Dos Equis (18 page)

and left.

Just in case Frances got a mind to watch me through the window, I made a good show of starting the car. I delivered a fist

pump of happiness into the air when it caught, then exited the car to lower the hood. By time I was done my no doubt fantastic performance, Sereena and Frances were already at the front door, air kissing each other’s cheeks. I opened the rear door for Sereena. She took her place without even resting an eye on me. Methinks she was enjoying her role a little too much. With

some fluttery waves, we were off.

We each held our tongue until we were down the hill and near the marina. Only then did either of us dare to speak.

“So? Did she go for it?” As I asked the question, one half of my moustache drooped over my mouth. I pulled the entire thing

off and tossed a hopeful glance over my shoulder at Sereena.

“Frances Huber has gratefully accepted my invitation to a private art show at the splendid home of
Senor
Toraidio Garza.”

Another fist pump. A couple more of those and I betya I
would
be able to fix an engine. Phase 1 of “Taking Down Frances Huber” was officially a success.

Chapter 13

I will always regret being unable to accompany my mother, Kay Quant, on the occasion of her first airplane voyage. Instead,

that “pleasure” went to my good friends Anthony and Jared. By necessity, I needed to be in Zihuatanejo much earlier than Mom did. So Anthony and Jared, who were also part of my grand scheme, agreed to ferry her down with them.

According to Anthony, it wasn’t exactly a three-ring circus, but it came close. It began right at the Air Canada check-in

counter in Saskatoon. Mom chatted up the check-in agent as if the woman was waiting there for no other purpose than to

celebrate her first plane ride. Amid an impatient crowd of travellers waiting in line behind them, Anthony and Jared had to

finally drag Mom away, all the while Mom promising to send the flabbergasted staffer a postcard to thank her for her help in taking care of her luggage.

Then came security. Although we’d gone over the many do’s and don’ts in great detail, it was as if Mom thought the rules

were merely suggestions. The bells and whistles began to shrill at the first sight of her. Firstly, the personal scanner detected several metal objects on Mom’s person. According to Anthony, Mom began to describe to the security officer, in great detail, each of the operations she’s had over the past decades to replace hips, knees, and various other body parts with metal

facsimiles. This of course netted her a full body pat-down. She submitted to this quite good naturedly, saying loudly to anyone within earshot, that she’d rather have a massage from this nice young person, than some terrorist blow up her plane.

Oi.

Her carry-on was locked with a padlock. The kind she uses to secure the diesel fuel tanks on her farm. She could not find the key, and eventually acquiesced to the security inspector’s request to cut it off with a pair of bolt cutters. Inside, they found a jar of borscht and a margarine container of still-warm perogies (for snacking on the plane, because she’d heard how little they

feed the passengers), a full-size aerosol can of Aqua Net hairspray (I didn’t realize they still made that stuff!), and another of Pledge (who knows why?).

All this, before even having left Saskatoon.

Most of the plane ride, first to Calgary, then direct to Zihuatanejo, went smoothly enough. Instead of being nervous or scared, Mom was apparently quite giddy over the near spiritual sensation of being lifted into the air above the clouds. She began a

prayer of thanks, but soon resorted to silent mouthing of the words when she realized no one else was joining in. At one point, when most of the onboard service was completed, and things had quieted down, Mom leaned over to Anthony and asked if

maybe they should start a sing-a-long to break the unsettling silence. Anthony managed to convince her that not many people

would likely know the words to the Ukrainian ditties she had in mind. He suggested that maybe it was best to stick to watching a movie. She decided to forgo the onboard entertainment system in favour of cloud gazing and more praying.

Anthony, usually unflappable, found it quite disarming to realize that Mom was entirely non-plussed by the fact that he and

Jared had, as a treat, bumped her (and themselves), up to business class. Never having flown before, she wouldn’t necessarily know the difference. But Anthony got the express feeling that somehow Mom would have preferred it in back, where people

were a little noisier and rowdier. When the meal was served, Mom politely ate every last bite off her plate. She did, however, grumble under her breath about how nice a bowl of borscht would have tasted right about then.

It was late afternoon when the Air Canada flight pulled up to the Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo International Airport. Passengers

descended a set of rollaway stairs directly onto the tarmac. It was at this point, when the first waves of glorious, radiant heat, tasting of sunshine, saltwater, and desiccated vegetation first caressed the skin of sun-starved passengers as they disembarked.

It was also at this point that my mother’s legs began to cramp.

Mom grabbed onto Jared’s arm, yanking him to a standstill.

“Kay, what’s wrong?” Anthony asked, alarmed.

“Oh, eets notting. Just my legs. Here, hold da bag,
proshu
.”

Anthony held on to Mom’s carry-on, while she dug around in her purse. Passengers coming behind them, desperate to either

get out of the heat, out of their long pants, or into a bottle of tequila, hurriedly zigzagged around the stalled trio, and headed inside the small terminal building.

A guard, armed with a rifle, approached, making a motion with his non-arms-bearing hand, encouraging them to keep

moving.

“
Si
,” Jared said, explaining in passable Spanish that his “mama” needed to get some medicine for her sore legs.

Little did Jared know that the “medicine” Mom was searching for was a small tin, filled with white powder, which looked

suspiciously like cocaine.

The guard’s eyes widened as Mom wetted her forefinger, dipped it in the powder, and put it to her tongue. Immediately he

began some speedy Spanish rant that, even without a translator, told Anthony and Jared that he was more than a little upset.

Jared, at first a bit discombobulated by what was happening, demanded to know what my mother was doing. In Spanish. She

looked at him, confused, and answered back in rapid-fire

Ukrainian. All the while, the excited guard continued to rail.

This went on for a few bewildering seconds, until both Jared and my mother converted back to English. Jared quickly

understood that mother’s “medicine” was actually three or four packets worth of McDonald’s salt, which she’d poured into an

old Anacin pill tin. She’d heard on TV—Dr. Oz or some such expert—that having a blast of salt as soon as you felt cramps,

quickly relieved the pain. As it turned out, the cure worked for Mom. She was fine.

The guard was not.

It took Jared a full two minutes to convey to the guard what Mom had done, ending up with offering him a taste of the white

powder. Surprisingly he took some. Eventually satisfied that Kay Quant, international drug fiend, was actually just another pale Canadian tourist, he let them go.

It took another ten to fifteen minutes in the long, snakelike waiting line to get through Customs. On the other side, the three quickly found their luggage, and headed straight for the final obstacle in what was quickly turning into Mom’s
National

Lampoon’s Vacation
Inaugural Flight.

Only in Mexico have I seen this system of luggage screening. It is a wholly random process, whereby all passengers entering

the country must push a button that will either light up green or red. Greens go through. Reds are searched. Mom approached

the button. Anthony and Jared were close behind her, whispering in her ear what to do. As her arthritic forefinger reached for the button, both men fully expected a blindingly red light to fill the room with the intensity of a lighthouse beacon.

Instead, Mom smiled at the attendant, used her newfound command of the Spanish language by saying: “Bwenee Day-o,

Senyoka,” pushed the button, and sailed right through on green. She moved directly into the waiting area and my arms with a

“Bwenee Day-o,
Sonsyou!

”

Anthony and Jared were rewarded for their many hours of caregiving with two reds in a row.

Later that evening, in a very
Ocean’s Eleven
,
Twelve
, and
Thirteen
way, we all gathered on the balcony of Errall’s condo for a welcome dinner and to review our plot to bring Frances Huber to justice. While Mom and I were staying with Errall, everyone

else was bunking with Sereena at the large home of her friend, Toraidio Garza. (I’d long ago realized that Sereena has friends pretty much everywhere in the world. This comes in handy more often than you might expect.) The arrangement worked out

well. Errall’s place, although big as far as beachside condos go, couldn’t accommodate many more people than the three of us.

More importantly, it was always a good idea to keep my mother and Sereena separated as much as possible. The two women

mix about as well as ketchup and Coke.

Errall’s condo was located right on Playa la Ropa, with panoramic views of Bahia de Zihuatanejo (Zihuatanejo Bay).

Designed in part by a well-known local architect, Enrique Muller, the complex’s buildings were craftily constructed on the

side of a hill above the beach. It gave the place a unique look, as if the apartments are cascading down the slope. Each building has a different colour scheme that coordinates perfectly with its natural surroundings. Smoky violet. Sandy maize. Rusty

orange. Chilled avocado. The condos are an open-air design, with hand-cut tiles and river rock flooring. Palapa roofs hang

lazily over large decks, and tactile fabrics cover the chairs and beds. Local artisans handcrafted each piece of furniture, which included great wooden chests and tables, and wide, well-padded lounges for the deck. All of it had been carefully selected to reflect the rich culture of the region. My favourite features of all were the private cool-water dipping pool and outdoor shower.

My mother was not too keen on either.

There were seven of us in all. Errall had the management bring up a special table and extra chairs, so she could serve dinner on the expansive balcony. It was, as usual, a perfect evening, cooling off just enough to allow us to dine outdoors in comfort.

We gathered just as the sun, following a hard day’s work, began its slow descent into the sparkling Pacific. Everything in the dying sun’s path was thrown into the otherworldly golden glow of approaching dusk. Errall distributed margaritas with salted rims. Lime and chili flavoured peanuts were our amuse bouche.

Much later that night, with dinner gobbled up, along with some lovely Casa Madero Chardonnay, the group divided into

smaller clusters throughout the condo, chatting and drinking coffee. Errall approached me, contemplating the dark near the same railing I’d stood by so many times during my earlier stay there.

“Peso for your thoughts,” she said.

“I’m just thinking about the next few days.”

“Worried?”

I tried a smile that probably more closely resembled a grimace. “Are you kidding? What could go wrong?”

Errall wasn’t buying my flippancy. She never did. I don’t know why I tried.

“Is this going to work, Russell?” Her tone was uncharacteristically uncertain.

I turned to look her in the eye. I uttered the words I’d said to no one before. Not even myself. “I really don’t know.”

Toraidio Garza was one of those men who flirt with everyone. Old. Young. Fat. Skinny. Women. Men. He didn’t care. In any

situation, he was happiest when oozing charm, like juice from an overripe peach. Somehow, he pulled it off, the object of his attentions never doubting his sincerity, even long after he’d moved on to someone else. Hours later, you’d find yourself

smiling, your cheeks heating, recalling something he’d said to you. It was an art, and he an indisputably skilled artiste.

Toraidio was a near perfect doppelganger for the Cuban American actor, style icon, and “confirmed bachelor,” Cesar

Romero. Unlike Romero, however, I was quite certain Toraidio was straight. Comfortably into his seventies, Toraidio took

care of himself extremely well. Still svelte, he kept his thick white hair combed into a luxuriant pompadour, and favoured

smoking jackets, ascots, and tassled loafers with argyle socks. He was often spotted wearing a beret as he promenaded around the streets of Zihuatanejo.

Errall, Mom, and I arrived at Toraidio’s stunning hacienda intentionally early the evening of the art show. Although we’d

been rehearsing our roles for days, I wanted one last chance to go over everything before the unwitting guest of honour, Frances Huber, arrived.

If I do say so myself, our assigned roles suited us perfectly. This was a good thing, as I was discovering that my mother was about as good an actress as I am a ballet dancer. She was playing Kay Quant, my widowed mother. She was stinking rich, as

the result of the death of my father, an obscenely wealthy Russian industrialist. Best of all...she could not speak English. All the better for keeping her from engaging our quarry with conversational gambits like “Why you keel all dose nice ladies? You go

to hell for dat!”

I was playing her son, Russell, disgruntled to have received no monies upon my father’s death. Dependent on my stingy

mother, I was being ground into bankruptcy by my addictions to gambling and other pursuits. Errall was my unhappy wife

(can’t imagine why), and solidly distained by my mother. Anthony and Jared would be patrons of the arts. They would mix in