I handed it back to him. “Thoreau?”
“Hendrix, Jimi.” He sat there for a minute, puffing on his cigar. “We get the usual malcontents in here; people that are angry just because—and don’t get me wrong, they’ve got a right to be angry. We only get so much support money and we go through a lot of it at the beginning of the month. People have problems, I mean real problems, and we’re the ones with the money so they come here.” He paused to take another puff, and you could see him going through a mental list of everybody who might’ve ever threatened the young woman. “I’m not sure I want to implicate anybody on just hearsay.”
Long cleared her throat. “You’d rather whoever did this got away?”
He darted his eyes between us. “No.”
“Then why don’t you give us a few names to go on; just anybody that might come to mind.”
Even though the door was closed, he lowered his voice. “Have you spoken with Clarence?”
Long started to speak, but I cut her off. “Why would we want to do that?”
He looked around as if his office might be bugged. “She would come in with marks on her arms and face sometimes, nothing big, just bruises. I tried to get her to talk about it, and she said that he hurt her, sometimes. I mean, I assume it was Clarence.”
In my peripheral vision, I could see Lolo’s jaw muscles tighten. “How often?”
He thought about it. “Once a month, I guess.”
“Once a month?”
“Yes.”
She spit out the next words. “Why didn’t anybody report it?”
Herbert His Good Horse leaned across his desk and spoke in a slightly more aggressive tone, dashing some ashes off his cigar into the ceramic ashtray on his desk. “You know how hard it is to get these things investigated or to press charges when the victim refuses.” He looked at me, imploring. “She didn’t even want to talk to me about it.”
I glanced at the chief. “We understand.”
He leaned back in his chair. “I’m not accusing anybody, but…”
“Right.” I waited a moment. “Is there anybody else you can think of?”
He gestured helplessly.
“Anybody who might have seemed particularly angry with Audrey—any kind of odd behavior on her part when somebody might’ve come in?” He didn’t say anything, but I could tell my soundings had touched something. “Anybody?”
He sighed. “There were a few, now that I think about it—I mean, I don’t know if this means anything…”
Long produced a small notepad and pen. “Please.”
Herbert stared at the journal and then slowly spoke. “There’s an individual from the eastern part of the Rez, a man by the name of Small Song.”
For the second time today, I completed the man’s name. “Artie Small Song?”
“I hate to bring it up because his nephew, Nate, works with me up at KRZZ, but yes, that’s him.” The social worker nodded. “Artie was in here last week about his mother’s Elder support checks—we would give them to him to give to her. She’s a medicine woman out that way—big medicine. We were worried that she wasn’t really getting her checks and discovered she hasn’t for the last three months—so, this time we refused to give him her check. He was very angry.”
Chief Long was attempting to catch my eye, but I ignored her. “I bet he was.”
“I just remember him because Audrey read him the riot act and told him that he should be ashamed of himself.” His eyes went to Lolo. “Your brother had to throw him out. I thought he was going to kill Barrett.”
Chief Long started to close her notepad and stand. “Thank you, Herb.”
I placed a hand on her arm and reseated her. “Are there any others you can think of?”
His eyes, once again, went back and forth between us. “There are a few others.”
“Who?”
“Kelly Joe Burns down in Birney.”
I assumed it was Red Birney, which was not too far from the incident.
“Birney Day.” He quickly added.
Evidently political correctness was making headway on the Rez.
“Is that that white asshole meth-head Houdini who can run a hundred miles an hour I’ve been chasing for a month now?”
Herbert nodded his head. “There was also Louise Griffin, who got in a shouting match with her a couple of weeks back.” He thought. “You know? No, none of these people would ever…”
“Not even Artie Small Song?” He glanced up at me but didn’t say anything. “It’s not your responsibility to make those choices, Herb; we’re just relying on you to provide us with some names. It’s up to us to move forward with the investigation.”
He didn’t seem completely comfortable with my assurances. “You’re not going to mention my name; I mean, I have a small and deeply disturbed following on the radio.”
“Not to worry.” I glanced at the door. “Is there anybody here in the building, people she might’ve worked with?” I paused. “I noticed Loraine Two Two out there.”
“Well, considering what happened, they weren’t the best of friends.” He laughed. “No, God no. Audrey was a saint around here; everyone loved her. Everyone. She came in on her day off to do extra work, baked cookies on Fridays—that’s what makes this so hard to believe.” He glanced up at the poster behind him. “She ran and worked out with Karl, getting him ready for his races.” His words caught in his throat, and he placed a hand over his face. “Excuse me for just a moment.”
Lolo tapped my arm. “I think we’ve taken up enough of your time here, Herb.”
We stood, and I nodded to him in appreciation of his help. “Thank you.”
His eyes shone like puddles in his face. “Hey, there was this Indian woman hitchhiking back to the Rez in the middle of the night and this white woman picks her up. The Indian woman says, ‘Hey, thanks for picking me up. What are you doing out on the road this late?’ The white woman points to a bottle in a brown paper bag sitting on the seat between them and says, ‘I got this bottle of wine for my husband.’ The Indian woman nodded, ‘Good trade.’”
Lolo Long smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder as we turned and left.
In the hallway, Barrett and Karl were chatting up who I assumed was one of the girls from accounting, who beat a hasty retreat when she saw Lolo coming. “You had a wrestling match with Artie Small Song last week?”
Barrett crossed his arms—it must have been a family trait. “Huh?”
Chief Long flipped through the register and then turned the book around on the desk and shoved it toward her brother, a finger pinning the personage on the page. “Him.”
The young man leaned forward and read the name as Karl nodded a hello to me and backed his chair out of the line of fire.
“Oh, yeah, that guy.” Barrett looked up at his sister. “He had a screaming fit down the hall. Said he was going to come back in here with an atomic bomb and blow the place up.”
“Did he threaten Audrey Plain Feather?”
“He threatened everybody on the planet.” He looked at her thoughtfully. “Does that mean I can have a gun now?”
She turned and leafed through the rest of the book in a disinterested fashion. “No.”
“If he comes back, I could shoot the nuke out of his hand.”
The chief looked at me and then returned her eyes to the register. “Why don’t you tell my little brother about the 50 percent of cops that get shot?”
I shrugged.
Karl continued to study me and then spoke. “If you’re going after Artie Small Song, you better take an army with you.”
“That’s what I had in mind.”
He grinned at the floor. “Back before I lost my legs, some friends and me, we were out hunting one time and shot this whitetail deer up near Kelly Creek. When we got to it, that dude Small Song was already butchering it. This buddy of mine steps up and says, ‘That’s my deer.’ He didn’t even look at us, four of us, but stood there with that skinning knife just moving back a
nd forth.” He looked up at me for the first time. “Swaying, you know, like a snake before it strikes.”
I smiled. “You let him keep the deer?”
Karl nodded with the self-assurance of someone who has barely escaped death, perhaps numerous times, and is wiser for it. “You bet your ass we did; the guy’s a psycho.” He shuddered dramatically.
It was dark, but from my vantage point I could still see the old woman lift the planks and check the pit-roasted elk underneath. The shower of sparks rose like a constellation of orange celestial bodies reaching out for their brethren above, lighting the face of the woman as though she was onstage.
I was lodged at the base of a Y-shaped pine, the fallen branches making for a pretty good hiding place, or so I thought until the medicine woman looked up the hillside and directly at me—even from this distance I could feel the weight of those opaque eyes.
She had pulled a rumpled CPO jacket around her shoulders and the shawl she had been wearing earlier was around her head to protect against the slight chill of the evening. She might not know exactly where I was, but she seemed to know that I was out there and that most likely I wasn’t alone. There were other eyes than mine here and maybe the eyes of Artie Small Song to boot.
Almost an hour earlier I’d discovered the spot and had carefully made my way down the slope to where I now sat. I’d learned long ago that you needed to get comfortable at the beginning of things, because you wouldn’t have the luxury later on.
I usually had plenty to occupy my mind in these situations, and tonight was no different. My daughter and the impending wedding loomed large, and I was beginning to question my motives for sitting in the woods. Was I just avoiding the oncoming disaster that was around the corner by stretching my jurisdictional responsibilities, or was I focusing on a situation and a fellow officer who needed my help? Was I just out here because it was the path of least resistance and the kind of thing I was used to doing?
I had to fight to keep from sighing.
My daughter would be here tomorrow and, so far, Henry and I had not accomplished many of our assigned duties, the most important being finding a place for her to get married. Henry had actually gone over and spoken with Arbutis about the situation, but when I’d asked him about the meeting, he’d closed his mouth and said nothing—not a good sign.
This was a nice spot. Maybe I could talk Cady into a stakeout marriage ceremony that included armed guests—I’m pretty sure the groom’s side would have no problem with that since they were almost all cops anyway.
Not only was my daughter arriving tomorrow but so was Lena Moretti, Vic’s mother and Cady’s soon-to-be mother-in-law.
The wedding was in less than two weeks.
I could just stay here; chances are they’d never find me.
The medicine woman returned to the kitchen chair that she had stationed by the back door, turned her head, and spat. She brought a forefinger up and slid it across her lip where a little tobacco residue must have remained, then flicked the offending particle away.
Despite the distance, I could still make out the erosion-filled plains of her face. It was not unique in these situations that you start developing a feeling for the person you’re watching, almost as if they become an extension of yourself. It always comes down to being able to sit quietly and wait. Most lose the ability, the honing of their skills dulled and rusting in the forgotten kitchen drawers of their minds, but it was part of my job and I could just go away without going away and become a part of the landscape.
I had all night, but Artie didn’t. It was late, and she wasn’t going to be able to leave the elk on there for much longer. How much did Artie Small Song care about this meat? How much did he care about feeding his mother?
The answer came slowly, almost glacially, as I became aware of something to my left—something in the dark, vertical shapes of the trees that hadn’t been there before.
I waited, the sides of my eyes aching from being locked in one direction. Move first and die is the maxim that had been taught to me, the one I’d followed on the high plains, in Vietnam, and in every dire situation in my life.
I waited.
It was possible that we were staking out an innocent man, as innocent as somebody like Artie Small Song could be, but an ounce of prevention is always worth a pound of bloody results.
I could’ve sworn that I’d heard something behind me.
He would be at a much better vantage point to see me, front lit by the fire below. Had the old woman known from which direction he would come? Had she spoken with him? Did he know we were there? All these questions and a multitude of others attempted to dislodge me from my suddenly uncomfortable seat.
I waited.
A dark form melted into the trees to my right. I could make out a hand resting against the rough surface of the bark. The fingers flexed, no more than three feet from my head. I stopped breathing, thinking that he might hear me. Then he disappeared again, the fingers slipping away as if they’d never been there at all.
After a while I saw him again, a little further down the hill, his outline breaking with the stark form of the trees. The old woman was now looking directly at him and, consequently, me.
My eyes were momentarily drawn to the medicine woman as she took a step toward the fire pit. She gripped a knee and lowered herself so that she could move some of the boards, and another flurry of sparks rose into the night.
I could see where Artie Small Song stood, and I saw him pause for just a second before his head turned and the rifle in his hands swung around.
The Cheyenne Nation struck like a war lance, carrying the two of them down the hill, and all I could hear was grunting and heavy breathing as both combatants refused to give way to the slightest energy loss by crying out.
I threw myself from the relative comfort of my hiding place and stumbled down the hill in a striding attempt at speed, hoping I wouldn’t simply land on my face. The men continued to crash through the trees, and I heard a resounding thump as they reached the flat at the back of the house. I glanced off a creeping pine, which diverted my direction a bit, and tripped a little in an attempt to keep my footing.
The old woman had uncovered the pit and was holding one of the boards in her hands. The fire was blinding after sitting out there in the dark for so long, and I’m pretty sure that’s what she’d had in mind. Directly below me, the two men were struggling, one rolling on top of the other until they reached the rocks at the edge of the fire.
I was still a good thirty feet away when Mrs. Small Song swung the board in her hands and comically struck at the Bear in an attempt to get her son free. I landed on the two of them, receiving the majority of the medicine woman’s pummeling as Lolo Long joined us from around the side of the house, where we’d stationed her.
I was able to yank the rifle out of Artie’s hands and tossed it to the side, somewhat surprised that it appeared to be a simple single-shot bolt-action .22.
His mother was screaming as the chief pulled her away from us; she was surprisingly spry, and it was all Lolo could do to hold on, finally resorting to wrapping her arms completely around the old lady and lifting her from the ground.
We dragged Artie to his feet. I’d seen pictures of Small Song but hadn’t ever met him face to face. With all the stories I’d heard about him cleaning out bars, I’d assumed he was a bigger man, but he stood only about shoulder height.
Once I got my breath back, I gasped out a few words. “Lolo, are you all right?”
“Yeah.” She sat on the kitchen chair with the old woman in her lap and continued to hold fast.
I looked at Henry. “How about you?”
The Bear nodded and felt the back of his head, where the medicine woman had landed a telling blow. “Yes.”
Artie took the opportunity to elbow me and try and make a break for it, but Henry grabbed him with both hands and stood him up, locking an arm into his back. “He is an active little rascal, is he not?”
He tried to hea
d-butt Henry, the man’s hair flying away from his face as he looked defiantly first at me, then at Chief Long, and finally at the Cheyenne Nation.
“There is only one problem.”
I glanced up from Artie’s surprisingly youthful face. “What’s that?”
Henry grabbed the young man’s jaw and examined him like a horse he was intent on buying. “This is not Artie.”
6
The elk was really good, and I thought it was awfully nice of the medicine woman to invite us to dinner considering we’d staked out her house and had all but beaten the crap out of Nate, Artie’s nephew and the smallest of the Small Songs.
We’d helped them pull the elk from the pit—it seemed like the least we could do. Then one thing had led to another and, seated in more kitchen chairs liberated from inside, all of us ate elk and watched the fire in the pit. The old woman had tossed the boards in on top of the coals, and there was now a nice fire going as she retreated into the house for more potato salad.
Nate’s mood had improved when Henry had produced a twelve-pack of Rainier. He smiled at all of us. “So, you thought I was Art?”
Henry shrugged, and I nodded with my mouth full.
“If I’d been Art, man, you never would’ve heard me.” He returned his gaze to the Cheyenne Nation. “I used to hear about how you were really something; I guess you’re getting old, huh?”
Henry sipped his beer, and if you looked closely you could see the barest trace of a smile at the corner of his mouth. “I caught you.”
Defiance glowed in the kid’s eyes, his ego still stinging from having been taken. “You’d never catch Art.”
The Bear chewed his elk and said nothing.
I caught the boy’s attention. “When’s the last time you saw your uncle?”
“Yesterday.”
“What was he up to?”
The kid gestured toward the meat on his plate. “Hunting.”
Lolo Long’s voice rose from by the door. “He know it’s not elk season?”
As the Crow Flies Page 10