Statute of Limitations

by Steven F Havill

  “What a concept,” he said brusquely. “And a damn good idea, too. I could have come up with that if I had half a brain.” He opened the door and struggled out of the car. “Stop letting work interfere with your home life. That’s my advice for the day.” He shot her a wide grin. “Notice how effortless it is to say asinine things like that.”

  He stopped in front of the door and regarded the sad little acacia by the step.

  “Ruined that, didn’t I.” He twisted and looked back at the corner of the patio where the piece of rebar had been found. “Either I was preoccupied, or deaf, or stoned,” he said. “Not to hear someone crunching across that gravel behind me.” He frowned and turned to the door. “I can’t remember if I was in the process of turning, or not,” he added. It took him a minute or so to find the right key, and then to find the keyhole. “Don’t get old, sweetheart. That’s my best advice.”

  He swung the heavy door open. “There we go, then. Let’s eat. And you can tell me what you’ve found out about Janet Tripp. I’ve been lying in bed thinking about her a lot lately.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  “Mike Sisneros went to school with Janet,” Estelle said. “Sort of. He was a year ahead of her. He didn’t go out with her or anything like that, but he knew her. That’s all.”

  “Infatuation from afar?” Gastner asked.

  “I don’t think so. He just knew who she was, that’s all. And then over the years, he had occasion to see her once in a while at A & H Welding. Just a familiar face. He was the officer who provided initial treatment when she was hurt the night of the Pope fire. She stepped in a ditch and sprained or broke her ankle.”

  “Ah,” Gastner said. “I didn’t remember that.” He scooped another generous load of burrito, deftly wrapping the strand of cheese around the loaded fork. “She lived over at the trailer park on Escondido. I recall that. See?” He held up the morsel. “Feed the brain, and off you go.”

  “She’s been with Mike for a while now,” Estelle said.

  “Now, yes. But when she was on her own, that’s where she lived.”

  “There’s a sister, too. Mike says that she lives over in Kansas. He’s going to find the number and address for me.”

  “No one’s contacted her yet about Janet?”

  “No, sir. Do you remember anything about the sister?”

  “Not a damn thing.” He frowned. “That may require several more of these.” A tiny fragment of green chile lay at one end of the empty platter, and he speared it with his fork. “Her folks,” he mused, and shut his eyes. Estelle wondered what mental process it was that sifted through half a century of memories and associations, searching for a single face or a single name. Bill Gastner had once described his memory as being like an enormous walk-in closet filled from floor to ceiling with trivia scribbled in fading ink on millions of 3 × 5 cards, a true ROM.

  “Terry Tripp used to work for the electric company,” he said after a moment. “The mother. I think that’s where she worked. If it wasn’t too long ago, Kevin Tierney could tell you for sure. I don’t recall who was manager before him.” He closed his eyes again, perhaps watching the cascade of file cards. “She died of cancer. God, how long ago? I have no idea. Ten, fifteen years? Something like that?”

  “How about Janet’s father?” Estelle asked. Gastner had pushed the plastic take-out box away, and she scooped it off the counter and put it in the sack of trash under the sink.

  Gastner rested his chin in his hand, elbow on the counter. “This is interesting,” he said. “I haven’t thought about any of these folks for a long, long time.” He turned just enough so he could see Estelle. “You know, when Janet came into the Sheriff’s Office for the last time, whenever it was? Christmas afternoon? God...that’s yesterday. Anyway, I thought of her mother. I guess in part it’s because they looked a lot alike. I’m sure that at one time, I knew who Mr. Tripp was.” He shrugged and one hand sought out the bandage on the back of his head. “But that’s too long ago.”

  “Ancient history,” Estelle said.

  “Be careful with that ancient stuff,” Gastner said. “Mike didn’t know?”

  “No. Eddie and I are both going to talk with him again today sometime.”

  “His dad was a piece of work,” Gastner said. “Mike’s, I mean. A joyous drunk might be a good way to put it. He was one of those guys who just plain loved alcohol. A real love affair with old Nancy Whiskey. And you know what? I don’t recall a single time when he was actually arrested for DWI, or public intox, or anything like that. You ask Bobby Torrez. There’s never been a cop who had it more in for drunken drivers than Bobby. You know that. But even he never managed to nail old Hank for anything.”

  “Careful, or lucky, or both. Mike says his old man had a fine temper.”

  “Well,” Gastner said, hunching his shoulders, “probably.” He sighed. “But he and Irene split up eventually. Mike’s mom. Irene? She dumped him, he dumped her, I guess it doesn’t matter. Old Nancy got in the way, is all.”

  “And a few other issues, Mike says,” Estelle added.

  “No doubt.” He squinted at the opposite wall. “She is Native American.”

  “Zuni.”

  “I knew that.” He frowned. “Brad Tripp,” he said suddenly. He pronounced the name and then fell silent.

  “The father? Janet’s dad?”

  Gastner nodded and his gaze shifted to the coffee maker. After a moment, he pushed himself off the tall kitchen stool and approached it. He leaned on the counter with one hand on each side of the Brewmaster as if trying to decide a strategy.

  “Ask Bobby about Brad Tripp,” he said finally, and he smiled broadly at the memory. “Remember the old office, back before the county built the annex? Maybe that was before your time.”

  “No. I was here then.”

  “Well, Bobby hauled Brad in for something.... I don’t remember what it was. All I remember is that it involved Brad spending the rest of the night in the slammer. They were going up the stairs to the second floor, and old Brad decided that it might be a good idea to take a swing at Bobby.” Gastner turned around and leaned against the counter, arms crossed over his belly. “No one could figure out what Brad thought that might accomplish, including Brad, probably.”

  “I remember the time,” Estelle said. “Everyone was talking about it the next day. I’d forgotten that’s who it was.”

  “That’s it,” Gastner said. “A huge crash, and Brad lands at the bottom of the stairs in a crumpled heap. The dispatcher at the time was Miracle Murton, and he about jumps out of his skin. Murton asks Bobby what happened. ‘He fall down, go boom,’ is all Bobby would tell him. Miracle worried for days about whether he should be writing reports about what happened. He was afraid old Brad was going to sue Bobby, the county, and every living soul within shouting distance.”

  He turned back to the coffee maker. “Goddamn good thing Brad didn’t break his neck. But he was drunk enough that he bounced pretty well. No injuries that showed.” He frowned at the coffeepot again. “Little squirt of a guy. I have no recollection what the incident was all about.” He shook his head with frustration, then hauled the bag of coffee beans out of the cabinet above the counter.

  Estelle watched him go through the process of measuring and grinding the potent beans, and then filling the machine with enough water to supply coffee to a dozen troops. Everything accomplished without disaster, he stood and regarded the gadget thoughtfully. “Helps,” he said aloud, and flipped on the power switch.

  He turned back to Estelle. “You want some tea or something?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “It’s still a puzzle,” he said, and watched as the first thin stream of coffee gurgled out the bottom of the filter basket. “I don’t remember what became of old Brad—assuming I ever knew in the first place. And all this ancient history isn’t get
ting us very far.”

  “I think that the same person attacked both you and Janet,” Estelle said, and Gastner looked at her with surprise at the sudden change of subject.

  “That’s interesting,” he said. “What makes you think so? I mean, other than that this is a tiny town...and that makes the odds a gambler’s choice that violent episodes in one day are connected.”

  “Same MO, for one thing,” Estelle said.

  Gastner frowned at that, but took a moment to slip out the filling carafe and pour a partial cup.

  “In both cases, the intent was to kill,” she said, and saw Gastner’s eyebrow drift upward. He dumped too much sugar into his cup without bothering to stir it. “One shot to Janet’s head, execution style. One blow to yours, darn near in the exact same spot.”

  “He didn’t shoot me, though.”

  “No. I think he changed his mind at the last minute. Maybe he figured that if he shot you, that would tie the two events together for sure. He’s working on being pretty clever, sir. The assault on you is obviously a grudge motive—hit and run, no robbery, no burglary of the house, no auto theft. Someone from your past, making the score even.”

  “And Janet?”

  “It’s supposed to look like a robbery at an ATM—not the most imaginative thing. But then I think he changed his mind again somehow. He shoots Janet, makes it look like a robbery, and then for some inexplicable reason, takes the body and dumps her in the arroyo.”

  “It makes sense if he wants to buy some time,” Gastner said.

  “And that fits, sir. The key to Mike’s apartment was gone from her key ring. We don’t know how or why. And on top of that, there’s this: Mike owns a .22 pistol. It’s missing, and he can’t account for that.”

  “Well, shit,” Gastner mused. “He’s missing a weapon?”

  “Just the .22. An odd coincidence, maybe.”

  “But see, none of those pieces fit. If the killer took the key...that’s what you’re thinking?”

  Estelle nodded. “There’s that possibility, sir.”

  “If he took the key, he wanted to use it. So he disposes of the body, which by his bizarre thinking might give him some extra time. He goes to the apartment. How does he know that Mike won’t be there?”

  “I have no idea. Maybe he didn’t care. Maybe he talked to Janet before he shot her.”

  “And maybe dumb luck,” Gastner observed. “You don’t have a lick of evidence that she talked to anybody in that bank parking lot. And after he does that, and then steals the gun, which he didn’t need to kill Janet, by the way, he comes over to my house and clubs me on the head.” He looked at Estelle skeptically. “I don’t know, sweetheart.” He sipped the coffee and out of thirty years’ habit as a smoker, his left hand drifted to his left shirt pocket, searching for a phantom cigarette.

  After a moment, he leaned back. “You don’t actually have anything that ties the two incidents together, though. Am I right?”

  “Nada.”

  “If you’re right—and I’ll be the first to admit that your intuition has a pretty good track record—you’re saying that somehow there’s a connection between Janet Tripp and myself. Something in common.”

  “It would appear so, sir.”

  “Well, you know my shadowy past pretty well, sweetheart. The next step is to find out what you can about Ms. Tripp. Some little thing. What’s Bobby say about all this?”

  “He comes home today, Padrino.”

  “Well, he’s got a good head on his shoulders, and he’s got a hell of a lot of good connections with all kinds of dark little corners around the county. Go poke around and see what you come up with.”

  “You’ll be all right?”

  “Of course I’ll be all right.” He patted the smooth maple of the chopping-block counter. “I’m in my castle now.”

  “Maybe you’d like to come over for dinner later tonight?”

  “Sofía already invited me,” he said with a grin. “She promised something with a name about this long,” and he held his hands a yard apart. “Something that involves red snapper and chile. How bad can that be?”

  “Ah, huachinango a la veracruzana,” Estelle said. “She’s been planning that for a while. She complains that there’s no fresh red snapper in Posadas.”

  “This is surprising?” Gastner laughed. “Let’s see how the day goes, sweetheart. We all know what happens when we try to plan something.” He rose and stepped to the coffeepot to refill his cup, and Estelle slipped back into her jacket.

  “I’ll let you know what Bobby says.”

  “Do that,” Gastner said. “I’ll be home all day, and after that, I’ll be over at Twelfth Street as chief taste-tester for the chinchang.”

  “Huachinango, Padrino.” He accompanied her to the front door.

  “It’s a good thing you guys aren’t going to take her up on her suggestion to move down there. I can just imagine my North Carolina tongue trying to wrap itself around that Aztec language,” he said.

  “Mayan, Padrino.”

  “But you’re Aztec, aren’t you?” His warm eyes took in the outlines of her face with affection. “You wouldn’t fit in down there, anyway. Wise decision.”

  “Nos vemos,” she said with a resigned shrug. “There’s a whole world of things I have to think about. One step at a time. Right now I’m working on making it through to dinnertime.”

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  The expression on Robert Torrez’s face jolted Estelle to a stop at the doorway of the sheriff’s tiny, bleak office. He was always master of the threatening glower, whether there was any bite behind it or not, and the dark storms on his broad, handsome face were now classic in their proportions.

  He looked up so slowly it appeared that his neck muscles were actually a set of smooth hydraulic pistons. His skull clicked to a stop as his eyes locked on Estelle’s.

  “Welcome back,” Estelle said, although she could plainly see that words of welcome were wasted on the sheriff. Whatever orders the Albuquerque physicians might have given to their patient, it didn’t surprise Estelle that the sheriff had headed for his office the moment he arrived home in Posadas.

  “Yeah,” Torrez said. He flipped a piece of peach-colored paper across his desk toward her. “What the fuck is this?” Almost never profane, especially when he knew that women were within hearing range, the sheriff startled Estelle with his word choice.

  She picked up the paper as she sat down on one of the military surplus steel folding chairs, immediately recognizing the style of the author. Leona Spears was adept at losing elections, true enough. She’d lost every one she’d tried, including the one against Bob Torrez years before. But Leona was a meticulous planner, never—ever—leaving something to the last moment if it could be planned out, organized, and strategy-checked beforehand.

  The paper, perfectly organized onto a single page for maximum effect, was titled “Preliminary Needs Assessment and Budgetary Planning, Posadas County Sheriff’s Department.”

  Torrez sat like a lump, glowering, while Estelle read the paper. She understood it immediately, and had to agree that Leona’s logic was unassailable. If Leona was to be considered for the county manager’s position, then it made sense to scope things out before she faced the county commission. What did each department manager or supervisor need or want in order to effectively manage his turf? Leona would have no way of knowing unless she first asked, and then later observed and judged performance for herself.

  But Estelle knew that it wasn’t the planning that irked Robert Torrez. Being asked how many new patrol units he anticipated needing for the coming year was not radical. There was no implication that whatever he asked for, he was asking for too much. Asking what kind of units was perfectly logical. Asking the sheriff what he thought to be the weak spots in his organization was eminently practi
cal, and just good management.

  Estelle read the paper again. Nowhere on the sheet was there the faintest hint of direction or suggestion from Ms. Leona Spears. It was impossible to judge what Leona thought by what she asked on the paper.

  “I got two and a half dead people on my hands,” Torrez said, but there was nothing amused in his tone. “First I find out that Eduardo died, then Janet Tripp gets herself killed, and then Bill Gastner has his skull split open by some whacko with a grudge. I get sidetracked up in the city while a hundred doctors jam needles into me and drain half my blood.”

  “Bobby, please...”

  “Jesus, Estelle. Leona Spears?” He fairly shouted the woman’s name. “What the hell is going through their little pointed heads?”

  “Whose heads?”

  “You know whose heads, damn it. The commission. Didn’t you go to the meetings?”

  “Yes.” There was nothing prevented him from attending as well.

  “Leona Spears...cannot be county manager,” Torrez said emphatically. “That’s just the way it is.”

  “She can and will be if the commissioners vote that way, Bobby.”

  “Bullshit.” He shifted his weight and rapped his shin against the unforgiving military surplus desk, and he slammed the offending drawer shut with one swift kick of a black boot. “I mean, look at this thing.” He picked up the paper again. “She’s got something against white paper, for Christ’s sakes?”

  “Maybe she ran out,” Estelle said, amused.

  “Why doesn’t she spray it with perfume while she’s at it. What are they thinking?”

  “Well, I talked with Dr. Gray a while ago...I don’t even remember when it was. But a majority of the board is leaning toward giving Leona the job. She has a final interview with them on Tuesday. I suppose that’s the rationale for this.” She nodded at the paper. “It won’t hurt her case if she does some preplanning—if she finds out what we want and need. How long has that been lying on your desk?”