Border Town Girl by John D. MacDonald

and wring it as dry as she can get it.” He took the money from the shirt pocket and threw the garment toward the girl. She did as she was directed. The doctor spoke to the boy and he came timidly over. The doctor began to finish his work on the infected leg while the boy watched the gun with wide eyes.
    Christy put the damp white shirt on, then the coat. The doctor looked up. “That will be twenty American dollars, señor.”
    Christy laughed. “You make good jokes.”
    The doctor turned white around the mouth. “That is my profession and I get paid for my profession, señor. Pay me or I shall go to that window and call to the police.” The dark eyes looked at Christy with contempt, without fear.
    “Are you completely nuts?”
    The doctor turned his back on the gun and walked steadily to the window.
    “All right, all right,” Christy shouted. He threw two tens on the floor. The doctor spoke to the nurse. She picked them up and handed them to him.
    “Do you want a receipt, señor?” the doctor asked, amusement in his eyes.
    “No,” Christy said thickly. He hurried out. In the waiting room he turned and called back, “None of you leave here for a half hour.”
    The doctor and the nurse turned and stared at him as though he had already been forgotten. The nurse handed the doctor a roll of adhesive tape and he once again bent over the infected leg.
    Halfway down the stairway, Christy stopped and tried to plan the next move. It would be wise to wait until midnight. In some bar he could find a tourist. The tourist would have a car. A car would get him to Vera Cruz or Tampico. Somehow he would get on a ship. He wondered if he’d killed the ranger. The man had slumped with his head at a funny angle. Soon they’d check up and find he’d crossed the bridge. They’d be looking for him. The Piedras Chicas police would be looking. They’d have his description.
    He turned down another side street. It was empty. He found a barred wooden door set into a cement wall. He got his thick fingers around the edge of it, braced his feet and wrenched it open, hearing the squeal as the nails tore free. He went inside and pushed the door shut. He was in a quiet garden patio. He stood and listened. He fitted the nails back into the holes, wrapped a handkerchief around his knuckles and drove them in. Again he listened. A small fountain tinkled in the middle of the patio. Christy crawled back into a place where the shrubbery was dense. He lay down with his back against the wall. The torn shoulder throbbed.
    After an hour had passed a stocky blonde woman with a ravaged face came out to the flagstones near the fountain. Christy watched her from the shadows. She spread a blanket, went back toward the house, and returned a few minutes later with a tall bottle and a tiny glass. She slipped out of her housecoat and lay face down under the brute sun.

 
9
     
    IT WAS BLUE DUSK WHEN HE AWOKE. HE SAT up with a start, feeling for the keys in his pocket as he turned, feeling the keys at the same instant he saw the car, as he saw Diana sleeping beside him. He exhaled slowly. There was a tang of burning cedar scrub in the air and he heard the distant tank-tankle of goat bells.
    Sleep had ironed out the torment in her face, so that she looked almost childlike. She lay on her left side, facing him, both hands with the palms together under her cheek. A thick rope of blonde hair lay forward across her throat. Her knees were bent and thrust forward toward him. The line of her waist dipped sharply inward and then mounted high over the round crest of hip. He lit a cigarette and watched her in the gathering darkness as he smoked, thinking that few things in the world are more beautiful than the line of hip and flank of a sleeping woman.
    His watched had stopped at four. The car clock would still be operating. Soon it would be time to turn back to town. He wondered if he had made a mistake in not insisting that they turn back as soon as she had agreed that