Craig Johnson - A Serpent's Tooth - A Walt Longmire Mystery

She leaned over at the waist to inspect me crawling from the wreckage and whispered in a sultry voice, “I didn’t call on you, teacher’s pet.”

Boy howdy.

Reaching a hand up, I was able to graze my fingers across her muscular calf as she turned and marched away. My eyes closed again for what I thought was only a moment and when I opened them she was gone and a different head, panting with a different sort of breath and with a worried look on his long face, was hanging over me. Unsure, he slathered a lick on the side of my head with a tongue as wide as a paperback, correct in the belief that a good kiss made everything better—well, almost everything.

I reached up and grabbed his ruff and massaged his ear. “How you doin’, rascal?”

He wagged and disappeared as I noticed someone standing in my doorway.

“Walt?”

I tried my best to sound casual. “Yep.”

“I heard a crash.”

“That would’ve been me.” Ruby walked in, and I noticed she was wearing a pair of her sporty, reflective running shoes; funny the things you noticed from this perspective. “What’s up?”

“Saizarbitoria wants to talk to you, and Double Tough is on line one—something about a leased piece of drilling equipment?”

“Could you hand me my phone and tell the Basquo where I am?”

“Sure.”

She rested the whole thing on my chest, picked up the receiver, and handed it to me, a finger poised to punch the button. “Do you mind if I ask what you’re doing?”

“Nope, I don’t mind at all.”

We both waited.

Finally, she pushed the button and then smeared a thumb over my lips. “You might want to get rid of the lipstick—it doesn’t become you.”

I watched as she stood and disappeared out my door. “Do we have any aspirin?” Readjusting the receiver in the crook of my neck, I thought about getting up, but I wasn’t really that uncomfortable, so I just spoke. “What’ve you got for me, Tough?”

“Hey, Chief. Hughes Christensen got back to me, and let me tell you that’s the fastest that’s ever happened.”

“What’d they say?”

“It’s stolen.”

“Well, fancy that.”

There was a rustling of paper as he read from his notes. “The original leasing was through PEMEX, the Mexican government-owned petroleum company?”

“The big dog, huh?”

“Big to the tune of four hundred and fifteen billion in assets.”

I whistled. “How did they even notice it was missing?”

“They didn’t; it was subleased to a private contractor.” I noticed a few cracks as I stared at the ceiling in my office and listened to him. “That’s the way these big operations work; they order up a bunch of this stuff if they get even an inkling that they might need it, because, unlike the rest of us, they don’t wait on anything.”

“I see.”

“But then they got all this equipment lying around that they’re not using and start thinking about recouping their losses. Well, the small operators are desperately in need of the equipment, but the big companies have it all tied up, so they have to go to ’em with their hats in their hands and then the big boys overcharge ’em to get back some of the lease money they lost.”

“Who was the subcontractor?”

“An even bigger Brazilian company called Petrobras, but then they subleased the bit to a company called . . .”

“No offense, Tough, and I really appreciate your efforts, but—”

He laughed. “Seventeen more leases.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I want a raise.”

“I offered you a rug.”

“The final operator was a . . .” He read from the paper. “DT Enterprises.”

“Never heard of them.”

“Me neither, but there are a ton of these little wildcat operations down there; it’s like the Wild West.”

“And you are telling me this because?”

“These operators are not the best bookkeepers, because it is sometimes not beneficial to these operators to have the best books kept.”

“I’ll buy you a lamp to go with the rug.”

“You’re going to have to do better than that; you’re gonna have to find somebody else to work down here.”

I was mildly shocked. “Are you quitting on me?”

“Nope, but Frymire is; he dropped off a letter for you this afternoon. I guess him and the fiancée are movin’ down to Colorado. He says he can stick around for another week if you need ’im.”

“Do we need him?”

“Well, things are heatin’ up around here, but I figure I can handle it.”

“Any more contact with the East Spring bunch?”

“Nope, after you helped ’em get that piece-of-shit Plymouth goin’ they just headed on down the road.”

“What did you do with the bit?”

“I got it locked up in the back of the Suburban with my dirty laundry on top of it.”

“Sounds safe.”

“I wouldn’t touch it, unless I had to.”

As I thought about some of the things Sheriff Crutchley had said, I spotted one of the .45 dumdum rounds that must’ve rolled off the top of my desk. I picked it up and held it in front of my face. Neville Bertie-Clay, the British army officer who had worked at the Dum Dum Arsenal near Calcutta, had developed the hollow or soft point bullet that to this day carried the arsenal’s name. The things should’ve been called Bertie-Berties.

“Walt?”

“Yep?”

“Anything else?”

The British had used the ammunition in the venerable .303 against Asians and Africans because it had sufficient enough stopping power to deter a determined charge. The Hague Convention of 1899 had found the dumdum too cruel for use against fellow European countries, but some police departments still authorize them because they mostly do not pass through intended targets and continue on into innocent bystanders.

“Sheriff?”

I’d seen what they could do in Vietnam, and the fistfuls of flesh they removed. “Yep. Hey, where is DT Enterprises licensed?”

There was a pause. “Mexico.”

“Where in Mexico?”

There was more paper rustling on his end. “Chihuahua.”

“Where the dogs come from.”

“I guess.”

“See what you can dig up on them.”

“Roger that. Anything else?”

“Start taking applications down there, would you?”

He laughed. “Yeah, okay. Why don’t you just send Vic? I’ve got my cot set up in the back.”

“I don’t think that would work out, but don’t worry, I’m going to call in some reinforcements.”

He chuckled on the other end. “Smoke signals or war drums?”

Double Tough knew my methods. “I’ll let you know.” I hung up the phone and moved it off my chest, crossed my arms, and tried to think, once again, about my dwindling staff, but DT Enterprises kept getting in the way. Why did that sound familiar? Was it something somebody with Lynear had said? I didn’t think so—maybe it wasn’t the Enterprises part.

DT.

Sancho came in and sat on the corner of my desk with a sheaf of papers under his arm, one hand cupped around some aspirin, and a glass of water in the other. “You sleeping down there tonight?”

Dog followed him in and sat by my desk. “Just me and my faithful companion.”

“Sit up and take your medicine. Ruby’s orders.”

I took the four aspirin and the glass from him and leaned against the bookcase where I’d started the day. “Thanks.” I swallowed. “Everybody gone?”

“Cord is still working over at the Busy Bee, and Mr. Rockwell is reading about himself in his cell.” He studied my quizzical look. “Ruby went over to the library and picked up all the books they had on Orrin Porter Rockwell and gave them to him.”

“How’s he doing?”

“He’s been awfully depressed since Vic arrested him, but I think he appreciated the books.” He smiled, and I couldn’t help but think how handsome that face would be on a sheriff’s election poster. “Bishop Goodman came by, and they talked for about four hours.”