Border Prey Page 2

  “Be careful where you walk!” I called out. “I just found some important tracks over there!”

  I reached Hutchins just in time to see the man tread straight through my prized creosote bush as he finished pulling the zipper up on his pants. “Don’t get your petticoat in a knot—there are tracks all over this place. Besides, we rely on more scientific methods for dealing with crime here in Dona Ana County these days. Probably things your agency doesn’t even know about,” he drawled.

  I checked under the bush and found that the print had been totally eradicated. “Too bad. There was a perfect imprint of a heel mark that might have belonged to the killer.”

  Hutchins shrugged. “No big deal, since it wouldn’t have done you much good. That is, unless you were planning to check the heels of every Mexican around.”

  “You mean your scientific technique has already determined it was a Mexican who committed the murder?” I countered.

  Hutchins glared, his eyes aimed at me like two .45 revolvers. “Why don’t you tell me what you’re doing out here, anyway?”

  “The corpse over there is Timmy Tom Tyler from El Paso. He was one of my informants,” I replied coolly.

  Hutchins pulled out a Marlboro, lit up, and inhaled deeply. “Okay. What say we try this again. What were you doing out here in the first place?” he repeated slowly, as if I might not understand English.

  I was tempted to slow-mo the guy right into the next county. “He called me with a tip that something was about to go down, and asked me to meet him here.”

  Hutchins squinted hard, trying his best to intimidate me. “Yeah? Well, I’m waiting. You wanna tell me exactly what was going down?”

  His mucho macho attempt to extricate information nearly prompted me to suggest he take a refresher course in Interrogation 101. “I wouldn’t know. As you can see, he never got the chance to tell me.”

  Hutchins turned his head and cracked his neck as we walked back to the murder scene, where Jack Purdy was busy checking out Timmy Tom’s body.

  “So, you think this low life was calling you about some kind of puppy-napping?” Hutchins asked, transferring his snide attitude to the corpse lying at his feet.

  Okay, so Tyler might have been a low life. But he was my low life, damn it, and nobody else’s. “Tyler put his life on the line this morning by calling me. I think he deserves a little more respect than that.”

  Hutchins drew tightly on his Marlboro. “But you believe Mr. High Class here was calling you about animal smuggling that was going down?”

  “Of course. What else would it have been?” I responded.

  “That’s crazy!” Hutchins scoffed derisively. “Nobody’s going to risk a murder rap over a bag of snakes or tarantulas. Drugs are the only thing that make sense in this kind of situation.”

  I could have clued Hutchins in on the staggering sum of moolah commanded by the sale of endangered species, but I placed the lesson on hold as Jack Purdy finished bagging Timmy Tom and started to zip the sack closed.

  “Wait! Tyler’s wearing a money belt. You’ll probably want to check out its contents,” I reported, ever the good Samaritan.

  Hutchins leaned in towards me, his pupils cocked and ready for action. “And just how would you know about that, unless you’d been messing around with the body?”

  What did the guy think I was, a closet necrophiliac? “A vulture pulled down his zipper and opened his money belt. So I decided it wouldn’t hurt to take a peek.”

  “You know, I’ve heard about you, Porter,” Hutchins said in a low, menacing tone.

  “Only good things, I trust.”

  “What I’ve heard is that you’re considered a loose cannon who likes to poke her nose into other people’s investigations. Well, you’re not going to get away with that around here,” he warned, jabbing the air with the tip of his Marlboro. The ember burned red hot, devouring what little was left of the filter.

  “How often do you ride out this way?” I queried.

  “Only when I have to,” Hutchins replied, taking a last drag on the fiery stub.

  “Well, then. Since you didn’t know Tyler and you don’t regularly cruise the Anapra, you might want to thank me for handing you this case.” If I was going to be termed a loose cannon, I might as well enjoy it.

  “Yeah. Right. Like I need to waste my time on more paperwork,” Hutchins responded, stomping the remains of his Marlboro into the ground. “Hey, Purdy. Find the money belt and dig out what’s in it.”

  Purdy’s bony fingers loosened Tyler’s pants, and dove into the hidden belt. They resurfaced with the articles for Hutchins’ perusal.

  “Panfauna Associates, huh? Never heard of ’em.” Hutchins quickly dismissed the business card and moved on to the second piece of paper. “Congratulations, Porter. Looks like what you’ve got here is a bunch of mumbo jumbo numbers,” he huffed. “I advise you to leave the hard-core investigative work to real police and keep yourself busy with your critters. And that goes for any other case you happen to stumble upon here in Dona Ana County.”

  “Aw, shucks—I bet you sweet talk every federal agent like this. Or should I consider myself special?” I inquired.

  “I also expect you to keep me informed if you stumble across anything else involving this case,” Hutchins responded, blatantly ignoring my question.

  “You’ll be the first deputy sheriff I call,” I assured him.

  Purdy replaced Timmy Tom’s papers and began to zip the body bag closed once more. Tyler sullenly glared up at me as he slowly disappeared from view, as if to make sure I understood he’d died on my behalf. Then Purdy grabbed a roll of yellow evidence tape, and carefully wrapped it around the sack three times in a coroner’s version of a lock and seal storage bag. “Dr. Jack Purdy” was printed in black letters every few inches on its surface, and he used a magenta Magic Marker to sign his initials wherever the tape overlapped.

  I was silently saying good-bye to Timmy Tom when my pager started vibrating against my hip. I instinctively jumped, bumping into Purdy who in turn collapsed on top of Timmy Tom’s corpse. A low groan issued from inside the bag, almost as if Tyler were getting in the last word.

  “Excess air making its way out of the body,” Purdy stiffly remarked, doing his best to appear unperturbed.

  I pulled the pager off my belt and checked the offending number. I’d been beeped to call my own office? Very strange, since I’m the only one who works there.

  I flipped my cell phone open, punched in the number, and entered the answering machine code.

  “This is to let you know that twenty-five monkeys have been killed out at the Happy Hunting Ranch, east of El Paso,” crackled a bad imitation of Robert DeNiro. “You’ll find their bodies stuffed in a burlap sack hidden inside the taxidermy shed. This is a one-time call. Don’t blow the information.”

  The message had been left only an hour ago.

  I turned and stared at the bag containing Timmy Tom Tyler, as a large raven parasailed directly over my head.

  “Caaaaaaa!”

  The jarring cry chilled me to the very bone. The Happy Hunting Ranch business card had been in Timmy Tom’s wallet.

  “Caaaaaa!”

  The strident call hung in the air, patient as a waiting noose, then transformed into a cold laugh emanating from Timmy Tom’s corpse.

  I knew the noise was nothing more than the desert up to its tricks, yet a ghoulish premonition rose within me. What had Tyler been involved in? Why had he been murdered? And what were monkeys doing on a hunting ranch deep in Texas?

  Two

  Hunting ranches are big business in Texas these days. Dubbed the exotic game capital of the world, the state is more than just a home where the buffalo roam. It’s also where everything from Nubian ibex to African scimitar horned oryx are kept under lock and key at over one thousand private ranches. While the deer and the antelope may play on the Lone Star’s open range, so do 50 varieties of unusual trophy-class critters, all available year round to be mown down pure
ly for your hunting pleasure. Throw in a few snappy slogans, such as “No Kill-No Pay” and “If you don’t like him, don’t pull the trigger,” along with luxury accommodations, and game ranches have morphed into the Great White Hunter’s ultimate dream vacation.

  But such privilege doesn’t come cheap. Shooting an American bison runs a mere $3,000. But nab a markhor from the mountains of Afghanistan, and it will set you back a good twelve grand. If you get a hankering for something even more exceptional—say, a trophy-quality African bongo—be prepared to fork over a hefty forty-thousand smackers. It’s no wonder that raising cattle for McDonald’s quickly loses its appeal once ranchers hear prices like these. Exotic animals have become the Lone Star’s gold-plated cash crop, raking in a cool $100 million a year.

  I followed the set of tire tracks from Timmy Tom’s body across the desert floor, to where they disappeared on the asphalt. The lick of black top trailed off in the distance like a long mourning veil. I pointed the Ford east toward Texas, and sped down a two-lane road so desolate there weren’t even any telephone poles flying past to be counted.

  I was once again in the Southwest, thanks to some powerful politicos whose feathers I’d ruffled during my last assignment. Apparently, I’d upset them so much they hadn’t just wanted me banished from Miami, but run clear out of the state of Florida. After conducting a thorough search, they came up with the perfect place to bury me—a spot where I couldn’t possibly cause any trouble.

  My former boss, Charlie Hickok, had called upon hearing the news. “Congratulations, Bronx. Sheeeet! You must be doing something right to have gotten that scrawny ass of yours dumped on the border. You just gotta remember, the greater the odds are against you, the harder you gotta fight,” he’d said consolingly. “Tell you what. Seeing as how you’re probably ready to high-tail it back to civilization right about now, I’ll do what I can to get you transferred down here to New Orleans.”

  Charlie was a wise man. He knew how much I appreciated having my ass called scrawny. But a recent break-up with the love of my life, New Orleans police detective Jake Santou, put the kabosh on any idea of moving back to Louisiana just yet. Seeing Santou would have been more than I could bear. I’d turned Charlie’s offer down, and chalked up his blizzard of curses as being his way of wishing me well on the border.

  Crossing into Texas, I hopped on to Highway 180, grateful for the distraction of playing tag with an interminable number of traffic lights. I passed billboards trumpeting everything from discounted Tony Lama cowboy boots to Mexican saddle blankets, tacky hot pink taco stands, and other comforting signs of Western civilization. It helped keep Timmy Tom’s image at bay. Soon, the traffic lights grew fewer and the billboards more sparse as I headed deeper into rugged west Texas ranching country.

  The Happy Hunting Ranch was an elite stomping ground for many of the world’s wealthiest hunters. Or, as the ranch liked to advertise, “We’ve got 15,000 critter-filled acres of pure happiness, all trigger-ready for those discerning enough to want to shoot the very best.” Equally well known was its eccentric owner, Frederick Ulysses Krabbs.

  Frederick Ulysses was the scion of an old El Paso family which professed to trace its lineage back to the battle of the Alamo. That claim had been disputed by a San Antonio newspaper, which insisted there was no record of a Krabbs having ever fought there.

  The Krabbs clan immediately sued the paper, then bought it. Renaming it the Alamo Bugle, they next proceeded to broadside history. A week-long series of front page articles trumpeted an exciting new discovery: it wasn’t Davy Crockett who’d heroically gone down fending off Santa Anna’s men. New, “reliable” sources revealed that to be a bald-faced lie pumped up to promote a 1950s television series. The real hero of the Alamo had been none other than Frederick Ulysses’ great grandfather, the esteemed Francis Uriah Krabbs. Supposedly Francis’ pivotal role had been ignored all these years due to the fact that the Krabbs family had left San Antonio, preferring to reside in El Paso.

  The Krabbses instantly became West Texas heroes, venerated for their loyalty to El Paso. The clan was celebrated with a parade whose route passed the largest bank, insurance company, and investment firm in town—all Krabbs-family owned. Frederick’s father, Filmore Udall, had gotten into the three businesses early on, establishing a Krabbs tradition of pillage and plunder. Promising to keep El Pasoans’ money safe from harm, Filmore had also sold life insurance policies to the men of each household—conveniently allowing him to better bilk their widows and orphans through shady investments.

  Frederick Ulysses had continued the family’s entrepreneurial tradition by jumping on the exotic critter gravy train.

  The entrance to the Happy Hunting Ranch was impossible to miss, marked by a giant billboard that featured an elk jauntily standing in the center of a bull’s-eye with its ankles crossed and a thumb cocked rakishly toward the access gate.

  I drove through, passing a camera mounted onto a post. I’d heard the ranch ran a tight operation. Translated into every day hunter-speak that meant U.S. Fish and Wildlife agents were definitely considered persona non grata.

  I followed a winding dirt road, guided by markers bearing shiny white hoof prints. The last sign was a cartoon drawing of a deer leaping joyously in the air while proclaiming, “You’re Here!”

  I pulled into a lot and parked next to a row of open-sided Jeep Scramblers painted with black and white stripes, clearly meant to resemble a battalion of motorized zebras. As long as one ignored the tires, shape, and size, it was quite the camouflage job. I was certain the resident critters were equally impressed.

  Each Jeep was missing its front windshield. Situated where the windshield wipers normally would have been were brown leather mounds touting the logo “Bucks Bull Bag”—custom-made bean bags upon which hunters propped their rifle barrels. How convenient: customers didn’t even have to rouse their rear ends from the comfort of their vehicle’s lushly padded seat to snag a world-class trophy. It made you stop and wonder what the phrase “sport hunting” really meant.

  I turned away from the gas guzzling zebras and focused on the stone and timber lodge which loomed before me. Obviously plenty of greenbacks had gone into building the place. It exuded an easy air of elegance and privilege, in silent acknowledgment that the bucks could be traced to old money.

  I bounded up a set of rough-hewn stone steps and went inside, which evoked East Africa in all its colonial glory. I half expected to spot Karen Blixen and Ernest Hemingway discussing the merits of a lion hunt over a glass of sherry.

  The main room was filled with enough exotic wildlife to make any zoo lustful with envy—except this collection was composed of decapitated heads mounted in a variety of frozen expressions. There were addax, water buffalo and aoudad ram, sable, eland, and gemsbok. A lynx’s taxidermied form was balanced on a large wooden support beam overhead. Next to it stood a dainty black and tan springbok, posed as if to take a death-defying leap into space.

  I’d have given anything for a dose of Merlin’s magical wizardry in order to zap every single creature back to life. Suddenly, a swell of power seemed to race up my toes, my feet, and my legs. My veins began to tingle and my blood started to rush, fed by a high-voltage electrical current.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I was sure I caught a ripple of movement. My breath froze and I remained perfectly still. A flurry of whispers murmured softly in my ear, then I spotted the flicker of an eye, and the twitch of a nose on a Grevy’s zebra. Next came the explosive bang of an angry kick as a powerful hoof ripped through the wooden panels and jettisoned past my head. The menagerie’s previously silent screams built to a roaring crescendo, followed by a torrent of movement. The hunting lodge’s taxidermied zoo had come alive!

  Gazelles and black-faced impalas sprang off the walls. A family of javelina squealed in joy at their freedom. I cheered on a herd of red stag deer which raced out the door, the thundering of their hooves rattling the stone and timber lodge. My brain pounded as more and more creatures g
alloped by until a full-scale stampede was in progress.

  The next instant, the room was wrapped in deafening silence, the gallery of heads motionless on their plaques as before. But each pair of eyes scorched through my skin, piercing straight into my heart. I knew the only place these animals would ever be set free was in my prayers.

  A long corridor loomed ahead and I followed, curious to see where it would take me. My expedition was interrupted when a woman the size of a bulldozer abruptly appeared, as if I had triggered a silent alarm. She planted herself directly in my path, placed her hands firmly on her hips, and stared at me, her nostrils flaring fiercely. The message was loud and clear: I dare you to come any closer.

  Just one look at her was more than enough to stop me dead in my tracks. Her mound of fiery curls rose skyward in that Texas tradition of “the higher the hair, the closer to heaven.” Meanwhile, Maybelline and Revlon staged a wild West showdown on her face. Bright blue eyeshadow weighed down a pair of lids which were fringed with “I Wanna Be Tammy Faye Baker” eyelashes, while a bright slash of tangerine lipstick competed with the “Like a Virgin” pink blush applied generously on her cheeks.

  There was no question that some poor mustang was no longer out galloping over the plains; its hide had been pulled, stretched, and distended into a jacket that dripped with a generous shower of fringe. The woman was weighed down with enough turquoise jewelry to make one suspect she’d raided an Indian reservation.

  An icy smile, taut as a brand new rubber band, informed me this wasn’t going to be easy. “Sorry. But only registered guests are allowed in this area. Why don’t you tell me who you are, and exactly what it is you’re doing here?”

  Hmm…I wondered what had given me away. Probably the fact that I wasn’t toting a loaded bazooka under one arm, while dragging a dead buck through the place.

  “I’m here to see Mr. Krabbs,” I politely responded.

  Her eyes stayed on me like a smart bomb.

  I waited a beat, and then pretended to take notice of something over the woman’s shoulder. She glanced around, and I made a quick feint to the left, followed by a fast dodge to the right, but my opponent nimbly blocked my Texas two-step with a simple shift of her hips. All this gal needed was a helmet and the Dallas Cowboys would scramble to sign her up for their defensive line.