Eagle's Last Stand (13 page)

“We believe he walked off into the desert to die. It’s the way of our Traditionalists when their time draws near.”

“I know, and I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. “I was hoping to work with him. I’ve been trying to preserve and document Navajo healing traditions. Word of mouth is uncertain because it’s subject to opinions and memory, but a written record would be there for generations to come. Would you or your brothers be willing to help me?”

“Our medicine men don’t allow Sings to be recorded or written down in their entirety. Sharing that kind of knowledge indiscriminately is believed to be dangerous.”

McCullough’s eyebrows knitted together. “You don’t strike me as a Traditionalist.”

“I’m not and neither are my brothers, but we respect our foster father’s wishes on something like this.”

“All right, I understand. How about this instead? His paraphernalia—the artifacts used for the Sings... No one will use them now because of the
chindi.
If I could buy them from you, or maybe you could donate—”

Rick held up his hand, interrupting McCullough. “We have no idea what he did with them. He clearly took care of those things before he left for his final walk.” Rick paused, then added, “Tell me something, professor. Do you normally offer to pay people for information?”

“I did at the beginning. I thought it might speed things along, but it didn’t,” he admitted. “Angelina Tso, a former medicine woman, seemed more cooperative after I offered to pay for her time. She delivered a few of the Sings, but when she found out that I’d have to verify their accuracy with another healer, she refused to have anything further to do with me.”

“You didn’t trust her?” Kim asked.

“My reputation is on the line with every monograph or article I write, and having two or three independent sources is standard practice,” he said. “I was sorry to lose her, but it was the weird stuff that happened afterward that bothered me most.”

“Like what?” Kim queried.

“A few weeks later someone vandalized my car and office. I was sure it was her because I found ashes scattered everywhere—a bad omen for most Navajos—but I couldn’t prove she was responsible.”

“You’d had problems with Angelina but you still came to her shop looking for help? How come?” Kim was curious.

“I made sure she wasn’t there before I went in. I knew she had contacts, so I wanted to talk to the clerks. I’d hoped to get the names of some high-end carvers. One of the papers I’m currently researching deals with the power of fetishes and their role in the Hopi and other Southwestern tribal cultures,” he said, then checked his watch.

“All right then,” Rick said, sensing this was all they’d get for now. “Thanks for your time.”

“If you find anything among your foster father’s possessions that might shed light on what it was like to be a
hataalii
of his stature, I’d appreciate the chance to catalog it—keeping the name of the source confidential, of course. A copy of my paper will go to the Navajo community college at Tsaile, so you’d be adding to the tribe’s storehouse of knowledge.”

“I don’t think we can help you with that, not yet anyway,” Rick said.

“You want closure first,” he said, nodding.

Rick didn’t reply. As was customary, he didn’t say goodbye, either, he simply walked back to the SUV with Kim.

“He’s right about one thing,” Kim observed gently. “You and your family need closure. Once you know what really happened to your foster father, the rest will fall into place.”

“Let’s go back to the ranch house. I need a chance to think.”

Once they were on the highway again, Rick’s attention focused on something on the road ahead.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“Maybe nothing. There’s a pickup coming in our direction, and he’s really making time. Could be kids, a drunk or just someone in a hurry. Seat belt on?”

“Always. Better give him as much road as you can,” she advised. “He’s not slowing down.”

As she spoke, the pickup eased toward the center line of the two-lane highway.

Rick touched the brakes again and eased to the right, hugging the shoulder. Though they’d avoided a head-on, the pickup driver tossed something out his window.

Glass shattered onto the SUV’s reinforced windshield and quickly coated Rick’s side with a black, flowing goo that completely blocked his view.

“Hang on!” he yelled.

Chapter Fourteen

Rick held the SUV’s steering wheel steady, took his foot off the gas and looked out the side window to gauge his position on the road. He already knew the big vehicle tracked well, so if he could keep it on the highway...

“Can you see anything ahead?” he asked Kim, whose side of the windshield wasn’t completely covered.

“You’re doing great, drifting just a little to the right. Just hold us steady,” she advised.

As they slowed to a crawl, he looked over. “How close to the shoulder am I?” he asked.

“About three feet. You can come over just a little more. Gently... That’s good.”

He braked and came to a full stop, flipping on the emergency blinkers to warn oncoming traffic, despite not seeing any vehicles.

“You okay?” he asked, glancing over.

“I’m fine, just a little rattled. I knew something was wrong after the way he raced up to us like that, playing chicken like in the movies. For a second I thought we were dead.”

“Did you catch the plates?”

“No, he went by in a flash and I was too worried about where
we
were going,” she said, her voice thick with fear and adrenaline.

“I’ll call Bidtah. That’s paint on the windshield. You can tell by the smell.”

“Maybe he can get prints from one of the pieces of glass,” she suggested. “Good thing it was a glass bottle, not a big rock...or bullets.”

“We’re both okay and the SUV is still in working order, so let’s take it as a win,” Rick said.

“Some win,” she muttered.

* * *

B
IDTAH
AND
TWO
crime scene techs arrived twenty minutes later. At their insistence, Rick and Kim stayed inside the SUV as they collected evidence.

“This SUV is built like a tank,” Bidtah said, coming over to them. “The impact of the paint-filled jar didn’t even crack the windshield.”

“Were any of the pieces of glass big enough to lift a print?” Rick asked.

“No. All we know is that the container was a twenty-ounce pickle jar—still had the label attached. But we did get a partial from the lid, which escaped being coated with paint except on the inside surface.”

“If possible, can you share your findings with my brother Preston?”

“I sent him what I have and will keep him updated,” Bidtah said. “One more thing. I took a close look at a sample of the paint, and there’s something else mixed in there. I could see the particles. They could have been small clods, I suppose, except some were porous.”

“What do you think it was?” Rick asked.

“My guess is either bits of pumice or corpse powder.”

“Pumice, I know about,” Kim noted. “We use it to clean the grill at the Brickhouse. But corpse
what?
”

“It’s said our skinwalkers dig up the bones of the dead, grind them into powder, then use that as a weapon,” Bidtah told her.

“Ugh,” she said with a grimace.

“There’s something else you need to be aware of,” Bidtah added, looking at Rick and then at Kim. “If people around here see you as cursed, or subject to being cursed, they’ll avoid you. People will stop talking and you’ll be ostracized,” Bidtah pointed to his belt. “That’s why my men and I carry a medicine pouch.”

“I have one, too,” Rick said, pulling it out of his pocket, “but I think it’s time I fastened it to my belt and made it easier to see.”

“Excellent idea,” Bidtah said, then added before leaving, “You should consider carrying one, too, Kim.”

She nodded. “Thanks.”

Fortunately, the paint was water-based, so after wiping away the paint with paper towels and bottled water from their emergency kits, they’d managed to restore enough visibility to make it to a trading post and hose down the SUV.

“I’ve decided to push my brothers into helping me find our foster father’s body,” Rick said as they made their way back to Copper Canyon. “It’s too late to follow a trail, but we know he left on foot, so together we can make some intelligent guesses concerning where he might have gone. Then we’ll know, once and for all, if he died of natural causes or if he was murdered.”

“Most of you have law-enforcement training. How come you never checked into this before?”

“We talked about it, but the truth is none of us was ready to accept his death. As long as there was no body, we could all hang on to the hope he’d turn up again someday. There was also the matter of accepting his wishes and respecting Traditionalist ways. We all believed, at first, that he had gone off to die.”

“Do you think they’ll help you look for his body now?”

“Yes, but it won’t be easy for any of us.” He glanced over at her. “Bidtah was right, though. If you’re going to continue to take part in the investigation, you’ll need a medicine pouch. First, we’ll get you the fetish of a horse. You can carry it in the pouch with pollen, a symbol of well-being, and a crystal, which stands for the spoken prayer. Together they have the power to make your prayers come true.”

“What a beautiful tradition.”

“That it is.”

* * *

S
URPRISINGLY
,
ALL
HIS
brothers were in agreement with the plan to search for Hosteen Silver’s body. Kyle had also abandoned his trip in favor of joining in. Those who could attend met at the ranch house at nine the next morning, accompanied by Detective Bidtah, who, as a tribal cop, had official law-enforcement jurisdiction.

The two newcomers joined Rick, Kyle and Kim at the kitchen table while Erin was out feeding the horses.

“Rick, searching for our foster father’s remains is going to be very difficult,” Preston said, taking a sip of freshly brewed coffee. “First of all, no one on the Navajo Nation is going to feel comfortable speaking of the dead. That means establishing his whereabouts on that last day is going to be nearly impossible.”

“I agree with Detective Bowman. You’re not going to get any cooperation. There isn’t a crime to speak of, so most will see what you’re doing as disrespecting the old ways and the
hataalii
’s wishes,” Bidtah said. “If I were in your boots, I’d concentrate on the battles you have a chance of winning.”

“We can still question possible witnesses, and we will,” Preston said. “We just have to remain respectful and not be so direct.”

“Kim and I will try to retrace the likely steps Hosteen Silver may have taken when he left here for the last time,” Rick said. “I recall that he liked to go to the Totah Café in the mornings. It’s an hour’s walk from here, a short distance by Navajo standards. There’s always a chance that he might have gone there the day of his final walk, just to say goodbye to the café and his life here on Mother Earth. It would have also been easier for him to catch a ride there, too, if he’d decided to go farther from Copper Canyon.”

“Our dad walked off almost three years ago. The employees at that café aren’t going to remember much now,” Preston warned Rick.

“It’s still worth a try,” Rick said. “The fossil fuel industry in our state has grown these past few years, and a lot of oil and gas field workers take this highway to and from work. I’ve only passed the Totah a few times since returning, but there always seems to be several industry-associated vehicles parked there.”

In a somber mood but with a solid plan now in mind, they set out to find answers.

Rick and Kim were the last to leave. Reaching the highway, he watched beyond the fences that paralleled the road. “There are a lot of sheep herders around here. Perhaps we can find some to talk to.”

As the sun got higher in the sky, they saw an elderly Navajo woman sitting on a low hill, watching her goats and sheep.

“Let’s go talk to her, if she’s willing to speak with strangers. From the way she’s dressed, and what she’s doing, she’s a Traditionalist. Do not mention skinwalkers,” Rick warned.

“Got it.”

They left the SUV parked on the side of the road and crossed the fence some distance from where the animals were grazing.

The woman turned to study them as they approached, her eyes narrowed, but seeing Rick, she relaxed.

“Do you know her?” Kim whispered.

“No, but she’s probably heard of me,” he answered. “If you hadn’t noticed, there’s a scar on my face.”

He greeted the woman in the traditional way. “Aunt, do you have a moment?” Rick asked. “I’m the medicine man’s foster son. His clan was the Salt People, and he was born for the Near the Water People,” Rick added, referring to his foster father’s mother’s clan, then his father’s.

Normally he would have mentioned his own clan and that of his father’s, but those were unknown to him. Considering no one had ever claimed him, he’d never been motivated enough to find out.

“I know who you are, nephew,” she said with a nod. “It was a sad thing about the
hataalii.
His medicine was strong.”

“Did you ever see him walking in this direction along the highway after leaving the canyon?”

“Many times. Then one day he stopped coming.”

“Does anyone else pass by on a regular basis? Maybe another Navajo on his way to work or an oil worker?”

“Not that I’ve noticed,” she said. “I visited with your father often because he was my friend. I also warned him not to accept rides with company men on their way to or from work. The days when we could trust people so easily were gone. He never worried, though.”

They spoke for a little longer, but soon it became clear she had no more information to give him.

“Thank you, aunt,” Rick said. As they headed back to the SUV, he added, “Let’s go check out the Totah Café.”

“What’s ‘Totah’ mean?” she asked.

“Where three rivers meet. It’s a place of rest.”

They made their way back slowly, careful not to spook the sheep and goats.

With Rick leading the way, they went in and out a small arroyo recently formed by runoff. Rick stopped to pick something out of the small ditch. “What a rare find! I haven’t seen one of these in years.”

“What is it?”

“A flint arrowhead, probably made for hunting smaller animals, like rabbits.” He showed it to her. It was small, gray, with one pointed end. “Flint is sacred to the Navajo. Our creation stories say it came from the hide of monsters that preyed on our land. It has power because of its hardness and its ability to reflect light.”

He admired it for another minute, then handed it to her. “Carry it with you. Flint brings protection against evil.”

She studied the arrowhead, noting two small notches toward the base, probably where leather sinew was wound, attaching it to the shaft of the arrow itself. The find had meant a great deal to him, yet he was giving it to her. “What a wonderful gift. Thank you.”

“We’ll get you a proper
jish
soon. That’s a medicine pouch,” he added.

They crossed the low wire fence, then were soon on their way to the café.

She thought of the qualities she’d always envisioned her ideal mate would have. She’d promised herself to find a romantic man who’d sweep her off her feet, one who’d bring her flowers for no reason at all...someone filled with surprises.

She looked over at Rick. This morning he’d surprised her by giving her something he valued, a gift far more precious than flowers he could have picked up anywhere. Today he’d given her a memory wrapped in flint.

* * *

T
HE
CROWD
INSIDE
the Totah Café was sparse at the moment. Most of the customers were Navajo or Anglo oil workers who’d taken a coffee break between shifts. “Let’s ask around quietly,” Rick said. “I recognize the guy over there in the far booth, so we’ll start with him.”

As they moved across the room, Rick saw people glance at his face then quickly look away, as they often did.

From day one, Kim had been different. She’d never pitied him, nor made him feel different in any way. Kim saw him as a man—nothing more, nothing less.

“Donnie Atcitty,” Rick said, looking at the man who was wearing a tan uniform, handgun and badge on his shirt that identified him as private security. “Haven’t seen you since high school. Now you’re carrying a weapon and working for Sunrise Energy.”

“Yeah, I’m directing company security for over sixty company wells,” Donnie replied, offering them a chair. After exchanging a few pleasantries, he focused on Rick. “I heard you were back and I’ve been meaning to pay you a visit. You back for good?”

“Yeah, that’s the plan. For now, I’m staying at the ranch house with my brother and his wife.”

“I was sorry to hear about your father, Rick. He was a good man.”

Rick nodded. “We’re still not sure what really happened to him, so now that I’m back, we’re trying to piece things together. From what I’ve been told, he didn’t appear to be sick.”

“That’s Anglo thinking,” Donnie said, shaking his head. “Our people know when it’s time to die, and they leave so that the house will be safe for the family. The
chindi
can make problems for the living, you know that.”

“Are you a Traditionalist?” Kim asked him.

“Not me, but I’m married to a Traditionalist woman. The way I see it, it’s about respecting old beliefs. You can accept the way things are here on the Rez, or not, but you can’t change what is.”

Kim nodded slowly.

“All true, but before I can let this go, I’ve got to make sure he walked off on his own free will, Donnie. You get me?”

“So that’s what you’re thinking,” Donnie said in a quiet voice. “You may have a point. The old man made enemies,
hataaliis
often do, just like doctors or preachers.”

Rick nodded. “I found out it was pretty cold the day he disappeared, so he may have hitched a ride. It’s not unusual for an oil worker or truck driver to stop and lend a hand to someone on foot.”

“I’ll pass word among the crews and my staff via the radio net. But you’re talking years ago, and we’ve got a lot of new people.”

“I’d appreciate you giving it a try, Donnie. Here’s my telephone number. You can reach me anytime. If you hear from anyone who remembers giving him a ride, give them my number. Hosteen Silver wasn’t the kind anyone forgets. With that long silver hair of his, he was nothing if not memorable.”