by Ann Myers
Bunny leaned against the washing machine. “No one’s home next door at the brother’s house. Nothing seems amiss here, just unlocked doors, which is odd because I know these were locked when we left last time. Whoever was in here must have had a key or be an excellent lock picker.”
“If someone was here,” Manny said. “Rita has an active imagination.”
I rubbed my forehead, tired of this line, which had been Manny’s favorite during our divorce. According to him, his extramarital pursuits were figments of my imagination, except that some of those imaginary women had confirmed the truth. A slurry of white face paint came off on my palm. I was a mess. He was right about that.
“I don’t understand,” I said, turning my smeared face to Bunny. “Someone was in here. I looked right at him. He saw me in the mirror and ran off. I chased him up the creek.”
“Not a good idea, Rita,” Bunny said, shaking her head.
Manny snorted. “You can say that again. Rita has a lot of bad ideas.”
Yeah, like marrying you.
Bunny continued, her seriousness a sharp contrast to Manny’s childish sniping. “Someone was here. We found fresh footprints outside and this jacket.” She held up a padded camouflage coat with ragged cuffs and POW/MIA patches down one sleeve. A skull with flames was embroidered on the back. “Recognize this? Is it Victor’s?”
“That is not Victor’s,” I said, thankful for some evidence of an intruder’s presence. I described where I’d seen the hulk and tried to recall his features. “Small eyes,” I said. “And frizzy hair, going all over the place. Some gray.”
Manny’s phone rang, and he went outside to take the call, to my relief.
Bunny scribbled in her notebook. “We need to clear this matter up,” she said. “This break-in is suspicious. You have to know, though, Rita, it doesn’t prove anything.”
Blood pounded from my sore ankle straight to my confused brain. “Doesn’t prove anything about what?”
Bunny cocked her head. I interpreted this, and her thin smile, as an attempt to look sympathetic. “We’re waiting for word from the medical examiner. There’s still the possibility that your friend took his own life.”
“But the break-in—”
“Could be pure coincidence. We get a lot of burglaries in this part of town. It’s a thief’s dreamland. Big walls, big-time art collections, absent owners, and it’s no secret that this place is deserted.”
Deserted. The word tugged at my heart. It sounded like Victor had simply walked away. Had he? Had he left this world on purpose? I refused to believe it. I bundled my coat around me, feeling clammy wetness instead of the warmth I craved. What’s worse, I could almost buy Bunny’s explanation about the coincidence of the intruder. Victor was gone and decay in the form of dirty cars and filthy thieves was taking over.
“We’ll know more soon,” Bunny said. “Probably by Monday the coroner will give us her report.” She inspected the wall of saints behind the dryer. “You’d be surprised how easy people make it for thieves to break in. They give out keys to workmen and casual friends. They leave keys under flowerpots or under the doormat or those ridiculous fake rocks.”
Her words reminded me of what Jay-Jay had told Broomer. According to her, Victor hid keys in obvious spots. “You have to see this,” I told Bunny, unwrapping my coat to get to my phone. The phone, as usual, took its time waking up. As it did, I rushed through explanations of the Jay-Jay and Broomer sightings.
“Here,” I said, when the photos finally appeared. “Look at this.” I hadn’t exactly expected an “aha” moment from Bunny, and I didn’t get one.
She frowned at the shots. Her silence eventually ended in a perfectly reasonable, “This doesn’t prove anything.”
I explained again what we’d overheard from the party. “Victor’s ex-wife was telling Broomer to find Victor’s key. She wanted something in this house. She said the same thing you did, that Victor was silly about leaving spare keys in obvious places.”
Bunny seemed overly hung up on a detail. “So you said you were in some Texan lady’s pantry when you overheard this?” To her credit, she wasn’t Manny. She didn’t call me a fool or disparage my judgment or sleuthing. She did, however, look unimpressed. “We’ll look into it,” she said, in the rote way that I warn customers about hot burrito platters.
“You should have heard them,” I protested. “They’re up to something.”
Bunny gave me the head-tilting sympathy look again. “Go home, Rita. Put your ankle up.”
I felt my cheeks fire up, this time in anger. “I’m not going to sit around with my feet up eating bonbons when my friend’s been murdered.”
For one of the first times ever, I earned a genuine smile from Bunny. She nodded toward my ankle. “I meant, elevate that sprain. Put some ice on it too. Rest, ice, compression, elevation: RICE. I’ll call you in the morning.”
“To check on my ankle?”
“To get you in to look at mug shots. Your intruder might already be on our radar.”
I shuffled home, thinking about Bunny’s departing words. Stay out of it, Rita, she’d said. She must have known that I couldn’t do that.
Chapter 21
Rise and shine, Rita. The dead will be here at midnight!” Flori, a morning person, sounded extra perky this morning.
My eyelids felt heavy and my head fuzzy from the sleep-inducing pain pill I’d popped less than six hours earlier. I considered smothering the cell phone under my pillow.
“You there?” Flori demanded on the other end. “Wake up! You’re like your daughter, sleeping the day away.”
I wrenched an eyelid open and squinted at my digital alarm clock. In too-bright, too-red numbers it announced the time as 6:56. My mother had taught me to never call before nine. The only exception was an emergency like the call recipient’s house actively burning down, in which case Mom would probably still start the conversation with “Sorry to bother you so early, but . . .” Flori considers any time after 6:00 A.M. fair game. When I’d told her—jokingly yet pointedly—about Mom’s 9:00 A.M. rule, she laughed and said that my mother worried as much as Linda. That was probably true.
“Didn’t Bill Hoffman tell you about my late-night run-in with a burglar at Victor’s?” I asked. I immediately felt guilty for sounding grumpy. Today was Halloween, which meant that the Day of the Dead and Flori’s pan de muerto baking contest were tomorrow. In other words, this was like the day before Christmas for Flori.
The silence on the other end of the line heightened my guilt, as did Flori’s next statement. “Sugar! Bill Hoffman got himself admitted to the hospital last night, the old fool. Of all the nights to abandon his scanner! Are you okay?”
I assured her that I was fine, except for feeling terrible about poor Bill.
“Oh, he’s fine and dandy. His diverticulitis was flaring up again, that’s all. We all tell him that he can’t eat Indian takeout. He won’t listen to anyone and can’t resist chicken korma. Stubborn, that’s what he is.”
Flori was also stubborn, refusing my offers to come in and help her with her busy day and bread preparations.
“You stay in bed and recover,” she commanded. “And since you’re lying around, you can give me all the details. Tell me all about this intruder.”
I gave her all the details that I could remember.
“Hold on,” she said, midway through my description of his face. “What color were his eyes? I’m writing this down so I can ask around.”
I described his eyes as dark and squinty, his height as tall and looming. In my memory, he seemed more of a cartoon villain than a real person. I admitted to Flori that I might not recognize his photo in Bunny’s book of mug shots.
Flori offered comforting assertions that I’d do fine. I suspected that she couldn’t truly understand my concern. She can remember what she wore on
her first day of kindergarten or what flavor pie she served to the then-mayor on a Thursday in 1971. I, on the other hand, am surely one of the world’s worst witnesses. I’d stared right at the intruder and all I could remember were forms and feelings. “He was big,” I said again, for lack of concrete details. “And scary.”
“And suspicious,” Flori added. I heard tapping on her side of the line. “This could move suspect number three up to first place in our list.”
“Unknown intruder?” I asked, not trusting my memory of Flori’s list.
“Exactly. Maybe he was looking to rob Victor and got scared off when Celia and Manny’s Jeep girl arrived.”
I shuddered, wracked with the sudden desire to hold Celia close. She was safer with Flori, I told myself. Safer away from the casita and the unknown prowler. I thanked Flori again for including Celia on her weekend activities.
“My pleasure. Bernard’s going to get her and Rosa up soon for blueberry pancakes. Then we’ll all be off to the Folk Art Museum. I’m betting we make big money this year, thanks to Celia’s artistic talents.”
In the background, Bernard’s jolly rumble of a laugh was followed by a chant of “Big money.”
“Okay,” I said. “But if you need me . . .”
“Nope. I’ll mix up my dough this afternoon and let it rest overnight. I don’t need any help. I’m no cheater, like some people. You rest up. That’s an order from your boss.”
Normally I’d love a morning completely to myself with nothing to do except lie in bed. That’s one of my favorite things about my new single life. On weekends I can read late into the night, unbothered and knowing that I can sleep in. Now I felt more rudderless than free. Besides, I sure could have used some blueberry pancakes.
I limped out to the kitchen and settled for old granola and aspirin, washed down with the strongest coffee I could make without Gloria Hendrix’s Italian sports car of an espresso machine. Coffee made the day look better, as did wrapping my ankle in a stretchy compression wrap from Celia’s closet of sports clutter. Outside, the bright sun and glittering frost of a late fall morning beckoned. I decided that I wouldn’t sit around. I’d get out, enjoy some sun, and stretch my stiff ankle. I bundled up and swung the door open.
To my surprise, another car was parked in the driveway and it looked familiar. I walked up the driveway to check. Its owner was familiar too. However, when I called out Linda’s name, she ducked behind a nearby conifer.
“Linda?” I called again. “Are you okay?”
She peeked out from behind the tree, her face red. “This is not what you think, Rita,” she snapped.
I hadn’t been thinking anything except to wonder why she was hiding from me and what was in the picnic basket looped over her arm. Did she have something in there she didn’t want to share? Now, however, my wondering took a different track. Linda, here at her old flame Gabriel’s house, ducking behind an evergreen in the early hours of the morning. I rushed to assure her that I fully supported any romantic evening she may or may not have had.
“Good for you!” I concluded perkily, to which Linda’s mouth twisted in frustration.
“No! You’ve been hanging around my mother too much! Gabriel came over to my house last night to talk and it was too dark for him to walk home. You know what a danger the roads are this time of year with all the Halloween craziness and drunk drivers. I insisted that he stay on my pull-out bed, which he did. The perfect gentleman. I merely drove him back this morning because it’s so chilly out.”
Throughout this rambling explanation, I’d been nodding vigorously. “Yes, of course,” I said. “The roads are way too dangerous for pedestrians after dark. Especially this weekend and out here where there aren’t any sidewalks.”
Linda seemed mollified by my affirmation of her worries. She held out the basket. “I brought you these tamales. Green chile and cheese. I didn’t want to knock since it’s so early. I was thinking of leaving them on the door. Then I worried, what if a coyote or raccoon got to them first?”
Or a lurking prowler. Now I knew why Gabe hadn’t been home last night. I’d have to warn him to get new locks or put bolts over Victor’s laundry room door. I told Linda about my evening as we walked back to the casita.
“You chased the burglar? Rita, that’s dangerous. What if you’d caught up with him? Do you know how many people carry guns nowadays? What if he’d turned on you or you’d fallen in the creek after hurting your ankle? You can drown in an inch of water, you know.” She shuddered, thinking about the dire possibilities.
I’d thought some of the same things as I hobbled across the creek last night. Now, however, Linda’s worries made me almost proud of my bravery/foolishness.
“I need to find out who he is,” I told her. “He knows where Celia and I live.”
Linda, the mother of a daughter and a son, understood this worry. “So what are you going to do?” she asked.
“Right now? Eat some of your wonderful cheese and green chile tamales,” I said. “Will you come in and have some with me? I could use some company and more coffee.”
She hesitated on my doorstep. “Okay,” she said after a moment. “But only if you let me come with you afterward.”
“Come with me?” I was trying to play innocent. It wouldn’t fly with a daughter of Flori’s. Linda was too used to her mother’s guises and exploits.
“You’ve definitely been around Mama too long,” Linda said. “I know you’re going back in that forest to look for clues and I’m not letting you go alone.”
Emboldened by two more cups of coffee and a particularly fiery jalapeño in Linda’s delectable tamales, I tugged a rubber boot over my shoe and puffy, wrapped ankle. Linda managed to squeeze into some of Celia’s old waterproof snow boots.
“You should go to a doctor,” she chastised. “An ankle and foot specialist.” She’d said this several times already.
“It’s okay. Just a little sprain. Exercise is good. I’m sure of it.” I wasn’t actually sure of this. In fact, I suspected that the exercise I had in mind—namely, fording the stream and tromping through the forest—was the last thing my abused ankle wanted. I’d rest it later, I vowed. Or become an aspirin addict.
Fully booted up, we set out down the back garden. Linda paused to look around. “I haven’t been back here in decades. It used to be so plain. No rocks or art or anything. This is lovely.”
“This is what Broomer wants to destroy,” I said, raising my voice, hoping he was over there in his hot tub and could hear me. “It would be a sin to destroy something so lovely.”
Linda agreed more quietly. “I feel something here. A spirit.” She looked around some more. “Maybe it’s Victor.”
If Victor’s spirit was here, I hoped all the more that Gabe could fend off his pushy neighbor. Linda and I followed a path made of mosaic bits of tile before going overland to the creek.
“Here,” I said, pointing to the sandy mud. “Look at these footprints. These are mine and the big ones are the giant’s.”
Linda shuddered. “Why would he come this way? Why not take the road out front?”
I had a theory about that, but I wanted to get across the stream first.
“Are you okay?” Linda asked repeatedly. She had her purse swung around her chest and my arm in a vise grip for the entire crossing.
“I’m okay,” I kept assuring her. Except for my arm. When we reached the other bank, I resisted the urge to rub away the pain where she’d squeezed. Instead, I pushed through some willows to show her my theory.
“I think he got onto the trail on this side of the creek. I didn’t reach it last night, but look, it’s right here.” We emerged from the brush in a patch of forest. The trees here drank from the stream and grew tall. A path wove through them, leading to a small field of waving grasses and gnarled apple trees. I knew that if we followed this route farther up the gentle va
lley, we’d connect with the bird sanctuary and a web of hiking trails. If we climbed uphill and out of the floodplain, we’d find houses and a road leading back into town.
Linda pointed to steep stone steps camouflaged by lichens and wild grasses. The steps ended at a terraced patio and a coyote fence beyond. “When I was a kid, I knew a girl who lived in that house,” she said. “I thought we were so far out in the country. We used to ride horses up there on Cerro Gordo Road. It’s still a dirt road like I remember, but the neighborhood feels different now. Fancier.”
I tried to make out the home of Linda’s childhood friend. Trees and the fence hid all but a few patches of tan adobe. I guessed the house was almost directly north of my casita. My feeling of being lost in a deep dark forest last night had been unfounded. I probably could have yelled and someone would have come to help me.
“Maybe he parked in the lot for the bird sanctuary and hiking trails,” I postulated, turning in a circle to take in the thief’s numerous escape options. “Then he could have driven down Cerro Gordo and wouldn’t have crossed paths with the police coming up Upper Canyon Road.”
“In any case, he’ll be long gone,” Linda said, sounding relieved.
She was right. A burglar wouldn’t hang around, waiting for a decent hour to call on his next victim. The trail gave up no clues. It was well-trodden and the few fresh footsteps in the frosty leaves could have been those of an early-morning dog walker.
“Good, then,” Linda said briskly. “No one’s out here. We can go back and you can rest and put that foot up.”
It wasn’t a bad idea. Yet I lingered as Linda turned back toward the creek. “I’ll be with you in a moment,” I called to her. Wandering down the path into the forest, I came to an area blocked by a fallen tree. Gingerly, I stepped through its dry branches and over its trunk. Here I was, picking the most difficult route again. And for what purpose? To injure my other ankle? To try to affirm why I’d felt so scared last night? I looked around, seeing nothing but a tangle of braches, wild and unkempt. Except, I realized with a start, it wasn’t all a natural mess. My heartbeat picked up as I tiptoed toward a tepee-shaped mass of branches.
