Trouble at the Red Pueblo (3 page)

She shook her head. “No. Our sons moving so far away and doing great things showed me that distant places and different people aren’t scary. I guess a small town just suited me.” She looked both ways as the pickup stopped at the edge of the parking lot. “Do you know where you’re going?”

“Yeah, I think. The highway is Center Street, and the stop light is Main. We need to go north a couple blocks and then east.”

They drove away from the city center to where street lights were fewer, and Laurie rolled down her window. “I always loved the summer nights in Kanab. They seemed more exciting than the nights at home.” As they turned a corner, she pointed at flashing lights a couple blocks away. “Some family’s got a tragedy going on.”

“Yeah, and by my reckoning, that’s just about where we’re headed. Can you see anything?”

“Even numbers are on this side.”

Spider pulled up behind the ambulance and peered through the windshield, trying to locate the address on the house that stood with its front door open. “That’s it,” he said, reaching for the door handle. “I don’t like bothering people when they’ve got something like this going on, but I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

“At least the police aren’t here,” Laurie said.

“Not yet, anyway. Stay here.” He got out and crossed the lawn, reaching the edge of the yellow circle thrown by the porch light as a uniformed man backed through the doorway on one end of a wheeled stretcher. His partner followed on the other end, and they passed by Spider on the way to the ambulance. In the shadows, Spider was aware that the man on the stretcher had gray hair and an oxygen mask. Two people trailed behind— a young man with his arm around an older woman. She walked with hunched shoulders and folded arms. They stopped near Spider as the EMTs slid the stretcher inside, and the sound of the legs folding rang loudly in the quiet of the night.

The ambulance doors slammed shut, and the young man said, “Come on, Mom. We’ll meet him at the hospital.” He tugged on her arm. “You go get in the car. I’ll close the front door.”

Feeling uncomfortable and intrusive, Spider followed him across the lawn. “Excuse me. Are you… is this where the Taylors live?”

The young man whirled, obviously startled. “Yes?”

“I know this is a bad time.”

“This is a very bad time.” He jerked the front door closed and strode to the car with Spider in his wake.

“Who is it, Mattie?” The woman’s voice was querulous. As she stood in the driveway, she looked like she was ready to fold in on herself, and Spider veered to her side of the car.

Her son reached the driver’s door and opened it. “Get in the car, Mom.”

Spider took her arm and opened the passenger door, supporting her as she slid into the front seat. “My name is Spider Latham. I was supposed to be talking with Mr. Taylor right about now. Brick Tremain asked me to come over, see if I could lend a hand with the trouble.”

The driver leaned over and frowned up at Spider as he stood by the open door. “Come to the museum at nine tomorrow morning. We can talk then about ‘the trouble’ as you call it. I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Latham. When I find out who did this to my father, I’m going to kill him.” He started the car and shifted into reverse. “Now shut the door. We’re going to the hospital to see if my dad is going to survive the night.”

THE NEXT MORNING,
Laurie stood on the balcony of their hotel room and called through to Spider, brushing his teeth in the bathroom, “Have you ever seen sky so blue?”

“Not from where I am right now.” He rinsed, put the cap on the toothpaste, and strolled out to join her. “What makes this sky bluer than the one in Lincoln County?”

“I think it’s the red cliffs. They just bring out the blue.”

“Well, I’ll give you the red cliffs, but I’m not sure about the sky.” Spider tapped his watch. “We’re due at the museum in fifteen minutes.”

Laurie leaned on the railing, looking at the towering sandstone mesas that ringed the town. “I’d forgotten how beautiful it is.”

“You said that as we drove in last night. C’mon. We’ve got to go.” Shooing her through the sliding glass door, he closed it behind her and followed through the room and out the door, making sure it was locked.

When they were in the pickup headed south on Highway 89A, as the country faded from red sandstone to brown, Laurie asked, “What is the son’s name?”

“His mom called him Mattie. He looks more like a Matthew. Or a Matt.”

“Does he work at the museum?”

“Don’t know.”

They rode in silence, dropping down in elevation as they crossed the state line. A few houses perched among the rocky cliffs to the left, and a tumbledown package liquor store stood next to the highway, ready to serve thirsty Utahans willing to travel the few miles into Arizona.

Topping the next rise, they could see Fredonia below.

“I wonder how Mr. Taylor is,” Laurie said.

“We’ll know soon as we find the museum.”

“It’s on this end of town. Just beyond all the refinery tanks.”

“How do you know?”

“I saw the sign when we came through yesterday afternoon. It’s called the Red Pueblo.”

“Huh.” Spider scanned the small town’s outskirts, noting the missing metal on the huge steel tanks of the idle refinery and the vacant appearance of the surrounding buildings. “It doesn’t look like a prosperous place.”

“But the museum looks good. See the sign ahead?” Laurie pointed.

Spider followed the line of sight from her finger and saw three adjoining small square buildings painted red ochre. He looked at his watch. “We’re five minutes late, but it doesn’t look like it’s open yet.” He slowed and turned left into a drive that led to a padlocked gate painted the same hue as the buildings. He pulled up beside an older SUV with a dimpled roof that looked like a near kin to the one on his own pickup.

An older couple sat inside. The lady in the passenger seat had her silver hair trimmed short with bangs that fell over her brow. She turned and smiled so broadly at Spider that her eyes crinkled shut. She motioned him to roll down his window and lowered her own. Spider noticed for the first time that she had oxygen tubing over her ears and going to her nose.

She pointed to an area above him. “What happened to you?”

It took Spider a moment to realize she was asking about the roof of his truck. He had rolled it on Barkley Mountain, trying to outrun someone who was shooting at him, and he hadn’t been able to pound out all the dents. “I missed a turn on a switchback,” he said.

Her eyes crinkled. “We got ours on the hogback up on the Pinnacle Trail.” Waving her hand to indicate the driver, obviously her husband, she said, “Dad got too close to the edge, and over we went. But we landed on the wheels.”

Wondering at the wisdom of senior citizens on hogbacks, Spider said, “That was lucky.”

“Dad says it was good management. He just hitched up the winch and hauled us back up. We were out getting rocks for Mattie’s ax heads.”

“Now, Mother.” The SUV driver’s voice was admonishing. “We’re not to call him Mattie anymore. He’s got a master’s degree.”

She spoke over the whoosh of her oxygen canister. “Mattie was good enough when I used to babysit for his mom. It’s good enough now.”

Spider glanced at his watch. “We were supposed to meet him here ten minutes ago.”

“Mattie? He’s not here until this afternoon. His father’s scheduled to open today.” She turned her head to look up the road toward Kanab. “He’s always here early. I hope nothing’s happened.”

Spider cleared his throat. “Well, as a matter of fact—”

Her husband interrupted. “Here comes Mattie.”

A mid-sized red pickup with a rack of lights on the cab pulled up behind the SUV, skidding on gravel that had migrated from the shoulder to the blacktop driveway. Matt Taylor got out of the cab, strode to the gate, and unlocked it. Pushing it open, he stood grim-faced while the two waiting vehicles passed through.

Laurie let out a breath. “Things don’t look good.”

“Well, let’s wait and see what he says.” Spider parked in front of the entrance to the well-kept museum building. To the right, a fence encircled a log cabin, a small replica of a dugout dwelling, and several different kinds of wagons.

The SUV pulled up beside them, and the red pickup followed. As Matt got out and stalked across to the double glass doors, his angular form reminded Spider of a coiled spring.

The senior couple met Matt at the entrance. Her oxygen bottle was slung over her shoulder in a canvas grocery bag as she waited for him to unlock the door. The husband, tall and heavy set with iron gray hair and a cookie-duster mustache, frowned as he listened to what Matt was saying.

“I hope we haven’t come too late,” Laurie said. “Are you going to talk to him?”

“Yeah.” Spider watched Matt let the gray haired couple in and then turn to acknowledge the Lathams’ presence, raising his hand and giving a
come on in
gesture.

“I’ll look around the museum while you two talk,” Laurie said.

Spider opened his door. “No. You’ve got good instincts. I’d just as soon you hung close by.” He got out and waited for her to join him on the sidewalk and then held the door for her as they entered.

The museum lobby, though small, was well laid out. A receptionist’s area sat behind a U-shaped glass showcase filled with pottery, baskets, stone axes and other Native American wares to sell. Books, pamphlets and maps lined one wall, and on the opposite wall, a wide arched doorway led into the museum proper.

Matt and the senior couple were behind the glass counter. All three looked up with solemn expressions as Spider and Laurie stepped through the doorway.

For a moment, nobody spoke. Spider, expecting the worst and wishing he had stayed home in Panaca, took off his Stetson and introduced himself and Laurie, explaining that he had come at Brick Tremain’s behest. Turning to Matt he asked, “How’s your father?”

“He’s alive.” Matt ran his hand over the dark stubble on his chin. “I sat with him all night. You’ll have to excuse how I look.”

“I’m LaJean Baker.” The gray haired lady reached across the counter to shake hands with Spider and Laurie. “This is Isaac. We volunteer here at the museum, and Isaac’s on the board with Brick Tremain.”

“We knew he was sending someone, but we didn’t know it was you,” Isaac said.

LaJean smiled. “I guess we didn’t expect you’d be driving a pickup that had turned its oil pan to the sun.”

Spider smiled back at her. “I like to keep a low profile. Glad to meet you both.” Turning his attention to Matt, he asked, “What happened that sent your father to the hospital in an ambulance?”

“We thought it was his heart, but the doctors said that it was stress mimicking a heart attack.”

“Then it wasn’t an injury?” Laurie asked. “He wasn’t attacked?”

Matt’s brown eyes flashed. “Nobody came at him with a gun or a club, but I assure you, he is under attack.”

At the sound of a car pulling into the driveway, Spider glanced out. A bespectacled child sat in the backseat, nose to the window. “Looks like you’ve got customers,” Spider said. “Is there a place we could talk privately?”

“In here.” Matt opened a door behind the counter leading to an office. The wall between the office and lobby was mostly glass, but it would offer a place where conversation couldn’t be heard by strangers.

Spider stepped aside, so Laurie could precede him and then followed her in. The office was a study in organization, with labeled cupboards, cubbies and mail slots lining the walls. Matt sat at a desk located in the middle of the room, and Laurie and Spider took the chairs in front of it.

Setting his hat on the corner of the desk, Spider pulled a small spiral notebook and pen out of his shirt pocket. He looked Matt in the eye and said, “I know you’re angry enough to go bear hunting with a switch, but I need you to take a couple of deep breaths and tell me what’s going on. All Brick said was that there was some kind of trouble.”

Matt had his elbows on his chair, hands clasped in front of him, and his dark hair fell over his brow as he looked down and muttered through clenched teeth, “Some kind of trouble.”

Spider waited, and the moments stretched out as Matt continued to examine his hands.

Laurie was the first to speak, and her voice was gentle. “Tell us when the trouble began. What was the beginning of your father’s stress?”

Matt exhaled, a great whooshing sound like a deflating balloon. He unclasped his hands and rubbed his forehead, though he still kept his eyes lowered. “I guess the beginning of it was last year with the bathroom incident.”

Spider opened his notebook. “Can you tell us what that was?”

The younger man made a motion with his hand as if trying to dismiss the memory. “The museum was built on what used to be a rest stop. The foundation got it from the state when they were going to close it down but with the proviso that we keep the restrooms open for travelers.”

An electronic bell sounded a two-tone alert, and Spider glanced through the window into the lobby as a ten-ish boy shouldered his way through the door. His mother hung onto his shirttail, giving what seemed to be instructions as they entered. The boy pushed his glasses up on his nose and nodded as he towed her to the counter and began asking Isaac questions.