We stood there for a moment, listening to the drumming and chanting from the fancy dance competition echoing off the grandstand, no one looking at Tommy, Tommy looking up at the first evening star.
I straightened my hat. “So, what’s the story on the div— . . . Um, on the horse?”
His face came back to life. “Well, he’s got an adjustable lug on his left shoe, but even so, if we’d had him in this last heat we would’ve won straight up.”
“What happened?”
He shook his head at the injustice. “We had ’em all tied to the back side of the horse trailer over here and when we went to go take ’em to the start, he was missing.”
I looked past Saizarbitoria at the two embarrassed muggers. I remembered one of their names. “Markey, you guys look for him in the infield?”
The giant answered, “Yeah, but he’s an escape artist, that one. The only one he really liked was Lisa—he’d follow her and nicker and toss his head. Only bit me.”
The other giant added, “He can untie knots like a sailor, so I had him clipped. We looked everywhere but he’s not here.”
Tommy’s voice rose from behind me. “Somebody stole him. He’s not here, and there’s no way he would’ve crossed the track on his own.”
I glanced around the sizable infield—no trees, just dirt and prairie. “No way he could’ve pulled loose, jumped the railing, and joined in as the horses raced by?”
Jefferson shook his head. “The pickup riders would’ve gotten him. He was stolen, I tell ya.”
I glanced at Henry and watched as he walked between the muggers and rounded the horse trailer. Shrugging, I started after him, noticing my daughter’s hands behind her back, three fingers extended on one hand and three on the other: tied.
Ruthless.
I glanced at Saizarbitoria. “You can head back over to the grandstand, Sancho, but turn your radio up so you can hear it.”
* * *
I joined the Bear between the infield railing and the side of the trailer where the horses were tethered to a piece of rebar steel. Two-year-olds, the horses were skittish and moved away, stamping their hooves and showing us the whites of their eyes.
The Cheyenne Nation reached up and ran a hand over the nearest horse, a dark bay, nut brown with a black mane, ear points and tail, who immediately settled with a sighing rush of air from his distended nostrils; the Bear had magic in his hands, and besides, the animal was probably happy to meet an Indian who wasn’t trying to catapult onto his back.
Henry stepped forward and then ducked under the halter leads attached to the bar. Some of the other horses backed away. One tried to rear but was held down by the length of the rope strung through his halter. The Bear mumbled something and they settled as well. Magic, indeed.
At the ends of the leads were metal snaps that could only be manipulated by an opposing thumb, and I didn’t see a lot of those around on that side of the trailer.
Henry kneeled and placed his fingertips in the impacted dirt. I felt like I always did whenever I witnessed his intuitive skills. The Bear was a part of everything that went on around him in a way that I could only observe. He had described scenarios to me so clearly that I would have sworn that I’d been there. Crouching behind the trailer and looking at the hitching bar, he sighed. “If they had him clipped to the end of the bar—somebody took him.”
“Where?”
His dark eyes shifted as he stood, and he walked past the rear of the trailer to run his hand along the inside railing, finally stopping and lifting the top loose. He stared at the ground. “Here, the horse was led through here.”
I joined him and looked past the dimpled, poached surface of the track at a forgotten gate leading to a fairground building that hadn’t been used since they renovated the place back in the eighties. “Across the track and through there—toward the old paddocks.”
We stepped through, walked across the track, and opened the top rung of a rail that you’d never have noticed unless you were looking for it. The Bear paused at the end of the walkway that stretched a good hundred yards toward the stalls, the darkness permeated by a rectangular light shining through the windows of the old barn in staccato. “Which do you think will get us first, the black widows or the field mice?”
The place was deserted and looked as if it might collapse at any time, the peeling white paint scaling from the untreated lumber like parchment in abandoned books. “Termites would be my bet.”
In the powdery dirt you could see where a horse with an adjustable screw attachment had been walked through. I kneeled this time and studied the boot prints that ran alongside the horse tracks, smallish and worn down on the heels.
“Female, or a very small man.”
We were far away from the road and parking lots, which would make it difficult to load an animal into a trailer and whisk it away. That was the beauty of horse stealing, though—you could always ride your stolen property. Of course, that might be difficult to do with a headstrong, half-broke two-year-old that bites. “Did you see how those horses fought the muggers in front of the grandstand?”
“Yes.”
“And this horse is the worst of the bunch.”
“Yes.” He smiled, having the same thought.
* * *
We got back to the infield, rounded the trailer, and found Team New Grass and my daughter where we had left them. The muggers were still attending the horses, getting them ready for the next race, while Tommy and Cady sat talking under the tent.
Tommy looked at me, and I had to admit that Trent Burrup, the Big Horn County jail dentist, had done a wonderful job on his teeth. “So, what do I do? Come into the office and fill out some paperwork?”
I pulled up short, took off my hat, and wiped the sweat from my forehead with my shirtsleeve. “Your horse is in the abandoned paddocks across the track in stall number thirty-three.”
He looked past my shoulder toward the condemned buildings. “Over there?”
“Yep.”
“How the hell did he get over there?”
“No idea.”
“How come you didn’t bring him back?”
I shook my head. “He wouldn’t let me anywhere near him, but we got him blocked off in the stall.”
He stood and glanced at the wristwatch on his arm, which looked incongruous against the war paint. “If we hurry we can get him in this next race.” He looked down at Cady and took her hand. “I gotta go, but good luck with your marriage.” He smiled, the new teeth shining against his dark, paint-streaked face, and held her hands long enough for her to know that he meant what he said next. “There’s no way you’ll screw it up like I did.”
We watched as he walked past the muggers, who were busy currying the next team. They asked if he needed any help, but he shook his head no and lithely jumped over the railing, injured leg notwithstanding.
Markey turned and looked at me. “I’m really sorry about this, Walt. I don’t know how it is that he could’ve gotten out.”
“That’s okay. We were in the area, and it gave the two of them a chance to catch up.” Cady threw her water bottle in the trash bucket, and we made our way across the infield toward the gate where we’d come in.
Saizarbitoria was standing near the judges’ tower and joined us as we walked by. “You find the horse thief?”
“In a way.”
Cady volunteered. “The Bear and Dad found the horse over in the old paddocks.” She glanced up at Henry and then to me. “He must’ve wandered off on his own.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t quite say that.”
The Basquo looked at me with a puzzled expression, and I gave him a soft punch in the chest. “I’ll tell you about it on Monday.”
I’d almost made a clean getaway when he shouted out to my daughter, “Congratulations on the engagement.”
Acting as if she was
admiring her nail polish, Cady held up four fingers on one hand and three on the other as we walked across the track onto the ramp. Over the loudspeaker, the announcer called all the contestants to the last heat of the World Champion Indian Relay Race.
“Did he just say ‘Indian Really Race’?” Cady caught my arm as Thorpe shut the gate behind us.
“Just sounds that way with his accent.” I kept walking.
“Can we stay for the last go-round, Dad?”
“Why?”
She made a face. “Don’t you want to see if Tommy wins?”
We watched as the other teams rode into the area in front of the grandstand, leading their remudas, with Team New Grass suspiciously absent. Cady glanced around and then toward the infield and Tommy’s tent. “Do you think he couldn’t catch the horse?”
The Cheyenne Nation’s voice rumbled as he continued up the ramp. “Possibly.”
Cady paused, her hand remaining on the top rail. “He’ll miss the race.”
The announcer called for Team New Grass to make themselves present at the grandstand or face elimination through forfeiture. I waited a moment more at the gate and then pointed toward the team’s muggers and two horses approaching from the infield followed by Tommy, a blond woman, and a frisky two-year-old the color of store-bought whiskey.
I looked past the track and the infield toward the dilapidated stalls on the far end of the fairground. “I guess he just figured out what he really wanted.” I held four fingers on one hand and four on the other against my back as I followed the Cheyenne Nation up the ramp.
THANKSTAKING
“Otis Taylor would’ve caught that pass.”
The Cheyenne Nation eyed me from the other side of the bar and sipped his Armagnac, then glanced up at the tinsel and the vintage ornaments hanging along the beveled mirror at the Red Pony Bar and Grill and Continual Soiree. “I am thinking I queered the deal by putting up the Christmas decorations a day early.”
The quiet racket droned on from the 27-inch Sony Trinitron mounted in the corner of the bar as the Chiefs and Broncos locked horns in a lopsided battle for AFC West supremacy—Chiefs 6, Donkeys 27. “You don’t think it has something to do with the fact that you have a receiver corps that couldn’t catch a cold?”
He watched the TV in a disinterested fashion as another receiver allowed the ball to pass through his gloved fingertips. “It must be cold in Kansas City.”
I swiveled on my stool and adjusted the .45 on my right hip. Studying the frost etching the edges of the horizontal windows and the reverse reflection of the red neon Rainier Beer sign glowing in the darkness of the -26 degree high plains evening, I was trying to remember it was still November. “I guess.”
KC tried a reverse in the backfield, but either through confusion or nobody wanting the ball, that resulted in a four-yard loss. “No, definitely the Christmas decorations.”
I reached down and scratched behind the ears of Dog, aside from Henry, my only Thanksgiving companion. “Are those your grandmother’s old ones?”
“Yes.” Henry Standing Bear’s eyes shifted back to me as he lip pointed toward the festivities hanging at the back of the bar. “After she died, I never got around to putting up a tree so I decided to use them here.”
“They look nice—nostalgic.”
He shrugged his massive shoulders, straining the too-small Chiefs jersey with the words YOUR NAME HERE emblazoned across the back. “They make me a little sad, but I put them up anyway.”
I sipped my beer and confirmed from his expression that he was going through his usual seasonal melancholy. “Why sad?”
“My grandmother got depressed during the holidays.” He reached over and felt the weight of my can, and then automatically slid open the cooler, popped the top of another, and placed it in line behind the first. “Thankstaking was the one she hated the most, though.”
I nodded, refusing to snap at the bait of the social argument that we engaged in annually. “How’s the turkey coming?”
He studied me again for a second and then pushed off the bar to stir the cranberry sauce and check the brussels sprouts in the oven. Walking over to the back door, he wiped the moisture from the window and looked at the turkey fryer beside the Bullet.
“Why did you park in the back?”
“To keep the drunks from running into my truck.” I watched the corners of his mouth pull down and hoped it was in response to the lack of business and not the family holiday depression. “How’s the turkey doing?” The Bear could afford a newer, safer cooker—the thing was a festive fire hazard—but he still felt that the five-gallon contraption made the juiciest deep-fried turkey. “How do you know when it’s done, other than it blowing up?”
“There will be signs.”
I sipped my beer and surrendered the empty. “Ahh . . .”
He crushed the can in his fist and tossed it into the trash. “Do you know what Columbus wrote about his first encounter with the Bahamian Arawaks who swam out to meet his boat?”
I sighed. “I’m not having this conversation . . .”
His voice took on the phony, authoritative tone of a scholastic filmstrip. “‘They brought us parrots, food, balls of cotton . . . willfully trading everything they owned. They were well built, with good bodies and handsome features, but they do not bear arms, and do not know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out of ignorance.’”
“. . . Again.”
“‘With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we wanted.’”
I nodded toward the game. “Your team is punting.”
He ignored it and me, strolled to the end of the bar, and looked out the front window of the converted Sinclair filling station at the darkness of early evening—his thoughts darker still. “‘They would make fine servants.’”
“Umm . . .” I cleared my throat, in hopes of cutting this conversation short before it became a full-blown tirade. “I like to think of the thanks part of Thanksgiving as giving thanks to the Indians who brought food to the starving pilgrims.”
He stayed with his back to me, his voice echoing off the frigid glass. “And in repayment they took everything the Natives had and systematically destroyed them and their way of life?” He turned, and his strong features reminded me of the buffalo nickel. “Ten million Natives lived in what is now the United States when the white man began arriving, and a hundred years later there were less than one million.”
I shook my head and stared at him. “Henry, to be honest, I don’t know why we do the things we do to each other, or ever have historically. I just know that for me the holidays are for family, friends, and that tiny bit of grace we can afford each other.” I raised my beer. “Happy Thanksgiving.”
He ignored me. After a few minutes a set of headlights swung into the parking lot, and he returned to the other side of the bar and raised his own brandy glass, but still didn’t touch mine. “Thankstaking.”
I glanced back at the window where the headlights switched off along with the engine. I reached down and ran my hand across Dog’s broad head just so he’d know I wasn’t talking about him. “Whoever this is, I hope they’ve got a more positive seasonal spirit than current company.”
Silently we watched the football game, and it seemed to take an awfully long time for whoever it was to come in. Finally, a bearded young man in stained, frayed Carhartt overalls and a coat to match entered the bar and stood at the door. He stared at Dog and me.
“Don’t worry, he’s friendly.” Almost on cue, the beast began emitting one of his low-frequency, idling-motorboat growls. I reached down and pulled his ear. “Knock it off.”
He obeyed, but continued to watch the man as he moved to the far end of the bar and sat on one of the stools. He loosened his coat and tipped his ball cap, which bore a welding supply company logo on it, back o
n his head. Blond hair fell around his red-bearded face. “Can I get a Rainier?”
Henry nodded, fished another can from the cooler, and sat it in front of him. “Tab?”
The guy responded by pulling his keys and some coins from his pocket and scattered them onto the surface of the bar without a word. Henry scooped up the collection of change, returning a dime and a nickel, and then walked back to his vantage point in front of me for a few seconds before continuing toward the back door to check dinner again.
I let Carhartt settle in and get comfortable before reporting on the game, just in case he was interested. “Broncos, by three touchdowns.”
He looked at me questioningly.
I shrugged toward the TV. “Football.” He unzipped and uncovered a bit more but didn’t seem interested in the game. “Passing through?”
He nodded. “Back to Colorado.”
“Bakkan?”
He stared at me. “What?”
“The oil fields up in North Dakota.”
“Yeah.” He sipped his beer. “How did you know?”
“We get a lot of people traveling through, going to or from jobs.” I waited another moment and then asked, “You working?”
“Um, yeah.” His eyes darted around. “Was.”
I nodded and watched as the Bear opened the back door and stepped outside, evidently to check on signs more closely.
The welder stared at the surface of the battered counter, then glanced up at me with his jaw clinched. He shot a look around the bar, almost as if he were casing the joint.
There was something going on with him, and all the alarms were going off in my head. I closed the distance between the bar and me, effectively blocking his view of the clip-holstered .45 attached to my far hip. “Home for the holidays?”
“Um, yeah.” He took another gulp of beer and then stood. “Excuse me.”
As he headed for the toilets, I swiveled, keeping my sidearm out of sight. Dog growled as he went by, but I nudged him with my boot as Carhartt disappeared.
I thought about how the man had been behaving, then slipped the Colt from my holster and placed it in my lap with my hat over the top. I sat there wondering if I was overreacting when Henry returned, rubbing the cold from his shoulders and looking pointedly at where the welder had been sitting.
Wait for Signs: Twelve Longmire Stories Page 12