Pottawatomie, or maybe it’s Seminole. He wasn’t quite like Ellie and Begay, who were clean as a whistle.
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Delonie had already accumulated himself a little rap sheet. He’d done a little time in the Oklahoma reforma-tory as a juvenile, and then got himself arrested as an adult for stealing cars out of parking lots. The cops who worked Handy’s case from the beginning told me Delonie might have been the reason it happened.” Leaphorn considered that, raised his eyebrows, provoking Garcia to explain what he meant.
“You know how it sometimes works. A professional robbery type looking for a way to make some money asks around among the proper level of citizens for some locals who might have spotted a likely job, and so forth.
He hears about Delonie. Checks with him. Delonie says Handy’s looks ripe for a robbery. Shewnack offers to buy in. Something like that. You know what I mean?”
“Sure,” Leaphorn said. “I remember the double murder years ago on old Route 66 near the Laguna Reservation.
At Budville. Bud Rice and someone else shot. Turned out a bandit type from Alabama or somewhere shopped around in Albuquerque for someone to rob, paid the locals a fee, they provided him a car, all the information, he did the job and got away.”
“Killed himself in prison,” Garcia said.
“But doing time for another crime,” Leaphorn said.
“He decided to confess to the Budville murders before he died. But you’re saying the thinking was that Shewnack had contacted Delonie, offered to organize the crime for him?”
“The thinking is Shewnack showed up in Albuquerque, hanging around in the bars where the hard guys do their socializing, let it be known he was ready for some action, heard about Delonie. Having a hard-guy reputation, so forth.”
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“Sounds reasonable,” Leaphorn said.
“Anyway, whether or not robbing Handy’s was Delonie’s original idea, I don’t think he gets the blame for the way Shewnack set them all up. He told his parole officer that Ellie was his girlfriend. He was going to marry her, or so he thought, before Shewnack showed up and wooed her away from him and then wrecked her life. Apparently he talked about that a lot in prison. Anyway, his parole was passed over the first time because the board heard he’d been telling other cons he was going to hunt down the son of a bitch who’d ratted on him and kill him.
He didn’t get out until early this year.”
“How’s he doing since then?” Leaphorn asked.
Garcia shrugged. “Okay, I guess. His parole officer told me he’s been checking in and behaving himself. Turns out Delonie was sort of like Begay in prison. Turned himself into a skilled laborer. Got to be an electrician, plumber, that sort of thing. Good with fixing things—from your refrigerator to your truck. He married a Navajo woman over near Torre-jon, and I think he does maintenance and general handy-man stuff over at the chapter house out there.” Leaphorn considered that. “Wonder how he managed that?”
“What I heard, he’s married to a woman who’s involved with that Christian mission place out there, and she’s one of the people working at the chapter house.
Keeps the records or something,” Garcia said. “I’ve heard some gossip that the marriage didn’t last long. But he didn’t have Delonie on his ‘watch out for trouble’ list.” Leaphorn sighed.
Garcia chuckled. “You sound disappointed.”
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we’re looking for out here. Where we are now with what we know, all we could take to the district attorney’s office is a funny feeling. Not a hint of evidence about anything.” He laughed. “I guess we could tell him we just don’t feel right about that Shewnack death, and that fire either, and that maybe somebody stole an antique rug, and so forth, and if it was a murder, the one with the best motive would be Delonie. And then he reminds us that Delonie was in custody when Totter’s place burned and that he could call in a whole crowd of prison guards to back up his alibi, and about then the D.A. would recommend that we make an appointment to see a shrink.”
Garcia laughed. “I’m beginning to think that might not be a bad idea.”
“Well,” Leaphorn said, “I have to admit that all I have is that funny feeling I started with. The arson experts said there was no evidence of any kerosene or gasoline, or any of those fire spreaders arsonists use. Totter’s insurance company lawyers must have worked that over very thoroughly.”
“You think so?”
“Well, from what I’ve heard, Totter collected on a lot of valuable stuff burned with his store. So they would have done some looking.”
“Which brings us back to that damned rug,” Garcia said. “Bork didn’t seem to think it burned after he saw that picture. So we have us a clever insurance fraud arson with Shewnack burned up by accident. Or maybe burned on purpose to provide the careless drunk starting it with a cigarette.”
Garcia paused, waiting a Leaphorn reaction. Got none, and went on.
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“Or maybe Totter killed him for some reason or other, and needed to dispose of the body, and then added in a little insurance fraud as a by-product.” Leaphorn didn’t comment.
“I’ll bet you’d already thought about that,” Garcia said.
“Well, yes,” Leaphorn said. “And I admit I’d like to know more about the fire. But nobody’s likely to help us
