Not Dead Enough

by Warren C Easley

  Bingo. “Thank you. Uh, do you have a room number?”

  “He’s on the fourth floor, four-oh-two, but you can leave the package at the desk.”

  Well, well, every now and then I get lucky.

  We got back in the car, and I Googled the address of the Rose City. I looked back at Archie. “You up for one more stop, big boy?”

  Chapter Twelve

  The Rose City Senior Living Center was on Eighty-second Avenue in Southeast Portland, an area known not so affectionately as Felony Flats. Across from a used car lot and wedged between a beer joint and a mini-mart, the building had a weather-stained façade, squinty little windows, and a low, covered portico propped up with faux Greek columns needing paint. A large, free-form sculpture made from bent tubes of stainless steel welded together stood on one side of the entrance—the builder’s contribution to the arts, no doubt. It looked like a train wreck to me.

  As I approached the entrance, I fell in with a middle-aged couple. When they were buzzed in, I smiled, held the door, and then followed them into the elevator and got off on the fourth floor.

  Cecil Ferguson had been a big man once, but age and some wasting disease had stooped him at the shoulders and taken most of his body mass except for what held him together, skin stretched over bone, mostly. He had thinning, red-gone-to-gray hair, and his wavy nose and hollow cheeks swarmed with tiny blood vessels, most of them broken. His pale blue eyes blazed at me, as if all the life left in him had retreated there to make a final stand.

  “Who the hell are you?” He stood in the doorway, his bony fingers gripping the edge of the door, his hoarse words stalling between us from lack of breath.

  “My name’s Cal Claxton, Mr. Ferguson. I was wondering if I might speak to you for a few minutes.”

  “How’d you get in here?” The eyes got hotter. The anger that burned there seemed endemic, like something he’d carried around most of his life.

  “I came in with some folks who’re visiting one of your neighbors.”

  He considered that for a moment. “What do you want to talk about?”

  I hesitated for a couple of beats and decided to go straight at him. “Your old friend, Sherman Watlamet.” A momentary image of Watlamet’s shattered skull and wall-spattered brains flashed through my head.

  He laughed. “The chief? You know the chief?”

  “Uh, I met him the other day, yes.”

  He didn’t move. “You a cop?”

  “No. I’m a lawyer.” I handed him my card. “I just want to ask you a few questions, Mr. Ferguson. It won’t take long.”

  He stepped aside. “What the fuck. I’m not going anywhere.”

  Light filtered into the sparsely furnished room through soiled, gauzy curtains. The image of a female judge in a courtroom was frozen on a TV screen in the corner, and the warm air reeked of cigarettes and urine. Ferguson flicked off the TV and sat down in a recliner that had an oxygen cylinder propped against it. I sat across from him in a hard-backed chair. He fished a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and lit up with the casual grace of a longtime smoker.

  With the smoldering cigarette dangling from his lips he said, “Doc says I gotta quit these coffin nails, but I figure what’s the point?”

  I smiled and nodded. “Tough habit to quit.”

  He inhaled deeply and blew a cloud of blue smoke out of the corner of his mouth. His eyes burned like tiny gas flames. “The chief called me a couple of nights ago all hopped up on Jesus. Said he was gonna unburden himself or some shit like that. Is that what you want to talk about, Mr. Lawyer?”

  “Yeah, I think it is. I represent the granddaughter of Nelson Queah. I believe you knew Mr. Queah back when the Columbia dams were being built.” I paused and waited for a reaction.

  The line that was Ferguson’s mouth turned up at the ends like a smiling serpent, and he remained silent.

  “Queah disappeared the day they flooded the falls at Celilo. His granddaughter wants to know what really happened to him, you know, to put the matter to rest for the family and the tribe.”

  Ferguson leaned back in the recliner, took a drag on his cigarette, and appraised me. Then he smiled again, showing yellowed teeth and stretching the skin on his chin to translucence. “You can’t prove a damn thing, you know.”

  I struggled to hide my surprise. “I know that, Mr. Ferguson. This isn’t a criminal investigation. All I’m after here is the truth about the disappearance of Nelson Queah. We don’t think he killed himself or fell in the river. We think it was foul play.”

  “Why should I give a rat’s ass about some Indian or his granddaughter?” He laughed, a single “hah.” “Talk to the chief, Mr. Lawyer. He’s the one who wants to unburden himself.”

  “I can’t do that, Mr. Ferguson. Sherman Watlamet was murdered yesterday. Someone shot him with a high-powered rifle. I found the body.”

  “What?”

  “He’s dead.”

  Ferguson looked at me in disbelief for a long time, as if the words circled in his head with no place to land. “No, they wouldn’t do something like that.” He shook his head adamantly. “No. You’re wrong. It was some sort of accident.”

  “I can assure you it was no accident. The shooter took a couple of shots at me as well. Do you know something about this, Mr. Ferguson? Who’s they?”

  Ignoring the question, he wrapped his chest with his arms, closed his eyes, and began rocking back and forth. In a low, barely audible voice, he said, “Should’ve kept my fucking mouth shut.” He shook his head. “Ah, Sherman, you dumb son of a bitch.” Then he stopped rocking and covered his face with his hands.

  I leaned forward in my chair and spoke softly. “Who killed your friend, Mr. Ferguson?”

  After a long pause, he looked up slowly and gave me the serpentine smile again. Then he started to laugh, and the laugh turned to a deep, hacking cough. When he removed his hand from his mouth, a thin rope of spittle trailed down his chin. He drew himself up and looked at me, his eyes burning. “I’m no rat, Mr. Lawyer. And you can’t trace nothin’. I called ’em from a payphone.”

  “You’re not a rat if you tell me about it. These people killed your friend.”

  “Not gonna happen.” He paused again, and I waited, sensing he had something more he wanted to say. “But I’ll tell you this. The Chief did some pretty bad stuff in his day, but he never killed nobody, not directly, anyway.”

  “What did he want to confess?”

  Ferguson puffed a breath through his lips and smiled. “I don’t know. Probably that he took money to lie about what happened to Queah, maybe some other stuff he did to his Indian brothers he wasn’t too proud of. I suppose for an Indian that’s a big deal. Nobody else gives a shit.”

  “What happened to Queah?”

  He looked at me again with those blazing eyes and struggled to get up. “You need to get outa here now.” I got up and he followed me. When I turned at the door he smiled a knowing smile. “Tell his granddaughter he’s resting at his favorite spot—the bottom of the falls. I cracked his skull and put him there. Now get the hell out of here.” He shut the door with more strength than I thought he had.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I walked out of Ferguson’s apartment, not believing what I’d just heard. At my car, I leashed up Archie. We both needed a walk. We stopped at a little coffee shop three blocks down, where I bought a double cappuccino and took a seat at an outside table. I called Deputy Sheriff Grooms first and told her about my talk with Reverend Hinkley, careful to give the white lie that I’d noticed his name on a church bulletin in Watlamet’s house, not his number in the dead man’s cell phone. Then I filled her in on my visit with Cecil Ferguson, his reaction to Watlamet’s death, and the apparent confession he’d made.

  When I finished, Grooms paused a couple of beats before responding. “Well, looks like we got our answer on whether the murd
er’s related to that missing fella you’re investigating.”

  “Queah. His name’s Nelson Queah.”

  “Right. You’re right smack in the middle of this, aren’t you, Mr. Claxton?”

  “Not intentionally. I was just following up for my client. I didn’t expect Ferguson to know anything about the Watlamet homicide, and I sure as hell didn’t expect him to confess to killing Queah.”

  “Let me get this straight now. You’re saying that Ferguson told someone that Watlamet was gonna make some sort of confession about the missing man Queah?”

  “That’s right. He was going to admit that he lied about what happened all those years ago.”

  “And Ferguson told someone about this, then someone killed Watlamet to keep him quiet?”

  “Yeah, that’s what it sounded like to me.”

  “And this fella Ferguson knows who did it?”

  “I think so, yes.”

  After I gave her the address of the senior center, she said, “I’m gonna need another formal statement from you covering this new development, okay?”

  “I need to go home first so I can feed my dog and change my underwear.”

  She chuckled. “You make sure you do that now. You owe that pup of yours, you know. By the way, did you see The Dalles newspaper today? Our boy’s sketch’s on the front page, thanks to you. Who knows? Maybe we’ll get lucky and wrap this thing up quick.”

  My chest tightened a little. I didn’t feel quite as enthusiastic about the sketch going public as Grooms did. “I sure hope so,” was all I managed to say.

  Afterwards, I wondered if Watlamet’s murder had been picked up by The Oregonian. If it had, there was a good chance Winona had seen it, which wouldn’t be cool since I should’ve been the one to break the news. I went back into the coffee shop and found a paper, just to make sure. To my relief there wasn’t anything on the killing, which tended to bear out the complaint by the eastern part of the state that its news went essentially unreported by the Portland paper.

  I called Winona and got her this time. She said she’d been swamped all day and apologized for not getting back to me. I told her I had some news but didn’t want to discuss it on the phone. She said she was still working, suggested we meet at her office, and gave me directions.

  Pacific Salmon Watch was located in a tastefully renovated building in the Pearl, a warehouse district in Northwest Portland that was undergoing full-blown gentrification. When I cut the ignition Archie whined softly a couple of times. I turned around and took his head in my hands. “I promise, big boy, no matter what happens next, we’re going home tonight. You sit tight. I’ll be back with something to eat.”

  The receptionist told me “Dr. Cloud” was in a meeting and showed me to a small waiting area down the hall from her office. I thumbed through a spiffy four-color brochure describing the place and was comforted that an organization with such seeming clout was on the side of the fish. On the other hand, I wondered why the furniture was so damn nice.

  Her office door opened, and a familiar-looking man stepped out with Winona behind him. I watched unobserved as he turned to face her. He said, “Thanks so much, Win. Your help really means a lot to me.”

  She looked up at him and smiled, and I looked back down at the brochure.

  “Will I see you this weekend?” The man asked.

  “We’ll see.” Then she glanced over at me, smiled, and said, “Oh, Jason, I want you to meet someone.”

  I stood up. With the exception of a worn knit shirt I’d borrowed from Philip, I had on the same clothes I’d worn the day before, and I sported a large, blood-soaked bandage on my neck. To top it off, my Merrells were spattered with the dark stains of my own blood.

  “Jason, this is Cal Claxton. Cal, Jason Townsend. Cal’s the lawyer I told you about. The one helping me look into what happened to Grandfather.”

  He smiled broadly and shook my hand with the same firm grip of a week earlier. “Of course. You’re the lawyer from Dundee. Good to see you again, Cal.” He wore sharply pressed gray slacks and an expensive looking leather jacket, and his tan suggested he hadn’t spent the entire winter in Portland.

  “How’s the Senate race shaping up?”

  The smile became an ah-shucks grin. “We’re making progress, but it’s going to be an uphill fight.” Then he looked at Winona, who had let go of his hand. “Dr. Cloud, here, has been helping us define some of the environmental issues Oregon faces. I’m thankful to have her in my camp.”

  “I can understand why.”

  Townsend glanced at his watch. “Well, gotta run. Nice to see you again, Cal. I could sure use your help. Call me.” Then to Winona with an endearing look, “I’ll be in touch.”

  I followed her into her office and closed the door behind me. Her hair was pulled up and piled in a loose bun that accentuated her oval face and big, luminous eyes. We sat down and she smiled, although her eyes held concern. “What in the world happened to your neck, Cal?”

  “Uh, it’s quite a story.” I took her briefly through the events surrounding my discovery of Watlamet’s body and the aftermath.

  She sat rigidly in her chair, the color draining from her face. “My God, Watlamet’s dead, and you were nearly killed. Oh, Cal I’m so sorry. And this all started because he heard about my grandmother’s death and it triggered his conscience?”

  “Reverend Hinkley didn’t hear the name Queah, but I assume that’s what happened. Watlament wanted to get right with the Lord.”

  “This person, this killer, he’s still out there?”

  I nodded. “There’s more.” I described my meeting with Cecil Ferguson. When I finished, Winona lowered her head and clasped it in her hands. When she raised her head, her eyes were damp, her expression dazed. “So quickly? I can’t believe you unraveled this so quickly.” She took a tissue from a box on her desk and dabbed her eyes. “Thank you, Cal. I wish Grandmother could be here now. We knew all along Sherman Watlamet lied, and now we know he was paid to do it. What shame he brings to his family and his people. And this man, this Cecil Ferguson.” Her face grew rigid as she spoke the name. “He admitted killing Grandfather?”

  I nodded and repeated what he said, leaving out the part about where he put the body. “But apparently he doesn’t think anyone can prove it.”

  “Will the police arrest him?”

  “I’ve already talked to them. They’re going to pick him up for questioning. But I’m afraid they’ll be more interested in finding out who shot Watlamet than what happened to your grandfather, at least initially.”

  She nodded. “Do you think Ferguson will tell them what he told you?”

  I stroked my mustache and gathered my thoughts for a moment. “Hard to say. He was stunned by the news of Watlamet’s death. Maybe he’ll decide to tell all after he thinks about it. I think the man’s dying—emphysema or something—so maybe he’ll figure he has nothing to lose. Then, again, he might deny saying anything to me.”

  The muscles in her jaw flexed. “I want proof, Cal. I want something to take to the tribe.”

  “I know. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

  “Wait and see? Why do we have to just wait and see?” Her eyes grew huge, her lower lip trembled.

  I blanched and fought back an irrational feeling that Watlamet’s death was somehow my fault, that I should’ve prevented it. “Look, Winona, the deputy investigating the killing knows about your grandfather. I think she’ll work with us on getting some kind of statement from Ferguson. Trust me on this.”

  “Okay.”

  “Uh, there’s one more thing, Winona. Ferguson also told me where he put your grandfather’s body. He said he put him in his favorite place, at the bottom of Celilo Falls.”

  She looked down, seeming to study a ballpoint pen on her desk. Her eyes filled again, and a single tear fell to the desk like a raindrop. “Well, he’s i
n good company. A lot of good men died in those rapids fishing for salmon. And when the flood waters rose, the bones of our ancestors on the burial islands upriver were swept into the channel as well.” She nodded and showed a wisp of a smile. “Grandfather’s not alone down there.”

  Then she looked up. The smile was gone, and her eyes shone flat and hard. “Cecil Ferguson will pay for this.”

  The woman meant it. No doubt about it.

  Chapter Fourteen

  After leaving Winona’s office in the Pearl, I stopped at a Plaid Pantry and bought a bag of dog kibbles, two prepackaged turkey sandwiches, and a twelve ounce cup of black coffee. There was some light left, so Arch and I ate dinner in Tom McCall Park, a green belt that ran along the west side of the Willamette River in the center of Portland. The air was crisp with a hint of plum blossoms mingled with the smell of freshly cut grass. The low light had a soft reddish cast, and when the lights of the Morrison Bridge winked on they were reflected in the mirror that was the quiescent river.

  An hour and a half later, as we turned onto the gravel road leading up to my place, Archie was sitting up straight in the back seat and softly whimpering. The moon was full, but low and to the east, so the house was shrouded in deep shadow. I let Arch out when I opened the gate, and he ran next to the car as I taxied in. As soon as my headlights illuminated the front of the house I stopped the car, hit the brights, and took stock. Nothing caught my eye, and Archie gave no indication anything was amiss. Still, after I’d put the car in the garage I made a quick circuit of the house, carrying a flashlight and crowbar, rethinking all the while my decision to turn down Philip’s offer of a gun.

  I took a long, hot shower, being careful to keep the water off the bandage on my neck. Afterwards, I scrubbed off the condensation on the mirror with a fist, lifted one side of the bandage, and with a handheld mirror took a look. The wound was red and angry and possibly on its way to becoming infected. I might need to have it looked at after all, I conceded. I towel-dried my hair, suddenly flecked with more gray it seemed, and made a mental note to trim my mustache in the morning. I couldn’t help noticing a thickening in my waist and vowed to add a couple more miles to my jogging route.