offer, he’d have said it was a valuable antique and asked for about thirty thousand.”
Chee laughed. That, he thought, would probably be about what Timms would claim from his insurance company.
“How about using your telephone?” Chee asked. “And the directory.”
He punched in the Mountain Mutual Insurance Farmington agent’s number, identified himself, asked the woman who ran the place if she still handled Eldon Timms's insurance.
“Unfortunately,” she said.
“His airplane, too?”
“Same answer,” she said. “Or I guess you’d say the former airplane, the one those robbers stole?”
“Does he have another one?”
“Lordy, I hope not,” she said.
“He file a claim on it?”
“Yes, indeedy, he did. Right away. I just heard about the robbers stealing a plane out there and flying off in it, and he’s on the phone asking about getting his money. And I said, “What’s the hurry. They have to land someplace and the cops recover it and you get it back.” And he said, “If that happens, we tear up the claim.”
“How much was the insurance?”
“Forty thousand,” she said. “He just jacked it up to that a couple of months ago.”
“Sounds like quite a bit for a fifty-year-old aircraft,” Chee said.
“I thought so,” she said. “But no skin off my nose. Timms was the one paying the premium. He said it was an antique, a real rare airplane, and he was going to sell it to that military-aircraft museum in Tucson. I have a feeling he was using that higher-insured value to sort of—you know—establish a sales price.”
Edgar had been standing nearby, listening.
“That do it for you?”
“Yeah,” Chee said, 'and thanks. But by the way, what’s that Energy Department helicopter doing here? And what’s the DOE doing with those big white pods?”
“Actually, the pods aren’t DOE, they’re EPA,” Edgar said. “You are looking at a rare case of inter-agency cooperation. The Environmental Protection bunch borrows the copter and the pilots from the DOE’s Nevada Test site. They got radiation detectors in those pods, and they use them to find old uranium mines. Get the hot stuff covered up.”
After he left Four Corners Flight, Chee dropped in at the New Mexico State Police office below the airport and made two more calls—the first one to the Air War Museum at Tucson. Yes, the manager told him, Mr Timms had flown his L-17 down in June and offered it for sale. And, yes, they would have liked to add it to their collection, but they hadn’t made an offer. Why not? The usual reason, said the manager. He wanted way too much for it. He was asking fifty thousand.
The second call was to Cowboy Dashee, his old friend from boyhood. But it wasn’t just to reminisce. Deputy Sheriff Dashee worked for the Sheriff’s Department of Apache County, Arizona, which meant the ranch of Eldon Timms—at least the south end of it—might be in Deputy Dashee’s jurisdiction.
Chapter Six
For no reason except habit born of childhood in a crowded hogan, Joe Leaphorn awoke with the first light of dawn. The bedroom he and Emma had shared for three happy decades faced both the sunrise and the noisy street. When Leaphorn had noted the noise disadvantage to Emma she had pointed out that the quieter bedroom had no windows facing the dawn. No further explanation was needed.
Emma was a true Navajo traditional with the traditional’s need to greet the new day. That was one of the countless reasons Leaphorn loved her. Besides, while Leaphorn was no longer truly a traditional, no longer offered a pinch of pollen to the rising sun, he still treasured the old ways of his people.
This morning, however, he had a good reason for sleeping late. Professor Louisa Bourebonette was sleeping in the quieter bedroom, and Leaphorn didn’t want to awaken her. So he lay under the sheet, watched the eastern horizon turn flame red, listened to the automatic coffeemaker go to work in the kitchen, and considered what the devil to do with the names Gershwin had given him. The three had stolen themselves an airplane and flown away, which took some of the pressure off. Still, if Gershwin was right, having their identities would certainly be useful to those trying to catch them.
Leaphorn yawned, stretched, smelled coffee, wondered if he could get to the kitchen and pour a cup quietly enough not to disturb Louisa. Wondered, too, what solution she would offer for his dilemma if he presented it to her. Emma would have told him to forget it. Locking
