by Brian Hodge
He heard distant laughter, faint, mocking … the laughter of Junior.
Somehow he managed to find his voice. She did not notice the strain in it. "What did he say?"
"He pulled the article because he thought it would, and I quote, panic the populace even more than it already was, and he didn't want Senator Kent's visit spoiled. It's censorship!" She sat, tossed her address book into her purse and glared at her shoes. She didn't ask what was troubling him, although from his expression she could tell something was wrong.
They sat for a few minutes in silence. Chato was cold, as though he'd stepped into the midst of a snowstorm, and when he raised his hands to rub them together, he saw they trembled. At that moment the loudspeaker crackled, announced the arrival of the plane from Washington. They started toward the escalator to take them to the TWA satellite.
They walked without speaking; Chato, deep in dark thought, kept his eyes down. It was true; all of it was true, true, true. He had turned his back on all of it, and now he realized he had been wrong.
The TWA area had been cordoned off and closed to regular pedestrian traffic, but Laura flashed her press card, told the guards Chato was with her, and they walked through the metal detector and into the satellite. The room, decorated in what Chato thought had to be the ugliest southwestern-style furniture, was filled with reporters and cameras. Smoke curled above the heads of the crowd, and it seemed everyone was talking as quickly and as loudly as possible.
"Is he off the plane yet?" he asked, shouting to be heard.
Laura stood on tiptoe, looked around, shook her head. "No. Not yet. I wonder where the protestors are. They were supposed to come to the airport. At least that's what Yellow Colt said." The door to the tunnel was opening. "Oh, here he comes."
A tall man in his late forties strode into the room. He was smiling and had his hand raised to greet the reporters. Several other men, obviously aides, accompanied him.
Robinson Kent looked like a nice man, Chato thought. A man you could trust. A man you would want to vote for and to have represent you in Washington. His face was broad and plainly handsome, fair-skinned, but his brown eyes were sharp, and they moved constantly about the room, assessing what he saw.
It was the first time Chato had ever seen a U. S. Senator up close. He didn't feel as impressed as he knew he should. The news of Tenorio's death had taken the edge off everything.
Still smiling, Kent walked up to the podium set at one end of the terminal. He waited for the journalists to quiet, then spoke into the microphone.
"It's great to be back in Albuquerque again." He acknowledged the smattering of applause with a nod of his well-groomed head. The hair at his temples was just beginning to silver, and it lent him an air of distinction. Here, his demeanor clearly said, was a potential elder statesman. "And I want to tell you how much it means to me to be here just in time for the International Hot-Air Balloon Fiesta." There was even more applause at that and Chato had to smile. Albuquerqueans seemed to like their balloons even more than their senator.
"As you know, the primary reason I'm here today—" He stopped, looked toward the back of the room. Gradually the others in the audience became aware of a noise that was growing in intensity, becoming shouts. Kent glanced back at his audience, started again, but once more faltered to a stop as the yelling increased in volume and gradually drowned out his voice. Chato turned to see what was going on, as did the reporters around him.
The security cops at the doors were struggling to keep a handful of people from pushing their way into the room.
One was already halfway in, and he was twisting and turning, struggling, in a cop's hold. He recognized Thomas Yellow Colt.
"You have no right to take what's rightfully ours!" Yellow Colt shouted. He squirmed loose from the cop, shoved forward before the man could stop him. The crowd of reporters fell back, letting Yellow Colt pass through their middle. It was almost as if they feared him. Cameras followed his progress as he headed straight for Kent. When he was almost nose to nose with the senator, the white man did not fall back as Chato had expected. Yellow Colt's companions were still at the door, held back by the police, but they shouted their support. There weren't more than ten or twelve of them. A mightily pathetic number for a protest movement. Was it apathy that had kept others from the airport? Or fear?
"And you are?" Kent asked smoothly, as if he hadn't just been shouted down.
There was just the slightest hint of condescension in the senator's voice, and Chato thought that very few would have noticed it. Maybe only himself and Yellow Colt. And they were more accustomed to hearing it than the white and Chicano reporters.
"Thomas Yellow Colt. Founder of the National Coalition of American Indians." He met Kent's gaze. "We demand that you do not take what doesn't belong to you. That fetish belongs to New Mexicans, and even more than to them, to the Indians. It should stay here. It has no right to be in Washington. It belongs here. With the Indians."
"A very pretty speech, Mr. Yellow Colt. But the fetish is a wonderful example of pre-Conquistadoran Indian craftsmanship, that should be shared with the American people as a whole." He smiled at Yellow Colt, a full six inches shorter. "We, as New Mexicans, cannot be selfish."
"Bullshit."
For a moment Robinson Kent looked surprised, but he quickly masked it. "There's much that New Mexico has to offer, and this is just one of many—"
"You whites stole it forty years ago. It's bad enough that it's not in its rightful pueblo. Now you want to take it back East. We've told you before--I wrote you letter after letter, Kent, and all of 'em you ignored—that the fetish is an intensely religious article used in sacred ceremony. It should remain with its people. It has no right—"
"You speak of rights, Mr. Yellow Colt, and I think you are denying the right of the American people to shine in the glory of our wonderful southwestern heritage."
Strong applause met the senator's words, and he smiled, basking in the acknowledgement.
Yellow Colt shook his head, then lunged at the senator. Kent fell back, away from the podium, and tried to thrust Yellow Colt away from him. The three men standing by Kent seized Yellow Colt and grappled him to the ground.
Chato watched the Indian struggle on the floor with the three men. Yellow Colt was putting up a pretty good fight, although severely outnumbered. One part of Chato wanted to help, wanted to get Yellow Colt back on his feet, because he believed in what the man was saying, but another part warned him to stay away. It wasn't his fight.
And yet....
Not wanting to miss a second of the violence, the reporters pressed closer to the scuffle in an effort to get a better view. The cameras continued to roll. Camera bulbs winked continuously.
At that moment the Indians being restrained by the security cops chose to start struggling. One broke through their lines and rushed toward Yellow Colt. One of the cops chased him, grabbed him by the collar and hauled him back to the door.
Laura edged closer to him. "Is there going to be a riot?"
Chato watched the fight at the front of the room, the fight at the back of the room. Because of this fetish, this fetish he had never seen, never even heard of till two days ago. Something tickled in his mind, and he shrugged, as though that would push it away. He couldn't be getting strong feelings here. There wasn't any reason. Or was there?
Yellow Colt was still putting up a good fight, having knocked one of the aides to the ground. He jerked away from the other two, got to his feet, and lunged for Kent again. In the back the handful of Indians screamed as one, a sound that made Chato's spine prickle, and they surged forward. One of Yellow Colt's followers fell back against a local television cameraman. His mini-cam slipped from his shoulder, fell to the floor, shattered, littering the tile with glass.
"Goddamn, it!" the cameraman said as he bent to look at the wreckage. Another reporter backed up, didn't see the kneeling cameraman, and tripped over him. He fell into several other reporters, grabbed at them to break his
fall, and they all stumbled.
At that moment about fifty passengers from a plane that had just landed in another satellite straggled through another door, completely unaware of what was going on here, and stopped, staring at the brawl. Chato kept edging Laura closer to the wall, well away from flying fists and kicking feet. One of the security cops swung his nightstick toward a slim Indian, who ducked. The nightstick landed across the face of an elderly woman passenger, breaking her glasses and cutting her lip and forehead. The young man with her launched himself at the cop, and they toppled to the floor, the young man punching the cop first with his left, then with his right fist.
At that moment more cops, both city and airport security, poured in through the doors from downstairs. Guns ready, nightsticks raised, they went after the protestors. One of them headed for Chato, started to grab him by the arm, thinking he was a protestor, but Laura shoved the man away.
"He's with me!" she screamed, trying to be heard over the noise. He glanced at her, nodded, moved off to go after another Indian.
Within minutes the police had subdued Yellow Colt and his followers, handcuffed them, and were ready to remove them. They weren't going to go quietly, though, and they were chanting. As he passed Chato, still by the wall and out of the way, Yellow Colt glanced at him, and smiled with an ironic expression.
"It's up to you now, bro."
Chato stared, not knowing what to make of Yellow Colt's words.
Then Yellow Colt and his followers began shouting. He could hear the words as they faded into the distance.
Medics had rushed in to take care of the wounded, and the elderly woman was removed on a stretcher, the young man, his face a bloody pulp, tagging after. Several others, cops and reporters and one of the aides, were taken out of the room.
The two remaining aides conferred momentarily with their boss, who smiled a little shakily as he smoothed back his hair. "Well, enough of the interruptions now," he said into the microphone. Only the aides laughed. "I'm going to my hotel now, but I'll see you all later at the barbecue. Adios."
Chato and Laura waited until everyone had left the room before they headed for the escalators. Yellow Colt's words remained with him. What did the man mean?
"What's this fetish that everyone's talking about? Is it some kind of closely guarded secret?"
The fetish … When he thought of it, he heard faint whispers and moans, and thought he heard an old man trying to talk to him, as though his voice were coming from very far away. He shook his head. Too little sleep last night and not enough to eat today.
"It's no secret, really," Laura said, as they started downstairs. "The Mayor has it right now. After all, he's the one who'll present it to Kent."
"Have you seen it?"
She shook her head. "No, just heard about it.”
"Wouldn't it be funny," he said as they headed toward the car rental counter, "if it really didn't exist, and all this trouble was for nothing."
It did exist. He didn't have to see it to know that. He waited while she rented a car to replace the one wrecked last night. The airline ticket counters weren't doing much business, and only an elderly Chicano woman, dressed in a shapeless sweater and a nondescript dress with low black shoes, waited on one of the benches. She watched him as he went by, and watched him again when he walked past her from the opposite direction. Everyone was suspicious in Albuquerque these days.
The airport had already been cleared of the reporters and protestors, and it seemed to have returned to normal. All this trouble … because of the fetish. And suddenly he wanted to know more about it.
They walked toward the outside doors. "Do you think the newspaper has anything on it?"
"It?" she asked absently, as she thrust the papers into her purse.
"The fetish."
"I don't know. There's probably something in the morgue. I'll call you later if I find something." He nodded. "By the way about last night. I want to thank you for coming and staying with me. That was very kind." She paused. "There was more to my accident than I said." She rubbed a finger along the leather strap of her purse. "I was being followed when I left the office. In fact, I heard something behind me while I was going down the stairs, but thought it was just another reporter. Outside I couldn't see anything, but could hear something. I finally got to my car and started to pull out. Something climbed onto the car. It looked in the window at me. It had such … such evil eyes, and it was staring at me as if it wanted to reach out and—"
"Shhh. It's okay now, Laura."
"That's when I wrecked the car." She paused. "What does it mean, Chato?"
"I don't know, really. I guess from this and from the one I saw at the apartment that they can go wherever they want. They aren't confined to the mountains."
"I didn't want to hear that," she said quietly.
"Neither did I."
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The phone was ringing as he entered the motel room. "Hello?"
"Hi, Chato. I've got your information. Plus some more." There was an edge of excitement in Laura's voice that he hadn't heard before.
"Where are you calling from? It's really noisy."
"I'm in a phone booth around the corner from the newspaper. I didn't want anyone to overhear me, so I left the office."
"What have you got—national secrets?"
"Just about." She paused only the slightest of moments. "The fetish was actually fairly simple to research. There's not much on it, but it was discovered in the Pueblo de Sombras."
"I've never heard of it."
"Not many people have. The archeologist who excavated it was a professor at the University and found the fetish, along with some other artifacts, back in the late sixties. But it came up missing shortly after that. He's dead now, died just a few years ago, but I did manage to track down one of his assistants from that time. She's with the Museum of Albuquerque now and remembers the fetish well, and how excited they were at its discovery. And she said, well—now get this—she said the professor noticed the fetish was missing right after a young lawyer visited him on a federal case. Guess who the lawyer was?"
Coldness seeped through him. "Who?"
"Robinson Kent."
"The senator?"'
"The very same."
"Why doesn't this woman protest or something, try to get the fetish back?"
"Well, she no longer works there, and they never had time to tag it. And she has no proof. It's just a coincidence.
"Sure it is." He was silent for a moment, then: "But if he stole it, why does the Mayor have it now, and why is he about to present it to him to give to the Smithsonian? None of this makes much sense."
"Well, it was rediscovered last month in Santa Fe. In the Archbishop's office"
"Now what the hell was it doing there, after Kent had it?"
"Don't know, although the priest who found it has been sent packing to a strict monastery up north, one where they frown on everything, including life. De Vargas then declared that this valuable object had to be given to Albuquerque's mayor—because, he said, he had found it in Albuquerque—and he gave it to Griffen. And almost immediately Griffen announced his intention of handing it over to Kent, who said right away that the Smithsonian had to have it."
Chato frowned.
"Are you there?"
"Yeah. Just thinking. There's something fishy about all this. That fetish must be worth more than everyone thinks. Or something else." Something that nibbled gently away at his mind, tickled; he tried to brush the slight discomfort away.
"And that's not all."
"More?"
"When I arrived back here, Bob apologized about suppressing my article, said he felt bad about it—as he damned well should. Believe me, I played on that, too. Later he took me aside and gave me this. Said I couldn't use it right now, but he wanted to make up for my article." She paused.
"Yes?" His voice trembled slightly. What was she going to say?
"There is reputed—reputed only, mind you, but b
y a confidential source in the Mayor's office—to be a survivor of the attack on the campers."
"Jesus. Who? Where is he? Why haven't we heard from him?"
"Bob didn't say any more. Maybe he didn't know. But the Mayor's office, or whoever, is keeping this person—and it's a woman, incidentally—under wraps."
A survivor, and they hadn't known—no one had known—about this woman.
"Just thought you'd like to know."
"Thanks, Laura."
"Don't forget—I'll be at the barbecue later on, and I don't know when I'll get back. Maybe you should just wait for me to call you."
He agreed, and after he hung up, he continued to sit on the bed, his hands flat on his thighs, and stared down at the carpet.
A survivor.
The fetish.
From the Pueblo de Sombras. Roughly translated as the Pueblo of the Shadows.
Shadoweyes, Tenorio had called those creatures. Shadows. Shadoweyes. Survivor.
He was missing something, something that would tie things together for him, something that would make sense of all of this.
Something.
Where did he begin to look? De Vargas, Griffen, and Kent. There was a tie there. But why?
He picked up his denim jacket and headed for the door. It was time he met the mayor.
"What may I do for you, Mr. Del-Klinne?" Mayor Griffen asked, smiling.
He had come downtown, given the secretary his name, and even before he'd handed her the lie he'd thought up on his drive there, the Mayor was telling her to let him come through.
And that surprised him. Or maybe it shouldn't.
Griffen indicated for him to sit down, and he did so. The Mayor's office was tastefully furnished in heavy wooden furniture, with the American and the New Mexico flags behind the desk. One wall was filled with photographs of Mayor Griffen with country singers, with rodeo stars, and with several presidents. A glass-enclosed cabinet opposite that wall contained a number of Santo Domingo pottery bowls, a metate, and several ears of colored corn. One shelf held a number of intricately painted kachinas, most of them of Hopi design. He didn't see a fetish, wondered where Griffen kept it.