“So why’s he doin’ it? Odd way to play Santa Claus. Unless he’s settin’ somebody up. Is he cheating the Canadians?”
“That’s one possibility, Bobby. I’ll follow up on that Monday. But here’s what I’m thinking. Serafina won twice, and word of that’s going to go through the village like wildfire. A month or more before that, the Bacas won a legitimate state lottery jackpot. And that’s a lot of money.”
“Like more than a hundred grand, I heard.”
“That’s right. After taxes, it’s a nice old age pension. Well, then, consider what happens next. A month later, more or less, Serafina wins twice, two nice little nest eggs. She’s a bright woman, Bobby. I don’t think she’d fall for sending money off into the blue, in hopes of getting a prize.”
“People do it all the time.”
“I know they do, and maybe she would fall for it. But I don’t think so. I would hope that she wouldn’t. But this way, she is face-to-face with a personable young man who looks the part…uniform, name tag, white truck with a logo on the door. When one of the package delivery folks comes to our door, we trust them, don’t we? Just like the mailman.”
“I’m wondering now if that’s part of it,” Torrez said.
“I think it is. Remember COD? You take the parcel, and the postman or delivery agent collects the COD fee. We trust them to do that, right? We’re used to it now. We sign the gadget, and take the package, just like Christmas. That’s what Serafina did. And the check she received was good. Both times. At least the bank hasn’t said otherwise, and it’s been weeks-plenty long enough to notice a bogus check. And how long does it take the good news to spread?”
“Minutes, maybe. And then?”
“And then he does it again, this time with Joe and Lucinda. The first time, they won a little bit more than Serafina.” She lifted the page. “Eight thousand, two hundred and fifty dollars. They handed over a bank check to the driver-Chris Marsh-for just over fourteen hundred. That means their net winning is almost seven thousand.”
“That’s enough to make ’em short of breath,” Torrez muttered.
“Indeed it is. And the driver delivers, just like with Serafina. And this time, he plays off her experience, telling Joe and Lucinda that it hasn’t been unusual for someone to win more than once…maybe it’s even a computer glitch back at the home office.”
“Oh, sure,” Torrez said. He frowned. “But they got the money, am I right? The check was good?”
“It was good. There again, there’s been a couple of weeks for it to clear. No problems. But I’m beginning to think that Marsh’s making the comment about multiple winnings is enough to get them thinking, Oh gosh, maybe we’ll win twice, you think? And sure enough. The big one. The letter comes telling them that they’ve won $178,900, the big one. And what’s the risk? They don’t have to send money off to Nigeria or someplace like that. The handsome young man will come to their door with his official truck and his official this and that, and trade checks. He gives them a check for $178,900, and they hand over a cashier’s check for $30,413. They’re ahead $148,487. A nice chunk of change.”
“If the check is good,” Torrez said. “Don’t make no sense to me that it is. I ain’t never heard of a sweepstakes working like that. I never understood how those things made money.”
“In the legitimate world, I think it’s just a different way of spending your advertising budget,” Estelle said.
“Any chance of rousting Terri out of his weekend for some answers?” Terri Mears, the identical twin of Sergeant Tom Mears, was chief operating officer of Posadas State Bank.
“He’ll cooperate, I’m sure. The problem isn’t on this end. No one in some other financial institution is going to be working. We’d have to find someone in Calgary who has computer access after-hours, or at the issuing bank in Las Cruces. That’s going to take as long as just waiting a day until Monday morning.”
“If we have to, though…”
“If. And all this prompts the question of what Chris Marsh is doing with a fake ID, maybe a fake sign on his truck, and maybe a fake electronic signature board.”
“And all of that seventeen percent shit sounds official.” Torrez held up the letter that Estelle had handed him. “Listen to that nonsense: ‘those charges amount to 16.981 percent…’”
“Very official. And the comment about ‘by law’ is convincing.”
“We don’t know about the second check for the 178 grand, do we. That ain’t had time to clear?”
Estelle shook her head. “Lucinda Baca deposited it on Friday afternoon.”
“What time?”
“About three thirty or so.”
“Well, shit. What’d she wait so long for? She got it, what, Wednesday evening sometime?”
“Exactly. I don’t know why she waited, except she just did. Maybe they wanted some time to stare at it some, trying to figure out what to do with it.”
“You takin’ bets?”
“No. I have a sinking feeling, is what I have,” Estelle said. “If the setup was aiming at Joe and Lucinda all along, it worked pretty well. Counting Serafina’s two checks and the first one to the Bacas, that’s $11,800 or so invested. They copped a second check from the Bacas for $30,413. But when it shakes all out, that’s about twenty grand for profit.”
“That’s if the last check doesn’t go south,” Torrez mused. “Folks have been murdered for a whole lot less.”
“Oh, indeed. But maybe all this is just practice,” Estelle said. “Perfecting the system. That’s what I’ve been thinking. The way I see it, there are two roads to investigate. Either Chris Marsh thought he’d found some way to steal checks from this Canadian company-he was just waiting for the big one that he figured was coming-or the sweepstakes company itself is a scam, Marsh included. And that’s the way I’m thinking right now. If the company was legit, and Marsh was just waiting in the wings, I don’t see how he’d know what was coming through the pipeline.”
“I can’t figure that,” the sheriff said. “How’d they get the names, anyways? When Joe and Lucinda won the state thing, it was in the paper. Probably radio and TV, too. But Serafina wasn’t on nobody’s radar, was she?”
“We don’t know the answer to that, Bobby. But there must be dozens of ways. Mailing lists are commodities.”
“Well,” he said, swinging a foot up to rest it on the desk, “somebody climbed down to the crash site, found this Marsh kid, and then made sure that he wasn’t in no condition to talk. Took the paperwork, what there was of it, took the electronic receipt book, took the magnetic signs off the doors. Probably woulda taken Marsh’s name tag if it hadn’t been ripped off and lost.” He shrugged. “Somebody’s got something to hide, that’s for sure. Nilson and Abeyta are looking to find what they can about Marsh over in Cruces. There’s got to be something there. Somebody’s got to know something.”
“And there’s the Canadian connection,” Estelle said. “We need to know more about Canadian Publications Limited.”
“Sooner rather than later,” Torrez grunted. “And first thing, if that big check don’t clear? We need to give Baker a call. If the check is bogus, that takes it out of our hands.”
John Baker, an old friend and contact in the Albuquerque office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, would be intrigued, Estelle thought. “I was thinking of having a chat with him anyway,” she said. “It would be interesting to hear if he’s run across this one-or a variant.”
“If the check bounces, whether it came from Canada or Las Cruces, it’s their baby anyways,” Torrez said. “Bank fraud is either them or the Postal Inspectors, or both. A heads-up won’t hurt.”
“Oh, one other little thing,” Estelle said. “The telephone number in the woodcutter’s pocket? It’s the Contrerases’ number.”
Torrez glowered at her for a moment. “And so…”
“And so, I’m just about sure that Bertrand Anselmo wrote it.”
“No shit? Why would he do that?”
�
�Good question. The dead man’s name is Felix Otero. Joe Baca recognized him.”
For a long minute, Sheriff Robert Torrez stared at Estelle, or rather through her, it seemed to her, pondering the possibilities. “Did you just out and ask Anselmo about all this?”
“No. He’s spooked. I want to know more before I do that.”
“What did Betty have to say?”
“She didn’t recognize Otero. Or said she didn’t. Joe admitted seeing him around sometime, he doesn’t remember when. Anselmo was evasive.”
“Ain’t that interesting,” Torrez said. “This wouldn’t be the first time that Betty had a convenient memory lapse.”
“Neighbors know what neighbors are doing. Regál is a tiny village,” Estelle said.
“Ain’t it, though.”
Chapter Twenty-one
Madelyn Bolles was engaged in animated conversation with Gayle Torrez at the dispatch center as Estelle left the sheriff’s office, and wrapped it up by signing the document that lay on the counter in front of her. As Estelle approached, Madelyn smiled broadly at the undersheriff.
“You’re all waived,” she said, and handed the county attorney’s release of liability form to Gayle.
“Then let’s go for a ride,” Estelle said. “You’ve already had a tour of sorts with Bill Gastner, I understand?”
“Wonderful,” the writer said. “We did a late breakfast-”
“That’s not surprising,” Gayle interrupted, and Madelyn laughed.
“My impression is that his passions include green chile,” she said. “And we’re going to talk again. Mr. Gastner has a most interesting perspective on life in general and this country in particular.”
“A unique perspective, that’s for sure,” Estelle said. “Join me in my office for a few minutes?” She held the low gate for the writer, and they walked down the narrow hall to Estelle’s office. Madelyn turned in place, surveying the room critically.
“Have a seat,” Estelle said, but the reporter’s attention had been drawn to the east wall, where a series of twelve framed photographs hung, each an eight-by-ten, some in color, some in spectacular black and white. The photos were displayed in a pleasing, staggered arrangement. “That’s last year’s calendar,” Estelle said.
“Literally, you mean?”
“Yes. It’s an idea that our department photographer, Linda Real, had a number of years ago. She started collecting candid shots, and then had the brainstorm to put them together in a calendar. Now she does it every year.”
“My word,” Bolles breathed. “This is the entire department?”
“That’s us. An even dozen.”
“Let’s see. I saw this deputy down south, at Regál Pass. Jackie Taber. And this is the sheriff’s wife. And this is you, of course. That means this must be your department photographer.”
“That’s Linda.”
“Quite a talent. We should hire her away from you.” She turned to look at Estelle when the undersheriff made no response. “I would think that happens a lot in a rural setting like this. You train the talent, and then they move on.”
“That happens once in a while,” Estelle agreed. “We certainly hope it doesn’t happen anytime soon with Linda.”
“This is the Great Stone Face,” Madelyn said, touching the bottom of Sheriff Bob Torrez’s portrait, a photo that captured him with one foot up on the front bumper of his pickup, a pair of binoculars in one hand, and a map spread out on the hood. He was glowering at something, no doubt the shutter of Linda’s camera. “He is so Mr. Outdoor Life,” Madelyn added. “I wonder if he knows just how handsome he really is.”
“You’d have to ask him.”
Madelyn chuckled at that and then took a step to her right, where she frowned at a wonderful portrait of Captain Eddie Mitchell, kneeling amongst a forest of adult legs, talking to a tiny child wrapped in a soiled white blanket, the head of a teddy bear sticking out from the folds. Estelle remembered that circumstance, a mobile home fire in the middle of the night, and remembered how Linda had dropped to one knee so that the camera wasn’t looking down on Mitchell or the child.
“This is a tough-looking hombre,” Madelyn observed. “In a soft moment.”
“That’s Captain Eddie Mitchell. He was the village chief of police before the village dissolved its department and started contracting services from the county.”
“Uh-huh. She could sell prints like this,” the writer said. “Has she ever tried that?”
“You’d have to ask her, Madelyn.”
“Interesting. Interesting organization. So let me ask you something. Who are your dispatchers?”
Estelle stepped closer and touched the three photos of Gayle, Brent Sutherland, and Ernie Wheeler.
“Just the three?”
“Yes. At the moment.”
“How do you cover twenty-four/seven with just three people?”
“We swing a road deputy in to cover when we have to.”
“And the road deputies are…”
“Sergeant Tom Mears, Tom Pasquale, Jackie Taber, Tony Abeyta, Dennis Collins, and Mike Sisneros.” She touched the corner of each photo in order. “We just lost Sergeant Howard Baker to retirement. We’re shorthanded, and just starting the hiring process.”
“And you, the sheriff, and the captain are the supervisors? That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
“Impossible. That would mean that, more often than not, you only have one officer on the road during some of the shifts. One officer for the entire county.”
“That’s correct. But we have a good working relationship with the State Police, as you may have noticed. Thankfully, we have long bouts of peace and quiet.”
“‘Long bouts of peace.’ I like that.” She turned away from the photographs with a final nod of approval, and her eyes roamed the rest of the small, comfortable office. “So.” And she sat down, arranging her jacket and slacks carefully. “There is a wonderful story here for my magazine,” she said. “One-third of your department is made up of women. Your background is a story all by itself.” She spread both hands. “Born in Mexico?”
“Yes.” Omission was a wonderful convenience, Estelle thought. She caught a tiny wrinkling around the corners of Madelyn Bolles’ eyes, and wondered how much the reporter knew-if anything. She was not poised to take notes, and there was no visible tape recorder. She appeared to be simply surveying the ore load of the mine prior to serious digging.
“Sent to the United States to finish your schooling?”
“Yes.”
“Eighteen years old before you became a U.S. citizen?”
“Yes.”
At the third monosyllabic response, Madelyn smiled broadly. “Don’t worry. I’ll get beyond the yes-or-no questions.”
Estelle rested her elbows on her desk, chin comfortable on her cupped hands, and waited.
“Married a medical student who is now a successful family practitioner and general surgeon?”
“Yes.”
“And Dr. Guzman is a naturalized U.S. citizen?”
“Yes.”
“You have two wonderful children, Francisco, aged eight, and Carlos, now almost six.”
“Yes.” Madelyn Bolles had obviously done her homework, and more than that…she had committed the demographics to memory. Estelle wondered how much Bill Gastner had told the reporter, although knowing padrino’s discretion, she doubted that any of the personal data had come from him.
“You’re now thirty-nine years old, which means that you’ve worked for the Posadas County Sheriff’s Department for sixteen years.”
Estelle took a deep breath and lifted her head, laying her hands down on the desk. “Yes, and yes. I’m impressed.”
“Trivia is easy,” Madelyn Bolles said with an offhand wave of her left hand. “Most of the time. But we have to move beyond that. Every single person I’ve talked to so far, including his wife, Ms. Gayle, tells me that your esteemed movie star of a sheriff is going to be the tough nut to crack.
”
“Probably true.”
“But that’s all right,” Madelyn said easily. “That’ll be fun. Do you ever read our magazine, Estelle?”
“I confess that I don’t. I’ve seen it, of course.”
“Let me tell you what we do. We specialize in thorough, probing, tough articles about today’s women, Estelle. Not just a superficial profile of some glamorous star, or a page of gratuitous praise for a Nobel or Pulitzer winner. We like to think that we present complete portraits of women who we believe are accomplishing major goals in life, sometimes against considerable odds, women who are inspirations to others in this man’s world. We lean heavily on biography as a way to explain why our featured women are taking the paths that they are. Am I making sense?”
“Yes.”
“I love that.” She regarded Estelle, and the undersheriff could see the assessment going on behind the alert violet eyes. “We’re a highly regarded, much-awarded national magazine, Estelle, and I don’t tell you that just to blow smoke. We don’t take our assignments lightly. We’re thorough, as I said, and fair.” She reached forward and rested her right index finger on the edge of Estelle’s desk, as if the pressure she applied kept the desk from floating off into space. “I have to tell you from the beginning that although sometimes I use a tape recorder, most of the time I don’t. I trust my memory, I trust my instincts. I take my own photographs. When all is said and done, I will let you read the rough draft copy of the article, but will accept only corrections where I might have made an error in fact…not impression or interpretation.”
“All right. But I don’t need to read it. You do what you do.”
“Well, fair enough. But really most important is the way I work. I’d like to leave an open calendar for this.”
“What does that mean?” Estelle asked.
“It means that I won’t be flitting off to something that someone says is more important. I won’t be interrupted. And I’m also saying that this isn’t an afternoon thing, or one or two days. Who knows. I might be in town for two weeks. Maybe more. It depends on how much time we can find to work together-because it really is a collaborative effort, Estelle.” She tapped the desk for punctuation and withdrew her hand. “My intent is not to invade your privacy, although a certain amount of that is inevitable. I want to offer a profile of you, your department, even your family, that’s inspiring to our readers.” She sat back and waited.
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