J. Jance - Rattlesnake Crossing

"Sheriff Brady?"

She turned to find. Deputy Eduardo Sandoval standing behind her. Of all Joanna's deputies, Eddy Sandoval-a beefy man in his mid-to-late forties-was the one with whom she had the least personal contact. Because he both lived and worked in the far northwestern sector of the county, he was the most physically removed from her office. And when he came to Bisbee to drop off a prisoner or make a court appearance, Sandoval wasn't one to hang around the Cochise County Justice Complex shooting the breeze.

"Hi, there, Eddy," Joanna said. "How long ago did you get here?"

"Just now," he said. "Sorry it took me so long. I was up at Cascabel taking a missing-person report when this call came in. I got here as fast as I could."

"Missing person?" Joanna asked. "What missing person?"

"About this time yesterday afternoon, a lady wandered off from that oddball dude ranch just up the road from the Triple C," Eddy answered. "You know the place I mean-the ranch they've started calling Rattlesnake Crossing."

Joanna frowned. "Isn't that the dude ranch where all the guests dress up like Indians and camp outside?"

Sandoval nodded. "Right," he said. "That's the one."

"So who's missing?" Joanna asked. ''One of the campers? The List thing we need about now is to have some tenderfoot who Thinks she's a born-again Apache go wandering off in the desert. It's the middle of August, for God's sake. Depending on where she's from, she'll die of heatstroke before we can call in Search and Rescue."

"Her name's Katrina Berridge," Sandoval replied. "And she's not one of the guests. She's more of an employee, I guess. Employee or partner, I'm not sure which. She's the owner's sister. As I understand it, the missing woman and her husband work there at the ranch. Katrina handles paperwork-reservations, finances, payroll, that kind of thing. Her husband's the handyman-does a little of everything. According to him, his wife went out for a walk yesterday afternoon and never came back."

"Any trouble on the home front?" Joanna asked.

Sandoval shook his head. "Not that I could tell. At least, none that the husband happened to mention."

"If she wasn't driving a vehicle when she left, does anyone have an idea of where she might have gone?"

"Nobody knows for sure," Sandoval replied. "According to the husband, each afternoon Rattlesnake Crossing has sort of a free period. All the people pretty much go their separate ways for a time-a few hours. I guess they're all supposed to use that time to get back in touch with nature. Anyway, when dinnertime came around and Katrina didn't show up, people weren't too worried, because I guess she's done that before-gone out for a walk and stayed out later than the others, watching a sunset or a moonrise or something. When she still wasn't home this morning, though, her husband-his name's…" Sandoval paused long enough to consult his notes. "Dan… no, Daniel Berridge-he said he went looking for her. He claims she has some favorite hangouts up in the cliffs alongside the river. Mr. Berridge said he looked up there for her this morning, but he couldn't find any trace of her."

"Wait a minute," Joanna said. "Aren't those cliffs just on the west side of the river?"

"Yes," Sandoval nodded. "They are."

"And isn't Rattlesnake Crossing Ranch on the other side?"

Sandoval nodded. "That's right, too."

"The river's been running like crazy ever since that storm the day before yesterday. If Katrina Berridge was going over to play on the cliffs, how did she manage to cross the river?"

Eddy Sandoval shrugged. "That's what I asked her husband. He said maybe she swam."

"Or maybe she never crossed it at all," Joanna said. "Maybe, for some reason or another, he's interested in having us look in one place and not in another."

Eddy Sandoval frowned. "You're thinking maybe the husband had something to do with whatever happened to her?"

The irony wasn't lost on Joanna. She had been disturbed by the fact that everyone seemed fully prepared to jump to the conclusion that Belle Philips had murdered Clyde. Now here she was, jumping to the same kinds of conclusions about Daniel Berridge.

"I'm not saying that, one way or the other," Joanna re-plied. "But if we're bringing in Search and Rescue…" She paused. "We have called them in, haven't we?"

He nodded. "That's right. They should be on their way."

"Good," she said. "When Search and Rescue gets here, or when Dick Voland does, tell whoever's in charge of the search that I want them to look on both sides of the San Pedro. You got that?"

"Got it."

"Where are you meeting them?"

"I told Dispatch I was coming here and that Search and Rescue should catch up with me here. In the meantime, is there anything else you need me to do, Sheriff Brady? I'll be glad to help out."

"As a matter of fact, there is," Joanna told him. "You stand right here in this doorway and watch Detective Carbajal Iike a hawk. That floor he's walking on is made of so much Swiss cheese. If it caves in under him, I want to know about it right away . Now, I'm going to go outside and start talking to the neighbors. We need to find out where and when's the last time someone saw Clyde Philips alive."

Joanna soon discovered that when it came to Clyde Philips' neighbors, there weren't all that many for her to talk to. There were three other houses on the short, unpaved block, but two of them were empty. The only other one that was occupied belonged to Sarah Holcomb, the cane-wielding lady who had directed Joanna to Belle's restaurant.

Minutes after leaving Eddy Sandoval to watch over Jaime, Joanna found herself in Mrs. Holcomb's old-fashioned living room, seated on an overstuffed sofa in front of a doily-covered coffee table. It turned out that getting Sarah Holcomb to talk was easy; separating important details from the old woman's meandering conversation was considerably more difficult.

"I never saw a thing out of line," Sarah declared in answer to one of Joanna's questions. "Course, I was gone a good part of the weekend. Went up to Tucson to see the doctor and visit my daughter and son-in-law," she said. "I left about midmorning on Sunday and didn't come back until just a little while before you showed up this afternoon. My doctor's appointment was yesterday. Anymore, seeing a doctor just takes the starch right out of me. I don't like to make that drive on the same day as my appointment, not at my age. I'm eighty-three, by the way, and still driving," she added. "And I'm proud to tell you that I've never had an accident or a ticket, either one."

"When's the last time you saw Clyde, then?" Joanna asked.

Sarah frowned. "Musta been last week sometime, al-though I don't rightly remember when. He wasn't the best neighbor I ever had. A real ornery cuss, if you ask me. When Belle finally up and left him a few years back, I thought it was high time. Belle, now, she's all wool and a yard wide-maybe even more than a yard wide, come to think of it." Sarah grinned at the joke. When Joanna didn't respond, the woman resumed her story.

"Anyways, what went on between them was none of my business, although I always did think Clyde took terrible advantage of the poor woman. Belle never was much of a looker, and of Clyde always acted like he done her a great big favor by marryin' her. I can tell you that the man never lifted a finger around the place long as he had her to do all the cookin' and cleanin'. You'da thought she signed up to be his slave 'stead of his wife. Poor Belle'd spend all week workin'-she used to cook up three meals a day over to that rest home in Benson. You know which one I mean-the one that had that electrical fire and burned to the ground a few years back. That's where Belle worked, right up until the place burned down. As I remember it, she got burned in that fire, too, somehow. When all was said and done, I h i n k she got some kind of little insurance settlement. I'ro'ly wasn't all that much, but it was enough, and it was money dim belonged to her, not him. The way I heard it, that's what she used to open that little doughnut place of hers.