La Frontera

By Mark Miner

 Part 1

 Brass rivets shaped like mountains held the leather sky firmly to the horizon.  Dust rose in a thin column far across the copper expanse.  It was a hot October, and the desert south of Robles Junction was a griddle. 

       "Ramón, alto."  Juan had dropped to his belly in an arroyo.  He lifted his head between a nopal and a sage bush.  Ramón crouched at the bottom of the wash.  What now? he wondered.

 With a quiet vamos, Juan led the way up the low talus bank and they were on the coyote trail again.  

 Two nights ago they had paid five hundred dollars apiece to be tunneled under the frontera by their guide, Alejandro Torres, who had promised their group a quick trip up the Sasabe highway in his van, all the way to a Pentecostal church in Sells where they could rest and clean up. 

 Juan and Ramón were not fools, and the price seemed about right for the services offered.  The two of them had saved almost thirteen hundred dollars in the past four years, waiting tables in Puerto Peñasco.  They had turned down many more fantastic ofrendas before, but Alejandro knew Juan's cousin, and so they trusted him.

 The first day started out good.  By 4 am they had gone six miles through the cool night.  At the rendezvous they ate tamales and drank half of their water.  Alejandro became edgy as the sun began to lighten the stars, but the van came at 5:30, as planned.

 Primer gray with two tape-and-tarp windows, it was not the most impressive steed to ride to freedom, but it would serve.  Alejandro motioned for the group to stay put.  He hailed the van, it blinked its lights.  Alejandro descended the hillock where the group was concealed and walked over to the passenger door of the van.  He unlatched it as a Border patrolman threw the sliding door open, jumped out, and hurled Alejandro into the cargo area.

 Juan and Ramon felt sick.  The two women began to cry, and their husbands hushed them violently.  The group looked around at each other with blank, unreasoning eyes.  This could not be happening.  They had all paid good money.  Five hundred dollars represented years of savings, and a new life was worth it, but this?