The Story Teller

by Margaret Coel

  * * *

  It took twenty minutes over back roads to reach the two-story ranch house shining in the sun on top of a rise, like a white whale beached on the plains. A gravel driveway ran along the house to a cluster of barns and sheds beyond. Father John parked close to the house and they walked up the steps to a porch that sprawled across the front. Vicky pushed a small button by the door. Somewhere inside, a bell jangled—the only sound except for the high whinny of a horse out back.

  “Be here,” she whispered, then glanced up at Father John. She’d done a pretty good job today of convincing him she was nuts. Now she was talking to herself. He smiled at her—a reassuring smile—and she pressed the doorbell again.

  Minutes passed. They were close now, she could feel it. This was where Todd had come. This was where he’d found out about the ledger book. Behind the door was someone who knew . . .

  The door cracked opened and a fleshy-faced woman with a cap of gray hair peered around the edge. “Yes?” she said in a tentative tone.

  Father John introduced himself, then Vicky, and the door widened. The woman stared at them, curiosity and incredulity in her expression: priest in a cowboy hat? Native American woman?

  “A friend of ours, Todd Harris, came to see you about two weeks ago,” Vicky said.

  “Todd Harris.” The door was wide open now. The woman ushered them inside. “I felt so bad when I read about what happened. Such a nice young man. I can’t believe the police think he might’ve been mixed up with drug dealers. What rubbish. If they’d ever met him, they’d know he wasn’t the type.”

  They were standing in an large, sun-filled entry. The living room opened on the right, and a stairway angled upward on the left. Straight ahead was a hallway leading to the back of the house, where a TV was blaring—laughter and applause, a game show. “How can I help you?” the woman asked, closing the door behind them.

  Vicky said, “We understand Todd spoke with your grandmother.”

  “Yes. Yes. A nice long visit. Grandma was so pleased. We don’t get much company out here.”

  “Could we meet her?” Father John’s voice was soft.

  The woman led them down the hallway. “No guarantee she’s awake,” she said over one shoulder. “Spends most days dozing in front of the TV.”

  They followed her into the large kitchen ringed with cabinets and counters on which an array of gadgets were lined up in neat order. On the other side of the kitchen was a little room where an old woman lay back in a recliner, white sneakers propped in front of a large-sized TV.

  “Grandma, you got some more visitors.” The woman walked over and turned off the TV. Quiet fell across the room as the woman in the recliner seemed to snap herself awake and glanced sideways at them.

  “Come closer,” she said, motioning them forward.

  “They’re friends of Todd Harris, that nice young man who came to see you a couple weeks ago,” the other woman said.

  “You look tired and thirsty.” The old woman turned to her granddaughter. “Where’s your manners, Doris? Get some cold lemonade.”

  “Go on in and sit down,” the other woman said, brushing past them and into the kitchen.

  Vicky walked over to the recliner, introduced herself, and took the old woman’s hand a moment. It was rough and knobby with age. Then Father John did the same, and they stepped past the large wicker trunk that served as a coffee table and settled on a sofa.

  Leaning toward the old woman, Father John said, “Can you tell us what you and Todd talked about?”

  “The old days.” The old woman shook her head against the recliner. “Imagine, a young man wantin’ to know the old stories. Well, it did my heart good. So I told him about my granddaddy, James J. Smedden, comin’ out on the plains after nearly gettin’ hisself killed fighting for the Yankees. Just a kid, he was, but a good soldier. So the army sent him out to Wyoming to fight Indians.”

  “Wyoming?” Vicky scooted forward on the cushion. “We understood he ran a ranch here in Colorado.”

  “Over on the county line.” Doris sidled past the recliner and set a tray with four glasses of lemonade on top of the wicker trunk. Passing out the lemonade, she said, “Might’ve been a good soldier, but he sure wasn’t much of a rancher.” She sank into a straight-backed chair on the other side of the trunk. “Lost the place after a few years.”

  The old woman’s head jerked forward. “Lots of folks lost places in the drought. Lucky for you, my mama married into the Lawler family, and they had enough money to hold on to this place, or you wouldn’t be sitting here, missy.”

  Turning toward Vicky, the old woman went on: “When granddaddy was clearin’ out things, gettin’ ready to give the ranch back to the bank, he give a lot of his stuff to that museum up in Denver. But I still got some of his things. That young man thought they was real interesting.” Waving toward her granddaughter, she said, “Go get me Granddaddy’s box.”

  Doris lifted herself slowly out of her chair, set her glass on the tray, and disappeared: a soft patter of footsteps down the hallway.

  Vicky sipped at the lemonade. She hadn’t realized how thirsty she was, or tired. Yet every part of her felt awake, on edge, as if her nerves were wound tight, ready to spring. The old woman was bent forward in the recliner, talking about her granddaddy as if the man might walk through the door, dusty and sunburned from riding across the plains. He’d spent two years in Wyoming. Rough duty it was, chasing Indians onto reservations. Couldn’t blame them Indians for not wanting to be penned up, but he had his duty. Killed some of them, she guessed.

  Vicky set her glass back on the tray. A story was taking shape in her mind—beginning, middle, end. No-Ta-Nee dying on a battlefield in Wyoming two years after Sand Creek. The ledger book—his most precious possession—dangling from a cord around his neck or strapped to his body where Smedden had found it.

  Doris reappeared, carrying a small box that she deposited on her grandmother’s lap. The old woman began rummaging through papers and small books. After a moment she pulled out an old newspaper and handed it to Father John. “Real interesting,” she said. “Tells about the bank takin’ over Granddaddy’s ranch.”

  Father John asked, “Is there anything about the time your grandfather spent in Wyoming?”

  Vicky held her breath, awaiting the answer, realizing that John O’Malley had tuned in to her own thoughts.

  The old woman bent lower over the box—rummaging, rummaging. Suddenly she pulled out a gray ledger book and handed it to Father John. Vicky caught her breath. The ledger book had been here all the time! Rachel Foster was right. J. J. Smedden’s family must have loaned the book to the museum in 1920. But if that was true, why did Todd’s thesis say the book was in the museum?

  She moved closer to Father John, her heart tumbling as he lifted the cover. She heard herself gasp. The top page was covered with words and numbers, not pictographs. As Father John flipped through the other pages she saw they were the same.

  “Sad, isn’t it?” Doris took her chair on the other side of the wicker trunk. “Record of everything he sold to pay off the bank—furniture, dishes, tools, animals. Last page lists the stuff he give to the museum. Like he couldn’t bear for everything to go without a trace. Like he wanted some part of the ranch safe up in that museum so it could witness to what he’d tried to do.”

  Father John had already found the last page. Black squiggles covered the lines. At the top was Donations, Denver Museum of West, 1903. The list below took up two columns. Even before he’d set an index finger on the entry, Vicky’s eyes had found it. Indian ledger book. Colored pictures. Taken from Arapaho brave. Sweetwater Battle, 1866.

  Vicky couldn’t take her eyes away. Finally she turned to the old woman. “This record book of your granddaddy’s is very important,” she said. “It could help the police find whoever murdered Todd Harris. Would you trust us to borrow—”

  “I should say not.” Doris was on her feet. She leaned across the wicker trunk and grabbed the book f
rom Father John’s hand. “This is one of Grandma’s treasures. All she has left of the past.” She waved the book over the table. “You don’t know the hours she spends going through that old box, pulling out papers and books, just gettin’ the feel of them ’cause it makes it seem like her people—her granddaddy and her ma and pa—like they’re still with her, like she’s not the only one left.”

  Father John and Vicky both stood up. “We’ll see that the book is returned,” he said. “You have my word.”

  The old woman pushed down the footrest. It squealed like a trapped animal. “Give them the book,” she said.

  “You don’t mean that, Grandma.” Doris moved backward toward the kitchen, clutching the ledger book to her chest.

  “Like hell I don’t, missy. It’s my book, and I can do whatever I please. And what I please right now is doin’ whatever’s gonna help find the no-good snake that killed that nice young man.”

  Slowly the other woman came forward and held out the book, a tentative, reluctant gesture. Father John reached across the wicker trunk and took it, then handed it to Vicky.

  * * *

  Dusk was settling over Eads by the time they drove down Main Street. The sun glowed orange in the distance where the earth met the sky, and a hint of coolness tinged the air, as if the night had already begun to dispel the heat of day.

  They ate dinner in a small café that catered mostly to locals, Vicky guessed, judging by the trucks in the parking lot and the attention they received from the waitress. “Where you from?” she’d asked the instant they’d sat down. Later, pouring coffee: “Nice to see new faces around here.” And again, when she brought the plates of chicken-fried steak and mashed potatoes—the special of the day: “What brings you around these parts?”

  “Just out for a little drive on the plains,” Father John assured her.

  The waitress had shot him an I-don’t-buy-it smile. “Most folks come to Colorado and take a little drive to the mountains,” she’d said before swinging away. Then, leaning back: “Strikes me you two got headed the wrong direction.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time,” he said. Vicky had caught his eye, and they both laughed. She was thinking she’d spent her entire life headed in the wrong direction, always trying to get back on track, not ever sure if she was there.

  They chatted about Smedden’s records—the proof Steve Clark had demanded. How the detective would have to turn his attention to whoever had stolen the ledger book. When he did, he’d have Todd’s murderer. Every once in a while Vicky had found her fingers wandering to her handbag on the seat beside her, tracing the hard contours of the record book and Todd’s diskette through the leather, reassuring herself that they were both there.

  On they chatted, but in one part of her mind, Vicky kept thinking about the strange sense that had come over her at Sand Creek. Now, more relaxed with each bite of hot food, each sip of coffee, the experience seemed crazy—Nohoko. She was feeling more and more embarrassed. She said, “I’m not sure what happened at Sand Creek. You must think I’m nuts.”

  Father John took a draw of coffee and regarded her a long moment. “What I think is you’ve heard the story of the Sand Creek Massacre all your life. It’s part of you. Out there this afternoon, you imagined what it had been like, that’s all.” He sipped at the coffee again. “Stories are very powerful.”

  “I imagined you were there, too,” Vicky blurted.

  He set the coffee cup into its saucer. “I know.”

  She was quiet a moment. “We don’t have to go back tonight. We could stay here. In separate rooms, of course,” she said hurriedly. “I’m pretty tired. You must be, too.” She was groping for words, selecting, avoiding what she wanted to say: no one here knows us. She hurried on, “We can drive back first thing tomorrow and still get in early enough to catch Steve the minute he comes to work.” Rambling, stumbling over the words.

  She stopped breathing as he took his eyes away and glanced around the café: the waitress talking to two cowboys at the counter, the couple at a nearby table. Finally he looked back at her. “I’ll drive,” he said. “You can sleep all the way to Denver.”

  25

  Vicky curled up on the passenger seat, drowsiness overcoming her before they were out of town. At some point she was aware of soft music—an unfamiliar aria—and once she awoke and stared at the headlights streaming into the darkness ahead. Then she dropped off again into a kind of half-sleep, lulled by the music, the rhythm of the tires on the asphalt, the motion of the car, the quiet, steady breathing of the man beside her. He was different from the other men she’d known; they were the ones who made the offers. She wasn’t surprised he had turned her down. It was as it should be. She felt an odd sense of calm, of acceptance. At another time, in this place, it had been different.

  The car stopped, and Vicky opened her eyes. The headlights played over the steps of the Jesuit residence, and Father John was asking if she was awake. She sat up, willing herself awake, blinking at the dimness inside the car. Marcy’s house was only a few blocks, she told him. She wanted to tell him how grateful she was he’d come along, how grateful for everything that had happened. She said, “Ho’hou’.”

  He let himself out, and she slid over behind the wheel. “Why don’t you let me keep the diskette and the record book,” he said.

  In the glint of the dashboard light, she saw the worry in his eyes. She wondered what difference it made which one of them had the proof. If the killers came after her and didn’t find what they wanted, they would go after him. He was in as much danger as she was. She smiled at him. “I’ll call you tomorrow. We can take them to the police department together.”

  She waited as John O’Malley walked through the headlights and up the steps. He turned at the door and gave her a quick wave. She rammed the gear into drive and started forward.

  She drove through the deserted streets of North Denver: the stop sign here, the turn there—familiar to her now. The houses on Marcy’s street were dark, except for Marcy’s. Light burst through the front windows, forming a crazy-quilt pattern of light and shadow on the front lawn.

  Vicky parked and cut the engine, wondering if Marcy was having some kind of New Age celebration of light. She groaned at the thought of a houseful of Marcy’s friends, a part of her mind readying the excuses, the exhaustion she would plead. Yet there was only one car parked ahead: Marcy’s.

  Gripping her handbag, she slammed out of the car. At the front door, she halted, one hand on the knob, straining to catch the beat of a drum, the scuffle of a chair, voices raised in oms. It was quiet. Light glowed steadily through the windows. And then she heard the sobbing.

  She twisted the knob and pushed on the door. Locked. Remembering the key, she dug through her bag until her fingers closed on the small piece of metal. She jammed it into the tiny slot. The door fell open, and she was inside.

  It looked as if the room had tumbled down, spilled across the wood floor: books, pictures, shards of pottery and china. The twin sofas lay on their backs, seats jutting upward in a grotesque parody. The glass top on the coffee table had been smashed; slivers of glass hung like icicles around the chrome frame. Huddled on the floor near the corner where the hallway emptied into the living room was Marcy, knees pulled to her chest, head buried in the circle of her arms.

  Vicky crossed the room, stepping around the detritus of her friend’s life. She squatted beside her, placing an arm around the fleshy shoulders, the knobs of her spine: so fragile, she was taken by surprise. “Marcy,” she said, “are you okay?”

  Slowly Marcy’s face came upward; a mixture of wetness and makeup striped her cheeks. Her eyes were blurred and watery. “Oh, Vicky,” she said, swaying sideways, falling against her, “look what they’ve done.”

  Vicky held her as if she were a child. “Who, Marcy? Who did this?”

  Raising a hand, Marcy swabbed at her face, as if her fingers were a cloth. “I don’t know,” she said in a kind of whimper. “I went out to my encounter gr
oup. When I got back . . .” She flipped her hand toward the room. “I found this.”

  Vicky exhaled a long breath. At least Marcy was all right, at least she hadn’t been here when they’d come. But what if her friend had been here? She said, “Did you call the police?”

  A quick nod. “They just left.” The sobbing started again, a loud, racking noise. After a moment Marcy said, “All I wanted was some space where I could belong. When Mike left, there was this big black hole, and every time I tried to crawl out, I fell back in. So I found this house, and it sheltered me. I was just learning how to climb out of the hole, Vicky. I was almost out.”

  “I’m sorry,” Vicky said. A wave of guilt and regret washed over her. It hadn’t been a stroll through the park, Marcy’s separation from Mike; it was a wrenching apart of something that had once been whole, just like her own divorce from Ben. She’d fled to Denver, throwing herself into classes and term papers, trying to climb out of the darkness, grasping for that space where she could be whole again, while Marcy had come here, to a circle of new friends, new ways. Grasping, grasping.

  Marcy pulled away, her eyes wide as if she were seeing the destruction for the first time. “Who would do this? Why would anybody tear my house apart? What were they looking for?”

  Vicky leaned against the wall, numb with exhaustion and fear. Whoever had ransacked Todd’s apartment had been here this evening, ransacking the house where she was staying. What were they looking for? The diskette with Todd’s thesis? The link to the Sand Creek ledger book? Had Julie told them about it while she could still talk, before they finished beating her to death?

  Was that what they were looking for? A diskette that experts could explain away? Is that what drove them to a frenzy of murder and rampage—beating two kids to death, trashing an apartment and a house, tearing up books and papers, pulling shelves off the walls?

  Vicky leaned against the corner, the edge burrowing into her back. Slowly the realization came over her. This wasn’t about a diskette. This was about a ledger book. A ledger book worth $1.3 million.