Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 44, No. 7 & 8, July/August 1999

The policeman spoke up. “You mean the fellow who came for me this morning? I think he stayed in town. He was awfully upset. I saw him let the mare loose to eat grass in front of the station. Saves me having to cut it.” The policeman went out to his motorcycle, untied the water bottle, and drank. He brought the bottle inside and offered it to the salesman, who also had a long drink.

“Anyone else?” the policeman asked, waving the bottle in the air. Efraín had some; he knew Belicia wouldn’t offer anyone water. She was hoping they’d get thirsty enough to buy soft drinks from her.

The policeman retied the bottle onto the motorcycle.

“Nice rope,” Efraín told him. “You don’t have to worry about losing your water bottle when you hit a pothole.”

“That’s what I hope!” The young policeman seemed glad to have a neutral topic of conversation. “When I started out this morning, I’d gone only a couple of yards when my old rope broke and the bottle fell off. But luck was with me. I looked around a bit in the weeds and found this one.”

Efraín leaned back on the bench. He wished Sulema were here. He hadn’t even said goodbye to her this morning. He should have told her about the cow. She might even have known what was wrong with it. She liked that cow so much she’d given her a name.

He still hadn’t asked Lencho’s advice. Well, there was plenty of time. He was stuck on this side of the cliffs till high tide passed.

Efraín missed his neighbor Catalino, too. Where had he gone? Probably to visit his people, who lived scattered deep in the rain forest.

Efraín watched Belicia slowly drag a rag along the scarred wooden bar. How much had Mr. Ramos hurt her when he married his neighbor’s daughter? Belicia was strong, and tough from years of dealing with difficult customers. Had she killed for revenge and planted the money in the salesman’s valise to draw attention away from herself? But the salesman didn’t deny the money was his.

Belicia certainly could have followed Mr. Ramos when he left and called to him to stop once they were out of hearing of the cantina. She could have stepped up beside the horse and taken Mr. Ramos’ hand. Then a quick tug and a blow with a heavy bottle or rock.

Efraín turned his gaze to Soto, who along with his family had appeared out of nowhere a few months before. No one knew Soto’s past. His cows hadn’t produced their first crop of calves yet. How had Soto come up with enough money to buy a bull and have enough left to consider buying a fine horse? Had he decided to take back the money he’d paid for the bull?

But there were dozens of other possible suspects. The whole community had known Mr. Ramos was selling the bull to Soto. The people who lived along the road would have seen Mr. Ramos ride by leading the bull, and come back without it. Everyone in the cantina had heard him boasting about how much money he’d made. Plain greed was always a motive. Or it could have been an old grudge, forgotten by everyone except the grudge-holder.

Efraín looked down at his hands. There were several short black and white hairs, from a horse or a cow, stuck to the palms. That reminded him of his cow.

“Something’s wrong with my cow,” he said to everyone in the cantina, and described the symptoms.

No one had any helpful advice.

Efraín wanted a close look at the road between the cantina and the body. He returned on foot to where Lencho continued to sit under his wilting palm frond, keeping Mr. Ramos company. Lencho couldn’t help with the cow problem either.

The stout stick still lay by the side of the road where the band of leaves ended. Efraín scuffed the toe of his rubber boot through the leaves. Where they ended at the edge of the road, he found a hole the same diameter as the stick and half its length. A low grinding noise rumbled in the distance.

“That’ll be the judge’s Landcruiser,” Lencho said, sounding relieved. “I expect he went to get the Ramos family from their ranch and that’s what took so long.”

Efraín walked toward the cantina. He didn’t notice anything else out of the ordinary along the road. He went inside and whispered to Belicia for a moment. She gave him a deadly look. Then Efraín came back out and knelt by the motorcycle to examine the rope holding the water bottle.

He motioned to the policeman, who joined him.

“What do you see on this rope?” Efraín asked.

The policeman squinted at it. “Black and white hairs from a cow or horse. It’s a farm rope, that’s what you’d expect to see on it.”

“If you go to where the body lies, you’ll see a short, strong stick lying there and a band of leaves spread across the road.”

“I remember seeing the leaves.”

“There aren’t any trees around that place. Where did the leaves come from?”

The policeman took in the scenery, bare pastures with low grass. His eyes came to rest on the carpet of dry leaves under the mango tree.