The Corpse with the Emerald Thumb (30 page)

“Who borrowed Margarita's van and filled it with gas?” asked Frank, his hand raised. Ada pulled his hand down and tutted.

“Well, Frank, to answer your question, the Rose Killer was borrowing it, to transport and dump bodies. The same person was driving it the day that Margarita took photographs of her own van—not one like it, but her
actual
van—when she was out taking daybreak shots of the surf. I don't think she knew what she'd seen, or photographed, at first. But she eventually put it all together: the pictures, the idea that someone was using her van without her say-so, and a person coming to her store to buy two red roses on Sunday morning. She realized she was looking at the person responsible for killing Miguel's daughter and all those other girls. The killer's response, knowing they'd been found out, was to act instantly. That is why Margarita died.”

“So who
is it
?” asked Ada plaintively. “Is it one of . . . us?” She looked around the room, wide-eyed. And she wasn't the only one.

“Preposterous!” exclaimed Dorothea.

“No, it's not,” I said quietly. I looked at Captain Soto and said, “Ready?” He nodded and made a few signals with his fingers, and two of his remaining four guards stiffened to full alert. Anyone thinking of making a run for it would have several automatic weapons to consider.

“I think that the death of Miguel's daughter was an accident. A heavy drinking session resulted in her death, and the person she'd been drinking with panicked, identified Margarita's van as a convenient way to get the body out of the vicinity, and thought they'd got away with it. But the police pulled in Miguel as a prime suspect. A month of Federales buzzing about the area didn't go down well in many quarters for . . . many reasons. So everyone breathed a sigh of relief when another girl was killed and
everyone
around here had an alibi—they were all attending one of the crucifix of Requiem Masses that Miguel had arranged. Captain Soto—I assume you had all the men in this area under observation at that time?” Soto nodded. There were a few surprised expressions around the room. “But that day, with everyone heading off in different directions for religious observances, did you ease up a little?” Again, he nodded, ruefully. “The one day that Margarita's van was available in the daytime because she'd closed her shop, you saw the
only
daytime abduction of a girl who was killed. Unlike Angélica Rosa, the second girl was drugged. Her exact time of death was suspect, though you knew she hadn't been dumped before a certain point in time. Let me pose this question. If a young woman was alone, who would she trust enough to accept a ride from? What type of vehicle would she willingly get into? Especially if she felt she might be in danger?”

There were shrugs around the room. I answered my own question. “A police car. Despite the rumors about the trustworthiness of the Mexican police force—I'm sorry, Captain Soto, but even
you
have to accept that the evidence for some corruption is pretty clear”—Soto shrugged—“how could Margarita's van be mistaken for a police car? It's white, that helps, and I discovered that Miguel has a magnetic decal that can be attached to any vehicle, thereby transforming it into a ‘police car' containing a person a girl can, psychologically speaking, trust. And that's what the killer did: put Miguel's decal on Margarita's van and used it to lure in girls who would then be plied with drugged alcohol and allowed to die. But why? There was no interference. No apparent sexual motive. Was the killer doing it for the simple pleasure of watching these poor young women die? If so, why lay them out with such reverence, wrapped in a sheet, their hands in prayer, holding roses?”

There were mumblings. I turned and looked directly at the Rose Killer.

“Because that's what you felt was right to do for your little niece, wasn't it, Rutilio? I've seen how you like to pour your drinks. I'm betting you gave little Angélica Rosa just one too many strong drinks the night of the Día de los Muertos celebrations, she passed out, and you found she'd died. You panicked, loaded her body into Margarita's conveniently located van. It's always parked in the lane behind your restaurant, and I'm sure you knew where Margarita kept her keys, and how to get to them. It didn't occur to you that your brother would be suspected of killing his own child. It was during that period that your business suffered—I suspect you were racked with guilt. You came up with a plan: on the day of the Requiem Masses you took Margarita's van, and, once you were away from this area, added your brother's police decal. You might even have ‘borrowed' one of his spare uniform shirts to complete the look—it would have been easy enough for you to gain access to one. You drove around until you picked up your second victim, then you made sure you dumped the poor woman's body in a place where the time
after which
she was dumped, 6:00
PM
in this case, would be known. You probably followed a cop car on its normal route, so you knew there'd be a clear, unequivocal timeframe for the dumping of the body, because that was the vital part of your plan. You returned to Punta de las Rocas for the service here, assuring that both you and your brother, in Puerto Vallarta, had watertight alibis.”

Miguel shot to his feet. “My brother could not have done this. I was cleared because I could not have driven from the place where the poor girl was dumped to the church I attended in Puerto Vallarta—where many people saw me. My brother has the
same
alibi—he was at another service here.” Miguel looked terribly distressed.

“What time was the Mass said here?” I asked Al, who I knew had attended with Rutilio.

Al looked puzzled. “It was at 7:00
PM
, the same as in Puerto Vallarta.”

“But Punta de las Rocas, and the whole of Nayarit, is an hour behind Puerto Vallarta. When it's 7:00
PM
here, it's 8:00
PM
in Puerto Vallarta. Rutilio had a
whole extra hour
to get back here from the dump site and still be at the church in time for the 7:00
PM
service. You're all so used to the difference it didn't occur to you. I didn't even know about the time difference until this morning, which was why I was stuck. I couldn't work out how Rutilio could have been in two places at once that day, though I knew, by then, that it
was him
who'd killed Margarita.”

“This is rubbish!” shouted Rutilio, leaping up from his seat. “I would not kill my niece. I would not kill all those other girls. Why would I do that? You have no proof. There is nothing that points to me!” Rutilio grinned at me with his big teeth.
Look out, Cheshire Cat—here I come!

One of the cops motioned with his weapon that Rutilio should sit, and he did, grumbling.

I sighed. “Rutilio—you are a classic narcissist with sociopathic tendencies. The giant face sign you have? The way you present yourself as the star of your own show at the restaurant? The roses you like to give the women with their checks, so that you can flatter them and have them focus on just you? By the way, I know that's why, for the first time, you had to try to get the red roses from Margarita for this latest kill—you told me yourself, you don't have your own roses during the summer months. For the rest of the kills, you used the ones you had in bulk at your restaurant. I know you used Margarita's van, because it's refrigerated. The refrigeration is what threw off the coroner's ability to come up with an accurate time of death—it messes with the onset of rigor mortis. Sometimes rigor sets in more quickly because of it, sometimes it is delayed. After all the press coverage about the confused time of death, you might have put two and two together and worked out that, somehow, the refrigerated van could help you mask when you were really killing. You didn't target specific girls; you'd just drive until you found one who was ready to accept the offer of a ride home from a man driving a cop car. Enough young people walk in these areas, because they don't own a car or even a bicycle, so it wouldn't take too long. Your niece's death was an accident. You covered it up. Your first ‘real murder,' when you resorted to plying a girl with drink and drugging her, was to clear your brother, and you, of suspicion. So why more deaths, Rutilio? Why continue? My assessment would be that you did it just because you
could
. And because you
liked
it. It had become ‘your thing,' and you don't have many of those, do you? You had to give up your apartment in Bucerias and move back to live with your mother and your brother's family. None of your past jobs have gone well for you—you have always been ‘misunderstood' by employers. Even your own business, the restaurant, is failing. You are getting older, and whatever looks you once had are fading. It was one way you could reassure yourself you were a real man—not in a sexual way, but by showing you had power over people. You are your mother's ‘pretty baby.' She and your brother have unwittingly enabled you to remain free of responsibilities. They have backed you up when you've said that past misfortunes have not been ‘your fault.' You display a classic inability to take responsibility for any of your own failures.”

Finally there was a gasp from Miguel. “No!”

“Yes,” I replied. “When I saw Rutilio on the day of Margarita's murder, he was standing against a white wall, holding a glass of water and what I thought were two chopsticks in his hands, at exactly the time that Bud was trying to save Margarita's life. I could just about spot his white chef hat against the white stucco wall.” I looked at the killer and saw his mask slip even further as I spoke, a snarl beginning to twitch at his lips. “Initially, it was difficult for me to make out the white hat against the white wall, but I did.
Now
I know that what I'd thought were two sticks you were holding were, in fact, two red roses, but I couldn't make out the red of the flower heads, because they'd disappeared against the red of your chef jacket, just like poor Margarita's blood, which must have been all over it at the time. You put on a clean jacket in your kitchen before you joined the crowd in the street outside Margarita's shop. And the knife? You might have had one in your pocket when you went to her shop, but I think it might be discovered that the knife used to kill her was Margarita's own. Florists have all sorts of cutting implements to hand; all you had to do was reach out and make one swift slashing motion.”

The men with guns were now even more alert. Rutilio's mask of bravado had completely disappeared, but he still seemed to have his toothy grin because his dry lips had stuck to his teeth.

Al and Miguel were on their feet. But I wasn't done. “Here's how it went, Rutilio. You sauntered into Margarita's shop on Sunday morning, needing two red roses because you knew it was your time to kill again. She wouldn't sell them to you, right? She'd picked up a special order for a wedding, and they were all spoken for. You insisted, and your insistence and anger raised her suspicions. When I was in her shop with Al, I noticed that she had two buckets with red roses in them, and one with yellow. I even noticed that she had twenty-two red roses and twelve yellow. When would a florist buy in anything other than
full
dozens of roses? Two red roses were missing from Margarita's stock. When I returned to the shop with Miguel, I saw a newspaper, laying sodden on the floor, warning girls to be careful because it was Rose Killer time. She'd worked out that her van was being used without her knowledge. I think the penny dropped that she'd even photographed it in use. She probably accused you of taking her van. She must have mentioned that Callie had raised the issue of the extra mileage, because that's why you went after the Booths. When it comes to their drugging, I suspect it went much as Al suggested, but with you, not me
,
getting Tony to accept a drugged drink, waiting until he went to bed, then getting Callie to accept a drink from you in her already hazy state. But you got your doses wrong. You're used to drugging young women who are small in stature—Callie Booth is a healthy, fit woman, as I saw from her wedding photographs, and she has a bigger body mass than you were used to dealing with, so your usual dose didn't work on her. Tony was a fit, muscular man, and I'm betting you gave him some extra, just to make sure. You certainly meant to kill them both. It was
you
who headed to the flower shop to search for evidence. Knowing that Margarita had photographs of her van being driven without her permission, you didn't want to take a chance. You had no idea what they would show—maybe your face?—but you couldn't risk them turning up. That's why you checked through all her photographs, then took all her equipment. By the way, you scuffed the back wall with the black plastic cases when you pulled them out through the little door at the back of the fridge. We wouldn't have the photos that we do if Al hadn't known about Margarita's secret stash of extras in her glove box. The time and date stamp will prove the van was being used by someone other than herself at a critical time.”

There were stirrings around the room. Ada Taylor was looking especially perplexed.

I pressed on. I was almost done. “The ‘long hours' Rutilio worked at the restaurant, Miguel? They were a great cover. For example, on Sunday night, all he had to do was scrape down his grill, then wait until the coast was clear at the Booths', drug them, and head back to search Margarita's store. He still had time to drive off, kill another poor young woman, dump her body, return the van to its usual spot, and come home to bed. Al, you know that Bud was in your cell on Sunday night and couldn't have been out there killing this latest poor young woman. If the medical examiner knows what to look for, I'm sure they'll be able to determine her actual time of death. In any case, Bud was in Canada on Saturday, and in prison on Sunday, so clearly he didn't kill
this
poor woman. And, if you're still in any doubt about Bud not being the Rose Killer, in my purse there's a camera containing photos of an event Bud and I attended in Vancouver in December last year, with a giant dated banner in the background, that will prove that he wasn't here for that killing either. Captain Soto, I promise you, Rutilio is your man. He
is
the Rose Killer, he
is
the man who slashed Margarita's throat, and he
is
the man who drugged both Tony and Callie Booth.”