Convenient Disposal (3 page)

“They’re voting on it today?”

“That’s the plan. But Tinneman has Swartz wavering, and that’s two out of five. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if they forced it to the table.”

“Even after the village council voted unanimously to contract services from the county?”

“It’s a turf thing,” Zeigler said. “Remember, Tinneman was mayor of Posadas at one time. He thinks that the village should have its own police department, no matter what. He thinks that once they give that up, the next thing to go is the fire department, then Lord knows what all else…He even said this morning that if we’re not careful, we’ll lose our post office.” He shrugged at the absurdity of it. “Go figure. It’s hard to tell just what his agenda is, except he likes to hear himself talk. He even thinks I’m giving the county dump away by looking at a private contractor.”

The county manager pushed himself away from the car’s fender and brushed off the seat of his tan chinos. “If you can stop by, it will help. The sheriff told them that the SO would be absorbing the two and a half village officers, but I’m not sure that Tinneman heard him.” He sighed. “I’d like to get this all cleaned up and running smoothly so we can move on to other issues. The world isn’t going to hold still for us to dither this to death.”

“I’ll be there,” Estelle said. “I’m not sure what I can say that will make any difference to Tinneman, but we’ll see.”

“Every bit helps,” Zeigler said. He paused with his hand on the door of his idling truck. “Everything staying quiet?”

“Quiet is always relative,” Estelle said.

“Boy, ain’t that the truth. See you after lunch, then.”

As Estelle settled into the county car, she enjoyed an unexpected sense of relief. The county meeting, with the ebullient Barney Tinneman always vying for center stage, could be entertaining—a good way to pass the hours until Francisco stepped off the school bus later that afternoon. She had no idea what she would say to her son.

Chapter Three

Pershing Park was a dusty, forlorn triangle that overlooked the intersection of Bustos and Grande Avenues, the two main streets that crossed through the heart of Posadas. The park featured half a dozen elms, a spread of struggling grass, two picnic tables, and a rusting vintage tank alleged to have been part of Black Jack Pershing’s assault on Pancho Villa’s forces in 1916. The tank had rested on its concrete pedestal for so long that it had colored to a nice, even patina from tracks to turret. Sheriff Robert Torrez had once irreverently remarked that the tank had been donated to the Village of Posadas by someone who didn’t own a cutting torch.

Pershing Street formed the hypotenuse and northwestern boundary of the park. One of the few modern buildings in Posadas, the U.S. Post Office fronted the intersection of Pershing and Bustos. Its nearest neighbor was the former Martinez Brothers A & P grocery store, a flat-roofed, concrete block building. Sometime decades before, an industrious contractor had purchased the A & P, thinking that with a few tons of Sheetrock, the old store could be partitioned into a minimall of sorts.

Of the various ventures that had counted on the neighboring post office to provide a constant flow of daily traffic over the years, only three remained. Arley’s Vacuum and Sewing occupied a small corner niche in the old supermarket building, about where the fruits and vegetables used to be. The various cracks and BB holes in the front window had been artfully repaired with duct tape. Arley was semiretired. When Estelle had tried to have her mother’s aging Singer fixed, she had discovered that Arley had adopted “You can’t get parts for those” as his basic operating motto.

At the other end of the building, the elderly Helen Pierce’s retirement project, Junque and Treasure, was filled to overflowing with more the first than the second, and was open occasionally on Tuesday afternoons. Sandwiched between Junque and two vacant opportunities was Great Notions, a little boutique owned by MaryAnne Bustamonte.

The
OPEN
sign was propped in the window of Great Notions as Estelle’s county car drifted to a stop at the curb between the post office and Arley’s. She studied the boutique for a few minutes in the rearview mirror, then keyed the radio.

“PCS, three ten is ten-six on Pershing near the post office.”

“Ten-four, three ten. Did the county manager find you?”

“That’s affirmative.”

“Ten-four, three ten. Bobby wanted to be sure you were going to the meeting.” Gayle Torrez, the sheriff’s wife, leaned hard on the word
sure
.

Estelle grinned as she hung up the mike. It was a safe bet that the sheriff would bow out of the commissioner’s meeting the instant he could finagle someone else to represent the department. Despite something as important as the pending dissolution of the village police force, with village patrol contracted through the county, Robert Torrez would rather clean up roadkill than sit in the stuffy commission chambers.

The cork tip protecting the long, polished hat pin was still in place as Estelle slipped the evidence bag out of her briefcase and into her inside jacket pocket.

She had visited Great Notions a half dozen times since it had opened a decade ago, not always as a customer eager to browse through the scarves, handmade vests and hats, incense, or bolts of Guatemalan fabric. MaryAnne Bustamonte had developed a love of other things from south of the border, and generally wasn’t too concerned about whether the burning incense samples covered up the aroma of smoldering hemp.

MaryAnne Bustamonte and Ivana Hurtado were sisters, some times to the younger Ivana’s discomfort. Ivana didn’t find her sister’s occasional court appearances the least bit amusing. Perhaps more important, Ivana might find it even less amusing to know—if she didn’t already—that her middle-school daughter Deena probably regarded Aunt MaryAnne as the perfect role model. The instant she’d seen the hat pin, Estelle had thought of MaryAnne Bustamonte.

A little brass bell from India jingled above the door as the undersheriff entered. MaryAnne Bustamonte was perched on a two-step ladder, trying to shove a bolt of fabric into the highest spot on an upper shelf. She turned and looked over her shoulder, squinting through the haze.

Except for a thickening of the waist, MaryAnne had changed little from the attitudinal teenager Estelle remembered from an American History class the two of them had shared at Posadas High School twenty years before.

“Hi,” MaryAnne said. “I’ll be down in a minute.”

“No hurry,” Estelle said. She remained near the door, trying not to breathe the cloying air too deeply. When not smoking marijuana, MaryAnne lit one nonfiltered cigarette after another. One was smoldering in an ashtray by the antique cash register. Its smoke twined with vapors from a burning incense stick near the pens.

With a final pat to smooth the fabric, and apparently not the least concerned that the expensive cloth would reek of smoke, MaryAnne retreated down the ladder.

“And what is the law west of the Pecos up to today?” she asked. Her voice was raspy, on the verge of a cough. With an efficient twist, she snubbed out the cigarette and then leaned on the small counter with both elbows, watchful as Estelle ambled up the narrow aisle.

The undersheriff stopped in front of a glass-fronted display labeled
HEAD CASE
. Inside, MaryAnne had arranged an impressive collection of barrettes, combs, and hairpins on a large, open Oriental fan. The eclectic display featured accessories carved from, or studded with, coral, jade, turquoise, amber, enameled copper, even carved wood.

Fanned out on a shelf under the display were half a dozen hat pins, ranging in size from three to six inches. Their handles were utilitarian black plastic.

“MaryAnne, I wanted to talk to you about your niece.”

The woman reached across the register and pulled a cigarette out of the crumpled pack. “Need I ask which one?” When Estelle responded only with a tilt of the head, MaryAnne tapped the end of the cigarette against the glass countertop, then held it like a pencil, unlit. “We would be talking about little Deena, right?”

“Yes.”

MaryAnne exhaled as if the cigarette were lit and she’d drawn a lungful. “What now?”

“She was charged this morning with bringing a weapon onto school grounds. The school suspended her for the remainder of the year.”

“Oh, you’re joking.”

“No.” Estelle pulled the plastic envelope from her pocket and laid it carefully on the counter in front of MaryAnne. The woman didn’t change position, but Estelle saw her eyes flick from the envelope to the display on the shelf.

“Deena was carrying
that
in school?”

“Yes.”

“
That’s
the weapon?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Oh, please,” MaryAnne said, dragging the word out. “And she said that she bought it here?”

“She wouldn’t say where she bought it, MaryAnne.”

MaryAnne’s frown was dark. She glared at Estelle, violet eyes first opening wide, then narrowing to a squint. “Well, so,” she said. “That didn’t take you long, did it. It just makes me all warm and fuzzy inside to think that I was the first one to come to mind.”

“
Did
she buy it here?”

“Well, no doubt,” MaryAnne snapped, and straightened up, waving a theatrical hand at the display. “Now you’re going to tell me that it’s illegal to sell this junk? And you’re spending your time roaming all over town telling people what they can or can’t sell?”

“No, I’m not doing that,” Estelle said patiently. She slipped the evidence bag back into her pocket. “I thought maybe you’d like to know, is all.”

“She has this in her little purse, and that earns her a year’s suspension.” MaryAnne sneered. “Aren’t we all just
so
virtuous.”

“Deena was carrying it threaded into the inseam of her jeans.”

The woman’s forehead puckered for an instant. “Now isn’t she the clever one.”

“MaryAnne, this is one of those dumb fads that kids jump into without thinking,” Estelle said. “Who knows where it started, or how they hear about it. It would help
them
if they couldn’t just walk in here and buy the things.”

“Well, sure,” MaryAnne said. “They could walk into any discount store and buy a set of knitting needles, too…sharpen ’em up, and there you go.”

“Except knitting needles are too big, and they’re nice soft aluminum or plastic. Not steel that holds a point, like those,” Estelle added. “And I agree. They could walk into the hardware and buy a hatchet any day of the week, or a steak knife, or a pickax. Or how about a chain saw? They’d be a little harder to conceal, maybe. But those”—and she turned to nod at the display—“aren’t intended for sale as
hat pins
, MaryAnne. We both know that. They’re intended for sale to kids as weapons that are all the fad right now, that are easily concealable, and are as lethal as an ice pick.” She saw the woman’s face darken with anger and added, “It puzzles me that you would want to be part of that.”

“You can go away any time now,” MaryAnne said, turning half around. “This is the dumbest thing I ever heard.”

“I tell you what,” Estelle said, making no move to leave. She slipped a small camera from her pocket. “Do you mind?” MaryAnne didn’t reply. Estelle took her time composing a photo of the hat pin display, stepping close and angling the shot to diminish the effect of flash glare on the glass.

MaryAnne glowered but didn’t object as the undersheriff took three photos. On autopilot, the shop owner’s hand snagged the butane lighter on the cash register and she lit the cigarette.

Estelle turned away from the case in time to see the angry tremble in the woman’s hand.

“I think it’s ludicrous that I’m having this conversation with the aunt of a young girl who was just in a fight where she or someone else could have been seriously hurt, and on top of that, who just got expelled from school for the rest of the year.” The glower continued, but MaryAnne held her tongue, and Estelle counted that as progress.

“All I’m asking…and what, they’re just a buck or so each? All I’m asking is that you sell those things only to little old ladies who want to hold their hats on,” Estelle said. “Little old ladies who need a six-inch hat pin.” Despite the smoke that MaryAnne made a point of exhaling in her direction, Estelle stepped closer to the counter. “I don’t think that’s a lot to ask, and I don’t think it’s out of line.”

“Deena is old enough to make her own choices,” MaryAnne said.

“Oh, sure,” Estelle said. “At fourteen years old? She proved that this morning, didn’t she.” She smiled. “Remember what we were like back then?”

“No, thank God. I don’t,” MaryAnne snapped, but her tone had softened. “What was she trying to do, anyway?”

Ah, now we care
, Estelle thought. “We don’t know for sure. The best guess is that it was a jealous girlfriend-boyfriend thing. She thought that when she went back to school—maybe walking to or from—that she was going to be jumped. She wanted a little protection.”

MaryAnne shook her head slowly, thoughtfully turning the ash off the end of the cigarette.

“We hope it isn’t anything more than that,” Estelle added. “Did Deena talk to you about her troubles?”

“If she did, that’s between her and me,” MaryAnne said, an edge back in her voice.

Estelle nodded. “Yes, it would be.” She indicated the display. “And we’d appreciate any cooperation you can give us.”

“I
assume
,” MaryAnne said as Estelle turned to leave, “that I’m not the only merchant being harassed about all this?”

“Are there others I should talk to?” Estelle asked pleasantly. When MaryAnne just sniffed, she added, “You have a nice day.”

Chapter Four

The sheriff was leaning against the wall, the copier and drinking fountain between him and the double doors leading into the County Commission chambers. His eyes were fixed on the polished tile floor. Like a bobble-head doll caught in a light breeze, his nod was slight but continuous. While he nodded, Posadas Mayor Peter Lujan talked, bent at the waist and intent, one crooked and arthritic finger hooked within striking distance of Robert Torrez’s nose.

The sheriff glanced up as Estelle entered. His shoulders straightened, the nod increased, and he reached out a mammoth paw to rest on Lujan’s shoulder as if searching for the on-off switch. Before he could disengage himself, a group of four men directly in front of the chamber doors dissolved, three heading inside and one making a beeline for Estelle.

“You’ve come to join the fun?” Dr. Arnold Gray said cheerfully. He extended a hand, and his chiropractor’s grip was firm.

“Sure,” Estelle replied. Gray was unshakable in his support of the proposal that the county should provide police services to the village, but his quiet logic hadn’t made much of a dent on Barney Tinneman’s doubts. As chairman of the commission, Gray’s philosophy was to let others talk until the matter was resolved or reached a head. Estelle knew that the issue of the Village of Posadas abandoning its police force in favor of contracted services from the county had been jawed to death during various workshops and public meetings. Half a dozen stories had appeared in the
Posadas Register
before the village had voted in favor of the move, and waited patiently for the county to reach consensus.

Gray glanced at his watch. “Just about showtime.” He flashed a quick smile as he turned toward the chambers. “I’ll see you inside.”

Sheriff Torrez finally managed to break away from Mayor Lujan and strode toward Estelle—or perhaps toward the outside door behind her.

“What was the deal at the school?” he asked, voice low.

“A girl with a hat pin,” Estelle said.

“You’re kidding.”

“No. A nice, six-inch-long steel hat pin. She had it laced in the inseam of her jeans.”

“That’s slick.” He nodded at the county attorney who hustled into the building at that moment, favored them with a curt nod, and then vanished into the chambers. Torrez looked back at Estelle. “Zeigler found you, I assume.”

“Yes. He said that Tinneman is still a roadblock.”

Torrez muttered something and shook his head. “That old fart just likes to hear himself talk.” He glanced back toward the doorway. “I guess they’re about ready. I was thinkin’ that I probably have some work I have to do, somewhere.”

Estelle laughed. “Be brave, sir.” She took the sheriff by the elbow and steered him gently toward the meeting room. “Is Eddie here?”

“Sure.” Torrez grumbled. “He’s already been on the hot seat.” Estelle found it hard to believe that anyone could make the smooth, quick-witted police chief uncomfortable. “Well,” Torrez added with a sigh, “let’s give ’em a few more minutes.”

The commission chambers were not crowded, but a respectable showing of residents were scattered throughout the small auditorium. Chief Eddie Mitchell had settled halfway back on the right side, one seat in from the aisle. Estelle slipped into that spot, and he looked up from the magazine he’d been reading. Sheriff Torrez settled with a great creaking of leather and clanking of hardware into the seat directly behind her.

Mitchell leaned toward Estelle, his voice a loud stage whisper. “Weighty matters,” he said.

“So I hear.” Estelle scanned the room. “Are we going to have a vote today?”

“Ho, ho.”

Four of the five commissioners were spaced around the huge semicircular table, a welter of microphones, papers, folders, and files marking each spot, including the empty seat where Tina Archuleta would normally sit. To the right, County Clerk Stacey Roybal hunched over her desk, sipping from a thermal cup and studying a thick computer readout, while at her elbow newspaper editor Pam Gardiner leaned on the edge of the dais, probing something in the document with her pencil eraser. Only Roybal’s rimless granny glasses prevented her from looking twelve years old, tiny in comparison with the mountainous editor.

Commission Chairman Dr. Arnold Gray settled in his seat, glanced around the room, hesitated, then hefted the gavel. He leaned and said something to Barney Tinneman, seated to his right. Both men laughed. Gray rapped the gavel twice, and people dove for their seats. Estelle watched Pam Gardiner settle in the front row, voluminous handbag and camera case near at hand.

Gray nudged the microphone a bit. “We’re back,” he said by way of greeting. “For better or worse.” He grinned toward the back corner where a short, sober man stood beside a large tripod-mounted video camera. “You have a fresh tape in that thing, Milt?” The man shifted his feet and looked uncomfortable when several members of the audience snickered. At every meeting she had ever attended in Posadas County, Estelle had seen Crowley filming from beginning to end. He and his camera were a fixture. What he then did with the tapes was a closely guarded mystery, beyond simply owning them as proof should some public servant step out of line. His small ranch was allegedly studded with hand-painted signs threatening trespassers and warning of the dangers of government—whether in the form of tax assessors, the U.S. Forest Service, the Internal Revenue Service, or the Highway Department.

“All right,” Gray continued. “As I remember, when we adjourned, Mr. Tinneman had the floor.”

“Now
that’s
unusual,” Barry Swartz said. He was seated at the extreme left, beside the county clerk. Sales manager at Chavez Chevrolet-Oldsmobile, he was a burly man with a quick smile who favored the rumpled look.

Tinneman didn’t hesitate. “When we adjourned for lunch, Chief Mitchell was just wrapping up,” he said. “Chief, did you have anything to add?”

Mitchell shook his head.

“Then I have a few more questions both for the sheriff and the county manager.” He hesitated, glancing toward the rear of the chambers. The county manager’s desk was situated in the back of the small auditorium, near the large framed county map. Kevin Zeigler preferred to face the commission from behind the audience, rather than taking a place up on the dais. Frequently needing either documents from his office across the hall or summoned to the phone, Zeigler could come and go from his vantage in the back without disturbing the commission.

“Kevin’s on a power lunch,” Tinneman said with a smirk. He glanced across the dais. “And so is Tina, I guess.”

“She had an errand,” Dr. Gray intoned. “And Kevin will be here shortly, I’m sure.”

“Well, let’s get started anyway.” With an audible sigh, Torrez had lurched out of his seat. There were two microphone-equipped podiums in the commission chambers for members of the audience to use—one near the commissioners’ dais on the far side of the hall, and one in the back, by the double entry doors. Crowley had set up his camera just to the left of the rear podium, where the sheriff chose to go…as far as possible from the commissioners and as close as possible to the exit doors.

With his camera, Crowley could cover either the speaker at the guest microphone, or the commission—but not both simultaneously. He chose to pan the commissioners.

“Sheriff, I’m still confused about this one basic issue”—and Tinneman held up his right index finger while he scanned the papers in front of him.

“He’s confused about more than that,” Chief Mitchell muttered to Estelle.

“My concern is coverage,” Tinneman continued. “Small as the village department is, we’ve always got
someone
on duty…even if it’s just one person.”

“Actually, that’s not true,” Torrez said, and it sounded more like an aside.

“What’s not true?” Tinneman looked up sharply.

“The village department has three and a half employees,” Torrez said slowly. “The chief already testified to that. One secretary, one chief, one patrolman, and a part-time, noncertified officer who also serves as the animal control officer.”

“We’re aware of that.”

You’re aware of all of this
, Estelle thought, wondering how many times the same issue needed to be mauled before a decision could be made.

“You can’t cover twenty-four/seven with two and a half people, Mr. Tinneman. It’s physically impossible,” Torrez said.

“Three and a half,” Tinneman interjected.

“The secretary doesn’t go out on patrol,” Mitchell said from the audience.

“Well, all right,” Tinneman persisted. “But we’re covered
most
of the time, are we not? During the busy times, like evenings, weekends?”

“I suppose,” Torrez conceded. “If you can predict when ‘busy’ is going to be.”

“Well, see…I want to know how the county can provide better coverage than that from
outside
the village. That’s all I’m saying. And that’s what I’ve been arguing all along, ever since we first had this notion tossed on the floor.”

“Eighty-five percent of our responses to emergency calls are within the village limits,” Torrez said. “Not counting traffic stops.”

“That’s most of them,” Tinneman said, and Swartz muttered an aside that drew a chuckle from Dr. Gray. Tinneman ignored them. “So in your mind, there’s no trouble picking up the slack.”

“I don’t see it as slack,” Torrez responded. “For one thing, we plan to increase our manpower by two full-time officers.”

“Isn’t it true that there are times now when there is only one deputy on the road? One deputy for the whole county?”

“Yes.”

“One deputy for the
entire
county?”

“Yes,” Torrez responded patiently.

“So if there’s a call within the village, that leaves no one on the road out in the county?”

“There’s usually a state police officer within range.”

“
Usually
. But not always.” When Torrez didn’t respond, Tinneman relaxed back in his chair. “Sheriff, who’s on duty for the county right now?” He rapped the dais with a stiff index finger. “Right at this moment? Who’s working?”

“Me, the undersheriff, and one deputy.”

“Is that deputy certified?”

“No. Not yet.”

“So essentially, it’s you two, then.” He swept a finger to include Torrez and Estelle. “And you’re stuck in here. Right now, who’s on duty in the village?”

Mitchell shifted in his seat. “Officer Sisneros,” he said.

Tinneman frowned, looked first to the right, and then to the left as if caught in a profound conundrum. “See, that’s the thing. Is Tuesday afternoon considered a high-crime time around here?” Someone in the audience laughed, but Tinneman held the pose until Torrez responded.

“No, sir. It’s not.”

“And yet we
have five
officers on duty.”

“No, sir, we don’t.”

“Well, explain to me, then.”

“Myself, the chief, and the undersheriff are
always
on call,” Torrez said. “We don’t work any particular shift. We’re around when we need to be. We’re here right now because of this meeting. As far as
working
officers are concerned, cops who are out in cars and able to respond to dispatch, you’ve got Sisneros in the village, and one uncertified deputy in the county.” A flicker of a smile touched the sheriff’s handsome face. “And if something major happens, you’d see the three of us headin’ out this door.”

“And so how is that coverage going to improve with this merger?”

“It’s not.” When Tinneman looked triumphant, Torrez added, “The only way coverage is going to improve is to hire more staff. Merging the two departments saves some money spent on—”

When he stopped short, groping for the right word, Gray leaned forward. “Infrastructure?”

“That’s it.”

“Now here’s the question,” Tinneman said. “Is the amount of money that the village will spend to contract with us instead of having their own department
sufficient
…”—he lingered on the word—”is it sufficient to provide the extra patrol officers that you say you need?”

“Probably not.”

The silence hung for a moment as Tinneman assumed that the sheriff planned to amplify his answer. When Torrez didn’t, the commissioner shrugged his shoulders. “I just don’t see how we can take this on,” he said wearily.

“No one will
ever
spend enough to do the job right,” Commissioner Dulci Corona said. She shook her head in disgust.

“Well, that’s not the case—,” Tinneman started to say.

“Yes, it
is
the case,” Corona snapped, sounding like the grade school teacher she had been for thirty years. “No one wants to pay for police, but everyone will complain when an officer doesn’t show up in ten seconds when he’s called. We have an opportunity now to do something right. We can have a well-organized department that’s responsive in
both
the village and the county. We just
might
have to pay for it.”

“And that money comes from where?” Tinneman asked.

“There’s
always
money,” Corona said. “That’s the county manager’s job. To find it.”

Tinneman glanced back toward Zeigler’s still-empty desk. He ducked his head, turning toward Dr. Gray. “Was Kevin coming back this afternoon?”

Gray nodded. “As far as I know.”

“I have a couple of budget questions I want to explore with him,” Tinneman said. Torrez was already headed for his seat. “Sheriff, do you have your budget with you?”

Torrez hesitated, frowning. He settled into his seat when he saw Estelle raise her hand in response.

“Ah, you’re the departmental budget guru, Undersheriff?” Tinneman asked. He smiled benignly as Estelle rose and walked back to the podium. “Do you need to borrow some paper-work?” He held up a thick document.

“No, sir. I don’t think so.”

Milton Crowley swiveled the video camera so that its glass eye stared at her, and Estelle could hear it adjusting for the distance and dimmer light in the back of the room.

“Undersheriff Guzman, the chief told us this morning that his village department costs something like thirty-seven thousand dollars per person. Do I have that right?” Tinneman riffled through papers, stopped and underlined something with his pencil. “Counting salary, workman’s comp, benefits, vehicles, everything else, right down to the tissue paper in the restroom, it comes to just over a hundred thirty-one thousand for the department. That’s a little over thirty-seven thousand per person, if we divide it out that way.” He looked up at Estelle expectantly.