The Shaman Laughs cm-2

by James D. Doss

  The tribal newspaper was welcome mail. She unfolded the Southern Ute Drum and read the front page as she slowly made her way up the lane toward her trailer home. A powwow at Shiprock. A cut-rate spay-neuter clinic at Dr. Schaid's animal hospital. The Navajos were promoting another boycott against the business community in Farmington. She turned the page. A fishing contest at Capote Lake. The Nightbird Insurance Agency would be reopened under Emily Nightbird's maiden name. When she turned the page again, she saw the story. The Economic Development Board intended to pursue Arlo Nightbird's quest to turn Canon del Espiritu into a "Spent Nuclear Fuel Holding Facility." Ahhh… the pitukupf would not be pleased with this plan to dump garbage in the place where he lived!

  The shaman tarried in the foot path, flipping the pages of the newspaper slowly, absorbing these fascinating bits of information, correlating them, searching for connections. There was something here, but she could not quite see it. Almost unconsciously, she whispered: "maybe the pitukupf will show me."

  The tired old woman was climbing the front porch with the warm sun on her back when she noticed her shadow on the aluminum wall of her trailer.

  Her short, thick shadow began to grow. It became tall, the shoulders broad.

  The mail slipped from Daisy's hand; she gripped her skirts with cold, bloodless fingers.

  The shadow raised its arms. The arms became great wings, with feathers that fluttered as if troubled by a wind.

  The shaman stood frozen, unable even to cry out. Trembling, she watched the shadow wings spread as if for flight; they began to move in a slow rhythmic motion. Would they carry her away?

  She closed her eyes. "Dear Jesus," she whispered, "you can make it go away." When she opened her eyes, her ordinary shadow was on the aluminum wall-the shadow arms were at her side where they belonged. Immediately, the shaman understood the meaning of her vision. She knew who had killed Arlo Nightbird.

  That night, Daisy tossed uneasily in her bed staring alternately at the ceiling, then through the small window into the frigid darkness. What to do? Perhaps this dark knowledge was best kept secret. Or forgotten altogether.

  27

  She shivered. Cold as frog spit, that's what it was. The top of Chimney Rock was just now catching a faint glow of light from the east. Daisy trudged unsteadily along, eager to feel the warm light from the sun that would soon rise above the blue profile of Eight Mile Mesa. The paved road was a dark ribbon at her left hand, the waters of the Piedra rushed by at her right. She would occasionally pause to lean on her oak staff and wait until her breathing slowed. Ignacio was miles away and there was no traffic on the road at this early hour.

  Her troubled thoughts were on her vision of the dark shadow that became an owl. And the owl was transformed back into a misty shadow. Sometimes what you saw in a vision wasn't the real thing, but just a hint of what the actual thing was. It had been that way in the ancient days, when Joseph had explained the meaning of the old Pharaoh's troublesome dreams. Fat cattle meant good crops-thin ones meant famine. Shadows and owls and other symbols were like arrows that pointed toward the truth.

  There was still no explanation for the mutilation of Gorman's bull, or of the strange disappearance of Rolling Thunder, but the shaman had worked out a part of the puzzle.

  There was no doubt about who had killed Arlo Nightbird. But Arlo was dead. Canon del Espiritu still lived. And the canyon was the only home the dwarf had ever known. Or, she supposed, the only home he could ever know. Like Daisy, the pitukupfwas too old and set in his ways to move. Aside from the dwarf, there were the peaceful old spirits that inhabited the ancient canyon. How could they rest if the matukach buried these dangerous things under the floor of their home? The old woman had awakened before daylight with an overpowering sense that she must take personal action.

  As she leaned on her staff and considered all of these things, the river began to speak to the shaman. The Piedra, which normally whispered in that secret language of all rivers, now muttered words that she could understand. Bloody bloody bloody… trouble trouble trouble, the waters said. She began to walk. As her halting steps brought her near a small rapids, the voices were much louder: BLOODY TROUBLE… BLOODY TROUBLE… BLOODY TROUBLE. The shaman paused; she frowned at the rolling surface of the river, which briefly assumed a crimson cast in the first direct rays of morning sunlight. These urgent words and scarlet colors from the waters were warnings; as clear as the painted signs along the highway.

  With an arm that trembled, the old woman raised her walking staff toward the mountains. "It's me, God," she whispered hoarsely. "I am very old now. My legs hurt when I walk and my ankles swell up. My hands… they shake like the leaves on the aspen." She held one hand out so that God might see this slight palsy. "I'm all worn out… can't take another step. It's up to you to do something." She sat down by the roadside. To wait.

  After a time, the urgent voices of the river quieted to a whisper, then fell completely silent. The surface of the Piedra was like a pond. The shaman sensed, rather than heard, a gentle voice speak to her. This message was also clear. Because of her stubbornness, Daisy would be permitted to go to Ignacio, to witness what would happen there.

  To learn the folly of it. Above all, she was not to do battle with the tribal council to save her home at the mouth of Canon del Espiritu.

  Another home was already being prepared for her.

  In most of his dealings, Albert Gibbons was a man with a whimsical, even gay disposition. But when he traveled, the Reverend Gibbons was a most cautious man. He made meticulous plans and he stuck to them. Albert was, so he believed, on his way to Colorado Springs to deliver a learned paper that would electrify the annual convention of Wisdom Literature Theologians. In fact, he was rolling down Route 151 toward Arboles and the northern finger of Navajo Lake. His right brain rehearsed his erudite speech on subtle parallels between sections of Ecclesiasticus and the Sama-Veda, while his left brain raised questions that were of some practical importance:

  Can this narrow little road possibly be the highway that will take us through Alamosa and thence to Walsenburg and Interstate 25? And should the sun not rise before us? Wake up, Albert!

  He shifted his gaze between a crumpled map and the highway and his sleepy wife. "Can't figure how we got off on this little back road," he muttered. It was partly Pamela's fault. She should have been paying attention. He glanced at the sun rising on his left. "We must be heading south."

  "I gotta go pee-pee," little Billy bawled from the backseat.

  "Albert," his wife said, "look at the old woman sitting by the road." She tugged at his sleeve, causing the station wagon to swerve slightly. "I think she's an Indian. She looks so… so forlorn."

  Albert corrected his steering. "We'll stop and see if she needs some help."

  "Neato," Billy squawked, "I ain't seen no real Indians yet." The child's stubby vocal chords vibrated with that nerve-jarring quality of broken fingernails scraping over a chalky blackboard.

  Albert braked the big automobile to a crawl.

  Pamela pushed a button to lower the window. "Dearie," she called out, "over here. You need a ride?"

  "It's about time you got here," Daisy said gruffly as she pushed herself erect with the wooden staff. "Open the door for me, I got the arthritis in my hands."

  "I'm Albert," the driver said, cheerfully resigned to his fate. "This is Pamela. That's our son Billy in the backseat."

  "I'm tired," the old woman said. "My feet and knees hurt." She noticed his clerical collar. "You a priest?"

  "That I am," Albert replied. But he did not wish to be mistaken for a priest with pastoral duties. This woman was very old and feeble. And there was a hint of guilt in her expression. Neither last rites nor confessions were his cup of tea. "I teach at a small seminary in Arizona." Five years and still no tenure.

  The old woman leaned on her staff and squinted suspiciously at this matukach and at the woman seated next to him. "We have us a priest over in Ignacio… but that Pope over in Rome
won't let him have a wife." Daisy turned her glare upon the homely child in the rear seat, who had his nose pressed hard against the glass. He resembled a little pig with freckles; Daisy shuddered inwardly.

  Pamela turned to open the rear door for the old woman. "It's all right, dear. We're Lutherans."

  Daisy got in beside Billy, who scooted away quickly. "Well-I need a ride." She could not afford to be choosy, but this development was a great puzzle to the shaman. The country between Durango and Pagosa had enough good Catholics to fill a dozen churches and here was God, sending her a Protestant. Maybe it was The Great Mysterious One's notion of a little joke. Well, that could be a good sign. Someday soon, she would have a lot of explaining to do and it would help if God had a sense of humor.

  "We're on our way to Colorado Springs," Pamela shouted over her shoulder. She always spoke loudly to the elderly, as if the entire lot had defective hearing.

  "God," Daisy said, "wants you to take me to Ignacio. I got important business there."

  Albert found Ignacio on his road map. He finally understood where he was, and sighed. The Forty-Fifth Annual Convention of Wisdom Literature Theologians would have to wait. God's will be done.

  Little Billy eyed the wrinkled woman with frank suspicion. "You a real Indian?"

  She glared at him. "Sure as Columbus was a foreigner."

  "I don't think you're a sure-enough Indian," the boy squawked.

  "Now, son," Albert cautioned, "remember your manners." The boy had little to remember.

  "Sure-enough Indians live in Calcutta," the shaman said. Daisy leaned over, her face close to the boy's. "Besides, how would you know a real Indian if you saw one?"

  Billy paused to consider this, then smirked at the supposed impostor. "Real Indians can make fire"-he rubbed his grubby little palms together to demonstrate-"by rubbing two sticks together." He grinned, exhibiting a set of red gums from which sprouted about nine teeth. "Till they get red hot!"

  Daisy tilted her head and winked. "Watch this." She closed her eyes and raised her hands, fingertips touching as if in prayer. "O ghosts of my ancestors," the shaman moaned, now raising her arms in a theatric gesture, "put the spirit of fire in the hand of your daughter!" She cracked one eye to watch the child, who waited with no little apprehension.

  "I don't see no fire," he said sullenly. As he spoke, a thin blue flame leaped up from the shaman's index finger. Billy was startled. Billy peed in his pants.

  Albert braked the station wagon and glanced over his shoulder at the old woman. "This close enough to your destination? We don't mind taking you…" Daisy unbuckled the seat belt. "No. This'll do fine."

  "Good-bye, dearie," Pamela said as she waved at Daisy's back. "Albert," she whispered, "how do you suppose she did that fire thing with her hands?"

  He made an illegal U-turn. "Some kind of Native American magic, I suppose." The priest, who had watched the episode in his rearview mirror, smiled with satisfaction at the secret he shared with the hitchhiker. He had seen the old woman palm the plastic cigarette lighter.

  Charlie Moon arrived barely two minutes before the fire engine; both were too late to make any difference in the outcome. The Economic Development Building was wrapped in flames. The scorching heat kept the curious onlookers well away. Moon was interviewing potential witnesses when he noticed a familiar face under a maple tree. He turned his task over to Sally Rainwater and made his way through a throng of onlookers to the solitary figure. Moon pushed his hat brim back a notch. "What brings you here, Aunt Daisy?" What, indeed.

  The old woman looked up and blinked innocently. "Had to come to town. Things to do."

  Moon had no doubt that his aunt had seen the Drum article. Daisy would have read about the Economic Development Board's decision to revive the late Arlo Nightbird's plans to convert Canon del Espiritu into a nuclear waste repository. Arlo's extensive files had been stored in the EDB building. Now, the valuable papers were ashes. Without the stacks of documents, the plans for the canyon were as good as dead. The policeman wanted to ask the question; the nephew didn't want to hear the answer.

  The old woman watched the flames. She looked guilty. Extremely guilty. Moon turned to see the remains of the building collapse. "Good thing it happened so early in the day; nobody was inside." He cocked his head and stared down at his aunt. "Don't suppose," he said casually, "you have any secrets you want to share with your favorite nephew?"

  "You want to learn yourself some secrets," she said with a poker face, "maybe you should go over to Canon del

  Espiritu and have a long talk with the pitukupf."

  "Maybe I'll drop by later and have a chat with the dwarf," Moon replied. "But in the meantime, I need to figure out how this fire got started. Anything you want to tell me?"

  "Was on my way to the grocery store," she said. The shaman had learned this trick from the politicians she watched on television. Someone asked them an unwelcome question, they answered a different question with the intention of sowing confusion. It was a very clever ruse and it usually worked.

  Moon's brow furrowed. "The grocery store's way over on Goddard Avenue. Isn't this stop a bit out of your way?"

  And sometimes it didn't work. "Meat," she said darkly, "need to pick up some… fresh meat." Daisy had no intention of stopping at the grocery.

  Moon grinned down at his aunt. "Don't suppose you brought any matches with you?"

  Daisy closed her fingers over the plastic cigarette lighter in her pocket. "I read in the Drum that there's going to be a fishing contest at Capote Lake." Any mention of fishing always distracted her nephew.

  "Uh-huh," Moon said absently. "Maybe I'll go wet a hook."

  The fire chief waddled up in his oversized rubber boots. Abe Workman pushed his helmet back and wiped sooty sweat from his forehead. He nodded politely at Daisy Perika, then turned to the Ute policeman. "I got something for you, Charlie. Federal Express lady stopped next door to make a delivery. Navajo woman, her name's Martha George. Said she saw something… ahhh… somebody near the building right before she smelled the smoke."

  Moon looked for the familiar van and didn't see it.

  "Where is she?"

  "Already took off. Had some deliveries to make in Bay-field."

  Moon knew about this Martha George. The Navajo woman was rumored to be some kind of clairvoyant. Her father was a traditional Navajo healer… performed the Blessing Way. The policeman found his notebook. "She give you a description?"

  "Not much. Except… she says the suspect was… uh… not more'n two feet tall." Workman blushed under Moon's stare. "Must have been somebody's kid, Charlie. Playin' with matches, maybe."

  "Yeah. A kid." The policeman put his notebook in his shirt pocket.

  Daisy's face was impassive. Reflections of the flames danced in her dark eyes.

  28

  His face, she thought, had a hollow look. Almost haunted.

  Anne Foster frowned at the dark patches under his eyes. "You look absolutely exhausted." She caressed his hand. "You simply must take a few days off. Get away from the pressures at work."

  "I'm fine." Scott Parris forced a smile, and it hurt his face. "All I need is a few hours of good sleep." Sleep without dreams.

  But first there was work to do.

  And promises to keep.

  She knew that he was driving himself much too hard. Anne would have been astonished to know how he was spending every spare moment. But she would never know. No one would.

  Not unless the dead knew.

  The coyote paused to sniff tentatively, interrupting a determined search for the scent of the cottontail. The hungry canine turned, orienting her sensitive ears toward the source of the barely audible sounds. Scuff-scuff, the sounds said. They would pause, then start again. Scuff-scuff. The clever animal, long acquainted with the threat of the two-legged creatures and their dogs, sensed that something far more sinister approached along the floor of the canyon. The coyote moved into a patch of dead chamisa and waited with apprehension as the source
of the scuffing sounds approached. The animal tilted her head in puzzlement at first sight of the thing-this unnatural apparition that moved in undulating motion like a shadowy wave over the moonlit sand of the canyon floor. At first, the shape of the intruder was indistinct, an amorphous patch of dark fog floating over the ground. Then, as if it could change its shape at will, the presence seemed to take on substance. The thing paused, raised itself to a standing position… like a great bear. But it was not a bear… This creature had broad shoulders, no neck, and a peculiar, flattened head. The head had horns. And a single red eye. Now it would glow brightly, like an ember in a fire. Then it would dim, as if the creature had blinked. The coyote could not deal with abstract concepts, like Good and Evil. But there were primitive instincts deep within her breast that drummed an urgent warning: Be still, be still!

  29

  He had blood on his hands.

  For the tenth time in an hour, he washed carefully, using a miniature brush to scrub his knuckles and cuticles. He examined his fingers carefully in the dim light-his hands appeared to be clean but he was certain that traces of blood remained. Patiently, he lathered his hands again with the yellow disinfectant soap and scrubbed with the brush until it seemed that the skin itself might slough off into the basin. He rinsed under the faucet, then dried his hands gently on a soft cotton towel.

  As he locked the front door behind him, his thoughts were occupied with a bit of food and early to bed. But first, a walk. A long, quiet walk along the bank of the river. Contemplating his lonely evening, he didn't notice the small figure waiting in the quivering shadow of the willow.