“But,” Estelle said, and started the car.
“But what? Yes, I agree she has motive as much anyone. Maybe more. It makes my gut ache, but I see that. It looks like George was giving away property hand over fist, and obviously she gains if she can stop the flow.” I thumped the dash with the heel of my hand. “Nickel, dime, nickel dime. A few hundred grand maybe, at the most.”
The undersheriff lifted her shoulders, and I knew what that meant. “Yes,” I said, “We both have seen folks murdered for a good deal less.” I huffed a sigh. “We have the means. I’m not sure we have the opportunity. And without something firm there, a defense attorney will make hash.”
“If Maggie stopped by her father’s place at noon, just as he was sitting down to eat, that’s opportunity.”
“Ah, but,” I said. “She would need to have the histamine in her possession well before yesterday…she’d have no way to know for sure when this supposed opportunity would present itself.”
“Exactly so, padrino. Exactly so. Guy Trombley said that the last time he compounded histolatum was in May, for Phil’s sister. Then she died. Let’s suppose that somehow, Maggie found the opportunity to take the chemical. Guy wouldn’t even know it was gone. Sir, he didn’t know it was gone when we first checked with him. It came as a complete surprise.”
“You’re saying that Maggie might have been wandering around for who knows how many goddamn months, the stuff in her purse, waiting for an opportunity?”
“So to speak. Or working up courage, hoping something would change her mind. Maybe she did argue with her father against giving away the property. Maybe she did. And maybe her father stone-walled her. Yesterday, the opportunity presented itself. Her dad calls asking her to pick up some wine, and with the news that you’ve canceled out on lunch. She goes over to Ridgemont, and sure enough, the old man sees a fresh bottle of wine, chugs the remains of the old bottle, and then heads for the bathroom. She opens the new one, pours, and spikes. Even time to wipe the bottle.”
“Could have, maybe, maybe,” I said. “I’d still bet on the defense attorney.”
“She’s a sales professional,” she said, enunciating each syllable. “And that’s why I think she’ll run, given the chance, sir. She cuts deals. That’s what she does for a living. But right now, she doesn’t know how little we have. As soon as it’s clear that we’re not just chasing a red wine allergy, as soon as she knows that we have her trapped in a lie, she’ll be ready to cut a deal.”
“You think so.”
“Yes, I do. I’m certain that we have enough for a grand jury indictment. That gives us all the time we need to find something more concrete than a cash register receipt that calls her a liar.”
“That’s for sure.”
“We have Ricardo Mondragon,” Estelle added. She pulled out her little notebook and ruffled pages, finally holding one out for me to see. “’It was on the table. I asked him if I could throw it away…I didn’t see no new bottle.” She closed the notebook. “If Maggie had taken the fresh bottle to her father’s house earlier in the morning, why wouldn’t it be there? She said that she opened it for him. Who would put an open bottle away in a cupboard somewhere? It would be standing on the table…which is exactly where we found it.”
I settled deeper into the seat and stared out through the windshield at nothing much. “Now what?” I asked, although I knew the answer as well as the undersheriff.
“I’ll talk with Schroeder and see what he says.”
“I know what he’ll say.”
“And then an arrest warrant. She’ll be held pending grand jury action.”
The process sounded so cut and dried. Maggie Payton Borman’s life would come to a halt, the legal process more drawn out and painful than what she’d inflicted on her unsuspecting father.
I hoped that Estelle was wrong about one thing. Maggie could run and spend the rest of her life running, leaving the law behind. Whether that would be a worse fate, only she could decide, since all the memories would go with her.
There was nothing further I could accomplish that night. To the north, the state laboratory clanked its test tubes and watched the drip down the chromatography strips…that’s all I could remember from my own college chemistry class, but I had no doubt that the eager young chemists would find whatever could be found. At the same time, surgeons did their best to patch Pat Gabaldon back together again. We had no idea when he’d be able to tell us his version of events, but the news of nailing his assailants might speed his recuperation.
I didn’t take much satisfaction that the wheels of justice were still turning in George Payton’s case, however slowly. For the first time in probably too long, I wasn’t even hungry. Instead of to the Don Juan de Oñate restaurant, or to the Guzman’s for something homey in good company, I went home, deep into my dark, quiet burrow.
In a moment of silliness, I even contemplated calling my oldest daughter, Camille. I wouldn’t discuss the Payton case with her, of course-she’d make the connection in a flash and call me worse than silly. No, Camille wasn’t going to poison me so that she could heist the family wealth.
Instead, I took my time making the perfect mug of coffee, enjoying the aroma of freshly ground Sumatran beans. Leaning comfortably against the kitchen counter, I waited for the drip gadget to finish its work, then took the mug down into my sunken living room/library. One of the joys of being both an insomniac and a reader is that the clock never mattered. I perused the shelves, looking for just the right break from reality. Eventually, I pulled Trulock’s In the Hands of Providence from one of the upper shelves, a book I’d read half a dozen times and unearthed some new tidbit each time. Settling into the massive leather recliner, I buried myself in Joshua Chamberlain’s Civil War.
Three mugs of Sumatran later, as troops tried to find a way to storm up through the eastern woodlands without being cut to pieces by cannon and musket fire, the battle lost its focus for me. I ended up reading the same paragraph three times, then surrendered, letting my head sag back into the leather.
I awakened once when the furnace came on, closed the book and placed it on the slate table. With hands folded over my belly, I relaxed back again. What the hell. Bed was where I made it, like the old tejón that Estelle affectionately nicknamed me-an old badger who likes things his way.
With a jolt that twanged the arthritic spurs here and there throughout my skeleton, I awakened to the telephone. It was the landline, that black thing that hung on the wall in the kitchen. For several rings, I listened to it, holding up my wrist so that I could see the time. With a curse, I hauled my carcass out of the chair, barking my shin on the recliner mechanism. Whoever it was waited patiently, and I lifted the receiver after the eighth ring.
“Gastner.” The clock over the stove agreed. It was just coming up on midnight.
No one on the other end spoke, and for an instant I thought it was one of those robots that call, offering extended vehicle warranties or the command ‘don’t be alarmed,’ from account services, whoever they were, warning that my credit card was doomed if I didn’t subscribe to their service, whatever that might be. But the vocal robots didn’t work at midnight. In a moment I heard an exchange of distant voices.
“Gastner,” I said again, and the circuit switched off. “Well hell,” I grumbled, and leaned back against the kitchen counter, regarding the coffee maker. But ten pound weights hung from my eyelids.
The next day was going to be a whirlwind of activities, including conferences with District Attorney Schroeder, maybe even Judge Hobart. Estelle would map out a game plan to deal with Maggie Borman, and I wouldn’t want to sleep through that. Gambling that my eyelids would slam shut the rest of the way, I made my way to the bedroom and eased onto the down comforter, too tired to bother undressing. There’d be plenty of time come morning for a shower and all those ceremonies that begin a new day.