"Take your piss and then I'll show you. I may even let you steer it for a minute or two."

"Pretty," Castillo said several minutes later as he and Fernando walked around a small, sleek, glistening white jet airplane. "What is it?"

"A Lear jet:"

"I can see that."

"A Bombardier/Learjet 45XR, to be specific."

"You said 'yours'?"

"Ours," Fernando said.

"You finally got Abuela to get rid of the old Lear?"

"Grandpa loved it," Fernando said. "She wouldn't admit that, of course. Until I finally wore her down. It was the old 'the wolf's at the door' rationale."

"What did it cost?"

"Don't ask," Fernando said. "But Grandpa's Lear belonged in a museum."

"I know," Castillo said. "But I know how she feels. It's not easy losing another connection to your past."

[TWO]

Hacienda San Jorge

Near Uvalde, Texas

1740 27 May 2005

The Bombardier/Learjet 45XR did not exactly buzz the sprawling, red-tile-roofed Spanish-style "Big House" and its outbuildings, but it did fly directly over it and wiggle its wings at maybe 1,000 feet before picking up altitude in a sweeping turn to make its approach to the paved, 3,500-foot runway a half mile from the house.

Inside the Big House, Dona Alicia Castillo, recognizing the sound for what it was, raised her eyes heavenward, made the sign of the cross, laid down the novel she had been reading, and walked quickly out of the living room onto the verandah.

She loved all of her children and grandchildren, of course, and tried to do so equally. But she knew that the airplane that had just roared overhead held the two people she really loved most in the world, her grandson Fernando-the son of her daughter Patricia-and his cousin Carlos.

She didn't like them flying at all, and she especially didn't like it when they were in the same airplane and Fernando might be tempted to show off-which, in flying so low over the Big House, he certainly was.

She got out on the porch in time to see the Lear put its landing gear down as it lined up with the runway.

If I stay out here on the verandah, it will look as if I'm desperately waiting to see them.

Which, of course, I am.

She sat down on a couch upholstered with leather pillows.

Five minutes later, they appeared in the ancient rusty jeep in which Juan Fernando, may God rest his soul, had taught them both to drive when they were about thirteen. Patricia and Francisco, her husband, had been furious when they found out, but Juan Fernando had silenced them by saying they're going to drive anyway and it was better that he teach them than have them kill themselves trying to teach themselves.

Juan Fernando had used the same argument, more or less, two years later when the boys wanted to learn how to fly. This time he said Carlos was going to fly, as his father had been a pilot even before he went in the Army, and what Carlos did Fernando was going to do whether or not anyone liked it. Or vice versa.

They were really more like twin brothers, Dona Alicia thought, than just cousins. They didn't look at all alike-while Carlos had been a big boy, Fernando had been outsized since he was in diapers-but they were the same age, within several months, and they had been inseparable from the time she and Juan Fernando had brought Carlos home from Germany.

Dona Alicia thought both had gotten many physical genes from their grandfathers. Carlos had shown her a picture of his mother's father when his grandfather had been a lieutenant colonel in the German army at Stalingrad; Carlos looked just like him except for the eyes, which were Jorge's eyes.

Carlos got out of the jeep and walked onto the verandah.

"How's my favorite girl?" he asked, putting his arms around her and kissing her.

"Your favorite girl would be a lot happier if you hadn't flown over the house like that," she said.

Carlos pointed at Fernando.

"Not me, Abuela," Fernando said. "The Gringo was flying."

"He's lying, Abuela," Carlos said.

Dona Alicia looked at Fernando. "How many thousand times have I asked you not to call him that?"

Fernando looked thoughtful, then shrugged.

"Five maybe?" he asked, innocently.

Fernando had always called Carlos "Gringo," or "the Gringo," but anyone else who did so got punched. She and Fernando had worried, on the plane from Frankfurt, how the two twelve-year-olds were going to get along. Would Fernando resent his new cousin? Fernando was not only much larger than Carlos but had acquired his grandfather's temper as well.

The problem hadn't come up.

"You talk funny, you know that?" Fernando had challenged five minutes into their first meeting.

"So do you, if that language you're using is supposed to be English," Carlos had replied.

Fernando, who was not used to being challenged, had looked at him a long moment and then finally said, "I think I'm going to like you, even if you are a gringo. You know how to ride?"

"Of course."

"Come on, I'll show you around the place." And they had been inseparable from then on.

"Since I didn't think you would think to," Dona Alicia said, "I called Maria and she's bringing the children out for supper."

"Abuela," Fernando demanded, "how are the Gringo and I going to get drunk if my wife and the rug rats are coming?"

"You're not going to: Fernando, stop! You are making me angry!"

"Yes, ma'am," he said, contritely.

"Rug rats!" Dona Alicia said. "I don't know where you got that."

"Watching television comedy, Abuela," Carlos said. "I agree with you. That's disgusting! Rug rats'! His own sweet and loving children!"

Dona Alicia tried and failed to keep a smile from her lips.

"Well, if you feel you must," she said, "come in the house and have a cocktail. I may even have a glass of wine myself."

"I left my suitcase on the airplane, Abuela," Carlos said. "Have I got a change of clothes in my room?"

"Of course you do," she said. "You know that. You 'forgot your suitcase on the airplane'? How in the world could you do that?"

"Tell Abuela whose airplane it was, and where you have been, Carlos Guillermo," Fernando said, as they walked into the living room.

She looked at him expectantly.

"My boss's airplane. Secretary Hall. The president sent for him and I caught a ride with him," Carlos said.

"Did you get to see the president?" she asked.

"From a distance," Carlos said, not liking the lie but knowing it came with the job.

"Your grandfather knew his father," Dona Alicia said. "They did some business together in Alabama. Something, I think, to do with trees for pulp. Long-leaf pines, whatever that is."

"Really?"

That didn't come up. Didn't they make the connection? Or did they know? And did knowing that have something to do with that two-minute job interview? Until just now, I thought the president was just trusting Hall. Or maybe they knew and wanted to see if I would bring it up.

"We used to see them at the Kentucky Derby," Dona Alicia said. "The president's father, I mean. And his wife. A really lovely woman. Your grandfather really loved horses."

"Abuela," Fernando asked, from the bar. "Wine, you said?"

"Please," she said. "There's some Argentine cabernet sauvignon in one of the cabinets."

[THREE]

Baltimore-Washington

International Airport

Baltimore, Maryland

0905 31 May 2005

"Lear Five-Oh-Seven-Five on the ground at five past the hour. Will you close us out, please?" Castillo, who was in the pilot's seat, said into his microphone.