Rock with Wings

by Anne Hillerman

  “I’m OK.”

  Bahe nodded. “We work with a hataalii here, a good man. Maybe you’ve heard of him.” He gave Chee the name. “I’m going to ask him to help us with that back there.” He nodded in the direction of the hotel. “If those bones are human, by some bizarre chance, we can deal with that, too.”

  Chee knew of the healer by reputation but had never attended one of his ceremonies. He appreciated Bahe’s concern. “Let me know, and I will come back for that with Bernie. It would be a good thing.”

  Chee called Bernie before he ventured into his cousin’s land of no phone service. To his joy, she answered. She was at work, and she talked about the burned car and Mr. Tso’s grandson and the old man’s skinwalker theory.

  “How’s your day going?” she asked.

  He told her.

  “I think that big shot from the movie company killed Samuel,” she said, “but it was an accident. He and Samuel were in the drug business together, and Samuel wanted more money.”

  “Interesting guess.”

  “Anything new in the case of the bloody towels?”

  “No.”

  “What if the necklace belonged to a tourist woman who found it in a pawnshop or an antique store or something? She has plenty of jewelry. She hasn’t even missed it. Mystery solved.”

  “So why were she and whoever making so much noise in there? Why the blood?”

  “And how is it tied to the man with the cocaine and the dead person?” Her laugh made him miss her all the more. “You know what the Lieutenant would tell you?” She continued before he could think of a good answer. “He always said to trust our instincts. What does your gut say?”

  “The necklace belonged to a person, a woman, who slept in the room and is connected to the bloody towels. Something bad happened to her, or she did something that she’s ashamed of there. She never would have abandoned that necklace if she could have claimed it. And whatever happened wasn’t a crime of passion.”

  “Why not?”

  “Beside the laundry, the person left the maid a tip.” It felt good to brainstorm with Bernie.

  “I was going to e-mail the Lieutenant the photograph of the necklace you sent me. I forgot.” She gave Leaphorn’s address to Chee. “You can ask him to help. I think he’d like to be involved with police work again.”

  “Speaking of passionately missing something, I can’t wait to see you again.”

  “I thought you were enjoying your work up there.”

  “I am. Bahe’s great, and it’s nice to spend some time with Paul in the evenings, help him get his business going. This movie stuff is interesting, too. It’s giving me—”

  “I’ve got to go.” Chee heard a siren in the background and the squawk of Bernie’s radio. She hung up without saying “I love you,” or giving him time to say it either.

  Before he switched off, Chee found his photo of the necklace. He sent it to Leaphorn with a cc to Bernie and a note: “Can you help ID this? Might be linked to a crime.”

  As he logged off, he heard someone approaching behind him, the sound of footsteps on the hard floor. Instead of heading to the break room, Officer Tsinnie was walking to his desk.

  “Yá’át’ééh,” said Chee. “Are you enjoying your day?”

  “It’s OK. I heard Paul had a bad time this morning. His funny Jeep broke down out there. My uncle’s company had to come and get his customers.”

  Poor Paul, Chee thought. He should have done a better job on the repair. “My cousin was lucky your uncle could help. Do things like that happen very much out here?”

  “Not with the good operators.” She waited a beat and then said, “There’s a young woman out there who asked to see you. Her eyes are red from crying.”

  “Me?”

  “She says she met you at the movie site.”

  “That slender blond woman, Melissa?”

  “No—a teenager with one of those little metal rings here.” Tsinnie pinched her right eyebrow.

  “Is there another girl with her?”

  “One groupie isn’t enough for you?”

  “It’s not that—” But Tsinnie had already left.

  Chee found Courtney pacing in the lobby.

  “What’s up?”

  “Can I talk to you? It’s complicated.”

  “Take your time.” He motioned her to some folding chairs by the wall and sat next to her. Her bravado from last night had faded, leaving a scared young woman in its place.

  “It’s about my dad and Alisha. She ran away or something, and now he’s gone too. I’m worried.” She got up, shoved her hands deep into her pants pockets. Sat back down again.

  “Go on. What happened?”

  “You remember how Alisha was acting the other night? All quiet and weirded out?”

  “Yeah.”

  “This morning, Dad noticed some big bruises on her arm. Dad asked her if you had hurt her. She shook her head, and then she said it had nothing to do with you, that you were nice to us. And then she started to sob, and Daddy hugged her. When she stopped crying, she said she didn’t want to talk about it.”

  Chee remembered Alisha rubbing her arm. He listened intently now.

  “Dad kept saying that nobody had the right to hurt his daughter, saying she needed to tell him whatever happened so he could take care of it. Finally, she told about the pictures. Then Dad got really mad, and she ran outside and she didn’t come back.”

  “Are you talking about something that happened at the movie site?”

  “You remember that guard guy?”

  “Samuel?”

  “He caught Alisha because she had the flashlight and didn’t turn it off. I was running ahead of her, and I hid behind the trailer. I couldn’t see them, but I heard him yelling at her and her crying and him yelling more, and then it got quiet. I didn’t know that guy was a creep. I should have helped her instead of hiding, but—” Courtney pressed her lips together and then relaxed them.

  “You’re helping her now by talking to me. Go on. What pictures?” He remembered Samuel claiming the girls wanted a picture of Rhonda and her trailer.

  Courtney compressed her lips more tightly. Took a breath. “Alisha said Samuel made her lift up her shirt like they do in those Wild Girl movies. He said he would put the pictures on the Internet if she told anybody. She’s my little sister, and I shouldn’t have let him do that.”

  “He might have hurt you, too, and you couldn’t have stopped him. Don’t blame yourself. You said that Alisha ran away. Is she still missing?”

  Courtney nodded. “After she told Dad, Alisha started crying again and went outside into the parking lot. I started to go after her there, but Dad said to let her be because she needed to calm down and have some alone time. When she didn’t come back, we walked around the hotel looking for her. Then he got in the car and told me to stay there to let him know if she returned. That was a long time ago.”

  “What time did all this happen?”

  Alisha had gone missing a few hours before Chee found Samuel’s body, according to Courtney.

  “You did a smart thing by coming here now. Maybe he found her and they are both back and worried about you. Come on. I’ll drive you to Goulding’s.”

  But Alisha wasn’t in the hotel room, and neither was her father.

  Courtney asked, “Will you look for her?”

  “Sure. But you need to stay here as our information center so you can let me know when you hear from your dad or your sister. Give me your phone number, and I’ll call or text as soon as I hear anything.”

  “But maybe I should—”

  He interrupted her with a shake of his head. “You don’t want Alisha to come back and find this place empty. She may need to talk to you about what happened. Are you clear on that?”

  “Yep. OK.”

  “Why don’t you call your dad now?”

  Courtney dialed the number, and it went to voice mail.

  He read her disappointment. “He’s probably somewhere ph
ones don’t work. And don’t worry about Samuel. He won’t hurt you or your sister anymore.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Trust me. I know that for sure.”

  Back at the station, he told Bahe about the missing girl and Samuel’s connection with the situation.

  “You met this guy Isenberg,” Bahe said. “Do you think he could have shot Samuel?”

  “Well, his daughter said he was furious. He had a gun in his car. He knew Samuel worked for the movie crew. He could have called out there, asking for the man’s boss, and been referred to Delahart.”

  “I’ll mention this to Burke,” Bahe said, “and he’ll want us to look for Isenberg in the park, at the movie set. You know how these guys are.”

  Chee could tell from the captain’s tone that he wasn’t finished.

  “Now for the bad news. The preliminary results are back from the bone fragments. I’m afraid they were human.”

  Chee felt as though he’d been punched in the gut. Shocked and then angry. What made Delahart think he could desecrate a human body for a movie promotion? And to blatantly lie about it? What kind of scum was this?

  Bahe’s voice scattered Chee’s thoughts. “The medical examiner told me something else interesting. The intern said the little bits of bone had been burned. Cremated. Like a mortuary does. The whole idea of it makes me sick.” He handed Chee a sheet of paper. “I drew up a new citation to include illegal disposal of human remains as well as the earlier charges.”

  Chee looked at the citation, remembering that the original was in his unit. “We ought to make Delahart remove every one of those little bits of bone on his hands and knees.”

  “I agree.”

  Chee put the paper aside. “I don’t like the idea of that girl out there somewhere.”

  “You can look for her on your way to serve the citation. I’ll call hotel security and ask Haskie and Erdman to look around for the girl. Maybe she’s at the restaurant, having a soda.

  After so many trips over the rough road, Chee had learned to avoid most of the holes and ruts and other obstacles in the dirt loop. He knew where the wide spots came that made passing the tour buses easier. He kept the windows up to reduce the dust, appreciating the air conditioning.

  His concern about Alisha Isenberg was tempered by his experience as a policeman. Unless parental abuse factored into their motivation, runaway children usually returned home or showed up at a friend or relative’s house. He assumed Alisha hadn’t gone far, and would head back to the hotel room once she came to terms with her embarrassment. But if she’d walked to the park, a several-mile hike in the hot sun, the story changed. Dehydration, sunstroke, and vast empty spaces to get lost in—that was more complicated. She’d already been traumatized, and he didn’t want her to suffer any more. He’d had good luck finding Missy; he hoped Alisha turned up safely too.

  Spotting a blue car in the Wildcat Trail parking area, he pulled off the road. He couldn’t see what kind of sedan it was, but it resembled Isenberg’s vehicle. When he got out of his unit, he realized the day had gone from hot to sizzling, and that the car was not Isenberg’s Audi. He stretched, felt heat seep through his skin into his bones.

  A couple in shorts and floppy hats using metal walking sticks approached. The man spoke first. “Hi there, Officer. Everything OK out here?”

  “I’m looking for a missing girl.” Chee described Alisha.

  “This is a big place to be lost in,” the woman said. “We haven’t seen her.”

  The man said, “If I were lost, I’d try to get to the road and follow it back. You can see the dust rise.”

  That gave Chee an idea.

  He stopped to chat with the next tour bus driver, and the next and the next. Bus number four had pulled over to let the customers get photos of Elephant Butte from the overlook. Chee drove close, lowered his window, explained that he was looking for Alisha.

  The driver, a portly woman wearing a straw hat, had news.

  “I saw that girl walking on the road. She looked bad, sunburned, beat down by the heat. I stopped and asked her if she needed some help. She started crying and asked me if I could take her back to the hotel. I told her to get in and I’d get her there but it would be a while yet because the bus had to make vista stops. I gave her some water.”

  The woman paused, gave Chee a knowing look. “We’re not supposed to pick up people along the road, but I was worried she could have a heat stroke or something. Ford Point, that was the next stop. She sat here in the cab with me. The customers got out for photos and to look at the jewelry and stuff and to get a can of soda or something. She just sat.

  “Then this car pulled into the parking area, and as soon as she seen it, she jumped right out and started waving and yelling. The car slammed on the brakes. And then she’s running over to it and the driver’s door opened and this man got out and he swooped her up like you see in the movies.

  “I went over there to make sure everything was OK. I’ve got a daughter myself, you know.” The gold cap on her front tooth sparkled when she smiled. “Turned out the guy was her papa. I think they’d had an argument or something.”

  Chee couldn’t call in the good news because of lack of service, so he texted Courtney and Bahe. As soon as his phone picked up bars, they’d get the message. One problem solved, two left: the citation to deliver and the People Mover to fix. Well, two and a half: Who killed Samuel? For the girls’ sake, he hoped it wasn’t Isenberg, but he figured that was Burke’s baby.

  He continued through the valley with a lighter heart. As always, the beauty of Dinetah spoke to him, the vertical red stone against the blue dome of the sky lifting his spirits. Why was it, he wondered, that those polls that measured well-being focused on income and home ownership and never asked about the view?

  He pulled into the movie parking area and realized that Gerald wasn’t on the job. Vehicles had parked haphazardly, some clustered under the juniper trees, some in uneven rows, looking as though their owners had stopped without a plan in mind.

  Perhaps because it was daylight, the movie camp seemed quieter than usual. He went to the administration trailer and asked for Robinson.

  “Sorry, he’s not here today,” BJ said. “Want me to have him call you?”

  “No. Do you know when he’ll be back?”

  “We have a big group meeting tomorrow.” She gave Chee the time. “I know he’ll be here for that. You could catch him afterward.”

  Or before, Chee thought. He would serve the citation directly ahead of the meeting and not have to listen too long to Robinson’s protests of innocence. “I’ll stop by then. Is Gerald off today? The parking lot looks like a disaster area.”

  “He got terminated. You know, fired.”

  Chee put on his I’m-interested look and waited for her to say more.

  “Oh, he’s a good guy. It wasn’t anything he did. One of those budget shortfall deals.”

  “Too bad. He lives around here. There aren’t a lot of jobs.”

  “If somebody had to get fired, it should have been Samuel. That guy was nothing but trouble.”

  With her use of “was,” Chee assumed she knew Samuel was dead. “Why do you say that?”

  She glanced down at the desktop, then back toward Chee. “He was Delahart’s stooge. Eavesdropping on our conversations and feeding him information for that dumb blog and all the other ways he gets publicity. But Delahart pays the bills, and Samuel was Delahart’s golden boy, so we all put up with it.”

  “The FBI investigator, Agent Burke, will probably want to talk to someone here about that.”

  “If he wants to ask me about why Samuel got shot, he better be quick. I’m leaving next week.”

  “Is that when the filming will be done?”

  “No. But most of the administrative functions, like this job, shift back to California to save money.”

  “Well, good luck to you.”

  She smiled. “You look like you could use a cold drink. You know how to find t
he food tent. Help yourself.”

  That sounded like a good idea. Maybe a bottle of cold, cold water would get him in the right frame of mind for working on the People Mover on a very warm afternoon.

  In the tent some local crew members nodded to him and motioned him over. Randy said, “I heard your cousin ran into some trouble with that big vehicle he uses for tourists.”

  “I heard that, too.”

  “Tell him my boy used to drive one of those at Canyon de Chelly, taking folks to the Canyon del Muerto and the ruins. He knows what makes them tick.” The man gave Chee his son’s name and number. “Paul knows me, but we haven’t seen each other for a while.”

  Chee was leaving with his water and an oatmeal cookie when he saw Missy. She was chatting with another woman, but Chee knew it would be rude to ignore her. She introduced him to Trish, a tall brunette wearing a T-shirt with an eagle design.

  Trish smiled. “So you’re the one who found my friend here?”

  “That’s me.”

  Melissa said, “I wasn’t lost. I keep saying that, but no one listens. Hey, I heard about Samuel. How awful. Do you know what happened?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Someone told me Delahart shot him,” Trish said.

  News traveled almost as fast in the movie company as it did on the reservation, Chee thought. “That’s interesting. Did he say why?”

  “That guy was a slimebag.”

  “Which guy?”

  “Take your pick. Sorry to speak ill of the dead, but it’s true. Samuel would make up lies based on little things he heard or saw. Then Delahart would put stupid gossip in the movie blogs, fan pages, whatever. He didn’t bother to check to see if it was true, or fair.”

  Melissa said, “Delahart never seemed like a guy who would shoot anybody. Spreading rumors about them, innuendo, that’s more his style.”

  “So that leaves about a hundred other suspects. You, me, BJ, even Rhonda,” Trish said.

  “Rhonda, she’s another story. She’s got an ego and a temper, and Samuel’s lies didn’t do her any favors.”

  Trish laughed. “Seriously. I think you’re confusing the real Rhonda with the Zombie Queen.”

  When Melissa shook her head, Chee noticed that she wasn’t wearing her turquoise earrings. He asked about it.