Vamos a Sacar Dahveed!

That's what Chayo said the chaparito who'd arrived with his brother Cresencio, the ejido commissioner, was dancin' around shoutin' at his place there in San Cosme. Chayo can't remember his name, just called him that word fer short guys. This hot-tempered jumper had had it with me! He'd shouted out how the ejido was gonna strike! I get further filled in that this one's just joined the ejido, bought out somebody else rights. Seemed like the ejido chief and this dust dancer had visited San Cosme solely ta spread this threat.

We're bouncin' along here on rancho road when Chayo feeds me this. "Bueno!" I give with a laugh. "When?" I asked, me willin' ta bet that it was gonna take 'em a while. He goes on ta tell me that this nasty tempered little character had stated that the Reforma Agraria from Mexico City was in the process of demanding that the Presidente of the Municipal District of Loreto send engineers out to check on Rancho Carrizalito's true location. In the replay I was gettin', this was ta put the skids under us. This nasty gringo and his lady would be goners!

I commented ta Chayo that this new player must not know very much. I was sure that Crecencio hadn't clouded any of these newly-bought-in one's minds with fuzzy details. Like maybe him tellin' Ôem there were only minor problems along this stretch of coastline...instead of really major ones.

In truth, I've heard so much of this threatening rhetoric, rhetoric that's resulted in nothin', that I easily put away thoughts of anyone from Loreto showin' up. Completely out-of-mind this was when Chayo, next day, comes pullin' my pickup up ta camps gate. He'd been employin' it in his straw bale casa's construction.

I'm in our palapa, playin' at makin' shell necklaces, not really wantin' ta be bothered. My thoughts are that maybe he's come over for some other tool, the interruption, hopefully, wouldn't chew up too much of my precious time. He opens gate and advances on foot ta where I'm happily employed.

"There are engineers here from Loreto," he calmly opens with. Three of 'em, he claims, with Alejo and in a red pickup that, right then, was drivin' around on the rancho. I'd seen a red pickup, heard it rattling' from a distance, but had thought it was Alejo's old truck, him perhaps on some kayaker rescue mission, somethin' he gets involved in quite often.

"No." That was Alejo with the engineers. And they'd passed by headed towards the northern boundary line of what we hold possession of, the last, furthest out campsite on the rancho...right at the mouth of arroyo La Ballena. As he's tellin' me this we both hear that pickup comin' back from that northern direction. Alejo'd thought it would be a good idea if I made contact with these guys, these officials Chayo gets across ta me...me who'd been happily playin' where I'm at, who doesn't want ta deal with anything like this on this gorgeous, glorious afternoon.

He could sense my resistance. Just enough, he persisted till I had ta give in. "What if they go past? I don't want to have to chase them all the way to San Cosme," I squirmed. My last attempt at duckin' this failed with him assurin' me that they'd stop at Playa Carrizalito, look at our south property marker located just down coast from there.

We get ta my truck and he insists that I drive. We make towards where our camp's drive connects with rancho's internal road. Before getting' ta this we can see that red pickup parked at this junction; Alejo, others guys in white shirts, seemingly waitin' on our arrival.

I haven't a clue as ta what I'm up against. There's two of these officious-lookin' gents standin' outside this officious-lookin' pickup, another white shirted guy, the driver, is still settin' in cab. They don't give away anything with their near expressionless faces.

Fear of gringos...maybe not fear but not knowin' how ta take us, that's what I can attribute those stone faces to. Soon as I stuck out my hand and introduced myself the stone evaporated, turned almost ta silly putty. Turns out they're all glad ta meet me, havin' heard my name often. The driver was a kid named Davis, a very common name in Loreto, whom we'd met before...deep up in the mountains at a rancho by name of El Parrel.

They're smilin' and Alejo's smilin' and I guess I'm smilin' too. Just slightly Alejo urges me ta come out with our side of story...as ta what's goin' on there with the rancho, our problems with the ejido. I start off by tellin' these others to relax and be patient with my Spanish. This was gonna take a while. They're all intently listening as I launch off inta this.

I mentioned the fact of the rancho's purchase, I couldn't remember how many years back, from Alejo's uncle Lorenzo Villalejo Fuerte. I was surprised that the one who looked senior in this white-shirted threesome knew exactly who I was talkin' about: the old mountain man who I've often written of as the wizard.

I talked about our surprise, after us first getting to study El Plano Definativo for Ejido San Jose De La Noria, us findin' what we'd purchased drastically reduced in size - and moved! I explained all we'd gone through to remedy this situation, me mentioning important players names as I rolled out this story. A Sr. Cholet, the First Delagado of the Reforma Agraria we'd worked with, Elijo Soto Lopez the second. "Que cabrones!" was their unanimous decisions on these two clowns. That one who was senior and this other mid-aged fella had been around long enough ta have a multiplicity of bad stories ta pin on both I'd mentioned. "Thoroughly corrupt! Bandidos! Ladrons!" words like this they felt quite comfortable hangin' on these characters.

I went on in some detail about what I learned about El Plano Definitivo during my years spent investigating it. They'd had no great difficulty in believin' my theory as to the group of high politicos that had to be behind all the stunts that this plano attempted ta pull off. "Si, Si," they were well aware of this high level of past corruptions.

Further along, when I got to part about this parcelization scam, the name of Francisco Savin brought a small storm of sour rhetoric. Oh! What a bad actor he was. What a reputation this ex chief has so firmly established - all bad!

It's my luck that Alejo'd known both these older fellas for quite a while already. They'd worked on surveying the area there at San Cosme that he's earned squatters rights to. The older one was quite familiar with El Carrizalito, him havin' extended family, shirt-tail relations to Alejo, who'd at one time lived there. He'd visited this rancho numerous times in his youth. We joked about all the hard physical evidence that was right there close at hand. "Si, Si!" He understood exactly where El Carrizalito was supposta ta lay. He knew precisely where ruins of casa Alejo was born in was located.

They felt the ejido's attempted parcelization a joke. A big one! But it was by no means unusual. They talked about what a problem there was with parcels of ejido Loreto. That middle gent clicked off a string of other attempted parcelization within the Loreto Municipal District. "What a mess! What a mess!" He threw arms up above his head to emphasize the immense magnitude of problems.

"Job security," I joked ta these three, "you've got a minimum of a hundred years worth of work out in front of you." They all laughed that it might take that long.

I talked about what had happened north of Ensenada, "Punta Banda."

"Si, Si!" They'd surely heard about that one. Another case where the Reforma Agraria had assured an ejido that land that legally belonged to another was theirs'. They knew all about all those who'd built their dream homes on property that was eventually granted to its rightful owners by the Tribunal Agraria, the court of last resorts in land dispute matters.

The specter of all those people havin' ta hand their house keys over to the real owners, this done with assistance of the military, we all found quite humorous. Luckily we were stopping this before the same would happen right there. At least I hoped we were.

We parted amigos. Alejo said I did a good job in my rendition of the story. I was glad Chayo had come and gotten me. In ultra light mood I walked back ta camp....

Email: david@dondavidonbaja.com