Cold Dish wl-1

by Craig Johnson

  Henry dozed as I drove away from the sun, and the ruffling of his breath became steadier as we took the cutoff to the reservation. I saw Brandon White Buffalo looking after us as we went through the intersection. He stood behind his counter. It was hard to miss him as he looked through the clinging soda, chips, and candy advertisements. I extended a hand across the cab toward him, and he watched as we passed without slowing. He raised his hand also and pressed it against the heavy double glass of the convenience store window. Brandon White Buffalo stood there in the maelstrom of modern consumerism like a sentinel, like a warning in a mystical undertow. I looked back through the rear window of the truck to catch a last glance; he still stood there palm out and fingers spread like an orchard basket against the glass. He looked after us until we were gone, and I thought of Melissa at the Little Big Horn.

  I reset my shoulders, concentrated on the road, and considered my dwindling staff. Turk would be out by January, Vic could possibly be gone before that, and the chances of me getting Ferg to return to full duty were slim. He would probably just retire. I was thinking about it myself. I picked the mic off the dash. “Base, this is Unit One, come in?”

  After a moment there was static, then Ruby’s voice. “Leave me alone, I’m busy.”

  “Any word from Dave at the Sportshop?”

  Static. “His wife called. She’s about halfway through and will fax the stuff over when she gets done. Stop bothering me.”

  I hung the mic back up and watched the trees pass by along the irrigation ditch. I expected to see the Old Cheyenne again, standing among the cottonwoods. But there was nothing there and that worried me a little more; maybe even they had abandoned me. I thought about where we were going, about Lonnie. Yes, it is so… I didn’t think that Lonnie had killed Cody and Jacob, but I wanted to talk to him directly and find out if there was anything more to his story than Henry had been able to tell me. I looked over at my friend. It seemed that his breathing had gotten a little rougher, but he still slept, his body attempting to repair itself while he wasn’t looking.

  There was a maroon minivan with a bumper sticker that read FRY BREAD POWER in Lonnie’s driveway, and there was someone sitting on the passenger side. Even from the distance and angle, I knew it was Melissa. I brought the Bullet to a stop alongside the van. Henry woke and placed a hand on the dash to steady himself. “You all right?”

  “Yes.” He blinked. “Just sleepy.” He looked out the passenger side of the Bullet, and I saw the muscles at the side of his face bunch as he smiled at her. His hand came up to the glass, and I knew hers was extended toward him. He handed me the rifle. I took a moment to collect myself, giving them enough time to be together before I opened my own door and came around the back of the truck. It was a moment I had avoided, this personal contact, but here she was, and here I was with her.

  She was holding him, and I was amazed at how she had grown. Melissa was taller, still lean but muscled now and, even though she hadn’t lost all of the stunting qualities of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, the graceful quality that was indicative of the Cheyenne and their personal beauty was there. Her face turned to me. I hadn’t seen that face, with the exception of that fleeting glance at the powwow, for more than three years. Her eyebrows still arched in a questioning fragility, and the folds at the insides of her eyes still attempted to betray her. In honor of the golden fall afternoon and despite the oncoming winter, she was dressed in a pair of gray flannel athletic shorts and a T-shirt that read SWEET MEDICINE TREATMENT CENTER, SOBRIETY RETREAT. I stood there for a moment with the rifle in my hand, unable to move, as she loosened herself from Henry only long enough to attach herself to me. I held the rifle out so that it could not touch her and looped my other arm around her shoulders. Henry quietly took the gun. After a moment, she pulled back to look up at me. “You are sad?”

  I laughed as a tear threatened to escape the corner of my eye. “I guess I’m just happy to see you.”

  She smiled back, and it was like sunshine through a church window. “I am happy to see you, too.”

  Henry retreated and headed up to the house with the Sharps as Melissa and I talked. She kept a hand on my arm as we spoke, as if the connection might be fleeting and neither of us could take the chance. She had received a partial basketball scholarship to a community college in South Dakota and was only back from her special classes for a tournament. She wanted to know if I could come home with her in a week and a half and spend Thanksgiving with her and her aunts. She assured me that Lonnie would be there, too. I asked her where Lonnie was now. “He is inside, arguing with my aunt Arbutus. She said that I should come out and sit in the car. I’m glad you are here. I was bored.”

  As she spoke, I became aware of a commotion. The screen slapped open and the most formidable of the aunts made her way from the porch and headed toward us. Henry was wheeling Lonnie out the door after her with the buffalo rifle in Lonnie’s lap along with a small, black plastic box. Melissa’s aunt pulled up short when she saw me. I hadn’t formally met Arbutus Little Bird and had previously withstood her cast-iron gaze from afar. She didn’t like me, but I think it was less because I was a white man with a badge and more because I associated with Henry. “Hi, Arbutus.”

  She redirected her gaze at Melissa. “Get in the car.”

  I took a deep breath and took Melissa’s hand in mine. She was trembling. “Arbutus, do you want to tell me what’s going on?”

  She didn’t respond but stood there with her hands at her sides as Henry wheeled Lonnie up behind her. She turned slightly and spat out the words, “I hope you’re happy, now that the sheriff ’s here.”

  Lonnie’s eyes did light up when he saw me. “Hello, Sheriff.”

  “Hey, Lonnie. What’s going on?”

  “Oh, my sister isn’t going to let me have my daughter for the holidays. Yes, it is so.”

  I glanced up at Henry, who shrugged. I looked back at the galvanized aunt. “What’s the story?”

  “I’m taking her home.”

  “Well, do you mind telling me why it is you’re not going to let her have Thanksgiving with her father?”

  A moment passed. “I don’t have to talk to you.”

  “No, you don’t, but I can get on the radio and get one of the IPs over here and you can talk to him.” I was playing an angle, but most inhabitants of the reservation hated Indian Police even more than us. We were just whites. They were apples, red on the outside, white on the inside. She didn’t say anything. “Whatever it is? I’m sure we can work it out.”

  “I found a beer in his refrigerator.”

  I turned and looked at Lonnie. “Is that true, Lonnie?” God, like I didn’t know the response.

  “Yes, it is true. Yes, it is so.” He continued to smile. “I keep it there as a reminder and to keep temptation at hand. Temptation out of reach does you no good.”

  “How long’s the beer been in there?”

  “About a year and a half.”

  She crossed her arms, but she turned to look down at him. We were making progress. “How come I haven’t seen it in there before?”

  He blinked his eyes through the thick glasses. “It was behind the pickled pigs’ feet. You don’t ever move them. Um-hmm, yes it is so.”

  The look on her face told me he was telling the truth. “Arbutus, do you think it would be all right if Lonnie came over for Thanksgiving dinner at your place?” I waited a moment myself, for the next one. “And do you think it would be all right if Melissa came over here and spent the night with Lonnie, maybe on the Friday after Thanksgiving?” She didn’t say anything but turned to look at me. “Friday night, then?”

  “Get in the car, Melissa.”

  She started to open the door, but Melissa’s voice stopped her. “Would it be okay if the sheriff came over for Thanksgiving dinner, too?”

  Arbutus stopped and turned to look at her, then at me. She was a hard old gunboat, but I saw the steely eyes soften a little. “Walter is always welcome at our table.” She starte
d to open the door, but her eyes steered clear of mine. “You know where I live. Melissa, will you get in the car?”

  The hand loosened in mine, and she leaned in to give a slight peck on my lowered cheek. “I’ll see you in a couple of weeks.”

  “I’ll do my best.” She stopped. “I’ll be there.” The smile returned, and I watched as she turned the corner and got into the van, or almost did, before she jumped out, ran around the front, and gave her father and uncle a good-bye hug.

  I leaned against the bed of my truck, crossed my arms, and looked down. “How you doin’, Lonnie?”

  “I’m good, and how are you?”

  “I’m all right. Did you leave me a little present?”

  He looked up at Henry through the split lenses, and the mid-afternoon sun glinted off his metal-framed glasses. Then he turned back to me and smiled. “Um-hmm, yes, I did.”

  I nodded. “How did you get in my truck?”

  “Oh, those new ones are easy to break into, that and the keys by the door of your office. Yes, it is so.”

  I had to relocate the key rack. “Why did you leave the ammo for me?”

  “You’re gonna think I’m crazy if I tell you.” The smile was a little weak when he looked up.

  “Lonnie, I’ve seen an awful lot of crazy stuff lately, so why don’t you try me?”

  “The Old Ones told me you would need them.” He nodded. “Yes. When I lost my legs, they began talking to me. I think it is because my legs are with them, now. They tell me half things.”

  “Half things?”

  “Yes, because I am only half with them. Someday, all of me will be with them, and they will tell me everything.”

  I smiled. “I hope you don’t get the whole story too soon, Lonnie.” I looked down at the rifle in his lap. “Lonnie, did you take the gun out and shoot it a bunch of times?”

  He looked genuinely ashamed. “I was angry, so I shot one of the fence posts out back.”

  I thought of the things I might shoot if somebody had done to my daughter what had been done to his. The image of Lonnie out on his back porch late one night shooting at a singular fence post hung there just out of range. I’m pretty sure I jumped a little when the radio crackled in the truck. I could hear Ruby’s voice through the glass and the transceived miles. “Come in, Unit One.”

  It was probably word from the Sportshop or on the Espers but, when I looked up at the clock on the dash, it was only two-thirty; maybe it was Jim Keller. I opened the door and keyed the mic. “Base, this is Unit One. Go ahead?”

  Static. “Walt, George Esper is gone again.”

  I slumped against the doorjamb of the truck and rested my head on the mic in my hand. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  Static. “He stole Ferg’s truck. Vic’s in pursuit.”

  “Where?”

  Static. “Out 16, probably on the highway. He already ran into somebody near the co-op. Turk’s out there now.”

  “Did anybody notify the HPs?”

  Static. “Yes.”

  I waited a moment; chances are Vic was still in range. Static, then a fainter signal broke through. “I’m at Mile Marker 113, and if the little fucker was up here, I would have caught him by now.”

  “Vic, leave the highway to the HPs, I got a sneaking suspicion that he’s headed out this way.”

  Static, and I listened as she slowed the five-year-old unit down to under a hundred, negotiating the divider with one hand. “I’m on my way back, but if that’s the case he’s got a hell of a lead on me.”

  “We’ll get him from the other direction. Unit One, out.” I hung the mic back up and leaned out to look at Henry. “You coming?”

  He nodded and started pulling Lonnie back up to the house. Lonnie grabbed the wheel rails of his chair and slid himself to a stop. “You go ahead, I can get back in the house myself. Yes, it is so.” Then he reached down and handed the rifle up to me. “Take this.” I took the rifle as he handed the black plastic box to Henry.

  Henry looked at him, nodded, and came around to the passenger door. As I crossed in front of the truck, I stopped. “Lonnie, you know that cartridge box?”

  He continued to smile. “Yes?”

  “It has writing on it, next to the bullet hole?” He nodded and smiled. “Whose handwriting is that?”

  “You should know that handwriting.”

  “Lonnie, I don’t have a lot of time…”

  “Nedon Nes Stigo, He Who Sheds His Leg.”

  Lucian.

  “He used to shoot with us out at the Buffalo Wallows, back in the day. One time, my father challenged him to try to hit a target as small as the cartridge box at four hundred yards, and he did it. Yes, it is so.”

  It took me a minute to get myself going. “Thanks, Lonnie.”

  I climbed in the truck and, reaching for my seat belt, motioned Henry to do the same. He placed the small, black plastic case at his feet and held the rifle as easily in his hands as he had held the one in Omar’s helicopter. By the time we got to the end of the state route that joined with the main drag, we were doing about a hundred with the sirens and lights at full tilt. It was still going to take us more than twenty minutes to get back to the other side of the reservation, and my knuckles tightened around the wheel. I concentrated on the road as we passed the cutoff down to the Powder River. “I think he’s headed toward us.”

  “Because of what he said at the hospital, about living on the Rez.”

  “It’s as good a guess as any.”

  He braced a hand against the dash as the gravitational pull of a sweeping turn almost slid us into the barrow ditch. “What did Lonnie say about the writing on the box?”

  “He said it was Lucian’s… You never heard that?”

  “I never asked.”

  “I guess it was done a long time ago, when Lucian was shooting with Lonnie’s father.” At the next straightaway he opened what looked like a cleaning kit and pulled out two long stems and began threading them together. “What’re you doing?”

  “I am cleaning this rifle.”

  “That’s evidence.”

  “No, it is a weapon.”

  It took awhile, even at our speed, but we finally made it to the northern end of the Powder when another vehicle popped over the horizon that was traveling at a pretty good speed of its own. From the distance, it was hard to tell who it was but, after a moment, I could see the lights. I grabbed the mic. “Vic, is that you?”

  Static. “Fuck yes, it’s me. Where in the hell did that little shit go?” I slowed and stopped. By the time I had, she was pulling up alongside us and was rolling down her window; she had to crank. I cut the siren, and she leaned an elbow on the sill. “What now?”

  I thought. “Well, if he didn’t take 14 back toward Sheridan, the only other main road is Powder River back here.”

  “North or south?”

  “We’ll take south, you take north.” She was gone in a billowing cloud of blue burned oil and tire smoke before I could finish my sentence. Maybe, if I bought her a new unit… I turned the Bullet around and laid a little strip of my own, accelerating back to the Powder. When we got to the cutoff, the only thing headed north was a drifting cloud of dirt that hazed the gravel road into the distance. We made the turn and headed south as the back end of the Bullet attempted to get ahead of us. I countersteered and hit the gas again as we slid around the first turn just about sideways and clipped a few mailboxes. I noticed Henry struggling to hold onto the Sharps and find his seat belt with one hand. “What’s the matter?”

  “Just buckling up. It is the law.” This was the first time I had taken the big beast up to speed for any length of time; there hadn’t been any reason before. It was heavy, but I was surprised by the agility it had. “All right, you can crash now.” He had gotten his seat belt on and was studying the road farther ahead as I dealt with the ground at hand. “I see dust.”

  If it was George, he had just jumped off the highway. A thought snagged in my mind. “Do you think he’s
got the radio on in that thing?”

  Henry turned to look at me as I negotiated another turn and another quickly afterward. “That would explain why he got off the state routes.”

  “There’s something else.”

  “What?”

  “The old Esper place is out here somewhere, the one that Reggie’s great-great-grandfather settled. I remember Vonnie telling me about it. She bought a bunch of property on a speculation that they were going to put that power plant out there someday.”

  “How does romance bloom?”

  “Don’t ask.” I could feel his disapproving glance as we crossed a cattle guard and momentarily became airborne. We made for the washboard curve that lay ahead, and he braced himself. “Hey, I thought you guys always thought it was a good day to die.”

  “Attributed to Crazy Horse who was often misquoted.”

  The road straightened after the washboard, and I was able to bring all ten cylinders on line. The speedometer was creeping back up on eighty, and we were starting to get that light, floating feeling on the ball bearings of loosely packed dirt. My testicles felt as if they were somewhere in my chest cavity, and it wasn’t a pleasant feeling. If we missed one of the curves at this speed, we were most assuredly dead. All Henry said was “Ooh, shit.”

  We hit the next turn at just about a hundred, and the sickening feeling in my stomach magnified as the laws of geometry exerted themselves on the velocity of all that Dearborn steel. At any reasonable speed it wasn’t much of a turn, certainly nothing worthy of a Jan and Dean ballad, but it was enough to slam the side of the truck into the red clay embankment. When we bounced off the wall, I overcorrected, and the Bullet shot for the river. I turned ever so slightly, trying to urge our velocity forward, and only the left rear wheel slipped off the road. The truck tipped slightly back to center where we gained purchase and shot into the next straightaway. He looked over at me, the passenger-side mirror beating against his door. “You want to wreck? Do your side, okay?”