Partner In Crime

“Have you collected water samples?” Joa

“Dave did that first thing.”

Just then Joa

Back in the studio, Joa

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Jaime was saying. “This is a crime scene. No one is allowed inside.”

“Crime scene!” the woman repeated. “Crime scene? What kind of crime? What’s happened? Where’s Rochelle?”

Removing her mask, Joa

“I’m Sheriff Joa

“Death?” the woman repeated, wide-eyed. “Somebody died here? But what about Rochelle? Where’s she? Certainly Shelley isn’t-”

Suddenly the woman broke off. She blanched. One hand went to her mouth, and she wavered unsteadily on her feet. Up to then, Jaime Carbajal had been steadfastly trying to keep her outside. Now, as she swayed in front of him, he stepped forward and grasped her by one elbow. Then he led her into the great room and eased her onto a nearby stool. For a moment, no one spoke.

“I take it Rochelle Baxter is a friend of yours?” Joa

The woman glanced wordlessly from Joa

“I’m sorry to have to tell you this, then,” Joa

The woman began to shake her head, wagging it desperately back and forth, as though by simply denying what she’d been told she could keep it from being true. “That can’t be,” she moaned. “It’s not possible.”

By now Jaime had his spiral notebook out of his pocket. “Your name, please, ma’am?”

“Canfield,” the woman answered in a cracked whisper. “Deidre Canfield. Most people call me Dee.”

“And your relationship to Miss Baxter?”

“We were friends. I own an art gallery up in Old Bisbee – the Castle Rock Gallery. It’s where Shelley was going to have her first-ever show tonight…” Dee Canfield’s voice faltered, and she burst into tears. “Oh, no,” she wailed. “This can’t be. It’s so awful, so… unfair. It isn’t happening.”

For several long moments, Joa

Joa

Dee nodded. “That’s the one.”

“What’s his relationship to Miss Baxter?” Jaime asked.

Dee shrugged in a ma

Dee paused for several moments before answering. “More than friends, I suppose,” she conceded.

“They were going together?” Joa

“Yes.”

“For how long?”

“I don’t know exactly. Several months now. Bobo is the one who introduced Shelley to me.”

“Had there been any trouble between them?” Jaime asked. “Any disagreements?”

“No!” Dee Canfield declared staunchly. “Not at all. Nothing like that.”

“You mentioned Rochelle’s show is scheduled to open at your gallery tonight,” Joa

“No,” Dee replied. “Thursday mornings are when I come down to get gas. I have a Pinto, you see,” she explained. “It still uses leaded. Once a week I come down here, go across the line to Old Mexico, and fill up in Naco, Sonora. I usually stop by to see Shelley, coming or going. We have a cup of coffee and indulge in girl talk. When Shelley worked, she’d isolate herself completely. A little chitchat is what I used to drag her back into the real world.”

“If Rochelle Baxter is an artist, why don’t we see any paintings here?” Jaime Carbajal asked.

“Because everything’s up at the show. Oh my God!” Deidre Canfield wailed. “What am I going to do about that? Should I cancel it? Have the opening anyway? And who’s going to tell Bobo?”

“My department will notify Mr. Jenkins,” Joa

Dee nodded and swallowed hard. “Rochelle was such a talented young woman,” she said, dabbing at her tears. “This was her very first show, you see, and she was so excited about it – excited and nervous, too.”

“Did she complain to you about feeling ill?”

“ Ill? You mean was she sick? Absolutely not. We worked together all day long yesterday – Shelley, Warren, and I. She certainly would have told me if she wasn’t feeling well.”

“Who’s Warren?” Jaime asked.

“Warren Gibson. My boyfriend. He helps out around the gallery. I’m the brains of the outfit. He’s the brawn.”

Just outside Dee Canfield’s line of vision, Jaime caught Joa

“Detective Carbajal has to leave now,” Joa

“Okay,” Dee said. “I’m happy to tell you whatever you need to know. I want to help, but I’ll have to leave soon, too, so I can make arrangements about the show.”

As Jaime hurried out the front door, Dave Hollicker appeared from behind one of the screens lugging two heavy bags. Joa

“It might be better if we talk out here,” Joa

“Five months or so,” Dee answered. “As I said, Bobo Jenkins met her first – I’m not sure how – and he introduced us. He knew I was getting ready to open the gallery. He thought Shelley and I would hit it off. Which we did, of course. She was such a nice person, for an ex-Marine, that is. I’m more into peace and love,” Dee added with a self-deprecating smile. “But then, by the time Shelley made it to Bisbee, so was she – into peace and love, I mean.”

“Where did she come from?”

Dee Canfield frowned. “This may sound strange, but I’m not sure. The way she talked about being glad to be out of the rain, it could have been somewhere in the Northwest, but she never did say for certain. I asked her once or twice, but she didn’t like to talk about it, so I just let it be. I had the feeling that she had walked away from some kind of bad news – probably a creep of an ex-husband – but I didn’t press her. I figured she’d get around to telling me one of these days, if she wanted to, that is.” Dee frowned. “Now that I think about it, maybe she has,” she added thoughtfully.

“What do you mean?”

Dee countered with a question of her own. “What do you know about art?”

“Not much,” Joa

“Remember that old saw about writers writing about what they know?”

Joa

“The same thing goes for artists,” Dee continued. “They paint what they know. Shelley painted portraits. Her subjects glow with the kind of intensity that only comes from the inside out – from the inside of the subject and of the painter as well. The titles are all perfectly i