Free Thirteen Senses by Víctor Villaseñor

couple of young, male pigs, and hired two of the Moreno boys to help him—at such a price that they couldn’t refuse.
    Then he quickly went to his mother’s place, got Luisa’s two older boys to wash his Moon automobile for him as he bathed, shaved, and got all dressed up. The boys did a wonderful job. Jose, his nephew, was turning into a very responsible young man. Salvador then offered to pay the two boys. Pedro immediately accepted the money, but Jose didn’t.
    â€œUncle,” said Jose, “you do so much for us all the time, that it’s a pleasure to just be able to do something for you. We don’t want your money. Do we, Pedro,” he said, turning to his younger, smaller brother.
    Pedro really didn’t want to, but he returned the money. “Jose is right,” he said. “We don’t want your money! Ah, shit!”
    Salvador laughed, then looked at his nephew Jose in the eyes. Blood was really blood. This boy had never even met his great big father—who’d been killed back in Mexico by two stupid, little, scared soldiers at the dinner table as they ate—but he had his father’s size and looks and sense of justice, balance, and the larger, fuller picture of life.
    Salvador hugged both boys in a big abrazo, kissing them, then he got in his fine, newly-washed Moon automobile and took off for Carlsbad with the Morenos following behind him in his truck with the two pigs.
    He was wearing a gorgeous suit and great tie. Salvador knew that he had to look the part for what he was now going to do. It was no accident that a good lawyer spent as much time and thought on his dress as a good prostitute. Clothes, about fine clothes, Salvador had also learned in Montana when he’d been hiding from the law and Lady Katherine, the English madam of the finest whorehouse in the whole Northwest, had taken him under her wing.
    In the barrio of Carlsbad, Salvador immediately found Tomas Varga, who’d brought in those two guys from Los Angeles.
    â€œ Cómo estas, Tomas,” said Salvador, stepping down out of his grand car and smiling to this man that was well known all through the barrio as a small-time, two-bit gambler. “I need to have a little talk with you. I got a little business deal for you, so you can make a few extra dollars.”
    â€œOh, no, I’m too busy, Salvador,” said Tomas, already looking nervous. “I can’t go with you right now.”
    Just then, the two Moreno boys were at Tomas’s side, and Salvador drew close and put his .38 snubnose into Tomas’s gut. “We insist,” said Salvador quietly. “Just keep still, and nothing is going to happen to you, te juro. I promise, we just need to talk a little bit.”
    Getting Tomas in the front passenger’s seat alongside Salvador, the two Moreno brothers got in the truck. Salvador drove slowly out of the barrio de Carlos Malo —as Carlsbad was referred to by the Mexican people, meaning the neighborhood of Bad Charles—and east up the hill, by the Carlsbad forest and over to El Camino, the old, abandoned dirt road that the padres had used when they’d first come into California over two hundred years ago.
    Salvador headed south, and he could see that Tomas was getting more and more frightened as they went. Salvador loved it. His mother was right, why be a huge, powerful wolf or coyote when you could be a quick, agile, little, cunning She-Fox, and allow the frightened man’s imagination to do it all for you.
    â€œBut where are we going, Salvador?” Tomas was saying. “I’m just a gambler, you know that, Salvador. I never had anything to do with—” He stopped his words.
    â€œYou never had anything to do with what?” asked Salvador, acting innocent and turning the knife in a little deeper. Imagination could do so much more than the wildest reality. His mother always said that a frightened person’s mind was the