by Aimée Thurlo
Ella nodded. She recalled that the robber, an underage Navajo boy, had recently been released from jail. Hunt had fought hard to have the fifteen-year-old tried as an adult, but failed. That was enough by itself to explain why Councilman Hunt wanted handguns registered. “Did she help her husband promote his proposed legislation?”
“Yes, she was behind him all the way on that. She thought that handgun registration might at least reduce the chances of anyone else having to go through what she did, both during the robbery and afterward. They’ve also promoted an overhaul of the youth offenders program, making young people who commit violent crimes face trial as adults. But nobody has paid any attention to that, though it’s a popular issue here in the Southwest. Everyone seems to focus solely on gun registration.”
Ella nodded, but didn’t comment, her gaze resting on several firemen who were all working the same spot inside the ruined house.
After a few minutes of silence, Louise continued. “The councilman made a lot of enemies by taking a stand for gun registration.”
“Has the family received any threatening phone calls, letters, or things of that sort?”
“Not that I know of,” Louise said, then after a long pause, added, “Councilman Hunt’s only enemy, if you can call him that, is Councilman Tolino. Councilman Hunt got into several heated arguments over the phone with him, mostly on the youth crimes issue, I gather, though they have their differences on gun registration. Get two lawyers together . . .”
She couldn’t see Kevin in the role of arsonist, and to Ella’s own surprise, the fact that Louise had thought to mention him at all bothered her. Kevin was a politician through and through. He’d argue politically, but that would be it. However, this kind of talk could harm him. Uncertain why she cared at all, she shoved the thought out of her mind.
Maybe she was getting soft now that she was pushing forty and starting to feel a little older every morning. Kevin didn’t need her protection. She’d treat him like any other suspect and would follow up this lead. “Do you know what they were arguing about?”
“I think Councilman Tolino thought that my employer was pushing the gun bill too hard. The words ‘dead in the water’ were the ones Councilman Hunt mentioned to his wife. Apparently Tolino wanted him to change his strategy so he could at least get the violent youth offender program passed. But since I only overheard one side of the conversation, then pieces of the discussion between the Hunts, I obviously don’t know all the details.”
Ella made a mental note to ask Kevin about it. Her gaze drifting back to the scene, she saw the firemen had moved on and scattered. Obviously the search for Mrs. Hunt wasn’t over. “Thank you for your help. I appreciate it.”
Louise followed Ella’s line of sight. “I guess they’re still looking,” she said and sighed. “If you don’t need me, I’m going to wait over by the fire truck until . . .”
“Go ahead.”
Ella studied the charred remains of the house. Arlene had probably had breakfast that morning and gone about her business in the normal way never realizing that, hours later, she’d be lying dead beneath a pile of rubble. Life was incredibly uncertain, but that knowledge was so hard to take most people avoided thinking about it at all.
She took a deep breath. It was time to get to work. Order had to be restored.
While the firemen continued searching for any sign of Mrs. Hunt, Ella’s team looked for evidence related to arson. Chief Curley had been right about the hot spot. Justine, Tache, and Neskahi worked to collect evidence, taking photos and collecting samples of charred wood that might contain traces of the accelerant. While they processed the scene, Ella walked around the perimeter of the ruined house trying to reconstruct the sequence the arsonist had followed as he committed the crime.
Ella turned around in a slow circle studying the area. As she did, she suddenly noticed a large, round-faced Navajo man wearing jeans and a cowboy hat walking toward the ruined house. He came to within fifteen feet, then stopped, his gaze on the smoldering rubble.
“Can I help you?” Ella asked, walking toward him.
He continued to stare at the house as if mesmerized. “I just needed to see this for myself,” he said, looking at her briefly, then back at the house.
The man was in his early thirties and wore his hair short, a common style almost everywhere. From what she could see, he didn’t appear to be wearing a medicine pouch. That, and his willingness to approach this site—a place where a death might have occurred—made her think that she was dealing with a modernist.
“Who are you?” she asked, pushing her jacket back so he could see her badge clearly.
“My name’s Hoskie Ben, Officer,” he said, finally looking at her closely.
“What brings you here?”
“This,” he said, gesturing toward the house. “I wrote copy about the fire for the radio news just an hour ago, but I just couldn’t believe it had really happened. I needed to see it for myself.”
Ella watched him, suspecting that there was a lot more he hadn’t said. “If you write copy for the news you’re probably used to hearing about all kinds of unpleasant subjects. Why does this particular event upset you? Do you know the owners?”
He looked at her, then at the ground. “This is different. I feel responsible for this fire.”
Ella’s antennas went up. “What do you mean?”
“We had an entire program devoted to the topic of gun control yesterday.” Hoskie swallowed, then in a taut voice added, “I did the research that provided most of the facts and statistics George Branch used when he went on a tirade against Councilman Hunt’s gun registration plan.” He paused, then continued. “I stuck to the hard facts, but I knew George would spice them up by adding all the redneck commentary meant to provoke. That’s what he does best.”
“There was a program that focused on Councilman Hunt?” Ella pressed.
“No, not on Hunt alone. The last show targeted all the current and possible proponents of gun control on the Rez. George said that The People had the right to know that the Tribal Council felt powerful enough to tamper with the Bill of Rights.” He looked at her. “You know how he spins things.”
Ella exhaled loudly. “Oh, yeah.” She was dying to ask Hoskie if he’d also provided background for the comments Branch had made about her last year when she’d become the talk show’s target, but decided not to ask. This wasn’t the time or place.
“I’ve studied very hard to become a journalist,” Hoskie continued. “I’m working on a Master’s right now, but the only job I could get around here was working for Branch at the radio station. I do a great job with news and editorial copy, but George edits anything I give him and uses the information any way he wants. There’s nothing I can do about it except find another job. I took a leave of absence once to do just that, but I couldn’t find any other openings. I have a family to support, so eventually I went back.”
“Give me the highlights of yesterday’s program,” she asked.
“Branch implied that there was a faction within the tribal government conspiring against the Dineh. He told the listeners that the problem with some politicians was that they were insulated from the real world. They received the best police protection, lived in good neighborhoods, and never went anywhere they might actually have to use a gun to protect their family. Of course the listeners knew exactly who he was talking about.”
“Naturally.”
“I’ve never owned a gun, but until this came up, I’d always thought that guns had to be licensed.”
“No, not in New Mexico. Here it’s just automatic weapons, and that’s done federally. Other than that, a waiting period and a background check is pretty much all that’s required.”
Hoskie nodded. “I’d sure like to speak to the issue myself but I have no editorial clout or airtime. I would also like to bring up the Hunt plan to put violent youth offenders away for much longer sentences. My employer conveniently ignores that side of Hunt, though I’m sure he agr
ees with the concept.”
She heard the ambition in his tone and had the strong feeling that he was the kind who’d never give up trying. “Maybe you’ll get your turn someday.”
“If there’s anything I can do to help you find whoever set this fire just let me know. I can try to write some discussion topic suggestions for George denouncing what happened here and asking people with any information to come forward. If I approach him in the right way, he may go for it.”
“Sounds like something that would really help our investigation. Do it.”
As he walked away, Ella noted paramedics joining some of the firemen in one of the smaller rooms of the house. They had a stretcher. From the looks of it, they’d found Mrs. Hunt. As she waited for confirmation, Ella joined Tache, who was photographing the hot spot beneath the window. A broken bottle lay in shards around a charred black spot.
Justine came up with a set of forceps and began to collect the glass, placing it in a box.
Ella sighed. “You won’t find any fingerprints on that.”
“What do you know that we don’t know?” Tache asked, looking at her intently.
Ella suddenly realized that she’d spoken aloud. “It’s just a hunch.” One she knew was right, however. Her intuition, something her mother believed to be something else, was rarely wrong.
A few minutes later, the paramedics came out with a body bag on the stretcher.
Ella stopped them. “The wife?” she asked, not using the name of the recently deceased in accordance with Navajo customs.
“It’s hard to tell,” one of the Navajo men answered. “The body was so badly burned. But there was a ruined wheelchair beside the remains and that makes me think your guess is right. The ME asked us to transport the body to her lab and she’ll be making the final determination.”
Before Ella could say anything more she heard running footsteps. As she turned her head, she saw Lewis Hunt, the councilman. He stopped abruptly inches from the stretcher and stared at the black plastic body bag in horror.
“Is that—” His voice was barely audible. He tried to finish the sentence, but the words wouldn’t come.
“We don’t know who it is for certain, Councilman. A medical examiner will be making the identification. All we know is that it wasn’t your in-home care nurse,” one of the emergency medical team members answered.
“Was there a wheelchair nearby?”
The EMT nodded.
“Then it’s my wife,” he said and began to shake violently. “There’s no one else it could be.” He took a step back and stumbled, weak at the knees.
Ella steadied him and nodded to the EMTs, who continued on with the body. “We’re investigating this now, Councilman,” she said, making sure he saw her badge. “It’s still too early to be certain, but the fire appears to be the work of an arsonist.”
“Arson? Who would do such a thing to my beautiful wife?” he whispered and crossed his arms in front of his chest in an effort to stop shaking.
“We need to find whoever was responsible,” Ella answered softly, leading him away from the site.
He stopped by the mailbox that was at the front of the house near the street and looked back. “Who hated me—us, enough to do this?” he asked in an anguished whisper.
“I’d hoped you’d be able to tell us.”
Hunt took several deep breaths as he stared at an indeterminate point across the highway. Then his eyes narrowed. “It may be connected to the radio show. Did you hear about that?”
“I’ve heard a few things. I’ll learn more.”
“Maybe one of Branch’s loony callers decided to come after me.” He started to say more, stopped, wavered slightly, then covering his mouth with one hand, ran over to the side of the road and vomited.
Ella waited. His grief and shock were stunningly real. She considered telling him what she’d experienced in her own close call with death, thinking it might ease his pain a little, then decided against it. She had no proof that any of it had been real.
Lewis Hunt returned to where she was standing a few minutes later. Ella’s heart went out to him. His eyes were dull and lifeless. His spirit had been broken. “Councilman, I know this is a terrible time, but—”
“Ask me whatever you need,” he said wearily.
“Did your wife have any enemies?”
“Not ones who’d do something like this,” he said, his voice unsteady. “My wife had a law degree and was active in politics. She didn’t run for office because that wasn’t what she wanted, but she was actively involved with me campaigning for the gun restrictions I wanted to pass. She spoke to any and every group that would listen to her—from Chapter Houses, to political science classes at the college.”
“Do you think she made enemies doing that?”
He shrugged. “Lots of people disagreed with us on gun registration, but that’s just because they don’t realize how prevalent handguns are on the reservation. Kids carry them around on the streets and in their cars, bring them to dances and social events, even to school. Although, so far, we’ve averted any major tragedies like the ones that have happened in other places, our luck will run out one of these days. Perhaps Shiprock will be next,” he answered, parroting what she suspected was his standard speech.
“Getting back to your wife. Is there anyone in particular who has given her—or you—a hard time recently?”
“I received some nasty hate mail this morning—a backlash from Branch’s radio show—but it wasn’t unexpected. I put it into a file just in case something comes of it.”
“I’ll want to examine that mail. Did anyone at the college classes or Chapter House meetings that your wife attended seem openly hostile to her, during or afterward?”
He considered it. “Pam Todacheene and my wife have never gotten along. They’re both attorneys and could argue a case nonstop for hours on end—and they did just that several times over the gun proposal. But she wouldn’t have hurt my wife or me.”
Hunt looked around as if lost, then waved halfheartedly at someone who’d just pulled up. “That’s my brother-in-law and chief aide, Cardell Benally. He’ll help me with the arrangements I’ll have to make. Do you need anything else from me?”
“No, sir. Thank you, Councilman. I’ll be sure to keep you appraised on our progress.”
“Yes. And I’d like to ask you to do something for me, Investigator Clah?”
“Yes, Councilman?”
“Find the person who did this. And when you do, gather enough evidence so that even the . . . stupidest jury in the world will convict him and put him away for life. My wife has been denied justice once already, I won’t have it happen again.” Hunt’s voice was shaking now, and it wasn’t just from grief. He was angry.
Ella didn’t know how to answer the man, and he was beyond consoling any more, so she just nodded and walked away. Quickly she joined her team, worked beside them for another hour, then took Justine aside. “I’m going to pay George Branch a visit,” she said, recapping what she’d learned about his last broadcast.
“Would you like me to meet you there? I’m going to be finished here shortly, and Ralph can take the evidence back to the station without me.”
Ella shook her head. “I need you to do something else. Find out when the last Chapter House meeting around here was held and if the deceased attended. If she did, find out how her views were received and if anyone in particular gave her a hard time.”
“Done.”
Ella drove to the radio station located in the off-reservation city of Farmington, glad to be working a case again. Arson, murder—these were crimes she understood, and something she was trained to deal with effectively. Trying to figure out intangibles of any kind—particularly what happened after death—was just an exercise in frustration.
As Ella entered the large cinder-block building off Main Street, she found Branch in the hallway getting hot cocoa from a vending machine. He’d easily put on another twenty pounds since the last time she’d seen h
im. The man had to tip the scales at close to two-seventy or -eighty.
“Hey, Clah,” he said, seeing her. “Figured you’d be dropping by. Hoskie told me what happened.”
“Then let’s cut to the chase and save us both some time. I’d like a list of your callers—the loony ones. Or is that redundant?”
“Charming as ever, I see.” The half-Navajo radio personality took the steaming cup from the machine dispenser and sipped it slowly. “But I’m feeling charitable so it’s your lucky day. The station won’t release phone records, naturally, but you can listen to a tape of the show and take all the notes you want.”
Branch led her to a booth down the hall from his office, then brought down a CD containing the audio of his last show and handed her a headset. “I didn’t take any callers for the first half hour of the show, but from then on, we had a flood of listeners expressing their opinions.”
Ella spent the next two hours forcing herself to listen to Branch’s show. Callers usually identified themselves only by their first names and she had no doubt that some of them had used aliases. Most of the callers had been really incensed by the issue and had expressed negative viewpoints, but none of them had mentioned Hunt specifically. There was nothing for her here.
As she walked outside to the hall, George Branch met her and she handed him the CD and headset.
“All done?” he asked.
“For now.”
“You and I don’t see eye-to-eye on much, Clah, but even you have to admit that if this is a reaction to the things said on my show, I’m still not to blame.”
“Your radio show is known for stirring up people’s emotions and getting them to react. You may have done a better job than you realized. Either way, an innocent woman was killed and I intend to find out who did it.”
“I’ve heard a rumor that Arlene died in the fire. Has this been confirmed?”
Ella nodded. “It’s not official yet, but I’m pretty sure the body they found was hers.”
“Damn.” Branch leaned back against the wall and stared at her, his face drawn. “I met her a few times. The woman had a mouth on her, but I admired her. She had guts and never pulled her punches, and in this day and age when everyone’s trying to be politically correct, that’s quite a virtue. I always thought she should have been the council member, not that spineless idiot she married. She’d have had enough sense to drop that gun issue and carry the ball on the youth offender bill, something most of us can agree on.”