Michael McGarrity - The big gamble

"Who ran the project?"

"The primary investigator was a professor named Jeremiah Perrett. I always wondered if he ever published the findings. I never saw it in any of the psych journals. After a while I lost interest and stopped looking."

"Did Anna Marie have any personal problems that summer?"

"No, but both of us thought Perrett was a bit of a flake."

"Why is that?" Kerney asked.

"He kept changing the data-gathering instruments we used in the interviews. You can't draw any significant conclusions unless you have reliable and consistent information to work with." Osterman forced a chuckle. "Maybe that's why he never published."

Kerney smiled at Osterman's humorous attempt. "Did you keep in touch with Perrett?"

"No. He wasn't one of my favorite instructors. At the time, he was thirty-something and tenured, so he may still be at the university."

"Was Anna Marie romantically involved with Perrett?"

Osterman chuckled again. "That's a laugh. He's gay. Or at least he was then."

"Why did you try to contact Anna Marie?" Kerney asked.

"Just to reconnect," Osterman said. "I lost track of a lot of people after I left New Mexico. I thought it would be fun to catch up with old classmates."

"Did you reconnect with anyone else?" Kerney asked.

"A few people," Osterman replied, his eyes widening a bit. "Are you thinking I'm a suspect?"

Based on his conduct, Kerney didn't think Osterman was a murderer. But he'd learned never to rely on first impressions. "Would you mind giving me their names?"

"I'll write them down for you," Osterman said, a touch of coolness creeping into his voice. He reached for a pen in his shirt pocket, scribbled on a napkin, and pushed it toward Kerney. "The first three live in Albuquerque, the others in Santa Fe. I don't have their phone numbers handy, but they're listed in the directory."

Kerney looked at the five names. They were all new to him. "How many of these people knew Anna Marie?"

"As far as I know, just Cassie," Osterman said, pointing to the first name on the list.

"Is Bedlow her maiden name?"

"No, it was Norvell back in college."

Kerney folded the napkin and put it in his shirt pocket. "I may need to speak to you again."

"If you must, please call me at home," Osterman said, rising from his chair. "I'm new here, and I'd rather not have to deal with the police at work. It doesn't create a good impression."

"I assured the people in personnel that you are not under any suspicion," Kerney replied.

"That doesn't stop office gossip," Osterman replied, "and you haven't reassured me."

"Thanks for taking the time to talk," Kerney said.

Osterman nodded curtly and left in a hurry. Kerney followed suit, not feeling overly optimistic that he was making any progress, but pleased to have some new ground to cover. He'd start with trying to locate and talk to Jeremiah Perrett.

When Clayton struck out on picking up Ulibarri's trail through a canvass of car dealerships and rental companies, he made the rounds of the few available public transportation services, which were limited to a shuttle service to El Paso, one taxicab company, a bus station, and the regional airport served by a small puddle-jumping airline. Ulibarri hadn't used any of them. So he was still in the area or he'd gotten a ride out of town.

Back at the office, Clayton worked alongside Quinones and Dillingham, calling what seemed to be an endless list of places where Ulibarri could be staying. As a tourist and vacation destination, Ruidoso boasted lodging options ranging from tent and RV campgrounds for the budget-minded to swanky resorts for the well-heeled. In between there were motels, hotels, cabins, privately owned houses and condos, bed-and-breakfast operations, and apartments available for short-term and long-term rental. Beyond the town limits but within reasonable driving distances were villages and towns with even more possibilities.

It was drudge work that frequently meant leaving messages on answering machines at property management and realty companies, or getting no response whatsoever from the mom-and-pop cabin-rental operators who only took reservations during certain hours of the day. After lunch, Paul Hewitt jumped in to help with the calls and sent Clayton out to start making the rounds of places that couldn't be reached by telephone.

There were cabins off the main roads in canyons sheltered by tall pines, cabins perched above the river, hillside cabins on stilts, cabins that hadn't yet opened for the season, and cabins sprinkled along and behind the main roads through the city. He stopped at property management firms, tracked down real estate people on their mobile phones, and met with resident condo and town-house managers.

After several hours, with most of his list checked off, Clayton called in. Dispatch passed along more lodging establishments Hewitt, Quinones, and Dillingham had been unable to reach by phone. One of them, Casey's Cozy Cabins, was close by Clayton's location.

At the bottom of a hill two blocks behind the main tourist strip, six rental units bordered a circular gravel driveway just off a paved street. Each cabin had a stone chimney; a covered porch; a shingled, pitched roof; and weathered wood siding. Old evergreen trees shaded the structures, and barbecue grills on steel posts were planted in front of every porch. All the parking spaces in front of the cabins were empty.

Clayton cruised by, parked on the shoulder of the road, and walked up to the compound. A hand-carved sign hanging from the porch on the cabin closest to the pavement announced the name of the business. On the porch railing were pots filled with ratty-looking artificial flowers.

Clayton knocked at the door and an older man, probably in his early sixties, opened up. He had a pasty gray complexion, watery eyes, and a heavily veined, pudgy nose.

"Are you Casey?" Clayton asked, showing his shield.

The man eyed Clayton suspiciously, stepped outside, and quickly closed his front door. "He died five years ago. I bought the place from his widow and never got around to changing the name. What can I do for you?"

Before the door closed, Clayton caught a glimpse of several poker tables in the front room. Tribal gaming operations had wiped out a lot of the illegal poker parlors in Ruidoso, but not all of them. Some players still preferred private big stakes games, where none of the winnings went to the tax man.

"Who are you?" Clayton asked.

"Do we have a problem?" the man responded with a tinge of an East Coast accent.

"Let's see some ID."

"Name's Harry Staggs," the man said, reaching for his wallet. He held it out to Clayton. "I run a quiet, family place here, deputy."

"I'm sure you do," Clayton said. "Take your driver's license out of the wallet and hand it to me, please."

Staggs did as he was told. Clayton copied down the information and handed back the license.

"What's this about?" Staggs asked.

"Do you have any guests?"

Staggs shrugged. "Three cabins are rented, but I don't think anyone is here right now."

"How about this man?" Clayton asked, holding up Ulibarri's photograph.

Staggs nodded in the direction of the cabins on the right side of the porch. "Yeah, he's in cabin three, but like I said, nobody's here right now."

"You're sure of that?" Clayton asked, stepping to one side so he could keep the cabin in view.

"Well, I haven't seen him all day, so I'm guessing he's out."

"Did he check in alone?"

"Yeah."

"Nobody was with him?"

"A man and a woman dropped him off, but they stayed in the car."

"Are you sure he doesn't have company?"

"No, I'm not. I rent cabins. As long as my guests don't cause trouble or do damage, it doesn't much matter to me what they do or who visits them."