Victorio talked quietly out of the side of his mouth. “Man that’s an assassin’s rifle. He’s not out to bag an elk with it.”
Watchman said to Limita, “Do you have the license number of the Land Cruiser?” Not that it would likely do any good; of all the cars in Limita’s yard Joe had selected the cross-country four-wheel-drive vehicle and that meant he didn’t intend to drive too far on the highway.
“I gave it to Pete Porvo that time,” Limita said. “But I think it is writ down someplace here.” He had an old school desk in the corner; he pried up its lid and pawed through papers, taking a frayed tally-book out and setting it aside. “Maybe Pete took it with him but I think he give it back to me.”
Watchman spoke to Victorio in a voice too low to carry across the room to the old man. “You mind waiting outside for me?”
Victorio resented the rebuff but went out. His shoulders were very stiff.
Watchman approached the desk. “Some folks think Maria Threepersons was witched, Mr. Limita. She died last week you know.”
“I heard about that.” Limita looked up at him and then resumed rummaging in the dog-eared slips of paper.
“Do you think she was witched?”
“Sure, it could happen you know.”
“Who would want to witch Maria?”
“I don’t know who was doing that to her.”
“Do you know anybody who might have had a reason to?”
“Maybe lots of folks don’t like that boy Joe. But I don’t know who could want to hurt his wife like that. Maybe her own people, those San Carlos kin. I guess they got witches down there too.”
“Did Joe know about your rifle collection before he went to prison?”
“Sure. That boy I took him deer hunt two, three times.”
“He’s a good shot, I hear.”
“He is sure a good one. That time I seen him shoot some real long bullets. Good hands on Joe.”
Watchman glanced toward the door. “You think maybe Tom there might have had anything against Maria?”
“Maybe so, but that boy’s too young for witching. A man got to grow up before he get the power.” Limita found the car registration. “This is your paper.”
Watchman copied down the license number. “Thank you.”
“That boy Joe been that way since he was just a boy. Sometimes he drink all the time, even his baby go hungry. Even when folks give him money he spend it on drink. He was crazy to do things like that. You should watch out, I think. He took some cold beer out of my springhouse down there on the creek.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
“You stay away, then. You get close to that boy he might hurt you.”
Watchman smiled; that had been what the old man was leading up to. They all had their own ways of telling him to leave Joe alone.
5.
Victorio was waiting in the Volvo. Watchman shook Rufus Limita’s hand and drove out of the yard. The shocks bottomed on the same bumps again. Pretty quick he was going to have to make a big decision: spend a small fortune renovating the old clunker or buy another car.
Victorio said, “Rifle like that, Joe sure as hell doesn’t aim to get caught alive.”
“That’s not why he took that gun.”
“No?”
“You said yourself it’s an assassin’s rifle.” Watchman steered onto the dirt road and headed down toward the fork. “He’s got it in mind to put somebody away.”
“Who?”
“Whoever killed Maria.”
“Killed Maria?”
“She was murdered.”
Victorio stared at him. “Maybe you’d better repeat that for the benefit of the West Coast audience.”
“Somebody fed her enough barbiturates to knock out five people.”
“I thought she crashed a car.”
“She crashed because the Seconals put her to sleep at the wheel.”
Either Victorio was a far better actor than he appeared to be or the news did come as a surprise to him.
Watchman said, “You were there that morning, weren’t you.”
“I was where?”
“Maria’s house. A little while before she died.”
“The hell I was. Who told you that?”
“Your car was there.”
“That’s a lie. This was last Tuesday?”
“Monday. Fourth of July. It was a holiday. You weren’t in your office.”
“Wrong. That’s exactly where I was. All morning. I had a brief to finish. And I had my car there and I’m pretty sure I had the keys in my pocket the whole time. You’re barking up the wrong tree—I never left Whiteriver that day. We had a rodeo that afternoon and I was there. I was one of the bronc handlers. You ask anybody.”
“That was afternoon. You had time to get back from Phoenix by then. Who saw you in the office?”
Victorio thought about it. “Nobody, I guess. Like you said it was a holiday. But somebody might have noticed my car. I always park it there between the council house and the trading post. Everybody knows my car.”
“Anybody else around here drive a blue VW?”
“Not that I know of. There’s a lot of them around but not right in town.”
“Well nobody’s arresting you yet,” Watchman said. “But somebody killed her. You’re right up at the head of the list.”
“If I’m such a hot suspect why are you telling me all this?”
“Think about it, you’ll figure it out.”
He turned the car onto the paved road and picked it up to forty-five heading back up toward the sawmill. Beside him in the bucket seat Victorio sat as tense as a runner in the starting chocks. “It’s a frame. A lousy frame. Somebody lied to you. I wasn’t anyplace Monday morning, I was in the office. I can show you the brief.”
“Sure.”
“I think I get it. You figure if I killed Maria then Joe’s gunning for me. I’m supposed to get scared and confess everything so you’ll put me in protective custody.”
“Well the idea crossed my mind,” Watchman agreed. “How about it?”
“I didn’t kill her. For Christ sake I’ve been in love with Maria since I was in pre-law.”
“You told me you were sore at her.”
“You murder everybody you get sore at?”
Watchman smiled with one side of his mouth. He saw Victorio’s right hand reach the dashboard handgrip and flex around it. Victorio said, “You know what worries me now? Suppose Joe heard the same lie about me and my car? Suppose he thinks it was me? Then he could be after me with that damn elephant cannon of Rufus’.”
“He sure could.”
“Son of a bitch,” Victorio breathed.
Watchman drove into town and made the turn at the corner by the council house and pulled into the lot behind it. He parked right beside the blue Volkswagen. Dwight Kendrick’s Corvette was farther back in the shade. Over against the trading post wall were parked several cars and one of them was Charles Rand’s high silver-grey Rolls Bentley.
Victorio said, distracted, “That’s Charlie Rand’s.”
“I know. Slumming?”
“He was due in today to talk a deal with the council.” Victorio sat with his hand tight on the grip even though the car was motionless.
“When’s the case due to come up in court?”
“It’s already been postponed a dozen times.”
“By Rand?”
“Usually. Sometimes we have to ask for a continuance ourselves.”
“I thought the tribe wanted to wrap it up as soon as possible.”
“Things aren’t that simple. It’s all juggling and maneuvering. You don’t want to go into court at a time that’s advantageous to the opposition. Hell a few months ago somebody rifled our files, we lost a lot of papers and practically had to start again from scratch. We’ve been stalling like mad until we can get the information together again.”
“What kind of information was it?”
“Nothing vital. Stuff like references to obscure cases that were tried seventy-five years ago in places like Montana and the Canal Zone. You have to marshal all the precedents. It’s boring as hell.”