MURDER ON THE ROCK PILE

A

McGraw / O’Grady Mystery

by

Danny Motola

-1-

Monday, 10:30 a.m.

Only the hardiest of vegetation and seemingly no wild life thrive in this rocky stretch of Baja.  Barren hills, exhibiting a mélange of colors from latte to beige clay and sandy riverbeds embedded with rocks of all sizes and colors that would make a geologist salivate, reach from the base of the Sierras to the Sea of Cortez.  On the dusty road, that climbs over rocks and dips into the arroyos between Puertecitos and Punta Bufeo, there are few settlements.  The road that extends down the Baja peninsula from San Felipe runs out of pavement at Puertecitos.  From there on, it’s called “the rock pile,” a proper nickname for this stretch of road which resembles a moonscape.  Either tremendous necessity or a very twisted mind conceived this road.

    Jessie’s shriek shattered the serenity of the desert scene and jolted my six-foot-two frame like a bolt of lightning.  “Roberto, come quickly.”

    I spun around like a wound up spring suddenly released.  My hair stood on end and my heart pounded.  I bolted in her direction.  I’d never heard her scream like that.  A spider might cause her to lose her cool, but this had to be big, a tarantula perhaps.  She had no fear of snakes, but maybe a rattler had her in a precarious position.  

* * *

I had parked on the side of the road for a pit stop to relieve our bladders.  Spade, our all-black Great Dane, and I stayed close to the truck.  Jess, ridiculously modest on this seldom traveled road, preferred to climb down into an arroyo freshly swept clean by the latest flash flood.  There were no trees to hide behind.

    “I’m going behind that black rock.”  She gestured toward what looked like a lava outcropping.

    “Why can’t you just squat here by the road?  There’s not a car in sight, Amor.”  Any vehicle approaching would send up a cloud of dust that could be seen for miles before it arrived.

    “Sure, and as soon as I pull my pants down we’ll have a traffic jam.”  Jessie’s flame red hair dropped out of sight.

    Spade started to follow her.  My loud baritone voice timbered, “Spade, stay, the lady wants her privacy.”  He looked at me, whined and gazed in the direction she had disappeared, then looked at me again as if doubting my judgment.

    Fierce rains, a rarity in this arid land, had pounded the area three days ago and managed to wash out the road in a couple of places.  Now ominous clouds of ash and charcoal obscured the tops of the mountains and threatened more rain, keeping the temperature mild.  It was late October.  In the summer this is not a spot you’d want to get stranded in.  Tall skinny stalks of ocotillo seemed to have sucked all of the moisture out of the rocky soil and with the recent rains tiny clover-like leaves had sprouted on the dead-looking sticks.  From where I stood, I could see the Sea of Cortez, like a sheet of blue glass.  The four islands called Las Encantadas sat placidly on top of their reflections, barely five miles from the beach.  The dirt road, no more than a wrinkled beige ribbon, rippled over the land and strove to stay in sight of the magnificent Sea.

* * *

The terror in Jessie’s voice brought a growl from Spade and sent us both on the run.  I zipped my pants and jumped into the arroyo.  Spade loped ahead.  When I got close, I stopped short. 

    “What the Hell!”  I blurted out.

    What Jessie had thought was a black rock had taken flight.  Dozens of vultures beat their massive wings, rose, circled, veered, and barely avoided a mid-air collision before slowly settling on nearby rocks.  While they waited for the first opportunity to resume their banquet, they glared at us from yellow eyes, their heads sunk between their shoulders.

    Spade placed his protective large body between Jessie and the vultures.  A few feet from where Jessie still crouched lay a partially buried body.  Only the head and shoulders protruded out of the sand.  Empty sockets stared at me from a face turned upward.  The vultures had shredded the face, part of the neck, and scooped out the fleshy parts.  They were working at removing the remnants of clothing to get to more meat when Jessie interrupted them.  Flies swarmed.  A gust of wind pushed the stench our way.  Spade stuck his nose between his front legs.  Silence enveloped us, and my stomach lurched at the grotesqueness of this body, so disfigured by the vultures.

    Jessie scrambled out of her crouched position, zipped up her jeans and together we stood, eyes bugged out, two PIs, trying to comprehend the scene.  From what little we could see of the body, I surmised it had been a male Caucasian with wavy black hair.  He  was caked with dirt, hair matted against his head.  Mud had washed down the arroyo, and carried him with it.

     I looked up the arroyo and wondered why and how he got to this spot when the irony of the situation hit me.  We were here to get away from this sort of thing.  We had worked hard to wrap up two cases at home, had planned this vacation for two weeks, had spent the last week packing and two days driving to this God forsaken spot, only to find a dead body.  I turned and looked at Jessie and felt my face flush.  Perhaps I was being unfair, but this was certainly her fault.  This part of the trip was her idea and although I trust her judgment implicitly, I also possess a character trait that works against me: I can’t say “no” to her.

     Her eyes widened at my look.  Probably my frown was fierce.  “You realize, Jess,” I just couldn’t resist rubbing it in, “Had I not listened to you, I’d now be sipping a cerveza instead of sniffing this stench.”  I turned to the disfigured body and pondered our moral duty.

    Jessie’s silence was golden.

* * *

Usually, our trip down the Baja peninsula to our favorite vacation spot took only three hours in our plane, a pleasant ride, looking down but not really seeing the evils that lurk below.  We have a tail-dragger, a Maule MX7-235, four-place single engine airplane capable of landing on the beach or short dirt runways with enough horsepower to carry us, our load of food and clothes necessary for an extended stay plus a 170 lb. dog.  This time, however, Jessie had an inspiration.  I should know better by now than to listen to her wild ideas.

    “Roberto,” she had insisted, “Everyone has driven the ‘rock pile’ except us.” 

    She had me there.  “And that’s fine with me, Cielo.  We don’t have to compete with them.”

    “We need to see this road.  We’ve flown over it so many times.  Come on, Rob, we have the time.  Let’s do it.”  She had gracefully avoided saying, “You’re getting soft.”  With excitement in her eyes, she had turned to Spade for support.  “What do you think?”

    He offered a quick bark that sounded like a woofle and his floppy ears bobbed in approval.  Now that wasn’t fair.  He’d jump off a cliff to his death if she commanded.

    She stretched her arms up and put them around my neck.  “It’ll be an adventure.” 

    Those eyes could melt an iceberg.  Yeah, it would be an adventure all right.

* * *

Now, as we stood in the desert with a death scene in front of us, I looked into her strikingly green eyes and wondered again if she had psychic powers.  My Mexican-Scottish background caused me to be spooked by that subject.  When we had discussed it before, she claimed I was being silly and explained it as her Irish intuition.  I turned to the body and marveled at the probability of us, or anyone, stopping at this spot and walking into the gorge to discover his remains.

Two days ago I could hardly wait to get on the road.