“My name’s Conroy. I wonder if I might speak with Joyce Oderkirk?”
The woman gave Steve a suspicious look. “Are you a reporter or something?”
“No.”
“What then?”
“I’m a lawyer.”
Wariness dug deeper into her eyes. “You know she’s suffered a terrible loss, don’t you?”
“I do. I knew her husband.”
“I’m sorry. It’s awful. Two little girls. I don’t know how Joyce does it, but she’s here and she’s — ” The woman stopped as if she’d just revealed a state secret.
“Please,” Steve said. “I think she’ll want to see me. If you could tell her I’m here.”
“What’s it about?”
“If you don’t mind, ma’am, that’s personal. But important.”
She shrugged, but her shoulders fought it. She told Steve to wait and went to an inner office. He looked at a framed picture of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., speaking at the famous Washington rally. The “I have a dream” speech. He wondered if Johnny LaSalle went to school here, if he looked at this same picture, if his elementary mind was molded more for racism by his father than inclusion by his teachers.
The woman returned and, tight-lipped, said, “She said she would see you. Room twelve.”
Steve found the room at the end of a row, near the chain-link fence typical of the penitentiary look favored by California elementary schools. Even in Verner. The blue door under a rusty 12 was open.
Poking his head in, Steve saw a woman sitting at an old-fashioned wooden desk on the other side of the room. “Mrs. Oderkirk?”
She looked up. “Yes. Come in.”
The room was done up in fourth- or fifth-grade style. Steve couldn’t really tell the difference. Pictures of all the presidents lined the wall like a ring of imperial heads. Except one was missing. Steve glanced at the vacant spot as he offered his hand to Joyce Oderkirk. She took it without standing up.
“One of your presidents is missing,” Steve said.
“Oh,” Joyce Oderkirk said. “Yes.”
“Let me guess,” Steve said. “I used to know them.” He took a step to the left and saw that it was the one after Millard Fillmore and before James Buchanan. “Oh man,” he said. “This is going to be tough.”
Joyce Oderkirk said nothing. She was about thirty, with black hair and light almond skin, maybe Mediterranean blood in her background. Pretty.
“I’ll guess Harrison,” Steve said.
Glumly, Joyce Oderkirk shook her head. “Pierce.”
“You lost Franklin Pierce?”
“Brenda said you were a friend of Larry’s.”
“Not a friend exactly.”
Joyce frowned. “She said you were in business together?”
“Let me explain,” Steve said. “I had called him to help me locate an autopsy record. When I came out here to see him, I found out he’d been killed.”
“That’s not what you told Brenda. I thought you were a friend — ”
“I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.”
“There was no misunderstanding.” She glared. “You purposely . . . who are you?”
“My name is Steve Conroy. I’m a lawyer. I’m — ”
She stood up. “I don’t want to talk to you.” She looked frightened, like Steve might be wearing a wire or carrying plutonium.
“I’m not here on a legal matter,” Steve said. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”
“Why?”
How to explain the coincidence of her husband’s dying at the same time he was being retained by a brother with nefarious connections? How to phrase a remark that wouldn’t deepen her grief, but would prompt her to give him a word worth having?
He thought about leaving the poor woman alone. She didn’t need to think foul play was involved. Thought about it, then stayed.
“I just wanted to know, that’s all,” Steve said. “Larry seemed like a nice guy, and . . . well, that’s all.”
She paused, considered, then sat back down, folded her hands on the desk like one of her students might. “I’m sorry. It’s just been so hard.”
“I understand.”
“There wasn’t a better-liked man in this whole community.” She started to tear up, but fought the breakdown like someone who’d been doing nothing else for the last couple of weeks. “He was not reckless. I just can’t imagine he’d drive off the road like that, unless something caused it.”
“Maybe an oncoming car.”
She shook her head. “That was my first thought. I went to the exact spot it happened. I looked up and down that stretch of road and I didn’t see skid marks of any kind. I can’t imagine there wouldn’t have been some marks.”
“Could be something was in the road. A deer maybe.”
Mrs. Oderkirk actually smiled a little, looking at her hands. “It’s funny you should say that. There was one thing Larry always told me, something he said his father taught him. About animals in the road. He said you just have to hit them. You just have to, if you can’t stop, otherwise you could swerve and hit another car. And as much as we love animals, Larry said, we have to love people more.”
Now she was crying softly. “I never could follow his advice. Even if it was a little squirrel.” She pulled open a drawer and withdrew a tissue, dabbed her eyes.
Steve gave her a moment. “Mrs. Oderkirk, you mentioned that Larry was well liked. I can see that, having just talked to him on the phone. He seemed that kind of person.”
“He was.”
“Can you think, though, of anyone who might have had something against him? He was a deputy sheriff, after all. Maybe somebody he arrested one time?”
“I suppose that’s possible. Anything’s possible.” She met his eyes directly. Hers were brown and dark. “You don’t suppose?”
“Can I ask, does the name Eldon LaSalle mean anything to you?”
Her wet eyes widened. “Of course it does. Not in a good way.”
“Why’s that?”
“He doesn’t exactly reflect well on the community.”
“Might Larry have had some dealings with him? Maybe a run-in with him or one of his followers?”
She shook her head. “He never mentioned anything like that. That crowd pretty much keeps to itself. Owen . . . Sheriff Mott, he seems to have found a way to keep things in order.”
“Where do these followers hang out?”
“I don’t know, I don’t think about them.”
“You haven’t heard anything?”
“Why are you asking me these questions?” she snapped. “What’s your business here?”
“I have a client who lives here.”
“Who?”
“I can’t really say.”
Cogs turned in her head. “Do you have something to do with the LaSalles?”
Steve said nothing.
“You’re trying to get information from me.” She got to her feet again. “Get out, please.”
“I assure you — ”
“I’ve said all I’m going to say.”
“Mrs. Oderkirk — ”
“Please leave.”
“Can I at least leave you my card?”
“No.”
Steve put one down on her desk anyway. “Thank you for your time,” he said, and walked out.