months that she knew it by heart. Joanna was still trying to imagine what she would say to Ruth Voland when the answering machine clicked on telling her that no one was home.
Relieved, but sorry, too, Joanna put down the receiver and went to work. Half an hour later Kristin called in on the intercom to announce that someone named Philip Dotson was waiting in the outer office.
“Philip Dotson?” Joanna returned. “Who’s he?”
“He’s Reed Carruthers’ nephew and Hannah Green’s cousin,” Kristin replied. “He says he came here directly from George Winfield’s office. He was supposed to talk to Ernie Carpenter, but since Ernie’s not in, Deputy Voland suggested that he talk to you.”
After a moment’s reflection, she pressed the intercom talk button. “I’ll see him, Kristin,” she said. “Go ahead and show him in.”
By the time Kristin ushered the visitor into the office, Joanna was standing, waiting to greet him. “Good afternoon,” she said, holding out her hand. “I’m Sheriff Brady. I’m sorry we’re meeting under such tragic circumstances.”
Dotson, a tall, spare man in his late forties or early fifties, bore no family resemblance to his dead cousin. He was carrying a cowboy hat, an old one made of worn gray felt.
“‘Tragic?” he repeated with a shrug of his narrow shoulders. “I don’t know. Couldn’t be helped none, I guess. It was bound to happen.”
Joanna motioned him into one of the two visitor’s chairs. He sat down, carefully balancing his hat on the threadbare knee of a pair of worn Levis’. “What couldn’t be helped, Mr. Dotson?” Joanna asked.
“Reed Carruthers was a son of a bitch, if you’ll pardon the expression, ma’am. It’s a wonder somebody didn’t cave his head in a long time ago. His poor wife-my Aunt Ruth-was my mother’s sister. For starters, Aunt Ruth is the one who shoulda done it. There may be meaner men on the face of the earth; I just haven’t had the misfortune of meeting any of ‘em. Leastways not so far. And as for Hannah, she was always a couple tacos short of a combination plate, if you know what I mean.”
“You’re saying she was mentally disturbed?” Joanna asked.
“Amongst the family, we always said she was just plain crazy-crazy and dumb both. She got away from her old man once when she run off and married that trucker from Drip-ping Springs, Texas. What nobody could ever figure out was why she come back home once that marriage broke up, or why she stayed, either one. Guess she thought she just didn’t have no other choice. The thing is, if she’da left him, she pro’ly coulda made it on her S.S.I. Aunt Franny-Franny Langford, my mother’s older sister-woulda taken her in in a minute if need be. Hannah never woulda been left out on the streets.”
“Your cousin was receiving Social Security income based on what?” Joanna asked.
“Who knows?” Dotson said. “On account of being crazy, I expect. Disabled, one way or the other. I’m sure my uncle never let her keep none of the money to spend on herself. That wasn’t his way.”
Joanna thought of the five hundred or so dollars Hannah had said she had hidden away in her underwear drawer. For someone in her straitened circumstances, that must have amounted to a fortune. How long had it taken the poor unfortunate woman to accumulate that much of a hoard?
“So what can I do for you today, Mr. Dotson?” Joanna asked.
“I just come to town to retrieve the bodies and make arrangements. Only havin’ one body sent back, really. My uncle’s gonna be buried here in Bisbee, and the sooner the better. No service, no nothing. I’m havin’ Hannah shipped up to Thatcher. Aunt Franny’s makin’ arrangements for Hannah to he buried in the Langford family plot, where she belongs. Her mother, too, if we can work it out. She’s buried over in Willcox, but we’re seein’ about movin’ her to Thatcher as well.”
“Has anyone given you your cousin’s personal effects?” Joanna asked.
Dotson shook his head. “Not so far. The lady out in the lobby told me I should come here to talk to Detective Carpenter, exceptin’ I guess he’s not here, so I ended up with you instead.”
Joanna pushed the button on her intercom. “Kristin,” she said. “Have someone from the jail bring over Ms. Green’ personal effects, would you?”
While they waited, Joanna turned back to Philip Dotson “You wouldn’t happen to know whatever happened to Hannah’s right hand, would you?”
“Sure,” he said. “Reed slammed it in a door once years back to keep Hannah from leavin’ home that second time. Never carried her to no doctor with it, neither. My Uncle Reed didn’t believe in doctors. That’s how come Aunt Ruth died so young, too. She caught pneumonia and died. If she’da went to a doctor, she’d pro’ly still be around.”
Joanna reached for Ernie’s written report on the two linked cases-on Hannah Green and Reed Carruthers. “I’ve had detectives over there at Sunizona asking questions for two days. How come none of the neighbors mentioned any of this?”
“Pro’ly didn’t know nothin’ about it. Reed Carruthers never was one to wash his dirty underwear in public. My mother’s people-the Langfords-is the same way.”
Just then Tom Hadlock, the jail commander, showed up in Joanna’s office bearing a thin manila envelope and a plastic bag. He dropped the bag on the floor and then dumped the contents of the envelope out onto Joanna’s desk.
“Her clothes are all here in the bag,” he said. “You’re welcome to them if you want…”
“I know all about Hannah’s clothes,” Philip Dotson said. “You go ahead and get rid of ‘em. Like as how burnin’s all they’re good for.”
Leaning forward, he saw the stack of clipped-together bills that had fallen out of the envelope. Picking up the paper money, he thumbed through it. “Where’d all this come from?” he asked. “Looks like a bundle. How’d Hannah lay hands on so much money?”
Joanna glanced at the listing on the outside of the envelope. “It’s five hundred fifty-six dollars and eleven cents in all,” she said. “Hannah told me she had saved it. She claimed she had more than that set aside, so she must have spent some of it on her way to my house.”
“Why’d she do that?” Philip Dotson asked, his eyes narrowing. “That’s what my Aunt Franny wants to know. II Hannah was just gonna do herself in anyways, why’d she come all that way down here to see you first, Sheriff Brady? Why not just do it at home and get it over with and save everybody the trouble?”
“She said she wanted to talk to a woman,” Joanna answered slowly. “She said she wanted somebody to hear her side of what happened.”
“And what did happen?”
“According to what she told me, Hannah wanted to watch a particular program on TV, but your uncle took the remote control and ran off outside with it. Hannah went after him, trying to get it back. When she caught up to him, I think she went over the edge and started hitting him.”
“She told you then, didn’t she,” Dotson said. “About my uncle. About how mean he was.”
Joanna nodded.
“And you believed her?”
“Yes, I did,” Joanna said. “If her case had gone to trial, I don’t think there ever would have been a homicide conviction. Manslaughter, maybe. Considering the extenuating circumstances, maybe not even that.”
Without another word, Philip Dotson started scooping the money and the few other loose items back into the envelope.
“Don’t you want to count the money first?” Tom Hadlock objected. “I need you to sign for it. You should make sure it’s all there before you do.”
“It don’t matter none,” Philip Dotson said. “However Much it is, it’s not enough to fight over.”
With careful concentration he signed the form Tom Hadlock handed him, then Dotson stood up. Holding both the envelope and his hat in one hand, he reached out toward Joanna with the other.
“Thank you, Sheriff Brady,” he said. “I thank you, and so does my Aunt Franny. She’s been cryin’ for twenty-four
