I Shall Not Want

all related in some degree. 'Senora Reverenda.'

She nodded. 'Hola.'

'Raul y yo cercabamos el pasto lejano-' He broke off. Looked at the expression of incomprehension on Janet's face, an expression Clare knew was mirrored on her own.

'I fix fence. Encontre un hombre muerto.' He spoke slowly and clearly. 'Hombre muerto.' He pointed past the barn, once, twice, three times. A long way that way.

Janet gaped. 'A dead man?'

He nodded. 'Dead.' He held a finger like a gun next to the back of his head. 'Man.' He gestured toward himself, then expanded his arms, as if he were growing larger.

Bloating, Clare realized.

'Oh, my God.' Janet's knees buckled. Clare and the man-Octavio-caught her by her arms. 'Oh, my God,' Janet repeated. 'Oh, my God.'

'Octavio,' Clare said, 'El hombre es muerto con-' she couldn't begin to guess the Spanish word for gun. She shifted, so she could support Janet with one hand, and made the same gesture he had, finger and thumb. 'Bang-bang?'

His lips twitched, but he kept from smiling. 'Si. Bang- bang. Alli hacia fuera lo estan por un rato.' He pinched his nose and waved his hand in the air, as if dispelling a foul smell.

'No-uh, ?Muerto naturale?'

He shook his head. 'Bang-bang.' He touched the back of his head again and, for a second, something moved behind his eyes. The photographic image of horror, that, Clare knew from personal experience, would never, ever leave him. She reached out and squeezed his forearm. He looked at her, surprised.

'Are you okay?' She hoped her quiet tone would convey everything she couldn't communicate with words.

His expression eased. 'Estoy bien. Gracias. I am okay.'

A nasty thought occurred to her. 'Janet, are you sure every one of your missing workers showed up?'

Janet nodded. 'Well, unless there was an extra man coming along they hadn't told us about.'

'El hombre. Es anglo? Or-um-Latino? Un amigo? '

'No Anglo. Latino. No amigo. Un extranjero.'

'A stranger?' Clare said. The man-Octavio-looked at her steadily. Across the barrier of language, she suspected they were both thinking the same thing: If it isn't one of the McGeochs' workers, who could it be?

'Oh, my God,' Janet said again. 'Somebody's killed an illegal on our land. What am I going to do?'

Clare shook her. 'First, you're going to stand up.' Janet took a deep breath and got her legs underneath her. 'Then, you're going to call the police.'

'I can't! What am I going to say? That my illegal employee whom I should have turned in to the ICE found a body on my property?'

Clare frowned, thinking. 'It may not be important who found the body.' She turned to Octavio. 'Did you touch anything? Touch,' she mimed poking, picking at, opening, 'el hombre? '

He shook his head. Held up his hands. 'No.'

'Okay, then.' She looked at Janet. 'What was Octavio doing and where was he doing it?'

Janet took another deep breath. 'He's our foreman. He and one of the other men were stringing electrical fencing. Out at the farthest pasture. About three miles from here, right up against the mountain.'

'Is that a job you can do?'

'Of course.' Janet's face cleared. 'Of course! I was the one who found the body.'

'Okay. Take Octavio with you to show you where, and as soon as he's done that, he can take off.' There was a small voice in the back of her head suggesting that none of this was a good idea. She ignored it.

'I can stop by the bunkhouse on the way out and tell the hands to hide.'

Clare raised her eyebrows. 'They're in the bunkhouse?'

Janet looked down at her sneakers. 'That's the drill if anyone pulls into the barnyard. Get out the back of the barn as quickly as possible and go to the bunkhouse.'

Clare shook her head. 'You have got to find some way of getting these guys papers. There's no way you can carry on like this for the entire summer.' She rubbed at the back of her neck, where sweat was gathering beneath her dog collar. 'I suppose Amado is hiding out there?'

The foreman looked at her.

'Yeah,' Janet said.

'Well, tell him it's okay to come out. We've got to get the church cleaned for the Eucharist and then ready for the concert tonight.'

Janet clutched Clare's arm. 'You can't go!'

'Janet, you don't need me. Let Octavio show you where the body is, and then as soon as he's out of sight, call the MKPD.'

'I need you to call them for me!'

'Me? Why?'

'Because I'm a terrible liar. You'll be able to do it so much more convincingly.'

Boy, if that didn't win the prize for backhanded compliments. She thought of another summer, Russ, grinning at her from the driver's seat of his pickup. You're pretty sneaky, for a priest.

'Please, Clare. Please, please, please.'

'Oh, good Lord.' She tilted her head up toward the clear blue sky. 'All right. I'll give you ten minutes to get there, and then I'll call. But I think it's muddying the waters unnecessarily.'

'Thank you!' Janet hugged her, hard. 'Cell phones can get tricky out here. Go ahead and use the phone in the tack room.' She whirled and, beckoning to the foreman to follow her, vanished around the barn. A moment later, Clare heard an engine fire up.

It struck her that she was going to be on the fringes of a police investigation. Again. The bishop was not going to be happy with her. Her deacon was not going to be happy with her. Russ was most definitely not going to be happy with her.

That thought, at least, cheered her up. She headed into the barn to find the phone.

V

'Fifteen fifty-seven, this is Dispatch.'

Russ slowed behind an eighteen-wheeler signaling to turn into the Wal-Mart. He nodded to the officer riding beside him. 'Go ahead. Pick it up.'

Hadley Knox unclipped the mic and switched it on. 'Fifteen fifty-seven, go ahead, Dispatch.'

'What's your forty?'