Bag Limit (28 page)

Chapter Forty-four

I knew that the undersheriff was right…we couldn’t sit around the campfire drinking coffee until someone decided to roll down off the mountain. Still, we held none of the advantages. The 911 call had involved three people, and every one of them had reason to be armed with a high-powered rifle that could fire a round farther than any of us could see on the best of days.

There was every possibility that our movements were being watched at that moment through a nice, clear telescopic sight.

Sergeant Howard Bishop, who normally spent his days managing the department’s civil caseload, looked up the steep, rugged canyon and shook his head. “You’re shitting me, right?” he mumbled.

“Channel three,” Torrez said. He checked his handheld radio and slipped it back on his belt. “Tom and Wade, go right. I’ll go left with Doug. Howard, why don’t you follow the water course right up the middle.”

Bishop nodded without enthusiasm. If we had to climb all the way to the summit, where the view of northern Mexico was terrific on a clear day, that would mean nearly three miles—all of it steep, all of it treacherous. Not all of it would be uphill. Like an old blanket dumped on the floor, the terrain was a series of folded saddlebacks, each one progressively higher and steeper until it reached the final ridge. It was a matter of hiking up, then down, then up still higher, then down, then up again.

He patted his ample belly as he regarded the task. No one had thought to bring a cooler of beer, either.

I lagged even farther behind, in no hurry to have my heart explode trying to solve a family dispute that—considering the silence of the mountain—had already been resolved one way or another.

Ten minutes later, I had ambled my way far enough up the hill, a hundred yards or so, that I could look back and see the road that snaked into Borracho Springs from the state highway. It tracked about as straight as a snarled ball of grocer’s string.

I found a comfortable boulder and leaned my back against it. By supporting my shoulders, I could hold the binoculars still. I swept the hillside, finding each officer in turn. Tom Pasquale and Wade Kearns were already approaching the crest of the first saddleback.

Off to the left, I saw Robert Torrez striding around a jumble of boulders about the size of a Motel 6. Ahead of him was a promontory of bare granite that would afford a commanding view. Doug Posey had split off, circling the rock motel in the opposite direction.

Howard Bishop plodded a hundred yards ahead of me. He stopped, hands on both hips, considering a route.

“Sergeant Bishop.” It was Tom Pasquale’s voice on the radio. I took mine off my belt and turned the volume up.

“Go ahead,” Howard said. He was breathing hard.

I swung the binoculars to the right and picked up Pasquale. He was standing under a gnarled juniper, his own glasses glued to his eyes. He was looking downhill toward Bishop.

“About fifty yards in front of you at eleven o’clock,” Pasquale said. “There’s a man sitting under a grove of scrub oak.”

I swung to my left, but the terrain blocked my view from below. Bishop hadn’t moved.

“How clearly can you see him?” he asked.

“Full view,” Pasquale said. I turned to watch him again, and saw that the young deputy had dropped to one knee to steady his hands. In a moment, Wade Kearns appeared beside him.

“So what’s he doing?” Bishop said. He hadn’t moved and I’m sure didn’t relish being a big, slow-moving target.

“Nothing. I can’t see his face, though. He’s wearing a red vest over blue. Blue jeans. There’s a rifle on the ground beside him.”

“He doesn’t have it in his hands?”

“Negative. His arms are folded.”

“Howard, we’re headed that way,” Torrez said. “Tom, you stay right where you are and keep us posted, all right? If he makes any move at all, you let us know.”

“Yes, sir. He’s covered.” Pasquale was being literal. He had replaced his binoculars with the scoped rifle that had been slung over his shoulder. Kearns had left the position and was working his way east toward Bishop.

“Okay, I see him,” Torrez said after a couple of minutes. “Has he changed position? Any movement at all?”

“Negative, sir.”

We converged on the man, but as we approached from three directions, he never made a sound.

“Bob,” Pasquale said at one point, “he just moved his right hand to his right knee.”

The radio clicked twice in response. I stopped, breathing hard, and said, “If he makes a move toward that rifle, you let us know, Thomas.”

“Yes, sir. He’s not doin’ anything at the moment.”

“So don’t blink,” I said.

If he’d been in the mood or condition to enjoy it, James Walsh had a marvelous view to the north, looking out over Posadas County on a crystal-clear November day. But the view just then was the last thing on his mind. I was the last to reach his position. By the time I pulled myself around the last interruption of rocks, Torrez was on the radio to Linda Real. In that rugged country, the little handheld radios were only slightly more efficient than pitching rocks with messages rubber-banded to them.

“Linda, have the EMTs bring their unit forward,” he said. “Tell ’em we’ll have at least one to transport, but they’re not to start up the mountain until we give the all-clear.”

I didn’t hear her response because I was too busy wheezing air into my own lungs. I reached out a hand to the nearest rough granite face and steadied myself, looking James Walsh in the face. He opened one eye and saw me, and we both knew exactly what was wrong with him.

His arms had been crossed over his chest in an effort to control the crushing pain that must have felt as if his Dodge Durango were parked on his ribs. His bluish lips were frosted with a pink froth. Sweat beaded his ashen forehead. First on his knee, his right hand now dropped down to the ground for support.

“Glad you could make it,” he murmured and tried a wan smile. Torrez knelt by his side and checked his pulse at the wrist while he scrutinized the man’s face. Walsh kept his eyes closed. “He’s up there,” he whispered.

“Mr. Walsh, the ambulance is on the way,” Torrez said. “Before I let ’em risk coming up the hill, though, I have to know what happened. Where are the others?”

Walsh slowly opened his eyes, having a hard time focusing. Torrez moved slightly so that Walsh could see him without turning his head. “Off to the east,” he said, and gagged. Wade Kearns handed Torrez a small water bottle, the kind cyclists carry clipped to the bike’s frame. Walsh took a sip and pushed it away.

“How far?” Torrez said.

“About half a mile. Maybe less.” I looked to my left, squinting against the sun. The terrain to the east was, if possible, worse than where we stood, the San Cristóbals jumbled into vertical chimneys of granite extrusions that resembled a giant’s attempt at building a massive pipe organ.

Down below, the ambulance picked its way up to the springs and stopped.

“The ambulance is here, sir,” Linda’s voice said.

“Tell ’em to wait,” Torrez replied. “Mr. Walsh, what happened? Where’s Scott Gutierrez?”

“I…I think that I hit him,” Walsh managed. His eyes opened wide with urgency. “I saw him and Connie together. They were across a canyon. At first…it was their voices. They were arguing.”

“How far away were you?”

“Across the canyon. Maybe fifty yards. Maybe more. I don’t know.” He closed his eyes and turned his head away. “They were standing out on a…kind of a spurlike thing.” He raised his right hand weakly. “It dropped off. I could hear them talking.” He shifted position, opened his mouth, and stuck out his tongue, as if something really foul-tasting was glued to the back of his palette.

“And then they were shouting at each other. And then…he pushed her. Really hard. She fell backward.” He closed his eyes again and his face scrinched up, either with the pain of the memory or the pain of what his innards were up to.

“You saw her fall?”

Walsh nodded. “I saw her…fall. She didn’t even have time to cry out.”

“And it was Scott Gutierrez who pushed her? You’re sure?” I asked.

Walsh opened his eyes and looked at me. “Oh, I’m sure.”

“I’m on my way up there,” Tom Pasquale said.

“Wait a minute,” Torrez snapped, and it looked as if he’d jerked an invisible line. Pasquale stopped in his tracks. “What did Gutierrez do after that?”

“I shouted at them.” He grimaced. “I mean, what could I do? I shouted and he turned around, raised his rifle, and fired at me. Just like that. He fired at me.” Walsh’s gaze fastened on the horizon, his breath coming in short, quick little gasps.

“You need to get the EMTs up here,” Posey said.

“Not if somebody’s out there with a rifle.”

“We’ve got cover here,” the officer said. “If they don’t get some oxygen up here, he’s not going to make it.”

Torrez frowned and then nodded. “Route ’em right up the middle so we can keep an eye on ’em,” he said. “But hold on a minute.” He rested a hand on Walsh’s shoulder. “Did you see where Gutierrez went after he shot at you? What direction?” Torrez turned and looked at me. “He’s got to be circling around to the vehicles, sir. That’s what worries me.”

“No,” Walsh said. “He shot at me twice. I didn’t even imagine that he’d do that. I had nowhere to go. I tried to dig in behind a rock, but he shot at me again. That’s when I shot back. Three times, I think.” Walsh sagged backward, exhausted from the effort.

“Did you hit him?”

Walsh nodded. “I think so. I’m not sure. But I think…that I did. He fell backward. Maybe he just tripped. But I think that I hit him.”

“Jesus,” Pasquale muttered.

“Okay,” Torrez said, stretching out an arm and pointing east. “I see a sort of jagged pinnacle over there maybe a thousand yards. Is that where they were, Mr. Walsh?”

Walsh nodded faintly without turning his head to look. “I…think so.”

“Tom, you and Wade circle around, come in from above,” Torrez said. “And be goddamn careful. Me and Doug will go straight across.” He stood up and peered down the hill. “Linda,” he said into the radio, “who’s got the gurney?”

“Judy Parnell and Al Langham, sir.”

“Okay. Radio dispatch and tell them that we’re going to need another unit out here with four people. Tell ’em it’s a real bad climb in rough country. They may want to pick up some folks from Search and Rescue. When they arrive, keep them at the bottom until I give the all-clear. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go ahead and tell Judy and Al to come up. Al, are you listening?”

“I’m here.” Langham’s voice was tense.

“You two be careful. I think it’ll be all right, but don’t be standing around out in the open. Keep in the cover of those rocks there in the old streambed as much as you can.”

“We’ll do it.”

“You’ve got a coronary to transport.” Torrez surveyed James Walsh. “We need you up here ASAP. Make sure you bring some air with you.”

“Ten-four.”

“Howard and I can give them a hand,” I said.

Torrez nodded. “You hang in there,” he said to Walsh, and he glanced at the others. “Let’s boogie.”

In a matter of minutes, the only sign of the four officers was the occasional clatter of their boots on loose rocks. Below us, the two EMTs, casting nervous glances up the side of the mountain, wound their way up toward us. They were within a hundred yards when James Walsh said, “Oh, my gosh.”

Chapter Forty-five

Sergeant Howard Bishop moved with surprising speed for such a big man. Even as James Walsh’s eyes rolled back in his head and his hands spasmed up against his chest, Bishop leaped forward, grabbed Walsh by the coat at the shoulders, and swung him away from the small tree against which he’d been leaning.

Striking out with his boots, he cleared the largest rocks while I scrabbled an almost clear patch of ground. Of average build weighted down by an expanding beer belly, Walsh was no child. Bishop handled him as if he were, and stretched him out on his back.

With practiced motions, the deputy lifted Walsh’s chin, cleared the airway, and took a deep breath. I dropped down on the strickened man’s right side. His carotid artery was easy to find, but instead of a nice, steady pulse, the artery jiggled under my touch as the man’s heart spasmed into a string of fibrillations.

It’d been a long time since I’d done chest compressions on a human being. The mannequins that the EMTs entrusted to us during the CPR refresher courses didn’t complain about mangled technique, and they didn’t die. I felt for the xiphoid process at the end of Walsh’s sternum, moved up a bit, took a deep breath, and used my considerable weight behind straight arms to do the work.

For what seemed like the rest of the day, I pumped while Bishop breathed, the two of us working in sync while I prayed that the two EMTs would just levitate up the hill. In reality, we worked for no more than three minutes before Al Langham dropped down beside me, puffing like a steam engine.

“Jesus, what a place,” he said.

“You ready for me to get out of your way?” I gasped. He listened with the stethoscope and even as he did so, his eyes were as much on me as on Walsh.

“You all right?” he snapped.

I nodded, continuing the compressions. The sun was almost hot, bouncing off the rocks.

“Then just keep doin’ what you’re doin’ for a couple of seconds.” Even as he said that, the radios barked.

“Sheriff?” Torrez said. “Call me when you can.” He was either a mind reader or was watching us through binoculars.

“He’s going to have to wait,” I panted.

Langham turned to the large aluminum case that he’d lugged up the hill, and then he and Judy went to work. But James Walsh had chosen a bad spot to have a coronary. In another minute, his heart gave up on the wild, run-a-way rhythm and flat-lined. The EMTs went the whole gamut for the next ten minutes, but eventually we sat back, exhausted. I touched Walsh on the neck, feeling skin that was already going cool to the touch.

“Shit,” I said.

“That just about covers it,” Al Langham said. “Where’s the rest of the hunting party?”

“I wish we knew,” I said. I pulled the radio from my belt. “Linda, call dispatch and tell Gayle she’ll have to reach us by phone. Then come on up.”

“I’m on my way,” she said. She was more eager to climb a rugged mountain than I was just to shift position to rest an aching knee.

“And there’s no point in you two heading back down yet, Al,” I said. “Not until we know what they find up above.”

“That’s good news,” Al said, and lit a cigarette. He’d unpacked a black plastic body bag, and he and Judy stretched it out.

Bishop nodded at Walsh’s rifle, still lying where he’d dropped it under the oak scrub. “I want pictures of that before it’s touched,” I said. “Of this whole area where he was sitting.” I straightened up with radio in hand, taking time to suck some air into my lungs.

“We’ve got some O
2
with us, Sheriff,” Langham said, my actions not lost on him.

“No, I don’t need oxygen. I’ll be fine. Mountain climbing is not my thing.” I raised the radio. “Robert, what did you find?”

“Sheriff,” he began, but his radio barked a long complaint of static. “Sheriff,” he said again, “we’ve located Connie French.”

“Is she alive?”

“Alive but unconscious. My first guess would be multiple fractures and internal injuries. A helicopter would sure make things easier.”

“All right. Any sign of her brother?”

“Negative, sir. Tom and Wade are working the area, but nothing yet.”

“All right. Linda, did you copy that?”

She didn’t respond immediately, but I’d probably caught her between boulders. “Yes, sir,” she panted after a minute.

“Let me see if I can reach dispatch by phone. If not, we’re going to have to keep you down at the radio.”

“Yes, sir.”

A dinosaur when it came to most new gadgets, I still viewed the little cellular telephones as nuisances that distracted motorists. This time, the gadget served its purpose. Gayle Torrez’s voice came through perfectly.

“Gayle, I’ve got a list for you,” I said. “First of all, we’re going to need a helicopter. It’s rugged, high country, so you better see if the State Police Jet Ranger is somewhere in this part of the state. While you’re at it, find where the Med-Evac plane is. And then see what personnel you can rustle up. We may need to cover a lot of ground before this is over.”

“Yes, sir,” she said. “Do you want me to put in a call to state police for ground support as well?”

“Hell, yes. Whoever you can find. Jerk the Forest Service out of bed, too.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll get back to you in a little bit.” I shifted to the handheld radio. “Robert, is Connie stable?”

“That’s negative, sir. She’s got an open compound of her right arm, what looks like a broken hip, and a really nasty injury to the back of her head. I would guess a fracture.”

I looked at Al Langford. “We’ll get some help up there, Robert. Al and Judy are on their way. You think it’s going to be all right?”

“Probably,” Torrez said. “There’s no sign of Gutierrez in the immediate area.”

“What the hell is going on here?” Langford said.

“I wish we knew,” I said, and lifted the radio again. “Robert, are you and Doug going to need more help with Connie in addition to the EMTs?”

“That’s negative, sir. But they need to hustle. She’s in deep shock, and her position is head down and really awkward. I don’t want to move her until we can stabilize her neck, but we don’t have any way to do that.”

“Ten-four. They’re on their way. And Gayle’s looking for the chopper.”

James Walsh was bagged and ticketed for his trip down the hill, but he was going to have to wait. The backboard went up the hill with Al and Judy.

“I’ll go on over with them and see what Bobby wants to do next,” Bishop said.

“Well, wait a minute. I’m going to go back down to the vehicles and sit the radio,” I said. “Linda needs to be up here where she can do some good, but somebody needs to be able to communicate.” I slipped the phone back in my pocket. “All I need is to have us all up here, and the battery in this thing goes dead. I’ll send her up. Show her what we need.”

“All right.” Bishop didn’t sound overly eager, but that was understandable considering his choices. He could either scramble over rocks until he was purple in the face with bruised hands and barked knees, or sit in the sun with a bagged corpse.

“Sir, this is Linda,” my radio crackled.

“Go ahead.”

“Gayle said that John Rivera was en route from the Forest Service office, and that the chopper is in Las Cruces, sir. Their best ETA is less than an hour.”

“Copy that,” Torrez’s voice interrupted. “Tell ’em to firewall it. Make it a short hour.”

“Yes, sir and sir? The Med-Evac plane is in Deming. They’ll meet the chopper at Posadas.”

“Outstanding,” I said, “I’m coming down. We’re going to need you up here.”

“Affirmative.”

I craned my neck and looked uphill, spotting a patch of brown. “Thomas, do you copy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Were you able to find the location where Connie was standing before she fell?”

“That’s affirmative, sir.”

“How far did she fall?”

“It looks to be about thirty feet, sir. And that’s with a strike about halfway down. There’s a ledge that she would have hit. We found her rifle and a little day pack partway down.”

“Any sign of Scott?”

“That’s negative. A little patch of blood, though.”

“Is there any way to tell what direction he might have gone?”

“Negative, sir. And the way this terrain is, he could be anywhere.”

“Make sure nothing is disturbed. Linda’s on her way up. One of you guys needs to be with her.”

“Yes, sir.”

I holstered the radio. Down below, I could see Linda Real standing beside one of the county units, waiting for me. I glanced at my watch. I had twelve minutes before Judge Lester Hobart would expect me in his chambers. If I hurried, I could be halfway back to the trucks by that time.

“Linda?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Have Gayle give Judge Hobart a call. Advise him of the situation, and tell him that Cliff Larson will be attending the hearing this morning instead of me. If that’s not going to work, he’ll just have to reschedule.”

“It’s a hell of a good time for somebody to rob a bank,” I said to Bishop as I turned to start down the mountain.