Scavengers

CHAPTER TWO

Irma Sedillos, known simply as Nana to little Carlos and his five-year-old brother Francisco, had arrived at the Guzmans’ at seven that Sunday morning, ready to cope. It was the third day of the siege. Under normal conditions, the usual frenetic schedule imposed on the household would have been sufficient challenge, with a surgeon father, an undersheriff mother, and an elderly grandmother whose English was fluent on those rare occasions when she chose to stray from her native tongue.

With illness settling like a gloomy blanket on the Guzman clan, Irma set out to brighten the house on Twelfth Street in Posadas, beginning in the kitchen, where she excelled. Irma was not the least concerned that she might catch one of the rampant flu bugs herself. If she thought of the possibility at all, it would be dismissed with a sunny shrug. She saw herself simply as a sixth member of the Guzman clan.

When the family had moved to Minnesota the previous spring, Irma had been encouraged to go along-but hadn’t. For months after the family left Posadas, she had felt that some portion of her insides had been torn away. In early December, just in time for the Christmas holidays, the Guzmans had moved back to New Mexico. Francis and Alan Perrone began plans for a new clinic, and newly-elected Sheriff Robert Torrez named Estelle as undersheriff of the Posadas County Sheriff’s Department. Irma glowed. Things were as they should be. A little illness went with the turf.

“Carlos is messy,” Francisco announced loudly when Estelle returned home shortly before ten that morning. “Corriendo de las dos puntas.”

“But he’s asleep now, so be quiet, niño,” Irma called from the kitchen.

After being awake most of the night “running from both ends,” as his older brother had been pleased to announce, three-year-old Carlos Guzman had finally fallen into a fitful sleep, sprawled across his bed like a little, fragrant beanbag-a sorry little sacito, as Irma Sedillos was fond of saying. Estelle touched his forehead lightly and then rearranged the feather-light blanket to cover the back of the little boy’s neck.

In her own bedroom down the hall, the boy’s favorite companion in conversation, Estelle’s frail, tiny eighty-two-year-old mother, had also spent a long night, racked by aching joints and a dry, painful cough. She too now slept, curled on her side.

Dr. Francis Guzman appeared in the kitchen door, a cup of coffee in hand. He had decided years before that blue hospital scrubs were the ideal Sunday morning lounge-around-the-house garments. He regarded Estelle over the top of the cup as she gently closed her mother’s bedroom door.

“How did it go?” he said.

“Bizarre,” Estelle replied. “Adult male, no ID, no nada. Misadventure out in the middle of nowhere.” She shrugged. “Mamá seems a little more at ease.”

Francis nodded. “She finally let me give her something to calm things down so she could get some sleep. I told her it was either that or the hospital where none of the nurses would listen to her.” He extended the cup toward her. “Something hot?”

Estelle sighed. “When I come back, maybe. I need to stop out at the airport for a little bit.”

“Someone else can’t do that?”

Estelle reached up and traced two fingers down her husband’s cheek, across the silky hair of his beard. The dark circles under his own eyes were pronounced, the reward for working with the designing architects for the new clinic, his own practice, and the demands of being on the lowest rung of the hospital’s primitive on-call system. “It’ll just be for a few minutes. If Mamá is resting, I don’t want to disturb her. I really need to talk to the young lady who first spotted the body. Then I’ll let Jackie take it from there. I’ll be back in half an hour.”

Her eldest son bolted into the kitchen and latched onto his father’s hand.

“I’m going for a hike,” Francisco announced. His father refused to budge away from his comfortable leaning spot against the kitchen doorjamb.

“You’re going to eat some breakfast before you do anything,” Irma said over her shoulder. “Come help me.”

“Big help,” his father said, and thumped Francisco gently on top of the head with a closed fist. “And by the way,” he said, turning back to Estelle, “Bob Torrez called a little while ago from Virginia. I told him that as far as I knew, things were going fine, and that you were out in the boonies, collecting bones. He’d like you to call him later this evening when you get the chance. The number’s by the phone.”

Estelle knew that Sheriff Robert Torrez had been loath to spend two weeks in Virginia at the FBI’s seminar for newly elected county sheriffs. Torrez considered anything east of the Pecos River to be one big housing development full of people with strange accents. His sojourn in Virginia hadn’t coincided with any of that state’s big game seasons, either-a screwup that he contended the Federal Bureau of Investigation could have avoided if they’d used half a brain when putting their seminar calendar together.

Estelle glanced at her watch. “I’ll be back by lunch,” she said. “Irma, do you need anything?”

“No, ma’am,” Irma said. “Did you remember to tell Padrino not to come for lunch today?”

Estelle groaned. “No. I didn’t. And that’s all he needs, to be exposed to this crew.” She smiled ruefully at her husband. “Would you give him a call, when you get a minute?”

“Sure.” Dr. Guzman scooped up Francisco, holding him upside down. “We’ll walk you out to the car.” He carried the boy outside, draped over one arm like a sack of potatoes. The wind had stopped, and the high February sun had pushed the temperature above sixty. Despite Irma’s ministrations inside, Estelle welcomed the clean, fresh winter air with a comfortable sigh. She settled behind the wheel and pulled the door of the Expedition closed.

“I could go,” Francisco said. “You could take me to Padrino ’s.”

“Not today, hijo,” she said and kissed him in the middle of the forehead as her husband held him up against the door. She glanced at Francis and held up her hands in surrender. “I know the look,” she said, and grinned at her husband’s scrutiny. “I’m fine. Really. And this will only take a minute.”

“Okay,” he said, sounding skeptical.

“And Alan said he’d probably want to talk to you this afternoon when he’s ready to do the prelim on the body.”

“How come Padrino isn’t coming today?” Francisco asked, and Estelle looked down at him.

“When we’re all better, Francisco. He doesn’t want to see a bunch of stinkies.”

“Carlos is a stinky,” he said. “I’m not.”

Dr. Guzman laughed and stepped back with his hands locked under the little boy’s armpits as Estelle pulled the Expedition into reverse. “Hurry back,” he said.

Estelle drove north on County Road 43, then west on the state highway that ran past the airport at the base of Cat Mesa. As she turned into the airport parking lot, she saw the small white-and-blue Cessna parked on the painted doughnut around the fuel pumps. Jim Bergin, the airport manager, was standing on a short aluminum ladder, topping off the left wing fuel tank.

He glanced around when he heard the crunch of tires on gravel. By the time Estelle had left the truck and walked across the tarmac to the pumps, Bergin had tapped the last drops of gasoline from the nozzle, screwed on the cap, and stepped down.

“Hey there,” he said. With a deft pull, he activated the recoil, and fed the hose back onto the spool. His motions were economical, almost graceful. With his leathery, wrinkled face, perpetual careless facial stubble, and ice-blue eyes, Estelle could picture him in a movie about World War I aces, wrapped in leathers and flying a Spad. “Did you find it all right?” He didn’t elaborate what the it was.

“Yes,” Estelle replied. “Jackie said that you flew the young lady out there to spot for her.”

“Yep.”

“Thanks for taking the time to do that.”

“You’re entirely welcome. One of my great pleasures in life is watching the county commissioners blanch when they get my bill for flying county charters.” He grinned at Estelle, showing a mouthful of colorful teeth that had seen better days. They both knew that the “blanching commissioners” was wishful thinking. Jim Bergin rarely billed the Sheriff’s Department for anything.

“Have at it,” she said. “Is this her plane?”

Bergin rubbed a smudge from the Cessna’s white propeller spinner. “Yep. She’s inside, talking with Flight Service.” At that moment, the door of the mobile home that served as Bergin’s FBO office and the airport terminal opened. The young woman who stepped out looked as if she’d be more at home on the ski slopes-long blond hair in a single Heidi braid down her back, bulky white Scandinavian sweater with blue reindeer cavorting across the shapely chest, tight black nylon stretch pants, and flashy multicolored jogging shoes-the expensive kind.

With her logbook in one hand and dark glasses in the other, she strode across the apron toward them.

“Terri Keenan,” Bergin said, “This is Undersheriff Estelle Guzman.”

“Hi,” the girl said. Her smile was a tribute to either the right genes or an orthodontist’s skill. She extended her hand, and her grip was brisk. “You’re not exactly what I expected when they said that the undersheriff wanted to talk to me.” Her smile widened and her green eyes flicked over Estelle’s tan pantsuit. “I met Deputy Taber earlier. Are all the officers in your department women?”

“You just happened to hit us on a good day,” Estelle replied.

“Sixty-seven fifty-five,” Bergin said. He took the credit card that Keenan extended to him. “And by the way, you two are welcome to use my office if you need it.”

Estelle shook her head. “The sun feels good.”

“Suit yourself.” He waved the card. “I’ll go write this up.”

Estelle watched him stride toward the office. Terri Keenan opened the passenger-side door of the Cessna and put her logbook on the seat, snugging it down behind a leather camera bag.

“I left Las Cruces this morning at six o’clock,” she said, and slammed the door. She ducked out from under the wing. “I was supposed to fly nonstop to Lordsburg. That was the plan, anyway.” She grimaced.

“How did you happen to catch sight of the body?”

“I…uh…” She glanced toward the FBO’s office, then smiled conspiratorially, moving a step closer to Estelle and dropping her voice. “I probably wasn’t doing what I was supposed to be doing.”

“And what was that?”

The woman rested a well-manicured hand on the engine cowling. “There was this eagle? I saw him soaring just about the same altitude I was flying at? And I thought how neat it would be to take a picture of him. In flight, you know?” She shrugged. “I mean, the air was like silk. How dangerous can it be?”

“That would be spectacular.”

“Well, it didn’t work out. I tried circling around him, you know? Trying to match my speed in a bigger orbit, outside of his and stuff? I closed to about fifty yards once, and zoom! He just turned a feather and shot straight up, way out of range.”

“Wonderful.”

“And basically, that’s what happened. I was turning to head toward Posadas, and I saw the ravens down below. I still had the camera out, and the thought crossed my mind that a flock of them might make a picture too. Then something spooked them, and they all kind of took off and started milling. That’s when I saw the body.”

“How high above the ground were you?”

“About fifteen hundred feet. Maybe a little more or less. When I saw what I thought might be a body, I spiraled down some. Probably lower than I should have been.”

Estelle’s gaze turned to the airplane, a small two-seater that looked like the aircraft version of a tiny economy car. “You’re a student pilot?”

Terri Keenan nodded. “I’m getting ready to take my flight test next week.” She watched as the undersheriff stepped close to the window on the pilot’s side and peered inside.

“It must be something of a challenge to fly and take pictures at the same time.”

“I think it’s easy,” Keenan replied. “My instructor would have a cow, naturally. I don’t see why, really. I mean, it’s easy to feel what the airplane is doing and stuff. And my camera only requires one hand.”

Estelle smiled and stepped away from the airplane. “Did you happen to take any photos of the body?”

The young woman hesitated. “Yeah, I guess I did. It was too far away to see any detail, though. It must have been at least a thousand feet. Even with the telephoto, that’s too far. Just a dot, maybe. Basically, it was a waste of film.” She held up her hands, rethinking the framing of the photo. “Some nice shadows, though. Early morning is really neat, you know? The sun’s all at an angle on the grass and stuff.”

“I’d like to see them, Terri. Sometimes, a photo shows something that the eye doesn’t catch.”

“Sure. The only other thing on that roll are a few pictures I took at the Las Cruces airport this morning. The sun wasn’t really up yet, even. There was an old C-Forty-seven there. I think it lives over at Mesilla.” She opened the passenger-side door and lifted the camera out of the bag. “It had been to some big air show out in California. I forget where. One of the engines was blowing smoke when they flew in a few days ago, and they had it all torn apart. Beautiful old thing.”

She started to rewind the film but stopped, fingers poised on the crank. “Do you want me to have them developed and send them to you, or…”

“If we could just have the roll, that would be fine,” Estelle said. “I’ll make sure you get the negatives of anything we don’t use. We really appreciate it.” Terri nodded and rewound the film. She popped the canister out of the camera and handed it to Estelle.

“I hope it helps,” she said.

“We’ll take all the help we can get,” Estelle said. “When you flew over that spot, did you happen to notice anything else?”

“Like what?”

“Any sign of human activity. Tracks, vehicles-anything at all?”

The young woman shook her head. “Nothing like that. Just a lot of open desert. But then again, I wasn’t really looking, you know? The eagle got me all excited, and that’s where my mind was.” She grinned. “He was quite a sight.”

“And nothing had changed out there when you went out again with Jim Bergin? Other than that the eagle had left the scene.”

“Not that I saw. The body was still there. I was going to try for a picture when he buzzed the spot, but it went by too fast. Sorry. Do you know how long it had been out there? The body, I mean? Is it something that just happened, or what?”

“There are still lots of questions to answer, Miss Keenan. Nobody is sure of anything yet. It may just be someone who got caught unprepared, out in the cold, after dark. It’ll take a while to sort things out.”

Terri Keenan looked skeptical as she opened a fresh package of film and reloaded the camera. “That’s a long way from anywhere just to be out hiking around in February, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” Estelle said.

When Estelle didn’t elaborate, Terri shot her a wry smile. She handed the undersheriff a business card, unadorned embossed gold lettering on ivory stock that announced the practice of Terri W. Keenan, DDS. “In case you need to reach me,” she said. “First thing in the morning is always easiest, before I’m up to my elbows in someone’s mouth.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary, Dr. Keenan,” Estelle said. “We’ll want to get the film back to you, and if you should think of anything else that might be important to us, I’d appreciate a call.” She extended one of her own cards to the pilot. Terri Keenan frowned as she read it, then looked up at Estelle with a bright smile.

“When your deputy said that the undersheriff wanted to talk to me, I pictured some big guy with a potbelly and bad teeth. I don’t know why. I mean, I’ve been told about a thousand times that I don’t look like your average dentist, either.”

“And I’m sure you’re not,” Estelle said, and extended her hand. “Thanks for your help this morning. We’ll be in touch.”

She left Terri Keenan to her preflight chores, and ducked her head inside Bergin’s office on the way out. “Thanks, Jim.”

“Don’t mention it. Interesting gal, isn’t she?”

“Yes.”

“Looks too young to be a dentist, though. She talks more like a high school kid…and stuff.” He grinned. “Makes me want to go to Las Cruces for a checkup.”

“Win the lottery first, sir.”

Bergin nodded slowly, pencil poised over his weather station log.

“That’s the impression I got, too,” he said.