Todd Sloan had run out of luck. He’d ended up stuffed in the ground under three dead hound dogs with nothing but a piece of garden plastic for a comforter.
With the plastic peeled back so that the pathetic, small corpse was completely exposed, Estelle Reyes-Guzman took photos and measurements. I stood back and wondered what to do next. Robert Torrez kept saying, “Huh,” as if that one grunt summed it all up.
“His mother said he went to Florida to live with daddy,” I said. “She said he went there a couple of weeks ago.” Torrez nodded and offered his one syllable. “But you said he was at the shoe store earlier in the week, buying a pair of shoes that could tie him to the farm supply robbery.”
“So either she was lying, or she really didn’t know that he was still hanging out around town,” Torrez said, finally slipping back into gear.
“She would know,” Estelle said. She knelt down next to my briefcase and rewound an exhausted roll of film.
“Why is that?”
“She just would.”
“A mother speaks,” I said, and pulled a corner of the blanket away from Francis Carlos’ face. He was sleeping through the best part.
“But it’s true, sir,” Estelle persisted. “If her son was in town, she’d know about it.”
“Then there’s only one alternative,” I said.
“She was lying.” I could see the artery in Deputy Torrez’s neck pulse as his blood pressure escalated. He kept shifting position, trying to get away from the smell.
“Could be.”
“There’s a bigger question,” Estelle said, standing up with a freshly loaded camera. She looked at me and raised one eyebrow.
“Does she know that her son is planted up here,” I said.
“Right.”
“Before all the fireworks start, we need to ask her. Robert, pick up Gayle Sedillos to act as a matron and go on out to the trailer park. Pick up Mrs. Sloan and bring her out here. She can identify the remains right here.”
“Are you sure you want to do that, sir?” Estelle asked.
“Yes, I’m sure. If she doesn’t know the boy’s dead, we’ll be able to tell.” I looked at Torrez. “We’ll meet you down at the road. Don’t just lead her up here cold. I want a minute to talk with her first.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Robert—”
“Sir?”
“I
do not
want the press up here. Not yet, anyway.”
He nodded and trotted off toward his patrol car, glad for the fresh air.
“It would appear he was wounded twice, sir,” Estelle said.
“Not heavy caliber, though?” I was thinking of Stuart Torkelson’s run of bad luck.
“I would guess not. It looks like he was shot once here, behind the ear. It didn’t rupture the vault of the skull, so we should be able to recover a slug. And it looks like he was wounded somehow in the stomach as well. There’s a lot of blood there.”
“The autopsy will tell us all we need to know.” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, wishing that I had a cigarette to clean up the fouled air. “You willing to make any guesses?”
“No, sir. I’m sure that Reuben had nothing to do with it. He couldn’t have managed. And he wouldn’t have bothered.”
“Unless he had a partner,” I said and watched the dark expression cloud Estelle’s face.
“That’s not a habit he would be apt to adopt this late in his life,” she said, her tone clipped with annoyance. “He lived alone.”
“Just mentioning all angles,” I said. “That leaves two routes. Torkelson was into something that went sour. Something that involved the kid here. Or…Torkelson just happened to wander into the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Estelle offered a slight smile. “I’m glad this isn’t in my jurisdiction.”
“You’d never guess it. And turnabout is only fair. I’ll get you so wrapped up in this you’ll never go home.”
“You’d do that.”
“Yes, I would.” I looked down at Todd Sloan’s sorry remains and was reaching down with my free hand to flip the plastic back over him when Estelle extended a hand to stop me.
“Wait a minute,” she said. She knelt down, moving to keep her shadow out of the way. “I don’t understand this. Look at his hair.”
I did so and saw sandy blond hair caked with blood and dirt.
“And here,” Estelle said, pointing at Todd Sloan’s face around the eyes. “And here.”
“And everywhere,” I added. “He’s covered with dirt.”
Estelle nodded and rocked back on her haunches. “So tell me what I’m missing,” she said.
“When a body is buried, it gets dirty,” I said. “That might be one of the more predictable things in life.”
Estelle shot me one of her rare withering looks. Behind us on the county road traffic was picking up. The ambulance arrived, with Dr. Emerson Clark’s blue Buick not far behind. I knew the elderly physician would stay with his car until one of the officers arrived to escort him over the uneven ground…after they cut the barbed wire fence.
“Sir,” Estelle said, ignoring the traffic. “Todd Sloan was wrapped in heavy plastic when he was buried here.”
“I see that.”
“It would protect the corpse from the dirt. Somewhat, at least.”
I pushed the black plastic aside with the toe of my boot and looked at Todd Sloan again. “Well, son of a bitch,” I said. And now that I looked, it was as obvious as daylight. The dirt—most of it pale dun yellow in color—was pressed into the clothes, the hair, even remnants of it here and there on Sloan’s face. I bent over and looked closer. “I’ll be damned.”
“What do you think, sir?”
I looked up at Estelle. Her expression was worried. I couldn’t fault her for that. I was worried too. Todd Sloan had been buried once without benefit of the plastic shroud. And then he’d been exhumed, stuffed in plastic, and reburied out here, on the edge of this desolate pasture. For the first time I realized how lucky old Reuben Fuentes had been. He hadn’t heard anything. And he wouldn’t have stood a ghost of a chance against the sort of person who’d killed Todd Sloan.
The efficiency of the Posadas community grapevine was astonishing. We were careful. Not once did I or one of my deputies slip and mention murder, corpse, burial, or Reuben Fuentes over the radio. Not once.
And yet, when Robert Torrez finally returned with Gayle Sedillos and Miriam Sloan in the back seat of his county car, he had difficulty finding a place to park. The narrow county road was a dusty bumper to bumper crowd scene.
And the press, damn its efficient hide, was there. Linda Rael had cornered Sheriff Holman, who didn’t want to get anywhere near the burial site or the bagged corpse. He obviously wasn’t giving Linda much satisfaction, because she kept looking our way—probably wondering who the stately Mexican woman in my company was. Or maybe she was wondering why the hell I was walking around holding a sleeping infant.
I handed Francis Carlos to his mother and headed for the roadway.
For his part, Holman kept looking up the road at a large white van with the Channel 3 logo on its side. He patted his hair for the tenth time, always ready should the unblinking eye turn his way. No one was going to cross the fence without my say-so. Tommy Mears had stretched a yellow crime scene ribbon along enough of the barbed wire that everyone got the point.
Torrez parked in the middle of the road and I reached the fence just as he opened the back door of the patrol car for Miriam Sloan and Gayle. Gayle, half Mrs. Sloan’s age and as stylish as the other woman was frumpy, was dressed in civilian clothes. She expertly put herself between Mrs. Sloan and the burly youngster who balanced the large television camera on his shoulder.
Gayle and the deputy led Mrs. Sloan to the spot in the fence where we’d fashioned a narrow gate.
I met them there and reached out to take Mrs. Sloan by the elbow as she slipped past the loose wires.
“Sheriff,” I said loudly enough for Martin Holman to hear. He’d been working his way toward us, trying to stay helpful to Linda and the dozen other curious onlookers at the same time. He excused himself, looking grateful.
Miriam Sloan was wearing a pale blue housedress and a worn cardigan sweater…no coat, typical of long-time New Mexicans who harbored that curious, innate belief that as long as the sun shone, it was shirt-sleeve time. Her shoes—more like slippers—were blue plastic and almost as inappropriate for the hike across the field as if she’d been barefoot.
She was breathing hard but otherwise her face was set in a stolid mask.
“We’re sorry to have to bring you out here,” I said, keeping my hold on her left elbow. Gayle flanked right, and to my surprise Miriam Sloan stepped right out, far more surefooted than I.
We said nothing as we crossed the field. A couple dozen feet from the grave site, I heard Martin Holman behind me say something like, “Hmmmmm,” and I glanced over my shoulder. The sheriff was showing great interest in the limestone patch off to one side, where the first blood traces had been found. The smell had gotten to him.
Mrs. Sloan didn’t hesitate. She stopped abruptly two paces from the grave, with the plastic-wrapped body within kicking distance.
Deputy Torrez had removed the small tape recorder from his shirt pocket. I noticed that Gayle’s was clipped to her belt.
Torrez caught my glance and nodded that he was ready.
I said, “Mrs. Sloan, I know this is difficult for you.” From the expression on her face I would have guessed that she’d find it more interesting to be home washing out empty mayonnaise jars. I stepped forward, bent down, and peeled back the corner of the plastic far enough that Todd Sloan’s entire head and neck were visible.
“Mrs. Sloan, is this your son, Todd?”
I could have counted to five in the heavy silence that hung around us. Then she said, “Yes.”
I snapped the plastic back in place and stood up. “We appreciate you coming out. I’m sorry.” There wasn’t much else to say to her, at least nothing that would make her feel any better. She was doing a commendable job of holding herself together in front of strangers. What she’d do in the privacy of her little trailer was her business.
“Mrs. Sloan, if there’s anything I can do, or the department—” Martin Holman had managed to maneuver close enough that he could stand with his back to the grave and still see Miriam Sloan’s face.
She looked up slowly and squinted at Holman, her pudgy, florid face wrinkling against the bright sky. “You can find who did this,” she said. Then she turned and started back toward the car. I nodded at the deputy, and he and Gayle escorted the woman to the road.
Coroner Emerson Clark had come and gone long since, and there was nothing left but to turn the body over to the patient ambulance attendants.
“What now?” Sheriff Holman asked. He had taken the opportunity to distance himself another couple paces from the grave, taking advantage of a slight breeze.
“We see what the medical examiner can tell us,” I said.
“And in the meantime, what about Mrs. Sloan?”
“Bob Torrez and Gayle will take her home. That’ll give her about twenty minutes to do some thinking. Then Estelle and I will pay her a visit.”
Holman looked over at Estelle and the baby. “You’re going to arrest her?”
“Martin, there’s no evidence for that yet. We do want to find out why she lied to me about where her son was.”
“There might be a logical reason,” Holman said.
“There might be. By morning, the M.E. can tell us what killed him, when, how…and where he might have been buried the first time.”
Holman made a face. “That’s really disgusting. That someone would do that.”
I almost chuckled. “Cheer up, Martin.”
“Why?”
“It’s going to get worse.”
“Shit,” he muttered, one of the few times I’d heard him cuss. “I wish I knew what to tell the news reporters.”
“Tell them that the body of Todd Sloan, age fifteen, was discovered this afternoon in a shallow grave seven point eight miles west of Posadas. And tell them that currently we’re investigating possible links between the death of Sloan and the murder of Stuart Torkelson, fifty-four, a prominent Posadas realtor.”
Holman managed a rueful grin. “I can figure that much out for myself, Bill. It’s the questions they ask afterward that get all over me.”
I watched the ambulance attendants trudging back toward the road with the gurney bobbing between them.
“Just tell ’em ‘no comment.’”
Holman fell in step with Estelle and me. “Sometimes this job isn’t all that great,” he said. I shot a quick glance over at Estelle. Ever polite and politic, she was concentrating on where she put her feet.
We reached the road and Holman held up a hand to ward off Linda Rael. “You’ll call me?” he asked me, and I nodded.
“We’re going to the hospital for a minute, then on out to the trailer park,” I said.
“She won’t—”
I shook my head. “Deputy Torrez and Gayle will be with her until we get out there. Not to worry.”
Martin Holman looked relieved. He turned to face the cameras.
Miriam Sloan hadn’t been home more than half an hour before Estelle and I arrived at the trailer park. Dr. Francis Guzman had remained at the hospital to keep an eye on Reuben, who was still resting peacefully. He also took charge of Francis Carlos, giving the nursing staff at Posadas General a chance to oh and ah.
Deputy Bob Torrez stepped up to the window of the Blazer as I pulled into Miriam Sloan’s yard.
“Now that you’re here, I’d really like to take a run out to the wrecking yard where Trujillo works,” he said.
“Fine,” I said. “What are you hunting?”
“I figure that if Todd Sloan was involved in the farm supply robbery, that’s as good a place as any to start hunting for some of the tools that were taken. I got a pretty complete list from Wayne Sanchez.”
“All right. And stay close to a radio. We don’t know how any of this is going to shape up, Robert. But you’re right. The more loose ends we can nail down, the better.”
We parked the Blazer and got out. Miriam Sloan didn’t greet us at the door this time. Kenny Trujillo did, though. His old Ford pickup, more decrepit by far than Miriam Sloan’s worn-out Oldsmobile, was parked under the kitchen window of the trailer.
“Kenny,” I said. His eyes were watchful with the built-in distrust of someone who’s had a brush or two with the law. “We need to talk with Miriam now, if she’s up to it.”
“She’s inside.”
He stood to one side on the porch as Estelle and I entered the trailer. The floor creaked as the flimsy plywood flexed under my weight.
Miriam Sloan came out of a back room. Her eyes were puffy and she had a ball of tissue wadded in one hand.
“Ma’am, we really need to ask you some questions,” I said. “I know it’s been rough, but the sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can be out of your hair.”
She gestured toward the remains of a three-cushion sofa that spanned from the television console to the veneered particle board bookcase that separated living room and dinette. Two of the three shelves were empty except for dust. On the third were two volumes of condensed novels and a blue plastic bowl.
Estelle and I sat on the sofa. Miriam Sloan settled for a metal straight-backed chair near the kitchen counter. Kenny Trujillo got a beer out of the refrigerator and sat on the other side of the counter.
“Mrs. Sloan,” I said, “I’m sure you’ll do all you can to help us find your son’s killer. But I’m going to be honest with you. We’re really up against it. That field out there is about as clean of any clues as it’s possible to be.” I shook my head and watched while Trujillo shook a cigarette out of its pack. He took his time lighting it.
“One thing really puzzles me,” I continued. “You told me earlier that Todd had gone to Florida to live with his father.” I stopped for a few seconds. Miriam Sloan’s knuckles went whiter as she clenched the tissue. She had been holding me in a fixed glare, but now her gaze wavered. She looked down at her hands.
“I thought he had,” she said quietly. “At first, that’s what he said he was going to do. Him and Kenny, here…they never did get along too well.” She glanced over at her boyfriend, a kid young enough to be her son. “I think he was jealous. I don’t know. He was all the time saying he was going to leave, and the last few times, he sounded like maybe he meant it.”
“And you would have let him?” I asked.
“He was old enough to make up his own mind about things,” Miriam replied. “I mean—” she hesitated. “Nothing I could say would change his mind.”
Kenny Trujillo snorted and blew out a cloud of smoke. “That’s for sure.”
I started to say something, but Miriam interrupted me. “He was spending more and more time with that Staples boy. You know him, I’m sure.” I did know Richard Staples and was sure he would be on Robert Torrez’s short list of suspects. “I think him and Richard were planning to leave. And the last few days, he must have been staying over with Richard Staples, ’cause he certainly wasn’t here. That’s why I just thought he’d gone to Florida…like he was promising.” She dabbed at her nose with the tissue.
“We have reason to believe that Todd may have been involved in a series of burglaries, Mrs. Sloan.” She didn’t look up and didn’t look surprised. “Do you know anything about that?”
“I don’t think he’d do that,” she said after a long moment of tissue crumpling. “Now I know—” and she held up a hand to fend off an expected protest from me, “that you people have had your complaints with Todd in the past. But he’s been trying harder lately. He’s been doing better in school. You ask Mr. Archer.”
“He has,” Kenny agreed.
“Did he ever mention friends of his maybe being involved in break-ins?” Estelle asked. Her quiet voice was apparently so unexpected that Miriam Sloan’s head snapped around. She looked long and hard at Estelle.
“Excuse me. This is Detective Estelle Reyes-Guzman,” I said.
“I remember you,” Miriam said. She didn’t pursue the memory.
“Did he mention friends being involved?”
“He didn’t talk to me very much,” Miriam said. “The only person he ever mentioned was Richard Staples. He spent a lot of time over there.”
“You ought to talk to that kid,” Kenny Trujillo said. “He’s a real little asshole. He worked out at the wreckin’ yard with me a time or two, and he don’t know his ass from a hole in the ground. Tries to be a big shot, though. Like he knows it all. I told Todd a time or two he had no business truckin’ with that kid, but he wouldn’t listen. You know how they are.” I was amused by Kenny’s social commentary. If he kept working at it, he could take a test to be a juvenile counselor, between beers and his own brushes with the law.
“And you don’t have any ideas about what kind of trouble Todd might have been in? That would prompt someone to do something like this?”
“He ain’t never been in trouble like this before,” Kenny Trujillo said. He ground out the cigarette butt. His brow was furrowed in thought. “Seems to me he must have crossed somebody up.” He looked at me. “Seems to me that’s what had to happen. You got any ideas?”
I shrugged. “Not yet. But we will.” I stood up. “We’ll keep you posted, Mrs. Sloan. If you think of anything we should know—”
“We’ll call. Yes.” She didn’t get up.
We left the trailer park after making sure that Deputies Paul Encinos and Eddie Mitchell were in the area. Paul parked his patrol car on the county road east of the trailer park, just below the driveway to Anna Hocking’s place. From there, he could watch the back of the Sloans’ trailer. Eddie Mitchell, no doubt relieved to be away from the hospital, parked his county car in the driveway of the trailer park, conspicuous as hell.
We pulled out on the county road and Estelle said, “Richard Staples?”
“Yes. Do you want to check back at the hospital first?”
She glanced at her watch. “It’s still early yet. Let’s visit the kid first.”
Richard Staples lived with an aunt, Marianna Perna, in the Casa del Sol Apartments behind the high school. It was one of those dark little corners of the village where I seldom went. Posadas had its own village police force—two full-time officers and three part-timers—and my department tried to leave the village alone unless they requested our help.
An eight-foot chain link and barbwire-topped fence separated the back of the high school gymnasium from the apartment complex’s parking lot. I parked along the fence, scanning the eight front doors of Casa del Sol.
The building was single-story, looking like a motel. Each unit couldn’t have been more than three small rooms. Marianna Perna lived in 104. The number was broken off the blue door, but the paint wasn’t quite as faded where the digits had been. A decrepit Ford Festiva was parked directly in front of the door next to a toddler-sized tricycle, a plastic scooter missing the back axle and wheels, and a small-bore dirt bike missing its back wheel, balanced on two cinder blocks under the engine.
The clutter in front of 104 was repeated, in various colors and details, in front of each apartment.
“Great place,” I said. I jotted down the license plate number of the Festiva and reached for the door handle of the Blazer. The radio interrupted me.
“Three ten, PCS.”
It was Gayle Sedillos.
“Go ahead,” I said.
“Three ten, ten nineteen.”
“Is this something that can wait a bit, Gayle?” I asked. She wanted me to return to the office. The only person I could think of who might want to see me was Sheriff Martin Holman, and I wasn’t in the mood.
“Negative, sir.”
“Ten four. We’ll be there in about a minute and a half.”
Gayle knew how I worked. She knew I didn’t like department business blabbed over the airwaves, and so she was as cryptic as she could be on the radio. But her common sense could be trusted. If she said her visitor couldn’t wait, that was that.
I backed out of the apartment parking lot. The sheriff’s department was eight blocks away, and my estimate was just about right. As we pulled into the lot, only one vehicle was out of place. Herb Torrance’s mud-caked Chevrolet one-ton, its fat, dual-wheeled rump projecting six feet beyond the rear of Gayle’s Datsun, was parked in the space reserved for the sheriff.
Herb was standing near the front of the truck, leaning on the hood. He saw us and straightened up.
I pulled in beside his truck. Despite the mud and dirt, the Triple Bar T logo was visible on the door panel.
“Reuben’s neighbor,” I said to Estelle. “Where’s he been all this time?”
“Knowing Mr. Torrance, probably minding his own business,” Estelle replied.
A week before, I might have believed that.