“Maybe that,” she said.
“The sheriff still had his wallet and money?”
Estelle nodded and turned to watch Linda Real add her vehicle to the growing parking lot on Guadalupe Terrace. “Jackie, will you give Linda a hand with what we have here? Tom and I will check the garage and around back. I don’t think we’re going to find anything, but I want to be sure.”
She was halfway to the garage, her flashlight and Pasquale’s sweeping the gravel driveway, when her cell phone chirped. The sound was loud in the quiet night air.
“Guzman.”
“Querida,” her husband’s soft voice said. “You okay?”
“Sure. Are you home?”
“No. Look, Eduardo Martinez died a little bit ago. I wanted to let you know. I set the time at 10:58.”
She stopped in her tracks, and looked up at the night sky. A few stars were showing, the others obscured by traces of wispy clouds.
“You there?” Francis asked.
“Yes, I’m here,” she said finally. “I’ll stop by in a few minutes.”
“That’s not necessary. Essie and the others all went home a few minutes ago.” When she didn’t respond immediately, he added, “Are you all right?”
“Sure. Did you look in on Padrino?”
“He’s fine, querida. He’s going to be just fine. I told him about Eduardo, and he was philosophical about it. He said he’d get together with Essie a little later, after the family thins out some. The hard part will be keeping Padrino from getting up and walking out of the hospital when our backs are turned. You know how he is.”
“We won’t turn our backs,” Estelle said.
Chapter Twenty
“Stay put,” Captain Eddie Mitchell said, looking back over his shoulder into his office. Out in the hall, Estelle’s view was blocked by Mitchell’s husky figure and the door, and she stepped sideways. Deputy Mike Sisneros sat at the end of the large folding table that Mitchell preferred to a standard desk. A tape recorder rested near his left elbow, and his pencil was poised over a legal pad.
Sisneros glanced up and saw the undersheriff. The young deputy’s face was pallid, and a half day’s worth of scruffy black stubble did nothing to hide the exhaustion on his face. Mitchell closed the door of his small office thoughtfully, keeping his grip on the knob even after it latched. “Let’s talk in your office,” he said to Estelle.
“He’s going to be all right by himself?”
“Adams is in there with him,” Mitchell said, and grinned without much humor. “Coiled over in the corner.”
“Ah,” Estelle said. She didn’t ask Mitchell why he had deemed it necessary to have an official witness in the room while he talked with Sisneros, but that was the captain’s call. Mitchell was as careful and methodical as anyone in the department. That he didn’t feel it prudent to leave the young deputy alone at this particular moment spoke volumes, especially since he had left him in the intimidating presence of New Mexico State Police Lieutenant Mark Adams, whom former sheriff Bill Gastner had once described as having the “deadest pair of eyes this side of a corpse.”
Mitchell followed Estelle into her office and sat in the straight-backed chair by the filing cabinet. He rested his head back against the wall and closed both eyes. After Estelle had settled behind her desk, Mitchell opened his left eye and looked at her. Add thirty years of wear and tear and fifty pounds in all the wrong places, and he’d be a fair Bill Gastner impersonator…except for the glacial blue of his eyes. In that respect he was a good match for Lieutenant Adams. Neither gave the impression that they would cut their own mother a deal.
“I am sooooo tired,” he said, and managed a grin. “And you too, I bet.”
“Very,” she said.
“Our young man is a basket case,” Mitchell said, and opened both eyes as he pulled away from the wall. “This is his story so far. He left here about 2:45 or so this afternoon to go back to his apartment, clean up, and then drive to Lordsburg. For some reason, and he doesn’t know why, Ms. Tripp decided at the last minute not to go along. Mike claims he almost canceled the visit, but he knew his mom would be disappointed, so he went over by himself. He arrived at his mother’s and stepfather’s place just about four thirty. They confirm that, although they’re a little fuzzy about the time. He was with them until I arrived there about a quarter to six.” Mitchell shrugged. “And that’s about it. It’s really that simple, if he’s telling the truth.”
“He really doesn’t know why Janet didn’t want to go to Lordsburg with him? No idea at all?”
“Nope. His best guess is that maybe Janet was uncomfortable around his mother. The two of them don’t hit it off much, he said. Since Mike and Janet started seeing each other back in September, he says that Janet and his mother haven’t spoken more than once or twice.” Mitchell bent his right index finger and studiously examined the short, blunt fingernail. “That’s not anything that surprises me, Estelle. I mean, some folks just don’t care for each other. But there are a number of little things that trouble me.”
Estelle waited, giving Mitchell time to frame his thoughts. “Number one,” he said without looking up, “it appears that Janet Tripp was killed sometime after 3:05 p.m. That’s what the ATM receipt shows, and we have no reason to suppose that she waited around in the parking lot for any length of time after making her transaction. There’s always the chance that the killer took her ATM card after shooting her and did the transaction himself.”
“I can’t imagine that,” Estelle said. “He’d have to have her PIN number, for one thing.”
“That, and other reasons. Number one, why take just $350? The single transaction limit is $500 a day, Mears tells me. And second, once the shot is fired, I would think that the killer would be motivated to split. I can’t see him casually walking over to the ATM, with her lying there, shot and bleeding.”
“He took the time to pull her out of her car and dump her into his…trunk, back of an SUV, whatever it was.”
“Sure, he did. But if we use a couple of minutes after 3:05 as the time of the shooting, that gives us a window of opportunity there. It might be easier if we had a stopwatch timing everything, but nobody pays too much attention to the fine details. The only time we’re sure of is what’s printed on the ATM slip.” He raised his head to look at Estelle. “3:05. She does her business, walks back to the Jeep, and pop.”
“And at that time, Mike isn’t even on his way to Lordsburg yet. He’s still in town,” Estelle said.
“Correct. But…,” and Mitchell leaned forward, shifting his weight on the small chair and pulling at the bottom of his vest where it chafed his belly. “I would be willing to bet every penny that’s in my enormous pension fund that Mike Sisneros didn’t kill Janet Tripp. I talked to him in Lordsburg, and tried to lay things out as gently as I could. I might as well have hit him between the eyes with a baseball bat. And if it was an acting job, I’ll hang up my spurs.”
“What’s he have to say, then?” Estelle asked. “Did Janet have enemies, or does Mike think it was just a random thing…a crime of opportunity?”
“I’m not sure he’s thinking straight at all. Desperate might be a good word. He’d like to wrap his finger around the trigger and put the killer in his sights. If anything, we’re going to have trouble keeping him from mucking around and getting in our way with this thing. He and Janet were closer than I thought, I guess. He said that they were planning to get married this spring sometime.”
“Ay. That’s rough. I’d heard that rumor, but they were keeping their plans close to themselves.”
“He said that he almost decided not to go over to his mom’s, but Janet talked him into it. Mrs. Cruz is ailing, and Janet said that Mike should spend some holiday time with her.”
“Generous girl.”
“I’ve only met her half a dozen times, but I liked her,” Mitchell said.