Bad Country: A Novel (36 page)

It’s what Mrs. Miller asked me to recover, Rodeo said. It’s what I recovered.

Randy Miller tucked the manuscript under his arm as if it were unimportant.

I understand from my Sissy that she has already paid you two thousand dollars for this … Judge Miller tapped the manuscript under his arm. And now you are asking for another three thousand. I have a little problem with that.

You won’t when you read Tinley Burke’s memoir, Mr. Miller.

The politician narrowed his eyes at the private investigator.

I don’t quite see how it is with you, friend. I don’t quite see your whole angle here.

My daddy said that sometimes the smart man just pays up and doesn’t make a big fuss on principle about every little thing, said Rodeo. And in the long run that can just be the cheaper way out of a jam, Mr. Miller.

Randy Miller stared at Rodeo then nodded and managed the manuscript as he pulled a large roll of high denomination bills out of a gabardine pants pocket. I will do business with you just this once, for my Sissy’s sake, the judge said. He handed Rodeo three one-thousand-dollar bills and Rodeo stared at the face of Grover Cleveland for a second then folded the money into his shirt pocket. The judge tucked the manuscript back under his arm.

What is your real agenda here, friend?

Rodeo stared at the judge, who locked eyes.

You know a man named Ronald Rocha, don’t you, Judge Miller? This abrupt question made the judge flinch. A single bead of scalp sweat coursed down his face and he brushed at it with his free hand. Ronald worked for y’all on Slash/M rancho down in Los Jarros, I think. And he served under you in the Gulf War. You know Ronald, Mr. Miller. Covert type. Torture expert. Sniper. A helluva shot from what I hear.

Randy Miller wiped away the gloss of sweat now on his full upper lip with the back of a white hand.

Is that what this is really all about, friend? Politics?

Nossir, said Rodeo. I guess it’s more along the lines of what I know about, what information I have.

And what intelligence would you possess that would be of interest to me? What information do you possess that I might have a need for?

I’m not selling information at the moment, Judge Miller.

Then what is your concern here, friend?

Erica Hernandez, Rodeo said. The sitting congressman from District Seven. Your opponent in the November elections.

Judge Miller raised both eyebrows.

I don’t want to see her assassinated by Ronald Rocha. Rodeo said this plainly and did not wipe the sweat off his face. And I don’t want there to be a fake assassination attempt on you that might unfairly alter the outcome of this next election.

And when and where was this supposed assassination or faux assassination attempt to take place? Randy Miller asked this as if he wanted the information.

Weren’t you going to give some sort of speech at the Juvenile Detention Center in South Tucson next month? asked Rodeo. Dedicating the new wing? Rolling in your caravan down Starr Pass Road in easy range of A-Mountain?

When Randy Miller squinted at Rodeo the skin on his whole face tightened. Perhaps I underestimated you, Mr. Garnet.

It’s happened that way before, Mr. Miller, Rodeo said.

Are you working for someone I know or should get to know?

I’m not working for anybody at the moment except your wife, said Rodeo. And Mrs. Miller has paid me to do a specific job of work for her and I did that job and she can trust me about that, said Rodeo.

The judge pulled the manuscript from under his arm and examined it more closely now, pursed his lips then squinted at Rodeo.

You have a license for your private investigation service, Mr. Garnet?

You can have your people look it up, Mr. Miller.

I think I will do that, Randy Miller said. Do you want anything else from me and my family?

I didn’t call y’all, Mr. Miller, said Rodeo. Y’all called me.

It won’t happen again, I assure you, said the judge. In fact, I don’t imagine your business phone will be ringing much at all in the future.

Suit yourself about that, Mr. Miller.

Rodeo got in his pickup and slammed the door shut. As he backed out, he looked at Randy Miller out the side window and over his elbow.

Good luck in your run for Congress, Mr. Miller. Though I think it’s a long shot.

I think I’ve got a fine shot at it, friend.

*   *   *

Rodeo drove east as fast as his old Ford 150 would go, which still kept him well under the posted speed limits on I-10. He didn’t slow down but for gasoline until he was in Texas and did not park until he turned off the truck in a Pay-and-Lock parking lot in downtown El Paso. He rented a room for a night at the Gardner Hotel, the downtown El Paso equivalent of Tucson’s Arizona Motel, which catered mostly to male pensioners, hitchhikers and European hostelers looking to slum. He paid the extra fee for his dog and led him up shaky wooden stairs to a barely furnished room with cracked window glass and the stench of old cigar smoke. The dog, exhausted from his long driving trip, simply circled three times and curled up near the foot of the sagging bed.

Rodeo used the El Paso telephone directory to find his next destination. There were dozens of O’Neals but only one labeled M
RS.
T
HOM.
O’N
EAL
. He dialed the number but it was disconnected. He tore the page out of the phone book and left the dog sleeping in the hotel.

*   *   *

The neighborhood of Mrs. Thomas O’Neal was near the University of Texas at El Paso, and Rodeo’s GPS guided him to a modest but freshly painted frame house planted in a neatly kept yard. He pressed the doorbell but no one answered. He moved to one of the similar-looking houses aside the O’Neal residence and rang the electric bell. An elderly man appeared behind an aluminum screen door and peered myopically at his unexpected and very bruised and disheveled caller.

How can I help you, sir?

I’m looking for the Mrs. O’Neal that lives next door, Rodeo said. Mrs. Thomas O’Neal, I think.

What’s your business with Mrs. O’Neal, sir?

I have a letter from her son I thought she might like to have.

Her son?

Her son Billy, said Rodeo.

Well, sir, Mrs. O’Neal has been passed on now for a number of years. And her son, well I don’t know that he has been around here for twenty years or more.

Does … did Mrs. O’Neal have a daughter who was a nun?

A nun? The old man stared at Rodeo. No. Miss Jane O’Neal is a nurse. Are you sure you even know the O’Neals, sir? The man sounded suspicious.

Nossir, said Rodeo. I didn’t mean to trouble you with what has probably turned out to be a wild goose chase.

The old man shut his door and locked it several times. Rodeo walked back to his truck and drove to a liquor store where he bought a six-pack of Tecate in cans, two limes, a pack of Marlboro Reds, a Party Size bag of Fritos, a plastic tub of Hidden Valley Ranch Dip and a pint of Jim Beam. He asked for his change in quarters and after he deposited his vice in the truck stationed himself at the pay phone bolted to the front of the convenience store.

He asked to speak directly with Detective Haynes and was put on hold by the Tucson Police Department dispatcher.

Jethro Haynes.

Rodeo Garnet.

Well, I guess you heard the news then, Garnet.

No, I hadn’t heard any news.

Carlos Monjano cracked in The Box, said the Tucson Police Department detective. Once we threatened to exhume that little girl of his for DNA tests to prove that he was the real father he confessed to the drive-by. Monjano did not want us disturbing his little sleeping beauty queen’s eternal rest, I guess.

The detective sounded pleased.

That little girl was his child, Detective, said Rodeo. Her name was Farrah Katherine Rocha.

The detective did not reply to this scold for a moment. It’s a sad business I’m in, Mr. Garnet, the cop said. But it is a business and it will never go away, I’m afraid. I don’t do the crimes, I just process them. Like yourself but in a more professional way.

I solve crimes, Detective, Rodeo said. I don’t just process them. But I savvy your drift. And I know it gets to be like that, doesn’t it? We all get to be like that about death and dying eventually, don’t we?

It is inevitable, said the detective. But the bright side is I am getting a major collar and somebody else … who knows who? is making money from 88CRIME for the anonymous tips to the hotline. That is, if the good citizen who made the anonymous call might care to collect the money for that anonymous information.

Everybody has to make a living, Detective Haynes.

Yes they do, said the cop. Even private investigators.

I guess Clint Overman is not coming back to work anytime soon? asked Rodeo.

Detective Overman is currently on extended medical leave since he piled his pickup into a tree near a kid’s soccer field and then left an abusive message on the governor’s voice mail. Detective Haynes paused a beat. So I doubt that Mr. Overman is coming back in an official capacity to any position in Law Enforcement at TPD or in Arizona since you cannot make mistakes like that in any bureaucracy, said Haynes. So you deal with me now at TPD, Garnet, or you don’t deal with Tucson Police at all.

I’m afraid I got some more business for you then, Detective. And this one’s not coming in on the hotline because you will owe me personal for this one.

I’m not sure I want that sort of debt from someone like you, Garnet.

Suit yourself when you hear it, said Rodeo.

May I record this phone call?

No, said Rodeo. He spoke very quickly. 592 South Convent Avenue, said Rodeo. Refrigerator freezer and Grand Canyon commemorative plate. Look in the bookshelves and the back outbuildings too.

Tinley Burke’s place?

Get in touch with Ted Anderton, late of State Highway Traffic now with Special Investigations Unit, Rodeo said. He’ll explain it all to you. And tell the trooper that he owes me too.

*   *   *

Rodeo awoke the next morning bloated from salt, his head swollen from beer and bourbon and a beating and with his tongue fuzzed from half a pack of cigarettes. He had fallen asleep in his clothes, so he unpacked a clean outfit and took a long tepid shower and re-dressed himself. He then fed and watered and walked his dog and left the dog asleep in the lobby of the Gardner Hotel, a once-fine establishment that was now mostly occupied by old men who liked old dogs.

Rodeo snagged a Styrofoam cup of very bad coffee and a couple of local newspapers from the lobby and sat in a lawn chair on the sidewalk in front of the Gardner, one eye aimed at the street and the other eye scanning the police blotter and news sections of the newspapers. Several stories were noteworthy to the PI.

*   *   *

The postmortem indictment of Tinley Chance Burke, brother-in-law to Law and Order, Right Wing Tea Party frontman Randy Miller, former Pima County Judge, former Speaker of the Arizona State House of Representatives, current frontrunner in the November midterm elections for Erica Hernandez’s District Seven Congressional Seat, had made the morning edition of the
El Paso Star-Telegram
.

Tinley Burke was being considered posthumously as potentially involved with the homicide of Winthrop Begay (of Lake Havasu, Arizona) in Sells, Arizona. Incriminating evidence of a wide variety had been discovered in and around the former rented domicile of the erstwhile University of Arizona adjunct professor. No direct response from Judge Randy Miller had been available by early morning press time but Miller’s spokespeople had assured the press that Randy Miller would do what was correct and Christian in order to uphold conservative family values in this matter.

The murder of Ray “Apache Ray” Molina, Sheriff of Los Jarros County, Arizona, was on page four of the
Telegram
. The lawman’s murder was still under investigation by Los Jarros County and Arizona State Law Enforcement. Ray Molina’s next-of-kin, his daughter Sirena Rae Asquith Molina had been detained as a person of interest by the Special Investigations Unit of the State Police and questioned about her father’s death, but had been released on her own recognizance and was, according to her lawyer, Jarred Willis, Esquire, uninvolved with this crime. Jarred Willis suggested Law Enforcement widen the net of their inquiries and perhaps recognize the half dozen murders of Native-American men during the last several weeks in Los Jarros County as potentially all being the handiwork of a single serial killer.

*   *   *

Rodeo’s name was not mentioned in the Burke/Randy Miller article or in the article about the death of Los Jarros County Sheriff, Ray Molina.

*   *   *

There was no mention in that edition of the
Star-Telegram
of the case of Carlos Monjano in connection with the death of Samuel Rocha, though all the regional and national news outlets eventually picked up the Reservation cop’s arrest. Eventually it became public that Carlos Monjano was the biological father of Farrah Katherine Rocha but her body was never exhumed.

*   *   *

When Katherine Rocha, the grandmother of Farrah and Samuel Rocha, died of a stroke in her house on the Pascua Yaqui Reservation, no mention was made in the regional or national press. Tucson papers and TV, however, did report that Katherine Rocha had probably been in her house dead on the kitchen floor for several days, in the last days of August heat, when she was discovered by a USPS mail carrier who noticed the stench while delivering junk mail.

*   *   *

Rodeo used the local El Paso phone book and his cell phone to locate Jane O’Neal at Saint Ignacio Hospital but was told by a the hospital telephone operator that nurses’ shifts would not be divulged to anyone without proper clearance. When Rodeo was done with his several cups of coffee and his dog was through with his morning constitutional, they drove to the small, private hospital on the northside of El Paso.

At the Information Desk of Saint Ignacio, Rodeo was informed that Jane O’Neal was an ER nurse, so he found his way to the Emergency Room and asked for her.