The white man down in the canyon had been relatively easy to deal with, even with the handicap of a bad arm. The man had obviously just finished bathing and washing his clothes, and had only just started up from the water when Luca stepped in front of him. The man smiled, embarrassed, at the sight of a stranger who appeared out of nowhere. When Luca showed the switchblade and ordered him to put down his clothes, the man hesitated only a moment. Luca’s English was not that good, but the man understood him all right and did as he was told—all the while backing down the few steps to the water. Luca kept gesturing with the knife until he was upon him, and then from his higher vantage, kicked him full in the chest, sending him sprawling backward into the water, where caught off balance the man was swept into the next and deepest pothole. This one was not so far across, but with steeper, slicker sides. The white man was forced to claw at the smooth edges to keep from being swept over the next sheer drop. He struggled desperately to cling to the smooth rock walls, and his fingers bled from the attempt. Finally, he managed one last desperate effort and was able to secure a hold by which he pulled himself partially onto the ledge. Luca dealt him a vicious blow to the head, sending him tumbling over the precipice to the rocky pool below. Then there was only a blob of white, floating face down toward yet another drop off, and that quickly disappeared from sight.
The white man had not shown the courage of the Indio girl, or even her dog, once the animal perceived itself to be in the right. Both had acted impulsively, out of instinct, and without thinking. That made it easier for Luca. If the girl had fled, he would have had to run her down, but it would have ended the same. He couldn’t afford anyone knowing he was here… not now. Going forward, he could see it would be these Indios who would pose the greatest threat.
7
The Hunt
“The wind people are out playing ball today!” Harley shouted, pulling up his collar and turning his mule’s rear-end to yet another sand-laden gust. Just after noon a cold front had blown in from the north and showed no sign of letting up. It was now nearly too dark to see the trail, and the three Diné looked at one another, each hoping the other would suggest finding a place to stop, preferably one out of the wind. While none of the three wanted to be the one to give in, it was Charlie who finally conceded it was getting too dark to go on. The other two quickly concurred and cast about for some shelter from the abrasive blast of the norther.
“There’s a little bunch of cedars just up ahead and what looks like an arroyo.” Harley peered through the dust and turned Shorty back into the teeth of the gale, urging him past the others. After only a short distance he called back over his shoulder, “It’s better than nothing.” The three edged off the trail and into the gully, which did afford some shelter, but not much. They tied their horses in the trees and dragged their saddles and blankets under the cutback, which did at least deflect the brunt of the wind. They knew they were in for a miserable night but pawed through the bag of canned goods the old woman had given them, and each plucked out a can, not really caring what it was.
“Good! I got beans.” Harley grinned in the failing light. “I like beans, all right.”
“Crap, this is some kind of little spaghettis.” Thomas poked around in it with his pocketknife. “All mushy too.” One would have thought he didn’t like it, had they not seen the way he wolfed it down.
Charlie dug out his flashlight and inspected his can. “Creamed Corn?” That was all right by him, and he settled back against his saddle and opened it up with the little pull-tab on top. The old woman had been meticulous in her shopping and nearly every can had a pull-tab—a handy thing for something you might have to eat in the saddle, as a herdsman often did.
“How far you think this guy is ahead of us now?” Thomas asked around a mouthful, as much to himself as anyone else.
Harley set his empty can to the side and thought about it. “Maybe a day. It would be longer if we weren’t horseback.” He raised his voice above the wind, now fairly ripping through the treetops. “This guy can move, and he don’t take no breaks neither.”
“We’ll get him… or someone else will.” Thomas rolled himself in his blanket and turned away. “He’s under the gun now… There’ll be lots of people looking for him tomorrow.” And then, just before drifting off, he whispered, “I hope it’s us that gets to him first.”
When he woke to the cold grey light of dawn, Charlie Yazzie rolled over in his blankets and stared for a moment at just a sliver of moon hanging above the horizon like a golden scythe. The wind had finally died, leaving a layer of grit and dust on his blankets. He wondered what his son was doing back home in Waterflow. Sue was an early riser, as was the boy. She would be up making coffee for herself and a little kettle of oatmeal for the two of them and, were he there, the three of them would enjoy a quiet hour before he left for work. He was beginning to regret getting mixed up in this case; it was not his job. His job was in the offices of Legal Services, where it was warm and clean, and everything was done on the telephone or by moving pieces of paper around from desk to desk. That was what he trained for. Harley and Thomas were more suited to this than he, who fresh out of high school, had chosen to apply to the university and pursue a career in law—what he thought would be a better way of life. Being a lawyer had sounded good in the beginning; he could be someone, make his grandmother proud of him (though she always said she would have been anyway). He had to admit, though, being outside seemed to strike a chord in him at times and was becoming more to his liking as time went on. The fascination of the chase was in his genes, he supposed—as it had been in a thousand generations of his forebears.
Harley Ponyboy was up early gathering dead cedar twigs for a small fire. A strong breeze was again building from the north, and the odor of smoke would flow downwind and alert no one to their presence. He thought briefly of his clan mother, She Has Horses, down below in the sage flats and hoped her sister and nephew had come for her. Her sheep would have to be driven a long way this day before the buyer from Becklabito could pick them up in his stock truck. He wondered at this old woman, only recently met, yet how she was like his own mother through the magic of kinship and clan. This was the lure of the reservation and his people—they were all of the same cloth and their fates intertwined. No matter how far away one might travel or how different the life, still, they remained a part of the whole. Harley was not one to consciously think about these things, but when he did, he liked for them to make sense, and this did. He was where he was supposed to be; he was on the beauty path. He looked over at Charlie and wondered if he would ever return to the beauty way and follow the path as he had as a child.
Thomas Begay didn’t sleep well and had dreams of evil spirits who changed shapes and disappeared at will. In wakeful interludes he desperately hoped this wasn’t some witch or Yeenaaldiooshii they were chasing. By the time he finally stuck his nose out of the blankets, he could smell coffee brewing in an open pan, and it brought him fully awake and anxious to be away. He thought, we will have to push hard today; that evil spirit can't be far away, at least as the crow flies. Ferreting him out might be another matter however. We will have to have our wits about us.
Lucy Tallwoman had not wanted him to go on this “wild goose chase,” as she put it. “What do you think you can do out there that the authorities can’t?” she said this tapping her foot on the hard, packed floor of the hogan.
Thomas had no answer for that and could only say, “We’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?” It was a foolish thing to offer, and he immediately regretted saying it, but it was all he had.
Lucy’s father, Old Man Paul T’Sosi, as he was now called, had sat there on the edge of his cot with a frown but had watched with more than a little interest. Lucy was a stubborn woman and Thomas knew he would have to watch his step if he didn’t want his saddle set outside the door. It was not even his saddle. He had only borrowed the saddle from Paul and knew the old man probably frowned because his daughter’s husband didn’t
even own a saddle. He was probably thinking maybe he should just give me the saddle then he could at least go in the knowledge his son-in-law owned his own saddle… and that his daughter could divorce him by setting it outside the hogan.
Thus the three Dinè, each with his own thoughts, huddled around the fire and waited for first light. The man they followed probably had no idea R. J. Tyler’s body had been found, but he had to know the shepherd girl would be quickly missed. Once the alarm was raised, the killer might well think he had nothing left to lose and strike again in his determination to escape. No one knew what he looked like, or where he came from, or even how he came to be in that country.
The weather was mild, and the man might choose to head further up into the sparsely populated Carrizo highlands, lie low for a while, and wait out that first intensive wave of searchers, something he knew was sure to come.
In any case, Charlie thought the three of them were in the best position to intercept him or at least keep track of him until authorities could be informed. He knew there were a few isolated summer camps scattered here and there—in all but the most remote areas. There was good grazing up there most summers, and herders, like the old woman down below, would be following the grass until the snow drove them down.
Harley sipped his coffee from his supper can and thought he still could taste last night’s beans. In the breaking dawn he looked across the hazy lower reaches of the Carrizos, and farther out toward the great flying ship of the desert, barely discernable now, as though adrift on a once barren and ancient sea. Early white settlers named it Ship Rock, but few then thought it really looked like a ship. Old Navajo still said Tse Bit’a’Í, “The Rock With Wings,” and believed their people had been delivered into this country on the back of that great bird—before Monster Slayer turned it to stone. There were many such myths from ancient times, just as there are in the distant past of any people. Harley Ponyboy had great faith in these legends passed down from his ancestors but had a harder time believing some of the stories told by local missionaries.
Harley and Thomas were some of the few younger people who still held to the old ways. That was why old people liked them. When the old woman back at the hogan learned he was a Reed People, she took Harley aside and told him she was also Lòk’aa’ Dine’é, or Reed People, just as he was, and called him her grandson and told him that should he run across others of the clan, he should mention her name and say he was there to help her. “Come right out and tell them you are my grandson. There are lots of Reed People hereabouts. Those are your people, too, and will surely give you anything you have need of, and they will tell you exactly what they know.” She cast a furtive glance at Charlie Yazzie. “Do not send in that one with the badge. They might not trust him and may even tell him something that is wrong.”
Harley told her he would be sure to do those things, should he get a chance, thanked her, and spoke to her thereafter as he would his own grandmother. To his people’s way of thinking, a clan member was close family, and was addressed as such. A person might have many mothers or fathers among the elders of their clan and treat them as such. That was the way it had always been.
Thomas pawed through the grub sack again and found a neatly wrapped package of fresh cornbread the old woman had included. He broke off pieces, which he passed to the other two. “I expect this might be all we have time for this morning, so we better eat it slow and enjoy it.”
Harley was still somewhat miffed at Thomas, looked him straight in the eye and crammed his entire portion into his mouth at once, then turned to study the trail. “That wind covered up a lot of sign last night,” he mumbled through the mouthful of dry cornbread. Thomas and Charlie just looked at one another, as neither could understand a word he was saying.
Charlie shook out his blankets and watched in the direction the search parties would come. Most likely they would be at the trailheads already, some on four-wheelers, a few horseback, but most on foot. They would work in pairs or small groups and be well armed, and they would be cautioned to use their radios to keep in touch. No one would be allowed to go off on his own—not with this sort of quarry. This person they were after would already be on the move and looking for a hole… a hiding place. Sanctuary.
Even though there would be a good number of people in the field, it was a huge area in rough country, and a single experienced man, who didn’t want to be found, likely wouldn’t be found. Charlie had seen Indian fugitives roam this country for weeks, even months without being apprehended. Though if the crime was not too serious, some of them might eventually come in on their own, tired of the hard way they were living. Even a few white men, survivalists mostly, had lasted a long time out there. Some, of course, had never been found— suicides probably—men who could not bear to give up or give in. The older and wiser of the authorities knew all this but figured the public expected them to keep the pressure on for as long as possible… and too, they might get lucky. But this time, of course, they had no idea who they were dealing with.
Thomas took a different view and thought the three of them might very well have a shot at this guy. He had been on the run himself and had a pretty good handle on what such a person might be thinking. The authorities, on the other hand, seldom apprehended anyone in this country without a little help from the locals, most of whom were not inclined to volunteer information to the law, preferring instead to handle things their own way.
Harley Ponyboy, now with the added support of clan, felt reassured. His “grandmother” had suffered a great hurt and thus, so had he. It was personal now. Clan ties come with deep roots, even among the more modern thinking Navajo. Sometimes this led to vendettas that might entail all manner of evil, witches and worse, and sometimes with far-reaching effects.
It was nearly noon when they ran across the first of the advancing phalanx of searchers, spread out like an old-time rabbit drive, and headed in altogether the wrong direction.
Thomas waited as the end volunteer drew near. “How’s it going, my man?”
Sweat streaked the young searcher’s face, and he carried his jacket tied around his waist. He stopped and regarded Thomas’s horse with a wistful expression. He was Navajo, and by the look of him would have preferred to be somewhere else. “Beats me, brother. You got any water?” He shook his empty canteen. “Goes fast out here afoot.” Then smiled at the fat canteen on the horse’s saddle.
Thomas untied the water and passed it to him. “Any word on your guy’s location or where he might be headed?”
“Reports have him all over the place.” The young man took a deep swallow from the canteen and passed it back. “People that live out here are starting to see boogers everywhere. There are so many volunteers they’ve got the dogs running in circles. I’m going to give it another hour and then head back to the truck. I doubt they’ll have this many show up tomorrow.” He grinned. “You wouldn’t want to sell that horse, would you?”
Thomas looped the canteen over the horn and chuckled. “Not today.” He scanned the horizon. “Well, we’re supposed to be out here looking for cows. We’ll let someone know should we spot anything suspicious.”
The young man waved over his shoulder and hitched up his jacket, which was now nearly dragging the ground.
Thomas turned to Charlie, who had remained silent during the short exchange. “About what I thought. Our guy is up high and gone to ground. He won’t peek his head out until this posse is back at the saloon.”
Harley sniffed. “They had to cross his sign up on that ridge. These boys couldn’t find a piss-ant in a sugar bowl.”
Charlie shook his head and smiled at Harley, looked to the high country and agreed with Thomas. “He’s up there somewhere—laughing at us. We need to get above him… and then just wait him out.”
8
Tressa
Luca scratched himself, lolled back against his pack, and peered through the stunted growth at the entrance to the little cave-like shelter. He was totally at ease, though it was above eight
thousand feet and had been cold the previous night. Once again, he was grateful for the sleeping bag. Reaching behind him, he pulled the little binoculars from the side pocket of the pack and spent a few minutes sweeping the slope almost two miles below. Too far to pick up a man on foot probably, but should one have a steady enough hand, it would be close enough to see one on horseback. He saw nothing for the moment but knew that somewhere there were three very determined and not unskilled followers—not part of the general melee that had broken out everywhere this morning. These other three were from before and slowly, methodically, tracking him. Twice now he had fallen back and watched them, close enough to know they were Indios. They were well mounted and moved with an assurance that rankled him. Eventually, however, those horses would prove more of a hindrance than an asset—it was still another thousand feet to the summit and would only get rougher. Many of those volunteers would eventually give up and go home, but not these three; they were in it for the long haul and like him, apparently had some skin in the game.
There was a plastic water bottle hanging from the pack. He had already filled it a couple of times from springs and seeps, but still it would not be enough should one consider the packets of dried food he had left to fix. His bad arm was improving rapidly; he guessed the nerves might finally be recovering from the shock suffered in the wreck. In any case he now had some use of the arm, and that was a great help in this rough country.
Mojado Page 6