by Sandi Ault
“Damn! Who does a thing like this? I hear about it every other day here in Taos—somebody’s always either shooting a dog or putting some antifreeze down to poison it. How did it happen? Did someone come all the way out to your place out there, or what?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know. Just…will you ask your wife to pray for him?”
“You damn betcha! I’ll have her go down to the sanctuario this evening and light a candle. Maybe I’ll even go with her. You go ahead and get what you need—I have to get something out of the back.”
I wandered around trying to find some things to take to the family feast at the pueblo. I finally settled on a bagged salad mix, some cherry tomatoes and cucumbers, a can of black olives, a bottle of lemon vinaigrette, and some cold, peeled, precooked shrimp from Jesse’s meat cooler. As hot as the day still was, I thought a cold shrimp salad would be a good dish to bring. When I got up to the register with my basket of items, Jesse stood over a huge parcel on the counter wrapped in butcher paper. “No charge tonight,” he said. “I already counted up the register. I don’t want my accountant to get confused.” He began stuffing my items in a paper sack.
“No, I…Just let me write you a check and you can put it in tomorrow’s earnings.”
“No, I ain’t gonna take your check. You got enough going on, just get on out of here.”
“Jesse, you don’t have to do this. I want to pay you for these things.”
“Go on, now,” he said, shoving the sack in my arms, “or you gonna make me mad. You don’t want to see me mad, I’m telling you.”
I sniffed back more tears. “Thanks, Jesse. You’re a dear.” I put an arm around the man and gave him a hug.
He was clearly surprised, and a little embarrassed. “Go on now,” he said. He followed me out of the store with his large parcel, barely able to hold it up with one arm while he locked the door. I was loading my groceries into the back of the CJ when Jesse came up and tossed the big paper-wrapped bundle onto the rear deck. “That’s for Mountain,” he said. “It’s part of a side of elk. He’s going to need his strength when he recovers. Red meat is good for that. Don’t worry, it’s frozen. I predict by the time that thaws out, you’ll have El Lobo back home and he’ll be as good as new.”
My mouth opened but I couldn’t speak.
“Don’t say nothing to my wife about that,” Jesse said as he walked toward his pickup. “She don’t need to know that I got a crush on some wolf. It would make her jealous, and I wouldn’t be able to live with her like that.”
At the gas station in Cascada Azul, I went to use the pay phone and called the ranger station in Tres Piedras. My voice came out in a whisper. “He’s still alive.”
“Where are you?” Kerry asked.
“I have to go to the family feast at the pueblo. Then I’m going back to the vet clinic. There’s a guy there named Steve—he’s going to spend the night and watch Mountain, keep him hydrated. I’m going to spend the night there, too, after the feast. I brought some things.”
“I’ll come when I get off work. Do you need anything, babe?”
I gulped. “I need Mountain.” My voice was a soft cry.
“I know, I know. I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”
Waiting for Serena, I remembered the maxim about being on “Indian time.” When Momma Anna invited me to come to her house, or anyplace else for that matter, even when I arrived on or before the specified time, she would always say, “You’re so la-ate!” in her singsong Tiwa greeting. But if she were to meet me anywhere outside of the reservation, I might wait as much as an hour and a half, and when she arrived, she might not say anything—or she might tell me the story of what she encountered along the way, as if this were explanation for why I was made to linger alone for so long.
I sat in the CJ in a corner of the lot, the windows down due to the heat. A car pulled up and unloaded a passenger. I saw Bone Man emerge, then open the back door—and out tumbled Bob Marley, his golden retriever. Bone Man reached into the backseat and pulled out a large duffel bag. The car pulled away.
Aw, jeez. Of all the times to have to deal with Bone Man.
It didn’t take long for the hippie to spot me, and I saw recognition in his face soon thereafter. He made a beeline for me. “Wow, dude! You got another car! Hey, your face looks all better, too!”
Sensing that I might be trapped if Bone Man came up to the driver’s-side door, I got out of the Jeep and came a few steps toward him. Bob Marley ran to me and deposited a huge loogy of slobber on the thigh of my jeans. “So, what you got there, Bone Man? You moving or something?”
He looked behind him, his face confused. Then the lights came on. “Oh, you mean the duffel? Dude, this is some great stuff. Wanna see?”
Before I could think of an excuse not to, Bone Man had pulled a rolled-up army blanket out of the bag. He proceeded to unfurl it, then to lay out some items in a rough display. He had an assortment of crudely taxidermied parts and pieces, mostly bear—faces, paws with claws, a cased arm of a bear like the one I’d seen in Professor Mason’s book, and a variety of animal tails and paws, from coyote to badger.
“What are you doing with all this stuff?” I asked.
“Indigo Falls time, man. I do a lot of trading at the pueblo this time of year so they can get their medicine right for the journey.”
“Yeah? What do you trade for?”
“Cash. A few other things.”
“Like what?”
“You won’t bust me if I tell you?”
“I’m not the DEA, Bone Man. I’m a resource protection agent. Unless you’re trading in endangered species or doing harm to the land, you’re out of my ballpark.”
“Dude, I’m always careful about that shit. I don’t want to bring bad juju to myself.” He snatched a lynx paw out of Bob Marley’s jaws. “Stop that! You know you can’t eat this stuff!” He started to roll up his wares in the blanket again. “Okay, I think it’s probably safe to tell you—but just in case, I want you to know that I’m a member of the American Indian Church so you can’t bust me for this.”
“For what?”
“I get peyote and sometimes some jimsonweed, too. I use it for ceremonial purposes only.”
“Yeah, I bet.”
He stood up, stuffed the roll back into the duffel. “No, it’s true. I’m a seeker. I’m always looking for visions. That stuff helps me get my sight.”
“Okay, whatever, Bone Man.”
He pulled the drawstring on the duffel bag and tied it. “I probably won’t get any jimsonweed this year, though. That stuff has to be doled out by a shaman, someone who really knows what he’s doing, or it can poison you. The medicine man who administers it is gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yeah, they say he left his horse standing out in the yard and just walked off without him. I guess the horse nearly died—it didn’t have food or water and was tied to some tree for a couple days.”
My heart beat so hard I could hear my pulse in my temples. “What’s the name of this shaman?”
“Yellow Hawk. He’s the peyote chief. He’s the head of the church right now, too. He’s the only one who can administer the sacrament—at least right now—well, there was this one dude before him, he’s my buddy Ismael. But I guess he got deposed or something like that, and he’s not supposed to do it anymore. So now Yellow Hawk’s the only one.”
I forced myself to breathe. “Do you know where he’s gone to?”
“Dude, nobody does. Nobody’s getting the sacrament for their vision quest. It’s got the whole tribe worked up.”
“Excuse me,” I said, fishing in my pocket for change. “I have to make a phone call.”
Diane answered her cell phone. “Langstrom.”
“Hey, have you heard anything about a missing person out at the pueblo?”
“Not that kid again, right?”
“No, I’m talking one of the tribal elders. His name’s Yellow Hawk Lujan.”
“We usually get
our Missing and Endangered reports from the sheriff’s office. Have you talked to them?”
“No, and I’m at a pay phone, but I know a guy who would know what’s up at the S.O. Do you know Jerry Padilla?”
“Horny guy, always slobbering over your tits?”
“Yeah, that’s him.”
“I could call and see what he knows. Why?”
“I think there’s some foul play here. Yellow Hawk was giving Santana religious training in the kiva before he died. He’s also the peyote chief and the leader of the American Indian Church. You remember that hippie guy I introduced you to, Bone Man?”
“Gawd. That guy stunk, how could I forget him?”
“Well, he says that Yellow Hawk administered the peyote and the jimsonweed at the pueblo, and now he’s gone. My medicine teacher, Momma Anna, is his sister, and she also said that Yellow Hawk had disappeared.”
“Well, I guess I can check and see if there’s an MEP report on him. I’ll call Padilla.”
“And, Diane?”
“Yeah?”
“Somebody poisoned Mountain.”
“Son of a bitch! Is he…?”
“He’s at the animal clinic in Taos. He’s barely hanging on.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know exactly. It’s—I’ll have to tell you about it another time. I’m waiting to get a ride into the pueblo right now.”
“Oh, no. Not again.”
“It’s okay, I’ve actually been invited to the family feast. They’re having someone pick me up at the gas station—you know the one in Cascada Azul where you and I talked the other night?”
“Yeah. Just the same, be careful. Where can I reach you if I get any information on this Yellow Hawk guy?”
“I’m going back to the vet clinic after the feast. I’ll be there with Mountain.”
“Okay, well, I’ll get back to you then.”
“Wait. Diane?”
“Yeah?”
“One more thing. Is there any way you can check and see if Sam Dreams Eagle is really at the Indian School in Santa Fe?”
“Why? You think he’s rolled up in this?”
“I’m sure of it.”
“How do you know?”
“I just have a big damn buzz.”
31
Family Feast
In the small kitchen of Grandma Bird and Grandpa Nazario’s adobe home, the stove exuded a tremendous heat. Stoked with wood, there was a pot on every burner, and the oven was full of feast dishes. I found a large plastic bowl on the shelf and started assembling my shrimp salad.
Momma Anna appeared over my shoulder. “Why you bring that?” she grunted.
I turned and gave her the formal greeting of respect. Then I answered, “It’s a shrimp salad. I thought something cool would be good—it’s been so hot today, and that warm wind…”
She looked at the bowl as if green slime were swimming in it. “Why you bring that? You know what we eat! We eat meat. We eat chili, posole, stew. Not shrimp salad! Indun not eat shrimp salad.”
All the women in the kitchen stopped to observe this discourse. They stared at me.
I hung my head, trying to appear ashamed, but in truth I was angry. I swallowed, then said, “I’m sorry. I’ll take it back with me; we don’t have to put it on the feast table.”
Momma Anna gave another grunt and moved through the crowd of cooks to the stove, where she tasted her red chili with elk meat. “Indun eat meat,” she said again, not looking at me. Then she turned to a forty-gallon drum that was lined with a black plastic bag. She reached into the sack and pulled out round loaves of Pueblo bread that had no doubt been baked by the women long before dawn this morning. When she had placed about a dozen of them on the table, she and Yohe began slicing the bread.
After what seemed like an interminable silence, the other women resumed their cooking and preparations for the feast.
I stepped out the back door of the kitchen to catch my breath, wishing I had my car so I could leave. I wish I hadn’t had to ride here with Serena. Now I’ll have to wait until she’s ready to take me back.
The men were stacking wood in a square tower on the hard dirt for a small bonfire. They talked softly among themselves and laughed. Anna’s son Frank looked across the yard at me and gave me the slightest nod. His uncles Eddie and Pete were splitting wood. Both much younger than their sister Anna, they were quite near to Frank’s age. Several teenaged boys stood under the brush arbor and laughed and pawed at one another. They looked at me and scanned my figure. This was no place for a woman. I went back inside.
By now, the ladies were ready to serve. The same table, constructed of plywood and sawhorses, held steaming dishes of food, baskets of prune pies and cookies, and plastic pitchers of Kool-Aid. These filled the center with barely enough room for the foam plates that rimmed the outer edges of the table. Heaping platters of roasted pork, stewed beef and vegetables, and sliced elk meat exuded an earthy scent. Big casseroles of sweet potatoes, supa, posole, and red chili added color and spice. A towering tray of sopapillas and the sliced loaves of the horno-baked bread spread so wide that three women had to work to rearrange the dishes already on the table to make a place for it. Momma Anna took my hand and pulled me toward the kiva fireplace in the corner of the main room. “Your face all better. You do what I tell you?” She clutched her jish through her shirt, referring to the root she had given me.
“I did, Momma Anna, but something went wrong.”
“What went wrong?”
“I don’t know. I ended up on the floor, passed out, and Mountain…” I had to stop and swallow hard to keep the emotion down. “He ended up poisoned somehow. He almost died, he may still—”
“What poison? Who?”
“I don’t know, I was burning the—the root you gave me, and it all happened then.”
“Where the wolf now?”
“He’s at the vet clinic. He’s so weak, Momma Anna.” I could feel tears welling.
“What happen?”
“I don’t know. He’s in a coma.”
“Coma? What that?”
“He’s not awake, he doesn’t respond. He’s just barely alive, not aware. The vet said someone gave him atropine.”
“What that?”
“I don’t know—a drug of some kind. I thought maybe he got the other half of that root you gave me. I can’t find it.”
Momma Anna opened her mouth in shock. “You lost your cachana? How you do that?”
“I was burning some with the red chile seeds and the salt, and then I passed out on the floor. When I woke up, Mountain had been poisoned. I thought maybe he had eaten the root.”
“No, no, that not what cachana do—maybe you breathe too much, but it not poison. Sound like someone give that wolf ololiuhqui.”
“What’s that?”
“Only medicine man can give. Very deadly if not done right. My brother Yellow Hawk only one right now can do it.”
Just then, Grandpa Nazario rose and held his palm up in the air, signaling the beginning of a prayer. Yohe hurried outside to gather up the men. They filed in quietly, removing their hats, squeezing against one another and the walls of the room.
Momma Anna let go of my arm and worked her way through the crowd to her father. She whispered in Nazario’s ear. He nodded. Then Anna took one of the gas lamps down from its nail hanger on a viga that spanned the roof. She lit the lamp and held it up as Grandpa prayed.
I had been to many feasts, and as Grandpa Nazario prayed in Tiwa, I knew he was calling the ancestors. He was naming them all, inviting them to feast with them, and asking for their blessing on the gathering. We stood, hand in hand, for what seemed like a half hour while this incantation went forth. Then someone passed me a large glass of water. I took my sip and passed it on, as I had been taught to do. We all drank from the same cup. When we were finished, Auntie took a plate and put a tiny bit of each food from the table onto it, making an offering to these ancestors that were just summoned.
She started to take the dish toward the kitchen, and I knew that she would then take it outside—to the sunset—where she would leave it for the spirits to feast upon. But before she could work her way through the gathered crowd, Momma Anna handed the lamp to someone and said loudly, “Wait. Look what my daughter bring.” She pressed her way into the kitchen and emerged with my shrimp salad held above her head. She set it proudly down on the table, pushing aside one of the Styrofoam plates to make room for it. “I not eat anything but this. My daughter make this shrimp salad for feast.”
A pinch of lettuce was added to the spirit plate, everyone grunted in agreement that it looked good, and the feast began, with the elders and little children eating first while the others waited on them.
When most of the family had eaten, Serena, Yohe, and I sat down to have some food. The table was still full of young folks, and Hunter sat at the far end from us, teasing the teenaged boys and making them laugh. Serena said, “You know my dad prayed for your wolf tonight.”
I turned to face her. “He did?”
“Yes. Anna told him, right before the prayer, that your wolf is sick or dying or something.”
I lowered my head and pushed a forkful of posole around the plate. “Yes, he’s in a bad way. But I’m grateful for the prayers.”
“We will all be praying for him. And for you. You didn’t eat hardly anything. Lucky the old ones already ate and didn’t see you. Otherwise, they’d make you eat. You just been playing with that little bit of food on your plate.”
The front door opened, and tribal police chief Epifanio Moon Eagle and another man I didn’t recognize stepped into the room. Moon Eagle was nodding his head, bowing and smiling, greeting all the family, when his eyes lit on me. His face grew stern and he said something to one of the women in Tiwa. A small crowd gathered around him, and there was much chatter. Momma Anna was wringing her hands and pushing her lips out in a scowl as she argued with the policeman.
I stood up, wondering what would happen to me.