Barone was still appraising her. Vicky could feel the gray eyes boring into her back like a laser. She turned to him. “Vicky Holden,” she said. “I’m an attorney.”
“Attorney?” The man coughed out the word. He seemed to find this interesting. There was the faintest hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth. “Well, as much as I enjoy the company of beautiful women,” he said, “I shall leave you and Ollie to speak in private.” He lifted one hand in the artist’s direction, then let himself out the door. There was the clack of footsteps along the porch, then quiet.
“You’re here about the murder of that Indian cowboy on the Taylor Ranch.” Goodman turned back to the easel. “When was that, exactly?”
“Seven years ago.”
“Ah. Seven years. Who would have thought that much time could pass in what feels like a snap of your fingers. You might as well sit down. You will pardon me for continuing my work. I have a client waiting for this painting of the high meadow.” He dipped his head toward the tray, picked up another brush, and took his time twirling it through a can of green paint.
Vicky found a wood, high-backed chair wedged between another case of paints and a small table. She scooted the chair forward and sat down. From outside came the sound of a motor turning over, then the noise of tires digging into the two-track. “What can you tell me about the day of the shooting?” she said.
The man laughed, a strangled sound that emerged from half of his mouth. The eye in the burned skin drooped almost closed. “Shooting took place after I left the ranch. I’d been working there that morning, in my usual place. Sun shining on the face of the bluffs, blue shadow on the log cabin. Sold that painting right away. As for the shooting, what I can tell you is nothing. Nothing. Exactly what I told the investigator who camped out here for two hours, asking a lot of inane questions. Did I know Raymond whatever his name was?” He waved a hand between them. “Did I know Travis Birdsnest?”
“Birdsong.”
“No, I did not know them personally. A couple of cowboys that worked on the ranch. Cowboys came and went around there, still do as far as I know. But I saw what those two were up to. Oh, I saw that, all right.”
Vicky leaned forward and waited.
The man pulled half of his mouth into a smile. “I saw them here in the canyon, scraping the ground in front of a petroglyph. I didn’t have to be a genius to know they were looking for artifacts. Found ’em, too. That’s why they kept coming back. I must’ve seen them three, four times.”
“How did you happen to see them, Mr. Goodman?”
“Mr. Goodman? Please. Let’s dispense with the formalities. We both know why you’re here. You’re hoping I’m going to hand you the means of getting that killer out of prison. But what you’re gonna get is this: He belongs in prison. He’s a thief, just like his buddy. They were stealing artifacts…”
“Where were you when you saw them?”
Goodman turned his head sideways, displaying the handsome profile and looking at her out of the corner of his eye. “I have a perch in the rocks with an unobstructed view of the petroglyphs above. I can make my way upslope quite well, thank you very much, with the help of my old friend here.” He tipped his head toward the metal crutch on the floor. “Painting images of the spirits is how I make most of my living. I sit for hours with the spirits, and they tell me many things. Oh, back then before the murder, the spirits told me how those two cowboy Indians had discovered their tools. Yes, even their buried bones. They’re very valuable today. Rich people pay a lot of money for old Indian bones and chisels and knives carved out of stone.”
“You saw Travis and Raymond plundering the sites…”
“The spirits and I watched them, but they didn’t know we were watching. Next time I saw those two Indians, they were working on the ranch. I put it together. I got the image, all right, and I understood what it meant.” He leaned back. Half of his face broke into a smile; the other side remained as impassive as an image carved in rock. “Sure those Indians went looking for work on the Taylor Ranch. You drive out of the canyon, you’re at the ranch. Perfect place for them to hide out. Spend all day up in the high pastures. Who’s gonna go looking for them? Anybody report them digging up artifacts, they’d be back at the ranch before the cops got their ass up the canyon.”
“Did you report what you saw?”
“Yeah.” He hesitated. “I reported two clowns desecrating holy ground. Sheriff said wasn’t his territory. I should take my story to the feds. Well, I got more to do than chase around trying to find the proper authorities. A couple weeks later, those Indians got a bigger idea. Instead of looking for bones and bits of tools, they’d steal a petroglyph and hit the big bucks. Took one of the best pieces of art in the canyon. Whoever chiseled that petroglyph—spirit, shaman, take your pick—knew what he was doing. He was a great artist. Produced two masterpieces. First one was stolen seven years ago. Now the second one’s gone, the one the Indians call the Drowning Man.”
“Travis couldn’t have taken the Drowning Man. Maybe he didn’t have anything to do with the first theft, either.”
Goodman turned away, giving Vicky another sideways smile. “You ask me, some other Indian—yeah, one of your own people—got the idea for making off with another masterpiece. Figured he’d make some big bucks, the kind of money that pair of cowboy Indians pulled in. You seen the oils I did of those petroglyphs?”
Vicky gave a little nod. “Nothing’s making sense,” she said, trying to bring the subject back to Travis. “Everybody seemed certain that Travis and Raymond had stolen the petroglyph, sold it, and got into a fight over the money. Yet somebody had tried to sell the petroglyph to the tribes. Contact wasn’t broken off until after Raymond was killed. That would suggest, wouldn’t it, that the petroglyph hadn’t yet been disposed of? Travis was arrested immediately. How would he have had time to sell it?”
“Duncan’s Antiques,” the man said.
“Excuse me?”
“Out on Highway 789. Duncan has an oil of the Drowning Man for sale right now. I’ve got a few petroglyph paintings left at the gallery in Dubois. Guess you seen those. Petroglyphs sell great in Santa Fe, too. Course those Easterners that go there like my Western landscapes, too. They’re willing to pay the kind of money that supports the arts. Supports my art, that’s for sure.”
Vicky studied the man holding himself upright against the narrow back of his stool, blue jeans clinging to bony thighs. “There’s something else that doesn’t make sense,” Vicky pushed on. “How would two Indian cowboys know where to unload a valuable petroglyph?”
“What?” Ollie Goodman blinked at her, a look of comprehension gradually invading the unscarred half of his face. “Same place he and that other cowboy sold the tools and bones. There’s a lot of…” he glanced across the room, taking time to reconsider, she thought, to plot his way. “Let’s just say there are some less than honest dealers in the art world. Couple Indians selling bones and tools in some flea market, and all of a sudden, a dealer finds them. Probably gave them the idea to go for the real art. ‘Get me a petroglyph’”—Goodman dropped his voice and took on a conspiratorial tone—“‘ I’ll make it damn worth the effort.’”
He tried another tentative smile. “What? You don’t agree?”
“I’m thinking that an artist like you, with connections in Santa Fe, could have run into a few dishonest dealers.”
This seemed to halt whatever line of thought the artist had been pursuing. The emerging smile on his lips dissolved into a crimped, thin line. “Now why would you think that? Because I’m an artist? I make my living selling my work to people who value true art? Quite a leap from selling art in the legitimate marketplace to cavorting with criminals. But I understand. Oh, I see the picture. You’re an attorney whose main interest is springing a thief and a murderer from prison, and you’re willing to do whatever it might take to accomplish your mission. Should that involve casting a little dirt on the reputation of a legitimate artist such as myself,
well…” He shrugged. “That, I suppose, is what you will do, but I warn you. I won’t hesitate to sue you if you make any slanderous statements.”
Vicky got to her feet. “I appreciate your time,” she said, starting toward the door.
“I don’t doubt that you’ll be very well paid.”
“What?” She turned back.
“Sooner you get that Indian out of prison, sooner he’ll be reunited with his money. I expect he’ll spread a little of it your way. You ask me, he was damn lucky to get a manslaughter conviction. That lawyer of his did him the biggest favor of his life.”
Vicky didn’t say anything. She crossed the room, let herself out the door, and took a deep breath of the warm mountain air. It had the faintest taste of sage. She hurried around the porch and down the steps, aware of the fast beat of her footsteps in the silence, as if she were running from something…something unholy.
She negotiated the curves down the canyon and turned south onto the highway, heading back through the reservation to Lander, Ollie Goodman’s voice ringing in her head. He’ll be reunited with his money. It was almost comical. There she was, jeopardizing the law firm, ignoring the agreement she’d made with Adam, and for what? A man who technically wasn’t even her client. A man who could have stolen a sacred petroglyph, maybe even murdered his friend. Damn lucky to get a manslaughter conviction.
And yet she couldn’t shake the image of Amos Walking Bear, the fear and grief in the old man’s eyes. “You gotta help Travis,” he’d said.
Vicky swung left onto Highway 26, taking the shorter route across the top of the reservation to St. Francis Mission. She had to talk to John O’Malley.
VICKY TAPPED THE brake as she drove around Circle Drive. Boys of various sizes, ten to twelve years old, with brown faces and black hair falling over their foreheads and white teeth flashing in wide grins, jostled one another across the grass in the center of the mission. She stopped as they tumbled out into the drive. Two of the boys hoisted large bags with bulges in the sides and bats protruding from the end. The smaller kid, with a round face and a cowlick shooting from the back of his head, let his bag drop into the field. He stared at it a moment before fitting the strap onto one shoulder and staggering off, the bag bumping along behind.
Father John walked with the kids, an even larger bag slung over his shoulder. Behind him was Del Baxter. She’d gone to school at St. Francis Mission with Del. He’d played first base on the baseball team. An odd memory to pull out of the past; it had been so many years ago. She didn’t recognize the elderly man loping along with the kids. Reddish face and a slight stoop, talking as he walked, waving both hands in front, his white head swiveling between Del and the kids.
Father John broke ahead and hurried toward the boy with the cowlick, wobbling under the bulky bag. He reached down, grabbed the strap, and lifted the bag. Together they stepped off the curb, swinging the bag between them. She wasn’t sure he’d seen the Jeep until he veered over.
“This will just take a few minutes,” Father John said, leaning toward Vicky’s window. He might have been expecting her, she thought, as if he’d guessed that sooner or later she would show up and want to talk about the stolen petroglyph. The boy grinned at her before looking up at Father John, and she was struck by the trust in the boy’s eyes. These were his kids.
“There’s coffee in the office.” Father John nodded toward the administration building. “No guarantees on the taste.”
In the side-view mirror, she could see the line of pickups and cars building up—parents coming to pick up the kids. The late-afternoon sunlight fell through the cottonwoods, and there were great globs of shade that lay over the patch of grass in front of the administration building and the paved alley that led past the church to the Little Wind River. “Think I’ll take a walk to the river,” she said.
17
IT WAS QUIET in the cottonwoods. Vicky could hear the water lapping at the banks before she spotted the river flashing silver through the brush. This was where her people camped when they first came to the reservation, a straggly lot, Grandfather used to say, more dead than alive, exhausted from the years of fleeing across the plains ahead of the soldiers and their rifles. The children were sick and hungry, most of the warriors were dead, and finally, those who were left—survivors, all of them—gathered on the riverbank. The spirits of the ancestors were still here. She could sense their presence. She found herself returning again and again when she needed their strength.
She reached the river, picked up a pebble, and skipped it over the surface. She watched it bounce until it dipped below the current. It was then that she heard the footsteps and the crack of branches. She spun around. John O’Malley ducked around a branch and came down the path toward her.
“Looks like you have a guest,” she said, although she wasn’t sure why she had blurted it. There had been times when she had stayed at the guesthouse. The mission was a sanctuary. It was silly to think she was the only one who might come here to regain some equanimity.
Father John stopped beside her. “Retired priest,” he said. “Father Lloyd Elsner. He’ll be with us awhile. How have you been?”
Vicky shrugged. It was startling how blue his eyes were, and the way he had of seeing more than she wanted to reveal. She turned away from his gaze and told him that Amos Walking Bear had asked her to file an appeal for his grandson, Travis Birdsong. She hurried on, saying that she knew nothing about Travis, except that he’d been convicted of manslaughter. She’d never met him.
But as she talked, other thoughts tumbled across her mind: Maybe Travis had been one of the kids at a powwow or rodeo, as anonymous as the kids running across the mission after baseball practice. She’d been away so long—ten years in Denver going to college and law school and working at a Seventeenth Street law firm, ten years of another life on another planet. The reservation had changed when she’d returned; so many people had come and gone and grown up. Her own children, Susan and Lucas, grown up, on their own. She had changed, too, of course, but there were times…there were times when she still felt like the scared Arapaho girl she’d once been on the reservation.
Father John walked over and picked up a pebble, taking his time, considering. He sent the pebble skipping over the water. The river bent out of sight around a cluster of trees. He threw another pebble, then said, “The jury found Travis guilty.”
“Everybody assumed Travis and Raymond Trublood had taken the petroglyph and that Travis had shot his friend. The thing is, neither one was charged with the theft. What did you think?” Vicky held herself very still, scarcely breathing.
After a moment, John O’Malley turned to her. “I visited Travis in jail before the trial. Travis swore he didn’t know anything about Raymond’s murder. He was certain he’d be acquitted.”
“Did you believe him?”
“He didn’t act like an innocent man.”
“How do innocent men act?”
“Don’t tell me all your clients are guilty.” A flash of amusement came into the blue eyes. “They’re eager, Vicky. They want to tell everything they know. They want to help the police find the real killer so the police will get off their backs. Travis clammed up. I told him he should do everything he could to help himself. He told me to save my advice. He had complete trust that his lawyer would prove the whole thing was some regrettable mistake. I don’t think he comprehended the danger he was in.”
“He had a lousy lawyer.”
Father John took a couple of steps farther along the riverbank. “I knew Raymond,” he said. “He came around from time to time and helped coach the Eagles. He’d been a pretty good ballplayer in high school, but he was a cowboy at heart. Loved working with horses, working in the outdoors. I remember the day he showed up for practice and said he’d gotten his chance. After knocking around a lot of ranching jobs that went nowhere, he’d hired on with the Taylor Ranch. ‘Beautiful spread,’ he told me. ‘Fine herd of cattle that I’m gonna help build and some of the prettiest ho
rses in the county.’”
Father John looked back. “I remember thinking that a part of him was already on the ranch. Raymond had been in his share of trouble, probably got fired a few times. He’d had a tough life. Father killed in a bar fight when he was about six, older brother Hugh in prison for assault. Raymond was accused of robbing a gas station once, but the charges were dropped. The station attendant couldn’t identify him. When it came right down to it, the attendant admitted that all Indians looked alike to him. The job at the Taylor Ranch was Raymond’s chance, and I remember telling him not to mess up. He said he was through messing up. He was going to be strong. The kids hated to lose him. They followed him out to his pickup. They were still waving after he drove out of the mission. A couple of months later, he was dead.”
“I’m sorry, John,” Vicky said.
“It was stupid and senseless.”
“Murder always is.” Vicky waited a moment before she told him that she’d talked to Marjorie Taylor and the ranch foreman, as well as an artist named Ollie Goodman who had been at the ranch the day Raymond was shot. “Everybody’s convinced Travis is guilty.”
“But you don’t agree,” he said.
Vicky could feel the calmness in John O’Malley’s voice flowing through her. She began to feel steadier. “I don’t know what to think,” she said. “Goodman says he saw Travis and Raymond digging in the mounds below the petroglyphs. If they were stealing other artifacts, they might have taken the petroglyph.”
“Even if it’s true, it doesn’t make Travis guilty of killing Raymond.”
“But that was the only motive the prosecutor had. He managed to let the jury think that Travis had shot Raymond over the money they’d gotten for the glyph.”
The Drowning Man Page 15