“Mostly the cab smelled like a body too long in the sun, and stale cigar. All that overlaid over the grader’s own body odor-oil, grease, hydraulic fluid.” I paused, the image playing in my mind. There Larry Zipoli sat, perhaps half buzzed, reflexes slow, big stogie clamped in his mouth, the thick smoke clinging to his skin, clothing, and every surface of the Cat’s cab.
“So, was this a one-time thing, or a constant problem with him? If it’s a beer a day or so, that’s one thing. If Larry Zipoli was chugging through a six-pack and three samplers every day, then that’s another story.” I chuckled at the image. “How the hell could he grade a straight line? Maybe that’s where we need to go.” I tapped a little tattoo on the steering wheel. “This is a doorway of sorts, Deputy Reyes.” I turned and looked at her, and her expression was intense. She was a listener, not a talker, and I liked her all the more.
“We go through the door, or we don’t. That’s the first choice. Well, of course we do. We welcome any doors, painful as they might end up being for somebody. A good share of the time, there’s a causative link between the victim and the killer.” I shrugged. “Now, sometimes there isn’t.” My door was ajar, and I lowered my voice so there was no chance of the sound carrying across the boneyard to Bea Summer’s keen ears.
“Let’s say the killer sees the grader parked along Highland, with the sun maybe on the windshield. He can’t tell if someone is in it or not, and doesn’t bother to check. Maybe he assumes the machine is untended. Those guys do take work breaks after all. Standing some distance away, maybe the shooter can’t hear the grader idling. And at idle, there isn’t much smoke out the stack, not until the throttle is cracked. So he takes a shot just for the hell of it. A vandalism kind of thing. He figures the operator will come back, see the bullet hole, and freak out.” I shrugged again. “It could have happened that way.”
“In that case, it doesn’t matter whether or not Mr. Zipoli drinks his lunch, or is an alcoholic, or not.”
“That’s exactly right. And that’s why we go through that door carefully and discreetly. Nothing is gained by spreading Larry’s bad habits all over town. Those who know him well enough, already know that he had a drinking problem. That’s the thing about alcoholics. They don’t think anybody is going to notice. They’ll go to elaborate lengths to hide the habit. The efforts are a waste of time. You can’t hide it, not the smell, not the behavior, none of it.”
I switched off the car. “End of lecture. Let’s take a look at the files, if Mrs. Summers has those records for us.” I hesitated. “And I hope I don’t have to tell you how confidential all of this is. It’s between you and me. You don’t even discuss any of this with anyone else, unless the sheriff himself has questions for you. Whatever Eduardo Salcido wants to know, he gets to know. But not with the other deputies, not with anyone.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You have a boyfriend you talk with?”
Her frown was instant but fleeting, as if I’d stepped on her foot and then as quickly recovered.
“Yes, sir.”
“Be very, very careful. What’s he do?”
“He’s a fourth year medical student at Baylor, sir.”
“Ah. That’s a long hard road. Local young man?”
“His family lives in Las Cruces and in Mexico.”
“Well, good. Anyway, confidential, just like between him and his patients.” She nodded and followed me out of the car, taking just a moment to tuck in her blouse and straighten her summer weight cotton jacket.
My hand was on the office door knob when a late model pickup came through the bone yard gate without slowing a lick and managed to stop beside my patrol car without spraying gravel against the building. Tony Pino was behind the wheel, with his foreman, Buddy Clayton, riding shotgun.
“I was hoping Bea would be able to reach you,” I said, and extended my hand. Tony’s grip was a single, perfunctory, limp pump. Buddy managed a little better. “This is Deputy Estelle Reyes,” I said, and let it go at that. Buddy gave her a thorough head-to-toe survey, looked like he wanted to say something cute, and bit it off. Tony had other things on his mind, and got right to the point.
“We was just over talkin’ to Marilyn Zipoli,” Tony said. “Christ, what a tough time.”
“Yes, it is. “
“You got any new ideas since yesterday? Who mighta done something like this?
“That’s why we’re here this morning, Tony. I need to know from you exactly what happened yesterday. From the first time you saw Larry yesterday morning until late in the afternoon. And I understand that Mike Zamora ran the new hydraulic hose out to him. I’ll want to talk with him.”
“He’s in Deming, I think.” Pino grimaced and glanced at the blinding blue sky. “Let’s go inside, then,” he said. The cramped office became a crowded place, all of us under the watchful eye of Bea Summers. Before I forgot it, I handed the keys back to her, and then we headed to Tony‘s dark little cave of an office. I noticed that Bea didn’t offer me the personnel file. She’d let Tony field that one.
Buddy Clayton appeared intent on joining the party, but I stopped him at the office doorway with a gentle hand on the shoulder.
“Let us catch you in a little bit, Buddy,” I said, and he shot a nervous glance at his boss. Tony waved an impatient hand at him, and I moved a floor fan so that I could close the door. Estelle moved to one side, taking the corner by a filing cabinet that offered handy support for an elbow. Before we were finished with this day, it would be a wonderful test of her discretion, but I had little reason to worry. So far that morning, I had been absolutely unable to judge just what she was thinking at any given time. She could have taken up a career as a professional poker player.
“Let me tell you what it looks like to us.” I tried to find a comfortable spot on the metal folding chair. “One rifle shot, fired directly from a point in front of the road grader, the shooter standing some indeterminate number of yards west on Highland, or maybe even beyond somewhere. You saw what it did. The slug blew through the center of the grader’s windshield right beside the windshield wiper, and struck Larry in the forehead, just over his left eyebrow.” I paused. “That’s it. You know as much as we do.”
Tony Pino’s face paled another shade, and he swallowed hard. “Jesus, Bill.” For a moment, he didn’t know what else to say, and I sat in silence, letting him work on it.
“There’s kids out at the arroyo all the time, shootin’ and stuff. There’s this one place out west of Highland where the arroyo is pretty deep, man. You know all about it. That’s where they go. Most of the time, we don’t have so many problems.”
“Most of the time.” The arroyo was just outside the village limits, and a sore point with some of the commissioners. Shooting there was legal, since it was a fair distance from the nearest dwelling, and if the shooters stayed down in the arroyo, the steep sides provided some barrier. Some.
“You thinking that’s what it was?”
“We’re exploring a couple of different avenues,” I hedged. I’d known Tony for years, and thought of him as an honest, hard-working village employee. But sometimes it was hard to tell what the connections were. “Tony, this is hard for you guys, I know. But I asked Bea if we can take a look at Larry’s personnel files.”
“Jesus, Bill, I can’t let you do that,” Tony replied without taking a moment to think it over. Well, he could, of course, but I hadn’t used all the keys yet to open that door. “I mean those files are confidential.” I nodded as if that was that, giving myself time to mull my options. I hadn’t said “warrant” yet in this conversation, and once I did, there was no going back. I was convinced that the shot that killed Larry Zipoli had not been an errant slug from across the arroyo.
“Does…did…Larry have much of a drinking problem on the job?” The blunt question might as well have been a ball peen hammer between the eyes. I saw the blood rush up Tony’s dark face, and he blinked half a dozen times, digesting the question.