Mourning Gloria (22 page)

His frown had deepened. Blackie does not like it when his deputies screw up. The guy—or gal—he had assigned to talk to the neighbors had missed Sanders’ Animal Services and would hear about it. Shortly.

“Thanks. I’ll get on it this morning.” He paused. “This reporter, Jessica Nelson—you think something serious has happened to her?”

“I wish I knew, Blackie. Sheila suggested car trouble or a boyfriend problem. I suppose that’s possible, but I somehow don’t think so. Jessica was really hyped about this story—in fact, a little too hyped, it seemed to me. She wants her own byline, and she wants to do a good job, but it goes deeper than that. She’s not just covering the trailer fire, she’s involved in it.”

“Involved?”

“Her twin sister and her parents died in a house fire ten years ago this month. This story has taken on some sort of symbolic significance for her. She wants to find out all she can about the victim. She wants to understand the killer’s motives.”

“Oh, hell,” Blackie said eloquently.

“She had a plan for interviews, for writing the story, but she didn’t make her deadline. And there was that phone call on my answering machine.”

“And you’re thinking her disappearance might be connected to the trailer fire?” He was taking me seriously now.

“It’s possible. I’m going to check out her house, and then I have one more person to talk to—somebody I know she intended to see.” I shrugged. “After that, I guess I’ll file a missing-person report.”

“Well, keep in touch.” He opened the door for me and we left the room.

“You bet.” We walked back down the hall to his office, past open doors where people were working. One or two of them glanced up, then away. Nobody looked very happy. “Are you going to miss this?” I asked, gesturing.

“Some of it,” he said. We were passing a vending machine and he stopped to fish in his pockets for change. “Not the paperwork, that’s for sure. And dickering with the commissioners over the budget—I won’t miss that. I’ll damn sure miss the people, though.” He fed quarters into the machine, punched a button, and waited for the can to rattle down the slot. “The county’s come a long way from the days when my mother used to cook meals for the jail inmates. But the department still runs on people. Whoever gets this job next is going to inherit a great bunch of folks.”

“Any idea who that’s going to be?” It wasn’t an idle question. In rural areas, we depend on the county mounties. I’d hate to see Blackie’s job fall into purely political hands—somebody with friends in high places but little law enforcement experience. And that could happen.

He popped the top of the can. “I’ve got some ideas—not sure I want to think about it, though, since there’s not a helluva lot I can do to affect the outcome.”

“You might be surprised. Plenty of folks respect your opinion. Isn’t there anybody you’d like to see get the job?”

“Not hardly.” His grin was tight. “Anyway, I just announced last night. The names won’t start popping up for a couple more days, I reckon.” He gave me a sideways glance. “So what does McQuaid want to talk to me about?”

“What do you think?” I countered archly.

He regarded me, head to one side. “You’d be okay with that? If McQuaid and I went into business together?” He paused. “Sheila and I have talked about it some. With both of us in enforcement, the big problem is the hours. McQuaid’s business looks pretty flexible, far as the time commitment is concerned.” He grinned briefly. “And nobody’s shot at him yet, so far as I’ve heard.”

“I’d be okay with it,” I said, and stood on my tiptoes to give him a kiss on the cheek. “Whatever you guys can work out is great with me. I’m just glad that you and Smart Cookie were able to come to terms. Better marry the girl quick—before she changes her mind again.”

“Yeah,” he said. “My thoughts exactly.” He lifted his soda can in salute. “I’m optimistic, though. She’s wearing that ring, and we’ve even got an appointment with a photographer for an engagement photo.”

But as I went out to the car, I couldn’t help wondering. Blackie had been in law enforcement his whole life. Being the sheriff of Adams County was his reason for being. It created a structure for his daily activities, gave him a reason for getting up in the morning.

I had to wonder how he was going to manage without it, especially when Sheila was the one who was bringing home all the latest law enforcement news.

I sighed. Maybe there wasn’t a lot of room for optimism, after all.

Back in the car, I picked up my list and checked off “Get a look at the crime scene photos and talk to Blackie.” I paused for a moment, thinking. What had I learned? That the accelerant the arsonist used was naptha—Coleman camp stove fuel—and that he or she was wearing size ten Converse shoes with a slash across the heel tread. And that the bullet had been recovered from the victim’s body. It wasn’t much, but it was something. With luck, the cops might find the gun and match it to the bullet.

I looked down at the list again. Jessica’s house was next, on Santa Fe Street, and after that, Lucy LaFarge, who lived not far away, on the north side of the campus. I started the car and drove off.

Santa Fe is a street of frame and stucco houses, most of them built in the 1950s and early’60s, when Pecan Springs was creeping up onto the hills and away from the flatland development along the highway between Austin and San Antonio. It wasn’t yet an Interstate in those days, but it was already beginning to spawn real estate developments and strip centers along its route. This is the kind of neighborhood I like, with shaded streets and wide yards and modest houses that fit comfortably into the landscape, rather than towering over it, like baronial castles. A neighborhood of kids and bikes and vegetable gardens in the front yard and clotheslines and swings in the back.

The address I’d gotten from Hark’s Rolodex was at the end of the street, with another small house on one side and a dense cedar brake on the other. Across the street, more cedars and a large clump of live oaks. For a city neighborhood, this had a country feel.

I turned around at the end of the street, pulled up at the curb, and got out. There were no other vehicles at this end of the street, except for a mean-looking red Harley chained to the porch rail of the house next to Jessica’s. I thought of what she’d said about the neighbor being a jerk and wondered if it was that motorcycle that had bothered her.

As I was thinking this, the front door opened and a man came out, a heavyset, long-haired guy wearing boots, black jeans, and a blue work shirt with the sleeves cut off at the shoulders, showing off muscular, hairy arms, heavily tattooed. He looked like one of those wrestlers you see on TV. He slammed the door behind him, locked it, then stood on the porch for a moment, staring at me.

“What’d’ya want?” he demanded.

“I’m looking for Jessica Nelson. Any idea where I can find her?”

“Nah.” He turned away with a sly, half-furtive sideways glance. “Ain’t seen her in a week.” He bent over to unlock his bike. “Both of ’em gone. Ain’t nobody home.”

A week? But on Monday, when Jessica was telling me about this jerk, she’d started to say something about “last night,” as if she’d had a recent run-in with him.

“You’re sure you haven’t seen her in a full week?” I asked. “What about Sunday night? She said—”

“Buzz off, sister,” he said contemptuously. “I ain’t got time. Gotta get to work.”

He was ignoring me now, muscling the Harley down the porch steps, kicking it into raucous life, then roaring off with an earsplitting bellow. He jumped the four-inch concrete curb in a show of Evel Knievel bravado and stood on the pegs as he rode down the street. I stared after him, thinking that the word
jerk
didn’t exactly do justice to this particular jerk. He definitely wasn’t somebody I’d like to have for a next-door neighbor.

But he was gone, and I focused my attention on what I had come for. I checked the front door, which was securely locked, and rapped and called until I was sure that if someone was home, she wasn’t going to answer. Then I made a quick tour around the perimeter, checking the windows and noticing that the blinds were all drawn tightly, as if to keep out prying eyes. The back door was locked, too, but there was no blind and I could see into a small kitchen. It was empty and tidy, with a tea towel draped across a rack, a geranium on the kitchen windowsill, a pair of copper-bottomed pans hung over the stove. I repeated my knocking and calling, but the place had a hollow sound and nobody answered.

I turned and looked out across the backyard. There was a white-painted lawn swing under a large cedar elm, and a narrow border of zinnias and marigolds blooming bravely against the ratty-looking hedge that grew between Jessica’s house and the jerk’s backyard. In a small, square vegetable garden set into the grassy turf, carrots, green beans, and peas were flourishing. A pair of cardinals, male and female, were sharing a splashy bath in a birdbath beside a pink-blooming rosebush. A lovely, peaceful scene.

I went to the hedge and peered over. The jerk’s place looked like a wrecking yard, with shoals of beer cans, mounds of rusted vehicle parts, an abandoned camper top, a pile of used tires, and a heap of junky detritus piled up against a small, tin-roofed shed. The house was of the same design and vintage as the one Jessica lived in, but not nearly as well kept up. The screens were torn or missing, the door to the fruit cellar under the house was boarded up, and the back door looked as if it had been kicked in once or twice. The house could do with a fresh coat of paint, too.

But now that the jerk had driven off, the neighborhood was very quiet, only the warbling, melodic chatter of a talkative mockingbird breaking the silence. I turned and contemplated Jessica’s back door for a moment, weighing possibilities and options, then went up the steps. Criminal trespass in a habitation is a Class A misdemeanor in Texas, punishable by as much as a year in the county hoosegow and a fine of up to four thousand dollars in cold, hard cash—probably a fair price to pay for breaking into somebody’s house and getting caught at it.

But I could argue that I had reason to believe that one of the occupants might be in that house, sick, injured, or worse. It was a standard defense against trespass, but in this case it would probably work, since I had explicitly stated my concern to the chief of police, the county sheriff, and the editor of the local newspaper. My worry was on the record, which would definitely count for something.

The back door was securely locked, but the window beside it wasn’t.
Naughty-naughty
, I thought as I raised the old-fashioned wooden sash and climbed into the kitchen. Naughty of me to come in this way, naughty of Jessica and her roommate to make it so easy. Good thing I wasn’t a burglar or a rapist or somebody equally nasty.

The house was small, and a couple of minutes inside were enough for me to see all there was to see. Kitchen, living-dining, one bath, two bedrooms. One bed neatly made, the other not. The neatly made bed was in what I assumed was Jessica’s bedroom, judging from the books (agriculture and journalism texts) on the bookshelves. I was surprised to feel the relief that flooded through me—I must’ve been expecting to find a battered body or an ugly bloodstain on the floor. I hadn’t. Whatever had happened to Jessica, it didn’t look as if it had happened here.

There was an answering machine on the kitchen counter, and the message light was blinking. Being thorough, I checked it. The first message was from Jessica’s roommate.

“Hey, Jessie, it’s me, Amanda. Just to let you know that Steve and I are staying an extra few days. Weather’s good, sex is better.” A giggle. “Listen, I’ve lost my cell phone. If you need me, here’s Steve’s number.” She rattled it off. “Hope you’re having a good time all by yourself.”

I jotted down Steve’s cell number, although there was nothing in the call that would help me track down Jessica, and checked the time stamp on the message. It had been left on Monday at 2 p.m. and was still a “new” message, which meant that Jessica hadn’t picked it up. Which suggested that she hadn’t come back here on Monday. Whatever had happened to her happened before she got home. I thought of the jerk next door. Or before she’d had a chance to listen to her messages.