Percival Everett - Assumption

“What about you? What do you think?”

“You might be smart. I don’t find you cute, so don’t get any ideas. I think you’re a stubborn son of a bitch with a messiah complex.”

“Second time I’ve heard that today. You’re probably right and I need to work on it.”

“Did I mention that you can’t fight worth a damn?”

“Don’t like violence.”

“Yeah, for somebody who doesn’t like to fight you sure rush into the fray awful quick.”

“Character flaw. I’m working on that, too.” Ogden looked at the passing landscape, relentlessly flat and generally uninteresting, except for the dense dark clouds looming ahead of them in the south. “That’s all we need.”

“I really don’t need to drive through a damn tornado today,” Warren said.

“Any of those chips left?” Ogden asked.

“Those were gone long ago.”

“Let’s stop and eat, see what those clouds do.”

They stopped and ordered sandwiches in a diner and watched the weather through the big window. The clouds did little but expand; they spat out some rain and flashed some lightning, but that was it. Ogden was glad to pause awhile. Now they would hit Dallas late enough to know certainly to wait until morning before contacting Tina Ortega’s mother. It was sinking in that he would have to tell the woman that her daughter was dead.

They rolled into Dallas around one in the morning. They slept in the truck in the outer reach of a parking lot at an enormous shopping mall. The morning came with a tapping on the driver’s-side window by Ogden’s head. A uniformed Dallas policeman motioned for him to roll down the glass. Ogden did.

“Sleeping it off?”

Ogden rubbed the sleep from his eyes and glanced over at Warren doing the same. “Mind if I grab my ID?”

“Go ahead,” the cop said.

Ogden handed the man his deputy’s badge and identification. Warren handed over his as well. The man studied them, then looked at their faces.

“We’re here on some business and got in really early this morning,” Ogden said.

The cop gave back their badges. “You’ll have to move on now, though”

“You got it.” Ogden started the engine. “Can you give me some directions?”

Ogden followed the officer’s directions to the Douglass house. He parked and looked over at Warren.

“You’re on your own, cowboy,” Warren said.

“I have a feeling that two of us might be a bit much anyway. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“I’ll be right here.”

Ogden got out and walked past snapdragons and day lilies to the front door. The cement walk was still damp at the edges. The storms of the previous day had left the sky clear, but thick with humidity. He rang the bell.

A woman, maybe seventy, answered the door. “Yes?”

He fell back a half step. “I’m sorry to bother you, ma’am, but is this the Douglass residence?”

“It is.” She was suspicious.

“Are you Mrs. Douglass?”

“I am.”

“Ma’am, my name is Ogden Walker. I’m a deputy sheriff from Plata County, New Mexico.” He fumbled with and then showed her his identification and badge.

“Yes?”

“This is awkward. Would you mind if I came inside?”

“I think I might.”

Ogden nodded. “I understand.” Ogden looked back in the direction of his truck. He was wishing that Warren had come with him.

“What do you want?”

“Do you have a daughter?”

“Christina, yes.”

“Does she also go by Tina?”

The woman nodded. Fear shone on her face.

“Last name Ortega?”

Ogden pulled out the photograph of the woman from the cabin. “Is this your daughter?”

The woman began to cry. She backed away into the house, leaving the door wide open. Against his better judgment, Ogden stepped in after her. “I’m so sorry,” he said.

“I knew it. I just knew it,” she said.

“I’m very sorry.”

“What happened?”

“She was murdered,” Ogden said.

The woman wailed for a few seconds and then stopped, sniffing, straightening herself, pulling her robe tight around her. Ogden didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing for a while. He looked around the house and saw that it looked very much like his mother’s. “I know this is difficult,” he said, finally. He felt stupid saying it. “I’d like to ask you a couple of questions.”

“I knew something was wrong when they called about the cabin,” she said.

Ogden nodded.

“Can you tell me anything about the last few weeks and Christina? Did she call?”

“Her friend was here.”

“What friend would that be?”

“Carla something. She was very rough-looking, if you know what I mean. I haven’t seen my daughter in years.”

Ogden couldn’t bring himself to tell the woman that her daughter had been a prostitute. “Why did Carla come here?”

“I’m not sure. She said she was a friend of Tina’s and asked if she could stay here a night or two.”

“That’s it?”

“She seemed so scared that I let her.”

“I see. Did you talk to her at all?”

“I tried. She wouldn’t say much. She wouldn’t talk about Tina. Her clothes were dirty, you know, like a street person.”

“Where did she go from here?”

“I don’t know.”

Ogden looked out the window at the street while the woman sat on the sofa. When her crying paused, Ogden asked, “You say you let her stay here for a couple of nights?”

“One night.”

Ogden didn’t believe her. It was the way she cried while she spoke, the way she had received the news of her daughter’s death. She already knew.

“Carla Reynolds is a prostitute from Denver,” Ogden said, surprising himself with his directness. “She’s a prostitute and I think she has some stolen money.”

“Oh my god.”

“You live here alone, Mrs. Douglass?”

“My husband is in a nursing home.”

“I see. When was the last time either of you visited the cabin in New Mexico?”

“God, it’s been years since he was up there.”

“Have you ever been there?”

“Once, when we first married.”

Ogden looked at a couple of photos on the mantel. One was of a man with a string of trout. “Your husband liked to fish?”

“Oh yes.”

“I can see.” Ogden pointed to the photo.

“Is Carla on her way to the cabin?”

“Yes.” The woman tried to catch her answer, but it was too late, it was out.

Ogden caught her eyes. “Mrs. Douglass, I don’t want to hurt Carla. And I don’t want her hurt. I’m trying to help. Has anyone else been here looking for her?”

“No.”

“Please tell me the truth,” Ogden said.

“No one else.”

“You already knew about Tina.”

She nodded.

“Ma’am, I’m going to try to find Carla before she gets hurt. Is there anything you can tell me that might help?”

“She went back for the money. She said she’d share it with me if I let her come back here and stay for a while. My husband didn’t make good decisions. About money, I mean.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Ogden looked at his watch. It was nine thirty. “How did Carla get here?”

“She hitchhiked. That’s what she told me. She looked like it, too. I let her take one of my cars to go back.”

“When was that?”

“Yesterday.”

“What kind of car is it?”

“It’s a old Cadillac, a red ’72 Seville.”

“Do you know the tag number? The license plate?”

She shook her head.

It didn’t matter, Ogden thought. How many red Cadillac Sevilles were out there? At least one.

“I knew something was wrong.”

“Just what did she tell you happened to your daughter?” Ogden asked.