Hillerman, Tony - [Leaphorn & Chee 01] (3 page)

There were two more paragraphs, one reporting on Leaphorn's wife and family and a mutual friend of their undergraduate days at Arizona State, and the other offering help if McKee decided to "go witch-hunting this summer."

McKee smiled. Leaphorn had been of immense help in his original research, arranging to open the Law and Order Division files to him and helping him find the sort of people he had to see, the unacculturized Indians who knew about witchcraft. He had always regretted that Leaphorn wouldn't completely buy his thesis—that the Wolf superstition was a simple scapegoat procedure, giving a primitive people a necessary outlet for blame in times of trouble and frustration.

He leaned back in the chair, rereading the letter and recalling their arguments—Leaphorn insisting that there was a basis of truth in the Navajo Origin Myth, that some people did deliberately turn antisocial, away from the golden mean of nature, deliberately choose the unnatural, and therefore, in Navajo belief, the evil way. McKee remembered with pleasure those long evenings in Leaphorn's home, Leaphorn lapsing into Navajo in his vehemence and Emma—a bride then—laughing at both of them and bringing them beer. It would be good to see them both again, but the letter didn't sound promising. He needed a dozen case studies for the new book—enough to demonstrate all facets of his theory.

Jeremy Canfield walked in without knocking. "I've got a question for you," he said. "Where do you look on the Navajo Reservation for an electrical engineer testing his gadgets?"

He extracted a pipe from his coat pocket and began cleaning debris from the bowl into McKee's ashtray. "Just one more helpful hint. We know he has a light-green van truck. We don't know what kind of equipment it is, but this research needs to be away from such things as electrical transmission lines, telephone wires, and stuff like that."

"That helps a lot," McKee said. "That still leaves about ninety percent of the Reservation—ninety percent of twenty-five thousand square miles. Find one green truck in a landscape bigger than all New England."

"It's this daughter of a friend of mine. Girl named Ellen Leon," Canfield said. "She's trying to find this bird from U.C.L.A." He was a very small man, bent slightly by a spinal deformity, with a round, cheerful face made rounder by utter baldness.

"Goddamn flatlanders never know geography." Canfield said. "Think the Reservation's about the size of Central Park."

"Why's she looking for him?" McKee asked.

Canfield looked pained.

"You don't ask a woman something like that, Berg. Just imagine it's something romantic. Imagine she's hot for his body." Canfield lit the pipe. "Imagine she has spurned him, he has gone away to mend a broken heart, and now she has repented."

Or, McKee thought, imagine she's a fool like me. Imagine she's been left and is still too young to know it's hopeless.

"Anyway, I told her maybe in the Chuska Range, or the Lukachukais if he liked the mountains, or the Kam Bimghi Valley if he liked the desert, or up there north of the Hopi Villages, or a couple of other places. I marked a map for her and showed her where the trading posts were where he'd be likely to buy his supplies."

"Maybe they're married," McKee said. He was interested, which surprised him.

"Her name's Ellen Leon," Canfield said with emphatic patience. "His is Jimmie W. Hall, Ph.D. Besides, no wedding ring. From which I deduce they're not married."

"O.K., Sherlock," McKee said. "I deduce from your attitude that this woman was about five feet five, slim, with long blackish hair and wearing…" McKee paused for thought, "… a sort of funny-colored suit."

"I deduce from that that you saw her in the hall," Canfield said. "Anyway, I told her we'd keep our eyes open for this bird and let her know where we'd be camping so she could check." He looked at McKee. "Where do you want to start hunting your witches?"

McKee started to mention Leaphorn's letter and say he hadn't decided yet whether to go. Instead he thought of the girl at the front entrance of the Anthropology Building, who had looked tired and disappointed and somehow very sad.

"I don't know," McKee said. "Maybe down around No Agua, or way over west of the Colorado gorge, or on the west slope of the Lukies." He thought a moment. Canfield's current project involved poking into the burial sites of the Anasazis, the pre-Navajo cliff dwellers. There were no known sites around No Agua and only a few in the Colorado River country. "How about starting over in those west slope canyons in the Lukachukais?"

"That's good for me," Canfield said. "If you've got some witches in there to scrutinize, there's plenty of ruins to keep me busy. And I'll take my guitar and try to teach you how to sing harmony."

At the door, Canfield paused, his face suddenly serious.

"I'm glad you decided to go, Bergen. I think you need…" He stopped, catching himself on the verge of invading a zone of private grief. "I think maybe I should ask a guarantee that your witches won't get me." It came out a little lamely, not hiding the embarrassment.

"My Navajo Wolves, being strictly psychotherapeutic, are certified harmless," McKee said. He pulled open a desk drawer, rummaged through an assortment of paper clips, carved bones, arrow heads and potsherds, and extracted an egg-sized turquoise stone, formed roughly in the shape of a crouching frog. He tossed it to Canfield.

"Reed Clan totem," McKee said. "One of the Holy People. Good for fending off corpse powder. No self-respecting Navajo Wolf will bother you. I guarantee it."

"Ill keep it with me always," Canfield said.

The words would come back to McKee later, come back to haunt him.

Bergen McKee had spent most of the afternoon in the canvas chair beside the front door in Shoemaker's. It was a slow day for trading and only a few of The People had come in. But McKee had collected witchcraft rumors from three of them, and had managed to extract the names of two Navajos who might know more about it. It was, he felt, a good beginning.

He glanced at Leaphorn. Joe was leaning against the counter, listening patiently to another of the endless stories of Old Man Shoemaker, and McKee felt guilty. Leaphorn had insisted that he needed to go to the trading post—that he had, in fact, delayed the call to take McKee along—but more likely it was a convenient piece of made-work to do a friend a graceful favor.

"There is a young man back in there we want to pick up," Leaphorn had said. He pushed a file folder across the desk. "He cut a Mexican in Gallup last month."

The file concerned someone named Luis Horseman, aged twenty-two, son of Annie Horseman of the Red Forehead Clan. Married to Elsie Tso, daughter of Lilly Tso of the Many Goats Clan.

Residence, Sabito Wash, twenty-seven miles south of Klagetoh. The file included three arrest reports, for drunk and disorderly, assault and battery, and driving while under the influence of narcotics. The last entry was an account of the knifing in a Gallup bar and of a car stolen and abandoned after the knifing.

"What makes you think he's over in the Lukachukai country?" McKee had asked. "Why not back around Klagetoh with his wife?"

"It isn't very complicated," Leaphorn had said. Horseman probably thought he had killed the Mexican and was scared. His in-laws detested him. Horseman would know that and know they would turn him in, so he had run for the country of his mother's clan, where he could stay hidden.

"How the devil can you find him, then?" McKee had asked. "It would take the Marine Corps to search those canyons."

And Leaphorn had explained again—that the knife victim was now off the critical list and that if the good news was gotten to Horseman one of two things would happen. He would either turn himself in to face an assault charge, or, being less frightened, would get careless and show up in Chinle, or at Shoemaker's, or some other trading post. Either way, he'd be picked up and the file closed.

"And so I go to Shoemaker's today and spread the word to whatever Red Foreheads come in, and one of them will be a cousin, or a nephew, or something, and the news gets to Horseman. And if you don't want a free ride you can stay and help Emma with the housework."

And now Leaphorn was spreading the word again, talking to the big bareheaded Navajo who had been collecting canned goods off the shelves. "He's sort of skinny," Leaphorn was saying, "about twenty-two years old and wears his hair the old way."

"I don't know him," the Big Navajo said. He inspected Leaphorn carefully, then moved to the racks where the clothing was hung. He tried on a black felt hat. It was several sizes too small, but he left it sitting ludicrously atop his head as he sorted through the stock.

"My head got big since the last time I bought a hat," the Navajo said. He spoke in English, glancing at McKee to see if the white man appreciated Navajo clowning. "Have to have a seven-and-a-half now."

"Get that hair cut off and you could wear your old hat," Shoemaker said.

The Big Navajo wore braids, in the conservative fashion, but very short braids. Maybe, McKee thought, he had had a white man's haircut and was letting it grow out.

"Some son of a bitch stole the old one," the Big Navajo said. He tried on another hat.

McKee yawned and looked out the open door of the trading post. Heat waves were rising from the bare earth in front. To the northeast a thunderhead was building up in the sky over Carrizo Mountain. It was early in the season for that. Tomorrow was Wednesday. McKee decided he would accept Leaphorn's invitation to spend another day with him. And then he would take his own pickup and try to find the summer hogan of Old Lady Gray Rocks. He would start with her, since she was supposed to be the source of one of the better rumors. And by Thursday when Canfield arrived they would move into Many Ruins Canyon, set up camp, and work out of the canyon.

The Big Navajo had found a hat that fitted him, another black one with a broad brim and a high crown—the high fashion of old-generation Navajos. He looked like a Tuba City Navajo, McKee decided, long-faced and raw-boned with heavy eyebrows and a wide mouth.

"O.K.," the man said. "How much do I owe you now?"

The Big Navajo had taken a silver concho band from his hip pocket. He let it hang over his wrist while he handed Shoemaker the bills and waited for his change. The metal glowed softly—hammered discs bigger than silver dollars. McKee guessed the conchos would bring $200 in pawn. He looked at the big man with new interest. The Navajo was slipping the silver band down over the crown of his hat.

"This Horseman," Leaphorn was saying, "cut up a Mexican over in Gallup. Got drunk and did it, but the Nakai didn't die. He's getting better now. They want to talk to Horseman about it over at Window Rock."

"I don't know anything about him," the big man said.

"He's the son of Annie Horseman," Leaphorn said. "Used to live back over there across the Kam Bimghi, over on the west slope of the Lukachukais." He indicated the direction, Navajo fashion, with a twitch of his lips.

The Big Navajo had been picking up his box of groceries. He put it down and looked at Leaphorn a moment and then ran his tongue over his teeth, thoughtfully.

"Whereabouts on the west slope?" he asked. "Law and Order know where he is?"

"General idea," Leaphorn said. "But it would be better if he came on in himself. You know. Otherwise we'll go in there and get him. Make it worse for everybody."

"Horseman," the Big Navajo said. "Is he…"

Leaphorn was waiting for the rest of the question.

"What'd you say this kid looks like?"

"Slender fellow. Had on denims and a red shirt. Wears his hair the old way and ties it back in a red sweatband."

"I don't know him," the big man said. "But it would be good if he came in." He hoisted the box under his arm and walked toward the door.

"This man's a college professor," Leaphorn said, pointing to McKee. "He's looking for some information out here about witches."

The Navajo shook hands. He looked amused.

"They say there's a Wolf over toward the Lukachukais," McKee said. "Maybe it's just gossip."

"I heard some of that talk." He looked at McKee and smiled. "It's old-woman talk. A man out there's supposed to had a dream about the Gum-Tooth Woman and about a three-legged dog coming into his hogan and he woke up and he saw this dog in his brush arbor, and when he yelled at it, it turned into a man and threw corpse powder on him."

The Navajo laughed and slapped McKee on the shoulder.

"Horse manure," he said. "Maybe the Wolf is this boy the policeman is hunting for." He looked at Leaphorn. "I guess you'll be after that boy if he don't come in. Are you hunting for him now?"

"I don't think we're looking very hard yet," Leaphorn said. "I think he'll come in to see us."

The Big Navajo went through the door.

"Be better if he came in," he said.