by Medora Sale
“It is a beautiful house,” said Kate, giving her hostess a puzzled glance before tackling her breakfast.
“And now you are wondering why your comment produced this lecture. Aren’t you?” Antonia filled their cups and sat down opposite Kate. She had not finished what she wanted to say.
“It was very interesting,” said Kate diplomatically, having forgotten by now what she had said to trigger Antonia’s speech. “But yes, I was wondering a bit.”
“It’s because my son has fallen in love with you,” said Antonia in clear, precise tones, looking directly across the table at her. Kate felt like a laboratory specimen whose mind was being probed and assessed by those dark, inquisitive, and slightly hostile eyes. “I thought you should know something about us and how we function before either one of you is too badly damaged by the experience. Fernando does not fall in love easily. He is very intelligent, the most intelligent of all my children, except perhaps for Consuelo. He is also very—what is the word—reserved, I think, or perhaps controlled. I’m afraid that he finds his family a terrible burden.”
“But he loves you all dearly,” said Kate, horrified. “Everything he says about you shows that.”
“I didn’t say he didn’t love us,” said Antonia impatiently. “I said that we are a burden—on his spirit, perhaps. Not his pocket. Not any longer. I have achieved my wildest dreams of independence now, with tenure and a real salary. I don’t have to look to any man to help feed me and my children and no man can tell me what to do. I’m talking about his father’s legacy to his sons—that still haunts him. Do you understand what I am saying to you?”
“You mean your husband—his father—was a criminal as well,” said Kate, who was beginning to understand where this conversation was going. “He was more than just an innocent employee of a dishonest company.” She waited for a moment or two for a reply and then went on. “How did he actually die? Was he murdered?”
“In a sense. What you might call a legal murder. He was caught in a trap near the border and tried to shoot his way out of it. He was, in many ways, a stupid man.”
“Is that why Fernando joined a police force?”
“Oh yes. That was why.”
“All the rest of the passengers have had their clothes restored to them,” said Harriet. “That’s why they look so much more elegant than I do. And I’ll have huevos rancheros and a very large glass of fresh orange juice,” she added to the waitress without pausing.
“Sounds good,” said John. “Or at least I think it does.”
“Make it two.”
“To get back to all these people in suits,” he went on. “Have you forgotten that you didn’t bring many clothes with you? Or at least that’s what you told me. And if it bothers you, why not go out and buy a new pair of jeans? And even a sweatshirt. Unless you really want to eat breakfast in black high-heeled shoes and a white skirt. I’m sure you could get them here somewhere.” He raised his hand and waved in the direction of the entrance.
“Who’s that?” said Harriet, not bothering to look behind her.
“The investigating team. They said they’d drop by and pick us up, and here they are.”
McDowell and Rodriguez threaded their way through the tables until they were standing over them, like a pair of grizzly bears watching a picnic. “Good morning, gentlemen,” said Harriet. “Join us.”
“We’ve already had breakfast,” said McDowell. “Are you folks ready?” he asked abruptly. Now that he knew from the previous evening’s interview that they weren’t your ordinary rich civilians, he didn’t feel he had to be excessively attentive to their tender feelings.
“You can’t have too many breakfasts,” said Harriet. “More coffee and one of those baskets of sticky things,” she said to the waitress who wandered by to see what was happening. “You might as well sit down. We’ve only just ordered, and it’s a much more comfortable way to drink coffee and eat Danishes.”
“This is Sergeant Rodriguez,” said McDowell, tacitly accepting their invitation by pulling out a chair. “He’s been in charge of several aspects of the investigation, and I felt I should bring him in at this point.”
Rodriguez sat down as well, and drew a deep breath. “There’s just one small point where I think you can help me,” he said politely. “Miss Jeffries, can you tell me when your friend Miss Grosvenor invited you to visit her in Denver? Precisely?”
“Precisely when?” said Harriet, looking oddly at him. “Are you sure you want the entire history?”
He nodded. “The whole thing.”
“Okay. Don’t blame me if you fall asleep. When she inherited that house in Denver about three years ago she invited me to come stay with her. Then every time she wrote, she repeated the invitation.”
“So she didn’t specifically invite you for a certain time?”
“Hang on a minute.” Harriet, frowning in concentration, held up a hand to keep him from interrupting. “After she was injured, she sent me a postcard saying how much she needed company. I had been thinking about the Kansas project for a long time, vaguely, and it all fell together. I had nothing else to do. John was tied up with a case, and things are slow at home. I didn’t write Kate that I was coming, because I hate tying myself down to specific times and places when I’m on a shoot in case I’m held up by the weather, and besides, I’m criminally disorganized about my personal correspondence. We set things up after I reached Kansas. Got that? After I got to Kate’s, we organized the Taos expedition. All very last minute.”
“So the dates and the times—when you were coming, when you were meeting her in Taos—they were your dates and times.”
“Ah—I see what you’re driving at. Yes, they were,” said Harriet, with a hostile edge to her voice. “For the first time in her life, Kate had absolutely nothing to do, and she was perfectly happy to fall in with my schedule. Perfectly happy. She made no attempt to maneuver me into being at a certain place at a certain time.” By now, Harriet was glaring at Rodriguez.
John offered him the basket filled with muffins and pastries; he took a particularly large and sticky Danish with a cheerful smile. “That’s great, Miss Jeffries,” he said, sounding both gleeful and triumphant. “I mean, thank you very much. It clarifies a few things for us.” He turned to grin at McDowell, who glared back at him.
Obviously Harriet had just helped Rodriguez score a point in some epic battle between these two men. Maybe they had bets laid on who organized the hijacking. Bastards. “How is Diana Morris?” she asked, opting for a change in topic before she was arrested for cop assault.
“I beg your pardon?” asked McDowell. “Who’s that?”
“The person on the bus we all knew as Diana Morris,” said John impatiently. “The one we dragged, bullied, and carried for three miles or more out to the highway. We were just wondering if she was okay. When you’ve put all that work into someone, you like to know.”
“I’m afraid we don’t have any information on her,” said McDowell stiffly.
“Look,” said Harriet. “We all knew she was a cop. And either she was awful shy—which she didn’t seem to be—or she was working undercover. She tried to tell us she was a librarian from Virginia. I suppose that means she was Washington-based.”
“How did you all know—what made you all think she was a cop?” asked McDowell.
“Only because when the bus driver pulled out a weapon and started firing, instead of hiding under the seat, she took a round or two while casually saving the tour guide’s life,” said John. “I’m not sure I would have done that, but maybe she’s better trained than I am. At any rate, it’s not the automatic reaction of your average librarian.”
“Sounds more like a royal bodyguard,” said Harriet.
“All we know,” said McDowell sourly, “is that when we got her to the hospital, this bunch of goons from the feds swooped down and carted her away. We don’t know
what happened to her. Or what she knows, which is probably plenty.”
“And that means,” said Rodriguez, “that when we’ve done all the dog work and have figured it all out, they’ll appear again like magic and say, hey, friends, this is a kidnapping and a hijacking and it’s federal. These guys are ours. This is our collar and you can go screw yourselves.”
“How did they know that the bus was going to be hijacked?” asked Harriet. “You can’t tell me that there’s an FBI agent on every tour bus, just in case.”
“Information received,” said John.
“Or maybe they were watching someone on the bus and the hijack was coincidental.” McDowell used the word coincidental as if it hurt.
“Come on, McDowell.” Rodriguez shook his head. “Deever is mixed up in it. He was convinced that his wife was on that bus, you know. Which means she probably was.”
“Who’s Deever?” asked Harriet.
“Rich man,” said McDowell, “owns a ton of land and people here and there in the Southwest. He was under investigation a few years ago over a question of prostitution. Procuring underage girls by forcible means—mostly in Mexico—and transporting them across the border into Texas. There was an extensive investigation and then hearings. Dragged on forever. The Santa Rosa hearings they were. That’s the town where a lot of the girls came from. He slipped out from under without a scratch on him.”
“Hardly without a scratch,” said Rodriguez quietly. “There’s still a lot of suspicion hanging over him these days. And when he walks down the street, people cross over to the other side to avoid the smell.”
“When you say underage,” said Harriet, “just how underage are we talking here?”
“How does twelve grab you?” said Rodriguez. “There were a lot of twelve-year-olds. And two of the kids they found were only ten. That’s even better.”
“Ten,” said Harriet. “My God. That’s younger than the twins. That is absolutely disgusting.”
“He is. Disgusting. Pond slime is lovable compared with Carl Deever.” Rodriguez finished his coffee and pushed back his chair.
McDowell stood up. “I don’t want to hurry you, but if you’ve finished your breakfast,” he said, “do you mind coming over to my office? We have coffee there, too.”
“What’s new?” McDowell called out as he swept them into his small office. It did, in spite of its size, boast a window of its own to indicate his exalted status.
“The search party has located the van and a body tentatively identified as Jennifer Nicholls,” said a young trooper, dropping a piece of paper on McDowell’s desk.
“Good,” said Harriet. “I don’t suppose there’s anything left of my camera and film. In the van,” she added heartlessly.
“They said there was a great deal of camera equipment lying around there, and that some of it may have survived.” The young man looked somewhat disapproving. “They’ll collect it all for you and you can check.”
“Thanks. Oh, just a minute,” she called to his retreating back.
“Ma’am?”
“Could you ask them not to open any of the four by five film holders that might still be in one piece?”
“I don’t think they’re stupid enough to do that, ma’am. But I’ll tell them anyway.”
McDowell pulled up two extra chairs for Harriet and John. Rodriguez leaned on the windowsill, silhouetted against the brightness of the late morning. “One of the interesting things about all this was that a week before the tour left, the regular tour guide was bribed into calling in sick,” said McDowell. “As soon as she heard about the bus disappearing, she smelled a rat, of course, and sat down and sketched the guy who contacted her. She’s some kind of artist, apparently. The feds got to her as she was walking out the door to go to the local police, and in a rare show of cooperation, they have given us a copy of the sketch.”
“Like hell they’re cooperating. They don’t know who it is and think we might,” said Rodriguez.
“Well, I can’t say I recognize him just like that,” said McDowell. “But we’re checking through Records. Meanwhile, we wondered if you’d seen him—at the airport, maybe. Anywhere.” He handed the picture to John.
Harriet craned her neck to get a look at it as well. “My God, John,” she said, “isn’t that Jennifer’s husband? It looks like him. I’d check with one of the other passengers, just to be sure, because by the time we got on the bus, it was pretty dark, but that’s who he looks like. What was his name?”
“Brett,” said John. “Brett Nicholls. And you’re right. I’m sure it’s him.”
“Brett Nicholls?” asked Rodriguez. “Doesn’t sound familiar. Is he one of Deever’s men?”
“Can’t be. At least, he sure as hell isn’t any of the men they investigated for the Santa Rosa hearings,” said McDowell. “The feds have them all memorized.”
McDowell had dropped the copy of the sketch on the table, face down. “Mind if I look at it?” asked Rodriguez, strolling over and picking it up. He carried it back to his comfortable niche against the window. Harriet, her attention drifting from the scene in front of her, watched him move across the room, impressed in spite of herself. Then he turned the paper over and lifted it to the light. The change in him shook her; she caught one glimpse of his face, bleak, white, and strained, before he strode across the room again. He dropped the sketch casually on the table, and raised a hand in farewell. “Urgent call. Sorry. I’ll be in touch.” And he was gone.
“Maybe she went from the bus to the cabin.”
“How?” asked Deever. “She doesn’t even know there is a cabin. Or where it is. How stupid do you think I am?” The heavy draperies were pulled tightly across both sets of windows in his office, cutting off every last stray beam of light or breath of wind, as if only in darkness and fetid air could he be safe. He was sitting in the chair behind his desk, staring at Ginger in the semidarkness.
“Women always seem to find these things out.”
Deever brooded over that thought. “If that’s where she is, I want her out,” he said at last. “We’ll take her with us across the border and worry about her then.”
Ginger sat and looked at him, waiting for clarification. “It would be easier to deal with her here. Leave her in the mountains somewhere.”
Deever shook his head. “Too risky. Go and get her.”
“The trouble is, Mr. Deever, I go out there in the Jeep and every cop in the state is on my tail, because they want to know where she is, too. Also they want to know what you’re up to. I don’t think it’s a good idea. If she’s there, I’d never get to her first. If she isn’t, it’s a big waste of time.”
Deever whirled his chair around so that it was facing the curtained window and leaned back in it. “Shit,” he said. “You’re right.” He drummed his fingers together as he thought. “I think we’d better get out of here and stay out for a while until things calm down,” he said at last. “We’ll fly in, pick her up, and get the hell out of the country. Leave the fallout for Harper to handle. That’s what lawyers are for, isn’t it?”
“What about that photographer? Grosvenor.”
“There’s not a hell of a lot she can do if we’re in Mexico. And after that, well—it’s her word against mine. No one made her come out here, did they? And who’s going to believe a lush like that?” He considered that a moment longer. “Tell Harper to write her a letter, sort of apologizing for any misunderstandings, but not admitting liability, of course. And then offer her a few thousand.”
“I don’t know, Mr. Deever. She’s a famous woman. Rodriguez said—”
“Fuck Rodriguez! I’m sick of the sound of his name. She’s a neurotic bitch and a lush and she needs the money for booze. And if she’s too fucked up to work, like they say, she isn’t much of a threat,” he added, an edge of doubt creeping into his voice. “Anyway, by the time we’re ready to come back, she’ll hav
e drunk through the money and be brain dead.”
Kate was being driven mad by inactivity. Antonia had disappeared into her study to work; Consuelo had rushed downstairs for a hasty breakfast and then hurried out of the house, late for school; a woman whose name Kate did not catch turned up and began to clean very energetically. Every time she found a quiet corner to sit down in, she was chased from it by an orgy of mopping and dusting and wiping.
But after a couple of hours, even that game was over. Antonia emerged from her study, pointed out the cold lunch waiting for Kate in the refrigerator, and rushed off to teach her first class of the day. “Don’t go outside,” she called, as she headed for the garage. “Don’t answer the door or the telephone.” And she was gone.
It was still much too early to eat lunch. She helped herself to some fruit in order to pass the time, and paced back and forth between dining room and living room. Her constant headache had been receding slightly. She’d been able to ignore it for hours at a time while mind or body was engaged in other things. But now, with nothing to occupy her but a returning sense of self-pity, it resurfaced, preventing her from doing anything that required concentration and thought. She looked at the bookshelves, with their rows of novels in Spanish, and tomes of philosophy and criticism, and gave up the idea of curling up with a book. The phone rang. Once. Twice. And stopped. Of course, the energetic housekeeper was still around. She went back up to her bedroom and stared out the window at the dogs. There were six of them outside, almost the entire complement of Rottweilers except for the pups. The housekeeper must have put all the dogs outside so she could clean. They were sleeping in the cool shade of a pleasant arbor, and she envied them their ability to fritter away the day. Perhaps she should emulate the dogs, and give herself over to sloth.
