Belinda Gray turned out to be the dead end that Robert expected. Brian’s resources put their best bet on her in Los Alamos, where it turned out she’d lived alone for the past forty-two years. She was not reclusive but independent, and happy to serve Robert and Brian chili-pepper lemonade while she told her story, which involved an antelope on the highway, a rollover accident, and a punctured gas tank. To this day she swore that it was a coyote that pulled her out of the wreckage, though no one had ever believed her. She didn’t care who believed what. She knew what she knew, and that was all that mattered.
It was nearly four o’clock before Robert and Brian arrived at the St. Vincent Regional Medical Center in Santa Fe. Brian gung-hoed his way into the records office, fully expecting to be done with this mini-investigation in time to get back to Arizona before midnight. Robert thought a repeat of their rather breezy experience at UNM Hospital might be too much to hope for.
It was.
The men stood in a hall at a sliding aluminum-framed window that separated them from the records office. On the opposite side of the glass, an offended old lady refused to reason with them.
“You shoo yourselves outta here and don’t come back until you can show me a court order for information like that.” The woman was probably seventy, and Robert would bet she’d worked in this office for fifty of those years. It would take that long for gravity and a sunless room to have sunk a frown so low, and she kept a typewriter rather than a computer on her desk. A manual typewriter.
“After I get that order, you’ll fill out these forms”—she shoved five or six sheets of paper across the counter—“and we’ll file the request. You’ll have your information in five to six weeks.”
The plump lady gave them a backhanded wave, slid the window shut, and turned her back on them.
“Glad she’s not my grandma,” Brian muttered.
“Maybe I can be of help?” The voice came from behind Robert, sudden like an unnoticed spider. He flinched.
“Sorry to startle you.” She rested a chubby brown hand on Robert’s arm apologetically and smiled at him. Everything about her physical appearance—and her jewelry—was bronze and round except for her pepper-gray hair, cropped short below her ears. The top of her head didn’t quite reach Robert’s shoulder. Her deep crow’s-feet framed her dark brown eyes with good humor.
“She’s by the book, that one. Been here a lot of years and has earned her keep.” The woman took Robert’s elbow as if he had offered it to her and tugged him to walk with her down the hall. Brian followed.
“I was thinking we could work something out,” she said to Robert, patting his arm.
“In regard to the records?” Robert asked.
She nodded. “I heard you say you are from the DEA, is that right?”
“It is.”
“I have a granddaughter who’s been getting herself wrapped up in the wrong crowds, now. And her parents, even me—you know that sweet girl has deaf ears for all of us.”
“Sorry to hear it.” He said this as noncommittally as possible, not sure of what she was about to request.
“But now, a fine young adult like you”—Robert heard Brian scoff under his breath—“might be able to talk some sense into the child.”
“Ma’am, I’m afraid I’m not—”
“I was thinking that my girl’s still got a chance to turn her choices around.” She tapped her bottom lip with the forefinger of her free hand. "Maybe she could take these street smarts she’s got and channel them into something more constructive.” She stopped and planted her squat, wide body in Robert’s path. “More professional. Maybe get a good job with the government if she was so inspired.” Her smile seemed as broad as Robert’s shoulders.
“Recruiting isn’t my area.”
Her laugh came from a deep, rich spirit. “Oh bah. I’m not meaning recruiting, now. Just a little pep talk. A little wake-up call. A fifteen-minute chat over Cokes. And maybe your business card.”
"I’m not sure I see what good—”
"And if she won’t be listening to anything inspiring, you go ahead and scare her. That’s no trouble to me. A little truth and consequences never hurt anyone.”
Brian clapped Robert on the back. “A fine young man like this can cover a lot of ground in a short time, although he’s not so sharp when it comes to the finer points of bartering.”
"Ah.” She leaned in and held out her hand, palm up. “Let’s have a look at this Jane Doe you’re trying to find. I’d say I could find her in about fifteen minutes myself, if she exists.”
Robert surrendered and dropped into a waiting room chair while the wily grandmother disappeared to do some research. Brian leaned against the wall, tapping on his wireless.
After several minutes passed, Robert said, “I’m not going to spend the whole afternoon here talking to a druggie if we’ve hit another dead end.”
"Not a whole afternoon. Fifteen minutes is all she asked for.” Brian didn’t look up.
"Do you ever stop it with that thing?”
"Got another deadline.”
"There’s nothing new to report.”
This time Brian did look up. “There’s always something new to report, if you know how to spin it.”
"That’s the problem with news these days, isn’t it?”
"You know, until you get over your negative attitude, I don’t see that we have too much to talk about.”
Which was precisely how Robert saw things.
The waiting and lack of sleep were making him crabbier than usual. He made an effort to set it aside.
"What are you writing about?”
"You.”
"No, you’re not.”
"Okay. I’m taking notes about you. So be nice.”
“You said you’re on a deadline.”
“Blog fans await.”
Robert sighed. “Why are you here, Brian?”
“Because I’m the only reporter in the world right now who has an inside track to Salazar Sanso through the only survivor of the Mikkado Massacre—oh wait! There might be other survivors, in which case there might be other witnesses against the most notorious drug dealer in the western hemisphere. The editor likes the possibilities. You old-timers would call that a scoop.”
Robert was willing to bet the kid was bragging about his “scoop” in his blog posts. We old-timers would call that hubris, Robert thought.
In a few more minutes the woman reappeared, still beaming. “Here now,” she said. “Very simple. No court orders required and a good deed done.”
Robert stood, thinking her optimistic indeed to credit him with good deeds in advance of the fact. Or maybe she was referring to herself.
“August 28. White female admitted at 6:14 a.m. by ATV riders who found her about two hundred miles from here.” Robert’s pulse quickened. “Air Life would have lifted her to UNM, but they were at capacity. Burned over 40 percent of her body, second and third degree. Medically induced coma for three weeks, inpatient treatment totaled four months.”
“What was the cause of the burns?”
She shook her head. “Unknown. There was some speculation that she was a victim of that Mikkado Massacre—same time, located within a few miles— but she denied any affiliation with that group. She wouldn’t discuss how she’d been injured.”
Robert could understand why a person would choose silence in the face of fear and the belief that everyone she’d ever loved was dead. He held out a hand for the piece of paper she had printed out.
“It’s a familiar name to me,” the woman said, “but I can’t recall why I know it. Here’s the address we have. Can’t promise it’s current, but she did come in periodically up until about three years ago. I wrote my granddaughter’s down next to it so you can call on her. I’m Mrs. Whitecloud. You tell her I sent you.”
He asked her with his eyes if she understood how many privacy laws she was violating by giving this information to him.
“Sometimes what’s right is bigger than any related wrong. You'll keep your end of the deal, now, won’t you?”
Robert sensed his head nodding but did not hear the rest of what she might have said. His eyes had locked onto the name at the top of the page. Katy Morgan. Misspelled, and yet the same name of his childhood friend.