The Lost Bird (22 page)

T
he reporters gathered around a white van in the dusk of the parking lot: four or five men, a woman, faces lifted up as Vicky came down the rear stairway. A cigarette sailed in the air and plopped on the cement, the tiny red glow lingering like an ember in a dying campfire.

The reporters surged forward, a gust of shadowy faces as she hurried across the lot, steeling herself against the blizzard of questions. “What about the Linders?” someone shouted.

“Are they Sharon’s parents?” A man’s voice. “What’s the proof?”

Vicky darted through the shouting voices and bobbing heads, the stale odor of perspiring bodies. She reached the Bronco and slipped inside. Faces peered in the windows shouting garbled questions at the glass. A man gripped the edge of the door, preventing her from closing it. “How’s Sharon like having an embezzler for a mom?”

“Charges against Edna Linder were dropped!” Vicky yelled over the barrage of questions.

A woman elbowed around the man. “Did you bring them together? How much is Sharon paying you?”

Vicky tugged at the door, wrenching it free and slamming it shut. She punched the key into the ignition. An interminable wait, and finally the engine turned over. The Bronco started moving, and the reporters peeled away, rows of faces bobbing in the windows like decoys in a shooting range. In the side mirror she watched the crowd scramble for the white van and several cars.

Jamming down the accelerator, she plunged through the intersection as the light turned red. Another glance in the mirror: the van and cars were stopped at the light. She swung into an alley, swerved left into another alley, and emerged on a side street heading south, putting more space between her and the reporters. Near the edge of town, she turned onto the pavement in front of a cluster of flat-faced, peak-roofed buildings. She parked in front of the Roundup Café, next to Ben’s brown truck.

He was sitting in one of the booths along a wall of plate-glass windows. He hadn’t seen her when she’d driven up, she knew by the mixture of disbelief and joy on his face as she walked past the counter toward him. Most of the other booths were occupied by families. A couple of cowboys hunched over plates of food and mugs of coffee at the counter. The rumble of conversation and clank of dishes punctuated the Willie Nelson song in the background. The air smelled of hot chili.

Ben slid out of the booth and drew himself to his full six feet. One hand gripped a white napkin. His black blazer hung easily from wide shoulders and revealed the front of his checked shirt and the black strings of his bolo tie. A silver buffalo sat at the collar. His blue jeans looked clean and stiff, molded to the
muscles of his thighs and calves. He was as handsome as she remembered: hair as black as obsidian, barely brushing the collar of his blazer; dark, wide-set eyes, chiseled cheekbones, and finely shaped nose with the hook near the top. His mouth parted in a smile that showed a line of perfect white teeth.

“This is a surprise,” he said. He remained standing as she tossed her bag onto the booth and slid in beside it.

“You left a message.”

“Just dumb hope.”

Averting his eyes, she glanced out the window. The last gray light of day hung in the branches of the trees across the street; a woman pushed a baby stroller in and out of the shadows on the sidewalk. Vicky was aware of Ben taking the seat across from her, of the calmness and certainty in his bearing—the bearing of a warrior. Men listened to Ben Holden; women fell in love with him. She was seventeen when she had come under his spell. Still learning who she was, when she had begun to define herself by him: Ben’s girl, Ben’s fiancée, Ben’s wife, the mother of Ben’s children. They had been married twelve years; but they had been divorced a year longer. He still defined a part of her.

“I’ve been wanting to talk to you,” he said.

Vicky brought her eyes to his. “It’s been pretty crazy.” She knew that he knew there was another reason for not returning his calls. There was always the risk of coming under his spell, losing that part of herself she had struggled to reclaim.

The waitress appeared and set two menus on the table. Her attention was directed to Ben as she ticked off the specials. He stopped her after the chili and chicken-fried steak. “Two hamburgers and two coffees,”
he said, handing back the menus. Then he instructed her to bring lots of fries and not to forget the ketchup.

When the waitress had gone, he said, “Used to be our favorite meal.”

Vicky remembered. She kept her expression blank and said, “The FBI agent wants to talk to Lucy Travise, the white girl living with your nephew James.”

Ben gave a little nod, as if this was old news. James and his friends were always in trouble with the law. “What’s it about?”

“The murder of Father Keenan,” Vicky told him.

Ben shook his head. “They didn’t have anything to do with that.”

Vicky folded her hands on the table, wishing the waitress would deliver the coffee. “Lucy saw Sonny Red Wolf’s truck on Thunder Lane about the time of the murder,” she began. “I tried to talk her into going to the fed. But she and James are scared. They took off. They’re hiding somewhere with the family.”

Ben ran one hand along the sharp line of his chin, his eyes fixed on hers. “I don’t want James mixed up with Sonny Red Wolf.”

“Ben”—she tried to keep the anxiety out of her voice—“what if Sonny meant to kill Father John and shot the wrong priest? He could try again. The fed has to stop him.”

“You care a lot about that priest, don’t you?”

“I don’t want to see anyone else murdered,” she said hurriedly.

“Especially that priest.” He paused. “I’ve heard the rumors.”

“Rumors!” Vicky said. “What rumors?” It astounded her, the way the moccasin telegraph never
delivered rumors to the people they concerned.

The waitress appeared with plates of hamburgers and fries. Then she stepped away and returned with a bottle of ketchup and two mugs of coffee, which she deposited next to the plates. “Anything else I can get you?” A cheery smile bestowed on Ben.

He shook his head without returning the smile. As she stepped away, he leaned forward and said, “Rumors are there’s something between you and him.”

“He’s a priest, Ben.” Vicky avoided his gaze and concentrated on shaking the ketchup into a little puddle next to her fries.

“He’s a man.”

“He’s an honorable man.” Vicky set the ketchup bottle down hard. It made a sharp
thwack
on the Formica table. Smells of charred meat and fresh coffee floated toward her. “This isn’t about him. It’s about stopping a killer. Lucy has to talk to the fed.”

“I don’t know where James might be hanging out,” Ben said. “I just got back from L.A. a week ago.”

Vicky was about to take a bite of her hamburger. She set it on the plate and stared at him.

“Kids are doing fine.” He spoke quickly, as if to supply the answers to the questions she was about to ask. “Lucas’ll get his degree in computer science in December. Susan likes her part-time job at a law office. Says her classes at the community college are going pretty good.”

“I didn’t know you went to see them,” Vicky said, startled at the hurt in her tone. The kids and Ben seemed to have a secret life, one from which she was excluded.

Ben took a bite of his hamburger and began chewing slowly, reflectively. Finally he said, “I’ve asked Susan
and Lucas to come home. Lucas can work with me up at the Arapaho Ranch. Susan, she can get a part-time job and finish up school.” He looked steadily at her. “Don’t tell me you don’t want them home.”

“I want what’s best for them,” Vicky said, hoping the longing for her children didn’t seep into her voice. She didn’t let herself think of them close by: dinners together, a movie now and then, telephone conversations that continued from day to day—a normal family life.

“What’s best for them is to be here instead of in that smoggy, paved-over city. They need to be with their own people so they don’t forget who they are. They need family, Vicky. They need us.”

“We’re not a family anymore.” She stared at the untouched hamburger. She was no longer hungry.

“Well, we’re all they’ve got.” Silence hung between them. After a few moments he shoved his plate aside and leaned toward her. Slivers of light glinted in his dark eyes. “I know it’s over between us, Vicky. I’ve had a hard time admitting that I lost you”—he shrugged—“drove you off with my drinking. I lost control at times. I’m not proud of it. Jesus! I hate thinking about it. I despise the man I used to be, the man who hit you. I don’t know him. I don’t want anything to do with him.”

A wave of sadness and futility swept through Vicky. These were memories she did not want. “That’s over,” she managed.

Ben leaned toward her, his face composed halfway between regret and acceptance. “I’d like for us to be friends. Get together once in a while, for the kids’ sake. I don’t expect anything else.” He hesitated, then
hurried on: “I’m seeing somebody now. She’s a real nice lady.”

Vicky picked up the coffee mug and gripped it with both hands. For the first time in—how many years?—he no longer wanted her. The realization gave her a new and unfamiliar sense of freedom, as if the last tie to that other life had been cut and she was, at last, completely alone. Woman Alone.

“I hear you’ve been hanging out with movie stars,” Ben said in a lighter tone, as if they were now casual friends.

Vicky took a long sip of the coffee before she said, “Sharon David’s looking for her natural parents.”

Ben gave a snort of laughter. “Some parents to find yourself saddled with. Edna and Wylan Linder.”

“I suspect the blood tests will prove otherwise.” Vicky felt her own tension begin to dissolve now that the conversation had shifted into a neutral zone.

Ben peered at her over the rim of his mug. “I saw in the newspaper that she was born in 1964. It’s hard to believe any woman let her child go that year. A lot of babies were dying. My mother lost a son. Contaminated water, so everybody said.”

“What do you mean?” A small alarm sounded somewhere in the back of her mind.

“I was seven years old, Vicky. I didn’t get all the details, but it was like a darkness fell over our house, like night came and never left. Mom never talked about it, and Dad . . .” Ben stopped talking and took another sip of coffee. “That’s when Dad started drinking.” He glanced out the window a moment. “I always wished I’d seen my brother.”

“What do you mean? Didn’t you go to your brother’s funeral?” In that other time, when they were
married, Ben had never spoken much about his own life before she had come into it. This was a different Ben, and she knew she had to be careful.

“Sure I went to the funeral over at the mission.”

“Maybe you don’t remember. You were only seven.”

Ben was shaking his head. “I remember everything. The priest saying the Mass, the elders painting the casket.”

“Painting the casket!” Vicky stared at him, scarcely believing what she’d just heard. “Was the casket closed?”

“That’s what I’m telling you, Vicky. The family never got to see the baby because the casket was sealed. The elders put the sacred paint on the lid.”

Vicky sat motionless, her eyes on the blur of activity: the waitress sidling to the table and slapping down a check, Ben plucking a wallet from inside his blazer, pulling out some bills. She was numb with horror. How many other caskets were sealed that year? How many other families never saw the bodies of their babies? Why? What possible explanation could there have been for sealing the caskets?

“You okay?” Ben leaned toward her.

She stared at him a long moment, trying to compose herself and force her thoughts into some kind of order that made sense. Then she grabbed her bag and slid out of the booth. “I’ve got to go,” she said, managing a little smile.

Ben was on his feet, reaching toward her. She turned and hurried toward the rest rooms, looking for a telephone. She had to call Laola and tell her to clear the schedule for tomorrow. She wouldn’t be in the office.

21

T
he morning sun glanced off the gray-stone library that stood among the pines in north Lander. Vicky parked at the curb and hurried up the sidewalk past a couple of women with three young children trailing behind, books gripped in pudgy hands. She pulled open the heavy wood door and stepped into the cool, spacious interior. Rows of book stacks jutted from the side walls, and in the center, several elderly men sat at rectangular tables, bent over newspapers that rattled into the quiet. She threaded her way among the tables to the reception desk, where a young woman with dark hair and serious eyes was peering at a small computer screen. “Yes?” she said. Her eyes remained on the screen.