Stallion Gate by Martin Cruz Smith

Hill. People went to Woolworth’s or Sears during the day, and at night to the La Fonda hotel. On the plaza in the center of town, the La Fonda was a three-story mock-adobe fantasy with exposed beams and wooden balconies. The hotel had also become, thanks to the Hill, an outpost of the FBI.
    It was the task of the Bureau to watch everyone from the Hill who came into Santa Fe. Since everyone went to the bar of the La Fonda, the agents comfortably stationed themselves in the hotel lobby. When Joe entered, half a dozen agents stirred, then recognized Oppy’s bodyguard and settled back into rustic leather chairs. The agents called scientists from the Hill “longhairs.” Everyone from the Hill, who could spot them by their straw snap-brim hats, called the agents “creeps.”
    The bar was full. Santa Fe was the state capital and attracted a large number of alcoholics who were legislators or lobbyists, plus oilmen, cattlemen and tourists. The bartender was a strategically placed agent, andeveryone had suffered while he learned to build a decent martini. For once, Joe didn’t see Harvey or anyone else from the Hill. It had taken him two hours to get to Santa Fe because he’d had two flat tires on the Pojoaque Creek shortcut to the highway. Under his arm was a newspaper folded over wrapped strips of gelignite. All he wanted to do was deliver the high explosive and keep on going to Albuquerque and the Casa Mañana.
    “A bourbon,” Joe said, since he was there.
    “That’s against the law.” A gnome in a white suit hopped onto the stool next to Joe. Hilario “Happy” Reyes waved a Havana panatella as if in the comfort of his living room—which, in many ways, the bar of the La Fonda was. “Tsk, tsk, serving liquor to an Indian? I suppose we can make an exception for the Chief.”
    “And you,” Joe said.
    Hilario was lieutenant governor of the State of New Mexico. More, he was legend. He was from Santiago Pueblo, and Joe had seen old pictures of him dancing in white buckskin leggings at the Omaha world’s fair of 1898. But when statehood came in 1912, Hilario had become “Happy” Reyes, a Spanish politician, and had since served in every state administration, only once falling as low as judge. Since Roosevelt’s second term, he’d become a Democrat. He was ancient and vigorous, as powerful as a joker in the deck, a worn but still potent magician, an evil Jiminy Cricket.
    “To the home of the brave.” Joe picked up his drink.
    “I want you to fight, Joe. I have a boy from Texas. Natural southpaw. Fast. Knocks them out with eitherhand. Hasn’t had a fight that’s gone four rounds. Works up on the Hill with you.”
    “You’re setting up fights again?”
    “Joe, it’s the spirit of the times. Entertainment. Baseball hasn’t stopped. There’s a one-armed outfielder playing for the St. Louis Browns right now. Hasn’t stopped baseball.” After years of wearing his white planter’s hat, like a girl holding a parasol against the sun, Hilario’s brown skin had become bleached to a pallor that made his eyes, which were black as tar, all the more piercing. “Joe, when you’re as old as I am, you find out that people lead very short lives.”
    “I noticed that on Bataan.”
    “Then the experience wasn’t wasted. Now it’s time again for fun. I want you to meet a fan of yours.”
    “Harry Gold.” Hilario’s friend popped out from behind the stool. Gold was short, swarthy and so fat that he looked inflated inside his double-breasted suit. He wobbled on new boots and removed a new Stetson to shake Joe’s hand. His hair was dark and wavy.
    “Harry’s a New York Jew,” Hilario said.
    “I saw you play with Charlie Parker on Fifty-second Street,” Gold told Joe. “And a couple of weeks ago, at the Casa Mañana. I always wondered what happened to you.”
    “Joe used to be the Indian Joe Louis until that nigger music got to him. Joe, you’re still popular. That boy has beaten everyone in the state. You’re