At Play in the Fields of the Lord by Peter Matthiessen Read Free Book Online

property.”
    “The airplane.”
    “The airplane. Precisely.”
    “And you know what the plane is worth.”
    Guzmán grinned. “As a matter of fact, I do. I have made inquiries.”
    “We are American citizens. Suppose we complain to our ambassador?”
    Guzmán grinned still wider, a grin that shot straight back along his jaw without curling upward. “I beg of you,” he said, “please do so. Your embassy will advance you funds and you may regulate your accounts, no?” His tone changed, and for the first time he spoke to Moon directly. “I have been waiting for you to do this,
piloto
. Why have you not done it, eh?” When Moon was silent, he continued, “Because you do not wish to do it. Because you are fugitives, perhaps, or criminals.” He banged both hands flat upon the table. “All the more reason why I must protect my country!” He waved his hand toward the door, dismissing them. “I will give you three more days,” he bawled, and jammed his face into his glass again, surfacing a moment later with a blast of air.
    “Hey,
momentito
,” Wolfie said. “Hey, Lewis, remember what we heard about them Indians?”
    “Guzmán,” Moon said.
    The man whirled on him. “Mestizo! You will call me Comandante Guzmán!” he shouted. “Be very careful! I can send you back where you have come from, do you understand? And there you will be shot!”
    Moon was listening to his partner, his face expressionless. Then he said to Guzmán, “It is your job to develop this region, no?”
    “Eh?” Guzmán placed his fingertips on the table, as if about to spring. “What is it?”
    “The Niaruna are still not pacified, and the news is getting out, and yet your hands are tied because the law prohibits you from sending your soldiers in to kill the Indians.”
    Guzmán nodded, looking carefully at Moon. “I am quite able to take care of our poor Indians.”
    “We were just thinking that a foreign plane loaded with armaments …? On its way elsewhere …?”
    Guzmán kept on nodding.
“Claro,”
he said.
“Sí. Claro.”
    L ATER , on their beds upstairs, they discussed it further. They were both irritable, Wolfie because he felt Moon had not really told him what had been decided with the Comandante, and Moon because he did not want to think or talk at all. He lay on his back and stared at a huge moth pasted on the ceiling.
    “Lewis,” Wolfie said. “I ain’t as stupid as I look, so level with me. Something happened there right at the end, I seen his face.” He heaved over on his side. “That bastard’s got a plan he didn’t have before, now ain’t that right? He kinda likes the Old Wolf’s idea about goin out and leanin on them poor motherin Indians we heard about, the ones that’s buggin him out to the east. Right?”
    Moon was silent.
    “Oh that murderin bastard,” Wolfie said. “Like, shame on’m.” After a while he said, “Listen, Lewis, I don’t blame you, not wantin no part of this. I don’t
blame
you, only did you stop and think, if
we
don’t do it, somebody else’s goin to, and if we
do
do it, we don’t have to make no direct hits, just maybe like a little napalm upwind, know what I mean? Just run ’em the hell out of there.”
    “Um.”
    “Well, there’s always the diamonds, Lewis.”
    “Yeah.”
    “These greasers run a lousy jail, Lewis, and how about the aircraft? And also, these Neo-rooneys ain’t real Indians, Lewis. They ain’t like Blackfoots or Apaches or Cheyennes or nothin. They’re just a bunch of starvin jungle rats, just like you told me. This is
South
America, remember? It ain’t like they was your own people or nothin. So maybe you could kind of think of it like a
mercy
killin, huh, Lewis?”
    Wolfie cocked his hip and cheerfully broke wind. “I said, huh, Lewis? You ain’t startin to go soft on me, I hope?”
    Moon was staring at the moth so hard that it blurred and became two.
    He was still irritable when Uyuyu knocked on the door; he snapped it open, and