Hanover then began pressuring Smith to take the money, and Smith blew up at him.
“He said he had been in touch with Izzy Darkmoon’s and Davey’s child from the rape, Hayley Perez. She called Bud periodically to ask him about her little sister, Amy. Bud told Hanover to put the half million in trust for Hayley and also retain a good lawyer for her, because she was a prostitute in Las Vegas and headed for serious trouble.”
“What was Hanover’s reaction?”
“He said he didn’t want anything to do with his trailer-trash bastard. That’s when Bud threw a glass of wine in his brother’s face. He told him he’d better establish the trust and retain the lawyer as soon as he went back to New York, and provide him with confirmation. Otherwise he’d go straight to the authorities over in Nevada and tell them the truth about the rape. And then he stormed out of the house.”
“What did Hanover do?”
“Wiped the wine off and called for me to serve the next course. He asked if I’d heard any of their conversation, and I said no, I’d been listening to my iPod. He believed me because there’s a light in the kitchen that flashes when somebody presses a button in the dining room, and a lot of times I do have my iPod on while I work. So I served him the roast. He didn’t eat much or ask for the dessert course. Afterward he gave me a hundred percent tip on top of my usual fee, which is fairly generous to begin with.”
“To ensure your silence, in case you hadn’t been listening to music.”
“Yeah.” Linda Jeffrey smiled wryly. “But me, I’m like Bud: I prefer to make an honest living. I wrote a check next morning to Friends Helping Friends for the amount of the tip, and then I went to see Miri Perez.”
So Linda Jeffrey hadn’t been summoned to Rattlesnake Ranch in five to six months. And the housekeeper had been let go and the handyman and gardener had suddenly moved to Arizona.
I had nothing if I couldn’t somehow prove Hanover was at the ranch on the date Hayley died.
Who would have the information I needed?
Amos Hinsdale. He practically lived in that shack at Tufa Tower. Monitored the UNICOM constantly. No one in a private jet could land in this territory without Amos knowing about it-even if the pilot didn’t broadcast to other traffic.
Now, if I could only get the old coot to talk with me…
“Canada Dry ginger ale,” the bartender at Hobo’s said. “Amos hasn’t had a drink of alcohol in his life that I know of. But he comes in here every Saturday night and always has three or four Canada Drys. Likes company and conversation that one day of the week. I keep a supply of the stuff on hand for him.”
“Would you sell me a cold six-pack?”
“Sure. You planning on seducing him?” He winked.
“If only what I have in mind were that simple.”
Hinsdale gave me a suspicious look when he opened the door of the shack at the airport. “We’re closed, lady pilot.”
What on earth could be closed? There were no avgas or mechanic’s services here, just the UNICOM and a rudimentary landing-light system that had ceased to work reliably years ago.
I held up the six-pack of Canada Dry. “I thought we might share a couple. It’s my favorite, and I hear it’s yours, too.”
Now he scowled. “I’d think a woman like you, married to Ripinsky, would prefer beer.”
“I like a brew sometimes, but not tonight.”
“So you decided to visit an old man and sip some ginger ale. Hard to believe.”
“Hell, Amos, you’ve nailed me. I need help.”
“Something wrong with that plane of Ripinsky’s? What did you do to it?”
“Nothing’s wrong with the plane. But something’s very wrong in this town.”
His eyes narrowed, wrinkles deepening around them. “What d’you mean-wrong?” But his downturned mouth told me he already knew the answer.
“Hayley Perez, her sister Amy, and her mother Miri. Tom Mathers and Bud Smith. And a private jet that landed at Rattlesnake Ranch around the day Hayley was murdered.”
His features seemed to fold inward, and his eyes grew bleak.
“Please, Mr. Hinsdale…”
He opened the door wider, motioned me in. “I’ll take that Canada Dry, thank you.”
Surprisingly, the shack was comfortably furnished, with two overstuffed chairs beside the table that held the UNICOM. Yellowing rental forms for Amos’ clunker planes, scribbled slips of paper, old newspapers and magazines, and even older aviation sectionals were scattered beside the unit.
I sat in the chair he indicated, opened two cans of ginger ale and handed him one. He sipped and stared silently at the opposite wall, where a framed photograph of a young man in a U.S. Navy flight suit was hung; he stood beside a fighter plane, his gaze stern, jaw thrust out aggressively.
Amos caught me looking at it and said, “Me. Down at Miramar before we shipped out for ’Nam on the Enterprise. December second, 1965.”
“You fly a lot of missions?”
“Yeah. I was one of the lucky ones: I lived to tell about them. A lot of my buddies didn’t.”
“My father was a Navy man-NCO. In fact, we lived in San Diego and could hear the planes out of Miramar.” The sonic boom from one had cracked our swimming pool so badly that my parents had filled it with dirt and turned it into a vegetable garden.
Amos nodded absently, sipped more ginger ale. “Wasn’t a private jet.”
“What…? Oh, you mean at Rattlesnake Ranch.”
“That’s what you’re asking about, isn’t it? That jet, I don’t even have to see it approach the ranch; I can hear it. You wouldn’t think my hearing could be so keen after all these years around aircraft, but it is. No, that day I was standing in the door trying to work myself up to cutting the grass alongside the runway when this Cessna 152 flew right over the field. Damned low, and the pilot didn’t even announce himself to traffic. UNICOM was dead silent. I watched the plane make its descent at the ranch.”
“You get the plane’s number?”
“I did. Was going to report it to the FAA, but”-he shrugged-“things get away from me these days.” His eyes strayed to the photograph on the opposite wall. “It’s hard to admit that you’re not as energetic or clearheaded as you used to be. But it’s a fact, you can’t challenge it.”
“It was clearheaded to take down the Cessna’s number. You still have it?”
“Somewhere.” He sifted through the items scattered on the table, came up with a blue Post-it note. He was more clearheaded than he gave himself credit for; I was willing to bet he knew where every item in that clutter was. “Yours,” he said, handing it to me. “How about we have another ginger ale?”
“Sure,” I said, surprised at how mellow he’d become toward me. I popped two more tabs, passed a can over to him.
“How’d you get interested in flying?” he asked.
“Ripinsky. I’d been at the controls of a plane a few times, years before I met him, when I was dating a Navy pilot stationed at Alameda, but I didn’t enjoy it all that much. He was a hotdog pilot and liked to scare people.”
“Guy was an asshole then. Ripinsky breaks a lot of rules, but never at the expense of a novice passenger.”
“That’s true. And he’s a terrific pilot. Once I got comfortable flying with him, I asked him to teach me-he’s got his CFI, you know. But he didn’t think it would be good for the relationship, so he found me an instructor near San Francisco. And I’ve been happily flying ever since.”
Amos pursed his lips; I suspected he was trying not to say something. But the desire to speak won out: “You been flying happily and beautifully. Nobody around here-male or female-makes the kind of landings and takeoffs you do.”
I was genuinely touched, but I said lightly, “Not even Ripinsky?”
“Not even him. And I’m not bad-mouthing your husband, because he admits you’re the better pilot.”