Short Cut to Santa Fe by Medora Sale Page B

and returned the problem to Santa Fe. And Taos. Since the whole thing started here and went to there, so to speak.
    â€œWhy are you so sure the children got on the bus?” asked Ed McDowell. His grievances went beyond annoyance and embarrassment. He had been dragged away from his wife and family in Santa Fe, and Friday night movies with pizza, because his ability to coax information out of terrified and hysterical parents was legendary. “Just because they were supposed to catch the bus, and they’re good kids? Because even the best behaved kids can miss planes, or not catch buses. And you know that kids never react the way we think they’re going to. They don’t worry about themselves. Not until it’s way too late. They just worry about your reaction. Only it never seems to occur to them that you’ll be frightened for them, not mad at them. You know—they stop to buy some candy, and there’s a lineup, and bang—they’ve missed their flight.” The soothing voice went on, giving them a chance to think, tossing up ideas for them to reject.
    â€œRodriguez,” he called over to the man from Taos, “have we heard from Dallas? Did the kids get on the plane?” It was, after all, his district.
    â€œI’ll check,” said Rodriguez.
    â€œNo, no—you’ve got it all wrong,” said Joe. “I know our kids. They can do things like that—especially if both of them get interested in something. Usually Caroline keeps an eye on the time, but you can’t count on it. But, you see, I called Charlie. Charlie Broca at the airport. We know him, and he knows the kids. He said they got off the plane and onto the bus. We have this arrangement with Archway Tours. If they have a plane flying in from Dallas and a bus going up to Taos—and they do Fridays—they’ll take the kids along for free. There’s almost always room, because they’re hardly ever fully booked. On purpose. They charge so much that they don’t want to crowd people into the bus. In return we give them a better deal on one of their special tours. And Bert—the Archway driver—he knows the kids, he knows us, everything.”
    â€œAnd Charlie said that he actually saw the kids get on the tour bus?”
    Joe Rogers had stared at McDowell in horror. “Christ almighty,” he’d said. “I never thought—”
    â€œWhat?” What was left of Samantha’s voice had come out in cracked whisper.
    â€œHe said something about what else would they do? And they weren’t at the airport when he locked up. I thought it was a funny way of putting it.” He had stared into the distance, like a man who sees hell opening up in front of him. “He always tells us that he makes sure that nothing happens to the kids and that they get from the plane to the bus personally. We gave him a pretty generous Christmas gift to make sure he does.”
    Charlie Broca had been easy enough to find.
    His wife had looked at the two men on her doorstep. “Come in,” she had said. “You wanna see him, go look.”
    The remark had had an ominous flavour to it.
    It was a little house, with a dark hallway running straight through to the kitchen, and a narrow staircase going up to an even smaller second floor. Mrs. Broca ushered them through a door on their left into a small, square living room, where she had been sitting with a glass full of amber-coloured liquid and a pitcher of more of the same beside it, watching the late movie. “Have some tea,” she had said. “I put mint and lemon in it. You’ll need it.” She had poured two more glasses and handed them to the wary officers. “Here.”
    McDowell took a mouthful and set the glass down. “Thanks, ma’am, but we really have to see your husband.” He was quickly developing one of those suspicions that he should have posted someone to watch the back of the house