Shadow Play Page 7

  The desk sergeant took my business card, flicked it with his thumbnail, checked my PI license, made notes on a rust-colored Post-it pad, peeled off the Post-it and stuck it to his left thumb.

  “Is there a problem?” I said.

  “And just tell me again, you’re here because…?”

  “Leon Begay. We’ve been asked by his family to look again.”

  “Murder and suicide,” he said. “It’s closed, the whole business, it’s been signed off up the line.”

  “Just a few questions,” I said. “And Mr. Brittles here also has something to tell you. About Leon Begay.”

  He checked Nathan’s name on the Post-it, frowned.

  “Is there a problem?”

  “Nope. Just trying to remember who all caught that mess, I wasn’t here that night. Think it was a volunteer patrol, let’s go ask Billy.”

  Lieutenant William Mangin. Small and round, halo of white hair, half-moon reading glasses on a silver chain. Ducked his head to look at us over the glasses.

  “Billy,” the sergeant said, “this is”—reading from my card—“Laura Winslow. And Nathan Brittles.”

  “Brittles,” Mangin said. “Winslow.” A guy thing, putting the man first. “Don’t know the names. And you’d be here for?”

  “I’d like to ask some questions about Leon Begay.”

  “Ugh,” Mangin said. “Nasty, nasty. I’ve seen a lot of suicides, I just hate it when they take others down with them. What interest have you got in a murder-suicide?”

  “He was an old friend.”

  “I’ve got lots of friends, too. So?”

  “Also friends of Bob Good Fellow.”

  “Who’d be what?”

  “And you’ve got a lot of attitude,” Nathan said.

  “Jim,” Mangin said to the sergeant. “You know anybody named Good Fellow?”

  “Nope.”

  “Navajo Tribal Police,” I said.

  Instead of going outside to his desk, Mangin picked up his phone, ran his hand down a speed-dial list, punched numbers, and then put it on speakerphone.

  “Navajo Tribal Police, Window Rock.”

  “Who’s this?”

  “Sergeant Healthier.”

  “Hey, sergeant. Bill Mangin here. Pima County sheriff’s office. How you?”

  “You’re on one of those tin-can speaker thingies. You got somebody there?”

  “Nathan Brittles. You know him?”

  “Nope. Heard the name, that’s all.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Last I heard, a U. S. Marshal.”

  “And how about a Bob Good Fellow?”

  “Tribal Police at Monument Valley. What’re you asking for?”

  “Just checking on some names.”

  “There are channels for this kind of thing, Lieutenant.”

  Mangin blinked, stared at his desk blotter, ran a bandaged thumb across myriad notes until he found what he was looking for.

  “I sent an envelope to the Tribal Police station in Monument Valley. Addressed to Vincent Begay.”

  “Yes. There are lots of Begays up here. What was in the envelope?”

  “Autopsy photos.”

  “Then call up to Monument Valley. Ask them.”

  “I’ll do that,” Mangin said. “Thanks for your time.”

  Mangin hung up his phone. “What’s this all about?” he said.

  “Leon Begay and Bob Good Fellow are very old friends of mine,” Nathan said. “We go back to Vietnam.”

  “Hey,” the sergeant said. “Semper Fi.”

  Mangin waved off the sergeant who’d rolled up a sleeve to show Nathan a tattoo. “And who is Vincent Begay?”

  “Leon’s brother,” I said. “Vincent moved to Hollywood. Changed his name to Vincent Basaraba. And now he runs the new casino in Tucson.”

  “He ask you to come down here? Look into this ugly business?”

  “No.”

  “Murder and suicide. Begay committing the murder.”

  “He swore he’d never fire another weapon,” Nathan said.

  Mangin stretched his arms over his head, linked his hands behind his neck, stretching his head back and forth, arthritic cartilage popping in some of the vertebrae on his neck.

  “Okay,” he said finally. “Jim, call the volunteer’s office. If Arletta Vezo is working this shift, have her come on over. If she’s not there, not at home, probably having her afternoon burger over to the Mercado del Sol. Ask her to come here, please?”

  Mangin got out of his chair and he suddenly wasn’t so short anymore. One of those people with extra long legs. Wide leather Resistol belt holding up his uniform pants, flat stomach, and torso. Woven leather equipment belt creaking as he unbuckled it and set it with a thunk on his desk.

  “Twenty pounds. You wouldn’t believe, just sitting down, how much those twenty pounds pull on your back.” He watched Jim put on his straw cowboy hat and go outside to a patrol car. “You’re wondering, I know you’re wondering, why’s a substation sheriff not readily extending courtesies to a fellow lawman.

  “You a law lady?” He read my business card closely, looked at the back. “Computer forensics, I don’t much know what that means.”

  “Data security,” I said. “Who is Arletta Vezo?”

  Instead of answering, he abruptly yanked open his middle desk drawer, took out a business card, placed it carefully in front of Nathan. “This guy, he came just yesterday. Also asking about Leon Begay.”

  Nathan read the card, handed it to me.

  WES MCCARTNEY

  MANAGER OF SECURITY

  FLAMINGO CASINO

  “You know him?” Nathan shook his head and I clamped my mouth shut. “Me neither. But that’s who he is. Security manager, at that same new Tucson casino. Something, I don’t know, odd about him, I didn’t tell him anything. Coincidence, about them both at the casino? What do you want to know? About Leon?”

  “You’ve already decided,” I said. Both men looked at me. You sent the sergeant to find Arletta Vezo. My guess, Vezo was first person at the crime scene.”

  “Two thirty-five A.M.,” Mangin said. “Neighbor heard the shots. At first, thought maybe somebody devastated a rattlesnake near their patio. But the neighbor calls us, anyway. We’ve got sheriff’s office volunteers down here in Green Valley. You know, a high-profile neighborhood-watch kind of deal. Ex-cops, usually, retired, bored, we give them a uniform, train them, give them everything they need except a gun, and they catch all the usual nuisance stuff.”

  The patrol car returned with the sergeant and a woman in shorts and a tank top, eating French fries off a paper plate. I thought she’d leave the plate outside, wash her hands, but she set it on Mangin’s desk. Short torso and long legs, large breasts tightly wrapped under the tank top, hair gathered behind her head with a scrunchy. At least sixty years old but leathered and muscled, the three officers looking like they could be from the same family tree.

  “Arletta, this is Nathan Brittles. And Laura Winslow.” Arletta pulled off her scrunchy, shook loose her white-and-gray hair. “I’m not really sure who they are, but this guy says he was a very good friend of Leon Begay. Just tell ’em about last Tuesday night, Arletta.”

  “Jesus God,” she said, repositioning the scrunchy. Pulled a small spiral notebook from her hip pocket, flipped the pages nervously. “I never expected to walk into a slaughterhouse. Desk gets a call, oh two thirty-five. I’m cruising Camino del Sol, get the address down in Canoa. Not our regular circuit, but nothing’s happening all night except the gas station fiasco, so I respond at oh two thirty-eight. Guy’s standing at the end of the street, there’s a wash right there, still water in it from the monsoon. I light him up with my flash, it’s Karl Inklemann. He’s smoking a cigar. ‘Begay’s house,’ he says, ‘sounds like somebody there shot a diamondback, except, usually, people don’t usually shoot ’em middle of the night. And two shots. I heard two. Sounded like a choked twelve-gauge, except I don’t know anybody what uses a choke, I’ve see
n some weapons down here. But hearing the gun, I’m not gonna go over to there, check it out. Called you people. You get paid for it.’”

  Flipping through her notebook.

  “Pretty much what he said. I ask which unit is Begay’s, Inklemann points. I respond to the front door. No lights on inside. Ring the bell, knock, ring the bell. Nothing. That subdivision, it’s five homes in a row, you can walk the common property all around. So I go out back, I go to the patio slider. Locked, drapes closed. I bang on the slider with my flashlight. Nothing. I go back around to the front door. At this point, Inklemann says, ‘You want a key?’ He’s right behind me, cigar in his mouth, neither of us is sorry the other one’s there. He holds out a key ring. ‘Neighbors,’ he says. ‘We look after each other.’ I ring the bell, knock again, unlock the door, go inside. Inklemann is right behind me, he knows where the light switches are. ‘Begay,’ he hollers, and then he lights up this Jesus God slaughterhouse.”

  Arletta sat down, fast, started eating the French fries. We waited.

  “Woman’s lying in the bedroom, blood everywhere, I can tell she took a round directly in the heart. Man’s slumped on the couch, head back, back of his head everywhere. Shotgun’s laying half on and half off a mirror-top coffee table, cracked the mirror. Twenty-three years, Chicago PD, I’ve seen a lot of gunshot fatalities. I back out of there, literally, I walk backwards, trying to match where my boots might have been. Inklemann’s still got his cigar in his mouth, but nearly bit in two. I respond to the office here. Didn’t touch a thing. Office gets Billy here out of bed, he took over the scene.”

  “And you’ll be wanting to see this, too.”

  Mangin unlocked a wall cabinet, took out a shotgun, laid it across his desk.

  “Must be damn near a hundred years old,” Mangin said

  “Double-ought shells?” I said.

  “No,” Mangin said. “Number four buck load. Twenty-seven pellets a shell. Why there was so much damage to Leon’s head.”

  “Who was the ME?” Nathan asked. I stirred, flexed my hands in surprise. “Who did CSI work?”

  “Pima County sheriff’s CSI. Team came down from Tucson, three guys were there in less than an hour. We taped off the place, they took photos while I was getting the local coroner over. With all the senior citizens down here, we had to elect a coroner. Heart attacks, mainly. Ambulance from Green Valley fire station takes them up to a Tucson hospital, if they’re still alive. Or morgue. That’s about it, far as this office goes. You want to know more, contact Tucson.”

  “No lights on in Leon’s house?” I said.

  “Nope.”

  “Anything else we can do for you?” Mangin asked.

  “No. Wait. Yes,” I said, tapping the security man’s card. “What’d this guy say, what was he doing down here?”

  “No idea.” Mangin said, studying Nathan. “Look. I’m sorry about your friend. Didn’t know him. Was he Law of some kind? Like you, maybe?”

  “Uh, Billy?” the sergeant said. I hadn’t noticed he’d left the room, the door now open, sergeant standing there with a surprised look on his face. “We got Karl Inklemann out here. Drove his damn golf cart all the way up from Canoa, says he’s got information about the Begay house.”

  “Not now,” Mangin said.

  “You oughta see him, I think. He’s saying that the Jeep Cherokee in the parking lot, belongs to these two people, Karl is saying it was at the house.”

  “I can explain,” I said quickly.

  Mangin frowned, a scrunchy disbelieving frown. “You two, wait in here.” He went to the outer office, closed the door.

  “I did it alone,” Nathan said to me. “Make that old man remember, you drove up while he was in the street. I did everything by myself. I’m going to tell them everything, tell them why I did it.”

  The door opened. Inklemann thrust an arm through the doorway, pointing at Nathan. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, “that’s the man that came out of the house. I went around back, the glass sliding door was smashed, I went inside, I tell you…”

  “Jim,” Mangin said to the desk officer. “Take Karl’s statement.” He shut the door. “Mr. Brittles,” he said. “I thought that gas station shootout was enough, we don’t get much real police work down here. A few break-ins, somebody smashed a rock through the front door of the Old Chicago Deli, that’s our usual style. But I’m gonna have to lock you while I sort all this out.”

  Nathan put his hands on Mangin’s desk, next to the equipment belt and the holstered 9mm automatic. Mangin tensed, half crouched, but Nathan went to him and held out his hands. Mangin started for his handcuffs, stopped.

  “Am I gonna have to hook you up?”

  “Call Bob,” Nathan said to me. “Tell him what’s happened. Get that letter.”

  “And that letter would be what?”

  “We have permission,” I said. “From Begay’s family. We have a letter giving Nathan Brittles total permission to take possession of Leon Begay’s belongings.”

  “I’m hoping to see that letter right now.”

  “At my house,” Nathan said. “In Casa Grande. Can I ask, where’s Leon now? His body, I mean, where is it now?”

  “PCSO handled the investigation and the scene,” Mangin said. “Homicide and Forensics come down from Tucson because of the mess at the gas station. At Leon’s house? To my knowledge, after the processing of the scene by PCSO is complete the bodies were turned over to the transport guys from the medical examiner’s office, or maybe to the contract body-recovery firm. I don’t know if one was used, we had so many bodies that night.”

  “What Nathan is asking,” I said, patient, slowing down my words, lowering my tone, wanting to be the only person in the room not so hyped. “Where is Leon’s body right now?”

  “The bodies were driven to the medical examiner’s office next to Kino hospital in Tucson, that’s where the autopsies were to be done. Since our substation was the primary at the scene, I got copies of the autopsy photos. The ones you have there, the ones I sent up to the rez. As required by Arizona statute. Autopsies required when death is by violent means. Typically within three days, depending on how busy the ME was. They might have been done that same day.”

  “Where is Leon’s body?” I said again.

  “Well. That’s why I sent the material up to the rez. Trying to locate next of kin, the autopsied body could only be released to the next of kin. If none, the state or the county would bury the bodies in a public cemetery. Call the ME’s office. That’s all I can tell you. Now, I think we’re done here. You want to ask me any more questions, Miss Winslow, I’ll lock you in the same holding cell, you can talk things over with your partner. Maybe you’ll even change your story?”

  “No,” I said. “That’s the story.” Nathan opened his mouth, I could see his lips moving, nobody else looking at him, mouthing the words Call Bob Good Fellow.

  “I’m missing something here,” Mangin looking from Nathan to me to Nathan, “aren’t I?”

  “Two things,” Nathan said.

  “I handled this business perfect,” Mangin said.

  “Nothing you missed. Somebody went into the house, probably early this morning. Took a few things from Leon’s study.”

  “We had a volunteer on that place,” Mangin said. “Until this morning. What’s missing?”

  “Don’t know. Picture frames, most likely. We saw spots in the dirt, maybe six frames missing. And a map, something two by three feet. Tacked on a wall.”

  “And what else?”

  “A week ago, the night Leon died, did anybody report a stolen golf cart?”

  “Yes,” Mangin said, puzzled, “indeed they did. Found the next day. Kids do that down here once in a while. Not much here for kids to do.”

  “Suppose somebody else shot Leon. No unfamiliar cars out front, the neighbor would’ve seen them. Just suppose, somebody came at the house from behind. Stole a golf cart, rode it to the ravine behind the house, left the same way.”

  “Coincidenc
e,” Mangin said finally. “Case is closed. Murder and suicide. Anything more to tell me?”

  “No,” I said.

  “I’m wondering, why do you want to see Leon’s body?”

  “He’s Navajo,” Nathan said finally. “The body needs to be prepared for burial. Shoes on the wrong feet, corn pollen…buried up on the rez.”

  “I sympathize,” Mangin said. “Nothing I can do. Contact the medical examiner’s office, they’ll tell you where they’ve stored the body. Anything else?”

  Nathan said nothing about the mysterious golfer, or about Antoinette Claw. In the parking lot, Inklemann saw me and quickly started his electric cart and scooted off. I began the long drive back to Casa Grande, dialing Nathan’s home phone every ten minutes, finally leaving messages for Bob, five messages, Nathan’s answering machine cut off messages after thirty seconds, infuriating, I kept punching redial, forgetting some of what I’d already said, repeating until I got it all and left my cell number and the number of the sheriff’s office.

  Once I got home, Spider still wasn’t there, but not quitting on her yet, I settled for waiting all night. I took a shower, got a huge aluminum pot of water on simmer, ready to throw in the rigatoni when she walked in the door, chopping tomatoes and onions, fresh from Mexico, lettuce not so fresh from Safeway, and three different kinds of lo-cal salad dressing in the fridge.

  I sorted through some CDs, tried some Mad Squirrel rap, I just couldn’t listen to rap these days, I couldn’t write my own raps, couldn’t enjoy music. Waiting for Spider, I ran through half a dozen small tasks at my computer.

  A year before, Spider came abruptly into my life after an absence of almost twenty years. Never expecting to see her again, astonished at her appearance in the Tucson city jail back then and the wild ride we’d had through a series of murders, she’d not left my mind a single day since. She’d flown off from the Tucson airport, half promising to see me again only to disappear for six months and reappear one night with two duffel bags of clothing and a backpack of computer gear. She rarely explained anything to me about those years, about any other years, even about her days and nights while living with me.