The Moving Target

26

For half a minute nobody spoke. The lovers stood together above the body. The others stood and watched them.

“We’d better get out of here, Miranda,” Graves said finally. He glanced at the District Attorney. “If you’ll excuse us? Mrs. Sampson will have to be told about this.”

“Go ahead, Bert,” Humphreys said.

While a man from his office took notes, and another photographed the body on the floor, Humphreys questioned me. His questions covered the ground quickly and thoroughly. I told him who Taggert was, how he died, and why he had to die. Sheriff Spanner listened restlessly, biting a cigar to shreds.

“There will have to be an inquest,” Humphreys said. “You and Bert are in the clear, of course. Taggert had a deadly weapon in his hand and was obviously intending to use it. Unfortunately this shooting leaves us worse off than before. We have practically no leads.”

“You’re forgetting Betty Fraley.”

“I’m not forgetting her. But we haven’t caught her, and even if we do, we can’t be certain that she knows where Sampson is. The problem hasn’t changed, and we’re no nearer to its solution than we were yesterday. The problem is to find Sampson.”

“And the hundred thousand dollars,” Spanner said.

Humphreys looked up impatiently. “The money is secondary, I think.”

“Secondary, yes, but a hundred thousand in cash is always important.” He tugged at his elastic lower lip. His gray eyes shifted to me. “If you’re finished with Archer here, I want to have a talk with him.”

“Take him,” Humphreys said coldly. “I’ve got to get back to town.” He took the body with him.

When we were alone the sheriff got up heavily and stood over me.

“Well?” I said. “What’s the trouble, Sheriff?”

“Maybe you can tell me.” He folded his thick arms across his chest.

“I’ve told you what I know.”

“Maybe so. You didn’t tell me everything you should of last night. I heard from your friend Colton this morning. He told me about the limousine this Lassiter was driving: it came from a car-rental in Pasadena, and you knew it.” He raised his voice suddenly, as if he hoped to startle me into a confession. “You didn’t tell me you saw it before, when the ransom note was delivered.”

“I saw one like it. I didn’t know it was the same car.”

“But you guessed it was. You told Colton it was. You gave the information to an officer that couldn’t use it because he’s got no jurisdiction in this county. But you didn’t tell me, did you? If you had, we could have taken him. We could have stopped the shooting and saved the money–”

“But not Sampson,” I said.

“You’re not the judge of that.” His face was bursting at the seams with angry blood. “You took things in your own hands and interfered with my duty. You withheld information. Right after Lassiter got shot, you disappeared. You were the only witness, and you disappeared. A hundred thousand dollars disappeared at the same time.”

“I don’t like the implication.” I stood up. He was a big man, and our eyes were level.

“You don’t like it. How do you think I like it? I’m not saying you took the money – that remains to be seen. I’m not saying you shot Lassiter. I’m saying you could have. I want your gun, and I want to know what you were doing when my deputy caught up with you down south. And I want to know what you were doing after that.”

“I was looking for Sampson.”

“You were looking for Sampson,” he said, with heavy irony. “You expect me to take your word for that.”

“You don’t have to take my word. I’m not working for you.”

He leaned toward me with his hands on his hips. “If I wanted to be ugly, I could put you away this minute.”

My patience broke. “Don’t look now,” I said, “but you are ugly.”

“Do you know who you’re talking to?”

“A sheriff. A sheriff with a tough case on his hands, and no ideas. So you’re looking for a goat.”

The blood went out of his face, leaving it haggard with rage. “They’ll hear about this in Sacramento,” he stuttered. “When your license comes up–”

“I’ve heard that one before. I’m still in business, and I’ll tell you why. I’ve got a clean record, and I don’t push people around until they start to push me.”

“So you’re threatening me!” His right hand fumbled for the holster on his hip. “You’re under arrest, Archer.”

I sat down and crossed my legs. “Take it easy, Sheriff. Sit down and relax. We’ve got some things to talk over.”

“I’ll talk to you at the courthouse.”

“No,” I said. “Here. Unless you want to take me to the immigrant inspector.”

“What’s he got to do with it?” He wrinkled up his eyelids in an effort to look shrewd, and succeeded in looking puzzled. “You’re not an alien?”

“I’m a native son,” I said. “Is there an immigrant inspector in town?”

“Not in Santa Teresa. The nearest ones are at the federal office in Ventura. Why?”

“Do you do much work with them?”

“A fair amount. When I pick up an illegal alien I turn him over. You trying to kid me, Archer?”

“Sit down,” I said again. “I didn’t find what I was looking for last night, but I found something else. It should make you and the inspectors very happy. I’m offering it to you as a free gift, no strings.”

He lowered his haunches into the canvas chair. His anger had passed off suddenly, and curiosity had taken its place. “What is it? It better be good.”

I told him about the closed blue truck, the brown men at the Temple, Troy and Eddie and Claude. “Troy is the head of the gang, I’m pretty sure. The others work for him. They’ve been running an underground railway on a regular schedule between the Mexican border and the Bakersfield area. The southern end is probably at Calexico.”

“Yeah,” Spanner said. “That’s an easy place to cross the border. I took a trip down there with the border guard a couple of months ago. All they got to do is crawl through a wire fence from one road to the other.”

“And Troy’s truck would be waiting to pick them up. They used the Temple in the Clouds as a receiving station for illegal immigrants. God knows how many have passed through there. There were twelve or more last night.”

“Are they still there?”

“They’re in Bakersfield by now, but they shouldn’t be hard to round up. If you get hold of Claude I’m pretty sure he’ll talk.”

“Jesus!” Spanner said. “If they brought over twelve a night, that’s three hundred and sixty a month. Do you know how much they pay to get smuggled in?”

“No.”

“A hundred bucks apiece. This Troy has been making big money.”

“Dirty money,” I said. “Trucking in a bunch of poor Indians, taking their savings away, and turning them loose to be migrant laborers.”

He looked at me a little queerly. “They’re breaking the law, too, don’t forget. We don’t prosecute, though, unless they got criminal records. We just ship them back to the border and let them go. But Troy and his gang are another matter. What they been doing is good for thirty years.”

“That’s fine,” I said.

“You don’t know where he hangs out in Los Angeles?”

“He runs a place called the Wild Piano, but he won’t be showing there. I’ve told you what I know.” With two exceptions: the man I had killed, and the blond woman who would still be waiting for Eddie.

“You seem to be on the level,” the sheriff said slowly. “You can forget what I said about arrest. But if this turns out to be a song-and-dance you gave me, I’ll remember it again.”

I hadn’t expected to be thanked, and I wasn’t disappointed.