“You talked to Detective Carbajal today?” Joanna asked.

“Oh, no. Not Jaime – that other fellow, the big one with the salt-and-pepper crew cut. He must be new. I don’t remember ever seein’ him around before. Can’t tell you his name, but I’m sure you know who I mean.”

Joanna knew exactly whom Harvey Dowd meant. Mr. Beaumont, I presume, she thought.

“What all did you tell him?” she asked.

“Nothin’ much. About that fight the other day, the one you had to break up. I was surprised that he didn’t seem to know nothin’ about it.”

I’m not, Joanna thought.

“I haven’t had a chance to talk to him this afternoon,” she said innocently. “Did you tell him anything else I should know about? Or have you seen anything unusual going on around the gallery in the last day or two?”

Harvey Dowd took a final, thoughtful drag on the end of his cigarette, then he dropped the stub into the gutter and ground it out with the sole of his boot. “Had a long talk again this evening with that nice black lady, the one whose sister was killed down in Naco earlier this week. She keeps coming by hoping to get a look at her sister’s paintings, but, of course, nobody’s been there.”

Cornelia Lester, Joanna thought.

“She was all wore out from walking so far uphill,” Harve Dowd continued. “She’s from Georgia, you see. She’s not accustomed to this here elevation of ours. My shop was closed for the day, but I let her come in and sit a spell in one of my old rockers until she got her breath back. I offered to bring my car down from the parking lot and give her a ride back to the hotel, but she wouldn’t hear of it. She said walking was fine.”

Harve paused long enough to shake another cigarette out of his pack of Camels. “What about that boyfriend of Dee’s?” he asked.

“So far there’s no sign of him,” Joanna answered.

Sheltering a flickering match with his cupped hand, Harvey Dowd lit his next cigarette. “Not surprised,” he drawled when he finished. “I’m guessing you’re not gonna find him, either. Never did like Warren Gibson much. Struck me as sort of underhanded, know what I mean? Didn’t seem like the type who’d stick around if there was any sign of trouble. I knew as soon as I heard the ruckus that Bobo Jenkins meant trouble.”

“You think Warren Gibson is underhanded?” Joanna asked. “What makes you say that?”

“When I’m out prospecting in the desert, which I do every now and again, I sometimes get this funny feeling. I call it feeling snaky. It’s like my body is picking up signals that I can’t see or hear, but it’s tryin’ to let me know all the same; tryin’ to tell me there’s a rattlesnake out there somewhere, and I’d best be careful. First time or two it happened, I ignored it and damned near got myself bit. Then I learned to pay attention. Now I stop and look around until I find the snake before it finds me.

“Warren Gibson’s the first human being ever who gives me that same kind of snaky feeling. It happened right off, the first time Dee introduced us, and for no real reason I can explain.”

“He makes you feel snaky?” Joanna asked, trying keep the disbelief out of her voice.

Harvey Dowd nodded. “Not exactly the same, but sort of. Like he’s dangerous or somethin’, although he never done nothin’ to me and never said anything out of line, so I could be mistaken about the man. Like I said, it’s just a feelin’.”

“Did you ever mention any of this to Deidre Canfield?”

Harve shook his head. “Did you ever have any dealings with that woman?”

“A few,” Joanna replied.

“I liked old Dee well enough, but she could be a screaming meemie when she wanted to. She seemed to think the sun rose and set on that man of hers, so far be it from me to try to tell her otherwise. Like I told you before, I’m not the gossipin’ kind. If I’d a told Dee Canfield that Warren was two-timing her, she would’ve bit my head clean off.”

“Two-timing?” Joanna asked. “Are you saying you saw Warren Gibson with another woman?”

“Didn’t see,” Harvey Dowd corrected. “Heard. Maybe not even heard, either, as far as that goes, but I’m as sure of it as I’m standing here. Why else would someone, with a perfectly good phone at home and another one right there in the gallery, spend so much time standing around on Main Street yakkin’ away on a pay phone? Maybe I’m all wet. Maybe it’s not a girlfriend, but I saw him talking on those pay phones down by the post office a lot – well out of Dee’s sight, you see. And what crossed my mind at the time was that, whoever it was he was talking to and whatever he was up to, he sure as hell didn’t want Dee Canfield to know about it.”

Joanna knew that Frank Montoya would be looking at the phone records for both the gallery and Dee Canfield’s house, but without Harve Dowd’s tip, no one would have thought to check the pair of pay phones on Main Street.

Thanking Harvey Dowd for his help, Joanna stuck her head into the gallery long enough to let Casey Ledford know where she was going. Then she got back into the car and drove down to the post office, where two waist-high public telephones stood side by side. After jotting down all the numbers, she radioed them into Dispatch, asking Tica to pass them along to Frank Montoya so he could ask for phone logs as soon as possible.

With that call completed, Joanna started to return to Castle Rock Gallery but changed her mind. The more people who showed up at a potential crime scene, the greater the potential for contamination, and the longer it would take for Casey and Ken Junior to process the place.

Across the street, through a tiny park, and up a concrete stairway, Joanna glimpsed the creamy-lit facade of Bisbee’s Copper Queen Hotel. Inside the hotel Joanna knew she would find Cornelia Lester. Latisha Wall’s sister was someone who had yet to have a face-to-face visit from the Cochise County sheriff. Joanna owed the woman that much courtesy, and some information as well.

With a sigh, Joanna put her Crown Victoria in gear and headed for the hotel. Once there, she stopped at the desk and asked for Cornelia Lester’s room. “She’s not there,” the clerk responded. “She’s right around the corner on the far side of the stairs.”

Walking around the sheltering stairway, Joanna saw a large African-American woman sitting on a leather-backed chair speaking to someone. Reluctant to interrupt, Joanna paused for a moment – long enough to see that the person opposite Cornelia Lester was none other than Special Investigator Beaumont.

All afternoon, the man had dogged her heels. Now he was interviewing Latisha Wall’s sister. Refusing to give way to a budding temper tantrum and steeling herself to be civil, Joanna stepped forward. “Good evening, Mr. Beaumont,” she said as she walked past him. She stopped in front of the woman. “You must be Cornelia Lester,” she said. “I’m Sheriff Joanna Brady. Please accept my condolences for the loss of your sister.”

IF LOOKS COULD KILL, I would have keeled over dead when Joanna Brady walked into the lobby of the Copper Queen Hotel and shook hands with Cornelia Lester.

“Thank you,” Cornelia said graciously. “I take it you and Mr. Beaumont here already know each other?”

Joanna nodded. “Yes,” she said. “We’ve met.” Her cool response was less than enthusiastic.

Settling into a nearby chair, Joanna leaned toward Cornelia as she spoke again. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Ms. Lester, but we’ve had another homicide this evening. Actually, I’m guessing that the death happened a day or so ago, but we’ve only just now discovered the body.”

Cornelia Lester didn’t blink. “Who?” she asked.

“Deidre Canfield.”

“The woman who owns the gallery?”

Joanna nodded. “Yes.”

“If she’s dead, too,” Cornelia speculated, “and if she and my sister were friends, then her death must have something to do with Tizzy’s, don’t you think? I’m sorry, Sheriff Brady. I mean with Latisha’s. Tizzy is what we always called my sister back home. But tell me, please, is there any progress now?”