The Last Chance Olive Ranch

by Susan Wittig Albert

  McQuaid sucked in a breath. It was like pulling ice into his lungs. “Another ex-cop?”

  Royce was regretful. “You didn’t mention Zumwalt in your list of the takedowns. Reckon you haven’t heard about him.”

  “No. I haven’t.” Carl. McQuaid felt frozen. Four. Now there were four. “How did it happen?”

  “Drive-by. Mowing his grass out front early this morning, in Pearland. His wife heard the shots, ran out, found him facedown on the lawn. No witnesses.” He cleared his throat. “We might not have made the connection so quick if his wife hadn’t told the investigator that Jessie Branson phoned early this morning to tell Zumwalt about the Watkins’ murders. She said Branson warned him to watch himself, to be especially careful, but he didn’t take it seriously.” There was a pause. “You sure you still want to go through with this stunt?”

  “Yes,” McQuaid said softly. Four people, dead. He was remembering the gun in his hand and Mantel, standing there in front of him, asking for it. Asking for suicide by cop. “Yes, I want to, Harry. I do. I really do.”

  “Okay, then,” Royce said. “Get back to me when you’ve got it set up.” He hung up.

  McQuaid sat for a moment, trying to think of nothing, nothing at all. Then he checked his cell. Another call had come in while he was talking to Royce. He went to voice mail and heard China’s voice, letting him know that she knew that Cindy Watkins had been shot, giving him the landline number at the ranch, telling him to be careful. Be careful, McQuaid, she said. I love you.

  He clicked off and sat tapping his pencil on the yellow pad, a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. Be careful. Be careful. He was thinking of Carl Zumwalt, who had been his partner for the better part of a decade. The two of them had always watched out for each other. They’d been careful, as careful as they could be, given their risky profession. And now Carl was dead. He had died mowing his grass. Mowing his damn grass in the goddamn front yard.

  McQuaid looked down at the yellow tablet on the desk in front of him, the guilty regret weighing on his shoulders, on his conscience, the pain gnawing like a live thing in his belly. He drew a heavy line through Carl’s name.

  And then, in a sudden blaze of anger, he snapped the pencil in two.

  Chapter Five

  An ancient Roman proverb says it: Partes humani cultus necessariae vinum atque oleum olivarum. The necessary ingredients of civilization are wine and olive oil. But the historian Pliny put his finger on the crucial difference: “It is not with olive oil as it is with wine, for by age the oil acquires a bad flavor, and at the end of a year it is already old.”

  That’s true, but like lots of other things in life, it depends. Your olive oil’s shelf life might be as short as three or four months for an unfiltered late-harvest oil in a clear glass bottle with the cap loosened that you’ve stored on a sunny kitchen windowsill. It might be as long as three or four years for a filtered early-harvest, high-polyphenol oil sealed in a tin or dark bottle and stored on a dark, cool shelf in the supermarket and in your kitchen.

  China Bayles “Virgin Territory” Pecan Springs Enterprise

  “There it is,” Ruby said with satisfaction as we pulled up the drive. “Not fancy or elegant, but it’s comfortable.”

  The ranch house looked like most old Texas ranch houses, long and low, built for utility, not beauty, with a narrow porch across the front and a rusty metal roof. But it somehow managed to be beautiful anyway. The weathered gray siding could have used a fresh coat of paint, but the house seemed to settle back comfortably among the surrounding pecan and sycamore trees, easy with its age and not at all worried about being photographed for House Beautiful. It had been built on a slope a hundred yards from the Guadalupe River. As Ruby parked Mama on the gravel strip beside the house and we climbed out, I could see the sunshine glinting off the water between the tall cypress trees that lined the banks.

  The river looked cool and inviting, especially since the June sun was already making the day feel like July and my Thyme and Seasons T-shirt was sticking to my shoulders. I glanced around. Somewhere close by, a redbird was singing—Cheer cheer cheer!—and the light breeze carried the pungent scent of sun-warmed cedar. The place seemed to have an almost tangible air of serenity. I could see why Ruby liked to come here.

  The house was old and so was the barn behind it. But as I walked around the van I saw that there were a half dozen other buildings clustered around the barn, several of them quite large and all of them looking as if they’d been built in the last ten years—the ranch’s olive oil production and storage facilities, I guessed. Off to the right, I caught a glimpse of a vegetable garden and what looked like the plant nursery Ruby had mentioned, with young trees in pots arranged in neat rows under a shade-cloth canopy.

  But there wasn’t time to look around, for a young woman had come to the end of the porch and was waiting to welcome us. A chunky black Lab was standing close to her knee, his tail wagging.

  “Maddie!” Ruby cried, running up the three steps onto the porch. “We’re so glad to be here!” She gave the woman a quick hug and bent over the dog. “Hello, Bronco. Remember me?”

  “He remembers,” Maddie said. The dog—obviously Ruby’s friend—sat down on his haunches and held up his paw for Ruby to shake.

  Maddie turned to me as I came up on the porch. “And you must be China Bayles.” Her smile was shy but warm. “Hey, I just got off the phone—a couple more people from San Antonio wanting to RSVP for your workshop tomorrow. Which brings us to twenty-four registrations.” She put out her hand. “Thank you for agreeing to do it, China. It’s very nice of you.”

  “You’re welcome, Maddie.” I took her hand, noticing the work-hardened skin. “Glad I could make it.”

  I didn’t say that I would have canceled if I hadn’t been rudely instructed to get out of town by both my husband and the local police chief, but the thought came into my mind. And then, just as quickly, I pushed it away. Whatever was going to happen in Pecan Springs was going to happen there, and I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. I was here, and the Last Chance Ranch seemed a pretty nice place to be, at first sight, anyway. If I could have known what lay ahead in the next twenty-four hours, I might have felt differently. But for now, I was just going to relax and enjoy myself.

  Maddie was almost as tall as Ruby, her skin darkly tanned and her hair black, parted in the middle and worn in two thick, glossy braids—more to keep it out of her way, I thought, than to make a style statement. It was hard to guess her age, but from what Ruby had said about her, I thought she must be in her early thirties. Her features were striking: a broad forehead, high cheekbones, aquiline nose.

  But what caught and held the attention was the bold scar that slashed across her right cheek, her jaw, and down her neck—the signature of the accident that had killed her parents. If it was the cause of the wariness I read in her expression, I could understand why. Some women would have considered that scar disfiguring and headed straight for cosmetic surgery. But Maddie was slender and athletic, and her worn jeans, plaid cotton blouse, and sneakers gave her the look of a woman who cared more about getting the job done than impressing people with her appearance. The scar belonged to her. She owned it—not the other way around.

  “I was admiring your olive grove as we drove in,” I said. “The trees look really good.”

  Maddie’s eyes lit up. “Thank you. The last couple of years have been hard on them, with the drought. But the weather was kind to us in the spring, and it looks like we’ll have a good harvest.”

  “I noticed that you’re irrigating,” I said.

  She nodded. “We pump water from the Guadalupe. Plus, we have a sixteen-hundred-gallon tanker trailer that we can tow where we need it. Good for brush fires, too.” She waved her hand at a large white tank on a two-axle trailer, parked under a tree. “As you could see, the large orchards along the lane—the ones that we harvest mechanically—are irrig
ated. But there are smaller plantings around the ranch, dryland olives. No irrigation. That may be the future, here at Last Chance.” She turned to Ruby. “Are you guys ready to eat? The men have been out working all morning. They’ll be here in a few minutes, and they’ll be hungry. After lunch, I’ll show you your cabin and the room where you’ll be doing your workshop. I can take China for a tour of the ranch, too.”

  Ruby raised an eyebrow. “Just China? Bronco and I can’t come along?”

  That drew a quick smile from Maddie. “Sure, if you want. There are a few things that are new since you were out here last.” She turned back to me. “I suppose Ruby told you that she’s not really a visitor. She first came to the ranch as a girl, long before I arrived on the scene.”

  “Hey, stop,” Ruby protested. “You’re making me feel ancient.”

  I had to laugh at that. “Yes, Ruby told me. She said she remembers you as a toddler.”

  “That’s right.” Maddie’s smile became a laugh. “I was one of those curious little kids who sticks her nose into everything on the ranch. When Ruby was here, she always looked out for me. She can tell you how many lessons I had to learn the hard way. And I’m still getting knocked on my butt twice a day, at least.” She flung a tanned arm at the surrounding landscape in a gesture that was part demonstration, part possession—and part determination. “Eliza . . .” She paused. “Ruby told you about her?”

  “A little, and about Sofia, too,” I said.

  She nodded and went on. “Eliza always said that the olive trees were her children. To me, growing up here on the ranch, they were my brothers and sisters. I’ll do anything I have to, anything, to keep them growing.” Another laugh, this one with a little edge. “Some people call me a tree hugger, you know.”

  I wondered who had called her that. “Tree huggers are my kind of people,” I said warmly.

  Ruby wrinkled her nose. “I knew you’d like her,” she said, in a stage whisper that Maddie was meant to overhear.

  From somewhere behind the house, I heard a bell clanging loudly, like an old-time dinner bell. “That’s the ranch bell,” Maddie said. “Come on.”

  I followed Maddie into the house. “It’s lovely,” I said as we walked through the long, dim central hall, Ruby and Bronco behind us. The hallway walls were painted a deep muted saffron, a strong contrast to the dark woodwork. The living room opened out to the right through a wide archway that revealed an expanse of polished wooden floor, a fireplace, and several comfortable overstuffed chairs covered with brightly colored Mexican weavings. The doors to the left were closed—bedrooms, I thought.

  “Eliza’s father built this place almost a hundred years ago,” Maddie said. “The Last Chance was a working sheep ranch back then. Four thousand acres. Mr. Butler had just two children—Eliza and her brother, Howard—but he had to feed a couple of dozen ranch hands. That’s why the dining room and kitchen are so large. The men ate at least two meals a day here, every day.” She opened a door on the right to give me a quick glimpse of a large modern kitchen. “Sofia’s kitchen,” she said.

  “Nice,” I said appreciatively, glancing at the layout and the industrial-sized appliances. “I became a connoisseur of working kitchens when we installed the kitchen at our tearoom and had to make sure it was up to code. It was a big job.”

  Maddie nodded. “Big job here, too. Eliza was planning to hire a professional chef, expand to a restaurant menu, and open on weekend evenings and for special events—a pretty ambitious agenda. Still, we’re less than an hour’s drive from San Antonio, and with the right kind of advertising, Eliza thought we could do it.” She shut the door. “But that was then,” she added matter-of-factly. “Under the circumstances, I’ve put the plan on hold, along with several other parts of the business. The café is open with a soup-and-sandwich menu on tour and workshop weekends—like tomorrow. Sofia and her helper Abby do the cooking, and Abby’s sisters do the serving.”

  I guessed that the “circumstances” had to do with the fact that Maddie’s inheritance was on hold. I was about to ask but she was already moving briskly, leading me into a large, light room some twenty feet wide. It spanned the entire length of the house, perhaps sixty feet.

  “We set up ten small tables here when the café is open,” Maddie said as we went in. “We can seat up to forty. As a dining room, it works very well. And it’s really very nice.”

  It was. On the far wall, there were four sliding glass patio doors that opened onto a sunny flagstone patio bordered by rosemary and artemisia and with small islands of olive trees under-planted with blooming lavender. The room’s other three walls, rough-plastered, were painted a pale ochre and hung with an interesting collection of folk art—weavings, paintings, wooden objects. The floor was made of terra-cotta tiles, the warm color contrasting with the pale walls. A long Spanish-style oak table in the middle of the room was set for ten with brightly colored placemats, wineglasses at each place, and several pottery pitchers filled with olive branches and wildflowers. It looked like there’d be a crowd for lunch. I wondered who would be joining us.

  An old woman, bent and frail-looking, came in from the kitchen. She wore a dark cotton dress with an olive-green apron embroidered with the words Last Chance Olive Ranch, and a half-dozen strands of wooden and bright ceramic beads around her neck. She was pushing a tiered cart loaded with a tray of cheese and cold cuts, a wooden bowl of crisp salad greens and a half dozen smaller bowls of cut raw veggies, and a dishpan-sized glass bowl of chunky gazpacho. A young woman followed her with a basket of sliced bread. She put the bread down and went back into the kitchen.

  Ruby took my arm. “China, I’d like you to meet Sofia. When I was a kid, she always made tamales when I visited—tamales with olives, of course.”

  “And how else would a tamale be made?” Sofia asked in a cracked voice. “Tamales must have olives. That is a Last Chance rule.”

  I found myself holding the old woman’s thin, wrinkled hand, which gripped mine with a surprising firmness. It was hard to guess her age—late seventies, perhaps older. Her hair, braided and coiled into a crown around her head, was a silvery contrast to the dark skin of her face. Her eyes were very dark under heavy dark brows, but they were not the eyes of an old woman. They were alert and inquiring, and I felt as if she could see through me somehow. It was a slightly uncomfortable feeling.

  After a moment, the old woman nodded, as if she had found what she was looking for and was satisfied. “I am glad to meet Ruby’s friend,” she said, letting go of my hand. “She has spoken often of you. You are a lawyer.” Her smile was oddly calculating. “It is interesting to be a lawyer, is it not?”

  I was about to say that I was no longer in practice, but Ruby was beginning to move the dishes from the cart to the oak buffet that stood against the wall nearby. “I’ll help you with this, Sofia,” she said. “The guys are here.”

  I looked around. Several men dressed in jeans, work shirts, and boots had come in from the patio and were talking to Maddie. I noticed that she didn’t seem shy with them—she was friendly and laughing. But Sofia had put a hand on my arm and was drawing me aside, with a quick glance over her shoulder.

  “I would like to talk,” she said in a low voice. “Perhaps after you get back from your tour of the ranch this afternoon? I will be finished with the kitchen work then, and in my cabin, resting.” She tilted her head, birdlike, but those eyes betrayed a canny intelligence. “An old woman enjoys her rest, you know.”

  “I’d like to do that,” I said, wondering what she wanted.

  But I didn’t have time to think about it. The men were heading toward the buffet, and Maddie was leading me through a quick round of introductions. Then I found myself standing behind Ruby and several others in the buffet line, making small talk with the guy behind me as I picked up my sandwich makings and put them on my tray, along with silverware and an olive-green napkin.

  “Maddie sa
ys you drove over from Pecan Springs this morning,” he said. “You and Ruby are staying for the weekend?”

  The man who had asked the question was tall and well built, with broad shoulders, thinning gingery hair, pale eyebrows, and very blue eyes in a sunburned face—a man with the look of a cowboy. He’d been introduced to me as Pete Lawrence, the manager of the ranch’s olive groves. Behind him, the smaller, younger man in T-shirt and jeans, wearing a Last Chance olive-green gimme cap with the bill turned backwards, was Jerry Kinkaid. He was in charge of the plant nursery, which (as he quickly told me) involved propagating and growing young trees and potting them up from one- to three- to five-gallon pots, ready for sale to retail and wholesale customers.

  “Jerry also manages the olive press during the harvest,” Pete said. “That’s when he gets a real workout. It’s a round-the-clock job, for as long as it takes.”

  “I’d love to come and watch when you’re pressing the oil,” I said, adding salad greens and some raw broccoli, green peppers, and cauliflower to my plate.

  Pete picked up two pieces of bread, some cheese, and two thick slices of ham. “Get Maddie to show you the video we made of Jerry doing the pressing last year. That’s as good as a visit.” He grinned. “Although of course you’re welcome to come and watch.”

  “Yeah,” Jerry said. “If you come, you can take home a bottle of fresh olive oil. Fresh, very fresh, unbelievably fresh. Not that two- or three-year-old oil you find on the supermarket shelves.” He leaned around Pete to frown at me. “Which I hope you are not buying. It’s better to go without than use that stuff. Most of it, anyway.”

  “I know,” I said, a little smugly. “I always check for a date on the bottle.”

  I had been doing research on the subject of olives and had learned that olive “oil” isn’t an oil at all. It’s actually a fruit juice, the juice of ripe olives, pressed, filtered, and bottled. Like any fruit juice, the fresher the better, which is why local olive oil may be preferable, all things considered. Even if it is truly extra virgin (that is, the cold-pressed juice from the first pressing of the olives), imported olive oil has been on the move for months: shipped from place to place, stored and bottled and perhaps even rebottled, nobody knows how many times. By the time it gets to your kitchen, it may be two or three years old. Even if the oil doesn’t smell or taste rancid, many of the heart-healthy compounds—the all-important polyphenols—have degraded to the point where they won’t do you a dime’s worth of good.