Rode Hard, Put Away Dead

by Sinclair Browning

  After leaving Jim Carstensen's office I headed east on Broadway and then turned south on Park, past the interior design type stores Rustica, Aquí Está and the Magellan Trading Company. Finally I hung a U-turn and parked in front of Tooley's Café, “home of the outrageously delicious turkey taco.”

  While I hadn't been to Tooley's for some time, nothing had changed: the glass windows, the colorful yellow walls with turtles, coyotes and snakes painted on them, and the low, midget-sized wooden counter were still there.

  I wrestled with the menu for a few minutes. While the Tooley's mole is legendary, I prefer my chocolate straight so I wasn't even tempted. I actually considered ordering the Killer Mailman Burrito; the same one that the menu swears killed the Park Avenue mailman. Finally common sense, and the heat, overruled me and I opted instead for a taco salad with grilled turkey.

  As I waited I reread an old framed ad that swore,

  “More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.”

  My food finally came on an old chipped plate that looked like it came from the Value Village thrift store. Appropriately, it was accompanied by dull, mismatched silverware.

  As I ate, I pulled out the list of names that J.B. had given me and went over it. I decided to drop in on Rabbit Carter, Abby's personal trainer, since the address was close by. According to my list, she or he—for J.B. hadn't given me Rabbit's gender—lived in an apartment near the University of Arizona.

  Fifteen minutes later I was wilting outside 15B waiting for someone to open the door. After knocking several times, I finally gave it up. As I was walking down the stairs, a tall, shaved-head kid leaned over the railing from above.

  “Hey! You looking for Rabbit?”

  “Yeah, do you know where I can find him?” I made a wild guess, figuring I had a 50 percent chance of getting it right.

  “Her, Rabbit's definitely a her,” he said with a grin.

  Well, at least we had that settled.

  “You don't know when she'll be home, do you?”

  He looked at his watch. “She should be at the Bear Canyon Gardens. She works there afternoons.”

  “Do you have any idea where that is?”

  He shrugged. “You might try the phone book.”

  As I walked across the parking lot, I saw two kids frying eggs on the asphalt. This sounds like a story, I know, but it really is that hot in Tucson in June. You don't need a skillet. Just throw those puppies on the pavement and presto! Fried eggs. And perfectly edible as long as you're not too fussy.

  Digging in my toolbox, I fished out the Tucson telephone book and then dove back into the air-conditioned comfort of my truck to look for the Bear Canyon Gardens. The telephone number was listed, but the address just read Tucson, which wasn't too helpful.

  It didn't take me long to find a pay phone, for the university area is loaded with them. As I stepped back out into the grueling heat, I thought, not for the first time, about the wisdom of getting a cell phone. Since I had just spent $1,051 on a new computer, another new toy—make that tool—was probably not in my immediate future.

  “Bear Canyon Gardens, this is Lisa, how may I help you?”

  When I asked for a street address, there was a long pause. Finally Lisa asked, “May I ask what this is regarding?”

  “I have business with one of your employees.”

  “And who would that be?” She asked in a still pleasant voice.

  I hesitated. It really was none of her business, but on the other hand, I needed to have the address before I could drop in on Rabbit Carter. I gave her Rabbit's name.

  “She's in the pool right now,” she said. “May I have her return your call?”

  Sounded to me like Rabbit had a pretty cushy job if she was allowed in a swimming pool during the course of her workday. “I'm sorry, but I'm only in town for a short time,” I said. It wasn't such a big lie, since I was planning on returning to the Vaca Grande later this afternoon, and after all, that was at least thirty minutes outside Tucson. “And I'll be in my car. I don't have a cell phone. It's really important that I meet with Rabbit.”

  Lisa was pretty good at hesitating and she did so again before finally relenting. “Well, okay, this is fairly irregular, but since you know her …” She paused and I didn't correct her assumption that since I was asking to see Rabbit that I automatically knew her. With that she finally gave me the directions to Bear Canyon Gardens.

  Driving across Tucson in the middle of the afternoon in June is a fairly bloodless task. Although our traffic used to thin out considerably in the summer, this is no longer the case. As more and more retirees come to call the Tucson area their permanent home, our traffic has increased substantially. Frankly our last good traffic year was 1994, and we didn't even recognize that until the hordes hit the following year.

  Thirty-five minutes later I found myself looking for the address off Bear Canyon Road. I found the numbers Lisa had given me etched in a couple of granite boulders. As I turned onto the long, graveled driveway, I discovered why the Bear Canyon Gardens address was not listed in the Tucson telephone directory.

  ATTENTION NUDIST COLONY AHEAD

  I was driving through a thick mesquite bosque. While southern Arizona is not known for its good cover, a mesquite forest was as good a natural landscaping as one could hope for. A few hundred yards later I was again cautioned:

  ATTENTION BEYOND THIS POINT YOU MAY ENCOUNTER NUDE GUESTS

  And finally, before I reached the main parking lot:

  BEAR CANYON AU NATUREL GARDENS

  I parked under the shade of a huge mesquite and hit the electric buttons on the windows so the air could come in, ventilate and hopefully cool Priscilla's cab.

  As I walked up to the lobby, the thought occurred to me that not only had I never been to a nudist colony before, but I also had no idea of what the etiquette was. Inside, would I really find naked people? If so, would I be able to divert my eyes from the obvious lower realms? And, even more importantly, would they expect me to take off my own clothes?

  17

  THE LOBBY WAS A COOL SANCTUARY WITH HUGE TINTED windows overlooking a manicured Tiff Green lawn. Overhead wooden ceiling fans, natural rattan chairs and sofas, and oversized palm trees in thick terra-cotta pots contributed to the overall feeling of peace and tranquillity.

  Whatever fears I'd had about opening the lobby door and being met by a band of naked hedonists were quickly laid to rest. A beautiful black woman, not more than twenty-five, was talking on the telephone behind the front desk. While I couldn't see below her waistline, her top half was clad in what appeared to be a loose white cotton dress.

  She nodded to me and held up a finger indicating that she would be with me in a minute. A plastic sign on her desk confirmed that Bear Canyon Gardens was affiliated with the American Association for Nude Recreation.

  She was quoting membership rates to the caller on the other end of the line as I strolled over to a display of local brochures touting the Pima Air Museum, Colossal Cave, Nogales and the Arizona Desert Museum. I picked up a pamphlet for the Shangri-La Nudist Colony in New River, Arizona. This one touted an equestrian trail and I found myself wondering if nude riders wore spurs.

  I was pretending to study a leaflet from Old Tucson, a movie set west of town, when a voice interrupted me.

  “May I help you?”

  I turned to find the receptionist standing behind me and was relieved to see that in fact she was wearing a dress and it did indeed go below her waist.

  “Hi, Lisa.” A quick glance at her name tag verified what I already suspected. “I called for Rabbit Carter.”

  “Oh, right,” she said. After consulting her watch she continued, “She's still in the pool.”

  “Oh Lord, I really need to talk to her,” I said. “It's about a death in the family.” While I doubted that Rabbit was related to Abigail Van Thiessen, she had worked for her so this didn't seem to be too much of a stretch. I neglected to mention that Abby had been dead a week and that Rabbit pr
obably was already aware of that fact.

  Lisa's cheery face fell. “I'm so sorry. Oh, that's terrible. I mean, she doesn't know, right?”

  “Well, I really need to talk to her.”

  Lisa consulted her watch again. “She should be out in about seven minutes. The intercom's broken down there so I can't call her.” She thought for a minute. “Maybe it's better if you go on down to the pool and wait until she's done with her class.”

  She walked over to a set of French doors and pointed down a shaded garden path. “You go out these doors and after that big mesquite tree you'll come to a fork in the path, you'll go left, it's marked, and then follow that down to the pool. You can't miss it.”

  “That will be all right?” I looked down at my clothes. “I mean, I'm okay like this?”

  Lisa looked at me and chuckled. “We have a dressing room, if you'd prefer going au naturel, but it really isn't required, unless you're planning on going in the pool or the spa.”

  “Oh no,” I said, perhaps too quickly.

  She smiled. “We have a lot of textiled visitors, delivery and service people, and then, of course, there are our visitors' guests.”

  “Great,” I said, feeling only a tiny bit disappointed in missing a great opportunity to skip and go naked.

  As I walked out the French doors, another thought occurred to me. I turned back and asked Lisa, “Will your guests mind, I mean …”

  “You'll be the fish out of water,” she told me.

  I did as she directed and headed back out into the miserable heat. Turning off at the left fork, I followed the path to the swimming pool.

  Lisa had sure been right about the fish-out-of-water thing. Once I opened the heavy wrought iron gate I discovered that I was the only one wearing any semblance of clothing. The jazzy strains of Olivia Newton-John's

  “Let's Get Physical” blared out of the patio speakers as a group at the far end of the pool bobbed up and down in the water in time to the music.

  A foursome, two men and two women, sat under an umbrella table near the deep end, playing cards. Their upper torsos were nude, and it didn't take Superman's X-ray vision to see that the game was honest. Not only was there was no place to hide a card, but they'd all be in big trouble if they dropped a cup of hot coffee on their laps.

  While one of the male card players looked up and nodded as I walked by, it was apparent that I was more interested in them than they were in me.

  I was walking close to the edge of the deep end when an overweight young man did a swan dive off the diving board, collecting himself just in time to shield his private parts from slapping the water. While it was an interesting variation on the popular dive, he still left a very small splash as his feet entered the pool.

  I couldn't say the same for the group in the shallow end. Their dancing to Olivia had a churning effect on the pool water and small waves lapped the sides of the tile.

  A tall young Nordic goddess was next to the steps, leading the group in their water aerobics. I did a few leaps in logic and figured her to be Rabbit Carter. As she performed her jumping jacks in the pool, her firm bare breasts tried to bounce in time to the music, but nothing jiggled. While they may have been willing, the enhancements she'd obviously had prevented any real movement of her boobs.

  The shaded ramada looked inviting, but there was an elderly couple already there. He was bald, smoking a stogie and reading the Wall Street Journal. The woman, who I presumed was his wife, had her chair nestled next to his. The clacking of her knitting needles seemed oddly in tune with the music. Sweet little domestic scene, but for the fact that they were both naked as jaybirds.

  I avoided looking at them and instead studied the Coke machine.

  “Fifty cents,” the Journal reader said. “Takes fifty cents and then sometimes you have to hit the side with your fist.”

  “Oh, I'm just looking.”

  He stood up. “Here, I'll help you with it.”

  “No!” I insisted. “I don't want a soda.” Actually I did, but I sure didn't need a naked man pounding on the side of the machine to get it for me.

  “Well, okay,” he said, settling back down in his chaise lounge.

  Relieved, I grabbed the closest lawn chair and plopped in it. Was that stupid song ever going to end?

  It was awkward, since I really didn't know where to look. While I had a pretty good idea of where not to look, the fact that everyone was naked confused me.

  I wasn't a prude or anything. After all, I'd even untied my own bathing suit top while catching rays, but truthfully, all this was a bit overwhelming. After all, what good was a tan if you had no tan lines? That was always the best part, seeing not how tan you were, but how white your white was against your tan or against someone else's white. Somehow, I didn't think that was a diversion for these guys.

  So I settled for staring over the heads of everyone in the water aerobics class.

  Finally, blissfully, it was over and the nudists began emerging from the pool. I picked at my fingernails, hunting for flecks of dirt to flick out, anything to avoid looking.

  The Nordic goddess retrieved a towel from a chaise lounge and began drying herself. Bending over, she fluffed the water out of her white blond wet hair. Once done, she headed for the ramada.

  “Rabbit Carter?” I stood and tried to concentrate on her eyes, which seemed to be at least a foot taller than my own.

  “Yeah.”

  Up close, she was in her twenties too, just like my pal Lisa in the front office.

  “I'm Trade Ellis. J.B. hired me to look into Abigail Van Thiessen's death.” I handed her a card.

  If she was surprised, she didn't show it. She examined the front of the card, then flipped it over and back again.

  “I was wondering if I might talk to you for a few minutes.”

  Two of the women from the class were hovering; either in hopes of overhearing our conversation or of having a private word themselves with Rabbit.

  “Sure.” She wrapped the towel around her body. “Let's go inside. It will be cooler there.”

  I followed her into the pool house where she headed to a small refrigerator behind the bar.

  “Want a kefir?” she asked.

  I shook my head. I'd never been that fond of fermented milk.

  “There's a Coke machine outside.”

  “I know, I'm fine.” A vision of the naked financier banging on the machine clouded my thoughts.

  We settled into a couple of chairs overlooking the pool area.

  “So, what's this all about?”

  “Abby's death. I'm exploring a few things.”

  “You think J.B. killed her?”

  Rabbit obviously didn't pull any punches.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “Well, it makes some sense, doesn't it, if he hired you to investigate things.”

  “I understand you were her personal trainer.”

  “Uh huh.”

  We talked for a few minutes about her tenure with Abby. She'd worked for her for two years.

  “You must have been with her before?” I asked.

  “In New York. She asked me to come out here when she moved to Tucson. I liked the climate.” She shrugged.

  “I drove out to the ranch three times a week. It was easy work for great pay.”

  She assured me that Abby had pursued her regimen alone on the remaining days of the week in the weight and workout room she'd built at the ranch.

  “Did she seem all right to you?” I asked.

  “All right? In what way?”

  “Was she depressed, or preoccupied, or anything like that recently?”

  Rabbit sipped her kefir. “Recently?”

  “Say in the past six months.”

  She sighed heavily. “Look, I really don't know anything.”

  The way she said it made me think she did.

  “Really.” Now she was staring at the slate floor, ignoring any eye contact with me.

  “Rabbit, if there's any possibil
ity that Abby didn't drown, then a lot of questions are going to be asked.”

  “By the police?”

  “Yes, and insurance investigators. There's a lot of money involved here.”

  She nodded.

  “So I'm probably just the first of many that you're going to see.”

  She thought about this for a minute.

  “They fought.”

  “Abby and J.B.?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What'd they fight about?”

  “Women. Abby didn't trust him. She was a lot older, you know.”

  What was it with these people? Didn't they think I had eyes? Abby looked good, damned good, for her age, but she sure as hell wasn't thirty-six and no amount of drinking on J.B.'s behalf would ever have evened that score.

  “She was in incredible shape and really worked hard.”

  “You mentioned women. Was there a certain one?”

  “Look, things were cool at first. When she started dating him, he never looked at another woman, and she never accused him of doing so.”

  “But …”

  “But then during his last bull school, there was a woman who came out from New York and Abby was very jealous of her.”

  “Jodie Austin?” I remembered her saying that this was her second bull riding school and made a wild guess.

  “You know about her?”

  “She's up there now, enrolled in the new session.” Rabbit rolled her eyes.

  “Anyway, one afternoon we quit early since Abby had a headache. Jodie was staying in number 12, which is right near the workout studio. As we were leaving, J.B. walked out of number 12.”

  “Did Abby see him?”

  “Oh yeah. Big time.”

  I remembered Jodie's T-shirt, “Bull Riders Will Ride Anything Horny.” Had that included J.B.?

  “Was there a scene?”

  “Not then. She pulled me back in the studio and waited for him to leave. It was kind of like high school. We were peeking out from the blinds, trying to see what was going on.”

  “Was anything?”

  “He left, and then Abby sent me over. She wanted me to ask Jodie if she was interested in working out. It was just an excuse.”