“Undocumented immigrants” sometimes vented their displeasure with Border Patrol agents’ efficiency by ambushing Border Patrol vehicles.
Amarilla straightened up and continued looking.
After perhaps sixty seconds, he asked, “You hear anything?”
Hernandez shook his head, and stood erect.
“You think that’s a wetback IED?” Amarilla asked.
Both men had done tours with their National Guard units in Iraq, and had experience with improvised explosive devices.
“It could be a fucking bomb, Guillermo.”
“I don’t see any wires,” Amarilla said.
“You don’t think a cell phone would work out here?”
Hernandez sought the answer to his own question by taking his cell phone out of his shirt pocket.
“Cell phones work out here,” he announced.
“Maybe they left,” Guillermo offered.
“And maybe they’re waiting for us to get closer.”
“Should I put a couple of loads in it and see what happens?”
“No. It could be full of cold beer. These fuckers would love to be able to tell the story of the dumb fucks from La Migra who shot up a cooler full of cerveza.”
Guillermo took a closer look at the container.
“It’s got signs on it,” he said.
He reached into the station wagon and came out with a battered pair of binoculars.
After a moment, he said, “It says, ‘Danger: Biological Hazard.’ What the fuck?”
He handed the binoculars to Hernandez, who took a close look.
He exhaled audibly, then reached for his cell phone and hit a speed-dial number.
“Hernandez here,” he said into it. “I need a supervisor out here, right now, at mile thirty-three.”
There was a response, to which Hernandez responded, “I’ll tell him when he gets here. Just get a supervisor out here, now.”
Ten minutes later, a Bell Ranger helicopter settled to the ground at mile thirty-three.
Two men got out. Both had wings pinned to their uniforms. One was a handsome man with a full head of gray hair and a neatly trimmed mustache. He had a gold oak leaf pinned to his uniform collar points. In the Army, it would be a major’s insignia. Field Operations Supervisor Paul Peterson was known, more or less fondly, behind his back as “Our Gringo.”
The second man, who had what would be an Army captain’s “railroad tracks” pinned to his collar points, was Supervisory Border Patrol Agent Domingo García. He was known behind his back as “Hard Ass.”
Both men walked to Hernandez and Amarilla, who were leaning against their Jeep station wagon.
“What have you got?” Hard Ass inquired not very pleasantly.
Hernandez pointed to the obstruction in the road, then handed the binoculars to Peterson.
Peterson peered through them and studied the obstruction. After a long moment, he said, “What in the fuck is that?”