Case File: Bright Sun (Case Files of Newport Investigations)

by Pat Price

  Jimmy and I both showed our identification to the receptionist and signed the guest register. The receptionist called the number Mendoza had given us and we waited. I would have thought that the waiting accommodations would have been somewhat more comfortable given that taxpayer’s dollars were being used to furnish the lobby. We sat on the world's hardest and most uncomfortable maple wood bench for some 10 minutes until Mendoza arrived and retrieved us. We then waited in front of the world's slowest elevator while it took its time getting to the ground floor.

  Mendoza was housed in the FBI office on the 5th floor. He ushered us into a meeting room and we sat in real office chairs arranged in neat rows on each side of a long ten foot table. Men drifted into the room over the next few minutes and seated themselves. No one spoke to us and we returned their bored looks until Mendoza returned to the room and sat at one end of the table.

  "Ok," he said, "let's get started. These gentlemen are the team contracted to locate the stolen fuel. They believe they have located where the fuel may be stored and have GPS coordinates pin pointing the facility. Questions?" he said, looking around.

  I raised my hand and looked at Mendoza.

  "Ed," he said with a smile.

  I returned the smile.

  "Is this where you boys take over?" I asked him. I was ready to get out of the spy game and to invoke the payment cause of our contract.

  "We'll get to that in a minute," Mendoza said. "Any other questions?" and looked around the room.

  One of the agents sitting across from me spoke up for the first time.

  "Can you tell us how you came to the conclusion that Officer Olson is implicated in this?"

  "Sure, I said, and then spent twenty minutes laying out how we were pointed to Olson. I neglected to include the part about McClintock probably dropping an Indian down a mineshaft, but included all of the necessary information. What the Feds did not know was not going to help them anyway.

  "Now," I said in conclusion, "why don't we give you boys the GPS coordinates and you can call in a Delta Team, the Hostage Rescue Team or the SWAT Team and bust all the bad guys. Then we can all go get a beer and I'm buying."

  The agent sitting at the far end of the table spoke up, "We think that the fuel has been converted into weapons grade material and probably incorporated into a weapon by now." He stopped for a few seconds and collected himself. He was probably trying to decide what to tell us. In reality we knew more than he did.

  "Look," I said. "Jimmy and I are in this all the way. We probably know more at this point than you do so stop trying to sanitize the data and let's get on with it."

  He cleared his throat. "Good point, we think that a frontal assault could result in a lot of green glass being created outside of town. If you guys go in and get neutralized we still have a chance to stop them. They wouldn't trigger the weapon because of you. If they even see us coming there's a good chance that a big cloud will be looming over Phoenix."

  "So," I said, "we're expendable?"

  "That's about the size of it," he said in a grim voice. It was the same voice I remember hearing as a child when my father was making funeral arrangements for his father before the old man had completely died from cancer.

  -42-

  Dinner that night was not a joyous occasion. We were at the restaurant sitting in our favorite booth with Phyllis hovering around us, making a fuss over the Chief. Jimmy sat opposite me with his farther and Rebecca sat next to me. Her leg still burned against mine, making it hard for me to concentrate and making me think about how someone like me with no marketable skills could make a living on the reservation. About then the realization kicked in that if I lived through the next several days I would not need to work for a living for a long time, maybe never.

  The door opening caught my eye. I saw a tall man, dark complexion, wearing an Arizona Department of Public Safety uniform walk into the restaurant. He was about six foot tall and looked like he worked out on a regular basis. A man, who was somewhat shorter and dressed in jeans, scuffed black cowboy boots and a blue nylon ski jacket followed him. Jimmy saw me looking and turned and looked over his shoulder.

  "That's Olson," Jimmy said, “The man with him is his uncle. Just be cool."

  Olson stopped just inside the doorway and looked around the room. He spotted us sitting in the booth and walked over.

  “Ya at eeh shicheii, Chief," he said upon arriving at our booth. Bear was wise enough to know he needed to greet the Chief with great respect. He looked at me sitting next to Rebecca and his pupils dilated. "Good even Rebecca," he said, shifting his eyes to Rebecca.

  "Officer," she answered, then raised her coffee cup up and took a long sip, keeping her eyes diverted down toward the table.

  Olson stuck his hand across the table toward me.

  "Bear Olson," he said, "you must Jimmy's friend I've heard about."

  "Must be," I said, taking his hand. He had a crushing grip that I guessed was heavier than usual because I was sitting with Rebecca and she effectively ignored him. I think Chief Two Feathers picked up on what was happening because the air became very thick very quickly.

  "How are you doing Running Bear?" the Chief said.

  Olson released my hand and snapped back to reality and turned his attention to the Chief.

  "I am doing just fine Chief. I decided to treat my uncle to dinner. What's good?"

  "According to Phyllis everything's good. I personally recommend the meat loaf," the Chief said, looking up at Olson. I looked at the Chief's eyes and they looked very hard and very cold. Chief Two Feathers was easily in his mid 60’s but I would not want to go up against him without a weapon and several yards separating us. After viewing the Chief's game face, I suspected Olson had the same feelings.

  "Well, maybe I'll see you all later," Olson said before stepping back from the booth. He and his uncle settled into the end booth away from us. Jimmy was starring at the back of Olson's head and his look was dangerous.

  "I want to go," Rebecca said, putting her cup down and suddenly standing.

  I slid out of the seat I was in and stood along side of her. The Chief stood and Jimmy slid out of his seat. He reached into his pocket and dropped two twenty-dollar bills onto the table.

  "Let's go," Jimmy said. Phyllis was on her way to the table when Jimmy dropped the money.

  "Hold on a minute," she said, "I'll get your change."

  "You keep the change Phyllis," Chief Two Feathers said, smiling at her.

  "Why thank you Chief," she said, beaming at him.

  The Chief smiled at her then smiled at Jimmy. Jimmy picked his coat up from the back of the booth and just shook his head.

  "Let's just go," he said.

  -43-

  Back at the house we settled down in the family room. I hung my coat on a peg beside the sliding patio door and sat on the lodge pole pine couch and leaned back, cracking my back. Jimmy and his father each sat on a matching armchair opposite me. The glass top lodge pole pine coffee table was between the chairs and the couch. Rebecca was in the kitchen area pouring ice tea into four glasses. She came into the family room carrying the glasses on a serving tray. She placed the tray on the coffee table and sat next to me on the couch.

  The couch was about six foot in length and I was seated on the end closest to the patio door and Rebecca was sitting a few inches to my right. I picked up a glass and looked across the coffee table at Jimmy and his father. Both of them had amused expressions on their faces.

  "What?" I said, then immediately knew what.

  "Nothing," Jimmy replied.

  "Look, Rebecca said, "We know that Bear Olson is responsible for stealing the Uranium and making that damn bomb. Why doesn't the FBI just arrest him and be done with it."

  "This is more than just Olson," Jimmy said. "We don't have a clue if his group actually stole the fuel or if they bought it from some other group. We don't know for instance, how many people are in his group or if he has an inner circle and a bunch of misguided clones workin
g for him. We don't know if some or all of the tribal police are in this with him or if some of his DPS officers are with him. In short, we just don't know."

  “Why would DPS officers side with him?” Rebecca asked.

  “Because my dear Sister,” Jimmy said, “There are a large number of Mexican American officers in the Highway Patrol. A lot of Mexicans believe that the white devils stole this land from them after they stole it from us.”

  “That implies that the Spaniards stole it from us first,” she said.

  “My point precisely,” Jimmy said. “It rapidly becomes a circular argument. The past is gone and we can’t change it. Since the mid 1950’s, the government has come out with one program after another trying to equalize society and level the country’s wealth across all groups with civil rights programs, preferential quotas, and one give away program after another and the end result was to create a never ending culture of illiteracy and poverty.

  All of the enforced quotas from the civil rights programs and set asides and color induced preferential programs in the universities have actually hurt more than they have helped. The inner city social programs have done nothing except to bring out the warrior gene in young men forced into the ghettos and barrios. Olson may have a large and wide support system in place and it may include the Hispanics and black communities, we just don’t know. The only thing we actually know for certain is that we can only trust each other.”

  "So just killing him probably would not solve anything," she said as a statement and not a question. Rebecca fell into a quiet resolve.

  The Chief cleared his throat. "Since you boys know where Olson's cave is, I think we should get some of the men we know we can trust and go over there and clean them out," that is what I think.

  "Like I said, we don't know who we can trust," Jimmy said.

  "What about some of the FBI agents?" the Chief asked.

  "They don't want any part of this until we physically locate the fuel or the weapon. If they are involved before we find the bomb and someone is killed, then the government is going to look really stupid," Jimmy said to his father.

  "They did not appear to care about looking stupid when they shot that man's wife at Ruby Ridge or the people in Waco," the Chief retorted.

  We thought about that for a few seconds before I spoke up.

  "Ruby ridge and Waco involved a bunch of wacky white guys,” I said, thinking out loud. “The shootout at Ruby Ridge was about rebellion against the government and Waco was about a religious cult. The Ruby Ridge people were perceived as a bunch of gun carrying nuts and the Waco group was perceived as a bunch of free love Jesus freaks with a dash of child abuse thrown in for good measure. No one but the news media really cared and I could make a case that all the media really cared about was selling ink and air time."

  I sat and thought for a few seconds more.

  "This is about something else. This is about Native Americans who have been screwed around by the white man for over two hundred years. If the FBI moves against them then can’t prove the charges, Olson and the few men they may manage to arrest are going to make the government look like they are trying once again to screw the Indians. This will not play out like Wounded Knee because Olson is better prepared and knows how to play the white man’s game."

  The Chief spoke again. "So, I guess what you boys have to do is go out to the cave and see for yourselves if this bomb is a fact. If it is there then the FBI will come in and arrest the men responsible."

  "That is about the size of it," Jimmy said. "We get the so called goods on Olson and then call in the Calvary."

  "Then," Rebecca said, "Everyone can get on with their lives again, hopefully."

  -44-

  The plan, such as it was, was for Jimmy and me to drive into the canyon we found running parallel to the canyon where Olson's operation was hidden. Once we reached the coordinates that would put us across from Olson's cave, we would climb out of the canyon and hike across the mesa. When we reached the canyon with Olson's cave we would climb down, sneak or fight our way into the cave and verify that the weapon was there. Once we had the weapon we would call Mendoza and he would bring in the heavy guns and we would collect our 4 million and live happily ever after.

  Plans are great. I like plans, especially when they work. But one of the great truths I learned in the Army during the Gulf war was that once the ball is in motion or the shooting starts, the plan usually goes out the window and that's what happened with our plan.

  We turned in around midnight and the plan said that we would head out about 9:00 the next morning. I woke up about 8:00 and found the Chief and Rebecca sitting at the breakfast bar between the kitchen and the family room. Jimmy was not present. I had slipped into a pair of jeans and a tee shirt before coming out of the bedroom.

  "'Morning," I said, announcing myself.

  "Your hair looks like it exploded," Rebecca said, suppressing a laugh. She got off of the barstool she had been sitting on and moved around into the kitchen.

  I self-consciously ran my hand through my hair and smiled.

  "Is Jimmy up?" I asked.

  "He left about 30 minutes ago. He went to the trading post to get some rolls and the newspaper," the Chief said.

  "Coffee?" Rebecca asked, holding a cup in the air.

  "Thank you," I said, sitting down at the breakfast bar next to the Chief. Rebecca put the full coffee cup in front of me and slid a small ceramic bowl with sugar and a ceramic creamer next to the cup. The sugar bowl and the creamer looked to be hand made and were decorated in the Southwest style. I ignored the sugar and poured cream into the cup until the color changed to light tan.

  We spent the next 15 minutes making small talk about the upcoming operation Jimmy and I were going to undertake. I started getting antsy because the trading post was less than ten minutes away. He had been gone 30 minutes when I came out of the bedroom and another 20 minutes had gone by. That made almost an hour. One thing Jimmy does not do is dally around when he goes to the store. He could have walked into the trading post, grabbed the paper and done a weeks shopping in less than 15 minutes. Something was going on and I was uncomfortable because I did not know what it was.

  I looked up at the Chief and said "can you or Rebecca call the trading post and see if he is still there or if he made it at all?"

  The Chief just nodded and got off of his stool and walked over to the telephone sitting on the coffee table in the family room. He picked up the receiver and dialed a number. Less than ten seconds or so later he started speaking in a local dialect and two minutes later he sat the phone down in its cradle.

  "He was seen talking to Bear Olson outside the trading post about 30 minutes ago," the Chief said. He walked over to the sliding patio door and grabbed his coat. Rebecca had come around the end of the breakfast bar and was grabbing her jacket.

  "Wait for me," I said as I ran down the hallway to the bedroom to grab a pair of boots. They were waiting in Rebecca's Bronco as I came around the house with my coat in my arms and my boots and socks in my hands. I climbed into the front passenger's seat and Rebecca dropped the transmission into gear and we were off.

  -45-

  The ten minute ride to the trading post only took six minutes. I had tied the laces on my shoes just before we pulled off of the two lane road and stopped next to the trading post. Rebecca and I jumped out of the front of the Bronco and I helped the Chief out of the back seat. As the Chief was stepping out of the truck, a thin man, obviously an Indian, came out of the trading post. He walked up to us and started talking to the Chief. Rebecca came around the front of the Bronco and listened.

  The Chief and the man were speaking in the Apache language and Rebecca was joining in. She and the Chief looked at me several times; as did the man they were talking with. The conversation became animated and the Chief switched to English.

  "Jimmy went away with Bear Olson," he said.

  I looked at Rebecca with total surprise and said, “what”?

  "Bear p
ut handcuffs on him," Rebecca said.

  "I'm going to ask one more time," I said, "why?"

  "He and Officer Olson got into a fight out here in the parking lot," the man from the trading post said.

  I turned around in frustration and clinched my fists.

  "Will someone please tell me why Jimmy and Olson got into a fight?"

  The man looked at Rebecca and then at the Chief. The Chief nodded.

  "James was inside drinking coffee with me," the man said to us. "He had just bought a bag of cinnamon rolls and the Phoenix paper. We were talking when Officer Olson came in. He walked over to us and made a bad remark about Rebecca."

  "What did he say?" I asked.