by Thomas King
“Hence the password.”
“Everyone has heroes.”
Duke squinted at the computer. “Redding appears to have emailed a Detective Walter Chang of the Sacramento Police Department. Any idea why?”
Cruz shook his head. “Jayme had sources. Or maybe he was a friend.”
Duke picked up the phone and began dialing. “There’s coffee if you want.”
Cruz started to stand. Thumps held out a hand and mouthed a silent no.
“Looking for Detective Walter Chang,” said the sheriff. “Sheriff Duke Hockney, Chinook, Montana.”
Thumps debated whether he should call Claire. It was late and he didn’t want to wake her. But he didn’t want her to think that he’d forgotten either. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to be with her. She’d understand that. If he explained it correctly.
“The phone message,” said Thumps. “Parrish said he was running late?”
“He’s not at the Tucker anymore,” said Cruz. “He moved to Buffalo Mountain for the conference.”
“So he would have had to drive down just to see Redding.”
“You think this is about the envelope?” said Cruz.
Thumps lined the pieces up as best he could. Redding takes the envelope from his car. What does she do next? She looks through the emails and the photos. That much is a given. She makes a copy? A copy would be the smart thing to do. Maybe she’s looking to use the information for a story. Maybe she’s looking to sell the file to Austin or Parrish. Or both.
“Yes,” said the sheriff, the phone wedged between his cheek and shoulder. “I understand.”
But then she calls Thumps and asks to look at the files as though she no longer has the envelope. Yet when her body is found in the hotel room, the files that she took from the Volvo are there on the coffee table.
“I very much appreciate that,” said Duke, and he put the phone back on its cradle.
Cruz shifted in the chair. “Qué pedo?”
“That was the duty sergeant at the Sacramento Police Department. Detective Walter Chang is currently off duty but will be available first thing in the morning.”
“You’re not going to make me spend the night in a cell.”
“That depends.”
“On what?” said Cruz.
“Why would Redding want to talk to Detective Chang?”
Conferences, as Thumps remembered, tended to run into the early hours of the morning. If he drove a little over the speed limit, he might be able to get to Buffalo Mountain before Claire called it a night.
“The serial-killer case.” Thumps tried to make the explanation as concise as possible. “I talked to Jonathan Green at the Sacramento Herald. The guy the police had arrested came up with an alibi, and they had to release him. And then they found another body. I think Green blames Redding for getting the story wrong.”
“You think Redding was calling Chang about the case.”
“If I know Jayme,” said Cruz, “she probably asked him for a copy of the crime scene report.”
“Which he would not send her,” said Duke. “Because contrary to television wisdom, police departments are not information centres for reporters and private eyes.”
“But we won’t know exactly what she wanted, until we talk to Detective Chang in the morning.”
Cruz looked at Thumps and then at the sheriff. “So I can go home and get a good night’s sleep?”
“That depends.”
“You know,” said Cruz, “‘depends’ isn’t the only active verb in the world.”
Thumps could feel his eyes beginning to droop. It might be a good idea to check his blood sugars. “How about you release him into my custody?”
“Wouldn’t be prudent to release a possible felon into the custody of a photographer,” said Duke.
“How about an acting sheriff?”
“That,” said the sheriff, “would be an entirely different matter.”
CRUZ LET THUMPS drive the Escalade back to Buffalo Mountain.
“You want to talk about it?”
“About what?”
“Redding,” said Thumps. “Finding her like that.”
“I was in Kandahar province in 2007. Saw my share of bodies.”
Even after all these years, Thumps could still remember that night on Clam Beach on the Northern California coast. He could remember the walk across the sand to where the bodies lay under dark tarps. Anna Tripp, thirty-nine. Callie Tripp, ten. He could remember looking at the still faces of his lover and her child. The Obsidian Murders. Nothing had faded. Everything was still in sharp relief.
“Not the same.”
“No, vato,” said Cruz. “It’s not.”
Thumps let the SUV float. The heavy vehicle felt like a boat on a quiet lake, gently rolling as it followed the current up to the resort.
“So what are you going to do with your new-found freedom?”
Cruz stared out the window. “Get some sleep. Find who killed Redding.”
“And then?”
“What would you do?”
That was the question Thumps had asked himself any number of times. What if he was able to find the person who killed Anna and Callie? What would he do? What would the cop do? What would the man do?
“I don’t know.”
“An honest answer,” said Cruz. “Most guys go all macho and start waving their dicks around, but talk is different than action.”
“So action makes it better?”
“Shit, no,” said Cruz. “Nothing makes it better. Nothing makes it go away.”
“But you do something anyway?”
“You asking me about Redding, or you doing research?”
Thumps ran his hands across the leather steering wheel. The thing was actually heated. “Little of both, I guess.”
“Nothing helps,” said Cruz. “But I’m guessing you know that already.”
Thumps drove the Cadillac to the front entrance of Buffalo Mountain and got out.
Cruz slid behind the wheel. “You going to find Parrish?”
Thumps looked at his watch. “Got something else to do first.”
“Smart,” said Cruz. “Take care of the important stuff.”
“Breakfast?”
“I’m an early riser.”
“What about Parrish?”
Cruz dropped the Escalade into gear. “Maybe he’s an early riser too.”
Forty-Four
Claire wasn’t in the dining room or in the bar. Thumps went up to her condo, stood outside the door, and listened for any sound that might suggest someone was still awake.
Nothing.
He ran through his available choices. He could stand in the hall and try to reach Claire mentally. He had read that people who have a strong, long-term relationship can sometimes sense what the other person is thinking.
So, that wasn’t going to work.
He could always knock. What’s the worst that could happen? Claire could open the door and tell him that she had been asleep, that she thought he had forgotten, that she didn’t want to talk, that it was past midnight.
Or she might open the door and take him in her arms, tell him that she hadn’t been asleep, that she hadn’t thought he had forgotten, that she needed to talk, that he shouldn’t worry about the hour.
The simple answer was to phone. He could go down to the front desk and call Claire from there. That way there would be some distance between success and failure. He could explain the crime scene delay and the late hour. He could give her the opportunity to invite him up or the occasion to turn him away. They could talk without having to face each other.
Standing in the hallway like a stump in a field wasn’t an option. Knock or call. In the end, those were the only choices.
His first attempt at knocking was a failure. He could barely hear the sound his knuckles made on the wood. The second attempt rang out like a volley of gunfire. Thumps waited and watched the security peephole for the change in light that would indicate that someone wa
s looking out from the other side.
Nothing.
He was about to knock for a third time when the door opened. Thumps was prepared to see Claire fully clothed, and he was prepared to see her in a bathrobe. What he was not prepared for was Stick Merchant in his underpants.
“Hey, Thumps.”
“Stick?”
“Did you know this place has premium cable and the sports package?”
Thumps looked over Stick’s shoulder to see if Claire was somewhere in the room.
“Come on in,” said Stick. “Just watching a show about a bunch of kings and knights and witches and dragons.”
The sofa in front of the television was piled with blankets and pillows. There were dirty plates on the coffee table, along with several empty beer bottles. The television was on, but there was no sound.
“They spend all their time sword fighting and taking off their clothes.” Stick flopped on the sofa. “Power, violence, and nudity. What’s not to like?”
“Your mother here?”
“Asleep.”
Thumps glanced at the bedroom door. He wondered if Claire was lying in bed awake and could hear the conversation. A part of him wanted the door to open. A part of him wanted Claire to appear and send her son home.
Stick waved the remote at the television. “You don’t even have to have the sound on to know what’s happening.”
Another part of him wanted to leave well enough alone.
“She’s going to be okay,” said Stick. “She’s going to get better.”
“That’s what everyone’s hoping.”
“Fuck hope,” said Stick. “She’s going to get better.” Stick looked at Thumps, his eyes darkening. “’Cause I’m here now, and I’m going to look after her. I mean, I appreciate all you did, but I’m her son.”
As hints go, it wasn’t subtle. “When she wakes up,” said Thumps, “could you tell her I stopped by?”
“We’re taking it one day at a time.” Stick began working his way back under the blankets and pillows. “Mom and me.”
THUMPS CONSIDERED DRIVING home, turning off the phone, and staying out of sight for the next week, out of harm’s way. And he considered throwing his camera gear into the car and heading up into Canada and Waterton Park. There were several hikes he had been meaning to do. Crypt Lake. Wall Lake. The Carthew-Alderson Trail. Lineham Ridge. Each choice had its appeal and photo opportunities. Instead, he took the elevator down to the third floor.
ARCHIE DID NOT appear happy to see him.
“Thumps?”
“I need a place to stay.”
Archie stood rooted in the doorway, not looking as though he wanted to move. “It’s one in the morning.”
“And you have two beds.”
“And you have a home.”
“Jayme Redding has been murdered.”
Thumps knew he should have eased into Redding’s death, should have managed the news with more tact and sensitivity, but he was diabetic and his stove had been sold to someone else and Claire’s obnoxious and annoying son had gone all Oedipal on him.
“What?”
Then again, Archie was equally obnoxious and annoying.
“Redding’s dead.”
Archie’s room was as Thumps had left it. The bed nearest the window was rumpled. It was the bed he would have chosen if he had had first choice.
“Sit,” said Archie. “Tell me everything.”
“Not much to tell.”
Archie scowled. “That’s what you always say.”
“She was found in her room at the Tucker, in the bathtub. Someone tried to make it look like an accident.”
“Austin.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Or his man Cruz.”
“Doubt it.”
“Or Oliver Parrish,” said Archie, ticking names off his fingers. “Or a hired assassin who is already on a plane to Morocco.”
“Morocco?”
“We don’t have an extradition treaty with Morocco,” said Archie, “and there’s a really nice beach at Al Hoceima.”
Thumps spent the next half-hour walking Archie through the crime scene—Redding’s body in the tub, Cruz in the living room, the stolen envelope on the coffee table, Parrish calling and coming by the room.
“Why are you telling me all this?” Archie waited for a moment. “What happened to ‘Talk to the sheriff’?”
Thumps shrugged.
“Be pretty dumb for Cruz to get caught with the body.”
“Cruz called it in.”
“If it were television,” said Archie, “Parrish would be the killer because he doesn’t seem to have a motive.”
“But it isn’t television.”
Archie pushed off the bed and went to the window. “The only thing that makes any sense is that all three murders are connected.”
“Okay.”
“So what connects them?”
Thumps kicked off his shoes and stretched out on the bed. The mattress was comfortable and the white duvet was soft and deep. Even the pillows felt luxurious.
“You’re not going to sleep.”
“Yes, I am.”
“We have a murder to solve.”
“Three murders,” said Thumps, “and now I’m going to go to sleep.”
“Duke won’t be impressed.”
“I’m closing my eyes.”
With his eyes closed, Thumps could no longer see Archie, but he could hear the man as he paced the room and tapped at his tablet. And then the lights went out, and he heard Archie get into bed. Now that the room was quiet, Thumps hoped sleep would come quickly, but it didn’t. He lay awake, trying to force square pieces into a round hole.
And just as he could feel his mind and body relax, just as he began to drift off on a sea of white foam and polished cotton, Archie began to snore.
Forty-Five
Thumps didn’t open his eyes right away. He could feel the light on his face, knew it was morning, understood that he should get up, but couldn’t think of a good reason to leave a comfortable bed. He had no place to go and nothing to do. Claire would be tied up with the conference or with her suddenly overly protective son. Or both. The sheriff would be chasing down leads. Beth would be processing yet another body. Austin and Parrish would be having breakfast.
That left Cruz and Archie. Thumps had no idea what Cruz was doing, and he didn’t want to know what was keeping the little Greek busy.
“Morning, Pancho.”
Cisco Cruz was sitting in one of the club chairs. There were two cups on the table in front of him, along with a white square box.
“Where’s Archie?”
“No idea,” said Cruz. “He was gone when I arrived.”
It took Thumps a moment to connect the dots. “Then how did you get in?”
Cruz smiled. “I brought coffee. And doughnuts.”
“Doughnuts?”
“I forgot about the diabetes.”
Thumps sat up. He was still fully dressed. Wrinkled, but fully dressed.
“You’re going to need to do something with your hair, vato.” Cruz opened the box and fished out a doughnut. “You look like a rooster.”
The coffee wasn’t particularly good, but it was hot. Thumps broke one of the doughnuts in half, seeing this as a compromise with temptation, and when he finished the first half, he ate the second.
“You know the trick for getting wrinkles out of clothes?”
“Why are you here?”
“Mira. You turn the shower on really hot until the bathroom fills with steam.” Cruz took another bite of doughnut. “And then you stand in it.”
Thumps padded into the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror. Cruz was right. He did look like a rooster. A badly rumpled rooster. Thumps turned on the tap and let the water run hot. He quickly washed his face and wet his hair. Not much of an improvement, but an improvement nonetheless.
Cruz was brushing doughnut crumbs off his pants. “You still acting sheriff?”
&n
bsp; Thumps looked into the doughnut box. It was empty.
Cruz crushed the box and placed it on top of the trash can. “My good deed for today.”
“Bringing doughnuts?”
“Eating the last one,” said Cruz, “and saving you from yourself.”
“Generous.”
“That’s me, vato,” said Cruz. “You ready to go to work?”
IF THUMPS REMEMBERED correctly, the unit Oliver Parrish currently occupied was called the Canyon, a two-bedroom, two-bath model with a fireplace. Parrish answered the door in grey slacks, a soft, green shirt, and a black-on-black sports jacket with silver thread. The man still reminded Thumps of a weasel, but he knew how to dress.
“Mr. DreadfulWater. Mr. Cruz. Come on in,” said Parrish. “You just missed Sheriff Hockney.”
Thumps glanced at Cruz.
“There’s fruit if you like,” said Parrish. “And cheese.”
“So you know about Jayme Redding.”
“I do,” said Parrish. “A tragedy. Didn’t know her well. She was doing a story on Orion. She interviewed Lester and Knight. We spoke a couple of times. Seemed nice.”
“She was,” said Cruz.
“You want coffee? There’s a fresh pot.”
Thumps helped himself to some cheese. There was the chance it might counteract the effects of the doughnut.
“But you didn’t come here for the food,” said Parrish. “You want to know about my relationship with Ms. Redding.”
“Mr. Austin has a vested interest,” said Cruz. “I look after Mr. Austin’s vested interests.”
“Yes,” said Parrish. “Mr. Austin mentioned that you were quite good at vested interests.”
The two men were smiling at one another, but Thumps could feel the warmth begin to flee the room. “You called Redding last night.”
“I did,” said Parrish. “We were supposed to meet at the Tucker. I called to tell her I was running late and when I got to her room, there was no answer.”
“What was the meeting about?”
Parrish arranged himself in one of the easy chairs. “Not sure. Redding said she had something that I would want to see. I think she was hoping to make a sale.”
Thumps took several grapes. “She didn’t say what she had for sale?”