Final Arrangements

by Rich Curtin

  Back at the office, Rivera looked up the phone number of Tony Reese and called him.

  A hoarse voice answered the phone. “Tony here.”

  “Tony, it’s Manny Rivera.”

  “Hey, Manny. How’s it going?”

  “Fine, thanks. I’ve got a question for you. You played in an all-night poker game at Roy Bartlett’s house a week ago Monday. Is that correct?”

  “Yeah, that’s right. It was our regular game. We usually get together every other Wednesday night for poker, but Roy had a conflict, so he moved the game to Monday night. What about it?”

  “What time did the game start and end?”

  “It started about nine and went almost to sunup. I got home around five-thirty.”

  “Was Roy Bartlett there the whole time?”

  “Yes he was. What’s this about, Manny?”

  “I’m reviewing the Frank Upton case. Just tying down some loose ends. Thanks for the info, Tony.”

  “Hey, wait a minute, Manny. Not so fast. Are you thinking Roy Bartlett might have killed Upton?”

  “Tony, at this point, I don’t know what I think.”

  “Look, I know you’re the go-to guy for murder investigations in this part of Utah, but you’re way off base on this one. I’ve known Roy for over twenty years. You’ll never meet a better guy or a more solid citizen.”

  “Okay, Tony. Thanks. I appreciate the input.” Rivera said goodbye and hung up.

  He shook his head. So Bartlett was telling the truth. He couldn’t have been the one who killed Upton that night in the mountains.

  Frustration and self-doubt began to seep into Rivera’s consciousness. Nothing was making sense. He thought the revised will would be the key to his case, but that had not been so. It appeared that Upton really did leave money to Bartlett simply to upgrade the lapidary shop. Rivera felt like he was back to square one.

  Now the only real evidence he had in the Upton case were the boot prints he found in the forest. And he still had no idea how Iggy Webb’s murder was connected to Upton’s death. Maybe he’d been wrong about that too. Maybe there was no connection.

  He thought about Webb the former criminal, Webb heading west to Moab, Webb the rockhound, Webb the rock salesman living in a motorhome. An image of the motorhome appeared in Rivera’s thoughts—the body of the dead rockhound, the boxes of rocks, the personal items scattered on the floor, the new motorhome brochure, the money hidden in the freezer. Then he began flashing on an image of Webb’s boots on the first step of the motorhome, and an old thought reappeared in his mind. Could Webb have been the one who killed Upton?

  He jumped into his vehicle and headed for Shirley Miller’s place. When he arrived there, he saw Shirley sitting alone on her porch drinking a beer.

  She held up a can of Coors. “Want a beer, Deputy?”

  “No thanks, Shirley. I’ll have to take a rain check. I’m working.”

  “Aw, c’mon, Deputy. I won’t tell anyone.” She laughed.

  To Rivera, she seemed a little tipsy. He forced a smile. “Sorry, I can’t do it.”

  “Well, at least stay and talk to me awhile.”

  Rivera walked over to the porch. “How are you doing, Shirley?”

  “Not so well. It’s awfully lonely around here.”

  “You miss him a lot, don’t you?”

  “Best friend I had.”

  “Do you have any children?” Rivera was concerned about her, but he was also eager to unlock the motorhome and check the pattern on the bottom of Webb’s boots.

  “I had a son. He’s gone now. It was that damn nonsense in Afghanistan.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  She took another swig of beer. “I told him not to go, but he went anyway. Said he had to do his duty.” Her words were slurred. “Are you sure I can’t talk you into a beer?”

  “Shirley, I’m sorry but I really need to get back to work. I’ll have to talk to you another time.”

  “He did his duty but left his mother all alone. What kind of a son does that?”

  Rivera nodded and started moving toward the motorhome, looking over his shoulder at Shirley, keeping eye contact. He felt sorry for her and normally would have sat down and tried to console her, but he felt a powerful drive to check Webb’s boots. He had a strong and growing hunch that the boot prints he saw in the woods belonged to Webb. He had to find out for sure.

  “He took me for granted. Left me all alone.”

  Rivera ducked under the crime-scene tape, unlocked the door, and opened it. He snatched the left boot off the step of the motorhome entryway and turned it over. Waffle soles and heels, just like the boot prints he saw in the woods. And three pebbles were wedged into the waffle pattern of the boot. They were arranged in the same pattern as the boot print he had photographed. He checked the image on his cell phone to be sure. It was an exact match.

  Now it looked like Webb was his shooter. He must have hiked to Upton’s house from the old logging road, shot Upton in the head, and returned to his vehicle the same way he had come. It appeared he’d revived his experience and instincts as a thug to commit cold blooded murder.

  Rivera wondered how Webb had found his way through the forest in the middle of the night. He used his cell phone to search for a website that listed the phases of the moon. The moon was barely a sliver that night, so the woods would have been pitch black. How was Webb able to navigate in the dark? It had been hard enough for Rivera to make the hike during daylight hours.

  Then he remembered seeing maps and a GPS receiver on the front seat of Webb’s pickup truck. At the time, he figured they were just the tools of the trade for any rockhound. He unlocked the pickup, searched through the folded maps, and found one for the LaSal Mountains. Most of Webb’s maps showed signs of wear and tear but the LaSal Mountains map was new. Rivera opened it and found a penciled-in circle marking the location of Upton’s house and an X on the old logging road. He inspected the GPS receiver and found it contained a series of stored waypoints delineating the route from the X to the circle. Rivera nodded. That explained how Webb was able to navigate from the logging road to Upton’s house in the blackness of the night.

  Any doubts Rivera had about Webb being Upton’s killer were now gone. And the money he found in the freezer had to be a portion of the payoff for the job.

  It was clear that, despite coming to Moab with the best of intentions and in search of a new life, Webb had succumbed to temptation. Upton must have persuaded him to revert back to his old ways for a one-time opportunity to make a bundle of cash and buy a new motorhome.

  31

  RIVERA HOPPED INTO his vehicle and headed back to his office. He wanted to sit in the quiet of his office and think things through. Pieces of the puzzle were falling into place, but he knew the picture he had was still incomplete. Plenty of unanswered questions remained, not the least of which was: If Frank Upton hired Iggy Webb to kill him and frame Arthur Atkinson, then who killed Webb and why? Also: How would Webb have received the $20,000 balance due him?

  As Rivera drove through the center of town, he once again heard spirited accordion music filling the intersection of Main and Center Streets, and saw the smiling young lady entertaining a group of onlookers. She was a delight and added so much to the festive feel of downtown Moab. He wondered how much longer she would be in Moab before moving on to another town. He decided to stop and add a contribution to her tip jar. He parked on Center Street, walked to the corner, and stood in a small crowd of fascinated onlookers. The music was exquisite and filled with rich notes. The accordion was connected by a cable to a battery-powered speaker which amplified the sound. Her husband was sitting in a chair behind her, rocking their baby and watching Rivera.

  The deputy pulled out his wallet, extracted a five-dollar bill, and dropped it into the jar. She grinned and nodded her thanks. Rivera lingered there, thinking how professional the musicianship was. He wondered why she wasn’t performing onstage in New York City or Chicago or some other big c
ity. He studied the accordion. It looked old and he noticed a crack in the plastic of the instrument’s body next to the bass note buttons. Then he noticed that the fingers of her left hand were resting on the plastic instead of depressing the buttons. He watched the fingers of her right hand go up and down the keyboard and realized that the finger placement didn’t exactly correspond to the musical notes emanating from the speaker.

  He suppressed a smile. He’d been had. So had hundreds of other unsuspecting people. She wasn’t playing the accordion at all. There was probably a compact disk unit inside the accordion playing the recorded music of an accomplished musician and feeding it to the speaker. For a microsecond, the thought of reaching into the tip jar and retrieving his five-dollar bill crossed his mind. He quickly rejected that idea, realizing how bad it would be on so many levels. He was embarrassed the thought even occurred to him. The girl’s family needed the money, or she wouldn’t be out here doing what she was doing. Besides, he had gotten some enjoyment from the music. He walked back to his vehicle and drove to the sheriff’s office, shaking his head and laughing at himself. Things were not always what they seemed to be. He couldn’t wait to tell Gloria about it.

  Rivera closed his office door and settled into his chair with a fresh mug of coffee. As he suspected from the beginning, the two shootings were connected. Webb had murdered Upton. That seemed certain. Now the job was to find out who had killed Webb and why. But he had a hunch he already knew the answer to the “why” question. Someone had agreed with Upton to kill him for money, and then, without Upton’s knowledge, had subcontracted the job to Webb. That would explain the crumpled note Rivera found in Webb’s wastebasket. He was paid $5,000 upfront with the promise of another $20,000 after the job was finished. Then Webb was eliminated either to avoid paying him in full or to keep him silent or both. And Rivera figured the person who had eliminated Webb had to be someone who was a member of the rockhound club, the place where the trajectories of Upton’s and Webb’s lives intersected.

  The three members who were acquainted with both Upton and Webb were Roy Bartlett, Pete Pearson, and Stagger Lee. Of the three, Bartlett seemed most likely to be Webb’s killer for several reasons. First, his name appeared in Upton’s revised will, suggesting he was the one Upton had hired to kill him. Second, he “conveniently” changed the scheduled night of the poker game to coincide with the date Webb would be in the mountains firing a couple of bullets into the back of Upton’s head. That would give Bartlett an ironclad alibi. And third, he seemed to be the cleverest of the three. His interest in solving puzzles gave testament to his analytic and calculating mind.

  Rivera considered the relationship between Bartlett and Webb. Bartlett knew Webb better than anyone, so much so that Webb had confided in him about his past life of crime. So if Bartlett was looking for a subcontractor, Webb would have been a logical choice.

  And Upton, though standoffish around the other rockhounds, was likely more comfortable being around Bartlett. Since Bartlett lived adjacent to the lapidary shop, Upton would probably run into him every time he went to the shop. There had to be some kind of a bond there—if not friendship, at least a comfortable association based upon familiarity and mutual interests. And there weren’t a lot of people in Upton’s life that he could approach with his plan.

  Rivera decided to advance his thinking on the premise that Bartlett was his man. He was certainly smart enough. The “three red hats” problem Bartlett had challenged him with demonstrated his intelligence. It had taken Rivera nearly an hour to figure it out that evening.

  He wondered if he was overlooking anything. As he always did, he went through the chronology of events, looking for cause and effect and making sure he hadn’t missed a logical step. He would assume Bartlett was Webb’s killer until and unless he could prove it was someone else.

  He placed a yellow tablet on his desk and began making a list of events in the order in which they occurred.

  Frank Upton and Arthur Atkinson fight over a girl in high school and feud for the next thirty-five years.

  Upton learns he has brain cancer.

  Upton decides to commit suicide.

  Upton decides not to waste his own death but rather to use it in one final and colossal attempt at revenge against Atkinson.

  Upton buys a diary and fills in the January through May pages, sprinkling in bogus stories about how Atkinson had threatened him on several occasions with a gun. (Atkinson had threatened him only once.)

  Upton hires Roy Bartlett to kill him using Atkinson’s handgun.

  Upton changes his will a few days before he dies, leaving $50,000 to Bartlett.

  Rivera stopped. He’d arrived at the point where he would be making some suppositions that may or may not be exactly right. He needed to be careful.

  Bartlett visits Upton a couple of days before Upton’s murder to assure himself that Upton had changed his will. Upton gives Bartlett his copy of the revised will as proof. Billy sees a Santa-like figure (Bartlett) talking to Upton, but no vehicle. Bartlett had come through the woods, storing waypoints in a GPS receiver he would later give to Webb. Bartlett would have been careful not to leave his own boot prints in the woods.

  Bartlett hires Webb to kill Upton. He offers Webb $25,000 to do the job. Webb accepts. Bartlett gives him $5,000 upfront. He also gives him a map of the LaSal Mountains marked with the locations of the old logging road and Upton’s house, and a GPS receiver with stored waypoints indicating the route through the forest. He instructs Webb to wear gloves, borrow Atkinson’s gun from his Jeep, kill Upton, and then return the gun to Atkinson’s Jeep. Webb prices out a new motorhome in anticipation of receiving the $25,000. His financial calculations were summarized on the paper found in his wastebasket.

  Webb pays Shirley Miller $800 in back rent and puts the other $4,200 in his freezer for safekeeping.

  Bartlett arranges a late-night poker game at his house the night of the Upton killing so that he has an alibi. Webb drives into the mountains late that night and kills Upton. Annette Benson hears two shots at 2:00 am.

  Bartlett visits Webb early in the morning several days later. Instead of paying him the $20,000 balance he owes him, he kills him. He searches the trailer for the other $5,000 but doesn’t find it.

  Rivera sat back and studied the chronology, looking for flaws in his logic or sequencing. He found none but realized his choice of Bartlett as his top suspect was based primarily on the modification Upton had made to his will, and the change in Bartlett’s poker playing night. The evidence was completely circumstantial. After all, it was possible that Upton had changed his will because he knew his death was near and he wanted to do something nice for the rockhound club by leaving Roy Bartlett funds to upgrade the lapidary machinery. And it was possible that Bartlett had a good reason for moving the poker game to Monday night. It was also possible that the “Santa” Billy saw was someone other than Bartlett.

  Rivera needed proof and the only proof that would withstand challenge in a court of law would be to find the gun that killed Webb in Bartlett’s possession. That would require a search of Bartlett’s premises and that would require a search warrant.

  He walked down the hall to the sheriff’s office, entered, and closed the door.

  The sheriff narrowed her eyes and studied him. “What have you got, Deputy?”

  “I know who killed Frank Upton. It was Iggy Webb.”

  “The murder victim found in the motorhome? How do you know that?”

  Rivera explained about Webb’s boot prints and the map and GPS unit in his pickup. Then he reviewed his theory of the crimes, starting with the events that led up to the murder of Frank Upton and ending with the killing of Iggy Webb. “Roy Bartlett is my suspect for the Webb murder, but the proof is circumstantial. It probably wouldn’t hold up in court. I need a search warrant for Bartlett’s place. Maybe I can find the gun he used to kill Webb.”

  “What makes you think he’s still got it? Wouldn’t he have disposed of it right away? Mayb
e toss it in the Colorado River or bury it somewhere?”

  Rivera had the strongest of hunches that Bartlett would still have the gun. But why did he believe that? The answer came to him. “I don’t think he would dispose of it because of his hubris and intellectual arrogance.”

  The hint of a smile appeared on the sheriff’s face. “What do you mean?”

  “Bartlett thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. He’ll assume his plan was so perfect that he wouldn’t need to dispose of his gun.”

  The sheriff rolled her eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding, Rivera. That would be an incredibly stupid thing to do.”

  “You said it yourself. Nonprofessional killers often do stupid things.”

  “How sure are you about Bartlett? The last thing we need is another embarrassing mistake like the Atkinson arrest.”

  “It’s the only logical conclusion I’ve been able to reach. Nothing else makes sense to me.”

  She thought for a long moment. “Well, okay, go ahead. We might as well bet the farm.” She laughed. “We might both be waiting on tables next year.”

  Rivera stood up. “How did it go with Atkinson when you released him?”

  She shook her head. “Not well. He was fuming. He said he’s going to make me pay for what I did. He said he would do everything in his power to prevent me from getting reelected. And he’s planning to bring a lawsuit against the department for false arrest.”

  “I heard that Denny Campbell might run against you for sheriff.”

  She shrugged. “I heard that too. I beat him once, maybe I can beat him again. We’ll see.”

  Rivera returned to his office, thinking that Atkinson had the money and connections to make things difficult for Sheriff Anderson in the upcoming election. And that would give Denny Campbell a leg up in the competition. Rivera filled out the paperwork requesting the issuance of a search warrant and walked across the street to the courthouse.