Rode Hard, Put Away Dead

by Sinclair Browning

“Wow, you mean like you could be out in space and still make the buzzer?” the kid from New York asked.

  “Yup. Of course, you might not score as well as the guy who's with the bull all the way,” J.B. added. “Let's take a break.”

  He walked over to me, recognizing the recess as my opportunity to further grill him.

  “José Covarrubias isn't here, huh?” I asked, trying to keep the irritation out of my voice. After all, I'd driven up here hoping to do at least two interviews.

  “I would have called you, but I didn't know he was leaving until I saw his truck drive out.”

  “Did he know I was coming?”

  “I thought so. I talked to Gloria this morning about it.”

  It seemed unusual that an employee would purposely duck an appointment his employer had made for him. Was there a reason Covarrubias didn't want to talk with me?

  “I forgot to mention that I'd like to take a look at Abby's calendar, or Day Planner, also look through her papers, her desk stuff.”

  “No problem. I'll intercom Gloria and tell her to let you go whole-hog up there.” He nodded in the direction of the main house.

  Finally I got down to what was bothering me at the moment. “J.B., why in the hell are you doing the bull riding school this week?”

  “I know, I know. It doesn't look that good, what with Abby being dead just a short time and all. But, frankly, Trade, I don't know how this whole thing is going to shake out, and I might need the money.”

  If ten thousand dollars was going to make a major difference in his current lifestyle, then J.B. really was in deep caca. My fees could be too.

  “Besides, I had to cancel the school last week, and some of the students had already made their plans.”

  “Like Jodie Austin.”

  He gave me a funny look. “Like Jodie Austin. Memo Flores took a week off from the mines, that guy from New York took a two-week vacation from his ad agency figuring he'd see some of the West.” He pointed to a tall, good-looking young man, the only one who hadn't spoken during the part of J.B.'s lecture that I'd heard. “Paulo Moraes there came all the way from Brazil. People made plans.”

  “And Abby's death interrupted that.” It was hard to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

  “Whatever. Look, Trade, it's done. Maybe I should have called you before I decided to go ahead with it, but I hired you to be my private investigator, not my conscience.”

  Ouch. The cowboy was getting uppity on me.

  15

  AN HOUR LATER I WAS SITTING AT ABBY'S FRENCH PROVINCIAL desk feeling like a voyeur. At least I was rummaging through her papers, and not her cosmetics, for that would have been far too personal.

  I flipped through her Day Planner for the weeks before she died, but I didn't notice anything too jarring. She'd placed the minutiae of her daily life on these pages and written her appointments and engagements down in pencil.

  There were a lot of erasure marks where she'd either eliminated engagements, or preempted them with something else. I'd read somewhere that when Donald and Ivana Trump were married they'd also gone the pencil route since their schedules frequently collided. Ah, the busy rich. I was lucky to write an appointment down on the back of an old feed store receipt.

  I checked the dates of Abby's ill-fated camping trip. She'd marked through the days with a yellow Hi-Liter and in the margin of that week were general directions to the camp site in the Baboquivaris. Interesting that she'd left these notes. Why? In case of an emergency? Seeing them written in her Day Planner meant that anyone who checked it would have known exactly where to find Abby and J.B.

  There was really too much to absorb from her appointment book in one sitting, so I placed it to one side, intending to take it with me.

  Her address book was another matter. I compared some of the names and addresses in it to the names on the list that J.B. had supplied. I knew I couldn't take this one, for it was likely that there would be people Calendar would want to contact about Abby's death.

  I found her personal checkbook in the right-hand desk drawer. It was one of those big, oversized jobs with three checks to the page. I noticed that the signatory on the account was Abigail Van Thiessen. Period. I rummaged through the desk drawers looking for a joint checking account, but found none.

  As I glanced through her check stubs I learned a lot about Abby's charitable giving. While she generously supported the Humane Society, the Christian Children's Fund, the Sierra Club, the Nature Conservancy and the Girls Clubs of America, her largest contributions went to the Church of Brotherly Love. I knew whose church that was. One Lateef Wise, formerly Bobby Bangs of the San Francisco 49ers. The Reverend Wise had managed to garner almost fifteen thousand dollars from Abby since March. That averaged out to about five thousand dollars a month. Not a bad tithe, not bad at all.

  Noticeably absent from the check register were any checks written to J.B. Calendar. Yet Gloria Covarrubias had mentioned that Abby and her husband had fought about money in the early months of their marriage. J.B. had to have money. Where was it coming from? Was there a separate joint account somewhere or a personal account for J.B.? I jotted a note on my pad to check it out.

  If Abby kept any correspondence, either written by her or received from others, it was not in her desk. Other than the address book, Day Planner and checkbook register, there wasn't much to pique my curiosity here.

  There was a picture of Abby and Peter in a silver frame. I studied it for a minute or two. I might need a picture of Abby, I thought as I flipped it over, pushed aside the clamps and took it out of the frame and slipped it into my pocket. Fortunately, underneath was one of those “pretend” pictures so I positioned this one face out. To a casual observer, it wouldn't appear that a picture had been taken. Of course I could just have easily told Peter or J.B. what I'd done, but at this point I didn't know who the players were so I decided to keep the photo theft a secret.

  A large telephone that showed three different telephone lines sat on one corner of the desk. I jotted down the numbers and then turned to the side console where there was another phone, this one in pink to match the burgundy and blush room decor. An answering machine connected to it sat quietly on the desk. There were no blinking lights. I wondered about the significance of the single phone. Was this Abby's personal line? And why would she need a separate line if she had three others?

  I debated for a minute and then punched the message button on the answering machine. There were two old telephone messages on the tape. One from her brother, Peter, and the other from someone named Clarice who left a telephone number for a man named Hornisher and suggested that Abby call him about collagen implants. It didn't sound like she knew the guy she was recommending. I jotted both names down on my pad, bundled up the Day Planner and quietly made my way out.

  The revelation I'd been hoping for wasn't there so there was really nothing left for me to do but to get down to some serious detective work.

  I was in my office trying to figure out my attack plan on the list of names that J.B. had given me when Charley Bell drove up. My ordering a computer still didn't seem like such a hot idea. But there was no stopping Charley. I watched him struggle with a huge carton, feverishly wishing that I could recall my order. At this juncture, that was impossible, so I did the next best thing. I walked out and helped him bring in the equipment.

  A half hour later my office was a wreck. There were boxes and cables strewn everywhere with Charley happily in the middle of it.

  “You're gonna love this, Ellis,” he said.

  I doubted it, but said nothing.

  “Say, did you hear about the chicken and the egg in bed?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  “The chicken's lying there smoking a cigarette with a big smile on his face. The egg, on the other hand, is frowning and looking put out. Finally the egg mutters to no one in particular, ‘Well, I guess we answered that question!’”

  I laughed and began stuffing bubble wrap back in the cardboard boxes.


  When Charley finally had everything set up, we agreed on placing the new computer on a long conference table that I used when I spread out paperwork. After wrestling everything up there, Charley then turned the equipment on.

  “This is your power button,” he explained.

  Encouraged that I at least understood that part, I sat through his patient instructions, all the while knowing I would be hopelessly lost once he left the Vaca Grande.

  “This is your cursor,” he said, demonstrating a little schizophrenic gizmo that alternated between being a line and being an arrow. “Your friend.”

  Anything called a cursor was sure to be okay in my book.

  We concentrated on the word processing program, since that was the one that I would be using for my reports to clients. After showing me the wonders of the computer, including something called cut and paste, Charley had me sit at the keyboard. I was amazed at how light the keys felt compared to my old typewriter. Leaning over my shoulder he'd alternate between the delete and backspace keys to clean up my mistakes.

  While it was fun, I had to admit that I was frustrated every time a typo popped up. Why couldn't my white-out work with this stupid machine?

  Finally Charley moved the funny-looking line thing and shut down the program. The next thing that popped up on the screen was a deck of cards.

  “Solitaire. I want you to play a lot of Solitaire.”

  “Charley, I don't have time to be playing games.”

  “It's not a game, Ellis. Think of it as a tutorial.”

  “A game of Solitaire is going to tutor me? I don't think so.”

  “Absolutely. This is one of the best ways to get familiar with your keyboard.”

  Although I offered to help Charley clean up the mess, he insisted that I continue playing Solitaire. On my sixth game I finally won and was rewarded with a house of cards doing a roller-coaster act across my screen.

  “I won! I won!” I screamed, genuinely pleased that my first effort with my new computer had been so successful. As I turned to gloat, I was stunned to see Charley with the IBM Selectric cradled in his arms.

  “Wait, what are you doing with that?”

  “Gotta go, Ellis. You'll never learn as long as you have this dinosaur around.”

  “But, but, it's not a dinosaur, it's my typewriter.”

  “Righto,” he said as he walked out the door with the machine.

  I was not a particularly happy camper by the time I left my stage stop office and drove home. I'd spent a couple of hours on the new computer and had a single paragraph to show for it, and that production was rife with typos.

  The good news was I was met by my fan club—Mrs. Fierce, Blue and Petunia the potbellied pig, They greeted me warmly and we all went to the corral to feed Dream and Gray, with a stop for the dogs to take a dip in the pond to cool off. Petunia, whose previous experience with swimming had not gone well, decided to forgo the afternoon dip.

  Although it was well after six o'clock, it was still hot. The thermometer at the barn read 97 and it looked like it was going to be another hot, dry night. The horses, the very same ones who in winter would come racing up with their long tails flipped over their backs, now walked in, plodding one foot after the other, stubbing their feet in the dust.

  We'd fed the last of the loose hay, so I grabbed the survival knife from the hook and sliced easily through the three lines of baling twine. Although the barn floor had just been cleaned, it was starting to get littered with fallen alfalfa once again.

  I had just finished feeding when Quinta walked up.

  “Hey kiddo, what's up?”

  She gave me the Ortiz megawatt smile. “I just wanted to report in on my tata.” She'd given her grandfather this affectionate Mexican nickname shortly after her arrival.

  “Is he all right?” I hadn't seen Juan in a few days, but as far as I knew he'd been healthy.

  “Oh, sure. We went dancing last night. He was great!”

  I smiled at the image of Juan Ortiz, well into his eighties and very hard of hearing, dancing. His granddaughter was definitely breathing new life into him.

  “Where'd you go?”

  “The Riata, where else?” Quinta, who did not drink, got all of her soda pop for free from her employer. Juan, who liked his cerveza, would not have fared as well. “Guess who was there? Alberto.”

  “Alberto?” I was surprised. When I'd seen Martín yesterday he'd told me that Jake Hatcher was dropping Cori Elena off to spend time with her father. Why would he leave Oracle and come to La Cienega without his daughter?

  “My mother wasn't with him,” Quinta said, with a touch of disgust in her voice, which told me that she'd heard of her mother's overnight plans. “Surprise.”

  Shit. Cori Elena had probably had a sleep-over with the brand inspector.

  “Does Martín know?”

  “I'm not getting in the middle of that one. Neither is Grandpa.”

  As I walked back to the house, I found the idea of strangling Cori Elena very appealing.

  16

  I'D BEEN SITTING ALONE IN JIM CARSTENSEN'S OFFICE FOR AT least fifteen minutes. Like most professional inner sanctums, there was nothing to read, unless I was interested in the Arizona Revised Statutes or old copies of the State Bar Journal.

  When Carstensen finally came in, he got right down to business.

  “Mr. Calendar has suggested that I cooperate with you. You're following the money, I presume.” He looked at me over the little half glasses that perched on his bulbous nose.

  “That's certainly one of the things I'm looking at.”

  “Well there was a pile of it. It will take the tax attorneys years to get this all sorted out.”

  “That complicated, huh?”

  He nodded.

  “Primary beneficiary?”

  “Not that easy.” He held up a hand and thumbed through some papers in a manila folder. Finally finding the one he wanted, he withdrew it and handed it to me. “I had my secretary prepare this for you, because I thought it might be helpful.”

  Indeed it was. The sheet in front of me listed Abby's beneficiaries. While I would study it in depth later, a quick glance told me that J.B. Calendar stood to inherit $60 million. With that kind of money, he'd never have to sponsor a bull riding school again if he didn't want to.

  Another $60 million was bequeathed to something called the Happy Clown Foundation with Abby's brother, Peter, as the executive director.

  “What's this clown thing?”

  Carstensen looked up from cleaning his glasses. “It's a charitable foundation established by Abby and Peter through their New York attorneys a few years ago. As you probably already know, both of the Van Thiessens are childless. Both are, were in Abigail's case, extremely wealthy.” He held his glasses up to the light of the window and examined them. “So they formed the foundation with each bequeathing $60 million at the time of their deaths.”

  “And Peter's the executive director?”

  “In name, and I suppose in principle. They have a New York staff that actually runs the organization.”

  “Theoretically, could Peter have access to foundation funds?”

  Carstensen replaced his glasses on his nose. “While the foundation is outside my area of legal expertise, I don't believe so. It was not the intent of either Van Thiessen to leave a large sum of money to the surviving sibling. They were in agreement on that. There were, of course, some personal items that each stipulated the other should have.”

  Interesting. Abby's brother would not get a penny from Abby's estate.

  “You are aware, I suppose, that Peter Van Thiessen is an extremely wealthy man in his own right?”

  I nodded and returned to the list that Carstensen had given me.

  Lateef Wise was a bit lower on the food chain, but still a heavy hitter, batting in with an escalated deal that could eventually garner him a cool $5 million. After the top three contenders, the amounts tapered off significantly with bequests to many of the same
charities I'd seen in Abby's checkbook register.

  Her bequests to her employees only covered the Covarrubiases and Laurette Le Blanc and weren't overly generous. She'd left nothing to her hairdressers, manicurist, personal trainer, accountant, maids, gardeners and the crew of people I knew had to be on the periphery of her life. Apparently she was big on giving money to organizations, not individuals.

  I noticed she'd left José Covarrubias $17,000 and Gloria $41,000.

  “Why the disparate amounts to the Covarrubiases?” I asked.

  Carstensen consulted a sheet in front of him that I assumed was a duplicate of the one I was holding. He tapped a finger beside his nose as though he was lost in thought. “You know, I don't recall her saying why she wanted it done that way.”

  “But normally you'd lump them together, wouldn't you? I mean you'd have $58,000 to Gloria and José Covarrubias.” What was Abby's logic in doing the bequest to the couple separately? Was there trouble between the Covarrubiases? Is that why she had given them each a specific amount rather than designate a lump sum for the two of them? And, if that was the case, could it possibly have anything to do with her death?

  “Well I would have if Abigail had wanted it done that way. Obviously she didn't, preferring to give Mrs. Covarrubias more money. She must have had a reason, but I just can't recall what it was offhand.”

  Although I thought I knew the answer, I asked anyway, “Those funds would be separate property then, wouldn't they?”

  “Each gift would retain its separate character until the party involved commingled them in a joint account. At that time, the commingled funds would then become community property.”

  “And if the other partner chose not to commingle?”

  “Then his or her property would remain separate.”

  I glanced at the list again.

  “I understand that Laurette Le Blanc was Abby's personal assistant. I'm surprised she only left her $5,000.”

  “Ms. LeBlanc has only been with Abigail since December,” Carstensen said.

  I did some quick mental math. Interesting. Laurette Le Blanc had been hired shortly before Abby and J.B. had married. Could there be a connection? And did that have anything to do with Laurette's returning to the Caribbean?