We took a meandering right onto a dirt road just before the Tongue River and followed the dusty track for a good half mile before Henry urged Rezdawg to a stop, then threw the gearshift into reverse and backed up fifty yards with the transmission sounding as if it was going to fall out onto the roadway.
The truck stumbled to a stop, and the Bear pointed at a crooked ranch gate with words chiseled into the overhead log—STOLTZFUS WORLD FAMOUS BOOTS.
I pivoted to take in the empty road and hillsides and then turned to look back at my buddy. “Hard to be world famous ’round these parts.”
“Give the people quality, and they will beat a path to your door.”
I guessed. “F. W. Woolworth.”
He shook his head.
“S. S. Kresge?”
He shook his head again at my listing of defunct five-and-dimes and spun the wheel several times to get the front tires to turn. “Actually, it was the Kinks.”
The road was deeply rutted and wound around a tall knob of rocks to our right, then straightened into a washboard that leveled off into a low-slung building that must’ve been built around the same time as the original Small Song structure back in the forties. There was a house farther up the hill and a large garden where a Native woman was picking vegetables with two small children.
Henry parked near the shop; again he turned the wheels so that if Rezdawg decided to go on an unscheduled sojourn, it wouldn’t be a long one.
There was a pinsized stream of antifreeze arcing from the radiator that I didn’t see until I walked in front of the vehicle and it sprayed on me. I jumped away and wiped the excess down my jeans and clenched a fist as if to strike the grille guard. “I really hate this truck.”
“Yes. So you have told me.”
I dropped my fist and followed Henry toward the front porch when the woman called from the edge of some tacked-together sheep fence on the hill. “Are you here about your boots?”
The two children joined her and looked at me as if they’d never seen a grown man who had pissed himself.
I tipped my hat. “No, ma’am.”
“Because if you are, they’re not ready.”
“Well, we’re not really here about boots.”
She continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “He always sends a postcard when the boots are ready; did you get a postcard?”
“No, ma’am. We haven’t ordered any boots.”
She glanced at Henry and then back to me; it wasn’t like we’d arrived in a reputable vehicle, so I could understand her concern. “Then what do you want?”
I gestured toward the Bear. “We’d like to speak to your husband, if we could. Are you Mrs. Stoltzfus?”
She pulled a bandana from her black hair and wiped her throat. “Yes, God help me.”
“Is Levi around?”
She gave some quick instructions to the children, who looked disappointed but returned to work as their mother hiked up her skirt, climbed onto a wooden cross-step, and swung a leg over the fence. “Do we owe you money?”
“No.”
She picked her way down the hillside, topped the porch risers, and walked over to where we were, her lace-up packers clapping the rough-cut wood like a xylophone. She’d been a beauty at one time, but age and hard work had worn her down; as Lucian would have said, you can’t have ’em plow on Friday and dance on Saturday. “Doesn’t make any difference, he’s still not here.” She glanced at the Cheyenne Nation. “I know you?”
Henry raised an eyebrow. “I do not know, do you?”
“You’re Henry Standing Bear.” She planted a provocative leg forward with a Mother Earth quality, and I immediately liked her. “I’m Erma Spotted Elk; you dated my sister.”
The Bear nodded his head. “Erma, how is Dottie?”
“She’s living in Seattle; she married some doctor and we never hear from her.”
He folded his arms and leaned against one of the porch poles. “That is too bad.” He looked past her to where the two children were working but continuing to sneak glances at us. “Yours?”
“Yah. They don’t like to garden, but they like to eat.” She turned to look at me, our heads about the same height with her standing on the porch. “You a cop?”
I smiled, but she didn’t smile back. “Does it show?”
“Yah, especially with that hog-leg at the small of your back.”
Henry’s voice played around her. “Erma here has a varied past.”
She laughed. “Varied. I like that.” She dabbed at the sweat that was dripping into her eyes. “I lived down in Denver for a while, danced; got into some trouble. I developed a talent for a lot of things, including spotting cops.”
I glanced up the hill. “And now you’re Amish?”
Her head inclined a little, belaying the next statement. “Yah, I’ve seen the world out there, and you can have it. Everything is going to hell.”
“Maybe.”
She smiled and studied me. “You gonna fix it?”
I shrugged. “Doing my part.”
“Which part involves my husband?”
Henry’s voice was low, but it carried. “Clarence Last Bull.”
She froze for just that brief instant, and if you hadn’t been looking for it you might’ve missed it, but I had a couple of talents myself. She converted the freeze into a slow turn toward the Bear and then looked back to me. “You wanna buy a pair of boots?”
I looked at mine—they were a little worse for wear. “Not especially, but I’d really like to talk about Clarence Last Bull.”
“That’s too bad, ’cause I really want to sell a pair of boots.” She turned, and the wide cotton skirt twirled as she clacked through the open doorway into the shop.
“Seems like the day for the barter system.” I glanced at the Cheyenne Nation, and he nodded for me to pursue.
She was sitting in a wooden armchair and had propped her feet on another facing it. She studied me. I walked over, and she put her feet on the floor so I could sit, settling my hat over the embarrassing stain near my crotch. She motioned toward the floor, so I pulled off 50 percent of my footwear and handed it to her. Erma took my boot and examined it like a surgeon would a tumor.
“I’d like to know about Clarence Last Bull.”
She examined the boot some more. “He used to work for my husband, but that was a while back.” She ran her hand over the nap. “You like rough-outs? Because we only do regular leather.”
Surprising me, she took my foot and propped it on the edge of her chair between her legs. “Clarence was really good; an artisan. He had an ability and flair, but what he didn’t have was stick-to-itiveness; he’d show up and work a few days and then disappear. Levi finally got tired of it and told him to hit the road. I understand he joined the army and became a cook or something.” She wrapped her strong hands around my foot. “Big feet.”
I nodded. “When was the last time you saw him?”
There was that momentary pause and the flicker of eye movement that meant the truth had just flown in the doorway, inspected the place, and flown out. “Year ago.” She looked down at my captured foot and leaned forward, her breasts on either side. “Fourteen.”
“Thirteen.”
I watched as she eased back and pulled a piece of paper from a sheaf on the rolltop desk. She placed the paper on the floor. “Stand on that.”
I did as she instructed, placing my stocking foot on the sheet as she pulled a carpenter’s pencil from the tomato can on the desk and traced around my foot, first at an angle underneath and then vertically. “I understand you have a cabin down by the river where he used to stay?”
“Yah, when he worked for us he used to bunk down there.” She tapped my leg, and I stepped off the paper. “I need your other foot.”
I pulled off the left boot and stood on another sheet. “Do you mind if we take a look in the cabin?”
She continued to regard me. “Yes, I do.” She studied my foot again. “If you want to wait you can ask for my husban
d’s opinion, but you might be here for a while.”
I examined the tools and the dust on them. “Where is he?”
“Buying leather in Rapid.”
I glanced up at the calendar and noticed it hadn’t been changed over from June. “How well did you know Clarence?”
“Well enough.”
“Did you know he was involved with Audrey Plain Feather?”
She paused and then continued around my heel. “I’d heard that.”
“Did you hear that there had been an accident?”
She traced around my foot twice, just as she’d done before, and finally looked up at me. “What kind of accident?”
“His wife was pushed off a cliff; Painted Warrior, a couple of miles up the road.”
She tapped my leg again, and I stepped off the paper and sat, bringing our faces a lot closer. She placed the two sheets together and tossed the pencil onto the overcrowded desk. “Pushed doesn’t sound like much of an accident.”
“No, it doesn’t.” I pulled my boots back on. “The added tragedy is that their little boy, Adrian, was in her arms when she fell.”
Erma couldn’t hide the fact that she was stricken with this bit of news. She wouldn’t look at me anymore, instead choosing to look out one of the tiny panes in the casement window above the rolltop. The glow of the afternoon light was prismed by the windowpane and played off her features. I could see a young girl who had jumped the Rez and headed out for the big town to a place she wouldn’t know anyone, least of all herself.
If it was a performance, it was a damn fine one.
She looked up the hill at her children and then finally turned to look at me. “That’s horrible.”
“Yes, it is.” I waited a few moments and then tipped my hat back. “You’re sure you haven’t seen him in a year?”
“Just ropers, like the ones you’ve got on?”
“Yep.”
She nodded and copied down my contact information, including the office address. “You’re kind of out of your territory, aren’t you?”
I didn’t say anything, which is the most unsettling thing you can say.
She stood and placed a hand back on the worn edge of the old desk. “And you don’t think the world is going to hell?”
I smiled. “Like I said—I’m just trying to slow it down a little bit.”
She remained silent until I saw no more reason to stay and took a step toward the open door.
“We have an eight-page list. It’ll be a year and a half.”
I glanced down the rows of boots. “I’m pretty good at waiting.”
The Bear took a few snap peas from a paper bag that he had liberated from the young farmers he had assisted on the hill while I had been ordering boots from their mother, and handed me one as he drove on through Birney Day proper. “So how did it go with Erma?”
I munched on the pea pod, crisp and delicious. “I ordered a pair of boots.”
He nodded as he navigated the vintage truck down the road. “It is good that you are supporting the local economy.”
“She knows something, but she didn’t know about Audrey.” I glanced out the window and watched the scenery flow by. “I think she’s seen Clarence a lot more recently than a year ago.”
“She saw him yesterday.”
I turned to look at the Cheyenne Nation. “The kids?”
“Yes, they were very chatty.” He took out another handful and handed me a few. “I thought it was very nice that they offered us this lunch.”
I chewed on another. “And?”
He glanced at me. “Only the peas.”
“About Clarence.”
His eyes went back to the road as we recrossed the rumble strip. “He was here yesterday afternoon, and she gave him supplies.”
“I assume we’re now on our way to Diamond Butte Lookout?”
“We are.”
I nodded and reached for more peas, but he slapped my hand and then took one for himself. “We have to ration our supplies.”
I listened to him eat as we continued down the road. We came up on a skinny kid walking on the gravel beside the asphalt who was wearing only one shoe. Henry slowed, finally matching the speed of the child’s pace, and being that I was on the passenger side, I went ahead and spoke to the young man. “Lose your shoe?”
He turned his head at my voice and looked at me. “No.” His smile was wide and beatific. “Found one.” His face brightened even more when he noticed the truck and, more important, the driver. Henry leaned on the brakes in an attempt to stop Rezdawg before it could run over the kid, who had bolted around the front and had pulled himself up on the grille guard. He stared at us from over the hood. “What’choo doin’, Bear?”
The Cheyenne Nation laced his fingers over the wheel and placed his chin there. “Looking for somebody.”
The kid smiled. “You’re always lookin’ for somebody—I’m just glad it ain’t me!”
Henry smiled back at him and then gestured toward me, his partner in justice. “This is my friend, Walt Longmire.” He reversed the gesture. “Walt, this is Wiggins Red Thunder, head of the Birney Road Irregulars.”
The boy interrupted. “The Bear says you saved his life up on the mountain.”
I laughed, glanced at Henry, and then tipped my hat. “Pleasure to meet you, Master Red Thunder.”
He cocked his head and closed one eye to look at me. “What did you jus’ call me?”
“Master. It’s a formal address used for young men of undetermined age below thirteen.”
He continued to study me. “I’m twelve.”
“That would be under thirteen.”
The grin broadened. “Heeeeeeeeeeehe’e!”
The Bear laughed. “Evoohta?”
Wiggins shot his eyes at me. “Emasets’estahe.”
Henry nodded, but the young man continued to look at me, uncertain as to my motives.
“You want a ride, Master Red Thunder?”
The smile returned. “Yah, up here.”
He turned and lodged his rear end between the top bar of the guard and the dented hood, facing forward and banging an open palm on the rusted green surface.
The Cheyenne Nation shouted, “Tosa’e?”
Our impromptu hood ornament pointed to the right down a dirt road leading to a cluster of small, shabby houses and a few trailers. Henry wrapped the wheel a few times, and we eased off the paved road and down the wallow of burnt-umber dirt.
“The Red Road?”
He gave me the horse-eye. “I have to check in with my homies.”
With a little direction, we pulled between a couple of the houses and found two younger children, a boy and girl, who had propped up a john-boat with rocks and filled it with a nearby garden hose, making a homemade pool. I watched as they splashed each other and then waved ferociously at us as Rezdawg parked.
“I sometimes miss being that age.”
“It was a good time, but now is a good time as well.”
I smiled as I started to open the door. “That was a point I was trying to make to Erma, but I don’t think she was buying.”
He looked thoughtful for just a moment. “Perhaps her now is different from ours.”
“Of that, I have no doubt.”
We met Wiggins at the front of the truck, and I noticed the rolling piece of work hadn’t pissed on the Indians. Rezdawg was obviously a racist.
Henry gestured toward the pair in the flooded boat. “Indian hot tub.”
The girl cried out. “We’re going to Alaska!”
We joined Wiggins and walked over. Henry dipped a hand in. “Warm; did you pee in this?”
They yowled with laughter until a man’s voice sounded from one of the trailers. “You damn kids better fuckin’ shut up out there!”
Henry looked left, and my eyes followed his to where a weathered blue ’69 Dodge Power Wagon with a white replacement door that read COLSTRIP CONCRETE sat parked next to a crummy, olive-green single-wide. “Who is that?”
I remembered the conversation at Human Services. “Herbert His Good Horse mentioned this individual as one of the people who might have something against Audrey Plain Feather.”
The Cheyenne Nation’s eyes were slow to return but finally came back to us as he introduced me to the two other children. “Walt, this is Leslie S. Little Hawk and her sidekick, Charlie Shoulderblade.”
I tipped my hat again. “Troops.”
The Cheyenne Nation placed a closed hand over his chest. “What is our motto?”
Wiggins and the other two did the same with their smaller fists and shouted back, “To go everywhere, see everything, and overhear everyone!”
“Epeva’e.” He took a breath, but just as he was about to speak, a pale, bald, shirtless man threw open the door of the trailer and started off the porch toward us, pulling his belt from his pants with his head down.
“All right, God-damnit, I told you little fuckers that if you keep makin’ a racket, I’ll whip your asses.”
Henry squared off quickly, lowered his arms, and waited.
The Kelly Joe Burns character was about ten feet away when he raised his head and saw what it was he was up against. Burns was thin with the obligatory tattoo of flames creeping up his neck, and he swung the belt from the buckle, but you could see his enthusiasm was waning. “You… you, you tell those fuckin’ kids to keep it down.”
“No, I do not think I will.” Henry gestured toward the impromptu weapon in the man’s hand. “And you better put your belt back on before you lose those pants.”
Kelly Joe took a step back. “Fuck you!”
The Bear took a few, easy steps toward him.
I looked around the Cheyenne Nation and made eye contact with the skinny guy, and saw no reason not to throw a scare into the probable drug dealer, who was a cliché walking. “Hey, is that your Dodge over there?”
He drew the belt back, and I wondered what it was going to taste like when Henry shoved the thing down his throat. “Who wants to know?”
“Sheriff Walt Longmire.”
He looked confused for a moment, probably trying to remember who was sheriff of the adjoining county. “This is the Reservation; you’ve got no jurisdiction here.”
I stepped up to the Bear’s shoulder. “I’m working with Tribal Chief Long on a case.”
As the Crow Flies Page 18