Death Where the Bad Rocks Live

by C. M. Wendelboe

  Manny eased an inch closer, his leg cramping up, calculating if he could get out of the path of the bullet in time.

  “Dozi killed Micah Crowder that day I went to Marshal’s cabin,” Sophie continued. “I often stayed there when I went to gather porcupine quills when Marshal wasn’t around. Benny Black Fox met me on the road after changing a lightbulb on the KILI tower. Said a red Indian had been chasing an old beater Pontiac. I thought it was Hamilton chasing someone and found Joe Dozi instead. He’d already killed Micah and jumped when I come on to him. But he holstered his gun. He knew I went there often hunting porcupine and knew I wouldn’t turn him in and jeopardize Hamilton’s judicial appointment. Guess the thought of an old woman killing him never crossed his mind.”

  Manny slid his feet an inch closer. “Did you shoot Marshal?”

  “You mean did I kill him?”

  Manny shook his head. “He’ll recover.”

  Sophie’s eye twitched. Her jaw muscles worked against something imaginary, her ill-fitting teeth clicking, her own breaths coming faster. “What do you mean, he’ll recover?”

  “The bullet followed the skull cap, but just separated a skull suture. That’s the odd things about .22s—they often take an odd path when they hit a body.”

  “You lie.”

  “He’ll live and tell my investigator who shot him when he comes to. It’ll still come out that Judge High Elk’s mother shot Marshal Ten Bears, no matter what you do with me.”

  “I’ll think of something,” she said after a long pause. “Like I thought where Marshal and Hamilton would have hiked to. I took the south path, and found Marshal alone.”

  “In Hamilton’s Suburban, because your car was still in the shop in Gordon for undercarriage damage the last time you drove to Marshal’s cabin?”

  “You knew?”

  “I called. The mechanic said the front end was all tore up. Damned rugged roads.”

  Sophie nodded. “Hamilton had gone off by himself to pray and Marshal was easy pickings. Just like Joe, he didn’t suspect an old woman of anything bad.”

  “But why Marshal? He didn’t know any of this.”

  “He was the last one that knew just where the bad rocks live. He was with Gunnar that week when they found the uranium deposits. He would have dragged Hamilton down when all this got out. I couldn’t let that happen with the Supreme Court nomination in the balance.”

  Manny inched closer, and his foot nudged the lamp. Sophie shouldered the gun, aiming it at his head, and Manny willed his muscles to relax, telling himself that relaxed muscles react quicker than taut ones do, telling himself he had to rush her. He wouldn’t go without fighting as had Joe Dozi and Gunnar Janssen. The candlelight bounced off her teeth that looked as if they were ready to drop out, flicked off eyes narrowed with a hatred for someone who would harm her son. In an instant, Manny knew Sophie was crazy.

  He slid his foot forward. Sophie’s finger tightened. The distance was too great. His heart raced. His chest pounded. A board on the porch creaked. Sophie shot a glance at the door and, in that heartbeat of time, Manny ducked and rushed her. She shot, the bullet shattering his elbow as his shoulder hit her. Manny fell to the floor atop the kicking, screaming woman clawing to get to her gun trapped underneath her.

  “Don’t do that!” Ham burst into the room ahead of Willie. He grabbed the rifle and kept it out of her reach as Ham picked Sophie up. She fought to get around her son, but Ham wrapped her tight in his arms.

  “Benny Black Fox called me,” Willie said, his eyes darting between Sophie and Manny’s elbow. Blood oozed onto the floor, and Willie bent to him. “Benny told me the judge was walking out of the Stronghold. He’d been looking for Marshal. I picked the judge up walking out and filled him in.”

  “About what?”

  “When Benny Black Fox called me, he also said it was Sophie driving away from the Stronghold in her rez rod the day he saw Joe chasing Micah. When I couldn’t get you back on the phone, I came here as quick as I could.”

  Ham stroked Sophie’s head and kissed her lightly on the temple.

  Willie guided Manny into a chair and ripped his shirtsleeve away from the elbow and reached for his bandanna. “When I talked with Sonja, she told me Sophie’s car had gotten tore up somewhere. I put two and three together and thought what better place to tear a car up than that area around Marshal’s cabin. Those roads can be hell on four-wheel drives, let alone a rez rod on its last leg. Now let’s get you to the emergency room. Again.”

  “What about Sophie? Who’s going to bring her in?”

  “The best person we can think of. A sitting federal judge.”

  CHAPTER 37

  They all stood from the conference table when Judge Alexander Hamilton High Elk entered the room. He motioned for them to sit. “If you argue a case or testify in my court, then you can stand.”

  Lumpy was the last to sit, and he leaned against the table shooting smug looks at Manny. “You understand, your honor, that it wasn’t the Oglala Sioux Tribe that put you on the suspect list for Joe Dozi’s and Micah Crowder’s murders. We got more sense than that.”

  Ham glanced at the Moses Ten Bears print on the wall and smiled before he took a seat. “I can see that.”

  “Your mother?” Manny asked. “Will she be all right?”

  Ham’s mouth downturned and he cleared his throat. When he spoke, it was with a clear, soft voice, as if addressing petitioners. “She’ll be evaluated mentally. Given her age, she won’t set foot in court for the homicides. Or see the light of day outside that mental hospital.” Maybe she’ll become friends with Lizzy.

  “Sorry to hear that.” Willie had put on a starched uniform, and sat clean-shaven. “I know what that’s like.”

  Pee Pee popped a PEZ into his mouth from Elvis, and motioned around the table. Everyone declined except Ham. He held out his hand, and Precious popped one into his palm.

  Ham scrunched his face up. “Never could figure what people saw in these things.”

  “Me neither,” Pee Pee admitted, and winked at Lumpy.

  They sat in silence, Manny waiting to hear what the announcement was, the one that Ham wanted those around the room to hear first. Ham cleared his throat. “I pulled out of the Senate confirmation hearings. I withdrew my name.”

  “I told you not to consider the judge a suspect.” Lumpy pounded his fist on the table. “Now see what…”

  Ham patted Lumpy’s hand. “It’s got nothing to do with the investigation, Chief.”

  Lumpy’s chest puffed out and he sat back in Elvis as if he were grateful someone had at last recognized his rank.

  “I’d be less than confident of Agent Tanno if he hadn’t considered me a suspect. No, I finally realized I can do so much more for our people remaining on the federal bench just where I am.”

  “I hear that you’ve ordered the Department of Energy to investigate the Cheyenne River,” Manny said.

  Ham frowned, but his eyes still smiled. “After talking with doctors here, I’m convinced there’s contaminates in there—and the surrounding area—that’ll show radiation levels far in excess of safe tolerances. When that study comes back, then the federal government can begin cleanup. Being a federal judge with reservation jurisdiction, I’m in the best position to review mining issues. And you all know my feelings on that by now.”

  Willie smiled. “Then it’s safe to assume permits won’t be granted? That sacred men will be able to go into the Stronghold and pray when Wakan Tanka calls them?”

  Ham smiled. “And anyone else who wants to pray there. White or Indian.”

  “Tell me, your honor, how was it that you didn’t hear your mother shoot Marshal?”

  Ham smiled at Lumpy. “Now who’s still putting me on the suspect list?”

  Lumpy stuttered, and Ham laughed. “Don’t sweat it, Chief. Fact is, Marshal needed to do a Sending Away ceremony for his Grandfather Moses. When he stopped at where the old Buick had been, I went ahead to the rim of the Stronghold mesa,
to where Chief Big Foot led his band away from the 7th Cavalry that winter of 1890, before he came into the agency, and the rest, as they say, is sad history.”

  Manny closed his eyes, recalling the miles between Marshal’s cabin and the rim of the Stronghold. “That’d make sense. You wouldn’t have been able to hear a high-powered rifle, let alone Sophie’s little .22.”

  Ham nodded. “It was toward evening when I got back to where I’d left Marshal, but he wasn’t there. I thought he’d got tired of waiting and hiked back without me. I camped overnight and humped out the next day. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to visit my mother before they transport her to Yankton State Hospital for her psych eval.”

  They all stood, and Lumpy stopped Ham. “Your withdrawal from the nomination—is this something we need to keep under our hats for now?”

  Ham shook his head and smiled. “I suspect some foxy reporter from the Rapid City Journal will pry the story out of me somehow. I’m certain it’ll hit the stands today.”

  Lumpy escorted Ham from the justice building, limping back into the room. He propped his feet up on the conference table, rubbing them through the boots. He winced in pain as he glared at Pee Pee.

  “Don’t blame me, boss. You were the one that insisted I sell you that pair of Elvis boots. You knew they were two sizes too small for you when you bought them.”

  “You want them back?”

  Pee Pee shook his head and picked his dentures with a paper clip. “Naw. I didn’t want them in the first place.”

  Lumpy’s face reddened, and Manny was certain he would have run around the table and choked Pee Pee. If he could have stood. “Well, at least we should charge Doreen Big Eagle for assaulting Janet.”

  “Can’t,” Willie said. “She jumped Janet in Pennington County. Not exactly the rez.”

  “Well, someone should prosecute Doreen.”

  “It was kind of self-defense.” Manny walked to the coffeepot and grinned at Lumpy. “Doreen was just protecting her man.”

  “Still don’t see why Doreen went berserk like she did.”

  “No? Maybe it was when Janet slipped up and told about Willie’s Durango getting keyed outside the Alex Johnson. How someone had started on the front fender and ended up over the back wheel well. Willie stuck the outfit in the body shop right after that to get fixed. On your order.”

  “And I never mentioned anything about where the damage was to anyone except Manny,” Willie added. “Now if you could testify that Janet went to the body shop…”

  “You know I can’t.” Lumpy waved the thought away. A long silence followed. “You know I did what I could for that girl ever since she was little. Even then she was a handful. I thought if she got into police work that she’d be forced to walk the straight and narrow.”

  “More like the loopy and wide,” Willie said.

  Lumpy agreed. “She got herself in real deep this time. It’s bad enough that she’ll be charged in Rapid City for keying Willie’s Durango, but also for breaking the window of his truck and stealing his flashlight.”

  “Guess that’s out of your jurisdiction, boss,” Pee Pee said, twirling a wispy strand of gray ponytail. “Can’t cover for her up there.”

  “And her framing Henry Lone Wolf’s frustrating. Framing another Lakota…”

  “He’s not Lakota,” Manny smiled. “He’s Italian.”

  Lumpy dropped his feet onto the floor and winced. “How’s that? Henry’s lived here all his life.”

  “My uncle Marion said Henry’s family came here to work on a WPA crew and left Henry when the jobs ran out. He looked Indian enough—and talked Indian enough—everyone just figured him to be Lakota. His real name is Domanali.”

  “A pant-shitting Italian. Damn him.”

  Willie smiled. “Let’s say this is the day for benevolence. I won’t press charges for Janet breaking my truck window and stealing my flashlight if you tell Rapid City PD you don’t want prosecution for her keying my Durango.”

  Lumpy smiled and sat up straight in Elvis. “You’d do that for her?”

  “That and the promise that she’ll never set foot in a police car again.”

  Lumpy paused, his eyes concentrating on the ceiling, mulling over the proposition.

  “You going to get a better offer today?”

  “Okay. Done. We won’t pursue charges. And I’ll see to it she doesn’t climb in a patrol car again. At least not one that she’s driving.”

  Willie parked the Durango on the hill overlooking Marshal’s house. “You sure you’ll be all right, with that arm? And you’re still gimpy from the cat. By the way, you never mentioned what you did with him.”

  Manny rubbed the itching leg as if the cat were clawing him right this moment. “He got better and just left the garage last night.”

  “Left or was helped?”

  “Let’s just say if Elvis were here, he would have been the one helping the cat out the garage.”

  “Elvis, as in Tony Lama Elvis?”

  Manny nodded and got out of the Dodge, holding his arm in a sling from where the bullet had shattered it. “And I may be stoved in, but Marshal just got out of intensive care last week. He’s on the mend worse than I am. Besides, he called me because he wanted to show me something, not to ambush me.”

  Manny started to close the door when Willie stopped him. “Just so you know, I appreciate it.”

  “Appreciate what?”

  “The help. I would have fallen on my face…”

  Manny started to speak, but Willie held up his hand. “Let me say this while I can. Thanks for steering me right. If I’d have stumbled, Lieutenant Looks Twice would have replaced me. Even if Janet wasn’t in the picture anymore.”

  Manny smiled. “Call it selfish on my part. The better investigator you become, the less I have to do.”

  Manny stumbled on popcorn gravel along the trail leading to the Ten Bears cabin. Marshal watched him from his porch, sitting in an Adirondack chair and smoking a briar pipe with a copy of Cowboys and Indians open on his lap.

  Manny nodded to the magazine. “Ever think what it would have been like to be one of those cowboys instead of an Indian?”

  Marshal pointed to the bandage encircling his torso. “Couldn’t have been any less painful, what with getting this old shack ready to move across from Billy Mills Hall.”

  “I heard you decided to donate it for the Cultural Center. I figured you’d eventually want others to see where your Grandfather Moses lived and did his work.”

  “And could have been rich if he’d wanted.”

  Manny nodded. “Could have been quite wealthy, from what art historians say about his works.”

  “Well, someone will be wealthy.”

  “How’s that?”

  Marshal used the arms of the chair to stand. “I’ll show you.” He paused a moment to catch his breath as he rubbed his stomach and the bandages constricting his chest. He led Manny into the cabin and chin-pointed to the wall that Moses had covered with wood, the wall that had held out the mighty west wind. Manny squinted, allowing his eyes to adjust to the dim light. Marshal lit a kerosene lamp and handed it to Manny. “There.”

  Manny stepped close to the wall and held the light up. Paintings, some on canvas, some on deer or elk hides, had been sandwiched between the outer wall and the inner wood layer. Other paintings had been laid on the bunks. Moses’s visions.

  “When I decided to donate it to the tribe, I decided I’d like them to have it in the condition Grandfather originally had it—with no inner walls to hold out the wind. Grandfather had nailed up scrap wood over the inner walls, but the wood had rotted and came away with little effort. Grandfather used the paintings people didn’t want for insulation.”

  Manny nodded, thinking of Sophie’s shack with newspapers stuffed inside the walls, and the cabin he and Unc lived in when Manny was a boy. “People used most anything they could back in the day to keep out the wind.” He played the light around the pictures. “These must be all the m
issing Ten Bears paintings. They’re worth millions. You’re rich.”

  Marshal shook his head, a smile crossing his weathered face, a smile Manny had not seen before. “I’m going to donate them to the tribe, with the caveat they display them. So people can get insight into Moses Ten Bears the sacred man.”

  “I thought that’s what you wanted—enough to live comfortably?”

  “When I was laying in that hospital room, unconscious, I could hear things, could think things, even though I couldn’t move. I got to appreciate the life I had before Sophie High Elk shot me. I swore if I ever recovered enough that I could live life again—really live—that money wouldn’t be my main pursuit.”

  Manny had his own revelation, mending in the hospital with Clara doting over him. He made an appointment that day—or rather asked Clara to make it—and, between his diabetes medicine and the little blue pill, he was confident that his relationship with Clara would work out.

  “The paintings would have the potential of bringing the tribe great wealth. Enough that they won’t have to even consider money from uranium mining.”

  “Oh I don’t think they have to worry about that, not with Hamilton remaining on the federal bench.”

  “You know about his decision to withdraw his name?”

  Marshal nodded. “We both decided on our walkabout that we’d prefer the Stronghold left just as Grandfather Moses wanted it—untouched and unscathed by the wasicu.”

  CHAPTER 38

  DECEMBER 1944

  Moses, cramped in the seat beside Ellis Lawler, wriggled to get comfortable. He couldn’t. They just didn’t make cars to fit him.

  “When the hell are we going to get to the center of the deposit?”

  Pissy little man. “Too soon. Did you know that men do not come back from where the bad rocks live?”

  “Like, nothing leaves the Stronghold?” Ellis took another pull from his mason jar of whiskey. “Another of your silly Oglala legends?” Ellis laughed, but Moses detected nervousness in that laugh. “We’ll just get this trip over and done with, and you and me won’t have to go anywhere else together again.”