Obstruction of Justice

by Perri O'shaughnessy

  Nina bounced back into the street and continued on her way. "Lousy drivers," she muttered.

  "Give me an example," Paul was saying. "How can they be connected some other way?"

  "I can’t think of anything right now. I’m too busy driving in the rain to think that hard. But the connection isn’t random."

  "Then what is the connection?"

  "I don’t know! It’s mysterious! The connection is at a level beyond human understanding!"

  "Sounds like a cop-out to me. There’s a logical reason, or it’s random. That’s it. Of course, I don’t read Jung right before I go to sleep. I read gun catalogs."

  "It’s how the gods do their work. So let’s just put it this way: What’s crawling through the mud? Besides me out here?"

  "Joe knows. Drive past and park down the block. I’ll be there."

  Twenty minutes later Nina wound her way in semi-darkness down a deserted road in Christmas Valley. The midday mimicked dusk because of thick pine forest that pressed in from the sides of the road, the branches overhanging like tangled black beards. Rain splattered in thick droplets onto the street and over the Bronco. Luckily for her, she was following the only road into the valley, and could not get lost.

  She passed the Marquez mailbox and drove on for a few hundred feet. A neighbor’s dachshund set up a howl and managed to keep pace with her on its stumpy legs. Paul’s Dodge Ram van met her and her canine companion from head-on, smooth and silent as a detective vehicle should be, easily avoiding the small brown animal that followed, splashing at her bumper. Paul pulled over. Nina swung around and parked behind him.

  "Hop in," Paul said, opening his door. "And tell your admirer there to pipe down. We’re supposed to be sneaking up on our friend." He reached over to unlock the door. "Suitcase first."

  "You mean my briefcase."

  "You always look ready for a weekend getaway to Napa or somewhere really glam, as if you’re about to jump into a Hertz Rent-a-Car," Paul said, placing her case on the floor behind his seat.

  Before she could get her legs tucked safely away, the dog reached her, still barking frantically, its wiry tail upright and alert. She talked calmly to it for a moment, and then reached down to pet it, stroking the wet silky fur behind the ears and accepting a friendly lick before closing the door. "I’d have trouble getting away for a weekend with nothing but paper to wear," Nina said, "and not even tape to hold it on."

  "Hmm. As you probably realize, that thought has a certain amount of appeal to a certain type of person."

  "Certainly not you, though," said Nina. "Not if the vicious gossip I hear is accurate."

  "Oh?" Paul raised a brow. "Which gossip would that be?"

  "I can’t repeat gossip."

  "Then we’re left with this case," he said, too eager, Nina thought, to let go of the game.

  While Paul peered through the murk up the street, she looked at the height and breadth and weight of him, her heart sinking. He was a stranger again. He had another woman.

  "What do you think? Anybody home?" Paul asked. A porch light burned dimly through the tree-induced gloom at the Marquez house.

  "I went past the house first," Nina said. "I think Joe’s home. Somebody is."

  Paul’s favorite tape, John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme, sent soft sax through the cab. The van smelled like fresh coffee, Paul’s aftershave, and damp leather. The wipers flapped, and she saw the reason for the leather smell. His old brown bomber jacket was tossed over the fake fur blanket and the pillows in the fold-down backseat, right next to the locked case he called his toolbox, which she had often wondered about.

  Unlike his hotel rooms or even his condo, Paul’s van revealed something intimate about him, his mix of whimsy and masculinity. He rode California’s freeways with the same rousing sense of adventure as a cowboy of old once rode the West’s ranges on his horse.

  "Let’s talk a minute before we go in," he said, setting the parking brake. The dachshund, apparently mollified by Nina’s fondling, trotted off toward a doggie door in the side of the house next door and disappeared. "The Meade case and the de Beers case are starting to crash into each other. It’s happening too fast for me to get a handle on it. Joe Marquez owned the car that killed Anna Meade. And Joe Marquez told you to go to Wright’s Lake the night of the fire. You still haven’t told the police that you were the one who went up there and made the 911 call?"

  "Not yet."

  "You’re taking a major risk. You know that. They could tag you with an obstruction of justice charge. Even if you had a lot of friends in this town who would go easy on you—and you really don’t, but that’s another topic—why take chances? And if you don’t tell them Joe sent you to Wright’s Lake, nobody looks at Joe as a potential bad guy."

  "If I give a statement now, any statement, I’m going to have to tell the whole truth, and I’m not prepared to do that quite yet."

  "Hey," Paul said, placing his hands on her shoulders and turning her toward him so she had to look him in the eye. "What do you know that you haven’t told me? Don’t you trust me by now?"

  "I don’t see why I should get you charged, too, except maybe for the pleasure of your company in the slammer."

  He sat on that thought for an instant, then said, "You know something else that could implicate Jason."

  "I’m sorry, Paul. Even if I do know something more, I can’t tell you about it. I’m not sure it would be privileged information."

  "Which leaves me bumbling around in the dark. Oh, you stubborn, stubborn woman. All right. Tell me this much. Are we the only people who know Joe has some connection, however tenuous, to both crimes?"

  "Yes. But I can’t say he knew what was happening at Wright’s Lake, Paul. He said Jason might be up there. That’s all."

  "Joe could have dug up the body and set the fire, no matter how Quentin died. The only thing is, I can’t imagine why," Paul said.

  "Joe couldn’t have set the fire. I went straight up there after I saw him at Sarah’s house. He couldn’t have beat me there."

  "He could have gone up there before you saw him and set a slow-burning fire, couldn’t he? It could have been smoldering for some time before you got there. Have you thought about that?"

  "No," Nina said in a small voice. She thought about Joe loading lawn clippings into his truck that night, his slow deliberate movements, his flash of anger....

  "I suppose it’s possible. I think I would have noticed something in his demeanor though, Paul. I think at most Joe might know who set the fire."

  "What if he does know? What if he tells us it was Jason?" Paul said. "Do we really want to cajole the story out of him? Shouldn’t we let sleeping gardeners lie?"

  "I’ll take the chance, Paul. I don’t believe Jason killed his grandfather."

  "You’ve been around the block, baby. Admit for once you might be wrong!"

  His vehemence shook her confidence, which brought up her defenses. "Don’t call me baby."

  "Sorry, b—"

  "And don’t call me boss." She reached up, removing his hand from her shoulder.

  Paul held his hands up in a gesture of conciliation. "Okay. So what’s the plan of action?" he said.

  "Play it by ear?"

  "Not exactly a plan, but it’ll have to do. Now, before we go in, I have to tell you about this other woman. Kim Voss."

  "The woman who saw the car hit Collier’s wife."

  "Right. Well, she admits Quentin was supporting her for the past four years. They had a kinky thing going. That’s what I mean by cases colliding."

  Startled, Nina tried to absorb this information.

  "She claims she was on good terms with him and lost her income when she lost him. According to Leo Tarrant, de Beers’s will left her a share of the business worth about fifteen grand, but I doubt if she’d kill the old man for that. The fact is, I doubt she did have anything to do with it, or with Anna’s death, but there she is, smack-dab in the middle of both cases, just like Joe Marquez."

  "What
’s she like?" Nina said.

  "A struggling artist. Very dedicated. No other interest in life. Smart and attractive."

  Nina did not like the tone of fake disinterest. So Kim Voss was the one Paul was so hot on. An artist. Why did she have to be an artist? A creative type who probably cooked beautifully, with long flowing hair and dangling earrings, smelling of patchouli, her mind lazy and free, able to discuss Picasso, Hockney, and Judy Chicago in the same breath. As someone totally out of Paul’s usual run of acquaintances, she would have special allure.

  It was idiotic, but Nina experienced a pang. "Maybe Kim and Joe know each other," Nina said. "Maybe she and Anna and Joe and Quentin all used to play poker at Prize’s on Thursday nights. Kim killed Anna because Anna had a real job and Quentin because he made fun of her art."

  Paul looked amused. "As good a theory as any."

  "You know, if she’s another connection between the two cases, we should consider her, shouldn’t we?"

  "Let’s see how things go before we start blaming Kim for everything, okay?" Paul said, and the double meaning of his comment didn’t escape her, even if it did escape him. "Get ready for our grand entrance." Paul drove boldly into the rutted driveway amid yelps of protest from another dog, this one large and vigilant, who stopped a few feet from the van, its lip curled just like Elvis used to curl his, then charged forward and bounded riotously around the van, spraying water.

  "More of your admirers. Dogs have a thing for you. Shall I shoot it?" Paul inquired, but just then a small boy, barefoot, came down the ramshackle porch, jumping nimbly over the puddles to grab the dog’s collar, cuffing it and choking it. The dog subsided, and the boy piped, "Private property."

  "Hi, there," Nina said. "We would like to speak to Mr. Marquez."

  "He’s working."

  "We might have a job for him," Paul said.

  The boy, who had black hair and a solemn expression on his face, said, "Wait a minute." He ran into the house, and they waited expectantly for a mom to appear behind him, but he reemerged alone, carrying a beeper. "I called him," he said in his stern little voice. The phone in the house rang. The boy left again to answer, returned and said, "Come in," directing them into the living room.

  Though even darker than the overgrown clearing in which it was set, the house was not unpleasant inside. A large TV dominated the threadbare room, glowing orange and green and blue as silent ads flickered swiftly over its face. Pictures of Jesus, Mary, and unidentifiable saints were matted and framed in gold-painted wood. A sofa in worn white chenille faced the TV. "Rex the Wonder Horse," a rocking horse on a metal frame, and an air-resistance exercycle crowded into one corner. Nina took the phone.

  "This is Nina Reilly. Mr. Marquez?"

  "I recognized you from the description. What do you think you’re doing at my house?"

  "I need to talk to you."

  "I’m busy. I don’t have time."

  "Is this your son? He’s been very polite."

  A silence, then Joe said grudgingly, "He’s a good boy. But listen, lady, you shouldn’t be there. That’s my home."

  "Is your boy all alone here?"

  "Are you going to call Child Welfare or something? He’s out sick, getting over the flu, so don’t bother, okay? Now, what do you want?"

  ’’Just a few words, Joe. We can wait."

  "No you can’t. I don’t let people wait at my home."

  "Tell me where I can meet you. Or are you afraid to talk to me?"

  "I’m not afraid."

  "Then what’s the big deal?"

  "Come on over," said Joe finally. "I’ll be here another half hour." He gave an address back in town, which Nina memorized.

  "We’ll be there."

  "Put my boy on." The boy took the phone. As they left they could still hear Joe’s scolding voice through the receiver and see the child nodding as if his father faced him in person, saying, "Sí, sí, Papa," over and over.

  They parted on the road. On the way back to town Nina called her office, where Bob was marooned with Sandy. "Bobby?"

  "Hi, Mom."

  "What are you doing?"

  "Wish is teaching me how to fix a radio. He’s got one all taken apart on the conference table. And Sandy brought us tacos."

  "I’m sorry, honey, but I’ve been held up. It’ll be another hour or maybe even longer."

  "What else is new?" Bob said cheerfully.

  "Put Wish on." Wish came on the line, and Nina said, "Wish? Do you mind keeping Bob occupied for a while longer? I’m running late."

  "We’ll be here," Wish said. "Gotta get this thing working again. There must be a million pieces."

  "That’s neat. You found an old radio to take apart?"

  "Right in the front office."

  "My radio from college? The one I keep on the shelf by the door? You better put that back together!"

  "That’s what we’re doing," Wish said in a tone of injured innocence.

  Not too far from Kenny Munger’s apartment building, on Black Bart Road, Nina spied Joe’s truck with its now-familiar logo parked in front of a cottage with a front yard scattered with leaves from a large central maple tree. She waited for Paul to arrive, thinking to herself about the snow that would be on its way in a month or so, wondering how she and Bob would manage with a steep driveway like this in the dead of winter.

  Paul pulled in behind her this time and they walked rapidly up wet wooden stairs. The rain had let up and the pine needles on the trees and maple leaves on the ground glistened.

  A girl with long hair drawn back in a braid opened the door. "Mr. van Wagoner!" she said with a gasp.

  "What the... Mrs. Lauria?"

  Paul and the woman stared at each other until Nina said, "May we come in?"

  "I guess so," young Mrs. Lauria said, continuing to eye Paul.

  After wiping their feet carefully on the mat, they entered the cottage. Inside, the house was dark like Joe’s, but it smelled like onions and refried beans, and a fire burned in the stone fireplace. Two toddlers hid behind the girl, clinging to her jeans. Joe sat in a tattered recliner in front of the fire, his feet up, looking like the man of the house, holding a small boy in his lap.

  "Sorry I can’t get up, but I slipped off a roof this morning and hurt my back some. Who are you?" he said to Paul, setting the child on the floor beside him.

  "This is the man who bought me lunch, Joe," Mrs. Lauria said. "He wanted to talk about Ruben and Mrs. Meade." She turned back to Paul. "I’m surprised to see you here."

  "It’s a shock to see you too. Nina, this young lady is Lucy Lauria. She used to be married to Ruben Lauria, the parolee who saw Anna Meade the day she died."

  "I’m Nina Reilly," Nina said to Mrs. Lauria, who said, "Pleased to meet you." She gestured toward the couch and Paul and Nina sat down.

  Seeing this pleasant family circle made Nina think of the boy all alone at Joe’s cottage. He was older. Maybe he didn’t like playing with the little kids, and enjoyed a little peace and quiet. Or maybe he really was sick. They were probably worried he would pass his illness along to the other kids.

  "What’s this about?" Joe said to Nina. "Why did you bring him along?"

  "He’s working for me on Jason’s defense. He’s also working on the Anna Meade case," Nina said. "We’d like to talk to you—about both cases."

  "I don’t have anything to hide," Joe said, dangling a red ball in his hand and letting the little boy snatch at it. He looked relaxed. "Is my boy okay? I’m heading home in a few minutes."

  "He seemed fine," Nina said.

  "Well, then. Let’s get this over with."

  "Mrs. Lauria?" Paul said. "How do you come to know Joe?"

  Mrs. Lauria looked at Joe. He nodded, and she said, "Joe and I are going to be married soon. Remember, I told you when we had lunch?"

  "Congratulations. But how did you meet?"

  "I can answer that for you," Joe said. "I see what you’re trying to figure out. Through Ruben. Ruben was my cousin."

&
nbsp; Something should have clicked into place, but nothing did. Again, Nina had the dizzy feeling of facts linked to each other, yet seemingly randomly.

  "We fell in love after Ruben died, and we’re getting married." Mrs. Lauria went over to the recliner and put her arm around the top of it as if it were an outgrowth of Joe. She seemed to Nina to be the stronger of the two. Joe patted her hand, never taking his eyes off Paul and Nina.

  Paul said, "Nina tells me that you had an idea Jason might have been up at Wright’s Lake the night Quentin de Beers was killed."

  "It was just a thought. Did you go up there?" Joe said to Nina.

  Ignoring him, Paul went on, "What I’m trying to figure out is, why did you think Jason might have gone there?"

  "Because you said he was after his grandfather. And that was his grandfather’s hideout, you know? The kid knew where it was. He came back with a six-pound trout from there last summer."

  "His mother didn’t mention it to me," Nina put in. "She was very worried about him. Why wouldn’t she mention that Jason might have gone to the cabin?"

  "How should I know? Maybe she didn’t want to tell you herself."

  Nina considered this. Was it possible? Sarah had in fact told her in an indirect sense, by sending her to Joe, who immediately had thought of the cabin. That way it wouldn’t appear that Sarah knew where the bodies were.

  Could Sarah have pretended concern for Jason, sent Nina up to the cabin to find the bodies and left Jason’s sunglasses there to complete the picture? Sarah didn’t want Ray’s body exhumed either, and she must have resented whatever pressure Quentin had brought to bear. But did she know how to use a backhoe, a big, clumsy digging machine? And what kind of person would dig up a dead spouse or, worse, frame her own child!

  Unless she had help and a lot of pressure on her from someone else. Leo?