Everything neat and tidy, everything in order, except for the dead girl’s fingerprints.
/>   He opened the door to his apartment. The living room was dark. Marta opened the door to the bedroom.

  “Filiberto?”

  “It’s me, Marta.”

  He turned on the light.

  “Do you want another coffee or a drink?”

  “A drink, please, Marta. Nobody stopped by?”

  “No, nobody.”

  Marta came into the living room and poured him a drink. There was a dark stain on the carpet.

  “Thank you, Marta. You aren’t having one?”

  “I looked out the window, very carefully . . .”

  “You shouldn’t have.”

  “You aren’t afraid of anything.”

  There was admiration in Marta’s eyes. García finished his drink in one gulp and poured himself another.

  “I don’t have anywhere to go, so I read a lot, especially detective novels. I thought it was all lies.”

  García looked out the window. The street was deserted.

  “I’m going to burn your passport, Marta.”

  “Burn it?”

  “Yes. It could get you into trouble. We’re going to ask for your birth certificate from Sinaloa. Marta Fong García’s birth certificate. And that’s who you’ll be now forever.”

  He went back to the window. Marta was standing in the middle of the room, and she walked slowly over to him.

  “You see, I wasn’t wrong. You are very good, and very brave, Filiberto.”

  “Like the heroes in your detective novels?”

  “You’re just going to say that I’m a silly fool.”

  “I’m going to take you home, Marta. It’s almost three in the morning.”

  “I can’t. I’d have to wake up Mr. Liu to open the door for me and . . . and I can’t. If he knows I’ve been talking to you, he’ll be furious.”

  “Why?”

  “He told me not to talk to you. He doesn’t want me to talk to anybody. He says it could be bad for him.”

  “Is he sweet on you, Marta?”

  “I can stay here tonight, on the sofa in the living room, and tomorrow I’ll go look for work. It’s not difficult to find work and now that . . . now that I’m not afraid, now that I know you’re going to help me . . . I don’t have to go back to Mr. Liu.”

  García kept staring straight at her.

  “Is he sweet on you, Marta?”

  “You have to rest, Filiberto. Many things have happened and . . .”

  “It’s okay, Marta. You sleep in my bed. I have to leave very early tomorrow. I’ll sleep on the sofa.”

  “But . . .”

  “Go on, Marta, it’s late.”

  Marta went up to him and kissed him gently on his cheek.

  “Thank you.”

  She went into the bedroom and closed the door.

  Now things have really gotten complicated. Fucking Chinese. So Chinaman Liu’s got a good thing going. That dirty old man!

  He lifted his hand to his cheek, to where Marta had kissed him, right next to his scar. Now I’m really acting like a chump. A stupid ass. What kind of crap is this anyway? How did they find out I was in on this international intrigue? Maybe it’s better this way with Marta. At my age it’s better to take things slow, to enjoy them more, but I’ve never done that before. And what was that about only three men in Mexico knowing about this; and with me that makes four; and then the Russian; and the gringo; and those who gave orders to the Russian and the gringo. And the two guys in the Pontiac, but they don’t know anything anymore. And the Chinamen at Café Canton. And the police in Outer Mongolia. And then, why did they put me on this investigation? Fucking investigation. We haven’t even really started and already there are two dead bodies. Just stiffs so far, we haven’t gotten to the proper corpses. And Marta is so serious, watching every last thing. As if she’s used to it. And she chose tonight to go out with me. Couldn’t she be trying to pull a fast one? And me, instead of taking advantage of it, I act like we’re in some kind of daytime radio soap opera. Fucking Palmolive soap opera! With international intrigue to boot. As if there wasn’t any competition. I’m on Hitler and Stalin and Truman’s team. Hey, you guys, how many dead have you got? But I’m very Mexican about it, which means I’m old fashioned. As you know, we’re a little underdeveloped. Just bullets for us. Sometimes I think it’s only a question of quantity. The more dead you chalk up, the less you go out at night. The first two, they kind of bummed me out. The widow of that dead guy, Casimiro, she stuck with me for a long time. The dead guy, too. Some dead people become very sticky, like syrup. And there are times you want to keep washing your hands. And now that Marta kissed me, I don’t want to even touch my face. Fucking Marta! As far as I’m concerned, she’s playing a dirty trick on me. Like the kind I’ve played on others. So I’d recognize a dirty trick when I saw one, as if I’d cooked it up myself. I don’t like so many people knowing my business. In matters like this, better to go solo. And even solo there are too many people involved. My left hand shouldn’t know what my right hand is doing. And what good is it to blab about it. Blabber mouths don’t live long. I keep my lips sealed, because fish die by the mouth. And me, I haven’t been the dead one yet, not like my pal Zambrano, who got into trouble in San Luis Potosí. All because of his big mouth. Right there in Alfonsa’s bordello, that’s where they did him in. I wasn’t there. I didn’t kill him. But I let on that he was talking more than he should and then I stayed in my hotel room like a goddamned faggot. Would have been better if I’d gone and killed him myself. They say he suffered a lot, because they kept kicking him in the gut and didn’t want to finish him off. Alfonsa, being his lover and all, she asked them to get it over with. But the guys who did it didn’t know what they were doing. Seems they got scared. They say one of them even wet himself. I should have done it myself. It was the least I could have done for my pal Zambrano. Make sure he had a good death, one any loyal soul deserves. Zambrano had a way with bitches. For better or for worse, not a single one ever left him. And there’s Marta in the bedroom and me here like Vasconcelos with my memories. Fucking faggot! And the next night, at the wake, I did it with Alfonsa. She smelled like a woman in mourning. From that day on she had it in for me. For all I know she knew something. Fucking Alfonsa! She was hot. And now, what am I doing with all these memories? Nobody can live off memories, only people who haven’t done anything. Fucking memories! They’re like hangovers. That’s why drunks vomit, so they don’t have to remember, and beginners vomit after their first hit, like they were trying to get rid of it. But the trick is to be like an old drunk and carry your Alka-Seltzer around inside you. That way it all stays put and everything that stays put turns into memories. Good thing not everything stays put. Especially from when you’re a kid and really a chump. Sometimes I think I’ve finally forgotten that gal’s name, Gabriela Cisneros. Why remember a woman’s name? One woman is like any other. All with their little holes. Gabriela Cisneros. There I was, just a boy, and on my knees to her, and finally she let me have a go. And Romualdo Cisneros found us out in that orchard in Yurécuaro. She was almost naked already. And right then and there, Mr. Cisneros made me get down on my knees on the ground, for real, and lower my pants, and he started whipping me with his machete. Right there, right in front of Gabriela Cisneros. And I started crying and I told him I wanted to marry her and Mr. Cisneros kicked me in the mouth. And Gabriela Cisneros pretended like she was crying, but she was laughing. She didn’t even cover up her legs. And there I was, crying, with my naked butt in the air, red, as if blushing with shame. And Mr. Cisneros said he didn’t want the son of La Charanda for a son-in-law. That’s what they called my old lady, same as the rum they drank back there. I never knew what they called my old man, because I never knew who he was. A few years later I went back to Yurécuaro. Must have been around ‘29 or ‘30, and Romualdo Cisneros had already left for the capital and Gabriela had run off with a lieutenant, who’d left her in Santa Lucrecia or somewhere around there, pregnant. Some things stay inside, especially things like that, thi
ngs that are left half done. That’s why I don’t like to leave things half done. Not international intrigue and not this business with Marta. And you also learn not to talk too much. There are things you don’t talk about. Or better, there’s nothing you do talk about. So you don’t end up like my pal Zambrano, whose big mouth got him killed. Only bitches go around blabbing everything, at least what they want to. And that’s why it’s best to do it with a bitch once or twice and then walk away. Fucking bitches! And so you don’t start blabbing, you’re better off forgetting. What if I tell Marta everything? Like about how my butt was red from the whipping, as if ashamed. Like about my pal Zambrano. Instead of telling her things I should be in bed with her. Fucking Marta! For all I know she’s laughing at me. But maybe things will turn out better this way, by taking it nice and easy.

  III

  García here, Colonel.”

  “Aren’t you at your meeting?”

  “I’m in Sanborns, and I’ve got my eye on the cigarette counter.”

  “The person who was here yesterday, he called me earlier today.”

  “I talked to him last night. There’s nothing new to report.”

  “You’re not going to tell him about the two men the police found in a car, three blocks from your house? They were both dead.”

  “Oh, that.”

  “What do you know about it, García?”

  “One of them tried to kill me, the one who was stabbed. Do they know who they were?”

  “Listen, García, I brought you in on this investigation to find out what’s really going on, not so you can liquidate anybody who runs afoul of you.”

  “I think they’re in on it. Do they know who they are?”

  “In on it! The one you stabbed was a Mexican citizen, though, granted, not an upstanding one, but Mexican, in any case. I thought you’d be investigating the Chinese.”

  “That’s what I have been doing, Colonel. Do you have a name?”

  “Luciano Manrique, a man of many trades. Specialist in armed robberies. Ring a bell, García?”