The First Eagle jlajc-13 Page 5

  "As I remember it," he said while he dribbled in the bourbon, "you don't drink hard liquor. If I'm wrong about that, you tell me and I'll get you something better than soda pop."

  "This is fine," Leaphorn said.

  McGinnis held the measuring cup up, examined it against the light from the dusty window, shook his head, and poured a few drops carefully back into the bottle. He inspected the level again, seemed satisfied, and took a sip.

  "You want to do a little visiting first?" McGinnis asked. "Or do you want to get right down to what you came here for?"

  "Either way," Leaphorn said. "I'm in no hurry. I'm retired now. Just a civilian. But you know that."

  "I heard it," McGinnis said. "I'd retire myself if I could find somebody stupid enough to buy this hellhole."

  "Is it keeping you pretty busy?" Leaphorn asked, trying to imagine anyone offering to buy the place. Even tougher trying to imagine McGinnis selling it if someone did. Where would the old man go? What would he do when he got there?

  McGinnis ignored the question. "Well," he said, "if you came by to get some gasoline, you're out of luck. The dealers charge me extra for hauling it way out here and I have to tack a little bit on to the price to pay for that. Just offered gasoline anyway to convenience these hard cases that still live around here. But they took to getting their tanks filled up when they get to Tuba or Page, so the gas I got hauled out to make it handy for 'em just sat there and evaporated. So to hell with 'em. I don't fool with it anymore."

  McGinnis had rattled that off in his scratchy whiskey voice—an explanation he'd given often enough to have it memorized. He looked at Leaphorn, seeking understanding.

  "Can't say I blame you," Leaphorn said.

  "Well, you oughtn't to. When the bastards would forget and let the gauge get down to empty, they'd come in, air up their tires, fill the radiator with my water, wash their windshield with my rags, and buy two gallons. Just enough to get 'em into one of them discount stations." Leaphorn shook his head, expressing disapproval.

  "And want credit for the gas," McGinnis said, and took another long, thirsty sip.

  "But I noticed driving in that you still have a tank up on your loading rack. With a hand pump on it. You keep that just for your own pickup?"

  McGinnis rocked a little while, considering the question. And probably wondering, Leaphorn thought, if Leaphorn had noticed that the old man's pickup was double-tanked, like most empty-country vehicles, and wouldn't need many refills.

  "Well, hell," McGinnis said. "You know how folks are. Come in here with a dry tank and seventy miles to a station, you got to have something for 'em."

  "I guess so," Leaphorn said.

  "If you haven't got any gas to give 'em, then they just hang around and waste your time gossiping. Then they want to use your telephone to get some kinfolks to come and bring 'em a can."

  He glowered at Leaphorn, took another sip of bourbon. "You ever know a Navajo to be in a hurry? You got 'em underfoot for hours. Drinking up your water and running you out of ice cubes."

  McGinnis's face was slightly pink—embarrassment caused by his admission of humanity. "So finally I just quit paying the bills and the telephone company cut me off. I figured keeping a little gasoline was cheaper."

  "Probably," Leaphorn said.

  McGinnis was glowering at him again, making sure that Leaphorn wouldn't suspect some socially responsible purpose in this decision.

  "What'd you come out here for anyway? You just got a lot of time to waste now you're not a cop?"

  "I wondered if you ever had any customers named Tijinney?"

  "Tijinney?" McGinnis looked thoughtful.

  "They had a place over in what used to be the Joint Use Reservation. Over by the northwest corner of Black Mesa. Right on the Navajo-Hopi border."

  "I didn't know there was any of that outfit left," McGinnis said. "Sickly bunch, as I remember it. Somebodyalways coming in here for me to take 'em to the doctor over at Tuba or the clinic at Many Farms. And they did a lot of business with old Margaret Cigaret and some of the other shamans, getting curing ceremonials done. They was always coming in here trying to get me to donate a sheep to help feed folks at the sings."

  "You remember that map I used to keep?" Leaphorn asked. "Where I'd record things I needed to remember? I looked at it this morning and I noticed I'd marked down a lot of skinwalker gossip over there where they lived. You think all that sickness would account for that?"

  "Sure," McGinnis said. "But I got a feeling I know what this is leading up to. That Kinsman boy the Hopi killed, wasn't that over there on the old Tijinney grazing lease?"

  "I think so," Leaphorn said.

  McGinnis was holding his measuring cup up to the light, squinting at the level. He poured in another ounce or two of bourbon. "Just think so'?" he said. "I heard the federals had that business all locked up. Didn't that young cop that used to work with you catch the man right when he did it? Caught him right in the act, the way I heard it."

  "You mean Jim Chee? Yeah, he caught a Hopi named Jano."

  "So what are you working on out here?" McGinnis asked. "I know you ain't just visiting. Aren't you supposed to be retired? What're you up to? Working the other side?"

  Leaphorn shrugged. "I'm just trying to understand some things."

  "Well, now, is that a fact?" McGinnis said. "I was guessing you were trying to find some way to prove that Hopi boy didn't do the killing."

  "Why would you think that?"

  "Cowboy Dashee was in here just the other day. You remember Cowboy? Deputy with the sheriff's office?"

  "Sure."

  "Well, Cowboy says the Jano boy didn't do it. He says Chee got the wrong fella."

  Leaphorn shrugged, thinking that Jano was probably kinfolks with Dashee, or a member of his kiva. The Hopis lived in a much smaller world than the Navajos. "Did Cowboy tell you who was the right fella?"

  McGinnis had stopped rocking. He was staring at Leaphorn, looking puzzled.

  "I was guessing wrong, wasn't I? Are you going to tell me what you're up to?"

  "I am seeing if I can find out what happened to a young woman who worked for the Indian Health Service.

  She was checking on plague cases. Drove out of Tuba City more than a week ago and she still hasn't come back."

  McGinnis had been rocking, holding his measuring cup in his left hand, left elbow on the rocker's arm, his forearm moving just enough to compensate for the motion—keeping the bourbon from splashing, keeping the surface level. But he wasn't watching his drink. He was staring out the dusty window. Not out of it, Leaphorn realized. McGinnis was watching a medium-sized spider working on a web between the window frame and a high shelf. He stopped rocking, pushed himself creakily out of the chair. "Look at that," he said. "The sonsabitches are slow learners."

  He walked to the window, crumpled a handkerchief from his overalls pocket, chased the spider across the web with it, folded the cloth carefully around the insect, opened the window screen, and shook it out into the yard. Obviously the old man had a lot of practice capturing such insects. Leaphorn remembered once seeing McGinnis capture a wasp the same way, evicting it unharmed through the same window.

  McGinnis retrieved his drink and lowered himself, groaning, back into his chair.

  "Sonofabitch will be right back first time he sees the door open, "he said.

  "I've known people to just step on them," Leaphorn said, but he remembered his mother dealing with spiders in the same way.

  "I used to do that," McGinnis said. "Even had some bug spray. But you get older, and you look at 'em up close and you get to thinking about it. You get to thinking they got a right to live, too. They don't kill me. I don't kill them. You step on a beetle, it's like a little murder."

  "How about eating sheep?" Leaphorn asked.

  McGinnis was rocking again, ignoring him. "Very small murders, I guess you'd have to say. But one thing leads to another."

  Leaphorn sipped his Pepsi.

  "Sheep? I quit
eating meat a while back," McGinnis said. "But you didn't drive all the way in here to talk about my diet. You want to talk about that Health Department girl that run off with their truck."

  "You hear anything about that?" Leaphorn asked.

  "Woman named Cathy something or other, wasn't it?" McGinnis said. "The Fleacatcher, the folks out here call her, because she collects the damned things. She was in here a time or two, asking questions. Wanted to get some gas once. Bought some soda pop, some crackers. Can of Spam, too. And it wasn't a truck, either, now I think of it. It was a Jeep. A black one."

  "About that black Jeep. The family's offering a thousand-dollar reward to anybody who finds it."

  McGinnis took another sip, savored it, stared out the window.

  "That don't sound like they think she eloped."

  "They don't," Leaphorn said. "They think somebody killed her. What sort of questions was she asking when she was in here?"

  "About sick folks. Where they might have got the fleas on 'em to get the plague. Did they have sheepdogs? Anybody notice prairie dogs dying? Or dead squirrels? Dead kangaroo rats?" McGinnis shrugged. "Strictly business, she was. Seemed like a mighty tough lady. No time for kidding around. Hard as nails. And I noticed when she was walking around, she was looking at the floor all the time. Looking for rat droppings. And that pissed me off some. And I said, 'Missy, what are you looking for back there behind the counter? You lose something?' And she said, 'I'm looking for mice manure.'" McGinnis produced a rusty laugh and slapped the arm of his rocker. "Came right out with it without a blink and kept right on looking. Quite a lady she is."

  "You heard anything about what might have happened to her?"

  McGinnis laughed, took another sip of his bourbon. "Sure," he said. "It gives folks something to talk about. Heard all kinds of things. Heard she might have run off with Krause—that fellow she works with." McGinnis chuckled. "That'd be like Golda Meir running off with Yasser Arafat. Heard she might have run off with another young man who was out here with her a time or two. Some sort of student scientist, I think he was. He seemed kind of strange to me."

  "Sounds like you don't think she and her boss got along."

  "They was in here just twice that I remember," McGinnis said. "First time they never said a word to each other. I guess that's all right if you're stuck in the same truck all day. Second time it was snarling and snapping. Hostile-like."

  "I'd heard she didn't like him," Leaphorn said.

  "It was mutual. He was paying for some stuff he got, and she walked past him out the door and he said 'Bitch.'" Loud enough for her to hear him?" If she was listening."

  "You think he might have knocked her on the head and dumped her somewhere?"

  "I figure him for being hell on rodents and fleas, things like that. Not humans," McGinnis said. He thought about that for a moment and chuckled again. "Of course, couple of my customers figure the skinwalkers got off with her."

  "What do you think of that?"

  "Not much," McGinnis said. "Skinwalkers get a lot of blame around here. Sheepdog dies. Car breaks down. Kid gets the chicken pox. Roof leaks. Skinwalkers get the blame."

  "I heard she had driven out toward Yells Back Butte to do some work out there," Leaphorn said. "There always seemed to be a lot of witching talk around there."

  "Lot of talk about that place," McGinnis said. "Had its own legend. Old Man Tijinney was supposed to be a witch. Had a bucket of silver dollars buried somewhere. A tub full, the way some told it. When the last of that outfit died off people dug holes all around out there. Some of the city kids didn't even respect the death hogan taboo. I heard they dug in there, too."

  "Find anything?"

  McGinnis shook his head, sipped his drink. "You ever run into that Dr. Woody fella out there? He comes in here a time or two just about every summer. Working on some sort of a rodent research project here and there, and I think he has some sort of setup near the butte. He was in three or four weeks back to get some stuff and telling me another skinwalker story. I think it's a kind of hobby of his. Collects them. Thinks they're funny."

  "Who's he get 'em from?" Leaphorn asked. It was a rare Navajo who'd pass along a skinwalker report to anyone he didn't know pretty well.

  McGinnis obviously knew exactly what Leaphorn was thinking.

  "Oh, he's been coming out here for years. Long enough to speak good Navajo. Comes and goes. Hires local folks to collect rodent information for him. Friendly guy."

  "And he told you a fresh skinwalker story? Something that happened out near Yells Back?"

  "I don't know how fresh it was," McGinnis said. "He said Old Man Saltman told him about seeing a skinwalker standing by a bunch of boulders at the bottom of the butte a little bit after sundown, and then disappearing behind them, and when he came out he turned into an owl and went flopping away like he had a broken wing."

  "Turned from what into an owl?"

  McGinnis looked surprised by the question. "Why, from a man. You know how it goes. Hosteen Saltman said the owl kept flopping around as if he wanted to be followed."

  "Yeah," Leaphorn said. "And he didn't follow, of course. That's how the story usually goes."

  McGinnis laughed. "I remember about the first or second time I saw you, I asked if you believed in skin-walkers, and you said you just believed in people who believed in 'em, and all the trouble that caused. Is that still the case?"

  "Pretty much," Leaphorn said.

  "Well then, let me tell you one I'll bet you haven't heard before. There's an old woman who comes in here after shearing time every spring to sell me three or four sacks of wool. Sometimes they call her Grandma Charlie, I think it is, but I believe her name is Old Lady Notah. She was in here just yesterday telling me about seeing a skinwalker."

  McGinnis raised his glass in a toast to Leaphorn. "Now listen to this one. She said she was out looking after a bunch of goats she has over by Black Mesa—right on the edge of the Hopi Reservation—and she notices somebody down the slope messing around with something on the ground. Like hunting for something. Anyway, this fella disappears behind the junipers for a minute or two and then emerges, and now he's different. Now he's bigger, and all white with a big round head, and when he turned her way, his whole face flashed."

  "Flashed?"

  "She said like the flash thing on her daughter's little camera."

  "What did the man look like when he quit being a witch?"

  "She didn't stick around to see," McGinnis said. "But wait a minute. You ain't heard all of it yet. She said when this skinwalker turned around he looked like he had an elephant's trunk coming out of his back. Now how about that?"

  "You're right," Leaphorn said. "That's a new one."

  "And come to think of it, you can add that one to your Yells Back Butte stories. That's about where Old Lady Notah has her grazing lease."

  "Well, now," Leaphorn said, "I think I might want to talk to her about that. I'd like to hear some more details."

  "Me, too," McGinnis said, and laughed. "She said the skinwalker looked like a snowman."

  Chapter Seven

  THEY'D AGREED TO MEET FOR BREAKFAST, early because Janet had to drive south to Phoenix and Chee had to go about as far north to Tuba City. "Let's make it seven on the dot, and not by Navajo time," Janet had said.

  There he was, a little before seven, waiting for her at a table in the hotel coffee shop, thinking about the night he'd walked into her apartment in Gallup. He'd been carrying flowers, a videotape of a traditional Navajo wedding and the notion that she could explain away the way she had used him, and—

  He didn't want to think about that. Not now and not ever. What could change that she'd gotten information from him and tipped off the law professor, the man she'd told Chee she hated?

  Before he'd finally slept, he decided he would simply ask her if they were still engaged. "Janet," he would say. "Do you still want to marry me?" Get right to the point. But this morning, with his head still full of gloomy thoughts, he wasn't so
sure. Did he really want her to say yes? He decided she probably would. She had left her high-society inside-the-Beltway life and come back to Indian Country, which said she really loved him. But that would carry with it, in some subtle way, her understanding that he would climb the ladder of success into the social strata where she felt at home.

  There was another possibility. She had taken her first reservation job to escape her law professor lover. Did this return simply mean she wanted the man to pursue her again? Chee turned away from that thought and remembered how sweet it had been before she had betrayed him (or, as she saw it, before he had insulted her because of his unreasonable jealousy). He could land a federal job in Washington. Could he be happy there? He thought of himself as a drunk, worthless, dying of a destroyed liver. Was that what had killed Janet's Navajo father? Had he drowned himself in whiskey to escape Janet's ruling-caste mother?

  When he'd exhausted all the dark corners that scenario offered, he turned to an alternative. Janet had come back to him. She'd be willing to live on the Big Rez, wife of a cop, living in what her friends would rate as slum housing, where high culture was a second-run movie. In that line of thought, love overcame all. But it wouldn't. She'd yearn for the life she'd given up. He would see it. They'd be miserable.

  Finally he thought of Janet as court-appointed defense attorney and of himself as arresting officer. But by the time she walked in, exactly on time, he was back to thinking of her as an Eastern social butterfly, and that thought gave this Flagstaff dining room a worn, grungy look that he'd never noticed before.

  He pulled back a chair for her.

  "I guess you're used to classier places in Washington," he said, and instantly wished he hadn't so carelessly touched the nerve of their disagreement.

  Janet's smile wavered. She looked at him a moment, somberly, and looked away. "I'll bet the coffee is better here."

  "It's always fresh anyway," he said. "Or almost always."

  A teenage boy delivered two mugs and a bowl filled with single-serving-size containers labeled "non-dairy creamer."