Nodding, Joanna turned to her detectives. “What’s happening up in Tucson?”
“I called Santa Theresa’s first thing this morning to see when we could make an appointment to see Sister Celeste,” Jaime Carbajal put in. “The lady who answered the phone told me she won’t be in all day today, either. I should try calling back tomorrow.”
“Sounds to me like you’re getting the runaround,” Joanna said.
“Sounds like it to me, too,” Jaime replied. “I tried asking if maybe she was attending a meeting somewhere, thinking we might be able to catch up with her at lunchtime, wherever she is, but the secretary clammed up on me and said I’d have to talk to her once she returns.”
“Great,” Joanna sighed. “Now what about the Pima County detectives working the Melanie Goodson case?”
Ernie Carpenter shrugged. When he frowned, his eyebrows seemed to come together, forming a solid caterpillar of hair across his broad forehead. “What about them? Like I said before, they’re not going to give us the time of day unless a specific order comes down to them from upstairs, preferably one signed in God’s own handwriting.”
Joanna scribbled Bill Forsythe’s name on the top line of her day’s to-do list. “I’ll get right on it,” she said. “Any information about when the Goodson autopsy will be completed?” she continued.
“Preliminary results today,” Ernie said, consulting his own notes. “But it’s going to boil down to toxicology reports, so you know that’s going to take time—a week or so, most likely.”
“Frank, what about you?” Joanna asked. “Do you have anything to add?”
“Fortunately, our working relationship with the City of Tucson PD is a little less troubled than our dealings are with Pima County,” Frank answered. “Consequently, I did manage to lay hands on a copy of the original case file for the Thomas Ridder shooting.”
“Complete with ballistics reports?” Joanna asked.
“Yes,” Frank said. “I think so.”
“Does it say what size bullet killed him?”
Montoya opened the thick file and thumbed through several pages before stopping to peruse one in particular. “Here it is,” he said. “Says here he died of a twenty-two-caliber bullet wound. The slug hit him in the heart, killing him instantly.”
“Was the weapon ever recovered?” Joanna asked.
Once again Frank consulted the file. “Not that it says here; why?”
“How soon can we get a ballistics report back from the DPS gun lab on the bullet that killed Sandra Ridder?”
“Today, probably, if I call up and ask them to rush it. But what’s going on?”
“What if the murder weapon is what was hidden in Sandra Ridder’s Tupperware bowl all this time?” Joanna asked. “All along I’ve been thinking that Sandra Ridder may have been killed with the gun Lucy lifted from her grandmother’s place. But what if that isn’t the case? What if she was killed with the same gun she used to shoot her husband years ago?”
“I’ll call up to Tucson and check as soon as we finish up with this meeting.”
“Would a twenty-two fit in that Tupperware container?” Jaime Carbajal asked.
“Sure,” Frank said. “One of those little featherweights would fit in a minute.”
Joanna turned to her detectives. “Ernie, what are you and Jaime doing today?”
“Paper, mostly. Then, if you can clear us to talk to those Pima County guys, I’d like to be able to shadow their investigation as closely as possible. Sandra Ridder’s funeral is scheduled for this afternoon at two over in Pearce. I don’t see any reason for both of us to go, so Jaime’s going to handle that.”
Joanna looked at the younger detective. “And here’s something else you can take care of at the same time. I’ve gone through all the Tom Ridder material Frank gave me yesterday. Nowhere does it refer to Melanie Goodson as being Sandra Ridder’s court-appointed attorney.”
“Somebody paid the bill,” Jaime said at once.
“Right,” Joanna returned. “Since you’ll be at the funeral, maybe you can ask Catherine Yates if she’s the one who paid Melanie Goodson’s fee. If it was somebody other than Sandra’s mother, let’s find out who that person was.”
“Will do,” Jaime said.
Joanna directed her next request to Detective Carpenter. “Ernie, you’re the one with contacts out at Fort Huachuca. I want to know more about Thomas Ridder’s dismissal from the army. He evidently punched out a superior officer, but that officer is never once mentioned by name. I want to know who he was and what the beef was all about.”
“I’ll see what I can do. Anything else?”
“Yes, there is one more thing. As you know, I’ll be gone all next week. I’m going to expect you to give Chief Deputy Montoya here your utmost cooperation. With any kind of luck, things will stay pretty quiet, but we all remember what happened last summer as soon as Doc Winfield left town on his honeymoon.”