The Thunder Keeper

by Margaret Coel

  “I read the newspapers.” Father John could feel the other lawyers’ eyes on him. “Some suits are valid.”

  Perry Hamilton arched one eyebrow and shook his head. “Shall we proceed?” he said.

  For the next hour—Father John checked his watch a couple of times—he fielded the lawyers’ questions. What kind of priest was Don Ryan? Hardworking. That was the truth. How many times had Father John seen Mary Ann Williams at the mission? Once. To his knowledge, was there anything inappropriate in Father Ryan’s relationship with Mary Ann Williams?

  To his knowledge. Father John glanced away. In his mind was the image of Don Ryan in his study—the dropped head, the hands squeezed together between his knees. I had an affair with her.

  “Ask Don Ryan,” he said.

  “We’re asking you, Father.” There was a sharp edge to Hamilton’s voice.

  “What I know was told to me in confidence, as a priest,” he said. Then he held up his hand. “Why not settle, put this behind us?”

  Hamilton pushed back against his chair. “Have you thought about the consequences to the mission? Try to picture your donors learning that their contributions aren’t helping the Indians at all. They’re paying off the priest’s mistress.”

  Father John locked eyes with the man. “You just admitted she was Don’s mistress.”

  A look that bordered on appreciation came into the man’s face. “The burden of proof will be on her,” he said. “We intend to ask a judge to hear the case. Judges are logical; they follow the law.”

  And you’ll destroy her in court, Father John thought. You and the implacable logic of the law. He pushed his chair back, picked up his cowboy hat, and got to his feet. “I take it we’re finished here,” he said, starting for the door.

  Father John drove through the wide streets of Riverton, a sense of futility pressing down on him like an invisible weight. Hamilton would probably win the case, and the mission wouldn’t have to sell the land. Wasn’t that what he wanted?

  The realization left him feeling empty and dissatisfied, as if he’d conjured up a vision of what should be, only to find that it was incomplete, untrue. He’d have another talk with the Provincial. Ask him again to agree to a settlement.

  He made a right onto Federal and turned onto the cement apron of a gas station. At the inside phone, he dialed the mission and tapped into his messages. Three from parishioners checking about upcoming meetings. None from Eddie or Vicky.

  He pushed more quarters into the slot and dialed Vicky’s law office. After two rings, Laola’s voice: “Sorry, Father. Vicky’s in Laramie. I knew she wouldn’t be able to stay away from Wyoming.” A laugh floated down the line, then: “We’re still waiting to hear from the secretary of state’s office on the mining companies. Vicky’ll get back to you soon as she knows anything.”

  He thanked her and hung up, conscious of a vague disappointment that Vicky wasn’t in. And something more: he had no part in her life now.

  He slid back into the Toyota and melded into the light stream of traffic—a couple of pickups, a sedan—and headed north to the Riverton Library.

  The redbrick building squatted in the middle of a parklike lawn that had turned emerald green in the rains. Inside was the familiar hush that reminded Father John of the neighborhood library in Boston when he was a kid, and all the libraries he’d ever done research in. Even the sense of anticipation was familiar: this was where the secrets would unfold.

  He walked past the stacks set at various angles on the green carpet, past the reading tables where two elderly men curled over opened newspapers. Seated at an L-shaped desk was an attractive woman who might have been forty, with shoulder-length auburn hair framing a triangular face. She raised her eyebrows as he approached. “Haven’t seen you for a while, Father.”

  “I believe I owe you a fine,” he said, remembering the Plains Indians on his desk. He pulled the twenty-dollar-bill out of his pocket and laid it down.

  The librarian tapped at the computer keyboard, then pushed the bill toward him. “Keep your money for the Indian kids,” she said, a mischievous light in her blue eyes. “Why do I get the feeling you aren’t here to pay fines?”

  “What do you have on diamonds in Wyoming?” he said.

  “A new interest of yours, Father? Diamonds?”

  “You might say so.”

  She tapped the keyboard again. “Somehow I expected you to request another history book or something on theology or spirituality. But diamonds?”

  “Maybe they’re related,” he said. Bear Lake was a sacred, spiritual place.

  “Diamonds and spirituality.” She gave him a sideways look, still tapping. “How right you are. I never felt more spiritual than when I got this.” She lifted her left hand and waved it in the air a moment, allowing the diamond ring on her third finger to catch the light.

  “Ah, here we go.” Leaning toward the computer screen now, where columns of black type scrolled downward. The scrolling stopped. She jotted three titles on a notepad, tore off the page, and handed it to him.

  “You can find these in the natural history section”—a nod toward the bookshelves—“while I get you a monograph.”

  In a couple of minutes he’d found three books that looked promising and settled at one of the nearby tables. He opened the book titled Wyoming Minerals, written twenty years ago by a man with numerous letters after his name. He located “diamonds” in the index and turned to a page with a full-color map of Wyoming. Clusters of tiny white arrows pointed to the locations of diamond mines. None in central Wyoming.

  He opened the next book and read a brief chapter on diamonds found in Wyoming. Superior crystals, including a faceted fifteen-point-six-carat gemstone cut from a twenty-nine-carat rough stone, the largest diamond mined in North America. More than one hundred and thirty thousand other diamonds produced. Deposits found in kimberlite pipes—columns of igneous rock injected into the earth’s crust four hundred million years ago, bringing up diamonds from depths of one hundred and fifty to two hundred kilometers. Other minerals could also be found in the pipes—pyrope almondine garnet, olivine, sapphire, chromium diopside, picroilmenite, chromite. Hundreds of acres in Wyoming contained kimberlite pipes, most running along the southern border. Only a few pipes in the west and north. Whole mountain ranges ran between the nearest known pipes and central Wyoming.

  In the last book, Father John scanned through the chapter titled “The Great Diamond Hoax.” Diamonds discovered in southwestern Wyoming in 1872. Eastern financiers enticed to invest in America’s largest diamond mine. Couple of prospectors salt the area with valuable gemstones—the only gemstone-quality crystals in the deposit. Financiers too embarrassed to press charges. One of the swindlers was from Kentucky where he became a folk hero for “out—Yankeeing the Yankees.”

  He closed the book, aware that the librarian had set a plastic-covered manuscript on the table and moved away as quietly as she’d approached. The plastic felt cool and brittle in his hands. He read the title page. A History of Diamonds in Wyoming, by Charles Ferguson, who had even more letters after his name. Slowly he turned the pages, scanning the sections with titles like “Mantle Source Rocks in the Wyoming Craton” and “Ultramafic Complexes.” The information was the same. No recorded diamond deposits in central Wyoming.

  He set the manuscript on top of the books. It didn’t make sense. Why had Wentworth and Delaney come here? For revenge on two small-time criminals? It seemed unlikely. And Vicky was certain Baider Industries had located diamonds on the reservation. Still, the experts were in agreement.

  He got up and walked to the desk, where the librarian was bent over the open pages of what looked like a reference book.

  “Have you lived in the area long?” he asked.

  She brought her eyes to his. A mild look of surprise played at the corners of her mouth. “Born on the family ranch on Arrow Mountain fifty miles north. My grandfather homesteaded the place.”

  Father John hooked the top of a nearby ch
air and dragged it over. He straddled the seat and wrapped his arms around the back. “Ever hear of diamonds around here?”

  “Diamonds,” she said, holding on to the word, as if she were tasting the brilliance. “Sure would’ve made life easier if Dad could’ve raised diamonds instead of cattle.”

  “Does that mean the answer is no?”

  She tilted her head back and stared at him. “We happen to be about two hundred miles from the nearest diamond mine.”

  He thanked her and was about to stand up when she said, “People do like to get their hopes up, though.”

  He wrapped his arms around the chair again. “What do you mean?”

  “I was just thinking . . .” She paused, her gaze on some point across the library. “A ranch hand who worked for Dad when I was a kid used to take off for days at a time to go prospecting, he said, but Dad always suspected he was on a drunk. One day he showed up and claimed he’d struck it rich. Said he’d found a diamond lying on the ground up in the Shoshone forest. We never saw the diamond, of course, but it was the last we saw of him. Took off right in the middle of calving season.”

  Father John didn’t say anything. The Shoshone National Forest was west of Bear Lake. “When was this?”

  “Thirty years ago.” She shrugged and pulled her mouth into a thin line, as if she regretted having told him. “There was nothing to it. He probably found a sparkling crystal or got drunk and started seeing visions. If he’d found a real diamond, there would have been people crawling all over the forest looking for more.” She leaned over the desk. “What’s all this sudden interest in diamonds?”

  He stood up and pushed the chair back in place. The last thing he wanted was to start a diamond rumor. “I’m thinking about doing some prospecting,” he said. “The mission could use a diamond mine.”

  He thumped a knuckle on the edge of the desk, winked at her, and started for the door, almost regretting the remark. Now, instead of a diamond rumor, there’d probably be a rumor that the pastor at St. Francis had a wild imagination, maybe he’d even started drinking again.

  He drove back through town, past the bungalows and ranch houses with trees budding in the yards, past the strip malls and corner gas stations, and out onto the highway, moisture flecking the windshield like tiny diamonds. The librarian’s story contradicted the experts. A ranch hand had found a diamond.

  A ranch hand who was a drunk. That was a problem. Drunks could see visions. He’d seen snakes once, and flashes of light. Never diamonds. But if the ranch hand had found a diamond in the Shoshone forest, it was possible diamonds could be found at Bear Lake.

  By the time he drove into the mission, raindrops the size of quarters were plopping on the windshield. He parked close to the administration building and ran up the steps. The minute he stepped inside, the clouds opened, and a hard rain crashed against the windows. The thunder was directly overhead, like cannons firing on the roof. He hung his jacket and cowboy hat on the coattree and checked the answering machine. No new messages.

  In the directory, he found a listing for the Thunderbird Motel and dialed the number. The thunder seemed farther away, like a battalion moving out onto the plains. On the third ring, a man answered, and Father John asked to speak to Eddie Ortiz.

  A buzzing noise sounded, followed by the man’s voice again: “He answer?”

  “No,” Father John said, irritated. The man must know there was no answer.

  “Guess he’s out.”

  “Is his truck gone?”

  “Jesus.” It sounded like a gasp. “Hold on.”

  Another minute passed, then: “I see that wreck still in the parking lot. Son of a bitch is probably sleeping.”

  “Thanks.” Father John hung up. The truck was there; Eddie could be too scared to answer the phone and possibly tip off Wentworth and Delaney that he was in the room.

  He jumped up, grabbed his jacket and hat again, and headed back out into the rain.

  25

  Thunderbird Motel. The red-and-blue sign, blurred in the rain, hovered over the flat roof of a strip mall. Father John drove through the parking lot to the rear, where a yellow stuccoed building with cookie-cutter-identical doors and windows stood next to the alley. A last-chance place, he thought. Whole families squeezed into tiny rooms—Indians, derelicts, drugged-out teenagers, and people who were hiding out, like Eddie.

  He parked next to the brown pickup in front of a door at the far end. Pulling down his cowboy hat, he made his way around a puddle that had replaced a slab of concrete and pounded on the door. Rain drummed around him, nearly obliterating the faint television noise coming from inside. He knocked again, then stepped to the window and peered through the slit in the curtains. Lamplight shone over the mussed bed, the dresser with food cartons scattered over the top.

  He walked along the building, dodging the water that poured off the overhang and spattered the concrete, and let himself through the door marked OFFICE in smudged block letters on the glass pane. Odors of damp cigarette smoke and stale coffee rushed around him. A middle-aged man with gray bushy hair that matched his eyebrows sat behind the counter that divided the small room.

  “Yeah?” The man pulled his eyes away from the television on a metal shelf in one corner.

  “I’m looking for Eddie Ortiz.”

  “You the guy that called a while ago?”

  Father John nodded.

  “Last room thataway.” The man gestured with his head toward the opposite end of the motel.

  “He doesn’t answer.”

  “Must’ve gone out for a beer.”

  “His pickup’s still in front.”

  The man gave a noncommittal shrug.

  “Let’s check the room,” Father John said. “I want to make sure he’s okay.”

  The man eyed him a moment, making up his mind. Finally he said, “Who’d you say you are?”

  Father John gave his name and said he was from the mission.

  “Oh, yeah. The Indian priest.” The bushy eyebrows rose in a kind of recognition.

  “What about the room?”

  A half second passed before the man slid off the stool, almost disappearing behind the high counter. There were sounds of a drawer opening and shutting, keys rattling. He walked around the counter. A short, stocky man in a white T-shirt with wide suspenders that rode over his protruding belly and hooked into the belt of dark, rumpled pants. Without saying a word—metal key ring jangling—he opened the door and went outside.

  Father John caught up and led the way. The man’s sneakers made a squishy sound on the wet pavement behind him. At the door in front of the brown pickup, Father John waited while the man jammed a key into the lock and nudged the door open with one foot.

  Father John moved past and went inside. The room was empty. The bed looked as if Eddie had just crawled out of it, leaving behind piles of sheets and blankets. A soap opera flickered on the television set in one corner.

  He checked the bathroom: a towel wadded on the vinyl floor that was peeling back from the base of the tub, a shaving kit on the back of the toilet.

  Next he flung open the closet door, every muscle in his body tense with the expectation of finding Eddie Ortiz crumpled on the floor like the towel. Except for a shirt and jacket that dangled from wire hangers, the closet was empty.

  “Like I said, he went out.” The manager was planted in the doorway, jiggling the keys, bored and impatient.

  “Has anybody else been looking for him? Did you see anyone?”

  “Hey.” The man rolled his shoulders. “I just take the money at the zoo. I don’t tend the animals.”

  Father John walked over. “Listen, you . . .” He had to stop himself from saying “moron.” “When Ortiz comes back, you tell him to call me. Father O’Malley at St. Francis. It’s important. You got that?”

  The man blinked up at him, then stepped backward, across the walkway and into the rain that poured off the overhang and turned the white T-shirt gray against his shoulders. He jerked forw
ard, one hand brushing at the wet shirt, and took off in the direction of the office, moving fast, sneakers slapping on the concrete.

  Father John got into the Toyota and negotiated his way back through the parking lot and out onto the street, where he jammed down the accelerator, willing the old pickup to go faster. He drove north through Lander, staring past the wipers moving back and forth, back and forth, taking the intersections as the lights turned red, the voice in the confessional loud in his head: There’s gonna be more murders.

  He made a left into the parking lot that wrapped around the convenience store where he’d met Ali a couple days ago. The Toyota’s tires squealed to a stop near the entrance. He jumped out and pushed through the double-glass doors, taking in the whole store at a glance: the young woman herding two kids past the candy racks, the red-faced, bald-headed man at the counter where the girl had been.

  “I’m looking for Ali Burris.” He walked over to the counter.

  “Well, now . . .” The man’s thick fingers drummed on the glass countertop. “Better get in line. Lots of people wanna find that little Indian gal.”

  “When do you expect her?”

  “Who can say?” He shrugged. The tapping harder now. “Supposed to be here twenty minutes ago. You see her anywhere?” He gave a mock look around the store.

  “I’m Father O’Malley from the reservation,” Father John said. “Ali could be in trouble. Have you tried calling her?”

  “Now, if I had a number, I’d be on the goddamned phone, wouldn’t I? Telling her to get her ass over here. Got me a meeting I’m supposed to be at. It don’t make me happy to hang around waiting for her to come dragging in here whenever she gets good and ready. Time don’t mean nothing to them Indians.”

  Father John struggled to ignore the remark. “Tell Ali to call me at St. Francis when she comes in,” he said.

  “Oh, I’m gonna have a lot of things to tell that bit—” The man bit his lower lip over the word. The red in his cheeks deepened. “I ever see her again, that is.”