Bitterroot Blues

by Paul Moomaw

  “And if he’s innocent?”

  “Don’t start, Sam. Arden Marks killed his wife. Maybe he wasn’t in his right mind when he did it; but he did it. No doubt about that. They’ve got him cold. And I can’t even plead insanity, because Montana Code doesn’t allow it.”

  “I can’t seem to see this open and shut case,” Arceneaux said. “It has too many holes in it. The pathologist’s report, the neighbor who will swear Arden was at home that night . . .”

  “Forget it, Sam.” French drained his beer, pushed himself out of his chair, and returned to the baby fridge. “Want another one?”

  “Sure,” Arceneaux said. “After all, if I get a DUI, I can always count on an aggressive, hard-hitting attorney like you to get me off.”

  French laughed and handed Arceneaux the beer. “Come on, Sam. Be kind. I guess it’s a good thing Arden has at least one person who believes he’s innocent, but I have to deal with reality.”

  Arceneaux nodded. “It does seem that way, I’ve got to admit. But as long as I’m complicating your day, take a look at this.” He reached into the cordura carryall from Lands End that served him as briefcase, lunch box, and carry-all, and pulled out the brown paper bag that held the hunting knife Helen Lousen had given him. He slid it across the desk. French picked it up and looked at it admiringly.

  “Nice piece,” he said. Then he looked at Arceneaux warily. “Is this a bribe?”

  Arceneaux laughed. “The housekeeper at the Double Pine was cleaning up the cabin where Samantha and Wallace were killed. She found that in the bedroom.”

  “It’s a beautiful knife, but I don’t see what it has to do with anything,” French said.

  “What if it belonged to the killer?” Arceneaux said.

  “Then it’s evidence, right? So you’re going to take it right over to Barbara.” He paused to take a swallow of beer, then shook his head slightly. “You’re not, are you?”

  “Sure,” Arceneaux said. “Just not right away. I want to try to find out who owns it. First thing, I plan to show it to Arden. Maybe he’ll recognize it.”

  “And lead you right to your mysterious killer.”

  Arceneaux nodded. “Who isn’t your client.”

  “Who isn’t my client. Right.”

  Arceneaux smiled and slipped the knife back into his carryall.

  French drained his beer. “Been fishing any?” he asked.

  “A little,” Arceneaux said. “The browns are still pretty active. I expect I’ll get in a couple more days before winter.”

  French sighed. “I wish I had the time. I don’t know if I would ever have become a lawyer if I had understood how much the job interferes with the important things in life.” His chair squeaked loudly as he leaned back. “I’ve tried oiling this damn thing, but nothing works. It’s hell. Whenever I have an important meeting, I have to sit real still, so I can stay dignified.” He stood up and tapped his watch. “Like I said, it’s quitting time.”

  They walked to the door together, both aware of the bond of years of friendship that no disagreement about a case could destroy.

  “You’re really going to hang on to that knife?” French said.

  “Just for a while.”

  “That’s kind of against the law, Sam.”

  “Why, thank you for the legal advice, counselor.”

  French opened the door and held it for Arceneaux. “Pretty crazy,” he said.

  “What do you expect from a crazy Indian?”

  “You’re only half Indian.”

  “Then maybe this is only half crazy,” Arceneaux said. He threw French a sloppy salute and left.

  Driving back through downtown Hamilton Arceneaux found himself rehashing his conversation with French, wondering what he could have said to be more convincing, and deciding there probably was no answer to that question. His thoughts distracted him and he failed to notice that the traffic light on Main had long turned yellow. It changed to red just as he hit the crosswalk, and he gunned the Subaru to get through the intersection, only to see a Sheriff’s car waiting on Main.

  “Oh shit,” he said, and crossed his fingers, slowing the car down to the sedate crawl all drivers resort to when they know they have been busted and there is nothing they can do about it. “Oh well,” he added, when the patrol car wheeled onto the road behind him and turned on its lights. He pulled over to the edge of the road, turned off the engine, and waited for the inevitable. The patrol car pulled up behind the Subaru and an officer got it, one Arceneaux did not recognize. He was young and his uniform and gear still had a new and shiny look. So did his face.

  By the time he reached the Subaru Arceneaux had retrieved his license, registration and insurance card and had them waiting. “That was a red light,” the deputy said. The name on his ID tag read LEWIS, T. He took the documents. “One of your tail lights is broken, too, but I’ll just give you a warning on that,” he said. He marched back to the patrol car and Arceneaux watched as the picked up his radio and checked in. He got back out and started toward the Subaru, then stopped, pivoted and returned to the patrol car. He opened the door, reached in, and pulled out his citation booklet. Arceneaux decided he would bet at least a dime that this was the kid’s first stop.

  Chapter 21

  Arceneaux glanced into the back of the little Subaru to make sure his fishing gear was all there. If he was going to waste a drive up the Bitterroot to try to convince Arden Marks to listen to his lawyer, he figured he might as well get in some fishing. The river was down, which was partly the time of year, and partly the de-watering from valley irrigators that seemed to get worse every year, but the cutthroats were still active, and usually gullible enough to take his nymphs. He climbed into the little car and headed south, past the giant strip mall that Brooks Avenue had become from just beyond downtown all the way to the giant Walmart that squatted under Dean Stone Mountain. From there the landscape was relatively open—if you didn’t count all the mini-villages that had started springing up, like mushrooms after a rain, between Missoula and Hamilton

  Arceneaux thought first he had picked the wrong time to visit. The old, green International was missing from its place by the side of Arden Marks’ house. In its place, a red dirt bike, small and beat up, leaned against the wall. But Marks stepped through his screen door onto the porch as the Subaru pulled onto his dirt driveway.

  “Glad I caught you home,” Arceneaux said.

  “Where else would I be, with this slave collar on my wrist,” Marks replied. He raised his left arm to display the bracelet. “I have to check in with her majesty the County Attorney every hour on the hour, or they send the dogs after me.” He pulled the screen door open and motioned me inside. “I was going through some photos,” he said. “Sorting out my life, I guess. Most of them are pictures of Samantha. You ever see what she looked like when she was alive?”

  “I’ve seen a few pictures.”

  “She was real pretty,” Marks said. “Photographs don’t really show how much.” He stepped over to the large wooden table that dominated the room, sat down with a grunt, and nodded toward the other chairs. “Grab a seat,” he said.

  Arceneaux settled into a chair, and Marks pushed half a dozen snapshots across the table. “Most of these I took right after we got married, but she hasn’t changed any since then.” He stopped, shook his head, a shadow of pain crossing his eyes. “I guess that’s not true. She’s changed more than I want to think about.”

  Arceneaux studied the pictures. Samantha Marks had, as an adult, retained the look of innocence and vulnerability that had been there in the pictures he had seen of her as a child, with the kind of heart-shaped face people refer to as sweet. Blonde hair, a warm but worried smile, and large, dark eyes that seemed to question the viewer, ask, “Am I doing okay? Are you happy with me?”

  “She had really deep, brown eyes,” Marks said. “Some people thought she must bleach her hair because of those eyes, and how dark her skin could tan in the summer. But that’s just the way she was
born. There wasn’t a thing about her that wasn’t the way God made her.”

  Arceneaux picked up another photo, one of Samantha in denim shorts and a sleeveless yellow blouse. She had big shoulders for a woman, smallish breasts and wide hips. Her arms and legs were fit and muscular.

  “She looks strong,” Arceneaux said.

  Marks nodded. “Before I made her stop, she was always climbing the rocks around here. She was as good at it as any man, but I told her we would have to have at least a couple of kids first, then she could go off and get her skull split falling off a cliff if she just had to.” He paused, glanced at Arceneaux with a tight smile. “It was a joke. We joked around a lot together.” He picked up another photo. “She did most of the wood splitting for us. She liked it. Said it was good for her mood, calmed her down. And she could handle as heavy a maul as I could.”

  Marks shuffled the photos around and shook his head. “Some of the shots I took about the same time are missing. I don’t know what happened to them, but I suppose it’s just as well. I’m kind of ashamed of them.” He paused. “They were sexy pictures,” he said, and his face turned a little red. “She didn’t have hardly anything on. Samantha didn’t want me to take them, but I insisted. I don’t know what I was thinking about.” He shook his head and gazed at a point somewhere past Arceneaux’s right shoulder. “Sometimes I wonder if that did something to her, made her go sour somehow, maybe began to build a wall between us.” He reached out and pulled the photos together, his big hands working them into a single stack. He rose and picked the pictures up. “I guess I should have worried about that then,” he said. “It’s a little late now. You want some water?” He walked to the kitchen counter, picked up a stoneware mug, and held it out in invitation.

  “Sure,” Arceneaux said. Marks filled the mug and returned to the table with it.

  “You figure out who killed Samantha yet?” he asked.

  “I’m working on it,” Arceneaux said. He took the mug from Marks and drank half of the water down. It was good, better than Missoula city water, which was said to be better than what you could find in most cities, which made him wonder if anyone ever managed to drink the stuff in other cities. “There’s not a lot to go on.”

  Marks sighed and shook his head. “I don’t suppose you think I’m innocent, any more than my so-called defense attorney does.”

  “Larry says hello,” Arceneaux said.

  “What else does he say?”

  “That you should take the plea bargain he negotiated for you.”

  “Is that why you came out today?”

  Arceneaux shook his head. “No, but I thought as long as I was here I’d pass the message along.”

  “Tell him I said forget it,” Marks said. “Tell him to earn his money and get ready to defend me in court.”

  “Pretty risky,” Arceneaux said. “Judges hate trials. Takes up their time. Makes them use their brains. You get convicted, you do twice the time you would if you cop a plea.”

  “No way will I ever plead guilty to that crime. If they want me, they’re going to have to convict me, and they won’t.” Marks smiled. “Who ever perished, being innocent?” He put his hands on the table and leaned towards Arceneaux. “That’s the Bible,” he said. “Book of Job, Chapter 4, Verse 7. I guess you don’t know a lot about the Bible.”

  “I don’t,” Arceneaux said. “But I know innocent men get convicted.”

  “I’ll take the risk.”

  Arceneaux stretched and then stood up. “You say you weren’t at the Double Pine the actual time Samantha died,” he said.

  “That’s what I say.”

  “But your truck was there. If you weren’t driving it, who was?”

  Marks shrugged. “Anybody could. Elbert uses it sometimes to go into town, when he’s feeling too cheap to put gas in his own car. The keys are always in the ignition. It’s how I keep from losing them.”

  They walked outside. “I’ve got something to show you,” Arceneaux said, and walked toward the Subaru. He opened the passenger door, reached inside, and pulled out the knife Helen Lousen had given him.

  “You ever see this?” he asked.

  Marks reached for the knife, and Arceneaux pulled it back. “Don’t touch,” he said. Something flickered in Marks’ eyes, but it was gone again before Arceneaux could be sure it had been there. “Nice piece,” he said. His voice seemed tense.

  “I wondered if it might be yours,” Arceneaux said.

  “I wish,” Marks said. He still sounded uncomfortable. He watched as Arceneaux turned the knife in his hand, and the blade glinted dully in the fading afternoon light. “This cost a lot more than I could ever think of paying.” He pointed at the hilt end of the blade with his index finger. “Matt Hagan made this,” he said. “See? Here’s his initials. He lives up at Potomac. People come to him from all over, just to beg him to make a knife. Doesn’t matter who you are, or how much money you have, you just have to get in line. I hear it can take up to a year. This string of numbers is like a serial number. He makes each knife to order, says no two blades can be just alike, because no two people are.” He nodded as Arceneaux slipped the blade back into the sheath. “That’s one serious knife. Just the wood in the hilt probably cost a week’s pay.”

  “You don’t have any idea whose it might be?” Arceneaux said.

  Marks laughed. “Tell you what. If nobody claims it, and you’re fool enough not to keep it, you just pass it on to me. I’ll be glad to give it a home.”

  Arceneaux tossed the knife back into the car. “I’ll just have to hope I don’t have to mail it to Deer Lodge,” he said. “The prison warden would probably confiscate it.” The dirt bike caught his eye again. “That yours?” he asked, and nodded toward the little machine.

  “Sure is,” Marks said.

  Arceneaux looked up at Marks and back down at the bike. “It sure is little. You must look like one of those Shriner guys in the parades when you ride it,” he said.

  Marks laughed again. “I guess I look a little silly on it, but it always got me around, at least until the beginning of summer. I was out in the woods and didn’t take a tree stump seriously enough. Wrecked the bike pretty good. I’ve meant to fix it up, but I guess I’ve had other things on my mind.”

  “I guess you have,” Arceneaux said. He opened the driver’s door and slipped behind the wheel. “Be seeing you.”

  Marks nodded and went inside. As Arceneaux backed up, Elbert Marks came out of the trailer next door and waved to him. Arceneaux stopped, and other man walked over to the driver’s window.

  “Have you gotten anywhere?” he asked.

  “I’ve found out some things that should help your brother, but no smoking gun, if that’s what you mean?

  Elbert frowned. “I suppose you’ve spent up all that money already.”

  “I’ve put a good-sized dent in it.”

  “The community made another collection,” Marks said. “I’ve got a check for five hundred. I’ll get it for you.” He walked back toward the trailer. Arceneaux got out of the car and followed him. Marks reached the trailer door, looked back, then opened the door and motioned. “You can come in,” he said.

  The inside of the trailer was as worn and used up looking as the outside. The linoleum on the kitchen floor was cracked, and the carpet that covered the other floors was faded and threadbare. The living room contained only a stained couch, a couple of rickety wooden chairs, and a small, formica and chrome table. But everything was clean and neat as a pin.

  Marks disappeared into one of the bedrooms, then returned with a check. “I’m not sure when there will be any more,” he said. “Maybe never.”

  “I’ll try not to spend it all in one place,” Arceneaux said. He looked around. “I’d have thought the older brother would have the house, and let the kid brother live in the trailer.”

  “Arden was married. I expected he would have a family some day. So I gave him our father’s house. I don’t need much space.” Marks paused, ran his fi
ngers through his thinning hair. “It was to make up to him a little, too. When he was a child, our father was very harsh. Some people would say he was abusive. And I took his side. When he was angry at Arden, I would help catch him, so our father could beat him. I suppose I thought that would keep me from getting beaten. I always felt guilty about that. I thought giving him the house would help balance the scales.” He took a deep breath and let it out, then handed the check to Arceneaux. “That’s nothing you need to talk about, of course.”

  “Of course not.”

  Marks motioned toward the door, looking uncomfortable. Arceneaux let himself out and got back into his car. As he headed back onto the highway, his thoughts returned to the knife. He was sure Arden Marks was not being honest about it. Maybe the blade did not belong to Marks, but Arceneaux was convinced the other man knew who the owner was.

  Chapter 22

  Coming back onto Highway 93, Arceneaux realized he would need to make a choice between duty and fun. The river looked inviting, and he had his gear; but he was also not that far from the West Fork Road, which would take him to the forest road he and Annehad seen David Crisp heading up in his truck. He stopped the Subaru and sat, engine idling, while he waited to see which impulse would grab him first. Nothing happened.

  “So much for the wisdom of the unconscious,” he said. He turned his head and looked wistfully at his fly rod and tackle bag, then put the car into gear and turned south. There was no traffic at all on the West Fork Road itself, which did not surprise Arceneaux. Most of the houses along this stretch belonged to people who had sold overpriced homes in places like California and then bought up land along the river. They were looking for their little piece of heaven; but when they found it they mostly sat inside their fenced log fortresses and looked at it through their cathedral windows.

  He got to Piquette Creek Road and started to turn onto it, then changed his mind. He drove another few hundred yards and found a spot where he could pull off the highway and behind a stand of trees and shrubs. No one would be likely to notice the Subaru there, or if they did they would assume it was just someone fishing.