A marked man, for a dozen crimes ... the criminal instinct, nothing else. Protected by my father. How can there be law and justice when a single person can dictate? Yet I will be dictating when I summon the rurales ... the law protects me against the lawless ... and the church has a law against divorce. So I am dictated to, in turn.... Well, I must get up and walk around, toughen myself for that long ride tomorrow. He got away early, before the sun broke through the low mist. He leaned out of the victoria and called goodbye. "I hope that spring doesn't come apart," she said. "Simon's a good driver," Raul said. "We have at least one good spring. We'll make out fine." "I love you...." "Goodbye." "'Bye, Chulo.... Write me...." It was a superb morning, the sun barely topping the palmera, mist blurring the ocean, haze concealing the volcano. Silver trimming on the guard's saddle sparkled. Creaking and bumping, sagging on its weak spring, the victoria rolled out of the sand, one of the horses whinnying. Sand gave way to hard ground and Simon cracked his whip. "Vamos!" he shouted to his team. Parrots, scarcely larger than hummingbirds, flicked out of the trees and seemed about to strike the carriage. The victoria traveled slowly, swaying from side to side like an old fat man. Little by little, the gray trunks of the palmera hid the beach and house. Raul tried to make himself comfortable by pushing his good shoulder into the cushion. I'll get used to it. Simon knows what he's doing. There will be good stretches of road. Damn these annoyances. Before long, they passed a family riding on burros, then several oxcarts loaded with firewood. At noon, they saw Indian women, spinning flax as they trudged along, their bare feet stubbing through deep sand. Later in the afternoon, they met a hill Indian, in buckskin, bow and quiver over his shoulder ... he dog-trotted past, saluting no one. At dusk, they drove through a herd of belled goats. Their shepherds had black and white serapes over their shoulders. By a campfire alongside the road, Raul noticed a youngster with two honey bears on a rope--cubs the size of house cats. I'll buy one for Vicente, he thought, and leaned out of the window and called the youngster. The carriage slumped into a pothole, and a spring seemed to snap. Simon bellowed angrily at his horses and the campers howled with laughter. Raul asked the boy how much he wanted for one of his bears. "You may have them both, patrón." Raul recognized that hacienda courtesy. "I want one for my son." "They're both yours," insisted the boy, rising, drowning disappointment behind a wooden grin. His small body might have been put together out of muscled vines. "For one bear," said Raul, and handed him some pesos.