by Paula Paul
“I’m not his…”
The doctor was out the door before Irene finished speaking. Two nurses, both male, entered and immediately began disconnecting tubes and attaching others. Within less than a minute, they were wheeling Juanita out of the room on her bed, forcing Irene and P.J. out of the way. They stood together outside the row of curtains, watching Juanita disappear through a wide door.
Just before the door closed, a dark-skinned man with longish black hair walked past Irene and P.J. He wore jeans and a Western-style shirt and carried a wide-brimmed Western hat in one hand. He followed Juanita and her entourage all the way through the wide doors with no protests from anyone.
“He must be family,” P.J. said.
Irene shook her head. “Not family. That’s Tony Tonorio. He’s a medicine man. He’s here to take care of Juanita.”
“The medical staff allows that?” P.J. asked.
“They have for several years,” Irene answered. “It seems to hasten healing.”
P.J. stared at the door for several seconds before he turned to Irene and asked, “What do we do now?”
“We still have to find Angel,” Irene said. “And we need to get back to Adelle. She’s probably giving them fits out there in the waiting area. When we fetch her, we can check with the desk to see if Angel has been admitted to the hospital.”
Adelle was not in the waiting area when they returned. Irene fought back a temporary flash of panic at not seeing her mother. Adelle could be anywhere, causing all sorts of trouble. Irene forced herself to take a deep breath and reminded herself that however disagreeable and troublesome her mother might be, she was a strong woman, perfectly capable of taking care of herself. Most likely, she had only gone to the restroom.
She walked to the reception desk and inquired about Angel. The woman who had been there before had been replaced by another receptionist.
“Just a moment,” the receptionist behind the desk said, turning to her computer. She tapped a few keys and without looking up from the screen said, “Mr. Barreda’s not here. He checked himself out.”
“Oh, no,” Irene said, giving P.J. a worried look. He must have wanted to get away before the police asked too many questions about his harboring a fugitive.
“We’re concerned that he was badly injured,” P.J. said.
“I understand, but we can’t keep a patient against his wishes,” the receptionist said.
“Where did he go?” Irene asked. “Did he go home?” She knew she sounded irrational. Of course the receptionist wouldn’t know. “I’m so worried,” she said, hearing her own voice quiver. She had to get hold of herself. Thankfully, P.J. saved her from further embarrassment by asking another question.
“And Mrs. Daniels?” P.J. said. “She was waiting for us here. Do you have any idea where she might have gone?”
“Who?”
“Mrs. Daniels. Mrs. Adelle Daniels,” P.J. said. “We left her here waiting for us in this area.”
The receptionist frowned and shook her head. “I’m afraid I don’t remember anyone waiting for you. All of these people you see seated here now are waiting for other patients.”
“You couldn’t have missed her,” Irene said. “She was wearing a dressing gown and high-heeled bedroom slippers. We left her right over there next to the—”
“Oh, of course. Mrs. Seligman. You’ll find her in the treatment area. I believe she’s in the last station. The one with the door. At the end of the row of curtains.” The woman gave Irene a concerned look and dropped her voice. “Are you family?”
“Yes, her daughter,” Irene said. “Is something wrong?”
The receptionist shook her head and mouthed, “I’m so sorry. Go on back.”
As Irene walked toward the treatment area, she felt an even stronger stab of panic that her mother’s head injury had taken a turn for the worse. Why else would the receptionist need to express sympathy to her? It was only slightly surprising that Adelle had identified herself to the staff as Mrs. Seligman. She’d done that before, but only when she was trying to impress someone with her ties to one of Santa Fe’s most important families.
“Excuse me, sir,” the receptionist said as Irene walked away. “You are…?”
“Son,” P.J. said and hurried to catch up with Irene. “Don’t panic,” he said when he caught up with her. “This doesn’t mean there’s anything seriously wrong with her. She could have injured herself slightly. Maybe just a little bump or a scratch.”
“Yes, of course,” Irene said, still fighting back fear. When they reached the closed door at the end of the treatment area, Irene reached for the handle and was relieved to find that it wasn’t locked. She opened it and saw Adelle staring back at her. She was seated in a straight-back wooden chair. Her elaborate dressing gown had been removed and replaced with a hospital gown, while long white sleeves covered her arms. Straps attached to the sleeves were wrapped around her body and tied at the back, making it impossible for her to move her arms. A young male attendant stood next to her as if to make sure she didn’t stand.
“Get me out of this godforsaken place,” Adelle screeched as soon as she saw Irene. “They’re acting as if I’m some sort of lunatic!”
Chapter 17
Juanita opened her eyes and saw what she thought was an apparition. An angel, she assumed. Ropes and tubes encircled him as if he were being restrained. Was someone trying to keep the angel away from her? Perhaps he was to be her escort to Catholic heaven, but she wasn’t meant to go. She’d been taught catechism at the mission church of Santo Domingo at the pueblo, but she’d also been taught by the elders that when she died she would join her dead ancestors who had become rain clouds. She believed both, and neither.
When she managed to focus her eyes, she saw that the angel wasn’t being restrained. He was simply standing beside her bed and was partially obscured by the lines and tubes attached to her own body. She was in a bed, but this wasn’t Angel Barreda’s house, which was the last place she remembered being. Something annoying was covering her mouth, but when she tried to push it aside, the one standing next to her bed caught her hand and gently restrained her.
He wasn’t an angel. He was Tony Tonoria. Juanita tried to speak to him, but there were no words in her parched throat. Tony, still holding her hand, shook his head and told her in their native Keres language not to try to talk.
“You are ill,” he said, still speaking Keres. “Be patient. Only the self can heal the self.”
Juanita had heard those words before when others in her tribe needed healing. She tried to nod her head, but she wasn’t certain that she had accomplished it because of the apparatus attached to her face, covering her nose and mouth.
Tony held a small bag in front of her. It was woven with wool yarn with fringe on the bottom. Beads decorated the top of the bag. Juanita recognized it. The woven pouch was protection for what was inside—another bag made of leather and stitched with sinew. Her own medicine bag. She’d forgotten about it. It was customary for young Pueblo men to find the necessary contents for their medicine bags, but women seldom did. However, her mother had insisted she assemble one for herself. They were the objects that represented her spirit, although she was no longer certain she could remember all of the contents. There were corn kernels, she thought, and some squash seed to show her kinship to plants that sustained her people. There may have been an eagle feather because it was necessary to have something representing her kinship to the animals of the earth. She had added a few beads later because she liked beads for making jewelry. Her mother had placed dirt inside—the amount she could hold with the tips of her fingers. Juanita had objected to that when she was young. It had taken many years for her to understand that the dirt was Earth Mother herself and that all women must have contact with her.
“You have forgotten this,” Tony said in Keres. “When a person loses connection with her spiritual self, sickness visits her.” He held the medicine bag in front of her, and Juanita felt the needle stuck in the t
op of her hand sting a little as she grasped the bag.
He pulled a jar full of tea made from chaparral from the paper sack he held, opened the jar, and held it to her lips. She pushed the oxygen mask away enough to take one sip, then opened her mouth to drink from another jar Tony offered. It was cornmeal gruel. All the while, Tony chanted in their native language about the interconnectedness of humans with the earth and about the four spirit worlds beneath the earth.
When he had finished, he put everything back in the wrinkled paper bag. “Heal yourself,” he said just before he turned to leave the room, “and let your son find his own healing.”
Juanita watched as he disappeared. She fell asleep gripping her medicine bag.
—
By the end of the second day, the doctor told Juanita he was moving her out of intensive care.
“I’ve never seen such a quick recovery,” he said to Irene when she came to visit the next day. “Her pneumonia was quite serious, but her breathing has improved remarkably. She came in with quite a few wounds, but they seem to be healing rapidly. I think she should be able to be released in another day.”
“You do know where she will go if you release her.”
“She’s on hold for the police department, isn’t she?” the doctor said. “They usually are when they come in with gunshot wounds.”
Irene nodded her head slowly.
“You must be Mr. Bailey’s secretary.” He glanced toward the door. “You must know that usually there are police everywhere when we’re holding someone. Outside the ICU, in the halls, everywhere.”
“They’ll be here soon,” Irene said. “You can bet on that.”
The doctor nodded, took one more look at the computer he’d brought in under his arm, and said, “I suppose you’re right.” He closed the computer and started for the door. “Don’t stay in here too long. We need to allow her to sleep.”
“Wait!” Irene said to the doctor’s back. “I want to ask you a favor,” she added just as he turned around.
The doctor raised his eyebrows and wore a questioning expression.
“Can you keep her in the hospital just a few days longer?”
The doctor shook his head. “I’m afraid not. We have to release her as soon as she’s well enough.”
“She escaped from jail so she could find her son. He’s in serious trouble. She wanted to help him.”
The doctor gave her an impatient look. “I just checked the computer. She was in jail on suspicion of murder.”
“Yes, but—”
“I’m sorry, ma’am; it’s not my place to decide who should be in jail and who shouldn’t. We have instructions from the police department, and I have to obey them.”
Irene felt her chest tighten. “Who gets to decide when she’s well enough to be released?”
“The medical staff, of course. Now if you’ll excuse me—”
“Who, exactly, on the medical staff has the most influence?”
“In this case, I do, but I can’t—”
“I know you’ve read about this case in the paper, Doctor,” Irene said.
“Certainly, but that doesn’t mean I can flout law and protocol both,” the doctor argued.
“I’m not asking you to flout anything,” Irene said. “I’m just asking you to be certain her condition doesn’t warrant a few more days in the hospital.”
A muscle in the doctor’s face twitched. “I don’t need you to tell me how to care for my patients.”
Irene lowered her eyes. “Of course not. Forgive me. I didn’t mean to imply that you did.”
He gave her a small nod, and his face relaxed slightly, but his only response was an incomprehensible grunt.
“Do you have children?” she asked when his back was to her once again.
He turned around slowly. “Don’t try to play on my sympathy that way,” he said. “It won’t work.”
Her reply was a deep sigh as the doctor disappeared out the door. She glanced at Juanita, noting the bag she had clasped in her hand. There had to be a way she could keep Juanita out of jail. Before Irene could clear her thoughts enough to come up with a plan, the door to the intensive care room opened again, and the doctor stuck his head into the opening.
“I’ll see what I can do,” he said. “But I can’t promise more than a day or two at the most.”
Irene nodded, and the doctor disappeared again. She left the hospital feeling only slightly relieved and primarily disconcerted. Two days was precious little time to tie all the ends together that would, she hoped, keep Juanita out of jail. Besides that, Danny was still missing, and she hadn’t heard from Angel since what she assumed was an accidental call to her mobile phone. Now he’d left the hospital in spite of his wounds. She’d called his number several times, but she pulled her phone from her purse to try again.
She let the phone ring until she heard a measured female voice advising that her party was unavailable, and she could leave a message. It was the third time today she’d called the number, and the third time she’d gotten the canned message. It would be only a few blocks out of her way to drive by his house, so she turned on Agua Fria Road to take her into the old neighborhood. She had driven there last night on the way home from the hospital and again this morning, but she had to try again.
When she parked her car in front of the low, sprawling adobe, it looked as deserted as ever. His Mustang was not in the driveway, and all of the curtains were drawn. Nevertheless, she got out of the car and walked through the flaming red geraniums that lined both sides of the concrete walkway leading up to the house. It seemed eerily quiet as she knocked on the door. There was no response. There was only more silence.
She felt a twisting knot of worry in her stomach as she left his house and drove to the plaza to open Irene’s Closet. When she approached the parking lot behind her store, she had what she knew was an unrealistic surge of hope that Angel’s Mustang would be parked in its usual place.
His spot was empty, but P.J.’s beat-up pickup was parked in the spot next to it. P.J. was waiting for her inside the truck. He got out as soon as he saw her car and walked with her through the back entrance of the store.
“A day or two at the most?” P.J. said when Irene relayed the information about Juanita to him. “That doesn’t give us much time to find the killer.” The two of them were standing in Irene’s store, staring out at the ancient plaza that was almost devoid of tourists. Pavements and sidewalks glistened with rain.
“We have more than that to do,” Irene said. “I have to find Angel! I don’t understand why he doesn’t answer his phone or why he’s not at home.”
“Not like him not to stay in touch,” P.J. said. “Maybe he’ll call eventually.”
“I keep hoping,” Irene said.
“You look terrible,” P.J. added, looking at her. “Why don’t you close the store? Take the day off?”
“Bills to pay,” Irene said.
“I have the same problem in my law office,” P.J. said, “which reminds me of why I’m here. I need to talk to Adelle again. Is she still being held in the hospital?”
“They didn’t keep her long,” Irene said. “Released her within a few hours. She’s home now and feeling well.”
“Mind if I stop by and talk to her?”
Irene gave him a look that was half surprise and half fear. “I strongly advise against it,” Irene said.
“If you’re worried about me talking to her alone, don’t. I can manage.”
“That’s what they all say.”
“Who?”
“All of her husbands. They all thought they could manage when it came to Adelle. I can assure you that no one who has tried has ever been the same again.”
P.J. chuckled and shook his head. “All I want to do is get her to give me a better description of that guy she met at the Green Corn Dance, the one who came on to her.”
“You still think he may be connected to the murders?”
P.J. shrugged. “Don’t know, but I do thi
nk there’s a good chance he may have something to do with whoever is cheating the Fairchilds out of money.”
“Because he mentioned the auction?”
“Yes, among other things.”
Irene nodded. “I know what you’re thinking. That he used Adelle to try to find out what we know about him and the auction fraud.”
“I guess it’s true what they say about great minds.”
“And the auction fraud is connected to the murder. And that’s connected to the disappearance of both Danny and Angel, maybe.”
“And the thigh bone’s connected to the—”
“Don’t make jokes,” Irene said. “This is serious.”
“Of course it is. That’s why I want to talk to Adelle.”
“Not without me,” Irene said.
“Suit yourself,” P.J. said, “but I’m going to talk to her immediately.”
“I can’t go immediately,” Irene said. “I have a store to run.”
“This can’t wait.”
“Of course not. Your rich client’s money is at stake.”
“Don’t be holier than thou.” P.J. pointed an accusing finger at Irene. “You’re not willing to close your store long enough to get to the bottom of this after you just admitted both Danny’s and Angel’s lives may be at stake.”
Irene was acutely aware of how her head hurt and how the tightness in her chest increased. She sighed deeply and noisily. “You’re right.” She went to the door and flipped the OPEN sign over so that the CLOSED side faced the street. “Let’s get this done,” she said.
Chapter 18
“And then they told me that if I didn’t stop they would restrain me!” Adelle’s voice was full of anger. “Restrain me! I’ve never been so upset in my life! Not even when I lost that two-carat diamond ring in Monte Carlo in the seventies when my second husband and I were there to meet the Shah of Iran.”
