Death Song

Chapter Nine

Loud pounding at the motel room door brought Clayton out of a deep, dreamless sleep. He rolled over, opened an eye, and tried to focus on the tabletop clock radio. It was exactly three hours since his head had hit the pillow. Light-headed and groggy, he got out of bed, padded barefoot to the door, and looked through the security peephole. Detective Lee Armijo was about to pound away again on the door.

“Okay, okay,” Clayton yelled, hitting the light switch and opening up. “Don’t you ever sleep?” he asked as Armijo stepped inside.

“I’m a narc,” Lee replied. “We all take drugs to stay awake.” There were dark rings under his eyes. “Get dressed while I make the coffee. I figure that’s probably your drug of choice.”

“I rarely self-medicate,” Clayton replied.

Armijo guffawed, took the in-room coffee carafe off the machine on the dresser next to the cheap twenty-inch color TV, went to the bathroom, and filled it with water.

“What are you doing here, Detective?” Clayton asked as he stuck a leg into his jeans.

“Please, Sergeant, call me Lee. After all, we did spend last night together.” Armijo returned from the bathroom, stuffed two individually wrapped packs of coffee in the machine, poured in the water, and pushed the button. The machine sighed and started to gurgle.

“But to answer your question,” Armijo continued, “I started thinking that maybe Brian Riley might be involved in the drug trade as a user, given his association with Robocker, in spite of the fact that our good pal Mort Birch told us he didn’t know him. So I called some of my snitches.”

Clayton sat on the edge of the bed and pulled on his boots. “And?”

“One of them, Ed Duffy, a good Irish-American lad who sadly turned to a life of crime as a juvenile, swears that Brian Riley is crashing at a house on Cornell Drive near the university. Duffy says he saw him there two nights ago.”

Clayton tucked in his shirt. “How reliable is your snitch?”

Armijo poured Clayton a cup of coffee and handed it to him. “Duffy, bless his heart, provides very good intel because I have him on a short leash and he can’t afford to screw up. If he pisses me off for any reason, I’ll have his probation officer violate him on a commercial burglary beef. He’ll go straight to the slammer and pull a dime.”

Clayton took a sip of coffee, made a face, and put the cup on the bedside table. “This stuff is terrible.”

“It’s my super high-octane formula,” Armijo explained as he threw Clayton his coat, “designed to get your motor running. Let’s go. Bring your coffee with you. On the way, I’ll tell you what else I learned from Duffy. It’s all very interesting stuff.”

Seated in Armijo’s unit, Clayton drank his coffee and blinked against the harsh, cloudless sky, made slightly hazy by a low thin brown cloud of pollution that hung over the city. Albuquerque looked no better to him at midday than it did at night or early in the morning. Central Avenue still had a string of cheap motels near the Interstate, rows of small businesses in a hodgepodge of uninteresting buildings still bordered the boulevard all the way up the hill to the university, and the sounds of traffic on the busy street filled the air like the dull hum of a swarm of angry insects. In truth, Clayton didn’t like cities much.

As Armijo drove, he filled Clayton in. Riley had told Duffy he’d gone into hiding because of something he’d learned that could get him killed.

“At first,” Lee added, “Duffy thought it was just some paranoid, drug-induced bullshit Riley was laying on him. But Riley went on and on about how his father and stepmother had been murdered, and he was next in line unless he could stay out of sight.”

“Maybe it was just paranoia,” Clayton ventured.

“I put the same thought to Duffy myself and he strenuously disagreed. He said Riley told him he knew things about his stepmother that could get him killed.”

“Did Riley say what it was he’d learned about his stepmother?”

Armijo shook his head and slowed as a driver pulled into traffic from a side street and swerved immediately into the left-hand lane. “Nope. Duffy and Riley. Doesn’t that sounds like an old Irish vaudeville song-and dance-team?”

“And this conversation took place two nights ago?” Clayton asked, just a bit weary of Lee’s wisecracking style.

“According to Duffy, that’s a roger.” A break in the traffic flow allowed Armijo to swing into the right lane. “Duffy also told me that Riley gave the guy he’s crashing with money to let him hide out there until things cool down. He’s been laying low since the night his father’s murder made the evening news, and he hasn’t once left the house.”

“So if Riley is supposedly in hiding, how did this Duffy character manage to connect with him?” Clayton asked.

Armijo signaled a right turn. “When he isn’t busy burglarizing homes and businesses, Duffy peddles cannabis to a select group of people he knows and trusts. Brian Riley’s host, Benjamin Beaner—I swear on a stack of Bibles that’s his name—is one of Duffy’s regular customers. Beaner called Duffy, placed an order, and asked him to deliver it. When Duffy arrived with product in hand, Beaner and Riley were already half-wasted. Duffy joined the party, and as the evening progressed Riley started talking.”

“What do you know about Beaner?”

“I found one intel report on him,” Lee replied. “Late thirties, bisexual, single, college dropout, heavy grass user with an off-the-charts IQ. Works as a salesclerk at a national chain home electronics and appliance store. In other words, he’s a middle-aged, switch-hitting, pothead geek.”

“Did Riley mention to Duffy or Beaner who he thinks is trying to kill him?”

“I thought you’d never ask,” Armijo replied.

“Well?”

“Agents of a foreign government.”

“What?”

Armijo eased to the curb in front of a cottage situated at the back side of a large, packed-dirt lot with one leafless, forlorn, thirty-foot-tall ash tree that overarched the driveway. Large cracked and partially broken limbs dangled dangerously from high branches above the roof of a beat-up silver Honda Civic.

“That’s all I know.” Armijo opened the car door. “Now lets go and see if any of it is true.”

The officers approached slowly, eyeing the cottage as they crossed over the partially exposed, charred foundation of a structure—probably a house—that had burned. The cottage had a screened-in porch, but most of the screens were either missing or badly tattered. The front door, which had been partially painted dark green a long time ago, had a bumper sticker pasted on it that read “Free Tibet.”

Clayton guessed the cottage had probably started life as either a garage, a shed, or an outbuilding for the main house that had once stood along a leafy lane, back in the days when the university was on the outskirts of town.

As he closed in on the front porch, he scanned the windows, looking for any sign of movement, while Lee Armijo kept his gaze locked on the door. They circled the cottage, found no rear exits, and returned to the front. Clayton knocked on the door and called out for Benjamin Beaner. When he heard movement inside, he knocked again.

“Yeah, what do you want?” a voice replied.

“I need to speak to Brian Riley.”

“There’s nobody here by that name.”

“Are you Benjamin Beaner?” Clayton asked.

“Who wants to know?”

“Police. Open up.”

The door opened a crack, and Clayton flashed his shield and Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office photo ID. The door swung open to reveal a man with a sunken chest, round shoulders, a tuft of hair that dangled down from his chin, and pasty skin. He reeked of tobacco smoke mixed with the pungent aroma of marijuana.

“Benjamin Beaner?”

The man nodded. “If you’re looking for Brian Riley, he’s gone.”

“When?” Lee Armijo asked.

Beaner shook his head. “I don’t know. I woke up and he wasn’t here. Took all his stuff with him.”

“Exactly when did you wake up?” Armijo demanded.

“About seven this morning.”

“Was Riley here last night?” Clayton asked.

“Yeah. He crashed before I did.”

“Mind if we look around?” Armijo asked.

“You got a warrant?”

“Do you want to go to jail for felony pot possession?” Armijo countered.

Beaner swallowed hard. “Are you going to bust me anyway if I let you in?”

“We’re not interested in arresting you, Mr. Beaner,” Clayton answered.

Beaner stepped aside. “Look all you want.”

The small front room was completely taken over by a home entertainment system consisting of a DVD player, a cable TV box, a stereo with large floor speakers, a wide-screen high-definition television, the latest video gaming system and a universal remote control. Two beat-up reclining leather chairs were positioned directly in front of the TV, within easy reach of a glass-top coffee table that held an ashtray filled with cigarette butts, a plastic bag about half full of marijuana, a water pipe, and several roach clips.

In front of the coffee table, no more than three feet from the screen, was one of those legless video rocking chairs gamers used to plug themselves into their artificial digital world. Clearly Beaner’s private life was almost completely detached from anything real. The room, the dark eye of the TV screen, the absence of any personal touches reminded Clayton of fanciful and scary Ray Bradbury stories he’d read as a child. He asked Beaner where Riley had slept.

Beaner pointed to a small hallway and said, “Turn left.”

The back room was filled with assorted boxes of salvaged electronics gear, a bookcase made out of stacked concrete blocks and unpainted pine boards, filled with technical manuals, a plywood worktable on sawhorses that held a laptop, scanner, printer, and digital camera, and a twin mattress on the floor that had been pushed up against a wall.

Clayton called Beaner into the room to ask him what, if anything, belonged to Brian Riley.

Beaner looked around and stroked the tuft of facial hair that hung from his chin. “I don’t see anything here that’s his.”

“Nothing?” Clayton demanded.

“That’s right.”

“What did he come here with?”

“He had a backpack, a sleeping bag, a toilet kit that he kept in the bathroom, and the clothes he wore. That’s it.”

“And he gave you money to hide him?”

“A hundred dollars a night plus cash for food and extras, all of it in old money.”

“What do you mean old money?” Armijo asked.

“There wasn’t a bill less than ten years old that he gave me. Tens and twenties, and they hadn’t been circulated much. I pay attention to things like that. I figured it was stolen and I asked him about it.”

“What did he say?” Clayton asked.

“He said that he’d found it.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know. He dropped the subject. But he pulled a wad of cash out of his backpack to pay me for putting him up.”

“Do you have any of those old bills?”

“No, I spent them fast in case they were counterfeit.”

“I understand he told you he knew something about his stepmother that could put him in danger or get him killed,” Clayton said. “Was he any more specific about it than that?”

“The night a friend dropped by, Brian said he’d found out something about his stepmother that was some pretty scary shit.”

“Like what?” Armijo asked.

Beaner shook his head. “I don’t know. He wouldn’t talk about it other than to say she wasn’t who she pretended to be.”

Armijo stepped closer to Beaner. “Did he say how he knew this?”

“He mentioned finding some documents on his father’s property.”

“He used the word property, not house?” Clayton asked.

“Yeah.”

Clayton flipped up the mattress, hoping Riley had left something behind. There were only dust balls on the wood floor and a spider that scurried away to safety. “Did he have a cell phone with him?”

“Not when he arrived. But he gave me cash to buy him one and sign up him for a prepaid calling plan at work under an alias.”

“What name did he want you to use?”

“Jack Ryan,” Beaner replied. “I’ve got his cell phone number if you want it.”

“You bet we do,” Armijo said.

Beaner took out his wallet and handed Armijo a slip of paper.

“I’ll get the ball rolling on this,” Lee said as he flipped open his cell phone and stepped into the front room.

“Stay put while I do a quick search,” Clayton ordered Beaner. He shifted nervously from foot to foot as Clayton looked through the documents and papers on the plywood table, the content of the boxes, the material on the bookcase, and the junk in a small closet.

Clayton moved a box at the head of the mattress, picked up a paperback novel that had been hidden from view, fanned through the pages, and glanced at the synopsis on the back. It was a spy thriller featuring a CIA operative named Jack Ryan. “Is this Riley’s book?” he asked.

“No, it’s mine,” Beaner replied. “He started reading it while he was here. That’s where he got the alias he wanted me to use for the cell phone. He said that he liked the sound of the name and it was close enough to Riley that he’d remember it.”

“Did he talk about hiding out from agents of a foreign government?”

“He mentioned that,” Beaner replied. “But I didn’t take it seriously.”

“Why not?”

“Because it sounded made up, like something right out of that book you’re holding in your hand.”

Clayton hadn’t read the novel. Maybe if he did, he’d get some insights into Riley. “Mind if I borrow it?”

“You can have it.”

Lee Armijo stepped back into the room. “I’ve got an expedited search warrant in the hopper for the telephone records, and there’s no toilet kit in the bathroom. Anything here?”

Clayton shook his head and returned his attention to Beaner. “Can you think of any reason Riley would leave so unexpectedly?”

“No.”

“Do you have any idea as to where he might have gone?”

“No.”

Clayton handed Beaner a business card. “If he returns, calls, or you hear about him through some other source, contact me immediately.”

Beaner stuffed the card in his shirt pocket. “I don’t think Brian is a bad person. I truly don’t think he would hurt anybody. He’s just a scared kid with an overactive imagination.”

“Uh-huh,” Armijo said. “Did you try to sleep with him?”

Beaner blushed and said nothing more.

Outside the cottage Armijo’s cell phone rang. He glanced at the incoming phone number on the screen, put the phone to his ear, and said, “Talk to me.”

He listened, grunted, hung up, and gave Clayton a totally disgusted look.

“What?”

“Captain Apodaca just informed me that one of his hotshot homicide detectives at the murder scene allowed a young man matching Brian Riley’s description to drive off on the Harley motorcycle. Apparently, the young man told the detective that he lived at the apartment complex and needed his wheels to get to work. Since the bike hadn’t been secured into evidence by the crime scene techs, the cop bought the story without batting an eye or thinking to check with anyone else. An APB has been issued.”

“When did this happen?”

“Ten minutes ago. Every city, county, and state patrol officer in the greater Albuquerque area is looking for him.”

“Well, at least Riley has surfaced,” Clayton said as he climbed into Armijo’s unit, although the stupidity of the mistake deflated his spirits.

Armijo grunted. “Yeah, but if he’s on the run again it’s because he found out that Minerva Stanley Robocker went and got herself executed. He’s got to believe the killer is closing in on him.”

“Let’s get some protection here for Beaner before we leave,” Clayton urged. “We don’t need another person Brian Riley knows getting themselves unnecessarily killed.”

Lee keyed the radio microphone and made the request. While the two men waited, they listened to radio traffic. Everyone on the streets riding any kind of motorcycle was being stopped. It didn’t matter if they were on custom hogs, choppers with sidecars, dirt bikes, or motor scooters. If it had two or three wheels and an engine, it got stopped.

A squad car pulled up behind Armijo. He waved and drove off. “Now what?”

“It’s back to Santa Fe for me,” Clayton said. If Benjamin Beaner was to be believed, whatever Brian Riley found had been on the Cañoncito property Tim and Denise Riley owned. It consisted of a sizable piece of land, and only the double-wide, stable, horse trailer, and immediate surroundings had been searched. Unless Brian Riley was found and had started talking before Clayton arrived in Cañoncito, he planned to comb every square inch of it if necessary.

“Get some sleep first,” Lee said, covering a yawn with his hand. “You look like shit.”

“Thanks a lot,” Clayton replied.

During the hours Kerney had spent analyzing Denise Riley’s letters to her sister, he’d filled a writing tablet with notes. When he’d reached the point where he was trying to decide if Denise’s handwriting curlicues had changed over time, he decided to stop. He put the letters aside, stripped off the latex gloves he’d worn to handle the documents, and reviewed his findings.

Denise had indeed used repetitive phrases and stock comments throughout her letters. No matter where she’d roamed, all the men she’d hooked up with were outdoor type guys who loved sports. Almost universally, she would characterize them to Helen as “footloose and fun-loving—not ready to settle down.” When she worked, her jobs were always “boring, but paid the rent.” When she wrote about adapting to new customs, struggling to learn foreign language phrases, describing the people she encountered, recounting an excursion to a landmark destination, experiencing exotic cuisine, very little detail went with it. It was as though Denise had lifted her imagery, facts, and experiences from travel guides.

There were seventy-eight letters in total, some of them lengthy, many of them short, but only five letters had any cross-outs or strikeovers, and the total number of misspelled words could be counted on both hands.

Was Denise Riley one of the most exacting and error-free correspondents ever? It was possible, but Kerney doubted it. The era of letter-writing was long gone, a victim of computers, the Internet, and e-mail. Even if Denise was a throwback inclined to write leisurely letters to her older sister, surely once in a while a note home would have been dashed off in a scribbled hurry. There was none of that in the packet of correspondence.

Kerney suddenly realized that not once in any of her letters did Denise refer to sending home snapshots of the places she’d visited, the people she’d met, or the men she’d supposedly fallen in love with. He picked up the phone and dialed Helen Muiz’s number. Ruben answered.

“How are things going?” he asked.

“I’ll be honest with you, it’s been rough,” Ruben replied. “Just getting her up and dressed in the morning is turning into a major feat. I’ve talked her into letting me make an appointment for her to see a therapist.”

“That’s a wise thing for her to do. How are you holding up?”

“I’m hanging in. Do you need to speak to Helen?”

“Maybe you can answer my question. In Denise’s letters home, did she ever enclose any photographs of the places she’d lived, her boyfriends, the excursions she’d made, or the tourist attractions she’d visited?”

“Never. She said she was too busy, felt that a camera made her look like a tourist and that she just wanted to blend in and experience the world rather than taking pictures of it.”

“There’s no explanation of that in her letters to Helen.”

“Helen had a phone conversation with Denise about a year or two after she’d left Santa Fe. That’s when the subject came up.”

“Didn’t you or Helen or the other family members think it odd that Denise wouldn’t want to share a photograph or two of her world travels and adventures, the men she lived with, the new friends she’d made?”

“Of course, but you have to understand that Denise had a habit of completely shutting down on a subject once she decided she didn’t want to deal with it anymore. It was one of her ways of establishing limits. Broaching a forbidden subject with her got you an icy stare or the cold shoulder. If it was a serious infraction, you could be completely frozen out of her life for months at a time until she decided to forgive you.”

“And the family tolerated this behavior?”

“She could also be charming, loving, and irresistible, Kerney. She was the eccentric, uncontrollable kid sister who got to break all the rules.”

“You’ve been a big help, Ruben,” Kerney said. “Thanks.”

“Is there anything you want me to tell Helen?”

“Just let her know that we’re still looking for Brian Riley and I’m taking Denise’s letters to the state crime lab for analysis.”

“Okay.”

“Ruben.”

“What?”

“Don’t forget to take care of yourself.”

Ruben laughed. “Yeah, sure.”

Kerney disconnected, put Denise’s letters in a large, clear plastic evidence folder, and made the quick drive from police headquarters to the Department of Public Safety, the umbrella organization of the New Mexico State Police.

Once buzzed past reception, he first went to check in with his old friend, Chief Andy Baca, and found him behind his big desk signing paperwork. Andy looked up, grinned, and waved him in the direction of the couch that faced the desk.

“What’s that in your hand?” Andy asked, sweeping the paperwork to one side.

Kerney sat on the couch and put the evidence envelope on the coffee table. “Letters from Denise Riley to her sister Helen that I’d like the Questioned Documents Unit to look at pronto.”

Andy joined him on the couch. “You got it, amigo. Cop killings go to the front of the line at our crime lab, no questions asked. Now that there are two dead officers, everything else goes on the back burner.”

“I know that, but a phone call from you while I’m on my way over there will surely add to their eagerness to be helpful.”

“No problem.” Andy eyed Kerney speculatively. “Do you really hope to break this case before you retire?”

Kerney nodded. “But it’s looking less and less likely.”

“And are you sure retiring is what you want to do? You’ve been in law enforcement your entire adult life. It’s not that easy to walk away from something you enjoy doing. Believe me, I know.”

Andy had retired from the state police as a captain, found it not to his liking, got himself elected as a county sheriff for two four-year terms, and had returned to Santa Fe after being appointed chief of the state police by the governor.

“I’m ready for a change,” Kerney said.

“That’s not the same thing as saying you’re ready to stop being a cop.”

“I’m going to find out what it’s like to be an American living in London. We’ll tour the continent as time allows, and when Sara is busy at work, I’ll take Patrick fishing.”

“You don’t even like to fish.”

“Don’t take what I’m saying literally. I’m talking leisure time, recreational activities, sightseeing, expanding cultural horizons, soaking up European history.”

Andy grunted and got to his feet. “Save me from grand tour of the continent rap. Connie called me a while ago to report that Sara has invited us to your house for dinner on Saturday night.”

Kerney raised an eyebrow. Since coming home, Sara had showed little interest in food and virtually no interest in cooking. This was good news.

“You didn’t know?”

“Nope, but I’m damn glad to hear it.”

“She’s coming along okay?”

Kerney laughed. “Seems the more I stay out of her hair the better she gets.”

“Well, that’s a no-brainer,” Andy replied as Kerney headed for the door.

At the crime lab, Kerney met with the Questioned Documents expert and her assistant, who took the packet of letters and envelopes and immediately began recording the transfer of the evidence to the lab on an official form.

“Is there anything special we should be looking for?” Claire Paley asked.

In her fifties, Claire was rail-thin, wore bifocals that perched on the end of her small nose, had long dark hair pulled back in a bun that was always unraveling, and talked in a voice that was childlike in tone. As a result, she came across as a woman on the verge of becoming completely undone, but she was highly competent and extremely bright.

“Look at everything,” Kerney replied. “From what I can tell, the victim used several types of stationery. If possible, identify the makers and check any watermarks against the FBI database. Also, I’d like to know if the stamps and cancellation marks are authentic, and there are a few strike-outs and cross-overs I’d like you to analyze. If you can read any impressions on the paper under the handwriting, that could be very helpful. Run a test on the inks used. I’m particularly interested in knowing the origin of the paper, envelopes, and ink. Are they of domestic or foreign manufacture?”

“What else?” Claire asked.

“I’ve included a recent sample of the victim’s handwriting for comparison to help you determine if any of the letters were forged. To my untrained eye, it looks like the letters are all in the victim’s cursive script, but that may not be so.”

Claire’s assistant handed her a letter and envelope that Kerney had placed in clear plastic sleeves, and she gave them both a long look.

“Excellent cursive writing,” Claire said. “I’d bet that she was educated in Catholic schools.”

“And you’d win,” Kerney said. “How could you tell?”

“Because except for the Catholic schools, teaching cursive penmanship is fast becoming a lost art.”

“You’re probably right. But then so is letter-writing. Send everything to latent prints when you’ve finished. I’ll drop off fingerprint cards to them on my way out.”

“Chief Baca called to say you want results quickly.”

“Burn the midnight oil, Claire. We need a break on this case. Two police officers and two civilians have been murdered in cold blood, an eighteen-year-old boy has gone missing and is on the run, and we’ve yet to nail down one substantial bit of evidence that can point us in the right direction.”

“You’ve got it, Chief. After all, we can’t have you looking like you’re up shit’s creek without a paddle,” Claire said sweetly in her breathless twelve-year-old-girlish voice.

On the drive to Santa Fe, Clayton listened carefully to APD and state police radio traffic in the hope that Brian Riley would be taken into custody and thus make the search of the Cañoncito property unnecessary. But by the time he climbed La Bajada Hill, Riley was still at large.

Although the sky in Clayton’s rearview mirror was a crisp, cold, clear winter blue, facing him was a ground-hugging storm that blanketed Santa Fe, hid the mountains, and swept wind-driven snow across the Interstate, slowing traffic to a crawl. He switched on his overhead emergency lights, headlights, and warning flashers, and kept moving, passing motorists stalled on the side of the highway and a jackknifed semi that had wound up on its side in the median.

Clayton stopped to check on the trucker. He made sure the man was unhurt, determined that the load was not hazardous—the driver was hauling kitchen appliances—set out flares behind the trailer, and called regional dispatch to send assistance.

Clayton bundled the trucker in a blanket and sat with him in his unit with the heat cranked up, waiting for the state police and a wrecker to arrive.

“I’m sure glad you came along,” the trucker, a man named Bailey Mobley, said.

“Yeah.” Through the swirling snow and dark gray squall clouds Clayton could see the first flicker of blue sky. The storm was moving fast, traveling southwesterly, but it was leaving behind a good six inches of heavy, wet snow on the pavement, perhaps more closer to the mountains. He wondered if the road to Cañoncito would be passable.

He thought about asking Ramona Pino to bring her detectives and meet him at the Riley double-wide for a ground search, but decided the place was probably under deep snow, which made the chances of finding anything in the current conditions remote at best.

Bailey Mobley said something that Clayton didn’t catch. “What was that?” he asked.

“Can I smoke in your squad car?” Mobley asked, showing a pack of cigarettes.

“No, you can’t.”

Mobley smiled sourly, got out of the unit, closed the door, pulled the blanket over his head, turned his back to the wind, and lit up.

The radio squawked. A patrol officer was en route, ETA five minutes. Through the windshield, Clayton could see that the sliver of blue sky had turned into a swath and the branches of the trees at the side of the highway were no longer being whipped by gale-force wind gusts.

Except for the little sleep he’d caught earlier, Clayton had been up for at least thirty hours, and the idea of delaying a search of the Rileys’ property and getting a good night’s rest was very appealing. He’d almost talked himself into going straight to Kerney’s ranch and crashing in the guest quarters, when it occurred to him that having been scared out of Albuquerque, Brian Riley might well be on his way back to the double-wide.

Granted, there was nothing Clayton knew that pointed to that possibility, but conversely there was nothing that argued against it. As a precaution, it only made sense to look for him at the double-wide. He should have thought of it a whole lot sooner, and being tired wasn’t an excuse for his lapse of smarts.

He glanced out the windshield. Traffic was moving slowly on the highway, vehicles throwing up gobs of icy spray from the slushy snow. Up ahead Clayton could see the approaching emergency lights of a state police cruiser. It brought to mind the deer that had crashed into his unit and the image of Paul Hewitt and Tim Riley hurrying to him to see if he’d been injured. It seemed as though all that had happened months, not days, ago.

Just as the state cop rolled to a stop, Bailey Mobley opened the passenger door to the unit and stuck his head inside, his breath reeking of tobacco smoke. He shook Clayton’s hand and gave him the wadded-up blanket. “Thanks again.”

“Glad you weren’t hurt, Mr. Mobley,” Clayton replied as he got out of his unit and walked with the trucker to meet the state cop.

After introducing himself and turning Mobley over to the state cop, he asked how the roads were northeast of the city.

“Where do you need to get to?” the officer asked.

“The lower Cañoncito area.”

“It’s probably snowpacked but manageable in your four-by-four. But the Interstate is closed in both directions just north of there at Glorieta Pass.”

“How long has it been closed?” Clayton asked.

“Two hours.”

“Any motorcyclists waiting to get through?” Clayton asked. He gave the officer a description of Brian Riley and his Harley.

“We’re all looking for him,” the officer replied. “Let me ask.” He keyed his handheld and asked the uniforms at the roadblock if anyone matching the description of Riley and his Harley had been spotted waiting for the highway to be reopened. The reply came back negative.

Clayton thanked the officer and drove on. The clouds had lifted over Santa Fe to reveal foothills and mountaintops covered in a white blanket of snow. Against the backdrop of a blue sky, the frosted radio and microwave transmission towers on the high peaks looked like man-made stalagmites poking toward the heavens.

Tire tracks on the road to Cañoncito told Clayton that a good foot of snow was on the ground but motorists were getting in and out. He kept his unit in low gear with the four-wheel drive engaged and steered gently through the curves as a precaution against any hidden ice patches. The western sun turned the snow-covered mesa behind the settlement into a massive monolith, and the houses along the dirt lane that led to Tim Riley’s driveway were thickly blanketed with snow. Horses pawing the ground in the adjacent corrals exhaled billows of steam that sparkled and then dissipated in the frigid air.

The snow-covered driveway to the Riley property showed no sign of fresh passage, either by vehicle or by foot. Clayton turned in and drove toward the double-wide with his driver-side window open, listening intently for any sound above the rumble of his engine that might signal someone was nearby. He was halfway up the driveway when the distinctive roar of a motorcycle engine came to life and cut through the air. He shifted quickly, floored the unit, and almost crashed into the Harley bearing down on him. The rider veered off the driveway and gunned his machine up a slope toward the base of the mesa behind the double-wide.

Clayton geared down and followed, slaloming around trees, the tires of his unit digging through deep snowbanks. He plowed into a hidden boulder and high-ended the vehicle. He threw the unit into reverse, the rear tires burning rubber on the frozen ground, and realized that he was hopelessly stuck. He bailed out of the unit, grabbed the wadded-up blanket the trucker had used, wrapped it over his shoulders, and started following the motorcycle on foot. Up ahead he could hear the whine of the engine. He ran toward it, and through a break in the tree cover he saw the rider unsuccessfully trying to force his machine up a steep rock-face incline, once, twice, three times.

From a good fifty feet away, Clayton yelled at the cyclist to stop. The man turned, and Clayton for the first time got a good look at Brian Riley in the flesh. The boy’s expression was wide-eyed, frozen with fear.

“Police,” Clayton shouted, throwing off the blanket. “Don’t run. I’m here to help you.”

The boy spun the Harley around, spraying an arc of snow behind the rear tire, revved the engine, and headed down the slope away from Clayton, zigzagging through trees, ducking over the handlebars to avoid low branches.

Clayton followed on foot, scrambling down a rock-strewn slope, quickly losing hope that he’d catch up with Riley as the sound of the Harley’s engine began to fade in the distance. He broke free of the trees at the base of the mesa and followed anyway at a fast jog.

Up ahead he could see the railroad tracks that cut through the narrow valley and followed the course of a shallow streambed. The railroad right-of-way was fenced, but at a track siding where new railroad ties were stacked, a gate had been left open. Running into a stiff breeze that turned his ears and nose painfully cold, Clayton followed the path the motorcycle had taken across the railroad tracks and through another open gate. When he could no longer hear the sound of the Harley’s engine, he slowed to a walk and listened. Riley was long gone.

As he walked on, he tried to call the Santa Fe S.O. on his cell phone, but the call kept getting dropped. He jumped a fence, walked in the ruts of a snow-covered lane, approached the first house he came to, knocked at the door, and got no response. Two houses farther on, he encountered an elderly Hispanic man breaking the ice in a water trough at a horse corral. He showed the man’s shield and asked if he could borrow the man’s phone.

The old man gave him a thorough once-over before speaking. “Was that you yelling in the woods?” he asked.

Clayton nodded.

“Were you chasing that motorcycle rider that just passed by?” the old man asked.

Clayton nodded again.

“On foot?” the man asked incredulously.

Clayton nodded for the third time.

“That’s loco.”

“Can I borrow your telephone?”

“Come inside,” the man said, leading the way to a back door.

The toasty warm kitchen of the old man’s house smelled of freshly baked bread and had framed pictures of saints and a hand-embroidered copy of the Lord’s Prayer on the walls. Using an old wall-mounted, rotary-dial phone straight out of the 1950s, Clayton called Don Mielke at the Santa Fe S.O. and reported his sighting of Brian Riley.

“I’ll put out an APB and BOLO immediately,” Mielke said.

“I crashed my unit. I need a tow truck and a ride.”

“What’s your twenty?”

Clayton covered the telephone mouthpiece and asked the elderly man for his name.

“Francisco Ramirez,” the old man replied.

“I’m at Francisco Ramirez’s house,” Clayton said. He gave Mielke directions and added, “Look for a Cattle Growers sign on the garage that’s opposite the house.”

“Ten-four.”

“And ask Ramona Pino to meet me at the Riley crime scene,” Clayton added.

“Are you on to something?” Mielke asked.

“Riley came back here for some reason. I want to take a look around the property to see if I can find out why.”

“What do you expect to find with a foot of snow or more on the ground?”

“Tracks,” Clayton replied. “Tracks that might lead me somewhere.”

“I’m coming out there,” Mielke said.

“Come along,” Clayton replied. “Bring a couple of deputies with you. We might as well do another full search of the double-wide, horse barn, corral, and horse trailer. Tell them to dress warmly.”

“Whatever you’re looking for, Riley may have already taken with him.”

“Yeah,” Clayton said, “and that would be par for my day. But let’s look anyway.”

He disconnected. If he’d just passed by the jackknifed semi on the Interstate and reported it to dispatch, he might now have Brian Riley in custody and be finding out what had caused the murder of two police officers and two civilians. But failing to render aid and assistance to Bailey Mobley would have been the wrong thing to do.

Clayton sighed in frustration. So far, the only good to come from his marathon effort to find Brian Riley was that he’d crashed the Lincoln County S.O. unit, which meant he wouldn’t have Tim Riley’s ghost hanging around him anymore. That was a burden lifted, but only a minor one.

He joined Francisco Ramirez at the kitchen table and looked over at the stove, where a coffeepot was slowly percolating over a low flame. “Is that coffee I smell, Señor Ramirez?”

“Sí, and from the way you look I believe you need some.”

“I look that bad?”

Francisco Ramirez pointed to Clayton’s forehead. “You’ve been bleeding.”

Clayton touched his head. At the hairline he felt a thick glob of congealed blood. He couldn’t remember bumping into anything. “Mind if I clean up?”

Francisco pointed to the passageway. “Go ahead, Sergeant. I bake my own bread and have two loaves in the oven. Would you like some with your coffee when you return?”

Clayton’s stomach rumbled in hunger. “That would be great.”

After getting away from the cop, Brian Riley ground the Harley to a stop on the paved road that led to Santa Fe and considered his options. If he drove to town on the frontage road or tried to get on the Interstate, chances were good the police would swarm all over him. That was if the guy who had chased him really was a cop.

Brian decided he couldn’t risk finding out. He turned left and took a country road that climbed the mesa, wound through woodland and pastures, and hooked up with a highway miles south of Santa Fe. At the top of the hill, the pavement turned to dirt, and Brian had to downshift the Harley to power his way through wet snow two feet deep.

A few miles down the road, where the forest gave way to rangeland, Brian paused. Up ahead he could see snowdrifts piled four feet high against the fences. If he made it to the highway south of Santa Fe, it would be a long, cold ride, and he wasn’t sure he could do it without warmer clothes and maybe some food and water to carry with him.

Last year when he’d stayed with his father and stepmother, Tim had let him use the truck to explore the mesa, and Denise had let him ride one of the horses along some of the lightly traveled Forest Service roads. On this stretch of the country road there was a good deal of privately owned land. On horseback Tim had investigated some of the ranches that were hidden away and posted to keep trespassers out. If he remembered correctly, there was one such ranch house deep in the woods where the rangeland ended.

He rode on, fighting to keep the Harley upright as the tires sought traction through the drifts. He found the turnoff and kept going through the virgin snow. His dad had told him the small ranches were summer operations only, and so far there was no sign of any recent traffic on the ranch road. The last rays of a weak sun were at his back and the forest had dimmed to dusk when the small ranch house, closed up and dark, came into view.

Brian skidded to a stop near the steps to the front porch and got off the Harley, his muscles aching from the exertion of riding the bike through the deep snow. He took a long look around before knocking on the porch door. An old truck parked by the barn was covered with snow, the sliding barn doors were padlocked, and there were no animal tracks in the empty corral.

He looked carefully at the house. In the gathering dusk he couldn’t see anything behind the windows. The porch door was locked. He thought about using his elbow to break the glass and decided against it. He found a wrench in the glove box of the old truck and used it to smash the glass.

Once inside, Brian realized how really cold he was. He stumbled over a chair and ottoman, found a lamp on a side table, and turned it on. The front room served as a kitchen, dining, and sitting area. It had a wood cookstove next to a kitchen sink that got water from a hand pump. The place looked like something straight out of the old two-reel Western movies that were sometimes shown on late night television.

In a wall cupboard above an empty refrigerator that had been turned off for the winter, Brian found a good stock of canned and packaged foods. He went to the kindling box next to the cookstove and got a fire started before looking around the rest of the house. There was no telephone or television, but a tabletop radio sat on a shelf next to a stack of New Mexico Stockman magazines.

An old but serviceable heavy barn coat with a good pair of insulated gloves stuffed in the pockets hung on a wall peg in the small back bedroom. In a rickety handmade chest of drawers next to a twin bed on a cast iron frame were some rolled-up socks and several tattered wool sweaters. Underneath the sweaters Brian found a pistol in a holster. It was a loaded Smith & Wesson revolver. He put the holstered gun in a bundle made up of the barn coat, the gloves, a pair of socks, and a heavy sweater and carried it into the front room, which had started to warm up. In front of the cookstove he stripped down to his underwear, hung his wet jeans, shirt, and jacket over the two wooden chairs near the small kitchen table, put his shoes close to the stove, and dressed in the dry socks and the wool sweater with the barn coat draped over his shoulders.

At the sink he used the hand pump to fill a pot with water and put it on top of the wood stove to boil. In the food cupboard he found a package of macaroni and cheese, a jar of instant coffee, and some restaurant-size sugar packets. In another cupboard there were mugs, plates, several pots, and some eating utensils.

As soon as the water boiled, Brian cooked the macaroni, mixed in the cheese sauce, and wolfed it down, sipping heavily sugared coffee with each bite. When he finished, he put the dirty dishes in the sink and looked out the window. Snow pelted against the glass. He could hear the wind howling, and the sky was a sheet of solid leaden gray.

It was no time to be traveling. He added some wood to the cookstove, mixed up another cup of instant coffee, and settled into the overstuffed chair. If he hadn’t gotten up early at Beaner’s and turned on the television, he wondered what would have happened to him. It had been a shock to see his Harley in the parking lot of Stanley’s apartment building as a TV reporter talked about the double homicide. In that instant, he knew Stanley was dead and he was next, so he packed and bolted.

What Brian didn’t know for sure was why somebody wanted him dead, or why Tim, Denise, and Stanley had been killed. Inspired by the spy novel at Beaner’s, he’d told him and his dealer friend Duffy that he was being chased by foreign spies. But who was it really?

He’d found the money by accident in an old well house on his father’s property where he liked to go to smoke dope in the evenings when Tim and Denise were home and keeping an eye on him. It was in a locked briefcase hidden under some boards behind a rusted water pump.

After breaking the case open, he had stared openmouthed at the stacks of U.S. dollars, a pouch containing gold coins, and three passports issued by foreign governments to Denise under different names.

He had inspected the old coins but had taken only the fifty thousand U.S. dollars. Counting on the snowstorm for cover, he’d come back today to see if the briefcase was still in its hiding place, to get the coins. But it was gone, which meant someone was killing anyone who might have known about it.

But why murder Denise? After all, the foreign passports in the briefcase had been issued to her under false names, which meant she’d probably hidden it in the well house in the first place. Was she some kind of government agent his dad had met when he was in the air force? Had he been killed because he knew about her past or had helped her do something illegal? And why had Stanley and a police officer been murdered? How did the killer even find out about Stanley?

Brian checked his clothing. His jeans and shirt were dry enough to wear. He dressed in front of the stove, thinking he’d spend the night and then figure out what to do after the storm passed. He still had almost five thousand dollars left from the fifty and that could get him to Mexico, where he could hide out.

He sat back down in the easy chair, with the holstered pistol in his lap. The old house was creaky and drafty, and there were mice scurrying in the walls. He was half-asleep when he heard the sound of footsteps on the porch. He raised his head, opened his eyes, and saw a man standing in the doorway holding a rifle.

Brian fumbled to release the strap that secured the revolver to the holster, and as he yanked the pistol free the man pointed the rifle and shot him between the eyes.