Desert Shadows (9781615952250) by Betty Webb Page B

which makes it evening. ”
    Why did so many anal retentives turn out to be racists? But love is blind, and I caught a hint of affection in Tinsley’s eyes as she gazed at him.
    â€œCan we just go on and get this over with, Randall? Ms. Jones is right. I’m a busy woman and I don’t have time to sit around here splitting hairs with you.” Turning her attention to me, she said, “I didn’t see anything until poor Gloriana started making those terrible noises. I’d been busy talking to Chaps Peterson.” She motioned down the hill where the poet was still spinning his Wild West yarns. “Chaps shares many of my concerns about the federal government’s secret projects.”
    I braced myself, expecting a harangue on black helicopters.
    Fortunately, it didn’t happen. Tinsley raised her nose again, as if smelling something unpleasant. “But Chaps said he didn’t care about…to quote him exactly, ‘that kind of bullshit.’ He said he was attending SOBOP merely to find a publisher for his poetry, and he even had the gall to ask me if I’d introduce him to a few.”
    â€œDid you?”
    â€œChaps being a member of my constituency, yes, I did.”
    â€œAnd?”
    Tinsley’s mouth stretched as far as the Botox would allow. I think it was supposed to be a smile. “I talked to Gloriana first, but she just laughed at me. Called his work ‘third-rate doggerel,’ even worse than the poetry of Robert Service, who—before she heard Chaps—she’d believed was the worst poet in American history.”
    I wondered if Tinsley had conveyed Gloriana’s literary criticism to Chaps. Given the politico’s evident malice, the odds were that she had. “Was Gloriana the only publisher you approached for him?”
    â€œOh, I talked to David Zhang, what little good that did.”
    Somehow I couldn’t see Arizona Trails printing odes to steers, but that was neither here nor there. “Ms. Tinsley, as a state lawmaker, surely you’re familiar with the laws that protect plants on government lands. Why did you disobey Owen’s orders on that hike? He told me you picked several plants.”
    Her shrug made the pink ruffles flutter up and down her suspiciously prominent bosom. “I’m not a botanist. I thought I was simply picking flowers, certainly nothing protected.”
    â€œHell, as far as that goes, I picked a bunch of stuff, too,” Ott piped up. “Not that I was allowed to keep it. That bossy Indian made me hand everything over. So if you’re thinking that either Lynn or I sprinkled a little hemlock on Gloriana’s salad, you can think again. Neither of us had any problems with the woman. She was my publisher, and I owe my considerable success to her. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re going over to the kettle corn booth to get a decent lunch cooked by decent White people.”
    Judging from the look on Tinsley’s face, I thought she might be more interested in the nearby Bar-B-Que Bison booth run by a couple of Sioux. Still, she followed Ott closely enough, her spike heels sinking deeper and deeper into the grass with each step. By the time they reached the kettle corn, she’d sunk almost to his level.
    Ain’t love grand?

Chapter 5
    Even though Captain Kryzinski had asked the SOBOP attendees to remain in town for the next few days, I worried that some of them might defy his request and return home. I decided to drive up to Desert Shadows Resort and interview whomever I could find, starting with Myra Gordon, the librarian from Wyatt’s Landing. Besides, after the confrontation with the National Alliance and my interview with Tinsley and Ott, the drive would calm my nerves.
    But first things first. I pulled my cell phone out of my carry-all and called the office. Jimmy picked up immediately.
    â€œI’ve got some names for you, all people who were on the hike with