The First Eagle jlajc-13 Read online

  Janet looked over her mug at him. "Jim."

  Chee waited. "What?"

  "Oh, nothing. I guess this is a time to talk business."

  "So we take off our friend hats, and put on adversary hats?"

  "Not really," Janet said. "But I'd like to know if you're absolutely certain Robert Jano killed Officer Kinsman."

  "Sure I'm certain," Chee said. He felt his face flush—"You must have read the arrest report. I was there, wasn't I? And what do you do with it if I say I'm not sure? Do you tell the jury that even the arresting officer told you that he had reasonable doubts?"

  He'd tried to keep the anger out of his voice, but Janet's face told him he hadn't managed it. Another raw nerve touched.

  "I'd do absolutely nothing with it," she said. "It's just that Jano swears he didn't do it. I'll be working with him. I'd like to believe him."

  "Don't," Chee said. He sipped his coffee and put down the mug. It occurred to him that he hadn't noticed how it tasted. He picked up one of the containers-. "'Non-dairy creamer,'" he read. "Produced, I understand, on non-dairy farms."

  Janet managed a smile. "You know what? Doesn't this episode we're having here remind you of the first time we met? Remember? In the holding room at the San Juan County Jail in Aztec. You were trying to keep me from bonding out that old man."

  "And you were trying to keep me from talking to him."

  "But I got him out." Janet was grinning at him now.

  "But not until I got the information I wanted," Chee said.

  "Okay," Janet said, still grinning. "We'll call that one a tie. Even though you had to cheat a little."

  "How about our next competition," Chee said. "Remember the old alcoholic? You thought Leaphorn and I were picking on him. Until your client pleaded guilty."

  "That was a sad, sad case," Janet said. She sipped her coffee. "Some things about it still bother me. Some things about this one bother me, too."

  "Like what? Like the fact Jano is a Hopi and the Hopis are peaceful people? Nonviolent?"

  "There's that, of course," Janet said. "But everything he told me has a sort of logic to it and a lot of it can be checked out."

  "Like what? What can be checked?"

  "Like, for example, he said he was going to collect an eagle his kiva needed for a ceremonial. His brothers in is religious group can confirm that. That made it a religious pilgrimage, on which no evil thoughts are allowed."

  "Such as thoughts of revenge? Such as getting even with Kinsman for the prior arrest? The kind of thoughts D.A. will want to suggest to the jury if he's going for malice, premeditation. The death penalty stuff."

  "Right," she said.

  "They would confirm why he was going for the eagle, and the prosecution would concede it," Chee said. |*But how do you prove that deep down Jano didn't want 1 even the score?" Janet shrugged.

  "J. D. Mickey will probably state that in his opening. He'll say that Jano had gone onto the Navajo reservation to poach an eagle—a crime in itself. He'll say that Officer Benjamin Kinsman of the Navajo Tribal Police had previously arrested him doing the same crime last year and that Jano got off on some sort of technicality. He'll say that when he saw Kinsman was after him again, Jano was enraged. So instead of releasing the bird, getting rid of the evidence and trying to escape, he let Kinsman catch him, caught him off-guard and brained him."

  "Is that the way Mickey is planning it?"

  "I'm just guessing," Chee said.

  "I have no doubt at all that Mickey will go for death. It would be the first one since the 1994 Congress allowed federal death penalties and there would be a media coverage circus." Janet doctored her coffee with the nondairy creamer, tasted it. "Mickey for Congress," she intoned. "Your law-and-order candidate."

  "That's the way I see it," Chee said. "But the courts would have to rule that Kinsman was a federal officer."

  "People in criminal justice say he was." Chee shrugged. "Probably."

  "Which led the U.S. Department of Justice to unplug him from the various life support machines," Janet said. "So Benjamin Kinsman could hurry up and be a murder victim instead of the subject of criminal assault. Thereby simplifying the paperwork."

  "Come on, Janet," Chee said. "Be fair. Ben was already dead. The machines were breathing for him, making his heart pump. Kinsman's spirit had gone away."

  Janet was sipping her coffee. "You're right about one thing," she said. "This is good fresh Java. Not that weird perfumed stuff the yuppie bars sell for four dollars a cup."

  "What else could be checked out?" Chee asked. "In Jano's version."

  Janet raised her hand. "First something else," she said. "How about that autopsy? The law requires one in homicides, sort of, but a lot of Navajos don't like the idea and sometimes they're skipped. And I heard one of the docs saying something about organ donations?"

  "Kinsman was a Mormon. So were his parents. He'd had a donor card registered," Chee said, studying her as he said it. "But you already knew that. You were changing the subject."

  "I'm the defense attorney," she said. "You think my client is guilty. I've got to be careful what I tell you."

  Chee nodded. "But if there's something that can be checked out that I'm missing, something that could help his case, then I ought to know about it. I'm not going to go out there and destroy the evidence. Don't you—"

  He had started to say: "Don't you trust me?" But she would have said she did. And then she would have returned the question, and he had no idea how he could answer it.

  She was leaning forward, elbows on table, chin resting on clasped hands, waiting for him to finish.

  "End of statement," he said. "Sure, I think he's guilty. I was there. Had I been a little faster, I would have stopped it."

  "Cowboy doesn't think he's guilty."

  "Cowboy? Cowboy Dashee?"

  "Yes," Janet said. "Your old friend, Deputy Sheriff Cowboy Dashee. He told me Jano is his cousin. He's known him since childhood. They were playmates. Close friends. Cowboy told me that thinking Robert Jano would kill somebody with a rock is like thinking Mother Teresa would strangle the Pope."

  "Really?"

  "That's what he said. His exact words, in fact."

  "How come you got in touch with Cowboy?"

  "I didn't. He called the D.A.'s office. Asked who'd be assigned to handle Jano's defense. They told him a new hire would be assigned to it, and he left a message for whoever that would be to give him a call. It was me, so I called him."

  "Well, hell," Chee said. "How come he didn't contact me?"

  "I don't have to explain that, do I? He was afraid you'd think he was trying—"

  "Sure," Chee said. "Of course."

  Janet looked sympathetic. "That makes it worse for you, doesn't it? I know you guys go way back."

  "Yeah, we do," Chee said. "Cowboy's about as good a friend as I ever had."

  "Well, he's a cop, too. He'll understand."

  "He's also a Hopi," Chee said. "And some wise man once told us that blood's thicker than water." He sighed. "What did Cowboy tell you?"

  "He said Jano had caught his eagle. He was coming home with it. He heard noises. He checked. He found the officer on the ground, head bleeding."

  Chee shook his head. "I know. That's the statement he gave us. When he finally decided to talk about it."

  "It could be true."

  "Sure," Chee said. "It could be true. But how about the slash on his forearm, and his blood mixed with Ben's? And no blood on the eagle? And where's the perpetrator, if it wasn't Jano? Ben Kinsman didn't hit himself on the head with that rock. It wasn't suicide."

  "The eagle flew away," Janet said. "And don't be sarcastic."

  That stopped Chee cold. He sat for a long moment, just staring at her.

  She looked puzzled. "What?"

  "He told you the eagle flew away?"

  "That's right. When he caught it, Jano was under some brush or something," she said. "A blind, I guess, with something on a cord for bait. He tried to grab th
e eagle by the legs and just got one of them, and it slashed him on the arm and he released it."

  "Janet," Chee said. "The eagle didn't fly away. It was in a wire cage just about eight or ten feet from where Jano was standing over Kinsman."

  Janet put down her coffee cup.

  Chee frowned. "He told you it got away? But he knew we had it. Why would he tell you that?"

  She shrugged. Looked down at her hands.

  "And it didn't have any blood on its feathers. At least, I didn't see any. I'm sure the lab would check for it.

  "If you think I'm lying, look." He held out his hand, displaying the still healing slash on its side. "I picked up the cage to move it. That's where its talon caught me. Ripped the skin."

  Janet's face was flushed. "You didn't have to show We anything," she said. "I didn't think you were lying. I'll ask Jano about it. Maybe I misunderstood. I must have."

  Chee saw Janet was embarrassed. "I'll bet I know what happened," he said. "Jano didn't want to talk about the eagle because it got too close to violating kiva secrecy rules. I think it would become a symbolic messenger to God, to the spirit world. Its role would be sacred. He just couldn't talk about it, so he said he turned it loose."

  "Maybe so," she said.

  "I'll bet he just wanted to divert you. To talk about something besides a touchy religious subject."

  Janet's expression told him she doubted that.

  "I'll ask him about it," Janet repeated. "I really haven't had much chance to talk to him yet. Just a few minutes. I just got here."

  "But he told you he didn't kill Kinsman. Did he tell you who did?"

  "Well," Janet said, and hesitated. "You know, Jim, I have to be careful talking about this. Let me just say that I guess whoever it was who had hit Officer Kinsman with the rock must have heard Jano coming and went away. Jano said it started raining about the time you got there. By the time you had him handcuffed in the patrol car, and called in for help, and tried to make Kinsman comfortable, any tracks would have been washed away."

  Chee didn't comment on that. He had to be careful, too.

  "Don't you think so? Or did you find other tracks?"

  "You mean other than Jano's?"

  "Of course. Did you have a chance to look for any before it started raining?"

  Chee considered the question, why she had asked it and whether she already knew the answer.

  "You want some more coffee?"

  "Okay," Janet said.

  Chee signaled the waiter, thinking about what he was about to do. It was fair, if her effort to get him to state that he hadn't looked for other tracks was fair.

  "Janet, Jano told you how he got those deep slashes on his forearm. Did he mention exactly when he got scratched?"

  The boy brought the coffee, refilled their cups, asked if they were ready to order breakfast.

  "Give us another minute," Chee said.

  "When?" Janet said. "Isn't that obvious? It would have been either while he was catching the eagle or when he was putting it in the cage. Or somewhere in between. I didn't quiz him about it."

  "But did he say? Specifically when?"

  "You mean in relation to what?" she asked, grinning at him. "Come on, Jim. Say it. The police lab people have told you that Jano's blood is mixed with Kinsman's on Kinsman's shirt. The lab is probably doing some of their new molecular magic to tell them if Jano's blood had been exposed to the air longer than Kinsman's, and how much longer, and all that."

  "Can they do that now?" he asked, wishing he hadn't been pressing her on this, making her angry for no reason. "They probably would if they could, because the official, formal theory of the crime will be that Jano struggled with Kinsman and got his arm slashed on Kinsman's belt buckle."

  "Can they do it? I don't know. Probably. But how can you get cut on a belt buckle?"

  "Kinsman liked to bend the rules when he could. Put a feather in his uniform hat, that sort of thing. He put a fancy buckle on his belt to see how long it would be before I told him to take it off. Anyway, that's why the timing seems to be important."

  "Well, go ahead then. Ask me. Just exactly to the minute, when did Jano get his arm slashed?"

  "Okay," Chee said. "Exactly, precisely when?"

  "Ha!" Janet said. "You're treading on client confidentiality."

  "Whaddaya mean?"

  "You know what I mean. I see J. D. Mickey with a new hundred-dollar haircut and an Italian silk suit addressing the jury. 'Ladies and gentlemen. The defendant's blood was found mixed with the blood of the victim on Officer Kinsman's uniform.' And then he gets into all the blood chemistry stuff." Janet raised her hand, dropped her voice—providing a poor imitation of Mickey's courtroom dramatics. "'But! But! He told an officer of this court that he suffered the cut later. After he had moved Officer Kinsman.'"

  "So I guess you're not going to tell me," Chee said.

  "Right," Janet said. She put down her menu, studied him. Her expression was somber. "A little while ago, I might have."

  Chee let his expression ask the question.

  "How can I trust you when you don't trust me?"

  Chee waited.

  She shook her head. "I'm not just a shyster trying for a reputation with some sort of cheap acquittal," she said. "I really want to know if Robert Jano is innocent. I want to know what happened." She put down her menu and stared at him, inviting a response.

  "I understand that," Chee said.

  "I respect—" she began. Her voice tightened. She paused, looked away from him. "When I asked you about the tracks, I wasn't trying to trick you," she said. "I asked because I think if somebody else had been there and left any traces you would have found them. That is, if anybody in the world could have found them. And if there weren't any, then maybe I'm wrong and maybe Robert Jano did kill your officer, and maybe I should be trying to talk him into a plea bargain. So I ask you, but you don't trust me, so you change the subject."

  Chee had put down his menu to listen to this. Now he picked it up, opened it. "And now, once again, I think we should change the subject. How were things in Washington?"

  "I'm really not going to have time for breakfast." She put down her menu, said, "Thanks for the coffee," and walked out.

  Chapter Eight

  "THERE'S JUST ONE THING I can tell you and feel absolutely certain about it," said Richard Krause without looking up from the box full of assorted stuff he was picking through. "Cathy Pollard didn't just run off with our Jeep. Something happened to her. But don't ask me what."

  Leaphorn nodded. "That's what my client believes," he said. My client. It was the first time he'd used that term, and he didn't like the sound of it. Was this what he was making of himself? A private investigator?

  Krause was probably in his late forties, Leaphorn guessed, big-boned, lean and gristly, probably an athlete in college, with a shock of blondish hair just showing signs of gray. He was sitting on a high stool behind a table in a faded green work shirt, dividing his attention between Leaphorn and stacks of transparent Ziploc bags that seemed to contain small dead insects—fleas or lice. Or maybe ticks.

  "I guess you're working for her family," Krause said. He opened another bag, extracted a flea, and put it on a slide, which he placed in a binocular microscope. "Do they have any theories?"

  "Ideas float around," Leaphorn said, asking himself if the ethics of private investigators, presuming they had them, allowed one to reveal the identity of clients. He'd deal with that when circumstances required. "The obvious ones. A sex crime. A nervous breakdown. A rejected boyfriend. Things like that."

  Krause adjusted the microscope's focus, stared into the lenses, grunted and removed the slide. In its former existence this temporary lab had been a low-down-payment double-wide mobile home, and the heat of the summer sun radiated through its aluminum roof. The swamp-cooler fan roared away at its highest setting, mixing damp air into the dry heat. The rows of specimen jars on the shelf behind Krause were sweating. So was Krause. So was Leaphorn.

&n
bsp; "I really doubt there's a boyfriend involved in this," he said. "She didn't seem to have one. Never talked about it anyway." He transferred the flea into another Ziploc bag, wrote something on an adhesive tag, and stuck it in place. "Of course, there could be a jilted one floating around somewhere in the past. That wouldn't be the sort of thing Cathy would have chatted about, even if she chatted. Which she didn't do much."

  The cluttered, makeshift laboratory was reminding Leaphorn of his student career at Arizona State, which in those long-ago days required a mix of natural science courses even if your major was anthropology. Then he realized it wasn't as much what he was seeing as what he was smelling—those tissue-preserving, soap-defying chemicals that drove the scent of death deep into the pores of even the cleanest students.

  "Cathy was a very serious lady. Focused. Just talked about business," Krause was saying. "She had a thing about bubonic plague. Thought it was downright criminal that we protect the middle-class urbanites from these communicable diseases and let the vectors do their thing out here in the boondocks where nobody gets killed except the working class. Cathy sounded like one of those old-fashioned Marxists sometimes."

  "Tell me about the Jeep," Leaphorn said.

  Krause stopped what he'd been doing, stared at Leaphorn, frowning. "The Jeep? What's to tell?"

  "If there's foul play involved in this, the truck will probably be how the case gets broken."

  Krause shook his head. Laughed. "It was just a black Jeep. They all look alike."

  "It's harder to dispose of a vehicle," Leaphorn said.

  "Than a body?" Krause said. "Sure. I see what you mean. Well, actually it was a pretty fancy model. We heard it was one of those seized by the DEA guys in a drug bust and turned over to the Health Department. Had a white pinstripe. Very hi-fi radio with special speakers. Telephone installed. The cowboy model. No top. Roll bars. Winch on the front. Tow-chain hooks and a trailer hitch on the back. I think it was three years old, but you know they don't change those models much. I drove it myself some until Cathy got it away from me."

  "How'd that happen?"

  "What Cathy wanted, Cathy got." He shrugged. "Actually, she had a good argument for it. Spent more time out in the bad country while I was doing the paperwork inhere."