Reason for Murder

by Jack Usher

  “He had a good trial,” Pelchek said. “One of the best goddam trials I ever heard of. Nice, tight, circumstantial evidence, presented by an unbiased district attorney to a jury that hadn’t been prompted or bought. I’ll lay odds it was a jury of good, middle-class people who go to church on Sunday, believe the poor will inherit the earth, and keep their kids away from the Mexican kids. Or any other kids that aren’t exactly like theirs.”

  “It was. I know most of them.”

  “Yeah. So that leaves us with a smart man. A very smart man. Whoever engineered this thing could afford to wait for the right opportunity. He knew the people, and knew that circumstantial evidence is as hard to disprove as it is to prove. He had an intelligent prosecutor to use it and the right crowd to listen to it.”

  “Do you think it was done that carefully?”

  “It had to be. One overt act hinting that Cal was being pushed into a conviction would have ruined the whole case. No, this guy is sharp. He may have made a mistake, though.”

  “How?” Chris asked.

  “That’s what we’re out here for. There may be a man out here who can tie our boy into all of it. One connection we can prove is all we need.”

  “What about Pete Romero?”

  “I think he’s part of it, but there isn’t much chance of his talking. He can’t afford to. He’d run before he’d implicate himself. No, it’s this guy out here we need. We get him and Cal’s home free.” He stood up, stretching.

  “It won’t be easy,” he continued. “One old man, two women, and a truck driver who doesn’t know one of these rocks from another. I’m not even sure which side of my horse to climb on. Besides, there’s a chance our man isn’t even out here.”

  She put her arms around his neck. “We’ll find him, Steve.” She kissed him, allowing warm lips to part under his.

  He reached back, disengaged her arms, then took her by the shoulders and pushed her far enough away to look at.

  “That’s what we’re out here for,” he said evenly. “To find a man.”

  “Is there something wrong with me?” Her eyes were puzzled.

  “No,” he said shortly, turned away and started back to the fire.

  “Wait a minute, Steve.” She grabbed his arm. “We’re not exactly strangers, you know. What was I the other night? Just someone to jump in bed with?”

  “Was it supposed to be something else?” He didn’t look at her.

  She let go of his arm and stepped back, head held high. “No,” she said, eyes leveled at his, “no, it wasn’t intended to be anything else.” She moved toward the campfire, shoulders square.

  Pelchek stood where she’d left him and, when her form had faded into the darkness, kicked savagely at a rock. Then slowly followed her.

  In the light of the flickering campfire he read Elman’s note. The man must have built a fire under Bartlett. There was more than he’d expected in such a short time. He read it through three times, then tossed it on the fire and watched it turn into ashes. He heard Elena call to him.

  “You’d better turn in, Steven. Grandfather will have us up at dawn.” She was in her sleeping bag, head against her saddle. Chris had spread her bag alongside Elena’s, pulled off her boots, and was sliding in.

  Pelchek picked up his roll, walked over to where the old man lay already asleep, and prepared for the night. He lay awake a long time, finally heard the girls begin whispering to one another. He grunted, rolled over, and faced away from the dying fire.

  CHAPTER 15

  AGUILAR stopped them in the shade of an overhanging rock. It was Sunday afternoon and the merciless heat beat down on the reddish earth. Although they’d walked the horses slowly, the animals were creamy with sweat.

  The party dismounted, loosened saddle girths and with water-soaked bandanas, wiped the nostrils and lips of their mounts. While the old man was attending to the pack horse, the others rested at the base of the large boulder. The dog flopped at their feet, panting.

  Pelchek wiped his sweat-stained face and looked at the two women. Elena lay leaning on one elbow, peering through rising heat waves at the distant ridges. Christine Baker sat with legs drawn up, arms and head resting on her knees. Both showed the strain of riding fourteen hours a day through rough, arid, desert country. In and out of long, tortuous arroyos and canyons.

  “One more of the box canyons and we must go up on the Shelf,” the old man stated. He had stumped back to join them. He rolled a cigarette, lit it, sank back on his heels. “We should be well in the last canyon by dark.” He squinted at Pelchek and the women.

  “Will there be water?” Pelchek asked.

  “I’m sure of it. Years ago we blasted a spring out up there and it filled to a good-sized pool. The sheepmen have used it ever since. There were trees, too,” the old man said.

  “I hope it’s still there,” Elena said nervously. She loosened the strings of her flat-crowned hat and pulled it from her head. “Why doesn’t anyone know where Orrosco is?” she complained pettishly, turning to Pelchek. “Are you sure this is where Al thought—”

  “Take it easy, honey. We’ll find him.” Christine put out a hand, laid it gently on the girl’s shoulder. “Maybe he’ll be in this next canyon. Right, Grandpa Aguilar?”

  “Of course he may,” the old man replied, turning to Elena. “We must keep looking, my child. This is a big country up here.” He pointed to the plains below them. “See. There’s a small road down there that would have brought us from Las Milpas in an hour. But why? Then we would have had to start from here. In and out of the canyons.” He shrugged. “What difference? A big country.”

  What an understatement, Pelchek thought, gazing out over flat country below them. Looking toward Las Milpas, the sage-covered plains faded into wavering obscurity before the eyes could establish a definite horizon. Behind them lay the Shelf. Twenty-five miles long and a thousand feet higher than their present altitude, its narrow two-mile width halting at sheer cliffs.

  They had ridden in and out of six vast canyons since the start of their search, old man Aguilar leading them over faded and half-forgotten trails. He had questioned the guardians of several flocks of sheep, none of whom admitted knowing the exact whereabouts of Pablo Orrosco.

  Always it was the dog, Nueve, who found the sheep camps. Ranging in front of the party, he would raise the camp dogs, and their combined barking would lead the riders to the small camps.

  Most of the sheepherders knew Aguilar and were free in talking with him. All knew Orrosco. They treated the old man with courtesy, allowing the party to fill their canteens from the camp’s water supply.

  Pelchek eased into a more comfortable position, lit a cigarette. and pulled his Stetson down to shade his eyes from the incessant glare. Over Elena’s protests he had discarded the head bandages, and the abrasions were healing with rapidity. He felt tired, dirty, and uneasy.

  He studied Christine Baker from under hooded eyes, seeing how the light shirt, wet with sweat, clung to her upper body. She appeared worn and inanimate. He looked away. Both girls had been polite, pleasant, and considerate to him since the night Chris joined them, and he knew they wanted to strangle him. What was it with women? For six years these two hadn’t spoken; now in forty-eight hours they’d become allies. What did they want from him? He looked at Chris again, grunted and stood up.

  “If we’re going to get to that damned canyon we’d better get on with it.”

  The two women rose without a word and began readying their mounts. The old man, lips pursed and eyebrows slanted, glanced at him.

  Soon they were on the trail again, Pelchek bringing up the rear and leading the pack horse. Mouth set stubbornly, he stared at the backs of two unyielding feminine necks, began cursing beneath his breath.

  Alfredo Reyes rose on one elbow, looked across the small cabin at Mary Perrini. “We’ll try it tomorrow morning, querida,” he said.

  She smiled at him, the candlelight casting grotesque shadows behind her as she put their plates away
in the cupboard. Then she brought out the first-aid kit and walked toward him. She had discarded the coat and was now wearing a combination of his shirt and shorts, the tails of the former coming almost below her knees. She knelt down beside him and began unwinding the heavy bandage from around his chest.

  “One more time, then,” she said.

  When they’d first arrived at the cabin she’d almost panicked. Running out of the building and around to the back, she had searched wildly for the spring. She finally located the fifty-gallon drum, the steady dripping of cold water from a half-inch pipe keeping it to the overflow point. The pipe extended from a point between two large boulders, the end receiving the water completely out of sight. She hurried inside the cabin for a container, to find that Reyes had fallen into a part-sleep, part-coma. For the next two hours she had an opportunity to inspect the shack and get organized.

  The high cupboard had yielded blankets, a stock of canned goods, including coffee, a supply of candles, and—she blessed war surplus—a half-dozen military field-type first-aid kits. Also a note. Left by the cold-weather line riders, it directed the reader to a bottle of whiskey, half-full, placed in a box under the bunks, and several of the sexier magazines, replete with nude girlies, stuffed in the eaves of the outhouse.

  Mary found the whiskey, poured a generous two fingers in a cup, and drank it. By the time Reyes began thrashing around with fever, she’d built a fire in the potbellied stove and was heating a wash basin full of water. She gave herself a bath, washing off the blood, dirt, and grime, then heated water for him.

  He slipped to the floor three times as she pulled off his clothes, so she left him there, tossing the mattresses from both bunks to the floor. She covered them with the cleanest of the blankets and laboriously rolled him on it. He was moaning in delirium by now and tried to fight her off as she removed the bloodstained clothing and bandages.

  The bullet hole in his chest looked the same, was not bleeding excessively. His back was a different story. The whole area around the place she’d cut was inflamed and angry-looking, the ragged hole exuding blood and watery matter. After tearing open a first-aid kit, she liberally sprinkled both wounds with sulfa powder, then applied clean compresses, binding them tightly with strips of blanket. Then she waited.

  She watched him for seventy-two hours. When he writhed with fever she bathed him with cooling water. When he shook with chills she covered him with blankets, crawling in beside him to warm him with her body. He raved and cursed and had few lucid moments. Then, near nightfall on the third day, his fever broke, leaving him weak and wet with sweat. He looked up at her from sunken eyes as she bathed his forehead with a damp cloth.

  “How long?” he whispered.

  “This is Saturday night, Zapata.” She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “You’re an awfully tough guy.”

  He looked down at his bandaged chest. “How is it?”

  “I think it’s going to be all right. Your chest hasn’t given any trouble at all, and your back has almost stopped draining. I’m no doctor, but I haven’t seen any sign of infection back there. I’ve used lots of sulfa on it.”

  “Where in hell did you get sulfa?”

  She explained about the cupboard as she rose and went to the table. Returning, she knelt by his side, sliding one arm under his shoulders and head.

  “Drink this,” she ordered, placing a cup to his lips.

  “Whiskey!” he gasped.

  “Compliments of the line riders.”

  He let out a long sigh and she allowed him to sink back on the mattresses.

  “I think I can sleep, Mary.”

  “Good.” She went to the table, prepared to extinguish the candles. “In the morning I’ll give you something to eat.” She blew out the light and made her way to the pallet, quietly lay down beside him, pulled a light blanket over them both.

  “It gets cold in the morning,” she explained, gently letting her body touch his as she buried her face in his neck. He lifted a hand and let it rest against the back of her head.

  “I told that dog you were a woman,” he said sleepily, his hand slipping to her shoulder, then to warm breasts. He started to move the hand and she caught it, pressing it hard.

  “Just go to sleep, sweetie,” she whispered.

  The next day he ate some of the rough fare provided by the stock of food, and managed to laugh at her attempts to bake pan bread on the small wood stove.

  “You’re not much of a pioneer, Mary.” He grinned at her.

  “I’m no damned pioneer at all,” she said, hitching at the elastic band of his boxer-type shorts. “And if this nail doesn’t hold,” pointing to the rusty nail holding together a large fold in the shorts, “I’m going to lose the only claim to decency I have left.”

  “How did a piano player ever get to be like you?”

  “Like me? Oh, I don’t know.” She placed the pan on the table, sat down by him on the pallet. “I had four brothers. All open-hearth men in steel. They worked on my behind and kept me in line when I was younger. Even saw that I had money to keep up with my music. When I left Pennsylvania for New York, my oldest brother, Angie, even got around to telling me the facts of life.” She laughed. “Very clinically, too. He didn’t think it was very nice, but felt it was necessary. He never dreamed Mama would discuss such a thing. I was nineteen.”

  “And since then?”

  “Nothing much. One playing date after another. No roots, no strings, and no ties. I guess a young girl shouldn’t live that way. It isn’t enough. I even tried to feel something for a couple of my agents, but nothing happened.” She ran her fingers through his hair, letting her head rest on his shoulder. “When I get back to Chicago I’ll start on the circuit again, I suppose. It’s good money,” she said lightly, starting to rise.

  He took her hand. “This talk about Chicago and good money and everything. It’s crazy.”

  “It is?”

  “Sure.” He pressed her hand against his face. “What about me? I love you like no man ever loved a woman.” He smiled at her crookedly. “You’ll have to excuse my excesses, Mary. A feeling like this brings out the Mexican in me.”

  For a long moment she sat silently, not looking at him, then said, “You really mean it, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” he said quietly. “And with you?”

  “With me too, Zapata. I love you, and I’ll have to divorce my piano, I guess.” She smiled, eyes downcast. Then she turned and looked at him, forehead winkled. “Only, I didn’t think… I mean, I thought maybe it was just… You know what I—”

  “No, this is the big thing, querida,” he interrupted. “I didn’t think it would ever happen to me either. But, here it is for both of us.” He remained silent for a moment, then continued, “So now I’ll have to go to Pennsylvania and ask permission of your brothers. Will they have me in the family?”

  “After I tell ’em about this they’d love you if you had two heads,” she replied. “But what about your place? You’ll have to—”

  “My joint?” he snorted. “The night we were in that powder house I sold the place to Benny Esparza. For whatever he can afford to give me.” He kissed the palm of her hand. “Finish whatever you were doing, Mary, then come help me rest.”

  Now evening had arrived and she was bandaging him for the last time. She used the remainder of the sulfa, then wrapped his chest tightly with the strips of blanket material, folding them over sterile compresses and the powder. Both wounds were still open, the one in his back still draining.

  “I figure it will take us six hours to walk out of here,” he said. “We should hit the highway about noon.”

  “Where’ll we go?”

  “Well have to hitch a ride to Las Milpas, then go to my place.”

  “Not the police?”

  “No. There’s a connection between the guy who kidnaped us, and the Baker case. I want to get hold of Pelchek before I do anything else. Besides, Benny can sneak in a doctor to look us over.”

  “What a
bout my bags? I haven’t a damned thing in the world except that wardrobe and the stuff in my luggage.”

  “They’re probably still in my car, Mary, and he’s hidden that somewhere. We’ll find it. In the meantime, the girls can fix you up with something.”

  “Maybe I can play the piano in the parlor for the paying guests.” She grinned. “They always have a piano in the parlor, don’t they?” She patted the tucked end of the bandage and stood up, adroitly avoiding his halfhearted slap.

  Later, lying in the dark, he reached over and kissed her lightly. Then he rolled over on his side, facing her, took both shoulders in his hands. He began kissing her eyes, cheeks, and neck, finally letting his lips come to rest on her half-opened mouth.

  “Al!” she said, breaking away. “Remember your condition!”

  “You talk like I’m pregnant, Mary,” he murmured, trying to nuzzle aside the shirt collar. “I feel strong tonight.”

  “You do?” she whispered. Her hands got busy at the front of the shirt. “Now, Al. Now kiss me, sweetie.”

  The man sat looking at Romero, drumming his fingers lightly on the arm of his chair. The detective was speaking earnestly.

  “… and I couldn’t find him either Friday or Saturday. He moved his camp from the canyon and I’m sure he went up on the Shelf. Maybe for a cooler spot or more water or something… Anyway, when I came out of the canyon I spotted Pelchek and his party.”

  “Where were they heading?”

  “Toward Last Canyon. They’re probably camped in there tonight.”

  “Did anyone see you?”

  “No. I parked my horse trailer at this end of the Shelf, and went in through a long draw.” Romero lit a cigarette, then went on. “I had to be on duty this morning, so I came back in.”

  The man shifted in his chair, sat upright.

  “Then you’ll have to go back. Tonight!” He held up a hand, cutting short Romero’s protestations. “There’s no use arguing about it, Romero. You have to go. Orrosco can’t be allowed to talk with Pelchek. Or to anyone else, now. We can’t tell who Pelchek might have told.”