adobe with a screened-in, low-slung front porch, sat in a grove of ancient cottonwood trees at the edge of a wide, sandy arroyo. Beyond the arroyo the tracks of the Atchison, Topeka amp; Santa Fe Railroad crossed a dry creek bed over a long wooden trestle. The place felt like it was a hundred miles from Santa Fe, locked in a time warp of an era long past. Thorpe had seen a lot of late-nineteenth-century ranch houses while stationed in Las Vegas, and the original part of the building was at least that old, if not older.
A smaller, much more modern residence with a slanted tin roof, probably a foreman’s cottage, stood steps away from a freestanding garage that contained three pickup trucks and a small farm tractor. Behind the garage was a long, rectangular building covered with sheets of tin that served as a shop and equipment shed. On a patch of grass by the walkway to the main house stood a six-foot-high piece of petrified wood that had once been a tree trunk. A mud mat at the front step read WELCOME.
Thorpe knocked on the partially open door, called out, and got no response. About a quarter-mile away, several horses lazed in a corral outside a pitched-roof, slat-wood barn. Back at his unit, Thorpe watched a pickup truck come into view around a low hill. It passed the barn and accelerated when the driver saw Thorpe’s patrol car.
A man pulled to a stop and looked Thorpe over through the open window of his truck. “What brings the police here?” he asked with a smile. “I thought you guys never left the pavement unless you had to, and I sure as hell didn’t call you.”
“Jack Burke?” Russell asked with a laugh.
“That’s right,” Burke replied, as he got out of the truck.
Through the open door, Thorpe saw a holstered pistol on the passenger seat and a hunting rifle in a roof-mounted rack. “Why all the weapons?” he asked.
Burke pushed his cowboy hat back on his forehead and frowned. A middle-aged man with graying hair and a thick neck, he had large hands with stubby fingers and thick arms that filled out the sleeves of his cowboy shirt.
“Because the more people who come to Santa Fe, the more trouble I’ve got,” he said in a disgruntled tone. “People cutting fences so they can drive their ATVs on my land, dumping garbage in arroyos because the county landfill is closed and they don’t want to take it back home, cutting firewood illegally, shooting at my windmills, killing the antelope, and hauling off gravel from an old quarry. I’ve even had to chase off a few folks I’ve caught digging up plants to take home and put in their yards. It doesn’t matter how many no trespassing signs I put up, some people have no respect for private property.”
“Have you called the police?” Thorpe asked.
Burke eyed Thorpe as though he was plain crazy. “Why? So they can take a report and file it? I gave up on that a long time ago. All it does is waste my time. Best I can do is catch ’em when I can and scare the be-jesus out of them.”
“Have you run anyone off recently who was driving an eighty-two or eighty-three blue GMC van with a crumpled driver’s side front fender?”
“Care to tell me why you’re asking?”
“Yesterday your neighbor, Chief Kerney, found his horse dead inside the barn, shot three times.”
Burke’s face flushed with anger. “Anyone who’d do a thing like that needs a dose of his own medicine. That was a damn fine animal, good-natured and well-trained. Had stamina, too. I remember when Kerney bought him at a BLM mustang auction. He turned that animal into a fine cutting horse with good cow sense.”
“Have you seen a blue van?” Thorpe asked, trying to keep Burke on topic.
Burke nodded. “When we sold Kerney his land we gave him an easement to use our road so he wouldn’t have to build a new one from the highway. With all the construction going on up at his place, it doesn’t make much sense to keep the gate locked, so I asked Kerney to make sure that the crew
A smaller, much more modern residence with a slanted tin roof, probably a foreman’s cottage, stood steps away from a freestanding garage that contained three pickup trucks and a small farm tractor. Behind the garage was a long, rectangular building covered with sheets of tin that served as a shop and equipment shed. On a patch of grass by the walkway to the main house stood a six-foot-high piece of petrified wood that had once been a tree trunk. A mud mat at the front step read WELCOME.
Thorpe knocked on the partially open door, called out, and got no response. About a quarter-mile away, several horses lazed in a corral outside a pitched-roof, slat-wood barn. Back at his unit, Thorpe watched a pickup truck come into view around a low hill. It passed the barn and accelerated when the driver saw Thorpe’s patrol car.
A man pulled to a stop and looked Thorpe over through the open window of his truck. “What brings the police here?” he asked with a smile. “I thought you guys never left the pavement unless you had to, and I sure as hell didn’t call you.”
“Jack Burke?” Russell asked with a laugh.
“That’s right,” Burke replied, as he got out of the truck.
Through the open door, Thorpe saw a holstered pistol on the passenger seat and a hunting rifle in a roof-mounted rack. “Why all the weapons?” he asked.
Burke pushed his cowboy hat back on his forehead and frowned. A middle-aged man with graying hair and a thick neck, he had large hands with stubby fingers and thick arms that filled out the sleeves of his cowboy shirt.
“Because the more people who come to Santa Fe, the more trouble I’ve got,” he said in a disgruntled tone. “People cutting fences so they can drive their ATVs on my land, dumping garbage in arroyos because the county landfill is closed and they don’t want to take it back home, cutting firewood illegally, shooting at my windmills, killing the antelope, and hauling off gravel from an old quarry. I’ve even had to chase off a few folks I’ve caught digging up plants to take home and put in their yards. It doesn’t matter how many no trespassing signs I put up, some people have no respect for private property.”
“Have you called the police?” Thorpe asked.
Burke eyed Thorpe as though he was plain crazy. “Why? So they can take a report and file it? I gave up on that a long time ago. All it does is waste my time. Best I can do is catch ’em when I can and scare the be-jesus out of them.”
“Have you run anyone off recently who was driving an eighty-two or eighty-three blue GMC van with a crumpled driver’s side front fender?”
“Care to tell me why you’re asking?”
“Yesterday your neighbor, Chief Kerney, found his horse dead inside the barn, shot three times.”
Burke’s face flushed with anger. “Anyone who’d do a thing like that needs a dose of his own medicine. That was a damn fine animal, good-natured and well-trained. Had stamina, too. I remember when Kerney bought him at a BLM mustang auction. He turned that animal into a fine cutting horse with good cow sense.”
“Have you seen a blue van?” Thorpe asked, trying to keep Burke on topic.
Burke nodded. “When we sold Kerney his land we gave him an easement to use our road so he wouldn’t have to build a new one from the highway. With all the construction going on up at his place, it doesn’t make much sense to keep the gate locked, so I asked Kerney to make sure that the crew
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