“Tell me about that night.”
“Chuck didn’t say anything about the files until we were on the way. I thought it was just about giving you that birthday box of dog shit as a payback for the fight you had. We waited for your brother to leave—plan was to give your mom the box, grab any files we found, and get out of there. He was nervous. When your mom didn’t answer right away, he kicked in the door—kept her in the kitchen while I looked for the files.”
“What about Puffy?”
“Chuck’s nerves. He lost it when he got his feet tangled. Taking the dead cat with us, spray painting your jeep, and hanging the cat was dumb, not planned. His way of hiding the fact he was scared. He wanted to impress me, show me how clever he was. Chuck knows he’s only here because of his dad. He needs to prove he can do things on his own.”
“Why take the whole file cabinet?”
“He didn’t know what he was looking for, was only told to take any files he found and so—”
“Who?” I cross the table and grab her scrawny neck. “Who put him up to it?”
“He wouldn’t tell me. He got five hundred dollars, not that he needs it. Cheap bastard—wouldn’t share any of it with me.”
I need to think about that. She wants to pee and I let her go off in the woods. She’s gone a long time. Five minutes after she comes back, Jack and Chuck return. Chuck’s nose is a bloody mess and two fingers on his right hand are bent back at unnatural angles.
“He stumbled on the trail, took a nasty fall,” says Jack. “Karen, help him get clean before your meal.”
Karen leads Chuck to a stream at the edge of the clearing. While they’re gone, I ask Jack, “Did you get what we need?”
“Yeah, got it all. He caved in after the first finger. The second one was for fun. I’ll fill you in after we get rid of them.”
They sit at the picnic table and I stand guard while Jack goes to the truck and returns with two paper plates, plastic knives and forks, and a familiar looking box.
“Remember this? You should recognize it—contained my sister’s birthday present. Matter of fact, it’s still in there, along with your main course. Open it.”
They don’t move and Jack raps the back of Chuck’s head. “Do it.”
Chuck has a problem using his fingers so Karen unties it and takes off the lid. The smell of the decaying dog shit makes her reel back. Her face contorts when she sees what else is in the box. It’s the dead cat, Puffy. Jack has skinned most of her, but left the head and the tail.
“I put her in the microwave this morning but she’s cooled off by now. Doesn’t matter. Cold cat makes a good picnic snack. Dogs and cats don’t get along, but I think they’ll make a tasty combination. Be sure to let me know.”
He takes out his hunting knife, cuts two slabs of cat meat, smears them with dog shit, and puts one on each paper plate. “Ready to eat?” It’s not a question.
Karen takes one look and throws up. Chuck is not with us. He stares over the tree tops with glazed eyes. Jack sticks his knife in the rotting table top. “Eat now, damn it,” he orders.
Part of me is enjoying the show but a bigger part is beginning to feel as sick as Karen. We’re torturing them. Jack’s getting off on it and I’m letting it happen. What’s that say about me? Time to end this. “That’s enough, Jack. We’ve got what we came for. Let’s get out of here.”
“Not Yet. They broke in, stole the files, killed mom’s cat now they’ve got to pay for it.”
He picks up the knife and looks at me. I don’t like what I see and I’m not willing to find out what it really means. I turn to Chuck and Karen. “Okay, just one bite, and then we can leave.”
Karen goes first. She wipes her mouth, quickly takes a small piece, swallows it, and throws the plate on the ground. Chuck’s a zombie. He can’t use the plastic knife and fork with his left hand and the broken fingers make the right useless. He mechanically picks up the whole slab, takes a chomp, sets it down and stares back at the trees.
“Fun’s over. Let’s get them back to town,” I announce. Jack’s eyes are less intense and he actually helps Chuck climb in the truck bed. We leave everything on the table and Karen squeezes in beside me. As we drive away, I see a swarm of deer flies descending on what remains of Puffy.
* * *
No one talks on the way back. We drop them off a block from campus and head for the casino where my jeep is parked. We barely make it across the reservation line before we’re pulled over. Two squad cars, four cops, the entire reservation force is in on the act. Two of them yank Jack out of the truck, throw him against the fender and cuff him. He must be too surprised to fight back. Two more stand outside my window. I can feel the pressure of the gun barrel one holds against the side of my head.
“You guys know me. I work security at the casino. My Uncle Gus is on the Tribal Council. What the hell’s this all about? Let me go,” shouts Jack.
“Sorry, Jack, you can’t weasel out of this one. It’s out of our hands. The city cops and the college are on this case.” They walk him to the first car and shove him in the back seat.
I go peacefully to the other. “You’re under arrest for kidnapping and abating a rape,” a cop tells me. “Got panicked call from a girl named Karen.”
I forgot about her phone. That’s why it took her so long to pee.
Chapter 10
The Reservation is a chopped up patchwork that runs from outside Buck Brush Falls to the border of the Superior National Forest and only has four cops. They spend most of their time keeping order around the casino and busting drunks who get too violent with their families. The jail consists of three cells and a communal drunk tank. There’s no separate quarters for women. I spend the night in the cell next to the tank and the smell of vomit and piss makes me want to puke but I keep forcing it down.
When it’s light enough to see, I look through the open window between cells and watch Jack doing pushups. The neon lights make his sweat shine over the tangle of amateur tats on his forearms and the chains that circle his biceps. I watch the abstract bear tattoo behind his neck raise and fall. Even in the harsh light, it looks impressive. Bear, Nooke in the Ojibwe language is our clan totem. Uncle Gus took us to an old fashioned sweat lodge when he came back from St. Paul. His friend, Gilbert, who fancies himself a shaman, told us stories about the history and legends of our tribe. Afterward Gus took us to Duluth and paid a talented artist to give us identical, custom designed, Nooke tats. I rub my hand behind my neck. Why do I try to hide mine most of the time?
“Have a good night, Sis?” Jack’s finished his morning exercise, has his hands on the bars, and smiles at me through the window.
“Why are you so damn cheerful?”
“Been in a few jails. As they go, this one ain’t bad.”
I can’t hold it any longer. I turn to the toilet and puke into the greenish water. “Gotta get out of here. Can’t stand it,” I wheeze through my vomit clogged throat.
“Relax, Uncle Gus is on his way.”
I’ve never liked closed spaces. The walls feel like they’re closing in, squashing me. The air is hot, wet, and filled with the smell of puke. The floor spins and I drop to my knees. “Let me out—don’t belong here—can’t breathe,” I scream.
I’m on my stomach sucking air from the slot at the bottom of the door when the guard comes.
“On your feet. You’re out of here—god what a mess.”
My sweater is sweat soaked and stained from the vomit and my breath tastes like I’ve been chewing old, wet groin pads. Jack looks fresh, like he spent the night at a luxury hotel.
Gus meets us in the lobby. He’s wearing his lawyer clothes, dark suit, white shirt and red bow tie. I look at his graying hair and watch the way he moves his lean, compact body and it’s easy to imagine why he was such a successful lawyer before coming back to the falls.
* * *
We go off the reservation to the triple P, Pete’s Perfect Pancake House. I clean up the best I can in the woman’s
room and we sit in a corner booth away from the breakfast crowd.
“I talked to the parents,” says Gus, holding a fork full of syrup drenched pancake. “Made them aware of the break in at your mom’s house. The deal we made is that they wouldn’t press charges if we did the same so—”
“Karen clamed I raped her,” interrupts Jack.
“She did that to get the cops attention. She admitted she made it up. Got it all in writing, notarized with witnesses. You kids got a good lawyer for an uncle.”
“How’d you ever get to be a lawyer? I never got that straight?” asks Jack.
“I was a pretty good amateur boxer. After I scraped through North Star—they had a scholarship to pacify the tribal council—I knew I had to get away from the reservation or I’d end up like my older brother—your dad. I went to St. Paul, turned pro, and made good money for a couple of years until I got thumbed in a preliminary in Milwaukee and lost most of the vision in my left eye. I couldn’t box so I went into wrestling. Things went downhill fast. They billed me as the Wild Redskin. Made me wear a feathered headdress, war paint, and carry a tomahawk—couldn’t live with myself—couldn’t get off the booze and pills—couldn’t even keep my wife. I got a wake-up call when I nearly froze to death behind a dumpster in Sioux Falls.”
“You, Mr. Respectable?” says Jack.
“I got that way through Alcoholics Anonymous and a friend who talked a low end night law school into squeezing me in. I worked my ass off and passed the bar my first try. Got into employment law and affirmative action. I was good at it, helped a lot of people and made a lot of money. I only came back to help your mom, and try to keep you two from ending up like your dad.”
“Thanks, Gus, I don’t know how I’d have been able to hold everything together on my own,” says Jack.
Jack’s voice quavers and I see his eyes grow misty. For a few seconds a different Jack—one I knew a long time ago—emerges. Then, he puts a lid on it, blinks his eyes and just digs into his pancakes.
Gus looks at me. “That was a damn stupid thing to do. I thought you were better than that. While I’m at it, I’m disappointed you’re turning your back on your heritage. When I hit bottom I learned the value of surrender to a greater power. For me that’s the Great Spirit, our Ojibwe beliefs, our culture. I don’t know what you believe in.”
“That makes two of us.”
He looks at Jack. “With your record, one more screw up and you’ll join your dad in Stillwater. It’s time you grow up and think of your wife and kid.” Jack doesn’t say anything but his eyes narrow and his lip tightens.
I know the signs of a pending explosion and I head it off by asking, “What did you get from Chuck on the trail?”
Jack relaxes. “He was paid five hundred dollars to do it. It was all very mysterious. He got an envelope in his gym locker with two hundred bucks and a note promising three hundred more if he’d go out to the trailer during your fight, deliver the dog shit gift, empty any file cabinets he found—the fat-assed moron took the whole cabinet—and leave the contents in his unlocked locker. He claims he did it more because he was pissed that a girl put him down at the party than for the money. He put the files in the locker, dumped the cabinet, and found them gone and the promised three hundred there the next morning.”
“You sure he didn’t know who paid?”
“Sis, trust me. He spilled his guts—all of them—after the first finger.”
“You record his confession like we planned?”
“Yeah, got it all right here.” He holds up a hand held recorder.
“Give it to me,” orders Gus, holding out his hand.
“Why should I?” Jack smiles and looks down at his hand.
“Because I just got your sorry ass out of jail. Because you don’t know what the hell you’re doing. Because you’re in way over your head. Because I got you that cushy job in casino security. Because one phone call to my friends in the Duluth police and they’ll raid that reservation chop shop and you’ll get a free ride to Stillwater. Need any more reasons?”
Jack shrugs his shoulders, drops the recorder in Gus’s hand, and presses his palms together like an angel. His eyes don’t look angelic. They bore into Gus with a hungry, predator look with no trace of his other self. I deflect his hostility with another question. “Gus, any news about Obama and the Duck?”
“They found the GMC across the street from a whore house on John Street in Superior. It was stolen, wiped clean of any prints. The security guys that have been watching you report no sign of anyone suspicious. I think you’re safe for now. I’m calling off the surveillance but stay alert.”
“Any connection between the break in and the attack on the logging road?”
“I’m still trying to all the put the pieces together but, right now, I can’t figure a link.”
“What’s it all about Gus? What do you know that you’re not telling us?”
“I know that you’re into something that’s very dangerous.”
Goddamn it Gus, they tried to kill my sister and broke in the trailer. I think the two are related. Tell us what you really know.” Jack pounds his hand on the table so hard the dishes rattle and my coffee spills.
Gus leans forward and gives him a withering stare. When Jack breaks contact he says, “I’ve said all I want to say. I saved both your asses today. Now, pay me back. Layla, go back to school. Jack, go back to your family and stay away from that chop shop. Both of you, keep your damn mouths shut about this. Let me handle it for now.”
At the door I say, “Sorry, Uncle Gus. What happened—what we did—jail—none of that’s really me.”
“Wanna bet?” says a sneering Jack.
Gus shakes his head, leads us to his pick up, and drives us back to the hollow. On the ride back Gus’s question rattles around in my head. Who am I? What do I believe in? Is Jack right—am I blind to my true nature?
Chapter 11
When I get back to my trailer, I soak in the shower, climb in the cot and leave the world. I’m brought back by a loud banging on the door. I’m paranoid about getting attacked again so I take my 30-30 and climb out the back window. When I peek around the corner, I see two guys unloading a box spring and a mattress from a delivery truck. One’s short and fat. The other’s tall and black. They’re not Obama and his duck friend but could be another pair.
I sneak through the trees and come up on the other side of their truck. Leaning across the hood, I lever off a round to get their attention. “Stop right there. Drop that mattress and lay on your bellies on top.”
“Who we got here? Annie Oakley?” says the fat one, giving me a gap toothed smile, and keeping hold of the mattress.”
“We ought to get hazardous duty pay, delivering out here on the reservation,” says the black one. His jumpy eyes discount his flippant words.
“Reservation’s behind that hill.” I fire a shot over their heads toward the ridge. “You’re in Desperation Hollow. Much classier place. Now, get down.” I chamber another round and put it two feet over the fat guy’s head. It hits the shithouse wall and splinters through the rotten wood. They drop on the mattress like two sacks of cement.
I nudge the black guy with my foot. “Turn over, stay on your back, and show me some ID.”
He fumbles for his wallet and produces a driver’s license and a calling card from Mattress Town. It says his name is Jerome.
“Jerome, tell me the location of Mattress Town. Better get it right because I drive by it every day on the way to campus.”
“It’s on Hill Street and fourth. Across the street from Olson’s Lumber Yard.”
“Show me your invoice. I didn’t order a mattress.”
“I’ll need to get up. It’s in the truck,” says the fat guy.
“Okay, but your buddy stays down. Keep your hands where I can see them.”
He walks carefully and reaches through the window with one hand. He pulls it out and tries to hand it to me. “Read it. I want to keep my eyes on both of you.”
“He looks at the invoice, then the faded spray painted address on the side of trailer. Hard place to find, but the address matches. Purchase, delivery, and set-up paid for by an Andy Mason.”
“I’ll be damned,” I say.
“Keep greeting people like this and that’s probably going to happen,” says Jerome. “But, right now just put down the rifle, let me get up, and show us where you want us to put it.”
* * *
I’m lying flat on my back on my new bed thinking I should have dumped that cot years ago and getting ready to text Andy when he beats me to the punch. I open my eyes and he’s standing there smiling with a suitcase in one hand and a stack of sheets in the other.
“The door was unlocked. You looked so peaceful I just wanted to enjoy the view for a minute.”
“The bed . . . you bought it. You shouldn’t___”
“It’s a birthday present for both of us. It didn’t happen last time, but tipping off that wobbly old cot could kind of ruin the mood.”
“I take that as an invitation.”
“Get up. Help me put these sheets on. I hope I brought the right size.”
“You still talking about sheets. I was pretty satisfied last time you were here?”
He pulls on my ear until I stand. “I brought something else for us to share,” he says, reaching into his suitcase and handing me a packet of a dozen condoms.
“How long you planning to stay?”
“Just the weekend. I work the nursing home late shift next week.”
“I knew you were an optimist but—”
“I do plan on coming back. They won’t spoil and—”
“But last time we—”
“You said the timing was okay but I don’t want to take any chances.”
“I forgot how organized, what a planner you are. I’ll do my best to hold up my end, make sure we don’t have an excess inventory.”
The bed made, his suitcase unpacked, and the condoms stashed in the cabinet drawer next to my new bed, we run of small talk. I’m a little nervous and, from his silence and wandering eyes. I sense he is too.
Squaw Girl: A Boxer's Battle for Love Page 5