Kirk Russell - Redback

Alice Durrell painted landscapes that sold through a gallery in Bishop. Yesterday was her day to bring work into the gallery and when she did she read about two bighorn poached up on Mount Williamson. She finished reading and folded the Inyo County Register in half, and then carried the newspaper with her as she walked through town to the Department of Fish and Game office to tell her story. When she found the office locked she left a note.

As they parked an Australian shepherd raced toward them snarling. Marquez calmed the dog down and the artist came out of a converted garage that was probably her studio. A thick head of snow white hair cascaded down her back and was tied off near her hips with a bright blue rubber band. In a face weathered like desert sandstone her blue eyes were strikingly clear. She wore a blue long-sleeved man’s shirt rolled up to her elbows and she led them into her studio where she’d drawn a charcoal sketch of two men standing near the back of a vehicle that to Marquez looked like a new Range Rover.

‘What color was it?’ Marquez asked.

‘Black. They were out on the Onion Valley Road about two miles west of Independence. I wanted to paint the sunset over the mountains. A friend had dropped me off and I planned to walk back into Independence.’

Muller had described her as a local eccentric who for decades could be seen walking along roads in the desert with her easel strapped to her back. Marquez read her as sincere and concerned about what she had found. She also seemed clearheaded. In the sketch the taller of the two had black hair and a ball cap. She touched her sketch.

‘The shorter man I recognized. The other man I made a second sketch of because he frightened me. It’s around here somewhere, though I don’t know what I did with it. I probably turned it so his face wouldn’t look out. I’m superstitious that way.’

She told her story now of sitting quietly on her folding stool out in rocks in the high desert and watching the short stocky man lug something out into the sage and cheat grass as his companion stayed near the Range Rover. She’d sketched the other man standing alone near the vehicle. After they drove away she walked over and found the head of a bighorn sheep with the horns cut off. She turned to Muller.

‘Did you find it?’

‘I haven’t looked yet.’

Muller had gotten the story from her late yesterday afternoon over the phone after finding her note, but it was seventy miles from Bishop to Independence and he hadn’t had time to go out there yet. It was Marquez’s idea to talk to her first or he would have gone out this morning. Marquez studied the sketch and then helped her move canvasses around as she searched for a second drawing.

Before she found it she said of the shorter man, ‘His mother was half Paiute and they lived out toward Benton. I’ve tried to think of his name, but I don’t have the memory I once had.’

‘Nate Thompson,’ Muller said quietly as soon as he heard that.

‘Yes, that’s right, one of the Thompson boys. He should have been the one to notice me but it was the other, and it was when he had his back to me. He just sensed me.’ She looked at Marquez. ‘You’re like that too.’

When she found the sketch there were no facial details, but the stance, the look, the posture was right. It was the way the man held his head as he seemed to stare at her.

‘Do you recognize him?’ she asked Marquez.

‘I might.’

Muller cut in, asking, ‘Alice, if we took you down to Independence with us, would you be able to take us to the head?’

‘I don’t think you should be warden for the area if you can’t find a bighorn head lying in a field.’

Marquez couldn’t help smiling though Muller looked offended.

‘The Thompson boy got in trouble for something like this fifteen years ago,’ she said. She stared at Marquez. ‘He shot a bear.’

‘I remember,’ Muller answered, and Marquez said, ‘I’ve got a photo that I’d like to bring back and show you. Can we stop back by this afternoon?’

‘I’ll be here.’

Marquez didn’t have Anderson’s recent photo of Stoval, but Katherine said an image of a man faxed through last night late. It woke her up. By now, he figured, Kath had faxed it to the Fish and Game office in town. He and Muller stopped there before driving out to Thompson’s house.

Turned out Thompson lived out in the desert near Benton. The asbestos-shingled house couldn’t offer much protection from the cold winds sweeping this gap in the winter. A couple of vehicles, a Chevy pickup with a high wheel base and an old Volkswagen Jetta, sat in the front yard. The Jetta’s tires had rotted and the car had settled on to the rims. Inside the house was a new flat screen TV, an ancient couch, and a dining table someone had carved their initials in. A big Mackinaw trout and two deer heads were mounted on the wall. Marquez looked through the window and across the highway where the long alluvial plain rose toward the White Mountains. When he looked back, Thompson stood as he had in the sketch, a bandy-legged man with a barrel chest. He folded his arms now as Marquez dropped it on him.

‘Someone ID’ed you dumping a bighorn head out in the sage a couple of miles from Independence.’

‘You’ve got the wrong guy. I haven’t been to Independence in months.’

‘You thought you were alone when you dumped the bighorn head, but a local recognized you. That’s why we’re here.’

‘Who saw me?’

‘I’m not going to give you a name yet, but we are going to give you a choice. You’ve got the choice of talking to us about your client and the hunt, or trying to bluff us. If you help us, it’ll probably go a lot better for you, because we’ve got everything, the black Range Rover, the carcasses of the bighorn, everything. You made a very real mistake and now the question is whether you want it to get worse.’

Thompson rubbed the back of his neck and frowned at Marquez.

‘You’ve got the wrong man.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m telling you the truth, warden.’

‘Then we’ll take your word.’

Marquez shook his hand and glanced at Muller. Muller didn’t get it. His eyes showed his confusion, but he rolled with it, hid his feelings and they walked out.

‘ He’s scared,’ Marquez said as soon as they were outside. ‘Give me binoculars and drop me as soon as we’re out of sight of his house.’

‘What do you think is going to happen?’

‘If he’s got something to hide he’ll do it as soon as we’re gone.’

Marquez took binoculars with him. Thompson should be patient, watch the road and give them time to get back to Bishop, but no way he was buying the handshake and sorry we bothered you. At least that’s what Marquez was betting as he got out of Muller’s truck.

Near Thompson’s house there was little cover, sage, desert grasses, a scattering of other houses and buildings, a shack behind the next door neighbor’s house that Marquez hid behind now. He settled in. He called Muller and let him know where he was. Half an hour later Thompson came out of the house and walked to the Volkswagen Jetta settling into the side yard. He looked around before unlocking the trunk. A hinge squeaked as the trunk lid went up and Marquez saw Thompson cradling something reasonably heavy and wrapped in a blue blanket. He carried it over to his truck and put it on the floor behind the driver’s seat as Marquez called Muller.

‘OK, he’s moved something wrapped in a blanket from the trunk of the Jetta over to his truck. Close in, let’s do this. It looks like he’s getting ready to leave.’

If Thompson left he could be in Nevada in minutes and Marquez doubted he’d get okayed to follow. Not without knowing what Thompson had in the truck. And even if they did get it, they’d be in Muller’s Fish and Game rig, so that was a bust.