Red Man Down(79)

‘We live in a world of interlocking systems, you know that?’ Sarah said. ‘And no matter how many systems I learn, there’s always going to be a new one popping up that will make everything I know stop working.’

‘Is that what makes you tired?’ Denny said. ‘When I’m tired, like tonight, it’s because I swam so hard in gym and I have too much stupid homework.’

‘Your Aunt Sarah lives in a much more rarified world,’ Aggie said. ‘We probably can’t hope to understand a thinker at her high level.’

‘Or a mother who ridicules her own child when she’s down, that’s pretty hard to understand too. You want to watch a rerun of Battlestar Galactica after the dishes?’ she asked Denny.

‘You bet. Can Grandma watch too or are you two having a fight?’

‘It’s not a fight,’ Aggie said. ‘More like a joust, to help Aunt Sarah keep her sense of humor limbered up.’ She looked very tired herself, Sarah realized with a pang. When her mother began to stack her dishes, a thing she never used to do at the table while she was still sitting at it, Sarah touched her arm and said, ‘Sit still, you cooked. I’ll get this.’ When the dishes were done, they all watched one short episode of an old saga and went early to bed.

Sarah felt much brighter in the morning, and observed that the rest of the crew sitting around Delaney’s desk also looked as if they found their jobs rewarding and life worthwhile. All of us in a good mood at once? Is the moon blue?

Delaney said, with a glint, ‘Oscar, you have some pictures to show us?’

‘Yes.’ He had an old corkboard set up next to Delaney’s desk with a sheet over it. He got up now, proud of himself, lifted the sheet and twirled it away like a bullfighter. On the corkboard he’d pinned copies of the digital shots he’d taken yesterday, which showed, in succession, the steps by which a Toyota Camry could be reduced to a pile of spare parts. The last shot was of the bare chassis, off its wheels, surrounded by its mounds of rubble.

‘Amazing old car,’ he said. ‘Motor could go another hundred thousand easy.’

‘Now tell us what you found?’

Standing together by the cork board, Oscar and Jason said, in unison, ‘Absolutely nothing!’

‘The money’s not there,’ Delaney said. ‘Now, Leo, you?’

‘It’s not in Mesa anymore either,’ Leo said. ‘As we know, Joey drew out the last of it – a little over nine thousand dollars – on the morning of the day he died. I’ve spoken to the bank tellers and it looks like he’s been drawing it out a little at a time for years. It was up to almost ten times this much at the tipping point, three years ago. Then for some reason he quit depositing and started taking money out, one or two thousand at a time.’

‘So nothing new there either. Now Ray, did you get anything from your stroll around the neighborhood?’

‘Met a drinking buddy in one of the bars,’ Ray said, ‘who had heard Joey talk about money a lot. He discounted most of it as tequila talk, but he said it always seemed to center on the idea that Joey was coming into a nice piece of cash, he was going to be a lot better fixed pretty soon.’

‘But nothing definite?’

‘No. I went in two places that sell used merchandize – you know, it’s a fine line between junk and antiques in this town. They both said they buy things that look ready for resale, and base that judgment on what they’re already selling. It doesn’t seem to get any more scientific than that. They might have bought a few items from Joey over the years – nothing steady.’

‘See, just what I said, occasional money,’ Leo said.

‘OK. Who’s next?’

Sarah told them the story of Joey’s enraged phone call and her efforts to get the number. ‘I haven’t got the list yet, but it should be along any minute.’

‘And you like this phone call a lot,’ Delaney said. ‘Why?’

‘Because of the part about the threat,’ Sarah said. ‘I think it explains the one thing we’ve wondered about all along.’

All the heads in the room swiveled in her direction, eyes of all colors staring at her as Delaney said, ‘Oh, really? Only one? Which of the many things I have wondered about does it explain, Sarah?’

‘Well, you know – haven’t we said, all along, why would Frank do this? He was a good employee all those years and got along all right on what he earned. Why would he suddenly start to steal? Especially if he wasn’t going to spend it on himself? Doesn’t that suggest blackmail?’