As she got up, a thought struck her. “By the way, Elle, if you want the news feed from my dreams, I can tell you up front that the man’s death has nothing to do with the horse.”
Elle grinned. “Did I say it did?”
“No, but we will definitely encounter a horse and it has nothing to do with him.”
“You are going to a race track,” Torre pointed out. “They race quarter horses there so meeting one seems likely.”
“But this has nothing to do with them?” Elle said.
“Nope.”
“What did you see that makes you so sure?”
Charli grinned at her grandmother. “It isn't what I saw. I got that from the horse’s mouth—the horse told me it had nothing to do with him.”
Elle shook her head in despair. “Once again we are off to an auspicious if confusing start in our investigation.” She looked at Torre. “She always does this to me. Can you imagine me sending a report back east that says that a horse told my Indian friend that the death had nothing to do with him and that the interview took place in a dream?”
Torre shrugged. “Perhaps you can broaden their vision of all that life offers us.”
“Doubtful,” Elle said. “Very doubtful indeed. Especially since such enlightenment would require changing the forms, and they are both miserly and pragmatic.”
“Accepting the truth, regardless of its source might be the ultimate in pragmatism,” Torre said.
Elle sighed. “She is definitely your granddaughter, Torre. I guess now I have to deal with two of you.”
Torre put her hand on Elle’s. “Seems so.”
Chapter Nine
Lacking Motive or kin
When Elle and Charli arrived in Ruidoso Downs they went straight to the police station.
“How do we do this?” Charli asked. “Is there some politically correct approach to getting police to share information with the insurance company?”
“No. It depends on the people. Best thing is to find out who is in charge and just ask for help,” Elle said. “Saves tons of time.”
As it turned out, in this police station, the top sat right next to the bottom. Ruidoso Downs had a population of 2,500 people and three of them were working in the station as they walked in.
Elle walked up to the desk of a short man with black hair, cut short, and eerie green eyes. He popped up from behind his desk and greeted them cheerfully. A female officer sitting at the next desk glanced up at them from her paperwork; an older man in the back ignored them altogether.
“Can I help you?” the man who had gotten up asked.
“We need to speak to someone about an open case,” Elle said, holding out a business card.
“Well then, I'd be your man. Chief of Police, Eknar O’Shaughnessy at your service.”
Charli suppressed a giggle. “Eknar? Is that a Gaelic name?”
He turned his grin on her. “And what would be making you think that?”
“Well, your last name certainly is Gaelic, and Eknar sounds kind of like it could be, but that isn’t quite right way either.”
He laughed again. “Eknar does have that sound, doesn’t it? Actually, the truth is that Eknar is as Apache as you look to be, my dear. In the language of my dear mother's tribe, my tribe, it means ‘poet,’ which proves that my mother erred on two major counts.”
“How’s that?”
“As an optimistic Apache, which might make her even one more anomaly in my life, she somehow expected me to have a romantic and poetic nature and to embrace my Apache heritage. As it turned out, like my father, I tend to be rather pragmatic. And I rather enjoy wallowing in the part of me that is Irish. But I doubt you came into our station on a fine day like this to discuss my heritage. Why don’t you have a seat and tell me why you are here.”
They sat in front of the desk. “Well Chief...”
“Eknar, if you please. We aren’t formal here in New Mexico, especially the folk in a wee village like this one.”
“We are here about the recent death of Jake Ravenwing.”
He nodded as if he’d known. “And what is the nature of this interest?” He looked at Elle's card and then at Charli. “Would you be his relative perhaps?”
Elle shook her head. “No. She is helping me with my investigation. My company has a life insurance policy on Mr. Ravenwing.”
“So you’ll be paying out a tidy sum to his heirs?”
“Possibly. However, when a death occurs under suspicious circumstances, we need to have the facts. We like to have some idea that the beneficiary deserves the money.”
“Murder shouldn’t pay, is that it?”
“Exactly.”
“Well, can’t argue with that.” He stared at the card. “And this is the name of the insurance company?”
Elle twisted a little in her chair, wincing the way Charli had noticed she always did when someone asked. “Yes. Nevermore,” she said flatly. “Nevermore Insurance LLC.”
Charli was trying to keep back her own laughter. “Some corporate creative creature thought that it would be clever. The company slogan is: ‘With us you get the best coverage and always pay less—nevermore.’”
The Chief was wiping tears from his eyes. He turned to the officer at the next desk who was covering her mouth. “Well, Officer Johns should join this conversation, as she is the investigating officer in the case.” He wrung his hands.
“I’d like to find out what you’ve learned about the death of Jake Ravenwing.”
The Chief choked again. “Until this second, I didn’t even put it together. Mr. Ravenwing. Nevermore Insurance. Was he insured against death while knocking on chamber doors? Do you insure entire ravens, or just raven’s wings?”
As he laughed at his own jokes, Elle glared. The company name often embarrassed her. “This is quite serious, Eknar. We came here because we have some questions about the circumstances of his death. We’d like to learn more.”
“What a coincidence. So would I!” he said brightly. “Officer Johns has barely started her work. Learning more, especially when you are at the point that you know nothing, is a good thing. You see, when a man is shot and then his body is dumped somewhere, like your home office, I find myself asking: what the hell is going on?”
“So you are calling it a murder?”
He cocked his head. “Me? Not at all. Officially, I’m waiting breathlessly for the coroner to tell me that. I’m not allowed to speculate. That is above my pay grade. Even though, in my heart I’m convinced he didn’t shoot himself, or then haul his own dead body out into the open area near the racetrack, I can't really say. Without a trace of a weapon, without a serious suspect, and especially without a coroner’s report, the mayor and the business council wouldn’t be happy with me telling the press, or insurance investigators a thing like that. They are hoping against hope there is some explanation other than murder.”
“Why not go with the obvious?” Elle asked.
Terri Johns giggled. “With the casino and racetrack being the big draws for this town, an unsolved murder wouldn’t be good.”
“Exactly. The business owners, one and all, would be more than pleased if we played down the murder word, at least until we have the culprit in custody. They are unhappy enough with reports of a suspicious death near their place of business.”
“Fair enough,” Elle said. “We aren’t talking to the press about anything, much less this.”
“Good. But can you tell me what your concern is? I’m confused what you hope to discover. You insured the man’s life and I can confirm he is, in fact, totally and completely dead. I’m afraid that regardless of what else we learn, that bit isn’t going to change at all.”
“It’s really just a matter of sorting things out,” Elle said. She took out a computer printout. “This is a copy of the policy we have on him. The first thing that concerns us, because the death is suspicious, is to confirm who this beneficiary is. We aren’t just going to stick a check in the mail, even if we had an addr
ess.”
He snapped his fingers. “And I’ll be glad to know who she is as well. It makes me just a wee bit curious where that person was at the time of death as this little payout might give that person a motive for murder.” He looked at the summary. “That’s not an insubstantial amount, either.” He passed the paper over to Terri Johns. “Do you know the lady?” he asked her.
“Carmella Garcia? No, her name hasn’t come up in the investigation yet.”
“A relative?” Eknar asked.
Terri shrugged. “Possibly. So far the only relative I’ve found is a brother, named Paul. Certainly this isn’t his wife’s name. Her name was Angela.”
“Was?” Elle asked.
“She died a while back. A year ago. Of cancer.”
Elle took her tablet out of her purse and went online. Terri wrote down the information from the summary in her notebook. “Angela Ravenwing?” Elle asked her. “Or did she keep her last name?”
Terri nodded. “That’s the name on the death certificate.”
“Well they never took out a policy on her,” Elle said. “And there isn’t another policy in the database on him that listed her as beneficiary, not even one that was canceled.”
“What about other insurance companies?” Terri asked.
“The database is a shared database among all insurance companies,” Elle told her. “It’s pretty comprehensive.”
“Who bought the policy he did have?” Terri asked.
“Mr. Ravenwing did. Quite a few years back.”
“So you need to know if the beneficiary is a suspect?” the chief asked.
“Ideally. If the beneficiary is a suspect we can hold off paying out the money until we know for certain who is the killer. Being the murderer invalidates the policy, but once we pay it out it can be difficult, if not impossible, to reclaim the money.”
The Chief leaned over his desk. “Aha, so you want to be in on the hunt while we discover who the killer is and perhaps save the company a pile of money.” He leaned back. “We paid out once by mistake and... nevermore.”
Elle shook her head. “I can see you are enjoying yourself.”
“The thing is, while I sincerely feel a sadness at the death of this man, there is a certain excitement to the hunt. I have to admit that having a chance to learn about him and what happened, digging into the strangeness of it all, is perhaps the most exciting thing that I’ve been involved in for some time.”
“Other than him being shot and dumped, there are other strange circumstances?”
“A few. The man was a farrier, you see.” They didn’t see. “Not ringing a bell, I see.”
Terri laughed. “That’s the term for a man who is specialist in equine hoof care, including the trimming and balancing of horses' hooves and the placing of shoes on their hooves. Or so I’ve been told numerous times.”
“So he worked at the race track.”
“Once upon a time. But success was his downfall.”
Elle snickered. “That doesn’t sound right.”
“Not his success, unfortunately. He was one of a handful of farriers working at the track. When the economy fell unceremoniously right squarely into the toilet, the track continued to do well. In fact, it’s fortunes improved.”
“That makes no sense,” Charli suggested.
“But it does,” Eknar said. “The sin economy, which entails gambling, smoking, drinking, prostitution, and curiously, chocolate sales, tends to blossom in a faltering economy. Nowadays, I suppose they put marijuana in that list as well.”
Charli saw Terri Johns flinch.
“So what happened?”
“With the gambling economy on the upswing, management decided to upgrade operations at the track. They made a classic executive decision and brought in some blacksmiths from out of State to work full time, replacing the freelance locals. I’m told this was more efficient and cost effective. That made the locals obsolete. According to the few folks we talked to who knew the late Mr. Ravenwing, he had no interest in learning computer programming.”
Charli snorted. “Why would that be an option?”
“The New Mexico State workforce people offer free training to people whose jobs get eliminated.”
“Oh.”
“We don’t know why, but he turned to doing odd jobs, like mucking out stables and that didn’t pay all that well.”
“That’s sad.”
“The profession is all but disappearing,” the Chief said, sounding wistful.
“So our murdered man wouldn’t have had any professional grudges worth killing him for.” Elle sounded sad.
“Not really. If he’d been kicked in the head by a horse, we might think it had something to do with the racetrack, but this way it doesn’t seem likely.”
“I’m still talking to people he worked with,” Officer Johns said. “There’s always the possibility he saw something he shouldn’t have, maybe he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“But there’s been nothing so far,” the Chief said. “I sort of doubt there will be.”
“Any idea of how we can find her?” Elle asked, pointing to the printout she’d brought. “The beneficiary?”
“Ideas, Terri?”
She sighed. “This Carmella Garcia? I’ve no idea who she is, but I agree that we better talk to her. I’ll check it out.”
The Chief laughed. “Tracking down Carmella Garcia, of the New Mexico Garcias.” He laughed.
“That’s funny?” Charli asked.
He nodded. “Around here Garcia is as common as Smith is back east. When she prints out her leads she will have to sort through a lot more than one Carmella Garcia, I can assure you.”
Elle got a determined look. “Well, I need to find this one.”
“We do too,” Terri Johns said. “Let me track her down. If she has a driver’s license...”
“And if she has kept the address current...” the Chief said. “Not meaning to be a wet blanket on your eager pursuit of a possible suspect. You make finding her a priority, Terri. Look up her contact info, and then you can take these ladies with you to chat with Ms. Garcia. They seem to have a bunch of questions to ask and if you are there, hearing the answers could be helpful in the investigation.”
Elle looked at Terri as the policewoman turned to her computer to begin the research. “We’d be delighted to go with you and cooperate,” Elle said.
The woman wrinkled her nose. “Depending on where she lives, you might not be quite as delighted as you think,” she said.
“Why not?” Elle’s quizzical look was almost comical.
“We have varied terrains in this region,” Eknar said. “Some of the locales around here are lovely and some are... call them less hospitable. If she lives in one of those places then having Terri take you in the police SUV would be safer.”
“Safer?” Elle asked.
“If the vehicle breaks down or there is a flash flood, you can be stranded. Our vehicles carry emergency equipment and supplies, as well as radios.”
Somehow, Charli didn’t find the reassurance very reassuring.
“If you leave me a phone number, I’ll call you when I have an address and we can go check it out,” Terri said.
Elle smiled. “Perfect. I’m glad we can work together on this.”
As Elle dug out a business card, Charli sat back, trying to recall if she’d had any dreams about being stranded in a desert. It didn’t sound attractive in the least and fortunately she couldn’t recall any. Of course, the fact that she didn’t dream about a thing didn’t mean it wouldn’t happen.
“I need a shower,” Elle said.
“And then a meal,” Charli said.
So they got a motel room and later went out for dinner..
Chapter Ten
The Money Lender
A cool breeze caressing her face got Charli’s attention. She opened her eyes and found herself standing on a mesa, facing a spectacular view of the valley floor below. Hearing the clink of metal she tur
ned to see a tall, thin man sitting at a wooden table counting large, copper-colored coins. He had stacks of them arranged on a red tablecloth that covered the table. He looked up at Charli with watery eyes. “How much do you need?” he asked.
“Need?” she was puzzled. “I don’t know what you mean.”
He fingered a stack of coins, lifting the top ones and dropping them again so that they made a clinking sound. “Money? How much do you need?”
“I don’t need any money,” she told him.
“Everyone needs money,” the man said. “Absolutely everyone. I know this better than most. I’m a moneylender and in my experience, the decisions are only how much they need and if they can repay it.” He pointed to two men standing near the edge of the mesa. They faced each other with grim expressions. “Those two, for instance. They both need, or at least want more money than they can repay.”
A woman stood to the side watching the men. “Neither of them truly need money,” she said. “Their fight is not about money. It’s about love.”
“I see no love there,” the man with the coins sneered.
The woman put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “You know it is about her. They both wish her love and they use money as tokens in that battle.”
“Who is this woman?” Charli asked.
“She isn’t here, even though they fight over her. She does want money; she is greedy enough for both of them,” the moneylender said.
“Even you think that’s wrong,” the woman said, her tone sharp.
“Nonsense,” he laughed. “Of course I don’t think it’s wrong, bruja. Even if I disapproved of their greed, who am I to condemn it? I facilitate this. And after all, when you examine this world, at what point does desire become greed? It’s natural that the woman has wants and expectations and these men each wish to be the one to fulfill them.”
“Even if they are taking from someone else?” the woman asked.
The moneylender smiled. “There is only so much wealth to be had, bruja. It has to come from somewhere, just as your power comes from somewhere and has a price.”
Charli heard threatening noises now and as she turned to look at the men, they came together in a clinch, each grabbing the other by the throat in an attempt to choke the other. Although they turned and twisted, neither one could gain an advantage. Their movements brought them toward the edge of the cliff, to the sheer drop to the canyon below. Suddenly one lost his footing and fell backward, his body thrust out past the edge. He let go of his opponent and his arms flailed. Rather than let go, the other man clung grimly to his throat as his body sagged down over the edge. He held on, holding them both, balanced precariously, then both men disappeared, toppling off the mesa and out of sight.
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