The Bisti Business

by Don Travis

  “No way.”

  “It’s the only way. It’s best for him, Aggie. But when we do, we’ll need a good lawyer standing by.”

  “Talk to Papa. He has the best.”

  “There’s already one on the way up from Albuquerque.”

  “You have a lawyer on his way up? Why? What am I missing?”

  Damn, what was the matter with my tongue today? I’d put my foot in a cow pie again, and Aggie picked up on it. There was only one thing to do. Lie.

  “I didn’t call him. He called the office for me, and Hazel told him I was in Farmington. Apparently that was good news because he has a case up here he needs help with. His name’s Del Dahlman. He’s not a criminal attorney, but he’s a damned good lawyer. He’ll be on hand for a few days, so he can take care of the preliminaries if we locate Lando. Or if the FBI does. He should be here around six, and I need you to meet him at the airport in my car.”

  “Why?”

  “My car’s bugged, and I want to throw my minder off my tail.”

  “I see.” Doubt shadowed his eyes.

  “Jim Gray’s flying him up, and you know Jim. He was the pilot at Taos. Del will be the only passenger. Tall, blond.”

  Aggie chewed his lower lip. “What have you told Papa?”

  “Just that I’m sure his son’s alive, and we are close to finding him.”

  I dug a key ring out of my pocket. “Time to go meet the vets I recruited. I don’t want anyone who might be watching over my shoulder to know about them, so I need your help. Give me your keys. I want you to be the bait for whoever’s following the bug on my rental.” I handed over my set. “The car’s parked right in front of my room at the motel. Get in the vehicle as quickly as possible and hightail it out of the parking lot so there’s less chance of you being identified.”

  “Where do you want me to go?”

  “Cruise around town. Make a trip to the bank. Drive down to Bisti. Anything that will keep you on the move and occupy someone’s attention. But stay in the car as much as you can to make it harder for anyone to notice we’ve switched.”

  “I was hoping to be a little more helpful than just being a diversion.”

  “There’s nothing more important at the moment than giving me some freedom. I need to meet with those vets, and then I want to check in with Lonzo Joe and John Gaines to see if there were any developments overnight. You and I can hook up again later.”

  “Okay. I’ll do it.”

  I stood up from the table, silently urging Aggie to get a move on. He got up and dropped money for a tip on the table.

  “Papa called me late last night before I left Salt Lake City wanting to know what was happening. I told him what I could, which wasn’t much. He wasn’t very happy.”

  “He didn’t call me.”

  He stared a moment and then began to move. To speed things along, I told him I’d take care of the check, almost kicking off an argument over who would pay. Damnation. I needed to know Lando was safe.

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  Chapter 28

  AS AGGIE headed out the door and started hiking to the motel, I dialed Jazz while the Bean Bowl cashier handled my credit card payment. I let the phone ring until an automated voice stated the obvious—the cell holder wasn’t answering—and invited me to leave a message. I hung up and called the Trail’s End to reserve a room for Del Dahlman. Melissa said there was one available next to mine and cheerfully agreed to bill the cost of his lodgings to my Visa. Then I tried Jazz again with the same results. This time I left a voice mail message.

  Aggie’s rental car would not have been my first choice as a ride, especially to navigate the back roads of the Navajo Reservation. The dark green Jaguar was a little too ostentatious for my taste, not exactly the low profile I needed. I kicked over the motor and got close enough to the Trail’s End to see my rental pull out of the driveway and head west. I waited until Aggie led me by three blocks before tagging along behind.

  No one appeared to be tailing him as he passed the municipal complex. When he turned right to make a sweep of the downtown area, I found a parking space and tried Jazz’s number again. Still no answer. What the hell was going on?

  The liver and onions I’d just devoured sat on my stomach like a lump of lead as a host of disastrous possibilities scrolled through my mind. Maybe someone had been watching us at the park this morning and followed Jazz and Henry to the Walmart. In that case, he would have witnessed the transfer of Lando from a bunch of vets to two Indian kids. Even though one of them looked as tough as any two of the homeless men, the odds would seem better to a stalker. So he could have followed them to the reservation. Maybe they were all lying in a ditch somewhere riddled with bullets. I shook my head to clear away that image.

  Gunner might have decided to see if the FBI was paying a reward—something I hadn’t bothered to check—and found it amounted to a hell of a lot more than $500. He wouldn’t have known I kicked in another five hundred as a bonus. But I would have heard from Jazz if he and his brother had been unable to pick up Lando.

  Or maybe Gaines had caught the whole bunch of them in a net. I’d never even considered the possibility the bug on my car was placed there by the FBI. Jazz and Henry and Lando could all be in custody right now.

  There was another possibility, one that made me cringe. Jazz and Henry might have collected Lando and taken him directly to the FBI. After all, I’d warned them he was a wanted man. They could have decided that betraying me made more sense than risking arrest for harboring a fugitive. And it was possible the feds had placed a healthy reward on Lando’s head. Had I made a mistake wasting all that time placating Aggie instead of taking care of urgent business?

  After trying Jazz’s number again without success, I headed straight for the reservation. Within a block I pulled over and took out my cell to find out if the authorities were already holding Lando here in Farmington. I was reluctant to go directly to Gaines because if he didn’t have Lando, he might ask awkward questions. But Dix Lee seemed like a cop who kept her ear to the ground, and because the case didn’t belong to the FPD, she’d be a little less interested in collecting information.

  The operator had a little trouble running her down, but when Dix came on the line, she had no hard information. She put me on hold and made a quick phone call to the detention center. I drummed on the steering wheel and checked my watch three times before she came back to report neither the feds nor the sheriff had logged Lando in. She snickered as she repeated the latest scuttlebutt; the feds were closing in on the fugitive and expected an arrest soon. Of course, that was always the scuttlebutt, promoted by the FBI itself. That probably meant they didn’t have Lando, although Gaines could be questioning the kid at the local FBI office without anyone being the wiser. Still, word usually got around pretty fast, even if the details were sometimes wrong. But there wasn’t a ripple of excitement over the apprehension of a double killer.

  I thanked Dix before she started asking questions and dialed Jazz again as I pulled out onto the street and started rolling. To my surprise and relief, he answered right away. Judging from the background noise, he was on the road.

  “I was getting worried. I tried you several times and got no answer.”

  It was hard to understand him over the rush of wind. “Aw, sorry. Phone battery ran down. I made a run into town to pick up Henry’s cell. He left it at his girl’s house this morning. Didn’t even think about switching his battery to my phone until I realized you didn’t have his number.”

  “Where are you?”

  “What do you mean?” he shouted. “That’s not you on my tail?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “There’s a cloud of dust in my rearview mirror. I figured it was you.”

  “Listen to me, Jazz, I’m still in Farmington. Turn off somewhere. Don’t lead that other car to Lando and Henry.”

  I heard his motor rev as he fed it gas. “Too late, man! The hogan’s dead
ahead. Shit, it’s that guy, isn’t it? That guy looking for Lando.”

  “That’s my guess.” The sharp, crisp beep of the Jeep’s horn sounded several times; Jazz was trying to warn Henry. “Head out over the desert,” I yelled. “He’s probably in a sedan and can’t follow.”

  “No, but he can drive straight to Lando. I’ve gotta hang up now. I’m gonna try something.”

  “Don’t be foolish, Jazz. Don’t—”

  Too late, the connection was broken. Clutching Henry’s map in one hand and the steering wheel in the other, I stomped on the accelerator, praying the vehicle behind Jazz was full of FBI agents. Once off the main highway, I took a wrong turn but discovered it within half a mile and backtracked to pick up the right road. I dropped the map on the seat and tried calling Jazz, but there was no answer. It was a good half hour before the stunted cottonwood grove sheltering the hogan came into view.

  I slowed at the sight of Jazz’s Wrangler half off the road, listing drunkenly to the left with a front wheel in a runoff ditch. The driver’s door hung wide open. I ground to a halt just short of the vehicle and scrambled out of the rental when I saw a long, slender leg sticking up out of the ditch with its boot still on the Jeep’s floorboard.

  “Jazz!” I slid down the shallow embankment.

  He lay sprawled on his back, arms akimbo. His eyes were closed; blood soaked into the sand beneath his head. Jazz moaned and tried to fight me off when I felt his neck for a pulse.

  “Lie still,” I ordered. “Something might be broken.”

  “Nuh,” he groaned, putting a hand to his head. “Fell out. Hit head… rock.”

  “What happened?”

  “Tried to block road. SOB shot at me. Ow!” he yelped as he tried to move his head. “Bastard put… round through the windshield. Right by my head. Swerved… ow!” he cried again and slid a hand behind his neck. “Hit ditch. Tried to bail. Fell.”

  “You were lucky. What happened then?”

  “Dunno. Went out.” His eyes widened suddenly. “Henry. Lando.” Jazz, in obvious pain, struggled to rise; I pushed him back.

  “Stay here and call for help.” I handed him a cell from the front floorboard of the crippled Wrangler. “I’m going to check things out.”

  I approached the cottonwood grove with my 9mm in hand. I saw no car, but the tree cover was heavy enough to hide one. A fresh set of tire tracks went in and came out again, so the bastard was probably gone, but I wasn’t about to take a chance. I abandoned the sandy track leading to the hogan and approached from an oblique angle over the desert hardpan.

  A whirlwind gathered dust off to my left and swept overhead, blinding me. I blinked and swiped my eyes. My right leg ached, as it always did when I faced danger—the legacy of a gunshot wound to the thigh while I was at APD. My shirt was suddenly damp with sweat.

  The miniature twister reached the grove, shaking the dry, thirsty treetops violently. I crept forward, nervously anticipating the flash of gunfire. I reached the tree line and took shelter behind the bole of a cottonwood. Now I had as good cover as the gunman. Easing my way through the thicket tree by tree, I almost blundered into the little building. The hogan blended perfectly with its surroundings. I circled the place three times, searching the grove thoroughly. Nobody. Nothing.

  I hugged the log wall of the old shelter and inched my way toward the door on the east side—it was always the east side in a traditional Navajo dwelling. The entryway was a gaping black hole. The scrap of blanket that had hung as a door covering lay crumpled in the dirt. Mouth dry, I stiffened my spine and held the S&W in a two-handed grip as I rushed the door, rolling through the opening on my back. Barrel held high to avoid clogging it with dirt, I regained my feet. My tongue was thick and tasted like brass. My eyesight gradually adjusted to the sudden gloom. Empty. I gave a shaky laugh before it hit me. The shooter wasn’t there—but neither were Henry and Lando. I called aloud. No one answered.

  I rushed outside, freezing against the side of the log shelter at the sound of someone approaching. I held the pistol at arm’s length, still in a two-handed grip, but jerked it up as Jazz reeled into sight. He put one foot in front of the other uncertainly, using any available tree as support.

  “I told you to stay where you were,” I said angrily.

  “Couldn’t. Had to… check on my… brother.”

  “He’s not here. Nobody’s here.”

  “Bike,” Jazz mumbled. He pointed to where I was standing. “Was right there.”

  My spirits lifted. “If the motorcycle’s gone, that means they got away.”

  “Yeah.” He motioned with a palsied hand to narrow tire tracks leading around the hogan. “Took Lando out. Back way.”

  “No car could follow him over that hardpan. Unless….”

  “Uh-uh. Sedan. Not four-wheeler.”

  “Did you call for help?”

  “Tribal police.” He sagged against the wall beside me. “Man, I feel woozy.”

  “We need to get you to a doctor.”

  “Nah. I’m okay.”

  “Don’t argue. You need a doctor.”

  Jazz flared. “No way. Gotta see ’bout Henry.”

  “You know where he’d go?”

  He gave a loose-necked, floppy nod of his head. “Yeah, we had a backup. Case something happened. ’Nother abandoned shack.”

  “All right. You take me there first, and then I’ll haul you to a doctor. No argument. And if you start getting sleepy, we’re heading straight for the hospital.”

  “Sleepy?”

  “It’s a sign of a concussion. Let’s go.”

  We made it no farther than my car parked near Jazz’s stranded Jeep. The tribal police cruiser rolling slowly down the road blocked our exit.

  “Shouldn’t a called them. Whada I tell them?”

  “Simple, you ran off the road and needed help.”

  “Uh-uh. Windshield shot out.”

  “Then it must be a case of mistaken identity. Somebody shooting at you by mistake. You have gangs around here, don’t you? Blame it on one of them.”

  Two burly officers, who looked to be peas from the same pod, got out of their unit. Round faces, coarse black hair, dark wary eyes. To me they looked more like Pueblos than Navajos. Jazz stepped forward and greeted one by name. I was proud of the kid. He handled it like a pro—and I think that’s what the two tribal cops believed he was. I could read their collective minds as they eyed me. They thought Jazz brought me out to the hogan for a good time, and he didn’t discourage that impression. I acquiesced to his superior knowledge of the way things worked around here and kept my mouth shut. Let them think whatever the hell they wanted.

  They soon turned their attention to the stranded Jeep with its starred windshield and flat front driver’s tire. The discovery of my firearm caused a bit of a flap until they satisfied themselves it had not been fired recently. Nonetheless, they examined my driver’s and PI licenses and carrier’s permit with extra care. If it was illegal to carry a firearm onto the reservation—as I believed it was—the two cops chose to ignore it. One of them ambled back to the cruiser with a rolling, mariner’s gait, making me wonder where the tribe kept its navy. He was probably going to check my bona fides. That presented a potential problem if he touched base with the FBI, who had jurisdiction on Indian trust lands.

  Our statements signed, we were finally free to “take Jazz to the doctor.” Actually we dawdled until they were out of sight and then headed deeper onto the reservation. I kept a close eye on my companion, but he seemed to be recovering okay.

  I periodically studied the rearview mirror, but there was no evidence of a tail as we tore west down Highway 64. We passed Twin Mountain and took the turnoff to Kirtland, whizzing through the old Mormon town on the approach to Upper Fruitland. Short of there, Jazz directed me south.

  “Did you see who was shooting at you?” I asked.

  “Naw. Happened too fast. Guy never got out of his car.”

  “What kind of car was it?”
r />   Jazz flopped back against the headrest and winced. “Just a sedan. Dark, I think. Man, as a junior PI, I suck.”

  “No, you risked your own neck to give Henry and Lando time to get away. I’d say that was pretty productive work.”

  He rubbed his neck gingerly. “Don’t understand. How’d they find us?”

  “Maybe they picked you up when you went back for the phone.” We hit a bumpy patch, and my voice vibrated with each shock. Jazz groaned aloud. “Whoever was following me saw us together at some point. He must have discovered Aggie and I switched cars and knew he’d lost me. When he saw your Wrangler, he latched onto you as the next best target.” I didn’t mention another possibility: the tail was Aggie’s man.

  “My fault.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up. I should have thought to get you a charger for the Jeep.”

  We fell silent while I concentrated on getting the low-slung sedan over a faint wagon track made out of rough rocks laced with razor edges. Eventually I spotted a small, isolated hut in the middle of nowhere. As we neared, it turned into a log hogan. There was not a shrub within shouting distance big enough to provide even a smidgen of relief from the weather. This country was searing hot in the summer and bitter cold in the winter. A figure stepped through the darkened doorway of the hut and watched a moment before bolting back inside.

  “Stop!” Jazz yelled. “Henry won’t recognize this car. He’s got a rifle. Let me walk up.”

  “You sure you’re up to it?”

  “Yeah. Be okay.”

  I braked slowly, allowing the car to coast as close to the structure as I dared. Then I shut off the motor. The Jag’s heat gauge registered alarmingly high. Jazz, moving like an old man, crawled out of the vehicle.

  “Henry,” he called, adding something with a lot of glottals in a language I didn’t understand.

  Henry came back out into the open cradling a rifle in his arms. He reminded me of an old photo of Geronimo’s renegade warriors in their last, defiant days of freedom. I know—wrong tribe, wrong time, wrong circumstance.