Desert Wind (3 page)

Click.

Shut down for the second time, I sat there and thought for a while, but the more I thought, the more uneasy I became. Jimmy had always taken the financial success of Desert Investigations as seriously as I did. He was hyper-dependable. In the past, whenever something necessitated an abrupt leave of absence on his part, he had always contacted me first. On the two occasions he couldn’t reach me—I was sometimes called out of town, too—he’d left detailed messages on both my cell and my landline. One week last spring he hadn’t made it to the office at all, but his phone message informed me he’d been called to testify in federal court about a disputed Indian water rights claim. The winter before, he received a last-minute offer from a friend to go dog-sledding through the Alaskan tundra, but before he said yes, he wanted to check in with me. After I told him he was nuts if he didn’t go, he detailed the route they would take, adding that he’d carry along both his cell and his laptop. Yet now, he’d shrouded his whereabouts in mystery.

Looking back, I realized I’d sensed the wrongness of things before I’d walked downstairs to an empty office. Maybe even three nights earlier.

The nightmares began on Friday night, with my usual flight through a dark forest, determined men not far behind, blinding flashes of gunfire, screams…Three nights in a row, a new record, even for me. Once I’d woken up murmuring Jimmy’s name.

Scientists say you can’t see into the future, and to that, I say baloney. Oh, you might not be able to “see” it like you can see pictures on a television screen, but you can often sense it. Warnings ripple through time like the strings of a harp, their vibrations audible to any attuned listener. Label this ability “precognition” or “sixth sense,” the terminology didn’t matter. What did matter is that all weekend long I’d known that something was amiss. Wherever Jimmy was, whomever he was with, he needed me.

After shutting down my computer, I locked up the office and headed out to my Jeep. Telephones and computers are all very well, but when it comes to investigation, there’s nothing like boots on the ground. I fired up the engine and peeled out of the parking lot.

One of the more interesting facts about Old Town Scottsdale is that despite its art-and-nightlife-friendly reputation, it abuts the western edge of the Salt River Pima/Maricopa Indian Reservation. Now that Casino Arizona had brought some much-needed income to the tribe, my drive east on McDowell Road took me past a flurry of new homes and Pima-run businesses. Indian poverty, at least in this area of the state, was becoming eradicated. Unlike the white folks who subdivided their portion of the Sonoran Desert with look-alike houses and look-alike yards, the Pimas left the desert alone to do its wild thing. Their widely spaced new homes, most of them clean-lined stucco ranches, sat surrounded by unmanicured creosote bushes, mesquite trees, and stately saguaro cacti. The Indians hadn’t decimated the wildlife, either. You could still see families of javelina and wild-eyed coyotes slipping through the wide spaces between the houses.

When it comes to living in harmony with Nature, we could learn a few things from the Pima. But of course, we won’t.

Within minutes I had turned off McDowell onto the dirt road that led to Jimmy’s trailer. The busy cross-reservation highway lay only a few hundred yards behind me, but his Airstream was located within a grove of ancient mesquite with limbs so heavy they scraped the ground. No one would see what I was about to do.

Unless you’re a professional thief, picking locks isn’t all that easy, but I’ve learned from the pros. Once inside, I paused a moment to get my bearings, feeling the hot, still air of the trailer sucking the breath right out of my lungs. Ever eco-conscious, Jimmy had turned off the air-conditioner before he’d left town. Not wanting to fry, I fumbled for the switch and flipped it back on. After a few moments, I could breathe again.

Once my eyes became accustomed to the dim light, I gave a brief glance around. I’d been here before, but was amazed anew at Jimmy’s unique style of decorating, so different than that of our bland office. The carpet was a deep burnt orange, the same color as the sandstone mesas that surrounded the reservation. Pima-patterned pillows were scattered artfully across a brown leather sofa. A hand-made coffee table comprised of saguaro cactus spines studded with tiny bits of turquoise held up two Hopi kachinas; they looked like they were about to leap into battle. But it was Jimmy’s cabinetry I admired most. The oak cabinets above the kitchen sink were covered with paintings of Pima gods: Earth Doctor, the father-god who had created the world; Elder Brother, who after defeating Earth Doctor in battle, had sent him into hiding in a labyrinth beneath the desert; and Spider Woman, who’d tried in vain to make peace between the two. Jimmy’s factory-built Airstream had become a holy place, and I hoped his gods would forgive my intrusion.

Knowing my partner’s habits, I went straight to the telephone stand, another piece of furniture-as-art. The only thing on top was a blank notepad, with a pencil next to it.

Resorting to one of the oldest tricks of the trade, I rubbed the top sheet with the soft-leaded pencil, and little by little, block letters began to appear. 928-555-7535. Below that, 928-555-7400. Telephone numbers with a far northwest Arizona area code, the double-zero number probably a business. All I had to do was call, but that created a slight problem. If I used Jimmy’s phone and he answered, caller I.D. would show I’d broken into his trailer. If I used one of my own phones, there was a good chance he wouldn’t pick up.

Fortunately, there was another way to gain the needed information. After stuffing the sheet of paper into my carry-all, I headed out.

***

As soon as I arrived back at the office, I turned my computer on again and logged onto the reverse phone directory. The 535 number turned out to be the reservations office at Sunset Trails Guest Ranch. The name looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. The next number startled me: the Walapai County Jail.

I stared at the screen for a while, thinking.

Guest ranch. Jail
.

Jail. Guest ranch.

Bingo.

Ted Olmstead, Jimmy’s adoptive brother, was assistant manager at Sunset Trails Guest Ranch, which was owned by Hank Olmstead, their father. A full blooded Paiute and the older member of Olmstead’s large adoptive brood, Ted had been visiting the Pima Rez several months earlier for an Inter-Tribal pow-wow when Jimmy introduced us. Less than a week later, Ted’s wife Kimama had been shot to death, but to my knowledge, her killer had never been identified. Although the husband is usually the first suspect in such cases, Ted had never fallen under suspicion. At the time his wife was shot, he’d been more than an hour’s drive away, leading twenty-five dudes on a long trail ride.

But now, had there been new developments in the case that necessitated Jimmy’s presence?

Hoping for an answer, I ran WALAPAI COUNTY JAIL+ THEODORE OLMSTEAD through Google. The first item that popped up was from the Saturday issue of the
Walapai Flats Journal-Gazette
.

WALAPAI FLATS, ARIZONA
—Friday night, sheriff’s deputies picked up Theodore Olmstead and are holding him as a material witness on suspicion of having information about the shooting death of Ike Donohue, a resident of Sunset Canyon Lakes. Donohue’s body was found by tourists at Sunset Point early Friday morning. His car was parked nearby.

According to witnesses, Olmstead, the assistant manager of Sunset Trails Guest Ranch, was involved in an altercation Thursday with Donohue at a service station in Walapai Flats, where both had stopped for gas.

“Mr. Donohue said something to the Indian, like, ‘I’m sorry, but I got to the pump first,’ and the next thing you know, he was on the ground,” said Mia Tosches, of Sunset Canyon Lakes. “He must have got hit pretty hard, poor guy.”

A second witness disputes Tosches’ story.

“Donohue just slipped on an oil spill and made a big fuss about it,” said Earl Two Horses, owner of the service station. “Ted didn’t touch him.”

A source who didn’t want his name released said there had been bad blood between Olmstead and Donohue ever since Olmstead’s wife, Dr. Kimama Olmstead, 36, a local veterinarian known for her political activism, was killed in a drive-by shooting this past May. Her murder remains unsolved, but the source said that Olmstead blamed Donohue for creating the hostile environment that led to her death.

“Mr. Olmstead has not yet been charged with any crime,” said Walapai County Sheriff Wiley Alcott. “He is merely being detained to prevent a failure of justice. Comments he made after Mr. Donohue’s body was found led our detectives to believe that Mr. Olmstead might have some knowledge as to the perpetrator or perpetrators of the crime. I would also like to point out that Mr. Olmstead, having relatives and friends on various Indian reservations throughout the U.S., presents a serious flight risk.”

Ike Donohue, the press spokesman for the Black Basin Uranium Mine, which is due to open next week, was formerly in charge of public relations at Cook & Creighton Tobacco, located in Durham, North Carolina. He leaves behind a wife, two sons, a daughter, and four grandchildren, all residents of North Carolina, where he lived before his retirement five years ago.

It is not yet known if Theodore Olmstead has obtained counsel.

Illustrating the article was a head shot of Donohue, a handsome, thin-faced man in his early sixties. His smile was movie-star-broad but didn’t reach his eyes.

Jimmy being Jimmy, he’d ridden to his brother’s rescue. Again, this brought up the obvious question: why hadn’t he wanted me working with him? Despite my partner’s considerable computer skills, I knew more about the ins and outs of criminal investigation than he did. Ted’s situation called for an experienced detective, not a desk jockey.

That “material witness” thing worried me, too. Since 9/11, it had become easier for law enforcement officials to hold someone indefinitely without filing charges. All the authorities needed was to hint to a sympathetic judge that pubic safety might be at risk, and the judge would comply. In this case, the victim being employed as the spokesman for a nearby uranium mine made a good argument. Given the ongoing oil crisis, the country’s nuclear power plants needed all the enriched uranium they could get. Hell, Ted was lucky he hadn’t been sent to Gitmo.

Further piquing my curiosity was the mention of Ted’s wife being a political activist. That was news to me, but when I Googled her name, she popped up in more than six thousand hits. Reading through the more reliable sites, I discovered that she and the group she headed—Victims of Uranium Mining (V.U.M.)—had raised legal hell over the proposed opening of the Black Basin Uranium Mine outside Walapai Flats, less than twenty miles from the Grand Canyon. V.U.M. pointed out that Roger Tosches, the mine’s owner, had at one time operated the Moccasin Peak Uranium Mine, located on the Navajo Reservation. Scores of Navajo miners had died of lung and kidney cancer, V.U.M. said, caused by the ingestion of the mine’s radioactive dust. But the damage hadn’t ended there. Moccasin Peaks’ mine tailings—leftover rocks from which the uranium had been extracted—continued to pollute the reservation. According to V.U.M., the Navajos were suffering from highly increased rates of various cancers due to not only working in the mine, but because of the poisonous tailings, which contained radioactive material and high amounts of arsenic.

The same poisoning would happen to the nearby Grand Canyon, V.U.M. warned. Did Americans want one of the world’s most magnificent places turned into a radiation hot spot?

An opposing press release—most probably penned by public relations flak Ike Donohue—had disputed V.U.M.’s claims, saying that the Black Basin would meet all federal safety standards. Ignoring the problems at the Moccasin Peak Mine, the release added that the new mine would provide jobs for approximately four hundred and fifty workers.

More curious now, I Googled Donohue and discovered in press conference after press conference, he had repeated that the Black Basin and its planned waste disposal methods were well within Federal guidelines. Ecofriendly, too, kind to the birds and bees and green leafy trees. Donohue never once addressed V.U.M.s concerns that the new mine would be operated by the same man who had so despoiled the Navajo community.

As for the possible despoiling of the Grand Canyon, he never brought it up.

In a lengthy interview on the front page of the
Walapai Flats Journal-Gazette
a week before Kimama’s death, Donohue was vicious in his portrayal of Kimama Olmstead, decrying what he called her “insensitivity” to the local economy, reliant for decades on the mining of various minerals, including silver, gold, and copper—as well as uranium.

“Mrs. Olmstead and the other hysterics in V.U.M. don’t care about the common working man,” Donohue sniped in the article. “Mrs. Olmstead’s own lucrative business won’t be affected, because Fluffy will always need a vet, and barring tort reform, V.U.M.’s high-roller attorneys will continue to chase ambulances. The people who will be hurt if the Black Basin doesn’t open are the honest, hard-working miners who need those jobs to feed their families.”