“Didn’t know you had a ranch,” Mallow said.
“Did since Ray’s dad died. It’s north of St. George. He’ll be back tomorrow,” she said. “What do you want him for?”
“The marshal here wants to show you some pictures,” Mallow said.
Lucas called up the photos of Toni Wright’s jewelry on the iPad and spun it around to show Alvin. She looked at them carefully, then said to Mallow, “That’s way high-end. We wouldn’t handle that. Of course if we did, we’d want a good provenance. There’s so much fake Loloma out there that you can’t sell it if you can’t prove where it come from.”
Mallow said, “Right,” letting the skepticism ride on his voice.
“Don’t believe me?” Alvin said. “Look at the stuff we handle.” She rapped on the glass top of the jewelry counter. “Most expensive thing in here is five hundred and forty-nine dollars, and we could be talked down. We don’t handle no twenty-thousand-dollar Loloma.”
“How about that princess necklace?” Mallow asked.
“Shoot. We didn’t handle no princess necklace.”
“Well, I know you did, and you know I know. You sold it to that Fitch guy up in Denver and he sent it along to Baltimore. What’d you take out of that? Fifty K? Is that where the ranch came from?”
She sneered at him, a rim of ragged teeth showing beneath her thin top lip. “You must not have checked the real estate market lately. You don’t buy no Colorado ranch for no fifty K.”
It was starting to sound like a lover’s quarrel, so Lucas jumped in. “Mrs. Alvin, I’m a U.S. Marshal and I’m trying to track down a killer. That cannibal from Louisiana, you probably heard about him on television?”
She said, “Maybe,” which meant yes.
“He’s with this bunch who stole the Loloma jewelry,” Lucas said. “If it turns out you or your husband handled it, and if you lieabout it and we find out we’ll put you in prison. We’re not talking about thirty days for handling a stolen bracelet. We’re talking about being an accessory to murder, which is the same as murder, and that’s life in prison.”
She twitched, maybe showing a little fear. “I’m telling you, we never saw that stuff. I’d know and we didn’t.” To Mallow she said, “You know who’d handle it, if anybody did.”
Mallow said, “We’re going there. We’re watching your phones and theirs. If you call them, we’ll be back. Like the marshal said, we’re talking murder here, Louise.”
“I hear ya.”
—
LUCAS FOLLOWED MALLOWto the next stop, five minutes after the first, at a dusty storefront called Loco’s Consignment & Furs. “This isn’t the place Louise was talking about, that’s next,” Mallow said. “Thought we might as well stop since we’re going right past it. Loco does some light fencing.”
Inside, a young woman with close-cropped black hair, black eyeshadow, black lipstick, and black nail polish, with lots of silver rings piercing her earlobes, cheeks, and lips, looked at them and said, “If you’re not from New Jersey, you gotta be cops.”
“We’re cops,” Mallow agreed. “Where’s Loco?”
“Dead.”
“What?”
“He’s dead. Funeral was last Saturday. Obit was in the paper.”
“Then who are you?” Mallow asked.
“His daughter.”
“We’re looking for some stolen jewelry...”
The woman waved a hand at the store, which was heavy on leather furniture, gilt picture frames, and old but nonetheless high-end women’s clothing, and said, “No jewelry. Not that I found anyway. I been in the store only since Monday. I wanna sell this junk and cancel the lease and get back home.”
“Where’s that?” Mallow asked.
“Oakland. California.”
“How did your father die?” Lucas asked.
