children could have split the take two ways. Afterward, it would most likely have to be divided differently, with half going to the husband and a quarter to each of the children.
Studying the picture closely, Joanna noted that Farley was probably twenty years younger than his bride. She remembered hearing something about his being stone-cold broke when he had arrived in Tombstone a year ago. For someone coming from that kind of straitened circumstances, an estate of any size would come as a bonanza. And even if he had to split the take with Alice’s children, Farley Adams would still be walking away with far more than he’d had when he started.
Joanna turned the postcard over and studied the canceled stamp. The year was illegible, but the date wasn’t. October 18. Susan Jenkins’ worst nightmare had been realized. Clearly, the road trip to Laughlin, Nevada, had been for purposes other than throwing money away on one-armed bandits.
“May I make a copy of this, Miss Monroe?”
“Of their wedding picture? I suppose so. I don’t see what it could hurt. But I want it back. As a remembrance, you see.”
“It’ll only take a minute or so. Let me call my secretary.”
Kristin was summoned once more. She took the picture down the hall and returned a few minutes later with the original and with color copies of both sides of the postcard. Joanna placed the two copies face-up on her desk and returned the original to Jessie. The old woman leaned forward and peered across the desk.
“Remarkable,” she said. “I remember all those years with Ditto machines. Do you remember those? The purple ink?”
Joanna looked at her blankly.
“Oh, well, I suppose not. There were probably mimeograph machines by the time you came along, or maybe even Xerox. But I used Dittos for years when I was teaching school. The idea that you cart just make a copy of something like this is astonishing. Why, you almost can’t tell the difference between the original and the copy! I guess that’s progress for you. I’m glad I’ve lived long enough to see it.”
As she spoke, Jessie carefully filed the postcard back away in her purse. “Have you spoken to Farley?” she asked. “I’ve tried calling his number out at the mobile, but there wasn’t any answer, and he doesn’t seem to have a machine. Alice did, but not Farley. I wanted to give him my condolences and find out about arrangements and all. I do hope he’ll have something to say about than-about the funeral, I mean. By rights, he should, since he’s her husband and all. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Susan and Clete didn’t cut him out of it. That’s the way they are, you see. Both of them selfish as the day is long. Both of them wanting to run the whole show. You have no idea how their constant bickering bothered Alice. There were times when she considered disowning them both.”
Cramming her purse back into the basket on the walker, Jessie Monroe struggled to her feet. “I’d best be going,” she said.
“Will you be needing a ride back to Douglas?” Joanna asked. “If you do, I can get one of my deputies…”
Jessie waved the offer aside. “Oh, no,” she said. “I have my own wheels. Not really mine, of course. I turned in my license when I hit eighty-five. Seemed like the responsible thing to do because my reflexes were getting so bad. But Helen Dominguez, one of the attendants from the home, drove me here. I’m paying her, of course. That’s only fair. But she can’t get home too late. She’s a young person, you see, and still has children that will be coming home from school soon. I’ve always felt that mothers should be at home when their children get out of school, don’t you?”
“Oh, yes,” Joanna agreed. “I certainly do.”
By force of will she managed to keep herself from casting a guilt-ridden glance at her own watch. Jenny would be out of school by now and on her way to Butch’s house where there would be no at-home mother in attendance.
Jessie started toward the door. “By the way,” she added, “when you read Ali’s book-Alice’s book-don’t expect it to be great literature. It was done by one of those self-publishing outfits. Vanity presses, I think they call them. I don’t know how much she paid for it-probably way too much-but the company who did it certainly didn’t squander any of what she paid on editing. My sister was a great gal, but she never was much of a writer, so the book’s a bit rough in spots. You’ll get the picture, though. Or your detectives will.”
“Thank you,” Joanna said, following her guest to the door. “By the way, is your address in the book, so I’ll be able to return it to you when I finish reading it?”
“You can keep it if you like,” Jessie said. “Alice gave me ten copies for my birthday last year. Even with this one gone, I still have seven. That should be plenty. It’s not like I have any children of my own to leave them to. I did give one to the Douglas Historical Society and another to the historical society over in Tombstone. Alice lived both places, you see. Both towns are in the book.”
“I’m looking forward to reading it,” Joanna said. “I’ll get to it just as soon as I can.”
As the door closed behind Jessie Monroe, Joanna picked up Alice’s book and began to read. The first chapter was a charming childhood remembrance of playing hide-and-seek with her older brothers and sisters. Halfway through the second chapter, though, Joanna could no longer hold her eyes open.
With the book lying open on her desk, Joanna laid her head on her arms and fell fast asleep. She had no idea how much time had passed when Kristin tapped on the door. “Yes,” Joanna managed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes and hoping she sounded more wide awake than she felt. “What is it?”
“Casey down in AFIS needs to see you right away.”
“What about?” Joanna asked.
“All I know is she said it’s urgent.”
Before Joanna could stand up, she had to find the shoes she had kicked off under her desk. It took several tries before she was able to force her aching feet back into them. “All right,” she said. “Tell her I’m on my way.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Casey Ledford, the gifted young technician who ran Cochise County’s Automated Fingerprint Identification System, was a Bisbee girl who had gone off to college on a full-ride Veterans of Foreign Wars scholarship. She had enrolled in the University of Arizona’s College of Fine Arts, where she had planned on becoming a commercial artist. Smart, but not smart enough to avoid all the treacherous pitfalls of young adulthood, she had returned to her parents’ home two years later, with no degree, but with a four-month-old baby-a daughter named Felicity-in tow. Back in Bisbee, Casey had taken whatever work she could find, including stints waiting tables in the dining room al the Copper Queen Hotel while she continued to attend college level classes on a part-time basis.
Like a lot of other things, the AFIS equipment had fallen into Cochise County hands through a law enforcement, War Against Drugs grant that paid for hardware and software, hut no “liveware”-the people necessary to make the other two work. Prior to receiving the equipment, Joanna had mistakenly supposed that automated fingerprint identification meant just exactly that -automated. With the arrival of the equipment and the technical documentation that accompanied it, Joanna learned that fingerprints usually had to be augmented by hand before they could be fed into the computer. That meant that the department was going to need to hire someone who was not only artistically inclined but also more than moderately computer-literate. When the position was advertised in the paper, only one applicant had responded-Casey Ledford.
“What’s so urgent?” Joanna asked, poking her head in Casey’s lab, where dozens of images of Felicity Ledford-most of them framed pastels-covered the walls.
“It’s the Rogers case,” Casey said.
“You got a hit?”
Casey Ledford nodded, but she didn’t look any too happy about it. Joanna perched on a lab stool. “So tell me,” she urged. “What did you find?”
“The hit resulted from prints we found at the mobile at Outlaw Mountain.”
“Farley Adams’ place,” Joanna murmured. “The ones left on the dirty dishes?”
Casey nodded again. “Right,” she said. “None of the guys thought to look there. They had dusted the outside controls, but they hadn’t bothered to check inside.”
“Good work,” Joanna said with a grin “That’s what it takes around here sometimes-a woman’s touch. Go on.”
