Free The Ways of Evil Men by Leighton Gage

into it like a dead man, was asleep before I left the room.”
    “So how likely is it that he would have crawled out of it in the middle of the night, gotten drunk, found a machete, and killed Omar Torres?”
    “As unlikely as anything could be.”
    “So someone rendered him unconscious and carried him?”
    “That would be my guess.”
    “How could they have done that without being seen?”
    “The back stairway, the one we used when we brought him in.”
    He took a hearty swig from his cup. Jade picked up her own. It was too hot, and she set it down again.
    “What time did Omar leave?” she asked.
    “Around midnight.”
    “Drunk?”
    “Any drunker and he would have fallen flat on his face. I remember thinking, some day he’s going to kill somebody with that jeep of his.”
    “Who was with him before he left?”
    Osvaldo closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead, as if he was trying to see the scene in his mind. After a moment, he said, “Five, no, make that six guys. They were all sitting around a table playing poker.”
    “Who were they?”
    He started counting them off on his fingers. The mayor, the priest, three
fazendeiros—
”
    He’d extended three fingers at once. She put her hand on his. “Which three?”
    “Bonetti, Frade, and Lisboa.”
    “And the sixth man? Who was he?”
    “That foreman of Lisboa’s, Pandolfo.”
    “I don’t think I know him,” she said.
    “You don’t want to. He’s an animal, a
pistoleiro
. Lisboa uses him to keep his laborers in line. He carries a gun, but mostly he uses his fists and his boots.”
    “Did Torres fight with anybody about anything?”
    “No more than usual. Lisboa can’t play cards for shit, but he keeps doing it. Torres had a gift. He could play well even when he was drunk. He’s taken a lot of money off of Lisboa down through the years, and he can’t help crowing about it.”
    Jade picked up her coffee again. Still too hot. “And that would have made Lisboa angry, right?”
    “Not just Lisboa, but that bulldog of his as well. And there’s something else that would have pissed them off about Torres, if they knew about it. But I’m not sure they did.”
    “Which is?”
    “I don’t like to gossip.”
    She set down the cup, still untasted. “That’s crap, Osvaldo. You
love
to gossip. And you wouldn’t have started unless you intended to finish. So let’s hear it.”
    “You know that waterfall on the Jagunami?”
    “The one with the pool? The one where people go to swim?”
    “Yeah, but mostly on the weekends. During the week, the place is almost always deserted.”
    “And?”
    “And a couple of months ago, on a weekday morning, Torres came into town to buy something or other. His way home goes right by that waterfall. He decided to stop by for a swim. So he parked his jeep, walked through the brush to the falls, and what did he see?”
    “What?”
    “Pandolfo buggering his boss, right there on the rocks.”
    “So the two of them are homosexuals?”
    “Or bisexuals, or maybe Lisboa just pays Pandolfo to do it. God knows, but I do know one thing.”
    “Which is?”
    “That Torres told the story to everyone who was willing to listen. And those he told must have told others.”
    “So the whole town would have had a good laugh about it.”
    “Especially about Pandolfo, him always playing the
cabra macho
and all.”
    “You think that if they’d found out—”
    “They might have killed Torres? Maybe. But there were other people in this town that might have had it out for him.”
    “Like whom?”
    “Torres was a real ladies’ man. And most of those ladies are married.”
    “In a town like this, that’s probably dangerous.”
    “It is.”
    “You know any names? Of some of the women, I mean.”
    Osvaldo didn’t like the question, she could see that. He pursed his lips, put both palms on the table and pushed back his chair to increase the distance between them. “Jade, I … Look, I’d like to help, I would, but this is my