by Rich Curtin
Rivera and Devlin exited the motorhome.
“So how’s Gloria doing?” asked Devlin.
Rivera smiled. An image of her flashed in his mind. She was a classic Hispanic beauty with a striking oval face, light brown skin, long dark hair, and curves in all the right places. Her eyes were a kind of hazel color. Depending on the light, sometimes they appeared brown and other times green. Rivera liked that. He once told her he could read her mood by the color of her eyes. Green meant excited or emotional, brown meant calm and relaxed.
“She’s doing great. I spent last week with her in New Mexico.
“She still a deputy sheriff down there?”
“Yeah. She works for Sheriff Gallegos in Rio Arriba County.”
“So when is the wedding?”
“October fifteenth.”
“Why are you waiting so long, Manny? You should marry her now before she realizes what a terrible mistake she’s making.”
Rivera grinned. “I’ll have to admit I’m getting the better end of the deal.”
“So why wait?”
“We both come from traditional Hispanic families, so the wedding’s going to be a big production. Everything has to be done right. The bridal shower, the announcements, the bans, the ceremony, the reception, the music, all of it. Relatives and friends will be coming from everywhere.”
“Oh, man, you should just elope. Avoid all that pressure. Have her parents met you yet?”
“Yes, I visited with them last week.”
“And they approve of you?”
Rivera smiled. “Apparently so.”
Devlin shook his head. “That’s amazing. I’d have figured they’d have rejected you at first sight. Where will the ceremony take place?”
“At the church in Abiquiu.”
“Will I be invited?”
“Of course, Pudge. We both want you to be there.”
“And where will you be settling down? Here in Moab, I hope.”
Rivera shrugged. “We haven’t worked all that out yet, so I’m not sure.”
“Well you’d damn well better decide soon. The wedding is only five months away.”
“I know.”
“For what it’s worth, I vote for Moab. We need you here.”
After the body had been picked up and Devlin had departed, Rivera considered calling in a crew from the Utah State Police to dust the motorhome for fingerprints but decided against it for the time being. Whoever shot Webb and searched the motorhome was looking for something specific and was probably smart enough to have worn gloves. Besides, Rivera preferred to conduct his investigations alone. He didn’t want any more people than necessary tromping around the crime scene. If he deemed it necessary, he could call in the lab guys at a later date.
3
RIVERA CLOSED THE DOOR of the motorhome, walked to Shirley’s house, and rang the doorbell. He wanted to learn more about Webb before he performed a detailed search of the motorhome. Knowing as much as he could about the victim and his life would make the search of his dwelling more informed. Inferences could be made that might otherwise be missed.
Shirley’s eyes were teary and bloodshot. She invited Rivera into the living room and gestured toward a couch covered with an elaborate quilt.
“I made a fresh pot of coffee. Would you like some?”
Rivera sat down. “I’d love some.” He’d smelled the coffee aroma as soon as he entered the house and was craving a cup. To Rivera, coffee was one of life’s essentials. Without it, he felt on edge and vaguely detached from the here and now.
While Shirley was busy in the kitchen, he glanced around the living room. Besides the couch, the small room was furnished with two end tables with old-fashioned, ornate lamps, two overstuffed chairs, a glass-covered coffee table, a set of wooden shelves, and a large, flat screen television.
On one of the end tables was a framed photograph of a young man in an Army uniform. He had a buzz cut, a strong chin, and the facial expression of a warrior. The family resemblance to Shirley was striking. Rivera figured the soldier was her son.
On the other end table was a copy of Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet with a bookmark protruding from it. Rivera was familiar with the classic masterpiece. Its presence on the table suggested to him that Shirley had been searching for some meaning in her life.
On the shelves were several geodes, a few cut and polished mineral specimens, a snow globe containing an angel figure, and an old set of encyclopedias. Framed prints of Mesa Arch, Balanced Rock, Secret Spire, and other canyon country landmarks hung on the walls.
Shirley returned with a mug of coffee, placed it on the coffee table in front of Rivera, and sat down in one of the overstuffed chairs.
“Thank you,” he said, and made a slight toasting gesture in Shirley’s direction with the cup. He took a sip. The coffee was delicious, and he said so. He took another sip, set the mug down, and pulled a notepad and pen from his shirt pocket. “You said you knew Iggy as well as anyone. How long have you known him?”
She sat stiffly in her chair with her hands clasped on her lap and her fingers tightly intertwined. “About six years. He was new to Moab at the time. He pulled up one day in that old motorhome and asked if he could rent my driveway as a pad for the motorhome. I said sure, I could use a little extra money. He said he would also need an electric power connection. I said okay. Then he said he wanted to rent my garage too. I asked him what for. He said he wanted to store some rocks in there. I thought that was a little odd, but I said fine. It was empty, and I never used it anyway. I always park my pickup out front on the street. We settled on two-hundred dollars a month.”
“What kind of rocks was he storing?”
“Oh you know, the kind people collect and display on their mantels.” She pointed to her shelves. “Like those. Decorative, colorful rocks. Iggy made a living by finding pretty rocks in the backcountry and selling them to tourists. He gave me a few of them.”
“I think I’ve seen him by the Colorado River selling his rocks.”
“That’s right. He’d usually drive his motorhome over to the river and set up a display table in the parking area there. Sometimes he’d set up near the entrance to Arches National Park. One time I saw him in the middle of town, right near the Moab Information Center.”
“What was his full name?” Rivera had seen the name on Webb’s driver’s license, but he didn’t want to assume Webb had given Shirley his real name.
“Iggy Webb. He told me one time that Iggy was short for Ignatius. He said he was named after Saint Ignatius, whoever that was.”
“Did you see anyone around here late last night or early this morning?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Hear anything unusual?”
“No.” She hesitated for a long moment. “But to be honest, I had a couple of drinks before I went to bed, so I slept pretty soundly.”
“What time did you go to bed?”
“Around ten-thirty.”
“Do you know where Iggy lived before he came to Moab?”
“He never told me, but I had the feeling he was from back east somewhere. I guess it was because of the way he talked—faster than folks around here—but I’m really not sure. Whenever I asked him a question about himself, he’d only talk about what happened in his life since he came to Moab. He always dodged questions about his previous life, so I learned not to press the matter. It was none of my business, I guess. He did say one time that he came to Moab to start a new life, but he didn’t elaborate.”
“Do you know if he had any relatives?”
“He never mentioned any, so I don’t know.”
“What kind of person was he?”
“He was a nice fellow. Kind of quiet. At first, he was just a source of income for me. I don’t have much coming in—just Social Security and a small retirement check—so the extra two hundred bucks each month helped a lot. But as the weeks went by, we began getting together in the evenings after he returned from selling his rocks. We�
��d sit on my porch, just talking and laughing and having a drink or two. I got to where I looked forward to his visits at the end of the day. He led a simple life and owned neither a cell phone nor a computer. He used my phone whenever he needed to make a call.”
“Did he have any friends?”
“He had three rockhound friends that I know of. Sometimes they would come by and join us on the porch. I loved listening to their stories and jokes. I’d usually set up a washtub filled with ice and beer for them.”
“Do you have their names?”
“I only know them by their first names. There was Roy, Pete, and Stagger. They all belonged to a rockhound club in town. There’s a garage somewhere in Moab where they meet to cut and polish their rocks.”
“Do you know the name of the club or the location of the garage?”
She shook her head. “No, I don’t. Sorry.”
“You said one of them was named Stagger?”
She smiled. “Odd name, I know, but that’s what they called him.”
“What did they talk about?”
“Rocks, rocks, and more rocks. Dozens of different types with names I’d never heard of. They talked about finding them, cutting them, polishing them, trading them, and selling them. They told stories about their backcountry explorations and the places where they found the best specimens. Sometimes they kidded each other the way guys do. I enjoyed being there and listening to the banter.” Her smile faded. “I guess those days are gone now.”
Rivera understood. He had surmised by now that Webb had become an important part of her world—probably her best friend—and she would soon be feeling a large emptiness in her life.
“Did he have any visitors besides his rockhound friends?”
She shook her head. “No. At least I’ve never seen any others.”
“Anything else you can tell me about him?”
She thought for a long moment. “Not really. He led a very simple life. He was my friend, and I enjoyed spending time with him. One time he was up in Dugway for a couple of weeks searching for geodes. I remember how much I missed his company.”
“During your conversations with him, did he ever mention having any trouble with anyone? Any arguments or fights?”
“No, I don’t recall anything like that.”
“I’d like to take a look inside the garage. Is it locked?”
“Yes. Give me just a minute and I’ll get the key.” She pushed herself out of her chair, went into another room, and returned with a ring of keys.
Rivera followed her to the garage. She unlocked the door and stepped back.
“I’ll let you pull it open. The door’s kind of heavy.”
Rivera reached down for the handle, raised the door, and peered inside. The garage had the musty smell of stale air and dust. The walls were lined with homemade shelves filled with rocks sorted by size and appearance. Metal carts with piles of rocks filled the interior space. In the back of the garage on the floor were several piles of larger rocks. All in all, he guessed there were at least five hundred rocks stored in the garage. He reached for the wall switch and turned on the light.
“Iggy built these shelves himself,” said Shirley. “He used scrap wood from the town dump.”
Rivera stepped inside and began inspecting the rocks. Most were still covered with dust and dirt and hadn’t yet been processed, but several of the shelves contained specimens that had been cleaned, cut, and polished. He picked up a rock which had been cut with a saw exposing a shiny tan interior with orange striations running through it. He’d never seen anything like it. Next to it was a rock Rivera recognized as agate. It had been cut in half exposing a beautiful pattern of concentric bands of color—orange, gray, yellow, tan, and reddish-brown. On the shelf above were a series of flat rocks covered with tiny green crystals. Next to them were several milky-white quartz samples partially encased in chocolate-colored rock.
“Beautiful, aren’t they?” said Shirley.
“They sure are.” Rivera was amazed by the clarity and brilliance of the colors. He wandered around the garage, making a cursory inspection of the specimens stored there. He’d heard a little about rockhounding during his years in Moab, but had never been exposed to it to any significant degree. What surprised him was how ordinary most of the uncut rocks looked on the outside and how extraordinary they appeared when their interiors were exposed, cleaned, and polished. The idea that each uncut rock in the garage held a beautiful secret inside appealed to his sense of adventure. He imagined that a talented rockhound with years of experience could spot a rock in the backcountry and decide on the basis of its external appearance whether it held promise as a thing of beauty. He decided he needed to learn more about rockhounding so that the next time he went hiking, he might bring home a few samples and cut them open. He felt a mild urge to begin exploring for rocks on the mesas and in the canyons around Moab.
“Shirley, I’m going to seal the garage now. I don’t want anyone in here until I complete my investigation.”
“Yes, of course.”
“And I’ll probably need to talk to you again. Will you be in town for a while?”
She shrugged. “I’ve got nowhere to go.”
He locked the garage, fastened strips of yellow crime-scene tape across the door, and headed for the victim’s Datsun. He unlocked it and slid in behind the steering wheel. The interior of the vehicle was dusty, and the odometer read just over 180,000 miles. On the passenger side of the front seat, he found a packet of maps held together with a thick rubber band, a well-worn paperback book titled Rocks, Gems, and Minerals of the Southwest, and an old GPS receiver. Standard gear for a rockhound, he figured. He rummaged through the contents of the glove box and found only the usual papers. The back seat and trunk yielded nothing out of the ordinary. He locked up the vehicle and returned to the motorhome.
4
INSIDE THE MOTORHOME, Rivera lowered himself into the padded chair, thinking about the task that lay before him. Someone had killed Iggy Webb for a reason, and understanding the killer’s motive would help Rivera identify him. His first priority was to acquire knowledge about Webb the person, and then learn all he could about the details of his life.
The chair was on a swivel base, allowing him to rotate and scan the entirety of the motorhome’s interior. Webb’s body had been removed, but bloodstains remained on the carpeting. The boxes filled with rocks took up some of the floor space. Unlike most of the specimens in the garage, these were all ready for sale—each had been cut, cleaned, and polished. Rivera could see why tourists would be attracted to them. They were beautiful and symbolized the rocky terrain of southern Utah. Each piece would serve as a reminder of a trip taken to Utah’s canyon country and the enjoyment of a memorable outdoor adventure.
He sat there, taking in the scene, letting it tell its tale. Feathers were scattered here and there. Drawers were open, and clothing was strewn on the floor. It was clear that whoever killed Webb had performed a search of the motorhome. That fact suggested a series of questions. What was the shooter looking for? Did he find it? Was he looking for something specific, or was the crime simply a random case of robbery? Did the shooter know Webb? Did Webb resist and die as a result?
Rivera thought about those questions for a long time, finally deciding that it wasn’t a random robbery at all—Webb’s cash was in his wallet and his wallet had been in his pocket. Besides, why would a thug looking for easy money choose a small, run-down motorhome in the hollows of Shumway Lane as a target for robbery? Moab had plenty of upscale subdivisions with expensive homes which would have held far more promise. So the shooter had most likely come here for a specific purpose. He wanted something Webb had and killed him for it. Then he searched the motorhome and either took what he had come for or was unable to find it. Because the shooter had to search in the dark of night, probably with a flashlight, he might not have been able to do a thorough job. The daylight gave Rivera an advantage.
He pushed himself out of the chair a
nd began a methodical search of the motorhome. He started on the outside of the vehicle, searching in all the compartments—the engine, the storage compartments, the propane tank compartment, and the utility connections—but found nothing. He climbed the ladder on the back of the motorhome, inspected the roof, and saw nothing worthy of further investigation. Next, he crawled under the vehicle, looking for a package that might have been stored there. Nothing. That done, he dusted himself off, and began a search of the interior.
He started in the front of the motorhome, checking the center console, the door pockets, the glove box, and the sun visors. Everything was as expected. Under the driver’s and passenger’s seats, he found only the usual detritus—a couple of pennies, a gum wrapper, some dead leaves and stalks of grass, an old, chewed-on pencil, and some pieces of gravel and chunks of dirt. He inspected each item on the floor of the motorhome, the contents of the drawers, the bed, the storage compartments in the bathroom, the kitchen cabinets, the interior of the refrigerator and the microwave oven, and the papers in and on the desk. He found nothing unusual.
He returned to the chair and sat down, his eyes scanning the motorhome’s interior for storage places he might have overlooked. His gaze fell on the small wastebasket next to the desk. He got up and fished out the contents: a postcard advertisement from a roofing company, another postcard ad for hearing aids, a crumpled piece of notepaper, and a letter from a political party seeking donations. He opened the crumpled sheet of paper, smoothed it out on the desk, and read it.
5,000 now
20,000 later
25,000 total
800 rent
24,200
17,800 motorhome
6,400 balance
Rivera studied the numbers. It appeared that Webb had come into some money and was expecting more. The $17,800 amount rang a bell in Rivera’s memory. Among the papers on Webb’s desk, he remembered seeing a quotation for a motorhome from a recreation vehicle company. He searched through the papers and found it. The quote was from the Briggs RV Company in Grand Junction, Colorado for a used Winnebago Brave motorhome with 26,000 miles on it. The price was $17,800. The quotation was dated four days earlier, and a brochure describing the vehicle was stapled to it. It was clear that Webb had been considering buying a new motorhome.