Pot Thief Who Studied Pythagoras Read online

  I needed Whit Fletcher’s help, but I couldn’t get it unless I helped him. The best help I could offer was solving the murder in the Hyatt. After seeing Guvelly on the laptop, I didn’t even know who the victim was. So far as I knew, I was still a suspect.

  The spring melt had started in the mountains to the north and the river had enough flow that I could actually hear the current. My thinking wasn’t getting anywhere, so I just let the sound of the river relax me as I walked along.

  Then it started snowing. It was early May, which tells you how late my payment to the IRS was and also how fickle springs are in Albuquerque. Soft flakes fluttered around me and dissolved as they hit the ground. I tried to catch a few on my hand, but the warmth of my palm melted them. The smell of the salt cedars along the river and the sight of the snow put me in mind of Christmas, but just as that pleasant thought was settling into my mind, the snow stopped and the sun came out.

  I own neither an umbrella nor a snow shovel and neither does anyone else in town. Of course it does rain and snow here. It just doesn’t do either long enough to justify buying the equipment.

  I was relaxed and my mind had cleared. I decided to retrace my movements on the night of the murder. I remembered Martin telling me how his grandfather taught him to see himself as a bird would see him, how he learned to drift out of his body up into a bird’s body and look down on his human body through the bird’s eyes.

  I imagined myself as a bird looking down on myself as I walked east on Central the night of the murder. For me it was just a technique to focus my memory. Maybe Martin’s grandfather believed it was an actual migration of his spirit into the bird’s body.

  I chose a hawk. If I was going to be a bird, why be a sparrow or a wren? By the time I saw myself arrive at the Hyatt, I’d become comfortable in the hawk’s body and followed myself inside. I watched myself ride the elevators and walk the halls. I concentrated on seeing every detail no matter how small. I saw the elevator buttons. They were the size of quarters with bronze edging around a white circle. I spotted the camera, a white rectangle on a white mounting arm with a black cord disappearing into the wall. I saw myself going back down to the lobby to call Wilkes. As I started to dial Wilkes’ room, I used my bird’s eyes to zoom in on the number pad and saw my finger touch the three numbers.

  I stopped thinking and went home. I took the hinges off my cabinets and walked to the police station. I did not intend to turn myself in.

  40

  “You come to turn yourself in like a good citizen, Hubert?”

  Well, you already know that was not the plan.

  “Remember you told me you had a piece of evidence that tied me in with the murder at the Hyatt?”

  “’Course I remember. I’m the one told you that.”

  “I think I know what the evidence is.”

  “You was always good at makin’ up stories. Give it your best shot.”

  “The security camera near the elevator on the eleventh floor taped me. That’s how you knew I was on that floor. I never entered the murder room, but there’s no camera in the hall, so you don’t know that.”

  “So?”

  “There are cameras everywhere in the lobby. After I left the eleventh floor, I went down to the lobby to call the person I had come to see. Here’s your secret piece of evidence: I think you have a tape of me dialing. You think I’m placing an anonymous call to report the murder. But in fact, I was calling the person I came to see in the first place. I can understand why you thought I was calling about the murder because I dialed 911. But I wasn’t making an emergency call. I was calling room 911.”

  He didn’t even blink. “Did the person in 911 answer?”

  He was testing me.

  “No, I realized as I was dialing that it was a pay phone, not a house phone, so I hung up.”

  “That’s pretty good, Hubert. But maybe you just figured out we had that tape and made up the part about the room. Who was in 911?”

  There was no reason not to tell him. He could get the registry if he had to. “His name is Carl Wilkes. He’s a dealer in antiquities.”

  “Why did you want to see some guy who sells brass beds and old wash stands?”

  “He buys old pots.”

  “Then why don’t he call himself a dealer in pots instead of a dealer in antiques?”

  I stopped trying to improve Whit’s English years ago, so I just said, “I guess he likes old pots.”

  “Real old? Like a thousand years?”

  I saw where he was going but said nothing.

  “Sounds like you was planning on selling him that pot from Bandelier. You know the one I mean, Hubert, the one you didn’t steal.”

  “That’s right. I didn’t steal it. I have many pots for sale.”

  “That’s a fact. But if he wanted a pot from your shop, why not just go down to Old Town? Why meet in a hotel room? Of course if I was buying or selling stolen goods, I’d probably want to do it in a place no one else would be at.”

  “I’ve already told you that if I happened to get the Bandelier pot, I would give it to you to turn in for the finder’s fee.”

  “What I figure, Hubert, is the sale to this Wilkes person fell through. Then you decided to salvage what you could and settle for the finder’s fee, and that’s where I come in. Normally, that wouldn’t bother me much. What do I care if you steal a pot from Bandelier? I’d be glad to get half the finder’s fee, let them put the pot back for the tourists to see, and nobody’s got any beef. But on the same night you were trying to make this sale, someone got murdered. And you were on the floor where it happened.”

  He put his feet up on his desk and leaned back in his chair. “Now, I’ll level with you. I don’t think you did it. But I think you know more than you’re telling me. It wouldn’t be the first time. I can’t do business with you while this murder case is open.”

  “I understand that, and maybe I can help. Can you at least tell me the name of the person who was killed?”

  He did, along with a few details.

  Then I pulled the hinges out of my pocket and asked him to have them checked for fingerprints.

  “Sure, Hubert. We can do that. Got any blood samples you want analyzed? How about comparing bullets? We do that, too.”

  “Just the fingerprints, Whit. It might solve a murder.”

  41

  “Guvelly’s alive,” I told Susannah as I sat down at our table.

  “Alive?”

  I nodded. “At least he was at 3:35 morning before last. He was captured on film by the security camera Tristan installed for me”

  “I don’t think it uses film, Hubie.”

  I shrugged.

  “So someone else was dead in Gubelly’s room.”

  “Right. Except it wasn’t Gubelly’s room. And it wasn’t Guvelly’s room either.”

  Ignoring my attempt to correct her pronunciation of the agent’s name, she said, “He wrote that room number on his card.”

  “Yeah, which I don’t understand. But I know it wasn’t his room. Remember I tried to get Fletcher’s help the first time by telling him about Guvelly? But he’d never heard of him at that point. Obviously, the police checked the registration for the room the body was in, so it couldn’t have been Guvelly who signed in.”

  “He may not have been in that room, but he was in your shop, so he really does think you stole the pot.”

  “He must. I can’t think of any other reason why he’d be snooping around my place.”

  “Did Fletcher tell you the name of the person we thought was Gruvelly but wasn’t who was in the room we thought was Gruvelly’s but wasn’t?” She hesitated for a moment. “Did I say that right?”

  “Except for the name, yes. Anyway, the dead guy was Hugo Berdal.”

  “What kind of a name is Berdal? It sounds like a generic bird call for hunters.”<
br />
  “So it does. Why don’t you look it up on the Internet and tell me what you find.” I was beginning to develop a theory. “Fletcher also told me Berdal lived in Los Alamos and worked as a security guard at Bandelier.”

  “I’ll bet he stole the pot.”

  “Almost certainly. But for whom?”

  “Why not for himself?”

  “If he took it for himself, what was he doing in Guvelly’s room?”

  “Maybe he agreed to give it back. That’s what Gur … the agent wanted you to do. He even hinted at a finder’s fee. Maybe Berdal wanted the finder’s fee.”

  “Maybe. But why kill him?”

  “That’s what we have to find out—why and who.”

  “We?”

  “Yes. We’re partners in crime, remember? Now that we have this new information, we need to do something. I just don’t know what.”

  “I think I do, but I don’t like it.”

  “Sounds exciting. What is it?”

  “I need to break into Berdal’s house.”

  She plopped her drink down on the table. “Geez, Hubie, for someone who isn’t a burglar, you’re becoming quite a break-in artist.”

  “I’ve never broken in to anything.”

  “True. You didn’t break into the Valle del Rio Museum. You just tricked the director into letting you walk in after hours and switch your fake pot for the real one.”

  “I suppose it comes down to the same thing, doesn’t it?”

  “Well, I’d have a hard time seeing it as mining the riches of the earth. And I’d have to say the same about Berdal’s house.”

  “I’m not breaking in as a burglar, Suze. I’d be going in to look for clues, not to steal anything.”

  “And what if you just happen to find the Bandelier pot?”

  “I’m sure the police have searched the place. The pot can’t be there.”

  “Suppose they missed it. Just hypothetically, Hubert, what would you do if you found it there?”

  “I’d take it.”

  “I thought so.”

  “Well, the guy’s dead. He has no need for a pot.”

  “He has no need for furniture either. Are you going to take that?”

  “Could you use a new couch?”

  She laughed. I took a sip of my margarita. I was so caught up in the conversation that I’d run out of salt on the rim but still had liquid in the glass.

  “Maybe I’m just a common burglar who rationalizes his thievery.”

  “I know you’d never do anything you thought was really wrong. You’d never murder, rape or pillage.”

  “Right on the first two. Does illegally digging up old pots count as pillaging?”

  “I’m not sure. You don’t hear much about pillaging these days. When do we go to Los Alamos?”

  42

  The trip to Los Alamos had to be postponed because Layton Kent summonsed me to his table at his club. I had been demoted from a lunch appointment to a cup of coffee, maybe because my celebrity status as a murder suspect was yesterday’s news.

  “I know this is unpleasant for you, Hubert, and unseemly for me. I never discuss fees with clients, but I find I must make an exception in your case.”

  “This latte won’t be added to the fee, will it?” The coffee was $4.95.

  “Certainly not. You can pay for that separately.”

  Layton folded his napkin neatly and placed it on the table next to his cup. My napkin was nice—white cloth and larger than normal. His, on the other hand, was light yellow, made of linen and was the size of a pillowcase.

  He pushed his chair back from the table and laced his fingers together on his Buddha belly. “The annual action for the Duque de Albuquerque Foundation draws near. Because this is the fiftieth anniversary of the organization, Mariella has decided to donate the frog pot she purchased from you several years ago.”

  “That’s very generous of her. It’s worth at least fifty thousand by now.”

  “I’m sure it will fetch more than that at an auction for a good cause. And my lovely bride will no doubt get more pleasure from the donation than she ever could from fifty thousand dollars.”

  I nodded.

  “The problem, Hubert, is there will now be a considerable lacuna in her collection. If you could see your way to clear to give her a suitable pot, I can waive my fee.”

  “Do you have one in mind?”

  “A fee or a pot?”

  “A pot.”

  “I don’t expect anything so rare or valuable as the one she is parting with. I leave it to your judgment. And hers. If she is satisfied, I am satisfied.”

  “Will you also waive the cost of the latte?”

  He just smiled. I took that as a yes and made my exit without a stop at the cash register.

  I walked back to Old Town and was honked at by several drivers angered by the effrontery of my walking on the pavement. Being a pedestrian in a Western city is challenging.

  Indeed, pedestrians are rare everywhere in this country. People go to gymnasiums and indoor malls to walk for exercise, but they won’t walk to the grocery store or the doctor’s office. Walking is a delightful means of transportation that allows you to see what’s around you. I saw a baby gopher, Indian paintbrushes about to bloom, and the tips of new tumbleweeds just starting to sprout. Also pull tabs, broken glass and scraps of fast food that looked perfectly preserved, probably because they were.

  I guess as an anthropologist I should be happy about our pervasive use of preservatives. It will give future generations of diggers more things to analyze when they try to figure us out. Good luck to them.

  You can think while you walk and smell the flowers along the way. Provided, of course, that you aren’t overcome by exhaust fumes.

  Although Martin Seepu owns an old pickup, he often walks to town when he’s not on a tight schedule. His house has electricity, but he doesn’t use it for much besides lighting to read by and power for his radio. The list of electric conveniences he doesn’t have is lengthy—no microwave, television, blender, clothes dryer, crock-pot, computer, dishwasher or vacuum cleaner.

  Martin lives a fuller life than most Americans who run their SUVs around town with a cell phone stuck in their ear. Here is what he has that they lack—time to reflect, knowledge of the plants and animals with whom he shares the earth, cardiovascular wellness, a strong back, a slow pulse and fitless sleep. Martin’s life is richer not in spite of lacking possessions but precisely because he lacks them.

  Pythagoras said that knowledge is to be preferred over possessions because things can be taken from you, but what is in your mind is yours forever.

  Of course, he didn’t know about Alzheimer’s, but I think you’ll agree that the point remains valid.

  I entered my adobe through the back door and passed the next hour placing calls to the West Coast and the Midwest.

  43

  Miss Flossie Martin, the Latin teacher at Albuquerque High School, taught us that Caesar said, “Omnia Gallia in tres partes divisa est.” We joked that she had heard him say it.

  He could have said the same thing about New Mexico. The plains east of the mountains are culturally and geographically akin to Texas. Most of the rest of the state has an Hispanic culture and a Western landscape.

  The third part is Los Alamos.

  Los Alamos sprang into existence overnight when Robert Oppenheimer chose it as the research site for the Manhattan Project. He had spent time at a nearby ranch recovering from a mild case of tuberculosis. When he discovered the ranch was for sale, he cried, “Hot dog” and bought it. Naturally, he named it Perro Caliente.

  Oppenheimer said the two things he loved most were physics and New Mexico. He thought the views from the high mesa would inspire the scientists brought there to create the first atomic bomb.

  Los Alamos is abo
ut as New Mexican as clam chowder. It’s mostly Anglo and mostly well educated. Over eighty percent of the adults are college educated and a third of them have graduate degrees in science or engineering. It’s the only place I know of where you can still buy pocket protectors. Their bookstore with the odd name of Otowi Station sells more science books than romances.

  People in Los Alamos who don’t work at the Los Alamos National Labs either serve the people who do or work at nearby Bandelier National Park. Hugo Berdal was in that second group. He had occupied a studio apartment at Mesa View Apartments, which I intended to nose around by pretending to be a prospective renter.

  The manager was a friendly fellow who laughed at the end of each sentence. He took a key from a set of hooks and said he would be glad to show me the vacancy. He had skin like a camel and shiny yellow hair greased into a pompadour. He was enveloped in a haze of tobacco smoke and wheezed when he talked.

  Hugo’s furniture had evidently been purchased with the goal of having no two pieces in the same style. It was a thoroughly depressing place.

  “The guy who had the apartment passed away, so it’s still full of his stuff. Hope you’re not superstitious.” He gave a hearty laugh that led to a coughing spasm. Then he lit another cigarette.

  I propped open the front door to get some oxygen. Despite the name of the apartment complex, there was no view of a mesa. I went to the back door and opened it. No mesa from that side either, although I did spend a little more time at that door doing something the manager didn’t notice.

  As a prospective tenant, I figured I had the right to check out the closet space. There were few civilian clothes and only one uniform. Behind clunky brown shoes and worn cowboy boots was a pair of green felt elfin-like slippers. Go figure.

  I wanted to look in the chest of drawers, but that seemed a little pushy. On one side of the room a recliner listed slightly to starboard. On the other side was an unmade bed. Next to the bed was a side table with burn marks and a few girlie magazines.