Yes.
“Did she walk up to the patrol car when the deputy stopped behind her vehicle?”
No. To front.
“Toward the front of her vehicle?”
Yes.
I slid the pad out and turned the page. Patsy Montano had finished checking her machinery, but we were still parked right in the center of her day, making life difficult. She stood near the head of the bed, not sure what she should do.
“Can you give me just a few more minutes?” I said.
Patsy nodded.
“Can you answer a few more questions?” I asked Linda.
Nothing else to do. She was getting used to driving that pencil without looking at it, and the words came smoothly.
I chuckled and squeezed Linda’s hand. Her mother’s eyes narrowed again.
“Linda, what kind of vehicle was the parked vehicle?”
The pencil tip drew a little spiral as if a memory was refusing to swim to the surface. Then she wrote, Chevy pickup.
“A Chevrolet pickup. Do you remember what color it was?”
White.
“All white?”
Just saw back.
“But it was just a regular pickup?”
Yes.
“You’re sure?”
Yes.
Yes. She paused. Think so.
“Were you able to make out the license plate, Linda?”
No. Wasn’t one.
“No license plate?”
No. It had…The pencil stopped and I looked at Linda’s face. Her eye was closed.
“She doesn’t have the energy for all this,” Mrs. Real snapped. “You should leave now.”
The pencil wavered. Thinking.
“Take your time,” I said.
Temp tag in window.
“It had one of those paper permits in the back window? Like it was just purchased?”
Yes.
“Linda, I need to ask you about the second vehicle. What direction did it come from?”
West.
“From the west. It came toward you then. And it stopped on the other side of the road?”
Yes.
“Was Deputy Encinos out of the patrol car then?”
Yes. Standing by front fender. She shifted her grip on the pencil and I moved the pad a bit to give her room. Think was going to talk to Tammy.
“And you didn’t see the driver of the second vehicle?”
No. Headlights too bright.
“Did the person fire from the vehicle?”
No. Got out. Paul backed up.
“Paul backed up? Can you tell me what you mean?”
Linda made a small groaning sound as the memories surged back. Stepped back. I saw hand move down toward holster.
“The first shot came from across the highway.”
Yes. Right away. Then he walked across. He walked across road.
“But you couldn’t see who it was?”
No. I tried to get down. Tried. So scared. The pencil’s tip drifted along the line an inch or so before touching the surface again. So scared.
I put my hand over Linda’s for a moment. The room was silent. Mrs. Real’s eyes bored into mine, but I ignored her.
“Linda, can you tell me just one or two more things?”
“Uh.”
“Do you know why Deputy Encinos decided to drive out Fifty-six so late in his shift?”
No.
“It was just chance?”
Maybe he wanted…The pencil stopped. Her forehead, what little of it I could see, furrowed, but this time in pain. Hurts so much, she wrote. Hard to think.
“We’ll let you rest.”
No, wait. The pencil almost stabbed the paper with determination. Paul thought Tammy maybe drinking.
“He thought she was drunk? When?”
This time, the pencil moved slowly, painfully. Linda wrote the sentence with her eye closed. A tear formed under the long black lashes and trickled back toward her ear.
She was parked on Bustos near MacA. Paul stopped, talked to her. She didn’t know how to tune radio. He helped. He laughed.
“Was this the same truck you saw later out on Fifty-six?”
Yes.
“And then the deputy headed out on Fifty-six as well.”
He joked.
She stopped writing and I placed my hand on her right cheek. She opened her eye and gazed at me. Then, ever so slightly, she shook her head. The movement cost her, and she closed her eye again. The pencil wavered and scratched.
He said might as well check on Bob’s drunks one more time.
“Bob’s drunks.” I smiled. Sergeant Robert Torrez would appreciate that. “Did he have any idea that Tammy Woodruff was headed out that way?”
Yes. We drove around some, saw her later, not too long. Saw truck go under interstate, turn onto 56. Paul checked some buildings near interstate, then we went that way, too.
She dropped the pencil and her hand curled up on the pad.
I took a deep breath and straightened up. I clicked off the little tape recorder and slid it into my pocket.
“You should leave now,” Mrs. Real glowered. “You’ve put her through far too much already.”
“Lady,” I started to say, then stopped. Instead I touched Linda’s right cheek once more. “Nobody will bother you for a while. You get some rest.”
Her eyelid fluttered. I moved to the door and beckoned Mrs. Real to follow. She did so, and when we were out in the hall, I waved Deputy Howard Bishop over.
Mrs. Real surveyed Howard with distaste and I said, “Mrs. Real, the ICU waiting room is across the hall, right there. You’re welcome to wait there. I’ll remind you that your daughter, besides being gravely injured, is a material witness in a homicide investigation. You’re going to have to wait out here. Deputy Bishop, I want you to arrest anyone who enters that room other than medical staff until I return. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.”
Mrs. Real’s jaw dropped. “Now I’m her mother…”
“I don’t care who you are.”
“I have the right…”
“No, ma’am, you don’t. Deputy, any questions?”
“No, sir.” He moved toward the doors of the ICU.
“I’ll be back shortly after noon.” I nodded at Mrs. Real. “Ma’am,” I said. “Make yourself comfortable.”
As I walked off, I heard Mrs. Real mutter, “I don’t have to put up with this.” But she pushed open the door of the waiting room.
Chapter 20
I hustled across the hospital parking lot to 310, anxious to find out what Estelle Reyes-Guzman had tracked down and disappointed that our lead on the stolen Suburban out of Albuquerque had been shot to hell by Linda’s story. I settled into the car’s front seat and wrinkled my nose as a waft of air blew just right to carry the aroma of me upward.
“Christ,” I muttered. “No wonder the woman was so grouchy.”
I drove directly home without bothering to call the office. Hell, Gayle Sedillos was working dispatch, and she always knew exactly where I was. An instinct of some kind. Or maybe just stink. I hadn’t thought of that before.
The long, hot shower was pure bliss, and I damn near fell asleep standing up. Afterward I dressed in comfortable wool flannel pants and my favorite blue-checked flannel shirt. I looked like an ad out of Retired Lumberjack Magazine. I sat down on the edge of the bed to draw on a fresh pair of socks and then made the mistake of lying back on the cool bedspread for just a moment.
My eyes slammed shut and that was that. I might have slept all day had Linda Real’s mother not intruded. She appeared vividly in a dream where I was once again a patient. She, of course, was the floor nurse. No matter how much I protested, she still insisted there was nothing wrong with the king-size hypo she was about to jab in my butt. I could see that the tip of the needle was bent, as if it had been dropped point first on a Formica countertop. The needle looked fine to her.