Until Dark - Mariah Stewart [77]
“It’s getting late.” Kendra glanced at the clock on the dashboard. “Are you sure this sheriff . . . what was his name?”
“Cole Gamble.”
“If that doesn’t sound like a western sheriff, I don’t know what does.” She leaned back against the headrest and grinned. “Can’t you just see him, in a wide-brimmed hat and dusty boots?”
Her voice dropped an octave or two.
“Howdy, ma’am. Sheriff Cole Gamble at your service.”
Adam laughed, wondering when she would begin to react to the fact that the last time she’d made this drive from Tucson to Bisbee had been for the trial of her brother’s murderer.
“Are you sure Sheriff Gamble will wait for us?”
“He said he’d be there. He was really intrigued by my questions, and seemed to be willing—eager, might be a better word—to meet with us.”
“I wonder why.”
“He said he grew up in the area, and remembers the boys’ disappearance, Webster’s arrest and trial. He knows the area well, and will take us wherever we want to go.”
“I wonder if he knows where my aunt’s ranch is.”
“I’d bet on it.” Adam took advantage of a long stretch of road to increase his speed. “You’re going to stop there, aren’t you?”
“Well, I guess we’ll have to, though I’m not looking forward to seeing her. On the one hand, I feel obligated. On the other hand, I haven’t heard from her since the trial, not even when my mother died. It’s hard to believe she didn’t know about Mom’s death. The story made the news everywhere. I received cards from all over the country.” She added with a touch of sarcasm, “The suicide of a senator is big news, you know.”
“That is odd, especially when you consider what they went through together, as mothers of children who went missing together.”
“One would think. But Sierra was always a very self-centered, self-indulgent woman, at least my mother thought so. As long as something didn’t directly affect her, it didn’t have any relevance in her life. I doubt she gave my mother’s death more than passing notice.”
“Well, I’d like to speak with her, as well as with some of the people living at her little commune. Assuming she’s still there.”
“You can bet on it. Sierra’s lived on that ranch with her merry little band for years now. She’s like the queen bee, you know? Queen of all she surveys? Everyone defers to her. That little world just revolves around her.” Kendra’s voice held a touch of bitterness. “The only way she’d leave would be in a pine box.”
“And I think it’s important that we speak with the boy who followed Ian and Zach the day they left, and with his parents.”
“There was only his mother, as I recall. I don’t think his father was ever around. Another fatherless boy, just like Zach. Frankly, my mother always felt Sierra treated Zach like an afterthought.” Kendra looked out the window, at the lights that sparkled here and there out among the hills. “I didn’t remember how open it is out here either.”
“It’s open all right. It’s pretty empty, actually, outside of the cities. There are a lot of ranches in this part of the state, cattle ranches and some cotton farms.”
“We haven’t passed many towns.”
“A lot of the towns down here are no more than dots on a map, places where the ranchers pick up their mail. And of course, a ghost town or two.”
“Cochise County,” she murmured, reading the sign they’d just passed. “Cochise was the Indian whose bow Ian wanted to buy.”
“Think that was a scam? What are the chances it was an authentic Cochise artifact?”
“I don’t know. Zach was pretty certain, said he’d seen something that made him think it was the real deal. I don’t recall exactly what, though. Of course, Zach was twelve, so what had seemed credible to him could have been anything. And truthfully, at the time, I wasn’t terribly interested in what the ‘kids’ were doing.”
“I’m assuming the old man was questioned after the boys disappeared.”
“There’d be a statement in the sheriff’s file, wouldn’t you think?”
“You’ll be able to ask Sheriff Gamble in about ten more minutes.” Adam followed the signs for Bisbee.
“We’re here already? That didn’t take long.”
“Seventy-nine minutes.” He