Death on the Greasy Grass

by C. M. Wendelboe

  Chief Deer Slayer poked his head into the doorway and laughed. He spilled coffee on his shirtsleeve and dabbed at it with a bandanna he’d grabbed from his back pocket. “Good luck finding Sam. He crashes wherever he feels like it.”

  Stumper dropped his feet onto the floor when Deer Slayer came in. “I put out the word to the other officers that we need to talk with him. Itchy, too. No luck yet.”

  Chief Deer Slayer laughed again and went to the coffeemaker in the corner of the room. “About the only time we see either one is when they get tanked up and tossed in the pokey for public intox. Or shoplifting. Or some other minor offense.”

  Manny rubbed his forehead, feeling a throbbing pain coming on. He hadn’t figured this investigation would drag out this long. He just wanted to sit in the chairs overlooking Old Faithful and watch it erupt on time. “Then let’s pay Chenoa Iron Cloud a visit. See if she’s heard from her brother.”

  Stumper shot Chief Deer Slayer a look. “I don’t know, Manny. Chenoa’s a very busy lady. Besides, she doesn’t have anything to do with her brother.”

  “It wouldn’t hurt to at least go talk to her.” Willie ran his pocketknife around a fresh can of Copenhagen.

  “You two just want to ogle her is all,” Stumper said.

  Willie smiled. “I can think of worse assignments.”

  Manny had to agree with him. He recalled the state tourism poster in Harlan’s office, how he got lost in that picture. Chenoa’s dark piercing eyes had seemed to follow Manny, seemed to beckon him to run his fingers through her shiny black hair. “I think we at least need to talk with her.”

  Stumper’s face flushed, and his jaw tightened. “We don’t need to talk with her. We ought to leave her alone.”

  “That’s enough,” Deer Slayer told Stumper. He turned to Manny. “What this rude banty rooster here is saying is that Sam is the black sheep of the Star Dancer family. And the only contact Chenoa has with him is when he comes around once a month to pick up his lease check.”

  “So there’s land involved?”

  “Considerable,” Stumper broke in. “When Old Smoke went to the other side, he left forty sections. Deeded them to Chenoa.”

  “Didn’t Sam get any?”

  Chief Deer Slayer grabbed the coffeepot and offered to refill Willie’s cup. By the looks of the thickness of yesterday’s coffee, Manny was certain it would be an insult to the great Mighty Mouse. “Smoke Star Dancer abhorred Sam’s drinking. Said that if Sam didn’t straighten up, he’d write him out of the will. And Smoke did. He left a small monthly pittance for Sam. And it’s that monthly check that brings Sam and Chenoa together for a few moments every month when he picks it up, or it’s dropped off. And when they need Sam to sign ranch papers.”

  “So Sam is involved in the Star Dancer Ranch?”

  Deer Slayer set the carafe back on the coffeemaker, leaving an inch of mud in the bottom. No one likes making coffee. “Smoke Star Dancer set it up that Sam had to approve some things ranch-related: land sales and purchases. Cattle and horse acquisitions and sales. Sam always signs whatever Chenoa wants, ’cause she might just conveniently lose Sam’s monthly check.”

  “Then we do need to talk with Chenoa.”

  The chief turned to Stumper. “Take Agent Tanno and his dreamy-eyed friend out to the Star Dancer Ranch. But don’t upset her. Last thing we need is Chenoa bitching to the tribal council.”

  Officer Moccasin Top came into the room and passed out copies of the tall man’s photo.

  “Let’s get this over with,” Stumper said.

  Manny grabbed the photo. “Just as soon as we see if our Sergeant Tess can ID the man.”

  * * *

  Stumper parked his marked Tahoe beside a Dodge Power Wagon in the Super 8 parking lot. “Can we release Tess when we’re done? He’s only called me about every two hours since we cut him loose, wondering if he can go home.”

  Manny nodded. “We know where he lives.” And Manny did, too, a mile from what he’d once called home in Arlington, Virginia. But had it really been home, or just somewhere that Manny could hide out from the memories of an orphan growing up on the poorest reservation in the nation? Those memories came sneaking back now and again, the bad times mixed with the good of living with a loving uncle after his parents had died in an auto accident. Thinking back, Manny really wasn’t orphaned at all. “We’ll let him go as soon as he looks at this photo.”

  Tess threw open the door on the first knock, looking as if he’d downed a dozen hip flasks. Rings tugged at the spiderwebbed skin under his eyes, and his hair stuck upward as if he’d dried it under a rest area hand dryer and used motor oil for fixer. His voice faltered as he teetered on shaky legs, his trembling hand working overtime with his bleary eyes to take the photo of the tall man. “This the guy that switched my ammunition?”

  Manny backed away from his buffalo breath. “You tell me.”

  “Frankie.” Tess backed into the room and sat on the edge of the bed. An empty Wild Turkey fifth lay atop a broken Jack Daniel’s bottle in the trash can. “He introduced himself as Frankie. Nice guy. Real sociable. Said he was one of the Sioux reenactors. Talked like he did it every year.”

  “He wasn’t dressed like a Sioux reenactor, was he?”

  Tess burped, but made no attempt to conceal the odor that reminded Manny of most hog farms. “I wouldn’t know a Sioux from a Cheyenne from a Crow. No offense.”

  Manny waved it away. “None taken.”

  “Now, put me in the front lines at Gettysburg with a .54 – caliber musket and a pocket full of fake minié balls . . .” Tess stopped and looked up at the three lawmen standing over his bed. “But this guy didn’t put in fake minié balls. He put in the real thing, and I murdered a man.”

  Manny sat on the edge of the bed and rested his hand on Tess’s shoulder. He slumped, and Manny was quick to keep him talking. “What did you and Frankie visit about?”

  Tess sat up and turned to Manny. “That’s how he knew.”

  “Knew what?”

  “How to switch my ammo.” Tess got up and paced the room. “He came to my tent. Asked about my cavalry gear. Asked if I had to buy my own rifle, acting like he was interested. Asked if I used period ammunition.”

  “And you told him you used dummy rounds?”

  Tess stopped in front of Manny and looked down at him. “He asked when my ammo was checked and verified to be blanks. He said he was concerned someone might be hurt accidentally. I told him it’s double-checked so accidents can’t happen. I said it had just been verified an hour ago. He was planning to swap my ammo then, wasn’t he?”

  “I think he was planning on switching your ammo long before the day of the show.”

  Tess’s legs shook and Manny gently sat him on the bed. “What else do you remember about him?”

  Tess rubbed his forehead and looked around. His eyes fell on a fresh bottle of Jim Beam but he made no move for it. “His Cadillac,” he said at last. “I thought it odd that an Indian could drive a car like . . .” He stopped, his already red face turning even more crimson as he looked first to Manny, then Willie and Stumper. “I didn’t mean . . .”

  Manny held up his hand. “Don’t worry about it.” Manny had heard comments like that all his life: people surprised that an Indian drove a decent car or wore neat clothes or shopped in public with children that were clean and well behaved. “Tell me about Frankie’s Caddy.”

  “Yes, his car.” Tess stood and paced the room again, staring at the beige carpet as if the answers were imbedded in the floor. “I was riding my horse out to the staging area, riding past the chief I was supposed to shoot to start things.”

  “And who you subsequently killed?”

  Manny glared at Stumper, smiling at Tess’s pain. “You rode past the staging area?”

  Tess turned his back on Stumper. “That’s when I saw Frankie leaving. I though
t it odd that he didn’t even stay for the show, as much interest as he showed. Him being a Sioux reenactor and all.”

  “The car?” Manny pressed.

  “The Caddy. Sure.” Tess sat in a chair within reach of the bottle of whiskey. He stared at it as he continued. “It was a new Sedan DeVille. Pearl color, like that iridescent color Pontiac offered before they quit making them.”

  “Did you get a license plate?” Willie asked.

  Tess shook his head.

  “Even a partial number?”

  Tess stopped in front of Willie, looking up through red eyes. “It never dawned on me to get a plate.”

  “Anything else?”

  Stumper shook his head. “Just tell me the fastest way out of Montana. I’m sticking to being an NCO at Gettysburg. Nothing like this ever happens there.”

  * * *

  Stumper climbed into his truck but made no move to put his seat belt on. “That was a dead end.” He started pulling out of the parking lot. “Waste of time if you ask me.”

  Willie nudged him. “Would you rather be working chickenshit meth or bogus missing person’s cases, pardner?”

  Stumper glared at Willie. “Don’t see you being much help in there.”

  Manny leaned over the seat between them. “Tess gave us a good deal of info.”

  “Right.”

  “You should clam up,” Willie told Stumper. “You might learn something.” He turned in the seat. “What do we have to work with?”

  “Think what we can do with Tess’s seeing Frankie driving away in a Caddy. We have no plate. Nothing else to distinguish it from any other pearl Cadillac on the road.”

  “We could put out a BOLO for a pearl-colored Caddy,” Stumper blurted out. “That’s something we didn’t have before. Can’t be a lot of those hereabouts.”

  “The man’s not from here,” Willie said.

  Stumper slowed to allow two kids riding a bike to cross the road, one hanging on to the handlebars for his life as he straightened his legs out to keep them away from the front wheel spokes. “Just ’cause Frankie said he’s not from here, doesn’t make it so.”

  “Sure it does.”

  “How the hell you know that?”

  Manny looked at Willie. “What’s your thoughts?” Manny always looked for chances to prod Willie, to get him thinking on his own, to steer him in the direction sharp criminal investigators went.

  He chin-pointed to Stumper. “Maybe I’ll leave him in suspense.”

  “Come on,” Stumper said. “If you know something, let me in on it. I am your liaison, after all.”

  Willie smiled. “Frankie—if that’s his name, which I doubt—wasn’t afraid anyone would recognize him. He made no attempt to hide his face. Or his car.”

  Stumper snapped his fingers. “The car. Folks hereabouts can’t afford a hubcap off a Caddy let alone the car. He can’t be from here.”

  “And Tess told us Frankie’s an amateur.”

  Now it was Willie’s turn to look at Manny with that thousand-yard stare. “I didn’t hear him say that.”

  Manny sat back in the seat, dragging out his answers, Willie turning in his seat to look at him, Stumper staring at him in the rearview mirror, waiting for an explanation. “Simple. Would a pro drive something as conspicuous as a pearl Cadillac?”

  Willie nodded. “Never.”

  “Unless,” Stumper added, “he’s not from here.”

  “And if it didn’t belong to him?”

  “It would be a rental.” Willie slapped the seat. “What an amateur.”

  CHAPTER 9

  “Stop here,” Manny said when his cell phone rang. Willie stopped the Olds at the Lodge Grass off-ramp while Manny scrambled to get his phone from his pocket. Service was little better at Crow Agency than at Pine Ridge, and high spots were at a premium.

  “We found someone who recognized the tall man.” Manny heard Stumper chewing on something, presumably a toothpick that clinked against the phone as he spoke.

  “Someone at the reenactment?”

  “Yeah. One of the ladies—Sylvia Cuts The Tree—works the parking area. Tough old bird.”

  Manny recalled an old woman, walking stick in hand, insulting his Oldsmobile, ordering Willie to “park this piece of shit” away from decent cars.

  “She remembered the Caddy. Thought it odd that a skin was driving something that nice.” Click. Click. Damned toothpick.

  Manny covered his phone with his hand and whispered to Willie, “We got a break.

  “Sylvia remember anything else about the driver or car?”

  Click. Click. “She says the guy was dressed like one of you Lakota. Well, not exactly like you—he didn’t wear those silly shorts and loud Hawaiian shirt.”

  “Just tell me what she said.”

  Laughter. More clicking. “Sylvia’s never seen this dude before, and she’s been telling people in cars where to go for eleven years.”

  “How can she be sure he’s Lakota?” Willie asked.

  Stumper paused and Manny heard pages flipping on the other end. “She just figured it was one of you guys ’cause he wasn’t anyone from Crow Agency she ever met. And she just got the impression he was a bad guy—which rules out any of us Crow.”

  Manny let that pass. “What else did she say?” Between the heat inside the car, and his soaked bandanna he ran across his forehead, Manny was losing his patience. They needed to get down the road and get some air moving. Willie was right—he should have gotten the air-conditioning fixed.

  “Just like Tess, she thought it odd that Frankie left before the show started. When all the Indians were mounting up in the field in back of the bleachers, he took off out of the parking lot.”

  “Tell me she got a license number.”

  Clicking against the receiver. “She didn’t. But she did notice it had Montana plates. Guess I’ll get that description out to car rentals in the area.”

  “Ask Chief Deer Slayer to put out a TTY on the car and a description of the way Frankie was dressed. He probably changed clothes the first chance he got, but we might catch a break.”

  “Sure thing.”

  “And have you located Sam Star Dancer yet?”

  Another long pause. “Not yet, but I’ve still got some follow-up at the reenactment site I need to do. Feel free to hunt him yourself, though.”

  Manny stared at the dead receiver and pocketed his cell phone. “Guess Stumper’s too busy to help.”

  “Or he just doesn’t want to find Sam and have to connect him to Chenoa.” Willie started unfolding the impromptu map Chief Deer Slayer had given them to get to Sam’s house. “Stumper’s starting to get on my nerves.” Willie started the Olds down the off-ramp as he drove with his elbows, spreading the map across the steering wheel.

  “That’s not very safe. Maybe we should pull over . . .”

  “Driving with my elbows, I’m still a safer driver than you.”

  “I still think . . .”

  “Look,” Willie said, “I’m trying to make up for lost time on this little vacation adventure you’ve managed to get us into. The sooner we’re away from Crow Agency—and that pompous little ass BIA officer—the better I’ll feel. That guy’s got some leftover animosity for us Lakota.”

  “And you don’t share the same for the Crow?”

  Willie ignored him and turned the map that the chief had drawn on the back of a report form. “According to this, it’ll be an off-color brown house at the end of the block.”

  “I think Stumper called it ‘shit brown.’”

  “Well then, that must be it.” Manny pointed.

  They drove past Strong Enemy Drive to the end of Red Bird Lane to the only shit brown house on the short block. A once-white picket fence kissed the dirt where it had lain for perhaps decades, rotting wood poking through the weeds, suggesting some
one had once cared for the property. Half the shingles had blown off the roof leaving the remaining ones to fend off what little rain Crow Agency got, and the off brown color of the house was as much from mold as from old paint. Nature’s cruel palette.

  They pulled to the curb behind a pink Hummer parked in front of Sam’s house. A couple picked their way through weeds and dead bushes and emerged by the front door. The woman drew Manny’s attention: tall, lithe, coming toward them like a model on a runway. Her hips swayed seductively inside faded jeans a size too small, and her breasts threatened to burst from a double-breasted Western shirt unbuttoned at the top, revealing cleavage. She met their gaze as she walked toward them, her head slightly high, strong jaw thrust out, ponytail tossed over her back, reeking of aristocracy as she neared.

  Willie sucked in a breath when he caught sight of Chenoa Iron Cloud, more stunning, more alluring in person than any tourism poster or calendar. He grabbed Manny’s arm. “See who I see?”

  Manny nodded. He instantly understood why Montana had chosen her as the face of tourism in the state. Manny imagined her riding across a gentle stream dividing green pastures, snowcapped mountain in the background, looking directly into the camera as she promised anyone who came to Montana the time of their lives.

  “And him.” Willie chin-pointed toward the man walking just behind Chenoa. He stood a full head taller than her, his broad shoulders sitting atop a narrow waist with the slight Lakota paunch. Gray-tipped braids tied with colored deerskin bounced on his black silk shirt as he walked. “That’s Wilson Eagle Bull.”

  “The rancher west of Oglala running for Senate?”

  Willie nodded. “What’s he doing here?”

  “We’re about to find out.”

  Chenoa and Wilson stopped beside Manny’s Oldsmobile. He eyed the crumpled fender of the green machine, while she looked first to Willie before settling on Manny. She grinned as she eyed his legs jutting out of his shorts, while he tried not to focus on the turquoise pendant around her neck, situated between her breasts, rising and falling with her breathing.