South Phoenix Rules (David Mapstone Mystery 6)

I spent the day writing a grant proposal, to fund a history I wanted to write of Phoenix. If I was going to make my re-entry into academia, I needed to publish again. And the histories of the city were lacking. Brad Luckingham’s book left out so damned much and VanderMeer’s wasn’t even in print any longer. I fretted about my future. Every job was being chased by six unemployed persons, and the competition was much greater among people with advanced degrees in the humanities. The situation was even worse in Phoenix, by far the largest city with only one real university. I hated to be at the mercy of ASU. Although I had gone there as an undergrad, I had long since moved on. But I really needed this job. And they had come after me, several high-ranking folks urging me to apply for the job after Peralta lost the election. By the end of the day, my eyes hurt from so much computer time. Robin did yoga in the guest room and stared out at the interior courtyard, saying little.

In the afternoon, she wanted to know about the family photos on the bedroom dresser. There were my grandparents in black-and-white, around the time they married: 1912, when Arizona became a state. They looked pleasantly unsmiling at the camera, he in his narrow tie and coat, she with raven black hair and wearing a high-necked blouse. The mother and father I never knew were in several photos, my father a surprise baby born to grandmother when she was in her thirties, when they didn’t think they could have children. One picture showed him in the war, in his fighter pilot’s jacket and a P-51 Mustang behind him. “Dashing,” Robin commented. All these people looked impossibly young. Another photo: my parents and me as a baby, taken a few weeks before they flew off to Denver and never arrived. I told her stories that didn’t cut too deep.

“You’re lucky to know your past,” she said. “I don’t know anything about my dad. I only knew Linda’s mother a little, we were on the road so much.” Linda being her and Lindsey’s mother, always referred to by her first name.

She sighed and looked at the pictures. “When I was sixteen, one of Linda’s alcoholic boyfriends burned down our garage. All the family photos were lost. You should have seen Lindsey Faith. She was the beauty. I was the ugly duckling.”

“I doubt that,” I said. “I wish I would have

asked more when my grandparents were still alive. Grandmother knew the entire family history.”

“So no brothers or sisters,” she said. “What about other family?”

“My grandmother had a sister. She had a beautiful acreage on Seventh Avenue, when it had irrigation ditches on either side and big trees. But she died in 1976.”

“God, you really are alone.”

I sprang up and dug into the closet. “Take a look at this.” I showed her a scrapbook that Grandmother had kept, page after page of old postcards from Phoenix in the 1930s and 1940s. One showed a narrow Central Avenue lushly bordered by palm trees and manicured grass. Other postcards were from places they had visited, plus miniatures of the labels that went on the citrus crates that were shipped out when this was a farm town. “Arizona Beauty.” “Big Town Grapefruit.” “Desert Call.” “Westward Ho.” “Kathy Anne Melons.” All were colorfully, lusciously illustrated in the style of the day.

I told her about the rich agricultural valley this had once been, even when I was young. We grew oranges, grapefruits, lettuce, cabbage, summer squash, tomatoes, beets, strawberries, cucumbers, watermelons and more. Just add water to the alluvial soil of the Salt River Valley and almost anything could flourish, especially with the ingenuity of our farmers and the water from our mighty dams and canals. Phoenix had one of the nation’s largest stockyards and major packinghouses. We shipped our produce all over the nation in long trainloads. It had almost all been lost to tract houses and shopping strips. Without a ten-thousand-mile supply chain, this city would starve. I was grateful my grandparents hadn’t lived to see it.

“What’s this?”

She pointed to a post card showing long red, pink, and white rows of flowers, framed by palm trees and the South Mountains. I told her about the Japanese flower gardens that once ran for miles along both sides of Baseline Road. The way the north side of the flower fields swept down toward the city, interrupted by citrus groves and ranches in what was then a largely rural south Phoenix. How my grandparents took me down there most Saturdays, were we would buy cut flowers for the house from one of the simple tin, open-faced buildings facing what was then a two-lane highway.

“It’s so beautiful,” she said. “And they plowed it all under to build houses and apartments. I can’t believe it.”

Neither could I.

The pictures and the postcards entranced Robin. I left her and she spent two hours with the scrapbook.

As the evening advanced to ten, I told her I was going for a walk and to stay in her room. I set the newly installed alarm and didn’t want her to come out and trip the motion detectors. She said to be careful. It was midnight in Washington and Lindsey hadn’t called. She had never gone three days without calling.

I dressed in black and had the Python on my hip. I took the alley west to Fifth Avenue to avoid rousing the dog. The night was chill and the air tasted dusty. It was so quiet I could hear a train whistle from the yards over at Nineteenth Avenue, nearly two miles away. Instead of walking around the block as I had done before, I walked to Vernon, two blocks north, then moved fast back to the east, popping out of the pedestrian entrance in the wall that closed off the street near Central. The bell and whoosh of a light-rail train went by. I cut back down to Cypress and came in from First Avenue, moving toward the house from the block to the east. I had made a wide circle around our house, the better to see the perimeter.

The pickup truck sat against the north curb, near the far corner. It was a compact job, dark paint, and it was occupied. As I got closer, I could see an arm dropping out of the driver’s side with a glowing cigarette. Closer, near the house where the state appeals court judge lived—he and his wife had a musical group on the side—I made out the tag and memorized it. It was not law enforcement. Whoever was in the truck had a perfect view down Cypress to our house, and could see if we drove out the alley onto Third Avenue. It was also parked in front of the two corner houses that were for sale and unoccupied—a great spot if you didn’t want to attract attention. This was how they had picked us up last night.

I counted on two advantages: my quiet old Nike’s, and the hope that he would be staring ahead. I had other hopes: that he might be bored and careless. But you can’t live on hope. I pulled the big Colt and walked with the barrel pointed down.

As I got to the left rear of the truck he dropped the butt on the street, where it joined a dozen of its colleagues. Almost immediately, a match flared in the cab, illuminating only one occupant, then it went dark and the hand flicked it out the window.

“Smoking’ll kill you.”

He still had the cigarette in his mouth and his arm outside the cab when I got to his side. I stood just behind him so he couldn’t really see me, just like they teach about handling a traffic stop. The difference was that I had the Python’s barrel pointed at his head. He turned and bumped into it with his cheek.

“And so will I. Put your right hand on the dash.”

My finger was on the trigger guard, but he didn’t know that. I didn’t want to accidentally blow his head off. I was taking a chance, though. If his left arm had been inside, he had the opportunity to open the door suddenly and knock me to the ground. I could almost see the thought bubble above his head.

“Keep your left arm where it is.”

He looked Hispanic and about my age, with a large head and black hair combed straight back. He was wearing jeans and a checked short-sleeved shirt, with tats on his lower arm. He slowly tossed the smoke out the window and laid his hands on the dashboard.

“Where’s your weapon?”

I nudged him again with the barrel and he said, “Right on the seat beside me. I’ll be happy to show you if you’re willing to fight like a man.”

“Hand it out. Use your weak hand.”