High Country Fall

CHAPTER 28

THURSDAY EVENING

“Jason Barringer? And he’s got a Tanser-Mac student card?” The name on the victim’s driver’s license did not register with George Underwood, but the bailiff had started hanging around the sheriff’s department past quitting time after his wife died the year before, and he was standing at the dispatcher’s station when Deputy Elkins radioed in. As soon as he heard that name, he poked Underwood’s shoulder and said, “Ask him if he’s got a tattoo of a naked woman on his shin.”

Underwood relayed the question to Elkins.

“Affirmative,” came the reply.

“Well, hell!” said the bailiff. “He was in court this afternoon. Him and his buddy busted up a place down in Howards Ford, and the judge, she come down on ’em pretty hard. Kid had a real attitude.”

The lawmen looked at each other apprehensively. They knew about kids with attitude. What was this particular Tanser-Mac student doing on that road, the same road Judge Knott had taken? It was miles out of his way back to the college.

“Shit!” said Fletcher. “He followed her.”

“No sign of Judge Knott’s car?” Underwood asked Elkins.

“Negative, sir, but Alpha Unit just arrived and one of us will keep looking.”

By the time Underwood and his team arrived, the third patrol unit had been there long enough for the three deputies to form a working theory. They were aided by a second body, that of a deer that lay mangled and torn a few feet down the slope from Barringer. Scraps of bloody fur were caught in the Ford Ranger’s grille, and blood spattered the windshield.

“Elkins found a mirror that could’ve come off the judge’s Firebird,” said Deputy Carter. “About eight-tenths of a mile further on, down toward the bottom of the hill. If Barringer was trying to force her off the road, it probably happened somewhere past where the mirror was. We haven’t yet found the spot where she actually went over, but from the skid marks, we can tell she was going west toward Eagle Rest. We figure he runs her off the road, then he turns around and is heading back toward Cedar Gap and Howards Ford when he comes around the curve too fast here, sees the buck right there in front of him, and just automatically swerves to miss it.”

“Sniffing for a doe in heat,” Sheriff Horton grunted. “Damn things are all over the roads. Be glad when hunting season opens.”

Officers walked the shoulder of the desolate road from the point where Elkins had picked up the mirror all the way to where the road teed into another two miles beyond. Three houses stood at that intersection and none of the residents had seen or heard anything unusual.

“If she got this far, she’d’ve driven right into one of them yards with her horn blaring,” said Horton.

Underwood nodded. “Too bad the state won’t give us guardrails. Cars could go over anywhere and we’d never know.”

By the time the sun had fully set, the moon was rising fat and orange in the east, and they came to the reluctant conclusion that finding Deborah Knott and her car was going to be a lot harder than they’d hoped.

Sheriff Horton, who’d been through many of these searches over the years, called for a helicopter and had the dispatcher notify the various fire stations that they needed all the volunteer help they could get.

“Temperature’s supposed to go down into the mid-thirties tonight.” Even as he spoke, Underwood’s breath made little puffs of steam in the chill night air. “Maybe that’ll help the heat sensors,” he said, reaching for all the silver he could find on this black cloud.

“Damn deers are gonna screw ’em up anyhow,” Horton said pessimistically.

Underwood’s cell phone rang and he pulled it from his jacket pocket.

“Captain Underwood? This is Sunny Osborne.”

Her voice sounded drained to him, but then picking out caskets can do that, he thought.

“You left a message for me to call you?”

“Yes, ma’am. Could you hold for just one minute?”

He held a broad finger over the mike. “It’s Mrs. Osborne.”

“Ain’t nothing more you can do out here right now till the chopper comes,” Horton told him. “Might as well run on over there and get her story.”

Reluctant as he was to abandon the search even for an hour, Underwood knew that Horton was right. He moved his finger and put the phone back to his ear. “Mrs. Osborne? I was wondering if I could come by for a few minutes?”

“Has something happened?” Her listless voice quickened in sudden hope. “You’ve found who killed Norman?”

“I’d rather discuss things with you in person,” he hedged. “I can be there in about twenty minutes, if that’s all right with you?”

“Yes, of course,” she said.

“Let me know how it goes,” said the sheriff.

Underwood nodded and walked back to his car. Before switching on the ignition, though, he gave Judge Knott’s cell phone one final try. It rang twice, then a pleasant digital voice said, “We’re sorry. The customer you have called is currently unavailable. Please try your call again later.”