Cat's Claw

by Susan Wittig Albert

  “You just never know when you’re gonna need a gun,” he said, shaking his head darkly. “Like, if somebody starts shooting up your history class or something.” The baby climbed up on the sofa and crawled into his lap. “We had a big argument about that, me and Larry. I said we oughtta have the right.”

  “Do you own a gun?” Sheila asked.

  Potts shook his head. “Just think we oughtta have the right,” he said again.

  Sheila nodded. “What about Dennis Martin and Jason Hatch? Do you know them?”

  Potts knew Martin, but didn’t think he was a very good tech. “Too slow,” he said, with another shake of his head. “That’s what Larry said, too. I think he was getting ready to tell Martin to take a hike. There’s plenty of other guys who can work faster. You know what I’m sayin’? You gotta figure stuff out quick. Martin’s slow. Which drives Larry up a wall.”

  Sheila was taking notes. “Jason Hatch?”

  Hatch had been at the shop when Potts himself came on the team. He was older, not a graduate student like Martin and Potts. Richie had the idea that he’d been working there for quite a while, since the place opened, maybe. He was good. “Best I’ve ever seen,” Potts said judiciously. “He could scope out a problem way faster’n me. Faster’n Larry, too, which is sayin’ something.”

  But Hatch had left about three weeks after Potts came on board. Hatch and Kirk had gotten into it, a real knock-down-drag-out, and Hatch was outta there. Fast. No notice, no nothing. Just gone.

  “Got into it over what?” Sheila asked, looking up from her notebook. “What did they argue about?”

  Potts shrugged. “Hatch was talkin’ to a customer, was what I heard from Dennis Martin.” The baby stood up on his lap and began to pull his hair.

  “Talking to a customer?”

  “Yeah. The way Kirk has his system set up, it’s against the rules for the techs to deal directly with the customers.” Potts pulled the baby’s hands down and the boy began to cry.

  “Why? I mean, why is it against the rules?”

  He put the baby on the floor. The little boy plopped down on his bottom and began to scream. Potts raised his voice over the noise, but didn’t move to placate him. “Lots of shops operate like that. Keeps the clients out of the techs’ hair, is the way Kirk explained it. Clients ask dumb questions—takes the techs too much time to answer them.” He grinned crookedly. “If you ask me, it’s more like it keeps the techs from lettin’ the clients know that they’ll work on the side cheaper than the shop can do it. In this shop, the jobs go in and out through Kirk or Henry Palmer, at the counter. Nobody comes around back. The tech’s got something to say to the client, he’s gotta write it on the job ticket.”

  The baby was screaming louder. Sheila leaned forward. “But Hatch didn’t do that?”

  Potts yelled, “Hey, Ruthie, come and get the kid. He’s bawlin’.”

  The woman padded out of the apartment kitchen, picked up the crying child by both arms, and perched him on her hip. She directed a dark look at Sheila, as if the crying were her fault, and went back into the kitchen.

  “Hatch didn’t do what he was supposed to do?” Sheila repeated.

  “I guess not,” Potts replied with a shrug. “That’s what Henry said, anyway.”

  Henry? “Mr. Palmer knew why Hatch was fired?” That didn’t square with what Palmer himself had said. He’d claimed not to know what it was about.

  “Well, he wasn’t fired, exactly. I mean, we’re not employees, we’re just contract. Larry told Henry not to call Hatch in for more work. But sure, Henry knew all about it. He and Hatch were buddies, so if Larry didn’t tell Henry what was going down, Hatch would’ve.” He grinned slyly. “It was definitely okay by Martin and me, y’know. Meant more work for us.”

  Sheila understood that reasoning. “Any idea who the customer was that Hatch was talking to?”

  “Nah. But if you really want to know, it wouldn’t be hard to find out. Just look at the job tickets from around the middle of August, when it happened. It would be one of Hatch’s jobs about that time. Maybe the last one.” He frowned. “How come you’re asking about all this stuff? It’s ancient history.”

  Sheila nodded and made a note to check the job tickets, wondering why she hadn’t thought of that. Or more to the point, why Palmer hadn’t suggested it. And why Palmer had lied about knowing the reason for Hatch’s firing. That was worth checking out.

  “One more thing,” she said. “A notebook computer was brought in recently. The customer’s name was Timms. Did you work on that?”

  “That’s the one the cops picked up, right?”

  “Correct,” Sheila said. “Was it one of your jobs?”

  Potts shook his head emphatically. “Nope. Never saw it, never touched it. Dennis and me talked about it afterward—after the cops took it, I mean. He didn’t work on it, either.”

  In the kitchen, Ruthie was banging pots and pans. The baby had begun to bawl again, and the rock music from the neighboring apartment was now so loud that the walls seemed to vibrate. Sheila stood and thanked Potts for his cooperation. When she told him that they needed his prints, he cheerfully agreed to show up at the station the next morning.

  “Yeah, okay. I’m cool with that. Anything I can do to help.” His shoulders slumped dejectedly. “Sure hope I don’t gotta look for a new job,” he said. He gestured toward the kitchen. “Ruthie got laid off last week. She’s babysitting a couple of neighborhood kids during the day to help out. Things are a little tight around here. I’ve got two more semesters to go before I can get a full-time job with health benefits.”

  “I hope everything turns out okay,” Sheila said, meaning it. “I know it’s tough to work and have a family and be a student.” She grinned. “Good luck, Richie.”

  “Yeah.” The young man’s shoulders straightened. “Yeah, thanks, Chief.”

  Outside in the rain-cooled air, Sheila took a deep breath. At the desk, barricaded behind a pile of paper, she lost the sense of real people, in real trouble, doing real things to try to help themselves out. She hadn’t enjoyed interviewing Richie Potts, but she was glad she’d done it. She was even gladder that she could walk away from the vibrating walls, the baby’s crying, and the smell of cooking cabbage.

  OUT in the car, Sheila radioed for a background check on Jason Hatch, current address and phone, employment, vehicle, and priors. It came back before she’d driven more than a few blocks. She jotted down the address, which matched the one she’d copied from the Rolodex, and the phone number. He was listed as self-employed. Vehicle: Dodge Ram. And he had two priors: a misdemeanor bad check and a third-degree felony possession.

  The address for Jason Hatch took her to a single-wide trailer in a trailer park on the east side of the interstate, in a flat, treeless field behind a shopping plaza that featured Walmart, Home Depot, and a five-screen movie theater. The trailers were close together, with motorcycles and pickup trucks parked along the narrow street and dogs chained to makeshift shelters—oil barrels, wooden crates—in the dirt yards. As Sheila pulled up in front of the address in her notes, a couple of neighborhood dogs began barking.

  But she knew when she got out of the car that this was a strike-out. The trailer windows were dark and a For Rent sign, red letters on a black background, was stuck into the narrow patch of withered brown grass between the sidewalk and the trailer. But she tried anyway, going up the dirt path—muddy from the evening’s rain—and banging on the door. After a few moments, she gave it up and walked back down the path and around the front of the trailer on the adjacent lot.

  Her sharp rap on the metal door was answered by a heavyset, blowsy woman who reeked of cigarettes. Behind her, a reality show was playing on the television, the volume cranked up so high that the woman had to yell over it.

  “Hatch?” she asked, in answer to Sheila’s question and the flash of her badge wallet. She frowned. “Sorry, ma’am, cain’t tell you a thing. There was some guy shackin’ up over there with his girlfrie
nd, yeah, but I never heard his name. Him and the girl moved out a while back. Good thing, too. Loud music, every night. Rock. Hate it. I’m a country and western fan m’self.” She grinned, showing one gold tooth. “Love that Willie.”

  Sheila wondered whether the rock music from next door had been a defense against the woman’s loud television. The battle of the volume controls. “Any idea where Mr. Hatch might be living?”

  The woman shook her head. “Manager’d prob’bly know,” she offered. “Double-wide at the far end.” She gestured with her head, then shut the door in Sheila’s face.

  The manager’s double-wide had a blue metal roof, a blue-painted front porch and shutters, some straggly landscape shrubs, and a nearly leafless willow tree in the front yard. The manager was bald and paunchy, with a red and blue plaid shirt and yellow suspenders holding up baggy pants. The toes of his fleece-lined house slippers had been scissored out and white socks showed through. He had apparently just gotten out of the recliner that faced the television, because a can of beer, a half-finished pizza, and a fat calico cat sat on the table beside it. The room was very warm.

  “Hatch,” he said, scratching his grizzled, unshaven chin. “Yeah, right. He was here, but him and the girl moved out the end of September. I keep that trailer for month to month, see, which ain’t my fav’rite.” He frowned. “Fact is, month-to-months are a pain in the patootie. They come, they go, or I wind up bootin’ ’em out. Always try to get a six-month lease, if I can. But when I cain’t, I do the next best thing, which is month-to-month.”

  When Sheila asked about a forwarding address, the man went to the gray metal desk, under the big window in the living room. He sat down and opened a drawer, leafed through some papers, then pulled out what looked like a rental record, copied the information onto a scrap of paper, and put the record back. On the chair-side table, the cat got up and stretched.

  “Guess this is what you want,” he said, handing her the slip of paper. “Address and phone. Anyway, it’s what I got. Normally, I don’t bother. Them with a lease, I allus get a forward, but not with the month-to-months.” He squinted up at her. “Couldn’t figger why that one was month-to-month, neither. Or why he was livin’ here at all. Bought hisself a brand-new red pick-’em-up truck, right after he moved in. Told Mr. Boggs three doors down he’d paid cash fer it. Anybody could pay cash for a new truck oughtta be on a lease.”

  “Would that be a Dodge Ram?” Sheila asked. The cat was now eating the pizza.

  “You bet. Big baby. Fully loaded. A cool twenty-five grand.” He stood and hitched up his pants. “Guess he decided he’d rather drive his money than live in it. Takes all kinds, you know.”

  The address on the scrap of paper was on Pecos Street, only about six blocks from Larry Kirk’s place. Jason Hatch had come up in the world since his month-to-month stay in the trailer park, Sheila thought, as she stopped in front of the house. The residence was attractive and nicely landscaped, on a quiet street lined with well-kept, fairly upscale homes surrounded by green lawns. But the place was completely dark. Sheila flipped her cell open and keyed in the number. The phone rang five times, then an answering machine picked up. When a curt male voice instructed her to leave a number, she cut off the call.

  IT was pushing nine thirty when Sheila got home, and the sporadic drizzle had settled into a steadier rain. The doghouse in Rambo’s run had kept him warm and dry, but he was delighted to see her. When she opened the kennel gate, the Rotti made a beeline for the back porch, where he turned to wait for her, rear end wagging furiously.

  The house that she and Blackie had rented was clean, comfortable, and big enough for the both of them. The fenced backyard and the kennel had been a bonus, as was the large kitchen with an old-fashioned dining nook. Its window overlooked what had once been a vegetable garden, although Sheila knew she’d never have time for gardening. And anyway, she didn’t have a green thumb. If a plant had the misfortune to be given to her, it was a sure death sentence for the poor thing.

  The house was chilly and the chicken sandwich she’d eaten earlier in the evening was an ancient memory. She loosened her uniform tie and unbuckled her duty belt, hanging it on a hook by the door, next to Blackie’s old blue denim jacket. Then she turned up the thermostat, made a cup of hot chocolate in the microwave, and grilled a cheese sandwich, with sides of chips and a dill pickle spear. She turned down the volume on the police band radio, set to the department’s frequency. The radio was a habit from her days in Dallas, when every call-out, every crime was fascinating. This time of night, it was generally silent, but it kept her in touch with what was going on in town. In her town.

  She took her food to the dining nook, sat down at the table, and pulled the Polaroids out of her briefcase, while Rambo fitted his large self under the table and around her feet. She laid the photographs on the table in front of her and began studying them, then took out her notebook.

  She was flipping the pages with one hand and holding her sandwich with the other when her cell phone twittered. She saw with a deep pleasure that it was Blackie. He was calling from his motel in El Paso. He sounded tired.

  “Just got in,” he said. “Talked to some people, picked up a couple of leads on the kid. Looks like his mom has taken him across the border already, probably heading for her parents’ village. I’ll be going over tomorrow.” She heard the sound of a shoe hitting the floor, then another.

  Sheila put down her sandwich, feeling a wrench in her gut. The border area had grown increasingly dangerous, with the cartels murdering members of rival cartels—and law enforcement officers as well. The previous week, two Mexican policemen had been murdered in Piedras Negras, across the Rio Grande from Eagle Pass, and an American tourist had been shot on a highway near Juárez. It was war down there.

  “McQuaid’s going over with you, isn’t he?” she asked, trying not to let the worry leak into her voice.

  “Yeah. He’s getting an early plane out here tomorrow. Don’t worry, Sheila—we’ll be fine.” His voice was strong and sure as it always was, and Sheila pushed her fear down, into some deep place, far away, where it couldn’t reach her heart. Blackie and Mike McQuaid were smart, experienced, confident. They could take care of themselves better than any two guys she knew.

  And she knew how important it was to find the boy. This was another one of those heartbreaking parental kidnappings, made even more complicated by the fact that the mother had taken her son over the border. The United States and Mexico had a treaty that permitted courts in both countries to enforce the international convention on cross-border child abduction, but that was on paper. In reality and on the ground, and especially in Mexico, it was a much different matter.

  “How was your day?” he asked. She could hear his long sigh as he stretched out on the motel bed and the sound of the TV as he clicked it on with the remote. “Anything new going on there?” He muted the TV.

  “You wouldn’t believe.” Sheila gave him a quick summary of the events that had transpired since Clint Hardin had left her office on his way to Rockport. As she spoke, she was surprised by how much had happened in a few hours, and by the rapid pace of developments. But that was normal for investigations into shooting deaths. She and Bartlett had moved from suicide to homicide, and—with Timms’ disappearance—to the strong suspicion of a connection between Timms and Kirk.

  But she didn’t get very far in her story before she was interrupted.

  “You skipped over a deputy chief to partner with a detective?” Blackie asked incredulously. “And you gave the lead in the case to the detective?”

  “Well, yeah,” Sheila said, surprised by his reaction and almost immediately defensive. “But I didn’t ‘skip over’ the deputy chief. Hardin was the one who skipped. He’s out for vacation—fishing, on the Gulf. Anyway, I’ve been wanting to get out of the office and do some serious fieldwork.” That part wasn’t news to Blackie—she had talked about it often enough in the past few months. “I’m sure you know how good it feels to get
away from the desk,” she added. In Blackie’s new career as a private investigator, he didn’t have to manage a department, fill out forms, sign papers, write memos. He could do as much fieldwork as he wanted. “Porterfield’s ruling is still open, but it’s more than likely she’ll call it a homicide as soon as the autopsy and forensic reports are in. Left-handers don’t shoot themselves in the right temple, and that email to the wife is more than a little suspicious. The date stamp on the email does give us the approximate time of death, though, whoever sent it. I—”

  “I’m not talking about the investigation,” Blackie interrupted. “Bubba Harris took an investigation every now and then. He’d rather stay in the office and out of the line of fire, but he thought it was good practice to get out in the community, let people see that the chief did something besides push papers around.”

  “Then what—”

  “I’m talking about command structure. I’m talking about you and Bartlett. You didn’t stop to think about the political implications of letting that kid take the lead?”

  “Political implications?” Sheila rubbed her forehead, her defensiveness beginning to smolder into irritation. “To tell the truth, mostly I thought about finding out how Larry Kirk died and who’s responsible. I thought about getting out from behind the desk for a few hours and doing some real-time, serious fieldwork. I thought about backstopping a bright young detective, who is a first-rate investigator, even if Hardin does take most of the credit for—”

  “Listen to me, Sheila.” Blackie broke in. “I don’t want to tell you how to run your shop, but I have worked in Adams County law enforcement for a lot longer than you have. As a matter of fact, I probably know your department even better than you do. Bartlett, I don’t know very well, except that I’ve heard he’s quite the young Romeo. It’s a departmental joke that he’s got girls fighting over him. Teaming up with that guy is a bad idea. And giving him the lead is worse. It’s going to look to everybody like you’ve gone out of your way to pick a favorite. Hardin will be furious.”