Statute of Limitations

Chapter Twenty-three

Estelle awoke to bright light bouncing off the tile floor as sun streamed in through the bedroom window. As if at a great distance, she heard the incredibly soft, gentle piano music, and for a moment she lay without breathing, listening.

By moving her head a fraction, she could see the clock on the night stand. She had finally given up at 3:00 a.m. that Sunday morning, stumbling into bed and falling asleep so quickly that her husband had never stirred. Perhaps she had only dreamed of his rising at six, perhaps she had actually drifted close to consciousness when he brushed her cheek with his lips.

For five blissful hours, the phone hadn’t rung-or if it had, she hadn’t heard it. She watched the clock flick its little digital window over to 8:04 a.m.-five hours more security for Janet Tripp’s killer and for the would-be killer who’d dented Bill Gastner’s head. If they had left town, those five hours would have put another 375 miles between their back bumpers and Posadas, New Mexico.

Combine those minutes and miles with the hours immediately after the crime, until the time Estelle had finally gone to bed exhausted with frustration, and they could be crossing the Mississippi or dabbling their toes in the Pacific…or be speaking Spanish somewhere south of the border.

She knew perfectly well that the county was patrolled as well as it could be-State Police, her own deputies (including at least two who were working double shifts), the Border Patrol, even the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. Every badge and agency within five states, and beyond by computer entry, knew that Posadas County was looking for a killer…or two.

Estelle groaned with a mixture of fatigue and irritation that she’d slept away too many hours.

From the front of the house, she heard Sofía say something to Francisco, the older woman’s voice little more than a whisper. In response, the little boy spent ten seconds trilling two notes, a soft tinkling sound, some small adjustment in this magical world he had discovered. And clearly, Sofía Tournál knew exactly which entry keys were the ones to help the little boy continue opening one door after another.

Estelle turned onto her stomach and buried her face into the heart of her pillow, leaving both ears above the surface.

“You wake?” She could feel the butterfly of her youngest son’s breath on her arm.

“Yes,” she said without moving.

“Do we get to go see Padrino today?”

“Maybe, hijo.” She turned her head and was eye-to-eye with the four-year-old. “Would you like to do that?”

He nodded. “Papá said somebody hit him on the head,” he said soberly.

“That’s right. Somebody did.”

“Why did they do that?”

“I don’t know, hijo.”

“Are you going to catch ’em?”

“If I can get out of bed.”

“Okay.” At least there was no doubt in his mind, Estelle thought. Carlos grabbed the blanket and backed away, pulling it half off the bed. She reached down and yanked it back, and a tug-of-war ensued that ended up with Carlos on the floor, wrapped in the blanket like a mummy. Estelle picked him up and dumped him on the bed and piled the pillows on top of him.

In response to the shrieks and giggles from Carlos, the volume of music out in the living room increased, reached a crescendo, then abruptly ceased.

“Ay,” Estelle said to the squirming mummy. “Reinforcements.” By the time the war was finished five minutes later, both boys lay trussed on the bed like cocoons. One foot, already plenty large for a six-year-old, stuck out unprotected, and Estelle sat down on the bed, grabbed Francisco’s ankle, and played spider on the bottom of his foot, holding him firmly against his laughing convulsions.

After a moment she stopped, and helped the two of them out of the wadded bedding without ever releasing her grasp on her eldest son’s ankle.

“You’re too strong, Mamá,” Francisco gasped. He tried to pry her fingers loose.

“Way too strong for you, mi corazón. What were you playing?”

“Tía gave it to me yesterday for Christmas,” he said. “It’s by Bach.” He exaggerated the guttural ch of the composer’s name. “He’s a grump.”

Christmas. What was that? “A grump?”

“Un gruñón,” Carlos chirped.

Estelle looked over at the little boy in surprise. “Where did you hear that funny word?”

“Tía said he was.”

“Ah. Tía said. Bach the gruñón.”

“You want to hear?” Francisco asked.

“Of course I want to hear. Then I have to get dressed.”

She wrapped herself in a white terry-cloth robe and followed the two out to the living room. Teresa Reyes already had taken up court in her large rocker, and she held a small mug of coffee in both hands, looking expectant. Sofía Tournál looked up from the kitchen sink as Estelle appeared.

“Finally, you get some rest,” she said. She held up a peach, impaled on a small paring knife. “These are no good this time of year, but we’ll make do. You have time for some breakfast?”

“Sure. First I promised to listen to el gruñón.”

“Ah, that.” Sofía waved the knife toward the living room. “Hijo!” she called, and somehow Francisco knew exactly which hijo was under orders. He slipped from the piano bench and trotted to the kitchen.

Sofía held up a bent index finger. “Give them time to talk,” she said, and then fluttered her fingers together in the universal sign of people jabbering. “Están parloteando, mi hombre. Let them have their say. Let’s see how well you can do it now.”

Francisco nodded and made a face as he returned to the piano. Apparently this was serious, since Carlos didn’t slide onto the piano bench with him, but instead took up a post on the sofa nearest his grandmother. Francisco sat for a moment, regarding the piano keys, and Estelle leaned against the right arm of her mother’s chair.

“Six hours of this,” Teresa grumbled. “You’re lucky you have something to do outside the house.” She wasn’t altogether successful at keeping the pride out of her voice.

What followed, even to Estelle’s untrained ear, seemed to be a conversation between two or three people-at times it was impossible to tell how many. One hand took a melody, then handed it off to the other, and even though Francisco started out precisely and almost methodically, before long he lost it in a burst of giggles, driving the invention into manic parloteando, a musical jabbering that made no sense.

“See what happens?” Sofía said matter-of-factly. “No wonder the composer is so gruñón when he hears you play like that. You make him tumble end for end in his grave.”

Each successive attempt dissolved into a musical intersection whose traffic light was out of order, but Estelle enjoyed it nevertheless.

“He’s not ready to be an old man,” Teresa observed dryly after Francisco abandoned Bach’s original time signature and ventured off on his own.

“That may be a good thing,” Estelle said.

“Come and eat something,” Sofía called, and Estelle couldn’t help noticing that her aunt had waited for an auspicious moment when it was clear Francisco was having trouble searching for something else to slaughter. The concert stopped as abruptly as it began.

“I’m impressed,” Estelle said as she settled at the kitchen table. She looked at Francisco. “Tell me what you hear when you play that piece by the gruñón, hijo.”

The little boy craned his neck, looking out the window behind Estelle. He pointed outside. “When the jays come,” he said. “They all fly in and argue about the seeds. Nobody listens. They all just jabber, jabber, jabber.”

Estelle laughed. “Bird feeder music. I wonder if Bach fed the birds.”

“No,” Francisco said without hesitation. “They didn’t have birds like that back then.”

“Por Dios,” Sofía said. “Where he gets these ideas.” She placed a large bowl of honeyed fruit on the table, along with a platter of English muffins. Teresa tottered to the table after a trip to the coffee pot.

Estelle turned to Carlos, who was already industriously buttering one of the muffin halves. “And what do you hear?”

He shrugged. “I like the other one better,” he said, and before Estelle had a chance to ask which other one, he added, “Can we go see Padrino now?”

“I can’t this morning,” Estelle said. “Bobby is coming home today, too. I need to talk with him.”

“He’s a gruñón too,” Francisco observed. “A scary gruñón.”

“That may be, hijo. And maybe he has reason to be, no? It was a scary day yesterday.”

“Do you want me to take the boys by the hospital?” Sofía asked.

Estelle was about to refuse the offer, but thought better of it. Things put off had a nasty tendency to turn into regrets. The gouge in Padrino’s door jamb came to mind, the gouge that had absorbed just enough of the blow that the old man’s eighth or ninth life had been spared. “If you would, I think that would be wonderful,” she said. “He’ll bitch and complain, but he’ll appreciate the visit, tía.”

“You come, too,” Carlos said.

“I can’t right away, mi corazón. I talked to Padrino just before I came home last night, and he understands.”

She ate so little that she earned disapproving looks from both her mother and aunt.

“Take something with you,” Sofía said.

“No. I can’t.” Both boys were within reach, and she took Carlos’s left hand and Francisco’s right, bringing them together until she could cover both hands with hers. “I need to go. When you two are with Padrino, you be careful, you understand? He doesn’t feel well. Don’t make it harder for him.”

“Somebody hit him,” Carlos said, as if maybe his older brother hadn’t heard the previous conversation. Estelle didn’t add to the remark, but just sat quietly for a moment, then released their hands with a final squeeze and excused herself from the table.

She showered quickly, brushed her short hair just enough to restore some semblance of order, and then dressed in one of her tan pants suits. She was in the process of putting her Kevlar vest on over her blouse when she realized that Francisco was standing in the doorway.

“What’s that?” he asked, although Estelle was certain that he already knew.

“My vest,” she said. “It fools the bad guys, hijo.”

“Does Bobby wear one of those?”

“Sure he does.” She didn’t bother to tell the boy that Bobby hadn’t been wearing a steel ass-protector when the.223 rifle bullet had drilled him through the rump, making hash of a pound or two of muscle and mixing it with chips of hip bone.

“Does Padrino?”

“Sometimes.”

“Not on his head, though, huh.”

“Nope. Not on his head.”

“You know those helmet thingies that knights wear?” Francisco stretched his hand far up, emulating the plume on top of the helmet.

“Maybe we should have those, too,” Estelle said. She watched her son’s eyes stray downward to the stubby.45 automatic in its black holster at the small of her back, and to the handcuffs beside that. An eyebrow flickered, but he didn’t say anything.

“When you come home for lunch,” he said, with implications far more refined and pointed than his years should have allowed, “I’ll play that piece just the way old gruñón says, okay?”

She picked him up in a fierce hug. “Promise?”

He nodded, knocking the knuckles of his left hand against her vest.

“I love you, hijo. You know that, don’t you?”

“I know that,” Francisco said with a grimace. He seemed fascinated by the hard edge of the vest, and as she held him, Estelle realized how heavy and solid he was. She boosted him up and held him even more fiercely.

“Don’t make Padrino laugh too much, hijo. He’s got a sore head.”

He beamed, and she crunched him one more time before letting him slide to the floor. She had just time to slip on her suit jacket before Carlos catapulted into the room for his hug, and he felt tiny and fragile to her in comparison to the robust six-year-old.

“Thanks, Sofía,” she said on her way to the front door, and then she detoured to her mother, who was back in the rocker. “Are you going with them to the hospital?” she asked.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” Teresa said. “Hospitals…” She let it go with a wave of her hand in front of her nose, fending off the odors. “That makes you look fat,” she said, nodding at the vest. “But I’m glad you wear it.”

“It’s easy to forget,” Estelle said. “Eddie gave me a hard time.”

“As well he should,” Teresa said. “You just be careful and take your time with this nasty thing you’re working on. Con paciencia, se gana el cielo, you know.”

“I know, Mamá.” With patience, you can reach the sky. As she went outside to her car, she wondered what Janet Tripp’s killer was thinking. And she wondered what the man who had clubbed Bill Gastner was thinking. She turned the ignition key, and as if she somehow shared in the jolt of voltage, realized that it made sense to her that the two attackers were one and the same.