“On the morning of October thirteen,1967, Robert Osborne rose, as usual, before dawn, showered and dressed. He wore gray lightweight gabardine slacks and a dacron jacket in a gray and black plaid pattern. He kissed his wife goodbye, asked her to be on the lookout for his dog, Maxie, who’d been gone all night, and told her he’d be home for dinner about seven-thirty that evening. Acting on doctor’s orders, Mrs. Osborne remained in bed. Before she went back to sleep she heard her husband outside calling the dog.
“Mr. Secundo Estivar, the next witness, testified that Robert Osborne appeared at his door while the family was having breakfast. He had the dog with him and acted very upset because he thought it had been poisoned. There was an exchange of angry words between the two men, then Robert Osborne departed, carrying the dog in his arms. It was still early when he appeared at the veterinary hospital run by Dr. John Loomis. He left the dog at the hospital for diagnosis and continued on his way to San Diego. As he drove toward the highway he saw Carla Lopez walking along the street and stopped to ask her about the possibility of her two older brothers coming back to work for him. He told Miss Lopez his present crew was no good and had no experience.
“The crew he referred to was composed of ten viseros, Mexican nationals with visas which allowed them to do agricultural work in the United States. Mr. Estivar made a record of the names and addresses of the men but he didn’t examine their visas carefully nor did he check the registration of the truck they arrived in. Such things seemed unimportant at the time. The tomato crop was ready to be picked and crated and the need for pickers was aggravated by other factors. During the preceding month one of Mr. Estivar’s sons, Rufo, had married and moved to Northern California; another, Felipe, had left to look for a non-agricultural job, and the border-crossers who’d been working the fields had their minibus stolen in Tijuana and were without transportation. It was a critical period at the ranch, with Mr. Estivar and his oldest son, Cruz, putting in sixteen-hour days to keep things going. When the ten viseros showed up, they were hired on the spot, no questions asked.
“They remained for two weeks. During those two weeks they kept, and were kept, to themselves. As Mr. Estivar remarked from the witness box, he was not running a social club. The bunkhouse where the viseros slept, the mess hall where they ate their meals were out of bounds for Mrs. Estivar and Jaime and his younger sisters, for Mrs. Osborne, for the cook, Dulzura Gonzales, and even the Osborne dog. This isolation made the job of the sheriff’s department not only difficult but, as it turned out, impossible. The men Mr. Valenzuela spent six months searching for were hardly more than shadows. They left no tracks and no pictures in anyone’s memory, no gaps in anyone’s life. Their main identity was an old red G.M. truck.
“The truck departed from the ranch late in the afternoon of October thirteen. Around nine o’clock that night, as Mr. Estivar was preparing for bed, he heard the truck return. He recognized it by the peculiar squeak of its brakes and the fact that it parked outside the bunkhouse. The Estivar family kept ranchers’ hours. Shortly after nine they were asleep, Mr. and Mrs. Estivar, the two sons who were still living at home, Cruz, the oldest, and Jaime, the youngest, and the nine-year-old twin girls. We have reason to believe they all slept through a murder.
“The victim, Robert Osborne, had arrived home about seven-thirty from his trip to the city. He had his dog with him, completely recovered and eager to run after being cooped up at the vet’s all day. He let it out and proceeded into the house, where he had dinner with his wife. According to her it was a pleasant meal lasting an hour or so. At approximately eight-thirty Robert Osborne went into the kitchen to give Dulzura Gonzales some money for her birthday, since he’d forgotten to buy her a present in San Diego. He took a twenty-dollar bill out of his wallet. Miss Gonzales noticed that the wallet contained a lot of money. We don’t know the actual amount, but it hardly matters—murders have been committed for twenty-five cents. What matters is that when Robert Osborne left the house he had in his possession enough money to constitute what Miss Gonzales called ‘a real temptation to a poor man.’
“While Robert Osborne was outside looking for the dog, his wife, Devon, went into the main living room to play an album of symphonic music which had recently arrived by mail. It was a warm night after a hot day and the windows were still closed. The drapes had been opened after sunset, but the windows faced east and south toward the riverbed, the Bishop ranch and the city of Tijuana. Only the city was visible. Devon Osborne did some straightening up around the room while she listened to the music and waited for her husband’s return. Time passed, too much time. She began to worry in spite of the fact that Robert Osborne had been born on the ranch and knew every inch of it. Finally she went out to the garage, thinking that her husband might have driven to one of the neighboring ranches. His car was still there. She then telephoned Mr. Estivar.
“It was almost ten o’clock and the Estivar family was asleep, but Mrs. Osborne let the phone ring until Mr. Estivar answered. When he learned of the situation he asked Mrs. Osborne to stay inside the house with the doors and windows locked while he and his son, Cruz, searched for Robert Osborne with a jeep. Following instructions Mrs. Osborne waited in the kitchen. At a quarter to eleven Mr. Estivar came back to the ranch house to call the sheriff’s office in Boca de Rio. Mr. Valenzuela, with his partner, Mr. Bismarck, arrived at the ranch within half an hour. They discovered a great deal of blood on the floor of the mess hall and called the main office in San Diego for reinforcements.
“More blood was found later that night on a piece of cloth caught on a yucca spike outside the mess-hall door. The cloth was part of a sleeve from a man’s shirt, small in size. On the following Monday children waiting for a school bus came across the body of Robert Osborne’s dog, which an autopsy later showed had been struck by a car or truck. About three weeks later, on November four, Jaime Estivar spotted the butterfly knife among the pumpkin vines. The floor of the mess hall, the sleeve, the dog’s mouth and the butterfly knife—these were the main areas where blood was found and from which samples were sent to the police lab in Sacramento for analysis. Three types of blood were classified, B, AB and O. Type O was confined to the sleeve; both B and AB were in considerable quantity on the floor; B was in the dog’s mouth and AB on the butterfly knife.
“Additional clues turned up in the lab. Tiny fragments of glass from the mess-hall floor were identified as the contact lenses Robert Osborne was wearing when he left the house. The torn sleeve contained particles of sandy alkaline soil with a high nitrogen content indicating recent use of a commercial fertilizer. Such soil is typical of the Valley area. Mixed with the sample taken from the sleeve was sebum, the secretion of human oil glands which flows more copiously in young people, and a number of straight black hairs belonging to someone from one of the dark but not Negroid races. Similar hairs and bits of human tissue were found in the dog’s mouth, as well as a shred of cloth, heavy-duty blue cotton twill of the kind used to make men’s work pants.
“From a police lab five hundred miles away, a picture began to emerge of the events which took place on the Osborne ranch that night and of the men who participated in them. There were three. The only one whose name we know was Robert Osborne. Let us refer to the other two, as we did previously, by their blood types. Type O was a dark-haired, dark-skinned young man, small in stature, probably Mexican, who worked on a ranch in the area. He wore a blue and green plaid cotton shirt of the kind sold by the thousands through Sears Roebuck. He was slightly wounded near the beginning of the fight and left early, catching his sleeve on a yucca spike as he ran out the door. Perhaps O was merely trying to escape further trouble, but it seems more likely that he went to get help for his friend, seeing that things were going badly. The friend, B, was also dark-skinned, dark-haired and probably Mexican. He wore Levis and carried a butterfly knife. Lum Wing referred to such a knife as ‘jewelry,’ but it was lethal jewelry. A butterfly knife
in the right hands can be almost as quick and deadly as a switchblade. We know that B was bitten by the dog and also that he was fairly seriously injured in the fight.
“I will not attempt to reconstruct the crime itself, how and why it started, whether it was actually planned as a robbery or a murder, or whether it was a chance encounter that turned into a homicide. We simply don’t know. The lab that tells us a man’s age, race, stature, blood type, clothing can’t reveal what’s going on inside his head. Our only clue concerning events prior to the crime was provided by Lum Wing, the cook, whose quarters were in a partitioned-off area at one end of the mess hall. Mr. Wing testified that he dozed off on his cot after drinking some wine. He was awakened by the sound of loud angry voices talking in Spanish. He didn’t recognize the voices or understand what they were saying, since he doesn’t speak the language. Nor did he attempt to interfere in the argument. He made earplugs out of small pieces of paper, put them in his ears and went back to sleep.
“While the circumstances leading up to the crime itself are and will probably remain obscure, what happened afterward is somewhat clearer. First, there is the evidence of the blankets missing from the bunkhouse—a double flannelette sheet-type blanket and two brown wool army surplus—plus the fact that no bloodstains were found outside the mess hall. Mr. Valenzuela has testified that the body of a young man Robert Osborne’s size contains between six and a half and seven quarts of blood. It’s a reasonable assumption that the body was wrapped in the three blankets and carried out to the old red G.M. truck. Ten men had arrived in that truck. Eleven left in it.
“As the vehicle moved toward the main road three things occurred: the murder weapon was tossed out into the pumpkin field; the dog was struck and killed as it chased the truck in pursuit of its master; and some of the contents of Robert Osborne’s wallet, if not the wallet itself, were thrown into the riverbed. One item, a credit card, was subsequently found downstream in a pile of debris after the season’s first heavy rain. Unlike other cards Robert Osborne carried in his wallet, the credit card was made of a heavy plastic, indestructible in water. If the men had been ordinary robbers they’d probably have kept the card and tried to use it. But the chances are that the viseros didn’t even know what it was, let alone that it could be useful to them.
“In hearings like this one, as your Honor pointed out, an averment of diligent search should be included. The search was diligent, indeed. It began the night Robert Osborne disappeared and has continued until the present time, a period of one year and four days. It covered an area from Northern California to Eastern Texas, from Tijuana to Guadalajara. It included the posting, by the victim’s mother, of a ten-thousand-dollar reward, none of which was ever paid out because no legitimate claim was filed.
“When a man drops out of sight, leaving behind evidence of foul play but no body, questions inevitably arise in people’s minds. Was the disappearance voluntary and the evidence faked? Would a presumption of death benefit the man or his survivors? Was he in trouble with the law, with his family, his friends? Was he depressed? Ill? Broke? In the case of Robert Osborne such questions are easily answered. He was a young man with everything to live for. He had a loving wife, a devoted mother, a child on the way, a successful ranch, good health, good friends.
“I will let Devon Osborne’s own words conclude this summary. She said in her testimony this morning: ‘I was sure my husband was dead. I’d been sure for a long time. Nothing would keep Robert from getting in touch with me if he were alive!’”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
on the way home lum wing, exhausted by his mental battles with the law and his unexpected victory, fell asleep in the back of the station wagon.
The day had had the opposite effect on Jaime. He felt excited and restless. Splashes of bright red crossed his face, disappeared and came back again like warning lights turning on and off. Around his family and friends he was used to playing it cool, limiting his reactions to blank stares, noncommittal shrugs or barely perceptible movements of the head. Now suddenly he wanted to talk, talk a great deal, to anyone. Only Dulzura was available, massive and quiet in the seat beside him. All the talking was being done in the front seat. It wasn’t loud, it didn’t sound like quarreling, and yet Jaime knew it was and listened to find out why.
“ . . . Judge Gallagher, not Galloper.”
“Very well. Gallagher. How did he get to be a judge if he can’t make up his mind?”
“He can,” Estivar said. “He probably already has.”
“Then why didn’t he announce it?”
“That’s not the way it’s done. He’s supposed to go over all the testimony and study the reports from the police lab before he reaches a decision.”
When Ysobel was angry her speech became very precise. “It seems to me the lawyer was attempting to prove the viseros killed Mr. Osborne. Accusing men who are not present to defend themselves is not American justice.”
“They weren’t present because they couldn’t be found. If they’d been found they would have had a fair trial.”
“Men do not just disappear into the air like smoke.”
“Some do. Some did.”
“Still, it doesn’t seem rightful to read names out loud and in court the way they did. Supposing one of the names had been yours and you weren’t given a chance to say, ‘That’s me, Secundo Estivar, that’s my name, don’t you go accusing—’”
“The names read in court were not real, can’t you understand that?”
“Even so.”
“All right. If you don’t like the way Mr. Ford handled the case, call him up and tell him as soon as we get home. But don’t drag me in.”
“You are in,” Ysobel said. “You gave him the names.”
“I had to, I was ordered to.”
“Even so.”
It was a dangerous subject, this business of the migrants, and Estivar knew his wife wouldn’t give it up until she was offered another to take its place. He said, “You’d have handled the case much better than Ford did, of course.”
“In some ways maybe I could.”
“Well, keep a list and send it to him. Don’t waste time telling me. I’m no—”
“I don’t think he should have brought the girl into it, Carla Lopez.” Ysobel rubbed her eyes as though she were erasing an image. “It was a shock to me seeing her again. I thought she’d left town, and good riddance. Then suddenly up she pops, in court of all places, and no longer a girl. A woman, a woman with a baby. I suppose you saw the baby when she had it with her this morning.”
“Yes.”
“Do you think it looked like—”
“It looked like a baby,” Estivar said stonily. “Any baby.”
“What fools we were to hire her that summer.”
“I didn’t hire her. You did.”
“It was your idea to get someone who’d be good with the kids.”
“Well, she was good with the kids, all right, only it was the big kids, not the little ones.”
“How was I to foresee that? She looked so innocent,” Ysobel said. “So pure. I never dreamed she’d dangle herself in front of my sons like a—like a—”
“Lower your voice.”
Jaime leaned toward Dulzura and spoke in a whisper: “What’s that mean, dangled herself?”
Dulzura wasn’t certain but she had no intention of admitting it to a fourteen-year-old boy. “You’re too young to know such things.”
“Bull.”
“You get fresh with me and I’ll tell your father. He’ll knock the bejeez out of you.”
“Oh, come on. What’s it mean, she dangled herself?”
“It means,” Dulzura said carefully, “that she paraded around with her chest stuck out.”
“Like a drum majorette?”
“Yes.
Only no music or drums. No costume or baton, either.”
“Then what’s left?”
“The chest.”
“What’s so great about that?”
“I told you, you’re too young.”
Jaime studied the row of warts along the knuckles of his left hand. “Her and Felipe used to meet in the packing shed.”
“Well, don’t you tell nobody. It’s none of their business.”
“There are cracks between the boards where I could watch them through.”
“You oughta be ashamed.”
“She didn’t dangle herself,” Jaime said. “She just took off her clothes.”
the five o’clock race to the suburbs had begun and cars were spilling wildly onto the freeway from every ramp. With the windows open, the way Leo liked to drive, conversation was impossible. Above the din of traffic, only very loud noises could have been audible, shouts of anger, excitement, fear. Devon felt only a kind of gray and quiet grief. The tears that stung her eyes dried in the wind and left a dusting of salt across her lashes. She made no attempt to wipe it away.
Leo took the off-ramp to Boca de Rio and it was then that the first words of the journey were exchanged.
“Would you like to stop for a cup of coffee, Devon?”
“If you would.”
“It’s up to you. You’re a free agent now, remember? You have to start making decisions.”
“All right. I’d like some coffee.”
“See how easy it is?”
Beyond This Point Are Monsters Page 13