Paradise Lost (26 page)

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“Tell me about her.”

“What do you want to know?”

Jaime Carbajal shrugged. “Everything,” he said.

“She wasn’t very smart,” Jenny began.

“Why do you say that?”

“Because she had been held back—at least one grade and maybe even two. She was thirteen.

Everybody else in our class is only twelve. Dora always looked dirty, and she smelled bad. She smoked, and she acted like she knew everything, but she didn’t. And she wasn’t very nice.”

“I can understand why Dora smelled funny and looked dirty,” Jamie Carbajal said quietly. “The place where she lived with her mother was filthy. The bathroom had been turned into a meth lab and the kitchen sink was bill of dirty dishes and rotten food. There was no place for Dora to shower or bathe.”

Jenny looked questioningly at Joanna. The idea of living with a mother who preferred manufacturing drugs to allowing her child to be clean must have seemed incomprehensible to her, just as it did to Joanna.

“There was some food in the house, but not much, and most of that wasn’t fit to eat,” Jaime Carbajal continued. “All in all, I don’t think Dora Matthews’s mother knew much about being a good mother. There’s a reason I’m telling you all this, Jenny. I understand why you may not have wanted to be Dora’s friend while she was alive, but I’m asking you to be her friend now. You can do that by helping us find out who killed her.”

“I don’t know how,” Jenny said in a subdued voice.

“Tell us whatever you remember,” Jaime urged. “Everything. Let’s start with Friday afternoon, when you went on the camping trip. What happened there?”

“Well,” Jenny began, “first we drove to Apache Pass. After we put up our tents, we ate dinner and had a campfire that wasn’t really a campfire—because of the fire danger. Mrs. Lambert had its use a battery-powered lantern instead of a regular fire. It was after that—after we all went to our tents—that Dora said we should go for a walk and ...”

Jenny paused and looked at Joanna. Sitting across the confer-ence table from her daughter, Joanna forced her expression to remain unchanged and neutral.

“And what?” Jaime prodded.

“...and have a cigarette.” Jenny finished the sentence in a rush. “I tried smoking one, only the taste of it made me sick—so sick that I threw up. It was after I barfed that we found that woman’s body—Mrs. Haskell’s body”

“Did you see or hear anyone nearby when you found the body?” Jaime asked.

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Jenny shook her head. “No. There wasn’t anyone. She was lying there by the road, naked and all by herself.”

“Did you see a vehicle, perhaps?” Jaime asked. “Maybe there was one parked somewhere along the road.”

“No,” Jenny said. “There wasn’t, at least not that I saw.”

Next to Joanna, Ernie Carpenter stirred, like a great bear wak-ing from a long winter’s sleep.

His thick black brows knit together into a frown. “You said a minute ago that Dora Matthews wasn’t nice. What did you mean by that, Jenny? Did she cuss, for instance, or beat people up?”

This time, instead of pouting, Jenny bit her lip before answer-ing. Lowering her eyes, she shook her head.

“By shaking your head, you mean she didn’t do those things, or do you mean you don’t want to answer?” Ernie prodded.

Jenny looked beseechingly at her mother. “Morn, do I have to answer?”

Joanna nodded and said nothing. Jenny turned back to Ernie and squared her shoulders. “Dora told lies,” she declared. “About what?”

Jenny squirmed in her seat. “About stuff,” she said.

“What stuff?” he asked.

“She said she had a boyfriend and that they like . . . you know.” Jenny ducked her head. A curtain of blond hair fell across her face, shielding her blue eyes from her mother’s gaze. “She said that they did it,” Jenny finished lamely.

“You’re saying that Dora and her boyfriend had sex?” Ernie asked.

“‘That’s what Dorasaid, ”Jenny replied. “She said they did and that he wanted to marry her, but how could he? She was only thirteen. Isn’t that against the law or something?”

“Dora wasn’t lying, Jenny,” Jaime Carbajal said softly. “Maybe the part about getting married was a lie, but Dora Matthews did have a boyfriend and they were having sex. And that is against the law. Even if Dora was a willing participant, having sex with a juvenile is called statutory rape.” He paused. “What would you think if I told you Dora Matthews was pregnant when she died?” he asked a moment later.

Jenny’s eyes widened in disbelief. She turned to her mother for confirmation. Again Joanna nodded. “It’s true,” she said.

“So what I’m asking you now is this,” Jaime continued quietly. “Do you have any idea who the father of Dora’s baby might he?”

To Joanna’s amazement, Jenny nodded. “Yes,” she said at once. “His name is Chris.”

“Chris what?” Jaime asked.

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“I don’t know his last name. Dora never told me. Just Chris. I tried to tell her not to do it, but Dora went ahead and called him—called Chris—from our house.”

“When was that?”

“Friday night, after Mrs. Lambert sent us home from the camp out. It was while we were at home and when Grandpa and Grandma Brady were taking care of us. Dora called Chris that night, after the Gs fell asleep. Then, the next morning, Chris called her back. I was afraid Grandma would pick up the phone iii the other room and hear them talking. I knew she’d be mad about it if she did, but she must have been outside with Grandpa. I don’t think she even heard the phone ring.”

“What time was that?” Jaime asked.

“I don’t know,” Jenny replied with a shrug. “Sometime Satur-day morning, I guess.”

“Could it have been about ten-fifteen?” Joanna blurted out the question despite having given herself strict orders to keep silent. Jenny looked quizzically in her mother’s direction. So did the two detectives.

“It may have been right around then,” Jenny said. “But I don’t know for sure.”

“I do,” Joanna said. “And I would guess that Chris’s last name will turn out to be Bernard,” she added, addressing the two detec-tives. “That name and a Tucson phone number showed up on our caller ID last night when I got home. Since neither Butch nor I know anyone by that name, I thought it had to be someone Jim Bob or Eva Lou Brady knew. Now I’m guessing it must have been Chris calling Dora.”

Jaime swung his attention from Joanna back to Jenny. “Did you happen to overhear any of that conversation?”

“A little,” Jenny admitted. “But not that much. Part of the time I was out of the room.”

“What was said?”

“Chris was supposed to come get her.”

“When?”

“That night,” Jenny murmured. “Saturday night. She said she’d be back at her own house by then, and that he should come by there—by her house up in Old Bisbee to pick her up. She gave him the address and everything. She told me later that they were going to run away and live together. She said Chris told her that in Mexico thirteen was old enough to get married.”

“Did you mention any of this to your grandparents?”

Jenny shook her head. “No,” she said softly.

“Why not?”

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Jenny looked at Joanna with an expression on her face that begged for understanding. “Because I didn’t want to be a tattletale,” she said at last. “The other kids all think that just because my mother is sheriff that I’m some kind of a goody-goody freak or perfect or something. But I’m not. I’m just a regular kid like everyone else.”

For Joanna Brady it was like seeing her own life in instant replay, a return to her own teenage years, when, with a father who was first sheriff and then dead, she too had struggled desperately to fit in. To be a regular kid. To be normal. It distressed her to think Jenny was having to wrestle the same demons. As a mother she may have been wrong about a lot of things, but she had called that shot—from the cigarettes on to this: Jenny’s stubborn determination to keep her mouth shut and not be a squealer.

“I see,” Jaime Carbajal said. “You already said you didn’t know Dora was pregnant. Do you think Chris knew?”

Jenny shrugged. “Maybe,” she said.

“What kind of arrangement was made for hint to route get her?”

“I don’t know that exactly, either. Like I said, I heard Dora give him her address and directions so he could get here. She said she’d sneak out to meet him just like she used to do up in Tucson.

She said her mother wouldn’t even notice she was gone. But then Grandma Lathrop called CPS.

The next thing I knew, that awful woman was there at the house to take Dora away, and all the while Dora was yelling, ‘No, no, no. I don’t want to go. Don’t make me go!’ “

Jenny paused then. A pair of fat tears dribbled down her cheeks and dripped onto the surface of the table. “I should have told, shouldn’t I? If I had, would it have made any difference or would Dora still he dead anyway?”

Joanna wanted to jump up, rush around the table, take Jenny in her arms and comfort her. She wanted to tell Ernie and Jaime, “Enough! No more questions.” But she didn’t. Even though it killed her to do so, she sat still and kept her mouth shut. It was Detective Carbajal who reached over and laid a comforting hand on Jenny’s trembling shoulder.

“I don’t know the answer to that,” he said gruffly. “Child Pro-tective Services took Dora Matthews into their custody. They’re the ones who were ultimately responsible for safeguarding her once she left your grandparents’ care.”

There was a knock on the door. Ernie lumbered up from his chair. “I’ll tell whoever it is to get lost,” he said.

Just then the door opened. Kristin poked her head inside and beckoned to Joanna. “I have a phone call for you, Sheriff Brady,” she said. “It’s urgent.”

Joanna looked at Jenny. “Will you be all right? I can ask Detec-tives Carpenter and Carbajal to not ask any more questions until I get back.”

Jenny shook her head. “It’s all right,” she said. “I don’t mind.”

Joanna followed Kristin into the lobby. “Who is it?” she asked. “Burton Kimball,” Kristin replied.

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Burton Kimball was Bisbee’s premier attorney. He did a fair amount of local defense work. He had also handled Clayton Rhodes’s will, the one in which Joanna’s former handyman had left his neighboring ranch to Joanna and Butch. Surely there was no lingering problem from that transaction that necessitated Joanna’s being yanked from Jenny’s interview.

“What does he want?” Joanna demanded. “I thought I told you we weren’t to be interrupted.”

“I’m sorry,” Kristin apologized. “Mr. Kimball insisted that it was vitally important that he speak to you. I offered to put him through to Chief Deputy Montoya, but he said you were the only one who would do.”

“All right then,” Joanna sighed. Shaking her head in frustration, she stomped into her office and unearthed her telephone from the mounds of papers that covered her desk. Then she sat down and took several deep breaths to compose herself. Finally she picked up the receiver and punched the “hold” button.

“Good morning, Burton,” she said as cordially as she could manage. “What can I do for you?”

“Well, sir,” Burton said in his mannerly drawl. “I’m sitting here in my office with my newest client, a lady by the name of Sally Matthews. I handled her parents’ estate, so she came to see me.

Ms. Matthews is interested in turning herself in, Sheriff Brady. The City of Bisbee has passed this case along to the Multi-Jurisdiction Force, so in actual fact, she’ll be turning herself in to them.

But, given what all has happened, she wants to talk to you first. Before Sally turns herself in to them, she wants to hear the straight scoop about what happened to Dora and what’s being done to find whoever’s responsible. That seems to me like a reasonable enough request.”

“She knows her daughter is dead?” Joanna asked.

“Yes, she does,” Burton replied. “She came back to town and heard it from an acquaintance—someone she ran into when she stopped to get gas. She took it hard, Sheriff Brady, real hard, but she’s had a chance to pull herself together now. If it wouldn’t he too inconvenient, I’d like to bring her out to see you as soon as possible. What do you think?”

There wasn’t much Joanna could say. “Sure,” she agreed. “Bring her right down.”

“I’m concerned that there might be reporters out front at your office due to that murder out in Apache Pass,” Burton Kimball continued. “Considering Dora’s previously publicized connection to that case, I’m afraid Sally’s appearance will cause quite a stir. Is there possibly a more discreet way of bringing her down to your place rather than just driving up to the front door and marching in through the main lobby?”

Joanna sighed. “Sure,” she said. “Come around to the back. There’s a door close to the west end of the building. That opens directly into my office. Knock on that, and I’ll let you in.”

“Thank you so much, Sheriff Brady,” Burton said. “You’re most kind. We’ll be there in a matter of minutes.”

As soon as Burton Kimball hung up, Joanna dialed Frank Mon-toya’s office. “What’s up?” her chief deputy asked. “Is the interview over already?”

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“It’s about to be,” she said. “Burton Kimball just called. He has Sally Matthews in his office.

She’s ready to turn herself in, and he’s bringing her here.”

“Why here?” Frank asked. “That meth lab was inside the city limits. It should be the City of Bisbee’s problem, not ours.”

“The city has passed the case off to MJF,” Joanna told him. “She’ll turn herself in to them, but Burton Kimball is bringing Sally Matthews here first so we can brief her about what happened to Dora. I’m calling to let you know that Sally Matthews now knows about her daughter’s death.

That being the case, you can go ahead and officially release Dora’s name to the press. We shouldn’t put it off any longer.”

“Will do,” Frank said.

Before returning to the conference room, Joanna stopped long enough to call Butch at home.

“Scroll through the caller ID screen,” she asked him. “I need the number of the guy named Richard Bernard who called on Saturday morning. I think we may have found the father of Dora Matthews’s baby.”

“The name is listed here as Richard Bernard, MD,” Butch said, once he’d read Joanna the number. “What is this, a doctor who’s some kind of pervert child molester?”