Death and the Delinquent — B.J. Oliphant

THE INDIANS SAY SCARY THINGS HAPPEN TO PEOPLE WHO VENTURE

Shirley McClintock, vacationing in New Mexico with her friend J. Q., her daughter Allison, and Allison's schoolmate April, wishes she'd heard about the mesa's bad reputation earlier. She might have avoided being hospitalized with a crushed knee--and nosy, neurotic April might still be alive. For it's on the mesa that a sharpshooter wings Shirley's mule and kills April.

Baffled and furious, Shirley hasn't a clue why all this is happening. Then she meets April's icily cold parents and finds among the dead girl's belongings an exquisite little golden horse and other curious objects. At the very least, April is a thief. But not the only one. Someone else steals a very important newborn from the hospital nursery.

So much for her vacation. Down but far from out, Shirley wrestles with a mystery that's as inscrutably dangerous as a rattlesnake--and, wobbling on her crutches, ensnares a murderer in his own trap.