It didn’t kick off anything. I’d watched the movie countless times, and could probably recite most of the dialogue by heart. During a burglary of my home two years before by local teenagers, the original VCR had been stolen, but not the tape. So much for taste. I’d replaced the VCR, but never added to the tape collection.
“This is cool beans,” my grandson said, nodding approvingly as Cooper walked out of the church, a disgusted man.
“How did your afternoon go?” Buddy said, and pushed himself out of the chair. “Sit. I’ll make some coffee.”
I waved a hand and glanced at my watch. “Even better. Let’s go get something to eat.”
“You ready for that?” my son said to Tadd, and the kid launched up off the floor and snapped off the VCR and television. “He’s always ready to eat,” Buddy added.
“We going to the Don Juan?” Tadd asked. “That’s a cool place.”
My estimation of my grandson clicked up another notch. And this time, we managed a meal that was uninterrupted and leisurely. By the time we finished eating, we were all ready to go to sleep right there in the restaurant. I knew that with close to thirty hours to wakefulness behind me and my belly full of fresh green chile I could go home and conk out for at least twelve hours. By that time it would be Sunday, the day that Estelle and her family would arrive from Minnesota.
Back at the house, we settled comfortably while Tadd watched Will Kane make preparations to face the vengeful brothers.
“So what happens after Tuesday?” Buddy asked. He rested his arm on the back of the sofa and looked at me. I tipped my mug slightly and regarded the steaming surface of the decaffeinated coffee he’d made for dessert.
“I thought maybe I’d figure that out on Wednesday morning,” I said. “Cliff Larson offered me a job today.” I shrugged. “He’s the livestock inspector. Maybe that would be interesting for a little while.”
“What sort of work would that entail?”
“Not much.” I grinned. “Basically, anytime a rancher moves livestock in New Mexico, he has to have a travel permit. The brands have to be inspected. Or lip tattoos on horses if they’re headed for a race track. You make an accurate count. Check for obvious signs of disease. That sort of thing.”
“Do you have situations very often like you had this afternoon?”
“Hopefully not,” I said. “But there’s a surprising amount of livestock theft that goes on. Our department has helped Larson clear several larceny cases over the years. And there’s more and more trouble with the border traffic. Especially with racehorses moving back and forth.” I sipped the coffee. “I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.” I set the cup down on the end table. “When’s your tour over?”
“In January,” Buddy said. “January twenty-sixth is my last day. Twenty-five years.”
“God, that got here in a hurry.”
“Yes it did.”
“And you’re only forty-seven years old!” I said in wonder.
“So the more immediate question is, what the hell are you going to do with yourself? Edie is not going to let you stay at home all day long and have all the fun while she’s swapping lies with other lawyers.”
My grandson glanced over at us. On screen, Katy Jurado was explaining the facts of life to Grace Kelly. “Did you tell Grandpa about our place in San Antonio?”
“You haven’t told me anything,” I said. “Great state secrets abound in this place. What’s with San Antonio?”
“We’ll be moving up there right after Christmas,” Buddy said. “I’ve got some accumulated leave, and Edie and the kids will be done with the semester. We’ve bought a place there.”
“This is all pretty sudden, isn’t it? But hell, San Antonio’s a pretty city. Why not.”
Buddy nodded enthusiastically. “You can’t imagine how happy we are to get out of Beeville. I signed on with the Texas Department of Public Safety, and San Antonio’s where I’ll be based. It worked out great, since Edie got an offer from a law firm there as well. It’s the firm she wanted.”
I held out my hands. “Whoa. You signed on with DPS?”
“Aviation division. I get to watch chases like you had this afternoon, from the air.”
“I always assumed that you’d end up with one of the airlines,” I said.
“Nah,” Buddy said with a grimace. “Bus driving is not for me. Shuttling those heavies from one city to another, full of a bunch of cranky passengers-that’s not my cup of tea. Anyway, for the last ten years or so, I’ve been in choppers.”
I smiled. “Well, good. If that’s what you want, that’s good.” I felt as if I needed sticks to prop my eyes open. I thumped the arm of the chair, and watched the TV for a few seconds. A very young Lloyd Bridges was trying to talk Cooper into saddling a horse and lighting out of Hadleyville.
“This is the same guy who was in Hot Shots, ” my grandson said with considerable wonder.
“Forty-five years younger,” I said. “And since I know how this movie ends, I’m going to go to bed. You guys are welcome to watch movies all night, if you want. There’s even a video store downtown, if you get desperate.” I pushed myself to my feet with an audible symphony of joints.
It was nearly nine. The phone had left me in peace for three hours. In my bedroom at the opposite end of the house, I couldn’t hear a sound-not my grandson chatting with his father, or the gunshots as Gary Cooper settled accounts, and certainly not the gentle little chunk as he pitched his badge in the dust at the end of the movie.
The cool silence enveloped me and for once chased away the devils of insomnia and the kind of circular, unproductive problem-solving that inflicts the prone and the wakeful. Maybe it was just the pleasure at having good company under my roof once more, with the anticipation of more to come the next day. Maybe it was profound relief that Dale Torrance had suffered nothing more serious than a rap on the head-something he probably needed anyway.
Whatever the reason, I slept like a dead man, deep and hard. It would have been nice to awaken refreshed and rested, with the sun of Sunday morning just peeking through the cotton-woods. Instead, I jerked awake soaked in sweat, the house silent and black. My mind had been working, even if the rest of me hadn’t.
“Son of a bitch,” I said, and sat up straight. The clock on the dresser said forty minutes after two. I fumbled for the telephone and managed to find the right buttons for the Posadas County Sheriff’s Department.
Chapter Twenty-four
I sat on the bed and listened to the circuits click, the light from the number pad soft in my peripheral vision. After five rings Brent Sutherland answered. I could hear voices in the background, and, as he brought the phone to his ear, Sutherland said, “No, I don’t think so,” to someone.
“Posadas County Sheriff’s Department, Sutherland.”
“Brent, this is Gastner. Is everything all right down there?”
“Yes, sir. Jackie just brought in a DWI. We were finishing up the Breathalyzer.”
“Who was it?”
“Out of town.” I heard papers shuffle. “A Mr. Bruce Whitaker, from Socorro.”
“Passing through, or staying in town?”
“Apparently he was passing through. Jackie stopped him on Seventy-eight, just beyond the airport. He told her that he’d had trouble staying awake, and had one too many cold beers.”
“That’s brilliant thinking,” I said. “Everything else quiet?”
“Yes, sir. Dead.”
I glanced at the clock on the dresser. At 2:43, deputies had been home from the swing shift for a couple hours, long enough to have settled comfortably in bed. “I need Tony Abeyta’s home number, Brent. I don’t have the roster in front of me at the moment.”
“Just a second, sir.” I could picture him leaning across the desk, consulting the neatly printed chart taped to the green filing cabinet. “That’s nine seven seven, three zero zero six,” he said after a minute.