Desert Shadows (9781615952250) (18 page)

My cue. “I believe you have a John Alden Brookings working for you?”

He pursed his lips. “Mr. Brookings is one of our part-time employees, yes.”

“Is Mr. Brookings here now?”

“He only works two days a week. Today is not one of them.”

Acceeding to my request, Ramos wrote down Brookings' phone number and address, which wasn't too far from Megan and Zach's former home. As I tucked the piece of paper into my carry-all, I asked, “I've heard that Gloriana made it difficult for Mr. Brookings to find work. Did she fax his ‘corrected' job history to you?”

A faint smile. “She most certainly did. You have heard the story about the ‘Alden' part being inaccurate? Well, I do not care if Mr. Brookings' ancestors rode that particular leaky boat or not. The only thing that concerned me when he applied here was his editing skills, and they were—and continue to be—excellent. He can take a hopelessly garbled manuscript, find the nugget of interest, and build a solid book around it.”

I thought back to my conversation with Zhang. “I'm sure most publishers in town didn't care about the Mayflower business, either. But I've also heard the resumé contained other, ah, inaccurate information.”

“Perhaps you should ask him that yourself. Now, if you'll excuse me, I was in the middle of a good book.” The smile was brilliant.

“One more thing, Mr. Ramos. When we spoke at the Festival of the West, you seemed quite emotional about Gloriana and Patriot's Blood. Did Gloriana ever do anything to damage you or your publishing house?”

He shook his head. “I am not certain she realized Verdad even existed. After all, none of us came over on the Mayflower. Our own ancestors arrived with Cortez a century earlier. But if Gloriana had ever turned her viper gaze toward Verdad.…Well, let me assure you that coming under Gloriana Alden-Taylor's scrutiny would be an uncomfortable experience for anyone. It is well known in the publishing community that there was no moderation to be found in her. Once she became enraptured by a thing, she stayed focused on it to the exclusion of all else, even family.”

“What do you mean, ‘even family'? I thought that was one of her major obsessions—family.”

“Her family's bloodlines, yes, but not
la familia
. There is a difference. People were not human beings to Gloriana, merely symbols of some abstract idea. For proof of this, you only need to see how she treated her
familia.
She was a neglectful mother, a hostile sister. Her niece…well, her treatment of that poor girl was unconscionable. A young mother, made to work all those hours, it is a scandal. But even her grandson was little more than an employee to Gloriana. She only cared what he could do for her.”

“But she left almost everything to Zach. House, Patriot's Blood, the whole deal.”

He shrugged. “Who else was there to leave it to? She disapproved of her daughter's lifestyle and she cared little for her sisters. At least Zachary is of her blood and understands the world of publishing. Not that he will put that knowledge to use. He dreams of something called
literature
.” A soft chuckle.

I'd been wondering about Zach's plans, myself. “Tell me, Mr. Ramos, do you think he has any chance to make a go of it publishing the kinds of books he's talking about, all that experimental stuff?”

“While I very much admire Zachary Alden-Taylor as a decent human being, I have little faith in his publishing acumen. Few people wish to read ‘literature' anymore. We are all too busy working two or three jobs to peruse long descriptive passages about the memories that a madeline may invoke.”

“Who's she?”

He corrected me. “Not who. What. The name of a French butter cookie Proust wrote about with such great effect in his
Remembrance of Things Past.
But that was another place, another time. Whether we decry the fact or not, this is the twenty-first century and people's lives and reading preferences have changed. So much so that it is my belief that if Zachary continues on his unwise path, Patriot's Blood will be bankrupt by the end of the year.”

While I didn't know anything about publishing, it sounded to me like Ramos' prediction made sense. Poor Zach. Poor Megan. Poor strays.

Before I left Verdad, I purchased all four books in the Detective Consuela Lopez series. Thanks to a trigger-happy redhead, my evenings remained free. Sublimating my murderous impulses toward a certain cowboy with a well-written mystery seemed like a fine idea.

It sure beat sitting in jail.

Chapter 19

John Alden Brookings lived in Wigwam Court, one of the few remaining trailer parks in southern Scottsdale, but it was no luxury RV park for vacationing or retired seniors. The Wigwam was a place populated by down-and-outs who had little money and even less hope. I steered the Jeep through the trailer park's narrow lanes and took note of the rusting single-wides and unkempt grounds.

I pulled up to Space 34 with a sense of foreboding. The weeds in Brookings' tiny front yard grew knee-high, and the old red Monte Carlo up on blocks in the driveway looked like restoration efforts had long since been abandoned. The grill was crushed, the front window shattered and its once-red paint sun-bleached to the same color as Brookings' pale pink trailer. Brookings hadn't just fallen upon hard times—he'd been buried by them.

When I stepped out of the Jeep, I noticed a wheelchair ramp leading up to the trailer's door. And on that door, yet another National Alliance flier. The boys sure got around. I was about to remove it when the screen door opened and a gaunt face peered up at me from a wheelchair.

“You're late.”

Before I could tell Brookings he must have mistaken me for someone else, he wheeled away from the door, calling over his shoulder, “Well, don't just stand there, come on in and let's get this over with. I don't have all day, ha ha.”

I entered the trailer, my eyes straining against the darkness. “Mr. Brookings, I think.…”

“What a nice change, someone from a government agency actually thinking. Will wonders never cease.”

The trailer smelled like old beer and even older cigarettes. A few flies buzzed around a bowl filled with wrinkled apples.

Magazines and books lay scattered on every available surface, even slopping over from the tiny kitchen's countertop into a sink which appeared not to have been scoured in years. If the trailer had ever held a sofa, it was long gone, replaced by a crude desk constructed by placing a cheap, hollow-core door across two battered file cabinets. I glanced down the hallway toward the tiny bedroom, where I could see no bed, merely shelves of books, books, and more books. Where did the man sleep? Stretched out across the Encyclopedia Britannica?

“So why are you denying my claim this time? As you can see, I'm as crippled up as ever.” He plucked a cigarette from a crumpled pack but didn't offer me one.

“I'm not denying you anything, Mr. Brookings, because I'm obviously not who you think I am.” I handed him my card.

He favored me with a dry chuckle, which quickly turned into a vicious cough. He lit the cigarette anyway. “So not only does the State usually show up late, sometimes it doesn't show up at all. What can I do for you, my pretty? No, let me guess. Private detective. Hmmm. Since my ex-wives have long since figured out they won't be bleeding any money from this miserable old stone, you must be here about something else. Hmmm again.”

Then he raised his hands in manufactured surprise. “Could it.…Oh, could it be that your visit has something to do with a certain late-but-unlamented publisher?”

I tossed his bitter tone back at him. “You're quick, Mr. Brookings, no doubt about it.”

His grin revealed surprisingly white teeth, and I realized that he wasn't as old as I'd first thought, probably only somewhere in his forties. Although his clothing was rumpled, it was clean, and his fingernails had recently been manicured.

He took another drag on his cigarette. “Have a seat, detective, and let's talk.”

I looked around, but the only “seat” I saw in the trailer was a step stool parked next to a walker, so I headed toward that.

“I don't get many visitors,” Brookings explained, after I'd propped myself against the stool's hard surface. “Those I do get, I generally don't want to stay long. I might make an exception for you, though. You're hot, but then I doubt if I'm the first man to tell you that.”

His eyes settled on my scar. “A run-in with a bullet, lovely Lena?”

Most people took it for granted that I received my forehead scar during a traffic accident. “Yeah, you're quick.”

With a grunt, he rolled up his right sleeve. Snaking toward his shoulder was a red scar almost the mirror image of mine. “A parting gift from my third wife. No, no, don't waste your sympathy. I had it coming. Hell, I didn't even bother pressing charges against the woman. Considering everything I pulled on her, I figure she still owes me a couple more of these punctuation marks.”

I motioned toward his wheelchair. “Another wife's editorial comment?”

He threw back his head in laughter. “Naw, just a four-day bender topped off by a car wreck. At least I didn't hurt anyone else, only some scraggly mesquite out on the Rez. The tree's still there, I hear, and flourishing. Wish I could say the same for myself. I'm here, but flourishing doesn't exactly describe my state. Thanks to Gloriana.”

“Speaking of Gloriana, Mr. Brookings.…”

“Oh, please. John. Yes, let's speak of her. I love getting in my licks. The hag ruined me.”

It looked to me like he'd done a pretty good job of ruining himself. “I hear Gloriana took exception to your job application, is that right?”

After a long, luxurious drag on his cigarette, he answered me. “You show me a person who doesn't pad his curriculum vitae and I'll show you a fry cook at McDonald's. Yeah, I padded the damned thing. I added some editing jobs I didn't really hold, for Doubleday and the like. I'd free-lanced for them back in the Dark Ages, but I was never actually on staff. I'll tell you this, though. I didn't pad my skills. I could do everything I said I could do. Gloriana herself said I was the best editor she'd ever worked with. What set her off was when she found out that while my middle name might be Alden, it's not the Alden she cares…cared about.”

I tried to wave the cigarette smoke away, but it was hopeless. There was no ventilation in the trailer, just stagnant dreams. “Did you lie about the Alden thing, too?”

A solitary fly floated up from the fruit bowl and lit on Brookings' head. He didn't notice. “Not really. As I said, Alden is my middle name, my paternal grandfather's
first
name. But when Gloriana saw it on my paperwork, she got excited. Since I'm no dummy and really needed that job, I let her believe what she wanted to believe. If I'd known she ran deep checks on her employees, I wouldn't have done it.”

I frowned. “Deep checks? What do you mean?”

“Such as hiring private detectives like you. Why she felt it was necessary to go to all that trouble with employees who didn't even handle money remains beyond my comprehension. But she did. God knows the woman was thorough. Anyway, I'd already been at Patriot's Blood six months, edited well nigh a dozen deranged books and helped rewrite a pile of garbage that should never have been accepted in the first place. Then suddenly I was called into her Chamber of Horrors, whereupon she fired my ass. She enjoyed doing it, too. Relished it, one might even say.”

“I hear that she faxed your ‘corrected' resumé all over town.”

“Yup. If you ask me, which I am certain you will get around to sooner or later, the answer is no, I didn't kill Gloriana. I'm too much of a cripple. But believe me when I say that the woman was a murder victim waiting to happen.”

I looked at the walker, suspecting that Brookings might be more mobile than he wanted me to believe. But was he mobile enough to drive up to Oak Creek, climb down into the creek bed, and harvest water hemlock? Also, no one had mentioned seeing someone tooling around the banquet either on a walker or in a wheelchair. However, I'd noticed that most people averted their eyes when confronted with the physically challenged. As for Brookings' obvious transportation problems, yes, that car of his probably hadn't taken him anywhere, but there were other ways for the wheelchair-bound to get around: Dial-A-Ride, Hertz, cabs.

I guess he could tell what I was thinking, because he said, “I haven't used that walker in a year.”

Then why wasn't it covered in dust? Everything else was. “Is there anyone who can vouch for your whereabouts the day Gloriana was killed?”

“Probably not. But I was here doing my usual, drinking and editing, editing and drinking.” The fly finally annoyed him enough that he brushed it away, lifting up a few strands of silver hair in the process.

“But you're working again.”

He flicked an ash on the floor. “A couple of days a week at Verdad, a few private jobs under the table. I get along.”

“What kind of private jobs?”

Brookings explained that he helped people who couldn't find publishers bring their own books to market.

“I edit their manuscripts, then find vendors such as typesetters, printers, and binders who won't take advantage of their ignorance,” he said. “Most of the books I help with are memoirs and family histories, lots of family photos, letters, that kind of thing. We're only talking about a hundred copies per title. But there are always a few people out there, novelists, usually, who think large and put up good money, hoping that they can crack the bestseller list. Ha. For them, I do publicity, marketing, work the phones, set up signings.…Pointless, really, but it pays the rent.”

In other words, Brookings sold his editorial expertise to self-publishers. “Do any of these folks ever recoup their investments?”

“It's possible that in the centuries-long history of publishing such an event may have occurred once or twice.” He vented that cough-laugh again. “But I don't lie to them about their chances and I get my money up front. I also take care that none of those benighted souls knows where I live. We have our editorial meetings at Verdad, one of the little perks Ramos allows me. I have an office there. And Ramos' daughter is a sympathetic soul. When my little self-publishers come in, she calls me Mr. Brookings and pretends to be my secretary. Verdad's a pretty classy setup, and it impresses the hell out of my clientele.”

For the first time, his eyes looked wistful, as if reflecting on the life he could have lived.

We continued chatting about the publishing business for a while until I eventually steered the subject back to Gloriana's murder. “Let's say I take you at your word that you didn't kill Gloriana. And let's say the man accused of the murder didn't kill her, either. Do you have any other likely suspects?”

He pretended to think for a moment before saying, “Likely suspects? Hmmmm. If I were a betting man, I'd probably put my money on David Zhang or Sandra Alden-Taylor.”

I tried not to look surprised. “Why would either of them want to kill Gloriana? Especially Poor Sandra.”

His face, never kind, took on a new malice. “So Sandra sucked you in? The bitch. Well, lovely Lena, I'm not the only person who got called into the Chamber of Horrors and had the riot act read to. Wait a minute. Is that a dangling participle? Oh, who the hell cares. Listen, the only difference between me and Sandra was that I got fired, while Sandra, being family, was given another chance.”

“What was Sandra's crime, Mr. Brookings?”

“Helping herself to the petty cash, a habit of hers.”

This information didn't surprise me as much as it should have. I'd sensed an odd current of desperation in the woman. But for all her sticky-fingered behavior with the petty cash, Sandra had not been written out of Gloriana's will. I wondered if the amount had been enough to alleviate all her money troubles.

“I can see your point about Sandra,” I told him. “But why would David Zhang want to kill Gloriana?”

Brookings flicked some more ash on the floor. “No particular reason, other than the fact that he has the worst temper I've ever seen on a Chinaman.”

I was as tired of Brookings' cynicism as I was his trailer's squalor, so after saying goodbye, I let myself out. I tore away the National Alliance's flier as I left, wishing that I could ram it down Brookings' throat.

I must have been in Brookings' trailer longer than I realized, because it was full dark as I settled myself into my Jeep. With lights off, I drove a few spaces away, stopped in front of a double-wide, and picked up my cell phone. I didn't want Brookings to hear me tell Jimmy to run one of those infamous deep checks on him. As well as on Sandra.

“Already a done deal on both,” Jimmy's voice crackled over the poor connection. “Brookings has a rap sheet. Back in ninety-two, he got drunk and almost killed some five-year-old kid walking home from school. Sentenced to two years, released in eighteen months. Then a few more DUIs, a few more wrecks, a few stints in rehab. Suspended license, of course.”

Somehow Brookings had neglected to tell me about the child and the prison sentence. Maybe he forgot. “Jimmy, he seemed to be expecting a visit from some kind of state representative. In fact, that's who he thought I was at first. Do you know what that's all about?”

The cell phone hissed some more (I really had to buy a better one some day), then Jimmy's voice emerged again. “He's collecting SSDI, Social Security Disability Insurance. They're probably checking on him to make sure he's still disabled.”

I frowned. “There are doubts?”

“If they're making home visits, yeah. Looks like they suspect he's leeching off the system. Lots of that going around, these days.”

I remembered Brookings' walker, obviously used. And then the trail by Oak Creek. How steep was it? With a little care, could any reasonably adept person clunk along the trail with a walker, pick a few plants, then clunk back to their car? I'd have to ask Owen. One of the residents at the Wigwam Trailer Park might not have minded renting out their car for a few bucks. And kept quiet about it for a few more.

“What did you get on Sandra Alden-Taylor? Brookings said she was pilfering petty cash from Gloriana. If that's true, I want to know why, and if she's stolen from anyone else.” I didn't add that Brookings appeared to have a personal hate on for Sandra. Perhaps she had helped get him fired?