by Pat Price
"It might give him the chance to get both of us at the same time."
"Only if one of us stands in front of the other and he has a really big gun," he said with more than a hint of amusement in his voice. "And another thing pale face," he said in closing.
"What's that?" I replied, knowing what was coming.
"When we get down there, keep your fingers off and out of my sister." The phone cut off with a click.
Jimmy was ever the big brother to his younger sister. Rebecca and I flirted with each other and while Jimmy really did not have a problem with me relative to her it did give him ample ammunition for teasing.
-29-
The cell phone rang just as I pulled up outside my room at the Road House. I lifted the phone off of the seat and pressed the answer button.
"It's me," the voice said. Everything about Jimmy is distinctive, especially his voice."
“What's the story, is there a flight?" I asked him.
"I can get to Vegas but not to Kingman tonight," he said.
"Want me to drive up to Vegas and meet you there?"
"Why don't you get some sleep tonight," he said, "then I'll fly down in the morning and meet you and we can leave after having one of those famous heart stopping, high fat trucker's breakfasts you have probably become addicted too."
"Sounds like a plan. I'll pick you up at the commuter airline in the morning.” “What time do you want me to be there”?
"I'll be landing at nine sharp, unless Eddie Rickenbacker Airlines is late in which case it will be sometime later." The phone clicked off again. I knew trying to teach Jimmy good phone manners was a waste of time so I didn't even try.
I got out of the cab of the Ford and locked the door. It was early in the evening and half a dozen cars and trucks were parked in front of the roadhouse. The lights were still out in the reception area and the windows were still dirty but enough light made it through the dust that you could see couples dancing in the area between the bar and the booths. There were no trucks or cars passing by and the sky was clear as it can only be in Arizona. I stood there for a couple of minutes, savoring the moment and watching, following the people inside like I was looking at something on a movie screen.
I opened the door and the slow Roy Orbison music from the fuzzed out speakers on the jukebox greeted me. I walked through the reception area and the short hall into the big room for probably one of the last times. There were three seats open at the bar and I sat in the left most of the unoccupied stools. Ray came over, wiped the bar in front of me and set a Bud Light down.
"You hungry tonight or did you eat lunch at Buc's?” he asked. It was a good question because, if you eats at Buc's ya don't needs ta eat at night.
"Nope, I'm ready for one of Connie's super meatloaf specials." I said over the fuzzy music.
Ray nodded and walked back to the kitchen then returned a minute later. I drained the beer and held the bottle up to catch his attention. Ray could sense an empty bottle if he was standing fifty feet outside his bar in a pouring rain. He turned and looked at me then nodded and reached into the cooler.
“Here you go Ed," he said replacing the empty in front of me with a full bottle.
"Ray," I said, leaning over the bar about half way so that he could hear me, "I've got to leave in the morning."
"How long you gonna be gone," he asked as if I were asking him to collect the mail or feed the dog while I went to Vegas.
"A long time," I said to him over Willie Nelson singing the blues on the jukebox. "I'm going back to California. My boss called me. The building is fixed and vacation time is over," I told him with a sad look on my face and hunching my shoulders.
"That's too bad son," he said with genuine concern in his voice. "What time tomorrow you pulling out?"
"Sometime after eight and I'm picking up a friend at the airport and he's going to ride back with me."
"Stop and say goodbye in the morning and I'll get the balance of your rent for the month for you," Ray said.
"Tell you what," I said, "use it for drinks for the bar tonight. If it runs low I'll cover the balance."
"You don't have to do that," Ray said.
"I know I don't have to. I want to," I told him, "this roadhouse has been like a home to me and you and Connie and these people have been like my family."
Ray's eyes got all misty. "You real country son," Ray said, blowing his nose on the bar rag.
-30-
I woke at 6:00 in the morning like I had every morning over the past six weeks. I pulled on a pair of running shorts and a tee shirt with a hole under the left arm. I laced up my gel sole running shoes and stepped out onto the gravel parking lot. I started off at a slow trot northeast on old Highway 66. The sun was making its way over the Hualapai Mountains to the southeast and it was still cool from the night air. Very little traffic passes by the roadhouse during the night so the dust was still settled.
I maintained the slow trot for about half a mile then picked the pace up to a fast jog and the sweat started. Four miles east of the Road House was the gas station on the reservation. The old man running the station would have the coffee started by 6:30, about fifteen minutes before I would reach his front door. The hawk that normally shopped for breakfast was in the air on the south side of the road, working the open pasture looking for ground squirrels and other rodents for his morning meal. The minutes melted past and I crested the only short grade in the run and looked down on the gas station. The last half mile down the back side of the hill was an easy run and I was starting to recover when I stepped off of the hard road and onto the packed dirt driveway that lead to the two gas pumps.
Uncle Howard was sitting in an armed chair tipped back against the front wall of the gas station. The glass door was to his left and open. His blue tick hound, Fred was sleeping in the doorway and Uncle Howard did not look much more alert than Fred did.
"Morning Uncle," I said, addressing Howard as Uncle as a sign of respect.
"Morning nephew," he said after looking up at me.
"How's your bones?" I asked. That was the standard greeting. Howard stood and stretched a little. I could hear a couple of faint cracks and pops from his back.
"They are still holding me up so I guess they are OK," he said. "Can I get you a cup of coffee?"
"I would love a cup of coffee," I said as I followed him into the office of the gas station, stepping over Fred.
Howard brewed coffee in an old fashion campfire coffeepot. The only concession to modern convenience Howard allowed himself was a single propane burner stove he had in the office. He picked the big pot up by the handle on the top using his left hand wrapped in a towel. He sat a tin cup on a chair and tipped the pot by raising a handle mid-way down on the pot with his right hand. The coffee came steaming out of the pot and into the tin cup ready to melt solder. He sat the pot back on the stove and you could hear it starting to boil again within a few seconds. He handed the cup to me.
“You are leaving." he said, just looking at me.
“How do you know?" I asked, taking a sip so that my eyes were lowered. Howard had been dealt a bad hand in life but he made the best of it he could by raising other people's kids and trying to keep the young "braves" as he called them off of drugs.
"I found out what I needed to know." I stopped for a minute to collect my thoughts.
Howard pushed an old wire and sheet metal milk crate over to me with his foot.
"Sit down," he said.
I took it not so much as a request as I did an order. I sat down and continued to blow on the coffee. Howard pulled an old wooden soda bottle crate over in front of the milk crate and sat on it. He reached into his blue denim shirt pocket and pulled out a pack of hand rolled cigarettes. He shook one of them out into his hand. He tapped one end of the cigarette on the soda bottle crate. He placed the flattened end between his dried old lips then struck a match and put it to the end of the fragile tube of paper and tobacco. He pulled air through the cigarette and I could hear the
sound of the paper crackling as it burned. He shook the still burning match then dropped it on the floor where a thin stream of smoke from the ember rose. He held the smoke in his lungs for what seemed like eternity then blew it out.
"Tell me what is troubling you," he said. The cigarette was held between the first two yellow stained fingers of his left hand. The smoke was rising up in a thin line to the ceiling and the only noise I heard were the chick-a-dee beetles outside and Fred snoring just inside the doorway.
"You know I came to Kingman to try and find a man," I said, looking him straight in the eye. It was hard to avoid eye contact with Howard when he wanted it because he was a commanding and intense entity in spite of his small stature.
"You never said if the man you are looking for did something to you?" he asked after thinking.
"He has not done anything to me, not yet, and he probably never will do anything to me. But this man has stolen something that will allow him to make a weapon the likes of which has never been seen in this country. If he uses this weapon a whole city could die." I looked back at the coffee and blew on it some more before taking another sip. Howard did not say anything for several minutes but he continued to look at me and take an occasional pull on his cigarette. He finally broke the silence.
"This man is an Indian." he said it as a statement and not a question.
"How do you know?" I asked.
Howard ignored my question. "You must be careful with this man," He said to me, looking over his coffee. His cigarette had burned down to his fingers. He took a last puff and dropped the smoldering stump to the floor.
"I'm always careful when I'm trying to catch a crazy man," I said, not wanting to state the obvious.
"This man has a lot of power," Howard said in his monotone voice. "This man may be out of his mind but he is not stupid and he is not weak."
He stopped and sat his tin coffee cup down beside the crate he was sitting on. He pulled the pack of cigarettes out of his shirt pocket. I've noticed that everyone who smokes has a ritual involving lighting a cigarette and Howard was no exception. I waited until he was finished.
"We Indians are terrible gossips," Howard said after exhaling the first pull from the fresh cigarette. "Most white people would not believe that. They think we do not talk to each other but they do not know us. That is because we talk to very few of them." He paused to take a sip of coffee that had cooled somewhat. He went on "You and I have become friends because you know how to show respect to your elders and you make time to listen. Our children have lost their way in the world. They listen to those damn radios and televisions and have forgotten how to listen to the voice of their own people. They have lost the true way and worse, they have become Godless."
He paused and took another puff from his cigarette, never taking his eyes off of me. I had the feeling that Howard was slowly working up to something important. The pause dragged out. I maintained eye contact with the old man but noticed that the second hand on the clock on the wall behind him made two circuits of the face before he began speaking again.
"They are killing themselves because they no longer belong to us and they do not fit into the white world. They are trapped between the whites and their own people." He stopped and puffed the cigarette again. "There is a powerful Apache who is ready to bring ruin to the white man." He stopped and drew on the cigarette again. "This man will bring a bright sun to the city of Washington. He will kill the lawmakers and the ones who have turned our people into little more than herded sheep. He will also destroy the center of the white man's money and his banks in New York City. He will bring ruin and take the white man down." He stopped and drained the tin cup of now cold coffee.
"So this man has two weapons?" I asked, and then thought to myself, The Feds thought there was only enough fuel stolen to make one weapon. Boy is Mendoza going to be pissed. This was real bad. I looked at the clock and saw that I was running out of time. I was supposed to pick Jimmy up at the airport in about an hour and I didn’t have time to run back to my room, change into other clothing, and get out the door.
"Uncle Howard, this is very important. Do you know the name of the man who will do this?" I asked to see if I could match the name with the 1 given to me by Bob and McClintock.
Howard took a last pull on the cigarette and dropped the butt next to the other one he finished. He looked at me for maybe twenty seconds before speaking.
"I only know of him, not who he is," he said, dropping the cigarette.
“I need to ask a favor Uncle," I said. "I need a ride back to the Motel."
Howard stood and looked out through the door. He turned back toward me and looked at me as though I had missed something.
"The truck is outside," he said. I had learned from Jimmy's family that ownership of objects is mostly a European concept.
"Thank you Uncle," I said, standing and finishing the cup of cold coffee. I walked out to the old pre-60s pickup that appeared to be held together with rust, bad welds, and a wish. The key was in the ignition switch on the dashboard instead of on the steering column. The hinges on the driver's door protested when I pulled the door open. I slid behind the wheel and pushed the clutch in. I turned the key in the ignition switch and nothing happened. Howard walked over and looked in the passenger's window.
"You have to push the starter button," he said without a smile.
-31-
The Eddy Rickenbacker flight from Las Vegas arrived about ten minutes late which qualifies for "on time" around there. The Kingman terminal is really just the main room of the commuter airline office. The patio cover next to the hanger is the real waiting room, baggage claim, and ticket sales if you count the open window.
Jimmy looked funny unfolding himself as he came through the doorway of the small twenty passenger twin engine turbofan aircraft. He was carrying a black leather sports bag and dressed in his standard designer jeans, blue raw silk cowboy shirt, and black exotic skin boots with silver toecaps. His hair was pulled back into a low ponytail held in place with a silver band. All in all, he looked as unique as he was. Jimmy waved as he walked around the wing carrying his bag. We slid into opposite sides of the Ford and I started the engine then turned on the air-conditioning.
"Having trouble with the Indian Summer along with the Arizona heat?” Jimmy asked with a smile.
"I've been taking the heat just fine the past month while you no doubt, have been enjoying the cool summer breezes on top of Ruby's. Thank you for asking though," I said. "I want you to meet a friend of mine named Howard. I need to return his truck."
I stopped talking while I fell into line with the other three cars leaving the parking lot.
This was rush hour at the Kingman airport.
"So," Jimmy finally said, "who is Howard?"
"You'll see," I said, "but first we need to load the Harley and pack up. I'm also going to buy you the best breakfast on Route 66 east of town."
"Would this also be the only place to eat east of town, on Route 66?" he asked.
I left the question unanswered and just smiled.
I followed the access road around the perimeter of the airport and under the Santa Fe railroad tracks situated between Highway 66 and the airport property. I turned north east on route 66 and ran the Ford up to 70, the normal speed for the road.
The distance from the airport to the roadhouse is about eight miles, which we covered in just less than seven minutes. I slowed as we came into sight of the roadhouse and crossed the oncoming lane, pulling into the graveled parking lot. We stopped next to Howard's old Ford truck.
Your friend must be an Indian," Jimmy said, looking over at the truck.
"Why would you say that?" I asked.
"Because no one but an Indian would drive something that looks that bad," he said.
He thought for a second then added, "Are the keys still in it?"
-32-
We spent the next half-hour loading the motorcycle on the back of the Ford and tying it down. I then packed my gun bags a
nd threw my clothing into one of the empty bags and cleaned out my room. I dragged Jimmy into the dining room of the roadhouse. We took a table near the back window and sat down. We were the only customers and Connie came out of the kitchen with a full glass coffeepot and two half-pint canning jars with handles on them.
"Morning Ed," she said in her perpetually cheerful voice. "That was some party last night. You go running up to Howard's this morning sugar? I'll be back for your order in a minute darling."
The great thing about talking with Connie was that she carried both sides of the conversation.
Jimmy poured coffee for both of us then got up and walked over to the kitchen and went through the door. He was inside for a couple of minutes, probably listening to Connie. He finally returned with a small can of condensed milk for the coffee. He poured cream in both of our jars then sat down.