The Man Who Fell from the Sky (20 page)

She felt the sharp edge scrape her fingers as Cutter yanked the keys out of her hand. “I'm in charge of the keys this time.”

THE RED VAN
with Cable TV emblazoned on the side stood in front of the retirement home. The rear doors hung open and two crew members in dark shirts and red vests were lifting out cameras and tripods. Like a relay team, others in identical vests carried the equipment down the sidewalk and through the front door. Father John pulled in next to the van and followed the second team inside. The reception desk was vacant. It looked as though everyone had migrated into the community room, where residents, leaning on walkers and sitting in wheelchairs, bunched around the wide doorway. The crew dodged past them.

Charlotte came through the opening the crew had made, hands in front as if she were bearing a gift. “Father John! Mother will be so pleased. She is having the time of her life.” A wide smile creased the woman's face. “It's like she's gone back to when she was young. It's wonderful, but . . .” He felt her fingertips digging past
his shirtsleeve into his arm. “We know it won't last. Todd Paxton's here.” She tossed her head toward the community room. “I've explained that she should tell the most important stories first because, well, you never know how long she can stay in the past. Come with me.” She propelled him forward. “Mother's waiting for you.”

The room was packed. At least fifty people, mostly residents, seated in rows of folding chairs or on the sofas and chairs pushed in a U shape against the walls. Aides in green scrubs moved among them, leaning down and patting arms, placing walkers and canes in a vacant corner. In the aisle between the folding chairs, Todd Paxton and two crew members were aiming large, rectangular lights toward the front of the room, where Julia Marks sat in a cushioned, wing-backed chair, shoulders straight, head high. She lifted her face into the light and surveyed the audience—her audience. All the folks in the nursing home were her neighbors, whose names she probably couldn't remember. But this morning, Charlotte said, she remembered the past.

Father John realized the old woman was waving at him. A royal wave, hand barely moving. Beside him, Charlotte was nodding him forward. He waited for a crew member to set up a large tripod, then walked over. Julia's eyes were so bright that for a moment he thought she had been crying. She reached out and took one of his hands, then the other. “Oh, isn't this lovely? All these film people wanting to hear about my grandmother and George Cassidy. She always called him George, you know.” She twisted around and stared up at him for a long moment. “My, it's been such a long time since you've stopped by. You must come more often.”

He smiled. He was here a couple of days ago. Memory was a strange thing, the way it focused on different events at different
times. So many times with the grandmothers and elders, he had seen the way past memories washed over those of the present. He promised her he would come again soon and told her he was looking forward to hearing her family stories. Her hands were like cool leaves wrapped around his. After a moment she let go and started dabbing at her hair. “Oh my, I do hope I look presentable for the camera,” she said.

“You look fine,” Charlotte said.

“Good to see you, Father.” Father John turned around. Todd Paxton, a little frazzled-looking, long, black curly hair springing about his ears, and the faintest stubble on his cheeks, stood behind him. “We're ready to start filming. Charlotte's mentioned that we should get right on it, if you know what I mean,” he said, dropping his voice to a whisper. He nodded toward chairs that had been pulled into the aisle. “What I would like is for you and Charlotte to sit next to the camera and prompt Julia with questions. Keep her on track.”

With that, the director stepped past Father John and leaned over Julia. “Are you ready, Mrs. Marks?”

“Certainly.” Julia lifted her face and gave him the coquettish smile she had probably given suitors a half century ago. “You want to know about my grandmother and George. Well, I can tell you everything.”

“What I want is for you to look at either Father John or your daughter when you speak. Don't worry about looking into the camera. The camera will find you.” He nodded in emphasis, stepped back, and clapped. “We're going to need your cooperation. Silence your cell phones and please, no talking, coughing, or laughing.”

Heads bobbed, and several people started shuffling through bags in search of cell phones. Father John took his own phone out
of his shirt pocket and put the ringer on vibrate. Then he walked over and sat down in the chair Paxton had indicated. Charlotte had already taken the other chair. The cameraman hunched next to the camera, and Todd Paxton stationed himself right behind. As if on cue, the ceiling lights dimmed, and Julia pulled herself up even straighter, gripped the armrests, and smiled and blinked into the bright light.

Then Julia began speaking, her voice strong and energetic. “My grandmother, Mary Boyd, was a very tough woman. If she hadn't been tough, she wouldn't have survived. I remember her well, although I was still a kid when she died. She lived in Riverton, and we went to her house every Sunday for dinner. Mom and Dad and me, but I have to say that Dad would've just as soon stayed home. Every Sunday the same fried chicken, potatoes, and gravy, but every time Dad tried to make an excuse about not coming back next Sunday, Mary reared up—oh my, she didn't take to excuses—and told him she would expect us as usual . . .”

Out of the corner of his eye, Father John saw Charlotte glance back at the director. Then she interrupted: “Mom, tell us about Mary and Butch Cassidy. How did they meet?”

Julia's gaze seemed to go inward for a moment. Finally she said, “George. George Cassidy was his name then. Oh yes, my grandmother was in love with the man. Didn't matter to her what he might've done in the past, rustling horses or robbing banks. None of that mattered because he was ranching on the border of the reservation. Living a good, straight life when they met. George came to the barn dances and carry-in suppers, made himself real popular the way he danced with all the ladies. Wasn't a lady in the area, Indian or white, that didn't fancy George Cassidy with his big smile and gentlemanly way. But George took a fancy to Mary.
She was a half-breed. I heard stories she was part Shoshone, other stories she was Arapaho. She had their good looks. She was tall and straight as a cottonwood with black hair and eyes that shone like black diamonds. Even when she got old, she stayed pretty.”

“What happened between her and George?” Charlotte said.

“Oh, lots happened. They fell in love when Mary was nineteen years old, and George promised to marry her. It was plain bad luck that he got sent to the state prison. Mary said she knew he'd taken to rustling again, and he got away with a lot of horses, but he never stole the horse he went to prison for. Ranching bored him. She understood George couldn't stay in one place long. Always had plans and dreams and schemes. Didn't matter to Mary. She would've gone anywhere with him, but she couldn't follow him to the state prison. He'd come for her, he promised, soon as he got out. But when he got out, he disappeared. So he never knew . . .”

The room went quiet with expectancy; the words hung in the air. “What didn't he know?” Charlotte said.

“She had a little girl that she gave to an Arapaho family to raise because she was alone and she had no way to bring up the child. Little Mary, they called her. My grandmother worked on different ranches, cooking and scrubbing, and lots of times tending to the horses and killing rattlesnakes. She could shoot a snake between the eyes. When she knew George wasn't coming back for her, she married Jesse Lyons. They ran a spread south of Lander.”

Charlotte broke in again: “Tell us about when George stayed at the ranch.”

“He never forgot Mary. When he needed a safe place to stay, he headed back here where he had friends. Arapahos, whites, all kinds of friends. Worst time was after his gang held up the train down near Wilcox and made off with a lot of money. Posses and sheriffs
and all kinds of do-gooders came after him, so George and one of the gang called the Sundance Kid headed to Mary's place. Sure enough Jesse welcomed them, just like they figured. They hid out on the ranch for some weeks and helped with the work. They were sure welcome because the work was hard for just Mary and Jesse and the one hired hand they could afford. Barely afforded him. Matter of fact, they were having a hard time making it, and the bank was threatening to foreclose. George wasn't about to see Mary thrown off the place she and Jesse had worked so hard to keep, so he gave them the money to pay off a loan. That's the kind of man he was, always helping out people. Would've kept on helping out folks, except the railroad sicced the Pinkertons on him and Sundance, and they had to light out again. George was always leaving, my grandmother told me. The way she put is was, ‘He didn't like good-byes, so he just left.'”

Father John leaned forward. “Rumors are that he buried treasure in the mountains and left behind a map. Did Mary say anything about a map?”

“Oh, he buried the loot, all right.” Julia bent forward as if she were about to jump out of the chair. Her features froze with anxiety. “But if George had left a map, don't you think Mary would've used it during all the troubles?”

“Tell us about the troubles, Mom.”

The room was quiet. Father John could feel his cell phone vibrating against his chest. Vicky, he thought. He pulled the phone out of his shirt pocket and glanced at the ID. An Oklahoma number; Macon Walking Bear returning his call. Vicky was in court, Father John told himself. She was okay.

He replaced the phone and forced himself to concentrate on the elderly woman framed in the bright light. She seemed to be turning
the answer over in her mind. Finally, she said, “Jesse got killed; fell off his horse, which Mary said was no accident because Jesse was the best rider in the county. He could tame a wild horse, saddle, and ride it before the horse knew what was going on. In his rodeo days, he could stay on a bronco longer than any other cowboy. But one day the hired hand came galloping across the pasture with Jesse's body slung behind him and said the horse got scared by lightning and Jesse got thrown. Mary had hard times after that, real hard times. The hired hand took off and left her alone to run the ranch. If she'd had a map to hidden treasure, don't you figure she would've used it? There was no map. There was nothing.”

Charlotte seemed to take a minute to see if her mother intended to go on before she said, “How do you think the rumor of a map got started?”

“Everybody wants to find treasure. It's exciting to think of buried treasure up in the mountains. You can go up there and dream you're standing on it, thousands and thousands of gold coins.”

“So Mary denied there was ever a map,” Charlotte said, clearing up something for herself.

“Denied? I didn't say that. She never mentioned it, that's all, and us kids sure didn't ask her even though we'd heard the rumors and seen the treasure maps in the tourist stores. She would've called it hokum, and she didn't like hokum. She was real practical, down-to-earth. Accepted what came and made the best of it. Married a rancher near Rawlins after a couple years, but she always stayed in touch with her daughter. I never met Mary's second husband; he died before I was born. That was when she moved to Riverton to be closer to her daughter. Little Mary was my mother.” Julia was quiet a long moment, as if she were pulling a reluctant memory from the back of her mind. “We were a small family, just
Mom and Dad, me, and Grandmother. When Mother died, it about killed Grandmother, but she went on. Like I say, she was a tough woman.”

“What about George Cassidy,” Father John said. “Did she ever see him again?”

“Oh, more than once. Like I say, he never forgot her. I heard he came to visit old friends in the 1920s before I was born. Came again in the 1930s, and every time he came, he visited Mary. I remember her talking about how all of them went on a camping trip in the mountains in the summer of 1934. She told stories about how they left the others at the campsite and hiked around the mountains together, just her and George. He told her all about himself, how he'd gone straight, got married and had a son, and built a business in Washington. It made her happy to know he hadn't been run to the ground and shot like an animal, and all those stories about him and Sundance getting killed in Bolivia was just hogwash.”

“Were they looking for the treasure?” Father John said.

“They were looking, all right, but they never found it. I figure George must've told Mary where he'd buried it, and he was counting on her to help him find it. But she said she didn't know anything about it.” Julia put up a hand and waved at the light, as if she might turn it off. “Where are we now?” she said. “The sun is awful bright.”

“It's okay, Mom,” Charlotte said. “You're still telling stories about your grandmother Mary.”

“Mary.” Julia spoke the name softly, and her gaze took that inward look again. “She was a fine woman. Very tough, or she wouldn't have survived. I remember how she always wore a red gingham dress with a big white apron she'd lift to wipe her face. She worked hard . . .”

“Mom, do you remember any other stories about George Cassidy?”

“He gave Mary this ring with a real opal.” She raised her hand again and turned it in the light. A gold ring with a round stone sparkled on her finger. “Sent it to her after he went back to Washington. Look here, inside.” She slid the ring off her finger and held it out.

Charlotte got up, took the ring, and peered at the inner circle. Then she handed the ring to her mother and sat back down. “Tell us what the inscription says.”

“Geo C. to Mary B.” Julia slipped the ring back on her finger and patted it, as if she wanted to protect it. “Grandmother wore this ring until the day she died.”

*   *   *

THE RESIDENTS HAD
settled into a steady line that shuffled out the double doors when Todd Paxton slid in beside Father John. “That wraps things up,” he said. “We've got other folks that claim Butch Cassidy came back here. Lone Bear remembers seeing him. Historians aren't going to like it, but people hereabouts say they know what they know. I appreciate your help.” Father John shook the man's hand. The film crew was about finished packing up.