Joanna leaned down, reached into her purse, and was about to haul out Helen Barco’s dog —eared magazine when she thought better of it.
“Never mind,” she said. “There’s an article in one of them I thought you should read, but you already have enough to do. I’ll try to scan it some time tonight. If it looks as though it has any bearing on the case, I’ll get it to you first thing in the morning.”
“Good,” Ernie said, heading out the door “What I don’t need is one more thing that has to be done tonight.”
The intercom on Joanna’s desk buzzed loudly. Without having been given proper operating instructions, Joanna wasn’t able to figure out how to make it work. Giving up, she finally walked over to the door and threw it open.
“Yes?”
“There’s someone out here waiting to see you.”
“Who?”
Before Kristin could answer, a young woman rose from one of the chairs across the room and hurried forward, hand extended. Short, stocky, well dressed, and very businesslike, she seemed vaguely familiar, although Joanna couldn’t quite place her.
“Sue Rolles,” the woman said with a winning smile. “I’m a reporter for the Arizona Daily Sun.”
“A reporter. I’m afraid you need to talk to Chief Deputy Voland. He’s the one handling the press on today’s glory-hole cases.”
“This isn’t about those,” Sue Rolles said. “It’s something else entirely.”
Joanna led the way back into her office and motioned the visitor into a chair. “Have we met be fore?” Joanna asked. “You look familiar.”
“We didn’t exactly meet,” Sue Rolles replied. “We ran into one another back in September in the lobby at University Hospital in Tucson. But we were never properly introduced. Since then, I’ve spent a good deal of time here in Cochise County working on a special assignment.”
“What kind of assignment?”
“The sheriff’s race.”
Joanna Brady had been in office for only one day but she had been around law enforcement long enough to suspect ambush journalism.
“That’s funny,” she said. “I don’t remember your ever asking for an interview with me.”
“It’s not that kind of article,” Sue Rolles said quickly.
“I see. Exactly what kind is it then?”
Sue Rolles shrugged. “You know how it is. people are free to say things before elections that they can’t or won’t say afterward. My editors wanted me to survey some of the people who work here to get an insider’s view of how people would react depending on which of the three candidates was actually elected.”
“In other words,” Joanna interjected without humor, “you’ve been out stirring up a hornet’s nest in advance of my taking office.”
“Oh, no. Not at all.”
“What, then?”
“Since you’re the first woman to hold this office in the state of Arizona, there’s a good deal of interest, especially since most of the officers who will be reporting to you are men.”
“So?” Joanna asked warily.
“Do you see a problem with that?”
“Not particularly. I’ve addressed that question on numerous occasions during my election campaign. Crime is the problem. Gender is not the problem.”
“Even though some of your officers might be vocally critical of your… law-enforcement abilities?”
“The voters of this county didn’t expect me to know everything the first day I walked into this office,” Joanna countered. “You and I both know there’s a learning curve on any new job. I believe the people who elected me were bargaining for a hard worker. They want me to uncover any problems that may exist in this agency and to find solutions to them. That’s what the people wanted and it’s what I expect to give them.”
“Do you think your election combined with what happened to the previous sheriff will make for a continuing morale problem in the department?”
Joanna Brady wasn’t eager to discuss Walter V McFadden or the role she herself had played in his death.
“Any change of administration or supervision always comes with the potential for ‘morale’ problems. That goes for the private sector every bit as much as it does for governmental agencies. I didn’t come in here expecting to do a wholesale house cleaning. My intention is to give officers under me a fair crack at showing me what they can do. I assume they will grant me the same courtesy.”
“You know about Martin Sanders’ resignation then?”
Martin Sanders, deputy for administration, was Dick Voland’s counterpart on the administrative side. He had always been a background player.
While Dick had been out actively campaigning for Al Freeman, Martin Sanders had been at work minding the store. He was someone Joanna naturally would have expected to meet during the course of her first full day in office had two separate homicides not taken precedence.
“He resigned?” Joanna demanded in surprise. “Since when?”
Sue Rolles looked startled as well. “I thought you knew all about that. My understanding was that he turned in his letter of resignation sometime early this morning. I wonder if it would be fair to characterize his action as a vote of no confidence.”
Joanna could barely contain her irritation. “Since I haven’t seen the letter yet,” she snapped, “I don’t believe it’s fair to characterize it one way or the other. My answer on that issue is no comment. Period!”
“What about Chief Deputy Richard Voland?”
“What about him?”
“Do you have anyone in mind as his replacement?”
“Replacement? Who says he’s leaving?”
Sue Rolles shrugged. “Well,” she said disingenuously, “both he and Martin are political appointees, patronage workers who serve at the discretion of the sheriff. And since Voland actively supported your opponent…”
Joanna cut the reporter off in mid-sentence. “Ms Rolles,” she said, “did you attend Dick Voland’s press conference earlier this afternoon?”
“Yes, but…”
“Then you are well aware that this agency is currently in the midst of coping with not one but two separate homicides in addition to handling the regular workload of calls.”
“Yes.”
“From the tenor of your questions, it appears to me this interview is heading in a direction I don’t especially like. I believe it’s designed to undermine my new administration, to create ill-will and disharmony at a time when we all need to pull together to get the job done. With that in mind I have nothing more to say at this time.”
“But…”
Impatiently, Joanna punched a button on the intercom. Luckily, it was the right one, and Kristin answered. “Yes?”
“Miss Marsten,” Joanna said. “Ms. Rolles is just leaving. Would you please show her out? And would you mind bringing in my mail? I’ve been told there are some items lurking in there that require my immediate attention.”
While she waited for Sue Rolles to leave and for Kristin to bring in the mail, Joanna turned and looked out her window. Not that many offices in the building boasted private windows.
It was after four. Already the late fall sun was fast disappearing behind the Mule Mountains to the west. The hillside outside her window was spiked with gray sticks of spindly, thorny ocohllo branches. At first glance, the ghostly dumps of twigs seemed dead or dying, but the slanting after noon sunlight revealed a faint tinge of green out lining the stalks. Even though winter weather was fast approaching, pale new leaves sprouted among the spiny thorns.
In order to survive in the harsh desert climate, ocohllos spend most of the year looking parched and barren. But whenever the shallow roots are blessed with rain, short-lived leaves appear on seemingly dead branches. New crops of leaves can come and go several times in the course of a single year.
Why couldn’t people be more like ocotillos? Joanna wondered, envying the hardy desert candle wood its natural resilience. Humans didn’t necessarily have that same kind of toughness, the same ability to withstand and recover from terrible dry spells.