Death Along the Spirit Road

by C. M. Wendelboe

  “Must have come after you pretty quick. The tire’s rubbing against the fender.”

  Manny nodded. “Get it fixed and give me the bill. Price is no object. Your tax dollars at work.” He forced a laugh, but Willie didn’t. “What did you find out?” Manny asked to get Willie’s mind off the damage.

  He slid the seat back before he reached into his rear pocket for his notebook and flipped pages. “There was a ton of info about the Red Cloud Corporation,” he began, “but not much about Jason. I researched the date of his parents’ accident that Verlyn Horn investigated. The Journal quoted him as claiming the brake lines had been cut, not ruptured as they’d initially reported. The Red Clouds came down that long hill just south of Interior and lost their brakes and plunged off a steep ravine. They lay there four days until a rancher found them.”

  “What? I didn’t catch that.”

  “I know you didn’t,” Willie agreed. “It’s like you’re in a dream or something.”

  If Manny were in a dream, Clara Downing was there with him.

  “I said, Verlyn Horn was certain they lost their brakes on that steep hill out of Interior.”

  “I know the hill he was talking about.”

  “Me, too,” Willie said. “The one before you come to Badlands Grocery. I could see them losing control if they had a head of steam and no brakes.”

  “What else did you learn about the accident?”

  “Not much.” Willie pinched Copenhagen between his thumb and forefinger, then offered the can to Manny. He shook his head, and Willie put the can back in his shirt pocket. Manny looked lovingly at the tobacco. It could be rolled tight in a piece of paper, and if it were dried just a little bit, it might light. “Because the accident happened on the rez, there wasn’t much coverage. The only reason it got written up at all is because the victims were Red Clouds.”

  “Any mention of AIM’s involvement?”

  He handed Manny a photocopied front page of the Rapid City Journal. Yellow marks dotted the copy where Willie had highlighted parts he felt were important. “There was mention of the Red Clouds opposing AIM, despite their son’s former involvement with the organization. Why do you ask?”

  Manny shrugged. “Call it a hunch. A man should always listen to his hunches in this business. That car wreck had AIM written all over it, just like Jason’s murder.”

  “AIM involved in Jason’s death? They haven’t been active for decades.”

  “But they’re not all dead. There’s some holdouts still lurking on Pine Ridge.”

  “Sure, they have the occasional AIM member run for councilman from time to time; Russell Means made an unsuccessful run for tribal chairman a few years ago, even made it to the primary again this year. But they’re just a bunch of hangers-around now. Just old men playing dominoes and wishing they had the power again like they did in the 1970s.”

  Manny grabbed a piece of gum from his shirt pocket and peeled back the foil. It was gooey from body heat. He popped it into his mouth and licked his sticky fingers. “Jason’s resort was to be at Wounded Knee. On sacred ground, at least that’s the way it’s been played in the media. Wounded Knee is sacred to AIM.”

  “Most people I know on the rez think the massacre site is sacred, too. AIM doesn’t have a monopoly on that.”

  “That’s true, but AIM’s been more vocal about it. Some members are opposed to any outsiders even coming onto Pine Ridge at all. They’ve pushed to ban Whites from even watching a Sun Dance.”

  “Then how did the permits for the resort get through the tribal council?” Willie asked. “AIM doesn’t have the muscle it once did, and I doubt the threat of protests hold fear like it once did. But I’d have thought there would be an uproar over allowing the project to be built on sacred ground.”

  “Economics.” Manny reached for the radio, found powwow music faint and breaking up on KILI, and turned it low. “People are no different here than they are elsewhere. Jason promised prosperity for the tribe. He claimed the resort was just the start. People got hungry, got greedy, and the measure passed the council.”

  “That brings us back to AIM involvement.”

  “So we better talk with whatever militants are left.”

  “I only know one,” Willie said. “Reuben. He’d be the first one I’d visit with.”

  Manny agreed. “But I better talk with him alone this time. Find anything else?”

  Willie flipped another page in his notebook. “Sonja Myers. That’s one shark that’s out for herself.”

  Manny recalled the softness of her voice, the way she sat close to him at the bistro. He wouldn’t describe Sonja as a shark. Opportunistic and conniving, but not a shark.

  “The networks have their eyes on her,” Willie continued. “She has the looks and the education. The ability to make people tell her things, all sorts of things. All she has to do is break one story and she’s rocketed right out of Smallville to the big time.”

  “That what Journal people told you?”

  Willie smiled. “I found a lot of people who’d talk with me about her. Except for her making the majors, everyone would like to see her move on—soon. People warned me to watch her, so I’m warning you. She took things out of context before and she’ll do so again.”

  “Thanks for the advice.” Manny settled back in the seat while his mind switched from Sonja to Clara.

  They drove out of Rapid City past the green fields that melded into prairie grasses as tall as antelope. Both sat quiet, and Manny was thankful for that. He had other things on his mind: Clara Downing. She had been something more than charming. She had allowed him to forget his problems with Nathan Yellow Horse and Sonja Myers and Niles the Pile and the stitches in his head and hand.

  He fought down the urge to rip the bandage off and rub his wound raw. Instead, he concentrated on remembering his time in the Red Cloud offices. Clara had treated him as an equal. Even though Manny had been hired as a minority in the bureau, he had a reputation as a top investigator and academy instructor. But he never quite lost the feeling that people treated him as Indian first and senior special agent second. The bureau always went out of its way to be racially tolerant with other minority agents. Indians were treated differently, although Manny could not exactly quantify it.

  But here where Indians were populous, old racial biases rose to the surface once again. Relations had improved since he’d lived here, but his Lakota heritage was never far beneath the surface when he talked with people. But Clara had respected him. He wanted to cash in the rain check for dinner sooner than later.

  Then Reuben pushed thoughts of Clara aside. Though Manny never concluded a case in his mind until he had uncovered sufficient facts, he had to admit that Reuben rose to the top of the dung heap as the prime suspect in Jason’s murder. Tomorrow he might have his answers from his brother, for what happened to Jason as well as what happened to the Red Clouds nearly thirty years ago. Tomorrow he would reinterview Reuben.

  CHAPTER 13

  The entire trip back to the reservation, the tire thump-thumpthumped against the crumpled fender. It didn’t help any that Willie’s tires had less tread than his boots had. By the time they crossed the Pine Ridge line, chunks had begun to break off. One flew into the air and was caught by the rearview mirror before falling away. Willie strained to control the truck as it darted into road ruts. He slowed down to a crawl as they approached Manny’s apartment.

  “I’ll park it here. Call a wrecker tomorrow to cart it away to the body shop. Maybe get a new paint job, a new set of tires, since price is no object.”

  Manny could say nothing in his defense. He unlocked the rental car and slipped behind the wheel. Willie stood by the open passenger door.

  “Get in, I’m not that bad of a driver. You’ll be all right. I’ll regale you with tall tales of my exploits.”

  “All right.” Willie folded himself into the car. “But drive careful, and tell me about your exploits later, when you’re not behind the wheel. I’d rather you tell me
something about Aunt Lizzy’s AIM days. She doesn’t talk much about that.”

  Manny drove slowly, carefully to Elizabeth’s house, so as not to cause Willie to jump out of the moving car in fear of his life. “What do you want to know?”

  “She said that she, Reuben, and Jason were all close once, back in the day.”

  Manny jerked his hand away from his bandage. “The three of them were inseparable back then. Except when Elizabeth was pregnant with Erica, they attended every AIM function together.”

  “Aunt Lizzy always laughs and tells me she met Reuben in prison.” Willie grabbed his can of Copenhagen. The pungent odor caught Manny by surprise, and he yearned for a cigarette.

  “She did. When AIM took over Alcatraz prison in 1969, Reuben was one of AIM’s special enforcers, someone who kept the peace internally during the occupation. Elizabeth was one of the occupiers. That’s when they started their relationship—behind the bars of Alcatraz.”

  “She talks about Reuben now and again,” Willie said. “Talks fondly, even after all these years. She must have loved him a lot.”

  “I’m certain she did.” Manny drove past the Batesland Store toward Elizabeth’s house. “But when he killed Billy Two Moons, she had to do what was best for Erica. She’s always done what she had to do for Erica, and I can’t fault her for having ambition.”

  Willie nodded. “She worked her tail off for that finance position, and it fits her. Everyone on the rez knows she’s honest and thorough, and people look up to her for that. I’m as proud of her as she is of herself.”

  They turned onto Elizabeth’s gravel driveway and Willie grabbed his overnight bag from the backseat.

  “Will she be gone long?”

  Willie shrugged. “Hard telling. When Aunt Lizzy goes shopping, she may be gone for hours. Especially when she’s with Rachael Thompson, who’s a shopping legend around here.”

  Manny had never been married, never been close enough to a woman to know her shopping habits, but he had married colleagues who stood around watercoolers talking about their wives’ shopping marathons. If Elizabeth would be gone that long, Manny understood why she would want her nephew to house-sit until she returned. Elizabeth’s business associate had been killed recently, and her FBI agent ex-brother-in-law had been attacked. Willie’s presence would ease her fear.

  “I’ll pick you up in the morning, and we’ll go over those recent lab results. I want to be prepared when I interview Reuben.”

  Willie unbuttoned his shirt as he walked toward the house. Manny waited until he retrieved the house key from the flower bed before he drove away, and the washboard gravel road leading to the highway jarred his thoughts. How would he interview Reuben tomorrow? He’d finalize his attack when he ran tonight, when thoughts came more clearly. From a thousand interrogations, he’d pull pieces of what had worked and what had failed in his interviews.

  As he drove past the shelter belt along the road, his mind wandered. He found it hard to think of Reuben and the investigation. He let Clara Downing fill his thoughts, remembering how she had leaned against Jason’s office door, one lithe leg crossed over the other, hair falling freely onto her shoulders. She had the most wry smile he had ever seen, projecting that “Want a good time, sailor?” look. Yet she was no tawdry madam but a sophisticated woman, and that made her flirting with him especially intriguing. He longed to return to Rapid City and cash in that rain check.

  But he had little time for his own wants. The investigation had stalled, and he was not much closer than when he began. On the bright side, Clara Downing was part of this. She had vital knowledge he needed, and for that, he would have to visit with her again. Soon. Perhaps tomorrow after he talked with Reuben. Perhaps.

  Headlights suddenly filled his rearview mirror. In a heartbeat, something slammed into the rear of his car. His forehead hit the steering wheel. His head whipped around. Behind him. Coming fast. A truck. Manny floored the accelerator and stiffened his arms on the wheel. The truck hit him again. His arms buckled. A back tire caught a crumpled fender and he skidded sideways in the road.

  Manny gripped the wheel, but the Taurus skidded across both lanes, ran over a delineator post that punctured the radiator, and stalled. Steam rose from the dying motor while the truck’s lights illuminated him. Motionless, Manny strained to see the driver as the truck lurched forward and T-boned him on the passenger-side door. The car rolled. And rolled, and rolled. Manny scooted down in the seat, bracing himself. The car teetered once before it stopped with the passenger side up.

  Manny lay against the driver’s door and forced one eye open. The other was stuck shut. Sticky warm blood oozed between his fingers as he gingerly touched his head. Glass, gritting on his skin, mixed with blood as it trickled down his forehead, the stitches in his head pulling apart and breaking open. He closed the open eye against the blood and glass and spat out a broken tooth. His labored breathing came in short gasps, and he sprayed blood over the windshield from a split lip.

  He tugged at the seat belt. Stuck. Pulled harder. Pain shot through his chest. He stopped when he heard a door slam. Close. Close enough that footsteps approaching in the dry grass echoed in his ears. Purposeful footsteps, footsteps that approached to ensure the truck had done its job. He bit his lip to stay conscious. To analyze. Was there one set of footsteps, or two? Were they hard steps, or soft?

  He tried reaching the Glock. Three steps. Closer. Reached again. Steps stopped outside his shattered window. He lay on his arm, trapped, unable to get to the weapon. He willed his labored breathing to stop. He told the rising and falling of his chest to be still. He lay quiet, listening, praying to God he could pull it off. His hand fell automatically onto his medicine bundle.

  Someone shined a flashlight into Manny’s car. Through his closed eyelids, Manny saw all this as if he was sitting in a theater watching some dark, foreboding movie. Light played across his lids. He wanted to open them, wanted to get a look at his attacker, but he didn’t. The driver squatted inches from him, close enough that Manny felt warm puffs of breath on his neck through the window. He struggled to remain conscious. His cop side took over, and he listened for anything that would later identify the driver. If he lived through this.

  For the first time since childhood, he clutched his medicine bundle and prayed to Wakan Tanka, the Great Mysterious of the universe, giver of all things. He prayed his attacker wouldn’t realize he was still alive. Wakan Tanka, unsimalaye, he prayed. Wakan Tanka, pity me. He had no time to reflect from what part of his distant memory the old words came, and he slowed his breathing more.

  His sight returned, yet his eyes remained closed. Even as a boy during the hanbleceyapi, when he had sat for four days and nights crying for a vision, he had not had one. Hoofbeats neared, while the sweet scent of lilac reached him. Was this how a man faded into the other life to journey south along the Spirit Road, the Wanagi Tacanku? Amid collective memories and forgotten teachings? Maybe he was that close to death that his vision would come to him now. He wanted to cry out to the meadowlark he heard in his head, for he knew the meadowlark spoke Lakota, but no sound came from his lips.

  The hoofbeats grew louder. Riders neared. Bugles blared. The wailing of mothers louder than the horses. What were the surviving sisters and wives shouting to him? Where were they pointing? What did they want of a man lying near death, fighting for his life in a wrecked car along a dark reservation road? Before losing consciousness, Manny thought that these ancients had finally arrived to carry him home along the Spirit Road.

  Manny heard muffled talk somewhere to his left. He opened one eye, the other blocked by a gauze bandage. Desirée stood over him, her face inches from his, her lips painted like they had bad intentions.

  “I thought we’d lost you,” Desirée said.

  He tried sitting, but fell back down onto the pillow. He drew in a quick breath. A stabbing pain in his chest caused his breath to come up short. Elastic constricted, and he knew he had broken or bruised ribs. He closed his eyes.
Shallow breaths now, coming quicker as he tried to match his breathing with the throbbing in his head.

  Antiseptic stung his nostrils, like someone running ammonia under his nose. He was certain that the hospital staff had used about a gallon on him before patching him up. The room shone clean, unlike the would-be-rental-car-grave he last remembered. “I’m at the hospital?”

  She smiled a wide set of perfect pearlies. He looked at her as if for the first time since they were in school, since that time she left him for Lumpy. Slight crow’s feet tugged at the corners of her eyes, just enough to reveal she’d aged as he had, except she looked like she was ten years younger. She bent over, showing more chest than he needed to see right then. “I came as soon as I heard you were admitted.”

  “Let me guess: Lumpy told you I was here.”

  “What are ex-husbands for?”

  “Hoka hey.” Willie filled the doorway. He held a foam cup of steaming coffee. His grin was exaggerated, but his face was ashen and bags had formed under his eyes. “How you feel?”

  “I feel like you look.”

  “Been up all night since I heard you’d been in an accident.”

  “That was no accident,” Manny said.

  Willie turned a chair around beside the bed and sat backward on it. He rested his beefy arms on the chair back as he sipped his coffee.

  “Where . . . ?” Manny craned his neck to look at Desirée with his one good eye. “I’m afraid Officer With Horn has some confidential information to share with me.”

  Desirée frowned, then a smile lit her face. “Well, the least I can do is take care of you when you get released. Just rap on the wall and I’ll come over.” Just before she walked out of the room, she glanced back over her shoulder and blew him a kiss. Willie waited until the sound of her footsteps had died.

  “Guess you have a new love interest.”