Tony Hillerman - People Of Darkness

“Ah,” Chee said. He was no longer conscious of the ache in his left side, or of the nausea. Part of the pattern that had been trying to form in his mind for hours took firm, clean shape. Hunt was looking at him expectantly, waiting for a comment. “That’s interesting,” Chee said.

“It is,” Hunt agreed. “We never could figure it out. Obviously the bomb wasn’t intended for the wrecker crew – although we finally even checked on that. You’d figure if a guy puts a bomb in a pickup, he wants to waste the pickup driven. But the driver was a poor-boy Navajo who was already on his last legs with cancer. Already dying. No motive to hurry it along. Then we checked on the guy who had the parking space reserved. Big shot doctor. Money. Wife trouble. Maybe she wanted an instant divorce. No evidence, but we figured the doctor was the target. Now it looks like we got our bomber killing another Navajo, and he’s got the same last name.”

“They’re father and son,” Chee said.

Hunt slapped his leg. “That’s exactly what I hoped you’d say. That, or maybe brothers. You know for sure?”

“I know it for sure,” Chee said.

“Well, now,” Hunt said. “That tells us a couple of things.”

Yes, Chee was thinking. It should tell us a lot. But he couldn’t think of what.

“Like what?’ he asked.

“Like that bomb wasn’t intended for the doctor. If that hit man was aiming for Charley Junior, he must have been aiming for Charley Senior.”

“Yes,” Chee said. His head ached. Who would hire a professional killer to murder a man who was already dying? Why would anyone want to hurry the death of Emerson Charley? There were no apparent answers. Hunt was watching Chee, waiting for more response.

“Did Emerson Charley’s body even turn up?”

Hunt frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Tomas Charley told me that the hospital lost his daddy’s body. Emerson died one night, and Tomas came to get the body the next morning, and it was gone out of the morgue.”

Hunt opened his mouth; and closed it again. “I didn’t know that,” he said. “Be damned. Why wasn’t it reported?”

“Tomas reported it to APD,” Chee said.

Hunt’s embarrassment showed. “You know how that’d be,” he said. “Probably told some clerk at the front desk, and filled in a form, and somebody did a little calling around, and that was about it. Nobody pushing it. By then the bombing case wasn’t active. And nobody up front would have a way to know the detective division was interested in a sick Navajo.”

“Guess not,” Chee said.

“I’ll check on it. Right away.” He frowned again. “How can a hospital lose a body?”

“Tomas thinks it was stolen.”

“Stolen? Why? Who’d steal it? This guy?” He tapped the drawing.

Chee didn’t feel like talking about the Vineses. “Tomas thinks a witch stole it,” he said. “Why? Who knows?” But a reason was forming in his mind.

And, apparently, in the mind of Hunt.

“What did he die of?” Hunt asked. “They told us he had cancer.”

“But maybe the guy who tried to hurry him along with the bomb found another way to hurry him along. That’s what you’re thinking?” Chee found himself respecting the way Hunt’s mind worked, and liking the man.

“Exactly,” Hunt said. “And if the body’s gone, there’s no autopsy. I’ll check into that.”

“Good,” Chee said.

“I’ll let you know,” Hunt said. “And there’s one other thing.” He fished the sketch out of the folder again and looked at it. “If our man here is the same as your man, I think he’s a biggie. I think the FBI’s going to be very interested.”

“They were here this morning,” Chee said. “The nurse wouldn’t let ’ em in. What do they want?”

“Past several years they’ve had a run of professional killings done a lot the same. People shot in the head with a.22. Nobody hears a shot. And then there was a couple of cases where they had one person hit with a.22 and one bombed. A couple of hoods in the construction union in Houston and witnesses in an extortion case in Philadelphia. Anyway, mostly the little silenced pistol and a couple of times with the bomb. And both times the bombs seem to have been the kind that get set off by tilting the package. That’s the kind of bomb he used here.”

“Tilting the package?”

“Clever as hell,” Hunt said. “It uses mercury to make the electrical connection. You just set the damn thing down and take off the safety gadget, and the next time the thing moves, or tilts, or shakes, the mercury slides and it goes off. No timer to screw you up, no wiring it up to the ignition. No fuss. No muss. If the driver doesn’t see it, it goes off when the car moves. If he does see it, it goes off when he picks it up.”

“Then what went wrong here?” Chee asked.

“Luck. Wrecker crew was going to haul off the truck,” Hunt said. “They started to hoist the rear end. Tilt. Boom. But that was sheer bad luck. It’s quite a gadget. Understand the CIA developed it.”

The FBI arrived as Hunt was leaving. His name was Martin. He was young. He wore a brown suit with a vest. His mustache was trim, and his haircut would not have offended the late J. Edgar Hoover. Being second to an Albuquerque policeman did not please him.

“The nurse told me you were asleep,” he said. It was more an accusation than a statement.

“No,” Chee said. “I was watching Hollywood Squares . I guess she didn’t want to interrupt. Ever watch ’em?”

Martin denied it. He wanted to talk about what the blond man looked like. And about why anyone would want Tomas Charley killed. And about the Vines burglary. It took Chee less than five minutes to exhaust all he knew about all three subjects and ten minutes more to go over it all twice more from slightly different angles.

“You find anything in the man’s car?” Chee asked. “It was a rental car, wasn’t it?”

“We haven’t recovered it yet,” Martin said. “We think it was rented from Hertz at the Albuquerque airport.” He fished a folder from his briefcase and extracted a copy of Hunt’s sketch.

“Your man look like this?”

“Pretty close,” Chee said.

“The Hertz people identified him as the man who rented a green-and-white Plymouth sedan. Now the car’s overdue. He gave his name as McRae and an Indiana address. It doesn’t check out.”

Chee didn’t comment. Talking to Hunt had tired him. His chest hurt. His ears were ringing. He wanted Martin to go away.

“When you get out of here, we want you to come down to the office,” Martin said. “We want you to look at mug shots and give us more details on the identification if you can.”

“Mug shots? You think you have a record on him?”

“Not really,” Martin said. “We think we have a ten-year accumulation of suspicions. We want you to look just in case. And we want you to spend a lot of time remembering everything you can about him. Everything.”

Chee said nothing. He just closed his eyes.

“It’s important,” Martin said. “This guy’s slick. That little pistol he used must be really silent. And he gets it in places where nobody sees anything. Apparently he scouts everything out very methodically, and then he likes to catch them alone for one quick close shot at the head. In the john is a favorite of his. We know of four found sitting on the john with the stall door closed. And a couple in telephone booths. Places like that. A quick shot and he just walks away. Never any witnesses. Not until the bombing. And now you and Miss Landon.”

Chee opened his eyes. “We’re the first witnesses?”

Martin was staring at him. “The first he knows about. He didn’t know anyone saw him putting the bomb in Charley’s truck. Medium-sized. Blond. So forth. You’re the only two who actually got a look at him and who could pin him to a killing.”