20
1922
“VISITORS! VISITORS!” SHOUTS rang through the village. There was the swooshing noise of people rushing past, the rasp of moccasins against the ground. William stepped outside the tipi. Indians ran toward the covered wagons drawn up outside Fort Bridger, and whites poured out of tent city. Campfires crackled, throwing up little circles of light against the dusk. Moving over the desert in the distance was a great brown cloud that billowed against the sun dropping in a red sky.
“Visitors!” The shout came from the group of whites pushing ahead of the crowd. Six weeks in the desert, William thought, living inside a moving picture with no connection to the outside world. He could feel the sense of excitement, as if someone in the crowd had tossed him a lariat, and now he could lasso anything he wished—home, the reservation—and bring them to him.
He spotted Charlie and James standing by one of the wagons, next to McCoy. James was turning from side to side, his camera in front of his face, snapping pictures of the crowd. William made his way over. He had a clear view past the crowd. A long tan automobile, shining in the last of the daylight, drove in the direction of Fort Bridger. The top was rolled back, and William could see the man at the steering wheel. He wore a floppy cap that bobbed up and down as the automobile rose and dipped over the dirt road. In the backseat was another man, a black bowler shading his face.
“Who’s that?” Charlie’s voice cut through the hushed voices of the crowd.
“Mr. Lasky!” someone shouted, and William saw Mr. Cruze dodge past the people in front and start running alongside the automobile, a couple of cameramen straining to keep up. The director had the rear door opened before the automobile had ground to a stop. “What a surprise!” He might have been shouting through the megaphone. “We didn’t know you were coming.”
The man in the bowler climbed out of the backseat. He was almost as tall as the director, a narrow man in a long black coat that hung close to the ground. Beneath his hat, he wore round, rimless glasses that glinted as he looked around. Then he set about brushing dust off one shoulder, then the other, and Cruze joined in, sweeping his hands over the back of the man’s coat. “Great to see you!” the director shouted.
William felt an unease stirring inside him. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see McCoy shaking his head. No one had visited the location, and here was an important man in a big automobile. Mr. Cruze bent toward the man, one ear cocked to catch whatever the boss was saying. “Yes, yes,” the director said, a lower voice now. A strained look had planted itself on his face.
“What’s it mean?” Charlie had moved in closer. James was behind him, taking pictures. William could see the crowd gathering around the automobile.
“I heard rumors the picture’s gone over budget,” McCoy said. “Started out at one hundred thousand, went to five hundred, now it’s nudging eight.”
William caught Charlie’s eye for an instant. Five hundred thousand? Eight hundred thousand? What was this, grains of sand? Stars flickering in the black sky? How could there be so much money in the world?
“Could be the boss isn’t happy about spending all that extra money and has decided to shut us down. Could be he heard of problems on the set.”
William glanced at Charlie, but Charlie looked away. He stood ramrod straight, nothing changing in the brown mask that was his face. It was amazing what a good player he had become. News about Charlie and the girl must have reached Mr. Lasky. There were telegrams that went back and forth between Mr. Cruze and Hollywood; several times he had seen the director’s assistant set off in a black Model T for Milford where the telegraph office was.
“So that’s the boss?” A tense note sounded in Charlie’s voice that, William realized, had nothing to do with the moving picture. The tall, narrow man in the black coat was the man who owned the girl.
McCoy turned toward Charlie. “From what I hear over there,” he nodded in the direction of tent city, “Lasky’s the front man, runs the studio, gets paid to keep the money people happy back in New York. They get unhappy, Lasky has to solve the problem.”
William looked from Charlie to James. Money men. White men with a lot of money who owned everything around them—tent city, covered wagons, Fort Bridger. They had sent the front man who could wave his hand and all of it would melt back into the desert as if they had never been here.
“What about our pay?” James gripped the box camera in one hand.
“If we get shut down,” McCoy pushed the white cowboy hat back on his head, “I’ll do my best to see you Indians get the pay you were promised.”
The little group around the automobile started through the crowd, Mr. Cruze striding ahead, motioning people to the sides. Gradually the crowd began to fall away, leaving a clear pathway toward tent city. As Mr. Cruze walked past, William saw him nod at McCoy, who started after the director. The boss and his driver and the cameramen hurried behind.
William realized that James had dropped to his haunches and was drawing in the sandy earth with a stick he had found somewhere. He and Charlie hunkered down on either side. “The coming of the big white man is not a good sign,” James said. The picture in the dust was the image of a bird about to lift off. William understood. The eagle was his spirit guide, and now James asked for the eagle’s wisdom and strength. He had three children on the rez. He needed the pay that was promised.
William felt McCoy’s shadow fall over them before he looked up into the white man’s face. The features chiseled into place, the mouth barely moving as McCoy said, “You want to see the dailies?”
William pushed himself to his feet. Charlie was beside him, but it was a moment before James managed to stand up. No one said anything. The Indians had never been invited into the big tent at the edge of tent city where the white players went every evening to see the moving pictures they had made that day. “There’s gonna be a special showing,” McCoy said. “Looks to me like Cruze wants to convince Lasky he’s making the greatest picture ever. Anybody wants to see the dailies . . .” He lifted a hand toward the other Indians gathering around. “Come with me.”
McCoy swung about and started off. It was almost dark, and the white hat seemed to float over the black shirt. He veered toward Goes-in-Lodge, said something to the old man, then kept going. Goes-in-Lodge and several buffalo Indians stepped in alongside the others. An air of excitement ran through everybody, something new coming. No one had seen the moving picture. Now they would see themselves.
The large tent was crowded with whites and Indians when they stepped inside. William took a second to let his eyes adjust to the darkness. He could make out the shadowy heads of people seated in the chairs arranged in rows. Other people crowded along the sides. Halfway down the aisle was what William had once heard McCoy call a projector, and a beam of light ran from the projector to the large screen shimmering at the far end of the tent. Mr. Cruze stood up in front of the screen and squinted into the light. Then he seemed to fix on what he was looking for. He beckoned to McCoy, who started down the aisle.
Most of the Indians had gathered in the back, and William followed Charlie and James into an empty place in the far corner. Above the heads nodding on the chairs, he could see Mr. Cruze seated next to Mr. Lasky. McCoy sat on the other side.
There was a loud clap. One of the cameramen hurried down the aisle to the projector. Then a short, bald man with a pockmarked face and a big stomach stood up at the side of the screen and fit a violin under his chin. A screeching noise cut through the sounds of people talking and shuffling about. Like a wind dying down, the tent started to grow quiet, except for the clicking sound of the projector and the whine of the violin.
Black, white, and gray images began floating across the screen. Covered wagons coming across the desert, coming from the horizon. Oxen hauling the wagons, massive heads bent into the task, muscles flexing beneath the sheen of their coats. Some emigrants walked alongside the wagons, flicking whips at the oxen. The heads of women and children bobbed insi
de the wagons. William couldn’t take his eyes away. So this was the way it had been, this was what the buffalo Indians had seen with their own eyes. Trains of covered wagons that went on and on crossing their lands. He swallowed back the lump in his throat. For a moment he felt as if he couldn’t breathe.
Another scene flashed on the screen. The wagons fording the Platte River, the canvas tops dipping and swaying as the oxen stumbled forward. So like the Platte, he had to remind himself that the white men had dug out a passage so that water could flow from a lake. The river they made was as deep as the Platte.
There was Charlie on the screen, half-naked, running after the white man on the horse, demanding payment for helping to ferry wagons across the river. The violin was faster now, the tempo of a horse galloping. The white man pulled out a pistol, pointed it at Charlie and shot him. Charlie fell onto the ground.
William squeezed his eyes shut. Charlie was beside him, he knew, but he couldn’t look at him. Charlie was dead now. Stories are real, Charlie had said.
The music was still fast, but joyful and free somehow. William forced himself to look again at the screen. The wagons drawing up in front of Fort Bridger, the old trader bursting out the door. Molly ran into his arms, and right behind her was Banion, just the way he had seen it happen. And there was Missy, huddled in a wagon with her doll child.
Finally the images flickered and vanished, leaving the glowing white screen. Everyone was frozen in place. Then someone started clapping, a low, steady beat, and the whole audience joined in. People jumped to their feet and raised their hands over their heads. They were shouting and cheering. “Bravo! Bravo!” Even the Indians in back, shouting, “Bravo! Bravo!” Shouting for themselves, William thought, for the other lives they had lived on the white screen, the warriors they had been.
He waited with Charlie and James while everyone filed outside. The buffalo Indians first, the other Indians crowded behind. And finally the white people getting to their feet, scattering the chairs, coming down the aisle, and stepping past the projector as if it were a strange and powerful force. After almost everyone had left, William turned to Charlie. “It’s only a story,” he said, but Charlie looked away.
He followed Charlie’s gaze. Floating down the aisle in a white dress a few feet ahead of the skinny bodyguard was the girl. Charlie didn’t take his eyes off her until she had disappeared beyond the flap of the tent. The bodyguard veered over and lay a hand on Charlie’s shoulder for a long moment, warning him not to follow her. Charlie stood in place, red-faced and tight-lipped. “Bastard,” he said, when the white man had ducked out of the tent.
At the edge of his vision, William saw McCoy hurry down the aisle and run outside. In a moment he was back, Goes-in-Lodge and four other buffalo Indians trailing along. He ushered the old men into the aisle, then he walked over; “Mr. Lasky wants to talk to you,” he said.
William stepped out first and walked around the projector, just as the white people had done, sensing the power coming off the metal. Behind him he could hear the footsteps of the others, slow and tentative. At the front, Mr. Lasky and the director and two cameramen were seated in chairs pulled into a circle. The shadows of their heads bobbed on the screen. The instant Mr. Lasky stuck a cigar between his lips, Cruze found a match, flicked it into life, and leaned over to light the boss’s cigar.
William stopped a few feet away, the others coming up beside him. A polite habit he had learned as a boy—don’t push yourself; wait to be noticed. McCoy nodded them forward, and they sat down to one side of the buffalo Indians, across from the boss. In the dim light from the projector, William could see the black whiskers sprouting on Mr. Lasky’s chin, the gray tufts of hair, like a nest, in his ear. He kept a hand curled over the cigar; a tiny red light glowing at the end.
So this was how it would end, William thought. Inside a tent, their own shadows flickering on the screen. They would be shamed before Goes-in-Lodge and the other old men. Shamed before their people.
“How do you Indians like the moving picture business?” Mr. Lasky seemed cheerful. He jabbed the cigar in William’s direction, crossed his legs, and swung a black boot out into the circle of chairs. McCoy’s hands started flying, signing the white man’s words.
Goes-in-Lodge smiled and nodded. The other buffalo Indians broke out laughing. It was good, the old man signed back. Niisini! We have seen white men do wondrous things.
McCoy translated, and it was Mr. Lasky’s turn to laugh. A bold shout of amusement that left sparks of spittle hanging in the air a moment. He jumped to his feet and began moving about, the shadow flowing back and forth over the screen. “The Covered Wagon’s the greatest moving picture in history. You see all those panorama shots of wagons coming across the desert? Fantastic! It’ll knock the socks off audiences. All we gotta do is make sure folks come to the movie thea ters. Tell ’em,” he said, jabbing the cigar toward the director before dropping back onto his chair.
Mr. Cruze pushed his chair back and got to his feet. The black shadow rose across the screen. He made a noise in his throat, his eyes fixed on Goes-in-Lodge, hands clasped at his waist. William could see the white peaks of his knuckles rising out of the pink skin. “Mr. Lasky has hit upon a brilliant idea,” he said. “He believes the public should be given an . . .”
“Incentive, Jimmie,” the boss cut in. “I say we need special promotion.” He seemed to recollect himself. “Go on,” he said, flipping the cigar on the ground where it flickered and glowed red.
McCoy’s hands were still flying.
“Mr. Lasky would like to hire you to take part in a prologue at Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood that will take place each evening before the movie.” He took a moment, running his tongue over his lips. “He seems to believe the public will require such an incentive to bring them to the theater. May I say”—he turned to Mr. Lasky—“that it is my belief The Covered Wagon will be its own incentive. I do not believe . . .”
“Yes. Yes.” Lasky stood up. For an instant, he looked less sure of himself, as if he regretted getting to his feet. “The Covered Wagon is your masterpiece, as we are all aware. But I am aware of the expenditures.” Next to him, William could see McCoy signing for the old Indians. “We are almost three hundred thousand dollars over budget. The prologue will help promote the movie. You Indians can just do what you always do. Sing. Dance around and holler and yell. You’ll wear your own costumes, naturally. Keep your hair long, lots of feathers on your heads. Audiences will love feathers. We’ll put big signs up all over Hollywood. Come see the first and greatest Western epic moving picture, The Covered Wagon. Preceded by a prologue starring real Indians.”
McCoy said, “When will this take place?”
“Premiere is April 10. You go home after we finish here, see your families, and come to Hollywood first week in April. I need at least fifty Indians. Same pay you’re getting now. Bring your horses and tipis. You can pitch ’em up in Cahuenga Pass.” Lasky spread his hands as if the matter were settled. “McCoy, you’re in charge of who’s gonna come.”
“I’ll go.” It was Charlie’s voice. Then other voices: Goes-in-Lodge and the other buffalo Indians and James, all speaking up, voices giddy at the idea of more work, more money.
William turned to Charlie, took his arm, and started to walk him backward, away from the others. He tried to think what to say, how to tell him that they shouldn’t go.
Charlie said, “That’s where she lives. In Hollywood.”
21
CENTRAL WYOMING COLLEGE spread across a hilltop on the western edge of Riverton, swathed in snow and wrapped in a gray sky. Gusts of wind sent snow bursts over the sculpture of dancing figures in the center of campus. Vicky parked in the visitor’s lot and made her way along the walkways, dodging students with packs slung on their backs and intense expressions beneath the knit hats pulled low on their foreheads. She found the building that housed the psychology department and took the stairs to the second floor. The sounds of students moving throu
gh the halls reverberated against the concrete walls. Professor Jane Gorsuch had agreed to see her at 10 a.m. She was ten minutes early.
She knocked on the door next to the professor’s name on a white plaque affixed to the wall. No answer, no sound of movement inside. She knocked again. She had started back down the corridor toward the chair at the top of the staircase when one of the doors opened ahead. Jane Gorsuch stepped out, a tall woman in navy blue slacks and matching sweater, pushing a piece of gray hair from her forehead. “Vicky!” she said, walking toward her.
“I’m a little early,” Vicky said.
“Come with me.” The woman brushed past, waving Vicky along, an unhurried determination in her step. She used a key to unlock her office door and stepped in ahead. “Take a seat.” She nodded toward a folding chair in front of a wall of books haphazardly arranged on metal shelves and sank onto a chair in front of the desk. “The criminal mind is a most curious thing,” she said. “I’m not sure I can provide the insight you’re looking for, but I’m also not sure anyone can.”
“I appreciate your taking the time to see me,” Vicky said. She had consulted with Jane Gorsuch several times in the past, when most of her cases were unimportant, except to the clients involved. Petty criminals getting drunk or high, committing assault and battery, driving while impaired, whole lives ruined in moments. Jane Gorsuch had provided valuable insight into the personalities, suggested strategies for handling the defense, and provided reasons for juries to believe the clients might be redeemable.
She had called Jane this morning, worried that the anonymous caller would never call again. If Troy Tallfeathers knew anything that might implicate Jason Bellows in Kiki’s death, the caller would be free and clear. The information might be enough for an indictment against a known drug dealer who had managed to skate past any criminal charges. In the past, it had been Bellows’s associates who went to prison: Kiki Wallowingbull, Troy Tallfeathers.
The Silent Spirit (A Wind River Reservation Myste) Page 20