Partner In Crime

by J. A. Jance

  “That’s what my unit is called, the Special Homicide Investigation Team.”

  “Oh,” she murmured. “But since this is a family newspaper, we’ll probably have to write the whole thing out.” She fumbled to an uneasy stop and then started over. “And you’re here in Bisbee because…”

  “Why do you think I’m here?” I asked in return.

  She shrugged. “I presume it’s because of the woman who died down in Naco on Wednesday night. I’ve learned that her real name was Latisha Wall. I’ve also been told she was in the Washington State Witness Protection Program.”

  Marliss obviously had sources inside the Cochise County Sheriff’s Department. I wondered who those sources might be. Rather than asking, though, I simply raised my bottle of O’Doul’s and clinked it on her glass.

  “See there?” I said. “Since you already know so much about it, I don’t understand why you need to talk to me at all.”

  “All right,” she admitted, dropping her ploy of fake innocence for the moment. “I know who you are and where you’re from, but I still don’t know why you’re here. Is it because your boss…?”

  “Ross Connors,” I supplied. “He’s the Washington State Attorney General.”

  “Are you here because Mr. Connors has no faith in Sheriff Brady’s ability to bring this case to a successful conclusion?”

  Marliss Shackleford waited for my answer with her pen poised over a small notebook and with her eyes sparkling in anticipation, like a cat ready to spring on some poor unsuspecting sparrow. She clearly wanted me to say that I thought Sheriff Joanna Brady was incompetent. And, much as I might have liked to – much as I thought Joanna Brady to be an arrogant little twit – I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was incapable of saying so to a reporter, much less to a newspaper columnist.

  “From what I can see,” I told her guardedly, “Sheriff Brady is doing a credible job, especially since her department is so short-handed. She seems to have only one detective on the job, and he’s having to deal with two separate homicides. Her plate is pretty full.”

  Marliss’s eager expression faded to disappointment. She put down her pen. “Ernie’s on vacation,” she told me unnecessarily.

  “Ernie?” I asked.

  “Ernie Carpenter. He’s the sheriff’s department’s other detective. He and his wife, Rose, are off on an anniversary trip – their thirtieth.”

  Bully for them, I thought. God spare me from living in a small town.

  “So you think the county investigators are doing a good job?” Marliss continued.

  “Yes,” I said. “I do.”

  “And your function is?”

  “I’m here as an observer,” I told her. “An interested observer; nothing more.”

  “I see.” She frowned briefly, then added. “I understand Latisha Wall’s sister is in town. Have you talked to her?”

  “I’m not sure there’s any reason for me to talk to her,” I fudged. “As I said, I’m observing, not investigating.”

  Marliss tried coming at me from another direction. “I believe the sheriff’s department investigators interviewed a suspect today.”

  The columnist certainly did have an inside track. Now it was my turn to play innocent. “Really?” I asked.

  She nodded. “The guy’s a local, someone who’s lived around here for years. His name is Bobo Jenkins – LaMar Jenkins, actually. He and Latisha were a romantic item for several months. I suppose there’s a possibility that Latisha Wall’s death could have resulted from some kind of domestic dispute. What do you think of that idea?”

  Cops don’t talk to the press about critical aspects of ongoing investigations. Those are words I’ve lived by for most of my adult life. Joanna Brady’s actions may have provoked me beyond endurance, but I couldn’t bring myself to do that much of a flip-flop.

  “I don’t think I should comment about that one way or the other.” I said.

  “You think it’s true then?”

  “No. I said, ‘No comment.’ There’s a difference.”

  The desk clerk came through the doorway and poked his head into the bar. “Hey, Marliss,” he said, “I’ve got a call for you. Want to take it here or in the lobby?”

  “Lobby,” she said.

  Marliss got up and left me sitting alone. On this cool Saturday night the bar was filling up with people, most of whom seemed to know one another. I was relieved that none of the bikers from the Blue Moon were in evidence. Alone in that crowded room, I thought about what it might be like to be a homicide cop in a small burg like this – a place where almost every victim and suspect would be someone known to you and where every move you made would be accomplished under the glaring spotlight of local reporters who knew you, the victims, and the perps. That kind of case-solving was definitely not for me.

  And I also thought about having a drink, just one, maybe, in honor of my birthday. But before I made up my mind one way or the other, Marliss returned looking flushed and excited.

  “That was Kevin,” she explained breathlessly. “He’s our reporter. He just heard that the second victim has been identified. Tentatively, of course. Not officially.”

  “Really,” I said nonchalantly.

  If I had acted as though I were vitally interested in the information, I doubt Marliss would have told me. Since I gave every indication that I couldn’t care less, she eagerly filled me in.

  “Her name is Deidre Canfield,” Marliss said in a stage whisper that was entirely unnecessary since no one in the bar was paying us the slightest visible attention. “Dee owned an art gallery here in town. She and Latisha Wall were friends. This is all confidential, of course. It’s totally on the QT until there’s been an official notification of next of kin. You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

  “Of course not,” I agreed.

  “But I have to go back to the paper and check something out,” Marliss added. “I did a profile of Dee Canfield a year or so ago, when she first came to town. I’ll be able to reuse some of that material. I won’t print anything prematurely, you understand, but if I write it right now while it’s all still fresh, then the column will be ready the moment the coast is clear.”

  As I said before, between living in big cities or little towns, give me the city any day of the week.

  Fourteen

  AFTER MARLISS SHACKLEFORD LEFT, I found I needed either a drink or some air and space. Upon reflection, I took myself for a walk. It was well after dark by then and much chillier than the toasty daytime temperatures would have led me to expect. I was glad I was still wearing my wrinkled blazer as I wandered through narrow, crooked streets. The two- and three-story buildings I saw reminded me of those in downtown Ballard back home in Seattle. I wondered what Bisbee must have been like back in its heyday, back when domestic copper production was still a moneymaking proposition.

  Here and there streetlights revealed ghostly traces of old signs painted on the sides of brick buildings, just barely still legible. They testified to the more abundant and diverse commercial past in small-town America – Western Auto, Woolworth’s, JCPenney. But those bedrock businesses had long since deserted Bisbee, just as they had deserted countless other communities across the nation. Now the buildings had different occupants. It looked as though the current crop of merchants and organizations catered to tourism – a mining museum, an antiques mall, and a mostly used bookstore. The bars, of course, hadn’t gone away. Maybe you couldn’t buy a hammer and nails on Main Street in Bisbee, Arizona, anymore, but Coors on tap was readily available.

  Naturally, as I walked, my mind strayed back to Anne. Had she walked this winding canyon street as a little girl? Had she bought an Etch A Sketch in Woolworth’s or an Easter outfit in JCPenney?

  And, as often happens when I think of Anne, I see her again as I did that very first time. It’s a cloudless spring afternoon in Seattle’s Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Wearing that bright red dress, she’s striding across the green grass toward Angela Barstogi’s open grave. The dowdily
dressed mourners from Faith Tabernacle all stand aside to let her pass, parting before her commanding presence as the waters of the Red Sea did for Moses.

  She stops only when she reaches the grave. Her hair is long and dark. A slight breeze ruffles it around her face, and I realize I’ve never seen anyone more beautiful or so undeniably sad.

  The crowd is dumbstruck, and so am I. No one moves. Even the overbearing Pastor Michael Brodie is stunned to silence. Then slowly, gracefully, she raises her hand. A single rose drifts away from her open fingers and falls gently onto the casket of a small, murdered child.

  And then the scene shifts. The funeral is over and when I see her again, she is coming down the hill. She is walking purposefully, with a certain goal in mind. Eventually I realize she’s coming to me – directly to me. I am her goal, and my life will never again be the same.

  Lost in thought, I nearly blundered into Cornelia Lester, who was making her way down Main Street.

  “Sorry,” I apologized. “I was thinking of something else. Mind if I join you?”

  “But you were going in the other direction,” she objected.

  “That’s all right. I was about to turn back anyway.”

  She laughed. “Help yourself, then, Mr… I’m sorry. You’ll have to forgive me. I seem to have forgotten your name.”

  “Beaumont,” I supplied, falling into step beside her. “J.P. Beaumont. You can call me Beau.”

  Once again, Cornelia Lester’s clothing rustled as she walked. Despite her ample girth, she set a brisk pace, moving much more swiftly than I had been on my own. Only the fact that we were now going downhill made it possible for me to keep up.

  “I went up to the art gallery again,” she explained. “I keep hoping someone will show up there and let me in.”

  I wrestled with whether or not I should tell her what Marliss Shackleford had just told me – that Dee Canfield had now been identified as a murder victim as well – but I decided against it. A reporter’s unsubstantiated tip might very well be wrong. That kind of information needs to come from someone officially connected to the investigation. Marliss Shackleford certainly wasn’t official and, as far as this latest incident was concerned, neither was I.

  “There were lights on inside,” Cornelia continued. “They must be on a timer so they come on automatically. I was able to catch a glimpse of a couple of Tizzy’s paintings through the window. The one of Daddy…” She stopped talking abruptly, swallowed hard, and wiped at her eyes.

  “Did you know our father was a minister?” she asked finally when she found her voice again. “He was a United Methodist minister at a mostly black church in Macon, Georgia. You ever been to Georgia?”

  “Never,” I said.

  “Macon’s a quiet place. Comfortable. But Tizzy couldn’t wait to get out of town, and out of Daddy’s church, too. We both did that, Tizzy and I, left home and neither of us set foot inside a church for years.” She shrugged. “That’s kids for you. They have to rebel. Daddy was a man of prayer. Tizzy loved action. He believed in nonviolence. He wanted his daughters to go to church and get educated. What did Tizzy do? She joined the Marines and went off to war. I finally got over what was bugging me. I went back home to Macon for keeps and to Daddy’s church as well. I made my peace with our parents. Tizzy never did, and it broke Daddy’s heart. I think that’s part of what killed him, but that one picture…”

  Again she paused, overcome by emotion.

  “Which picture?” I asked.

  “It’s one of Tizzy’s paintings in the gallery. Have you seen them?”

  “No.”

  “Well, one of them shows Daddy standing outside his church on a sunny Sunday morning. He’s wearing that old robe of his – the bright red one that he loved so much and wore every summer until it was so thin you could practically see through it. Tizzy captured everything about it, even the little patch Momma darned into the arm. I could almost smell it, reeking of Daddy’s Old Spice.

  “The picture was so true to life that it took my breath away. It might have been a photograph. And there’s little T. J. Evans, standing there looking up at Daddy with those big brown trusting eyes. I’d know that boy anywhere; he was such a cute little thing. T. J.’s gone now, of course. Died in a car wreck three or four years ago, but Tizzy painted him just the way he was back then when he was a little-bitty sprout. It’s like her mind was a camera, with everything stored there just like it used to be.”

  We walked the distance of a block in silence, although with no cross-streets, it’s hard to measure blocks in Bisbee.

  “That picture just got to me, I guess,” Cornelia Lester continued eventually. “Made me think maybe she was intending to come back after all. Not home, of course. I know she couldn’t have done that, but maybe she was ready to come back to the fold. Like she was finally ready to make peace with Daddy and with all he stood for. What do you think?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” I said. “But maybe so.”

  “Did you happen to notice that United Methodist Church back there, just across the street from the gallery?” Cornelia asked.

  I hadn’t. “No,” I said.

  “Tombstone Something, I think. The sign says services start at ten-thirty. I believe I’ll go there tomorrow morning. I like to do that – visit other churches when I’m traveling.”

  I’ve never had a sibling, but if I had just learned one of them had been murdered, I doubt I would have been out looking for Sunday-morning services in a strange church in a strange town. Cornelia Lester had a depth of belief that made me half envious.

  We had come to a small plaza, an almost level spot in an otherwise up-and-down town. We crossed a one-way backstreet and were making our way through a postage-stamp-size park when three Cochise County patrol cars came roaring past us, one right after the other. None of them had their flashers or sirens on. Even so, they were moving at a good clip. I was pretty sure one of them belonged to Sheriff Brady, and I theorized that they had come from the crime scene in Naco and were probably headed for Castle Rock Gallery.

  I really wanted to turn on my heel and go there, too. But I didn’t. I was certain that if I showed up somewhere uninvited, Sheriff Brady would send me packing. Again.

  Call me a slow learner, but I’ve finally figured out that sometimes I’m better off not going where I’m not wanted.

  Cornelia Lester and I made our way up the steps on the far side of the park and then across a narrow side street and up into the hotel lobby. By the time we topped the last set of stairs, we were both huffing and puffing. I fully expected Cornelia Lester to head directly for the elevator and her room, but she didn’t. Instead she made her way toward one of the leather couches.

  “Wouldn’t you mind sitting with me awhile?” she asked. “I’d really appreciate it. I feel a need to talk to someone tonight, but it’s past midnight back home by now. Everyone there is probably sound asleep.”

  “Sure,” I agreed.

  After all, it may have been my birthday, but I had nothing else to do but listen. And with memories of Anne Corley haunting me once more, it was either that, find an AA meeting, or go to the bar and have a drink. Faced with those three alternatives, listening to Cornelia Lester was by far the best choice.

  WHILE FRANK MONTOYA STAYED with the crime scene investigation in Naco, Joanna took her Civvie and followed Casey and Ken Junior back into town and up to Castle Rock Gallery in Old Bisbee. Joanna had parked her car and was locking the door when a man smoking a glowing cigarette materialized unexpectedly next to her.

  “Oh, Harve,” she said, recognizing the owner of Treasure Trove Antiques. “You startled me. I didn’t see you there.”

  “Wasn’t,” he said. “Came down when I heard them other two cop cars drive up. See you’ve got some officers in there now,” he added, nodding in the direction of the gallery. “Did you find her? Something bad must have happened.”

  Joanna nodded. “Dee Canfield is dead, Harve,” she said. “Some boys found her body in an abandoned
house down in Naco several hours ago, but that’s not for public knowledge just yet. We need to notify her family.”

  Harve sighed and nodded sagely. “I was afraid of that,” he said. “In fact, I pro’ly should have said as much to that other detective of yours when I talked to him earlier this afternoon, but I’m no gossip. I didn’t want to cause trouble.”

  “You talked to Detective Carbajal today?” Joanna asked.

  “Oh, no. Not Jaime – that other fellow, the big one with the salt-and-pepper crew cut. He must be new. I don’t remember ever seein’ him around before. Can’t tell you his name, but I’m sure you know who I mean.”

  Joanna knew exactly whom Harvey Dowd meant. Mr. Beaumont, I presume, she thought.

  “What all did you tell him?” she asked.

  “Nothin’ much. About that fight the other day, the one you had to break up. I was surprised that he didn’t seem to know nothin’ about it.”

  I’m not, Joanna thought.

  “I haven’t had a chance to talk to him this afternoon,” she said innocently. “Did you tell him anything else I should know about? Or have you seen anything unusual going on around the gallery in the last day or two?”

  Harvey Dowd took a final, thoughtful drag on the end of his cigarette, then he dropped the stub into the gutter and ground it out with the sole of his boot. “Had a long talk again this evening with that nice black lady, the one whose sister was killed down in Naco earlier this week. She keeps coming by hoping to get a look at her sister’s paintings, but, of course, nobody’s been there.”

  Cornelia Lester, Joanna thought.

  “She was all wore out from walking so far uphill,” Harve Dowd continued. “She’s from Georgia, you see. She’s not accustomed to this here elevation of ours. My shop was closed for the day, but I let her come in and sit a spell in one of my old rockers until she got her breath back. I offered to bring my car down from the parking lot and give her a ride back to the hotel, but she wouldn’t hear of it. She said walking was fine.”