“We need some information, if you have a minute,” the undersheriff said.
Lauerson held out both arms to include the entire, cavernous office complex. “All is public information under this roof,” he said. “You’re welcome to it all, either solo or with a tour guide.” He looked at the Seth Thomas on the wall. “Is this a quick thing, or a long, involved search for deeply buried secrets, sheriff?” He smiled helpfully, apparently willing to go either route.
“We’ll need a guide,” I said quickly, fearful that Estelle might want to wander off, rooting and burrowing on her own, the hours flying by until we’d missed supper as well. Months from now, they might find our two dusty skeletons over behind one of the files.
Lauerson settled back against the corner of a desk, crossed his arms, and cocked his head at us, ready to listen. “So,” he prompted. “I saw you two across the hall with Kevin. Somebody’s world is ending, is it?”
“Sir, you have an organized listing of county properties, I would assume,” Estelle said.
Lauerson laughed good-naturedly. “Of course. Now, some would argue the ‘organized’ thing. I think it’s organized. But yes. We live in a world of lists, Sheriff. That’s what we do.”
“If a taxpayer owns more than one piece of property, are those properties listed all together somehow?”
“You mean can we access information about each piece of property by the name of the owner? Of course.” He nodded slowly. “Actually, property is listed and mapped in a variety of ways. Over in the county clerk’s office, they have those wonderful old binders with the deed legends and whatnot? Our mission is a bit different over here. But we do have a master listing that’s always updated. Each time there’s a property transfer of any kind that’s recorded across the hall or a building permit that’s issued, our lists are updated.” He smiled self-deprecatingly. “Most of the time. We’ve been known to slip up on occasion.” Cocking his head, he regarded Estelle with interest. “What was it you were looking for, exactly? Do I get to know?”
“Suppose I wanted to inventory George Payton’s real estate holdings in the county. How hard is that to do?” she asked.
“Not hard at all,” Lauerson said. “Somebody told me this morning that George passed away. That’s a shame. He used to come in and grump at me from time to time. More as a way to pass the time of day than anything serious.” He pushed himself away from the desk. “You know, I had that thought this morning when I heard about his passing. When his estate is probated, all the records will be scrutinized. Lots of changes. Lots and lots of changes.” He crooked a finger at us. “Come.”
A young man at a drafting table looked up as we passed and flashed a smile of welcome. “Don’t mind the mess,” Lauerson said when we reached the mountain under which his own desk was buried. His clutter made Kevin Zeigler’s workspace look downright antiseptic. A vast collection of neatly rolled maps and documents was stacked strategically to avoid slumps and avalanches. A small area around his computer remained clear, and the assessor sat down and pulled himself up to the keyboard. In a moment, lists appeared. At least I thought they were lists. The print was so fine it could have been text for a new Biblical translation.
“Here’s how they’re listed,” he said, and scrolled down. “Let’s get to the P’s here. Padilla, Padilla, Padilla…there’s a lot of them. Patterson, Payne, Payton comma Bruce, no relation, Payton comma George. Wowser.” The screen suddenly created a black chunk of text, with a whole field of listings. “All these are George’s,” Lauerson said, running his pencil eraser down the screen.
I bent down on one side of the assessor, Estelle on the other. Lauerson scooted his chair back and rose. “Here, sit.”
“Go ahead sir,” Estelle prompted, and I did so, then read the entries-legal descriptions of property with all the range-township mumbo-jumbo, acreage to three decimal places, and zoning classifications of the properties. The final five columns compiled the five most recent annual valuations.
Jack reached past my shoulder and touched the last column, where the figures were bold-faced. “These are current assessed valuations,” he said. “This is what went out to every property owner on the last statement, half due in December, second half in the spring.”
“A guy sort of has to know,” I mumbled, cruising down through the numbers. The problem was that if I was interested in a piece of property, I thought of it as “that little patch out past the Torrance ranch, just off County Road 43.” But these were all legal descriptions, down to the last dotted ‘i’ and crossed ‘t’. “How do I tell what’s what?” I asked.
“Well, you find a translator,” Lauerson laughed. “What are you looking for in particular?” He scanned down the highlighted brick of entries. “This tells us that he owns fourteen parcels in Posadas County. It’s none of my business, but I happen to know that he owns property outside of the county as well. I know that he traded with Miles Waddell for some property up in Grant County, for instance.”
“May I have a copy of that?” Estelle asked quickly. “This whole listing?”
“Certainly you may.” Lauerson reached past me again and tapped computer keys. In a moment, the laser printer beside his desk came to life.
The undersheriff had never actually said what it was that she was tracking, but I had my own curiosities.
“George owned a little chunk of prairie out by Herb Torrance’s ranch,” I said. “Just north of Herb’s house, on top of that little mesa there.” Lauerson reached out and scrolled the screen a bit, then jotted a number or two down on a scratch pad.
“That would be 1453,” he said, and touched the screen with the tip of his pencil. “And actually, he owns three parcels out that way. Here’s the listing with the legal. It shows 11.325 acres. He paid $17.90 last year in property taxes on that piece you’re talking about.”
“Eighteen bucks,” I remarked.
“It’s unimproved range land, no utilities, no easy access to the county road, no nuttin’ except a great view. Now, when the BLM does some development with the cave property across the county road, he may have something. One guy I know is positive that some of the cave complex extends under that mesa. Up on top might be a killer location for a visitors’ center or something like that.”
“Like Carlsbad Caverns,” I said.
“Exactly. I heard some scuttlebutt that the BLM was planning to trade the land that they own across the road to the Park Service.”
“Interesting,” I said. “I wonder how those properties got chopped up so that we’re left with an eleven-acre parcel out there in the boonies, unrelated to anything else.”
“Well, records will tell you, if you want to research hard enough,” Lauerson replied. “Over the years, these things get divided, given away, forgotten, you name it. You could research the deed and have a better idea of the history. Now, 99 percent of the time, it has to do with either water or access to something. Neither one of those applies to this little mesa top, though. I couldn’t even guess why George bought it originally.”
“Because it was there,” I offered. “Maybe he liked the view.”
“Most likely that’s exactly right.” He laughed. “What’s the old saw…‘they ain’t makin’ no more land, pardner.’” He beckoned toward one of the huge filing cabinets. “Is that the only one you’re interested in? He owns this little chunk down here, too,” and he high-lighted 1456. “That’s a little more than seven acres.”
Estelle said reached out and indicated 1463, farther down the column. She had done a pretty good job of letting me run wild over her investigation so far. “I’m curious about the lot right behind this building,” she said. “Right behind the county building. The one that fronts the alley and then wraps around behind the old bank.”
“Okay,” Jack said, and he jotted numbers on his scratch paper. “Let’s look at the ones out west first.” Confronting the massive file cabinets, he pulled open the fifth drawer from the top. Flipping through the corners of the stack of maps, he found the one he sought and slipped it carefully out of the drawer, then carried it to the nearest sloped drafting table.