CHAPTER 22
'The diary,' Delcia murmured immediately, as soon as I told her about my conversation with Denny Blake. 'That has to be what else those guys were after.'
'Right,' I said. 'That's what I figured, too, the moment he mentioned it. Only Michelle didn't have it. By then it was already sitting in Sedona waiting for Rhonda to show up and take possession.'
'Whatever's in it must be hot stuff for them to run the kind of risks they did to get it back.'
'There was the money,' I suggested. 'Don't forget that.'
'I'm not,' Delcia replied, 'but the diary may have been their primary target and the money almost an afterthought.'
Delcia was driving between Prescott and Phoenix. Radio transmissions were somewhat spotty. At times I had difficulty hearing her.
'You said you saw Joey writing in his notebook while you were roommates?' she asked.
'Yes. One that matched that description, anyway.'
'So given what we know about the Crenshaws…'
She paused. For a moment I thought she had gone out of range, but instead, she was thinking. 'Maybe I'd better take a run over to Wickenburg to check on the Crenshaws before I come on into Phoenix. What kind of car is she driving?'
'I don't know, not for sure. There's some confusion about that. She left here driving Ralph Ames' white Lincoln Town Car, but she may have gone over to La Posada and picked up the Fiat.'
'I need to know for sure, Beau,' Delcia said.
'Right. I'll find out and let you know. What about the F.B.I.? Did you find out anything from them?'
'You were right. They never got close to either Michelle or her father last night. They plan to interview both of them this morning.'
Again the transmission faded. 'I'm losing you, Delcia. You're breaking up.'
Delcia came back in, her words intermittently fading in and out.'…try to find…about car…let me know.'
'I will,' I answered, unsure whether she heard me or not. I turned around to Ralph. 'Where's the phone book?'
He took one from the cupboard and handed it to me. 'Who are you going to call?'
'A taxi,' I told him. 'We've got to find out for sure about the car.'
I called for a cab and was promised one within the occupational standard delay time of twenty minutes. Not wanting to waste those precious minutes in empty waiting, I tried reaching Raymond W. Bliss Hospital on base at Fort Huachuca.
I expected to be told that Michelle was either in surgery or in the recovery room, but I gambled that Guy Owens would feel enough obligation to Rhonda and me for saving his ass that he'd tell me what he knew, if anything.
Calling the hospital was an endlessly complicated process because the base telephone exchange was in the process of transferring from one set of prefixes to another. It was another sad case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand was doing. The phone company information operators kept sending me on wild-goose chases to numbers that were no longer valid or to phones that rang forever without anyone hearing or answering.
I'm a stubborn man, though, and I kept dialing away, one number after the other, all the while cursing the dimwits who broke up the Bell system. Those screwballs obviously never heard that old tried-and-true maxim: If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
At last I was connected to the base hospital. I asked to speak to either Lieutenant Colonel Guy Owens or his daughter Michelle. 'They're both patients there,' I said.
'I'm sorry,' the operator returned smoothly. 'We have no one listed by that name.'
She was lying, stonewalling me, that was certain. On a fainthearted whim, I tried another tack and asked to speak to Colonel Miller, commander of the hospital, but occasionally even the most unlikely wagers pay off. The hospital operator didn't hesitate.
'I'll put you through,' she purred, and did.
'Colonel Miller here,' a gruff voice said into the phone a moment later.
'My name is Beaumont,' I said. 'J. P. Beaumont. I'm looking for a patient of yours, a Lieutenant Colonel Guy Owens.'
'He's gone,' Miller replied shortly. 'Dismissed.'
'Dismissed,' I echoed. 'What about his daughter? What about Michelle?'
'Mr. Beaumont,' Colonel Miller said, 'Guy mentioned you to me. In fact, he spoke very highly of your efforts on his behalf as well as his daughter's, but when he left here, he gave me very clear instructions that I wasn't to give any information to anyone other than to say they had both left the hospital. No exceptions. He seemed to think he and his daughter might still be in some danger.'
'That's a distinct possibility,' I agreed.
'When I talked to them, that's what the F.B.I. said as well, but I told them the same thing. Guy and Michelle are gone, and I don't know where. I can't tell what I don't know.'
I could almost hear Colonel Miller smiling into the phone. He had gotten a charge out of telling the F.B.I. to go piss up a rope. Rank notwithstanding, stonewalling notwithstanding, he sounded like my kind of guy.
'I don't suppose that sat too well with the F.B.I., did it?' I observed dryly.
'Not particularly,' he answered with a brief laugh. 'As a matter of fact, I don't think they liked it at all. One thing I would like to say, though, Mr. Beaumont…'
'Yes? What's that?' I asked hopefully, thinking maybe he'd relent after all and tell me something useful.
'I personally would like to thank you for what you did for Guy and Michelle yesterday. Guy Owens and I have been friends, good friends, ever since 'Nam. As far as I'm concerned, I owe you one.'
The cab arrived outside and honked twice.
'You're welcome,' I said. 'I've got to go. If you hear from Guy, tell him to get in touch with me right away. I need to talk to him. It's urgent.'
'I certainly will,' Colonel Miller replied. 'You can count on it.'
Instinctively, I knew I could. Miller hadn't given me any more information than he had given the F.B.I., but now at least I had some confidence that it was because he really didn't know anything more. And having somebody like him owe you one isn't all bad. You never can tell when that kind of obligation might come in handy.
Ralph had gone to the door to tell the cab driver I was coming. 'Hurry,' he urged. 'The guy says the meter's running.'
'Give me an extra set of keys for the Lincoln,' I said.
'Why?' he asked. 'If you're taking a cab, why do you need keys?'
'Because if the Lincoln's there in the lot at La Posada, I'll come back in that. If it's not, I'll hot-wire the Fiat. Or would you rather I hot-wired the Lincoln?'
'I'll get the other keys,' Ames said.
He fished around in the drawer for an extra set, and I was out the door in a flash. At La Posada, the Lincoln was nowhere in sight. The Fiat remained parked exactly where we'd left it. I paid off the cabbie, hot-wire the Spider, folded myself inside, and drove home.
Back at Ralph's house, I got myself patched back through to Delcia, who had turned off Black Canyon Highway and was headed for Wickenburg.
'She's in the Lincoln,' I said. 'As far as we know.'
'That still doesn't sound very definite,' Delcia returned.
'All I can tell you is the make of the car she left here driving this morning. That's the best I can do.'
'It'll have to do. I'll alert people to be on the lookout for it. Give me the DMV number.'
With Ames' help I gave Delcia the license number as well as a complete description of the missing Lincoln, then I went on to tell her that Michelle and Guy had left the hospital at Fort Huachuca bound for an undisclosed destination.
'Is there a chance they went home?' Delcia asked. 'We need to talk to her, to find out if she can help us shed
