Dillinger looked around at what “here” represented. A crowd of rescue workers and their women. Rose, watching him helplessly from less than fifty feet away. Next to her, in black, father Tomas. And far behind them, standing on an outcrop of rock, Ortiz and two of his warriors.
Dillinger knew instinctively how men like Rivera control a community by their harshness in public. He would not hesitate to shoot “as an example to others.” The easiest one to shoot and get away with it was the big-shot gringo who was an escapee from the law in his own country.
To Dillinger’s surprise, it was Father Tomas who came forward.
Immediately Rivera waved his revolver in his direction. “Do not come closer, Father.”
Father Tomas did not miss a step until he was close enough to Rivera to touch him. He touched the left arm, the one without the gun, and said, “Please, Senor Rivera, this man from America is right. We must try quickly to save the lives of those souls who are entombed in the mine. If the only way to work quickly is dynamite, let it be dynamite. If God wills, the men will be rescued alive.”
“And if God doesn’t will, the mine will collapse, and not another ounce of gold ore will be got out of there. Let go of my arm, Father. Tend to God’s business, not mine.”
“Please, let the men be rescued,” Father Tomas said, “and put that thing away.” He reached for Rivera’s gun arm, and in that same instant, Rivera turned to face him and point-blank shot Father Tomas in the forehead. The force of the bullet sent Father Tomas back into the dirt, as people gasped and cried out.
“Rivera,” Dillinger said, “you are a son of a bitch and a coward.”
Rojas was about to strike Dillinger when a voice, louder than the crash of thunder, was heard. It was Ortiz, standing on the rock with his two warriors. “Rivera,” he boomed, “as God is my witness, you are a dead man!”
Ortiz and his men clambered off the rock, mounted, and with a war cry as of old, galloped off.
As Dillinger drove slowly back to Hermosa, trying for the second time in a month to hatch an escape plan, he could see that Rojas, sitting in the passenger seat, would much rather find an excuse for drilling him than for turning him over to the authorities as Rivera had ordered.
Suddenly there was the sound of hoofbeats, and catching up with the car were Ortiz and his warriors on their ponies. Ortiz’s rifle was in his saddle, but he knew it was useless to draw. The hated Rojas would kill the American before Ortiz’s bullet would reach Rojas.
“American,” Ortiz yelled. “Rivera should let you use dynamite. The men in the mine are my people,” the Apache said. He dug his heels into his pony and went over the ridge toward the village in full gallop.
“Catch up to him,” Rojas ordered.
“I don’t dare,” Dillinger said. “The radiator’s boiling. Can’t you see the steam? We have to add water.”
“You have a water can in the trunk?”
“Only gasoline.”
“Don’t get nervous,” Dillinger said to Rojas. He stopped the car, and then he did a trick that he’d learned when he was sixteen years old, what they used to do in Indiana if an old car boiled over far from a gas station. He unscrewed the radiator cap, stood on the hood, unbuttoned his trousers, and in full view of Rojas, urinated a stream three feet straight into the steaming radiator.
As they entered the town, Dillinger and Rojas could see a huge milling crowd around Ortiz in the main square.
“He’s getting them roused up,” Rojas said. “Why are you stopping?”
“Too many people.”
“Keep going!” Rojas barked.
“I’ll hit somebody,” Dillinger said, the car now going at a snail’s pace.
“Faster,” Rojas said. “Run the vermin down!”
As Dillinger applied his brakes, the crowd turned as if it were one person, and everyone, women, children, some men, all came toward the car. These were not a beaten people, but an aroused mob.
Dillinger could hear Ortiz yelling, “There in the car is Rivera’s man Rojas, the murderer’s murderer, who will not use dynamite to free our trapped people.”