Joseph Kanon - Los Alamos

“Jesus, Doc.”

By the time the coroner arrived, O’Neill had already completed the area search. “Shame about the rain. I’ll get Fred to look downstream just in case anything got thrown in the river. Like his wallet.”

“Yeah, if God wants to throw you a bone this week,” Holliday said. “Don’t figure on the wallet. Keys, though. Funny, taking his keys.”

“What have you got here, Ben?” Doc Ritter said, using Holliday’s real name. “Been a long time since I’ve been called out on a murder.”

“Well, you tell me. Careful of the clothes, though-I’m still hoping to get some prints.”

“After the rain?”

“Well, I can hope. We sure don’t have much else. John Doe with his head smashed in and his pants down.”

The coroner looked at him.

“Yeah, I know. Sounds like that case down in Albuquerque. I guess the papers will be all over us, but let’s try to keep them out of it until I can talk to the boys down there. We could use a head start.”

“You’ve got the whole police force out on the Alameda in broad daylight and you’re trying to keep this quiet? You’ve got yourself some news here, Ben, is what you’ve got.”

“I don’t know what I’ve got, except a corpse. Take a look at his teeth for me, will you? He’s got a plate but not like one I’ve seen around here before. Maybe he’s from back east.”

“Who is he?”

“No idea. Clothes don’t tell me anything. Civilian, but he could be on leave. Maybe a tourist.”

“Yeah, welcome to Santa Fe, where the Old World meets the New. Not too many in April, though, usually.”

“Not since the war, that’s for sure. I’ll check the hotels, though, just in case. It’ll give them something to do.”

“Maybe he’s from the Hill.”

Holliday sighed. “Don’t say it.”

“But he may be.”

Holliday nodded. “Then we’ll have the whole fucking army breathing down our necks.”

“Better call post security anyhow. Maybe they’ve got somebody missing.”

“Well, I’ll tell you. Maybe post security should be checking with us, instead of telling us how top secret they are and what a bunch of assholes we are. Besides, if they’ve got somebody missing, we’ll hear about it-not so easy to get lost up there, I wouldn’t think. Place is a fort. Meanwhile, all I’ve got here is a John Doe with a cracked skull. A month ago some queer down in Albuquerque gets knifed and it makes all the papers, and now I’ve got a boy looks like he was up to the same fun and games. So before I take on the U.S. Army and all the crap we usually have to take from our secret project friends, I think I’ll have a little talk with Albuquerque and see if they’d like to take this off our hands.”

“Suit yourself. They find the guy who did it in Albuquerque?”

“Not yet. But maybe they haven’t been looking very hard.”

“So it might—”

“I don’t know. But I’m going to check it out before I tell anybody on the Hill we’ve got a dead pansy and by the way are they looking for one. I can hear them yelling now. Just in case, though, you’d better do a good job on the autopsy. Don’t want your cleaver work making us look bad up there.”

Ritter laughed. “Anything else?”

“Yeah, be sure to check for any anal penetration.”

O’Neill, who had been standing quietly at his side, looked up. “What do you mean?”

Holliday laughed. “Tommy, you need to have a talk with your dad someday so he can explain things.” Then he looked down at the body, still twisted and pale and dead. “Poor son of a bitch. I wonder what he did to deserve this.”

Santa Fe gave its name to a railroad, but the train itself stops twenty miles to the southeast, at Lamy, a dusty town in the high desert that seemed to have been blown in by the wind and got stuck at the tracks. Michael Connolly thought he’d arrived in the middle of nowhere. The train had been crowded, a sea of uniforms and businessmen with travel priority and women holding children in their laps, but only a few got off on the sleepy platform. Beyond the buildings and the jumble of pickup trucks that had come to meet the passengers, there was nothing to see but scrub grass and sage until the tracks finally disappeared in the direction of the mountains. The young soldier looking eagerly at each face was clearly meant for him. He looked like a high school shortstop, jug ears sticking out of his shaved head.

“Mr. Connolly?” he asked finally, when the passengers had dwindled to an unlikely three.

“Yes.”

“Sorry, sir. I was looking for a uniform.”

“They haven’t got me yet,” Connolly said, smiling. “I’m just a liaison. Is this really Santa Fe?”

The soldier grinned. “It gets better. Help you with that?” he said, picking up Connolly’s suitcase. “We’re right over here.” The car was a Ford, still shiny under a blanket of dust.

Connolly wiped his forehead, glancing up at the cloudless sky.

“Nothing but blue skies, huh?”

“Yes, sir. Sunny days, cool nights. They got weather here, that’s for sure. Best thing about it.”

“Been here long?” Connolly said, getting into the car.

“Since January. Straight from boot. Not much to do, but it beats overseas.”

“Anything would, I guess.”

“Not that I wouldn’t like to see some action before it’s all over.”

“Better hurry, then.”

“Naw, I figure the Japs’ll hold out another year at least.”

“Let’s hope not.” It came out quickly, a kind of scolding.

“Yes, sir,” the soldier said, formal again.

“What’s on the program, anyway?”

“First we’ll get you checked in at Santa Fe. Mrs. McKibben will have your stuff. Then my orders are to get you up to the Hill ASAP. General Groves wants to see you before he goes back to Washington tonight.”

“Is ‘the Hill’ a code name?”

The soldier looked slightly puzzled. “I don’t think so. I never heard that, anyway. It’s just what everybody calls it around here.”

“I assume there is one-a hill, that is.”

“What they call a mesa. Spanish for table,” he said, a tour guide now. “That’s what they looked like, I guess-flat-topped hills. Anyway, there used to be a school there, kind of a dude ranch school for rich kids, I think. Sure doesn’t look like a school now.”

“What does it look like?”

The soldier grinned, breezy again. “Look like? Well, if you’ll pardon my French, like a fucking mess.”

Santa Fe, however, was pretty. The adobes, which Connolly had never seen, seemed to draw in the sun, holding its light and color like dull penumbras of a flame. The narrow streets leading to the plaza were filled with American stores-a Woolworth’s, a Rexall Drugs that had been dropped into a foreign city. The people too, dressed in cowboy hats and jeans, looked like visitors. Only the Mexican women, wrapped in shawls, and the Indians, nodding over their piles of tourist blankets, were really at home. The plaza itself was quiet, a piece of Spain drowsing in an endless siesta.

“That’s the Palace of the Governors,” the soldier said, pointing to the long adobe building that lined one side of the square. “Oldest government office in the country, or something like that. Project office is right around the corner.”

The sense of enchantment held. They walked through the quiet courtyard of a small adobe house where the only sound was the travelogue splash of a fountain. But America returned inside. A bright, cheerful woman, hair piled on top of her head, was busy on the phone as she arranged papers on the desk in front of her.

“I know space is tight, but he’s just got to have it.” She covered the mouthpiece and nodded to Connolly. “I’ll be with you in a sec.” Then, to the phone, “Edith, please see what you can do. He just won’t take no for an answer. Give me a call back when you hear, okay? Yes, I know. Bye now.” She smiled up at Connolly without pausing for breath. “You must be Mr. Connolly. I’m Dorothy McKibben. Welcome to Santa Fe,” she said, shaking hands. “You certainly have picked a crazy day. ’Course, they’re all crazy one way or another. I had to get all this together in a hurry, but I think it’s all here.” She handed him a manila envelope. “ID, ration card, driver’s license. No names, of course, we just go by numbers up on the Hill. Local stores are used to this, so you shouldn’t have any problem. Try not to get stopped for speeding, though-the police have a fit writing out a ticket to a number. You’ve been cleared for a white badge-that allows you into the Technical Area, so you’ll be able to go anywhere. I’ve included the army bus schedule into Santa Fe just in case, but you’ll have your own car.” She raised an eyebrow. “That’s pretty unusual around here, so you must be important, I guess.” She made a small laugh that said she was no stranger to importance. “Security office will give you your housing assignment up top. I’m sorry we couldn’t find anything at Fuller Lodge, but we’ve got wall-to-wall visitors for some reason, and it couldn’t be helped. If any of them leave, of course, we can reassign you right away. Let’s see, what else? All mail to P.O. Box 1663, Santa Fe. No other address. You should know that mail is censored. We don’t like to do it, but it became a security issue. You get used to it.”