People of Darkness jlajc-4 Page 9

  This time there were tracks everywhere. He drove west on Interstate 40 past the Grants interchange, thinking about them. Out here tracks were easy to follow. Too few people in too much space. Had all gone smoothly; Colton would have driven back to Albuquerque, checked in the car at the airport, picked up his truck, and returned to his trailer. That was Plan A, simple and quick. Then, after a few days, he would have hitched the trailer to the truck and moved along. Somewhere warmer. Maybe Houston, or maybe somewhere in California. It didn’t matter where. Until he could find his mother. Then there would be a home place. A place to settle.

  But now he had to use Plan B. That took him in the other directionto Gallup. There he would check the car into a garage for a major tune-up, leaving a Gallup number to be called when repairs were completed and telling the mechanic that there wasn’t any hurry. That would mean days before the car surfaced. He’d walk to the bus station, take the next bus to Phoenix, and fly back to Albuquerque.

  He drove exactly five miles above the speed limitthe margin highway patrolmen allow. There was no serious hurry. He’d bought himself some hours by burning the policeman’s car and radio. He’d wounded the man, probably in the abdomen. And it would take the woman at least three hours to walk out of the lava rock and turn in the alarm. By the time any serious search could be organized, he’d be well into Arizona. Outside the circle.

  A semi-trailer rig breezed past him, going perhaps fifteen miles above the limit. That would mean the trucker’s CB had assured him he was safe from the state police. But Colton held the rental Plymouth at a steady sixty. He was thinking how he would erase his tracks. Not since he was a boy had Colton felt so vulnerable. He knew the Indian policeman had seen him at the auction, clearly and close up. The policeman and the woman had seen him again on the lava. The policeman and the woman had to be killed just as quickly as Colton could manage it. Chapter Fifteen

  The way jimmy chee was propped against the pillows, he could shift his eyes to the left and look out the window of his fifth-floor room in the Bernalillo County Medical Center and see, across Lomas Avenue, the tan book tower of the University of New Mexico library and the modern-sculpture form of the Humanities Building. If he shifted his eyes to the right, he’d see on the TV screen the has-beens and never-would-bes of Hollywood Squares pretending to enjoy themselves. The TV screen was silent, the sound turned off. All Chee could hear was the voice of Sheriff Gordo Sena, whose face Chee could see when he turned his eyes straight ahead. Voice and face were angry. What I want you to do, Sena was saying, is drop all the bullshit. Just tell me some by-God truth for once. I want to know how you knew Tom Charley had that box. And what was in it. And what happened to it. And how come that feller in the Plymouth was after him.

  And what I’d like to know, Chee was thinking, is how Gordo Sena got past the nurse. The fbi people had come earlier, while he was trying to eat his breakfast, and the nurse had peered in at him and said, You’re not ready to talk to police, are you, and that had been the end of the fbi. But thirty minutes later, Sena had simply pushed the door open, stalked in, turned off the TV volume, sat in the bedside chair, and said, By God, we’re going to get some things straightened out. It was now about thirty questions later.

  I didn’t know Charley had the box, Chee said for the third time. It was an educated guess. I told you what Mrs. Vines told me. About thinking the burglary had a religious connection. Well, the religion is peyote, and Charley is the peyote chief. One plus one is two.

  Was, Sena corrected. Was the peyote chief. So you just walk up to Charley and ask him if he’s the burglar, and he admits it. That’s what you’re trying to get me to believe.

  That’s what happened, Chee said. Not quite, but just about. His ears were ringing, and his rib hurt, and the nausea that had come and gone all morning was coming again. He didn’t feel like talking. He closed his eyes. Sena’s glowering face went away, but not the voice. Question after question about why Charley had stolen the box, what Charley had said was in the box, what Charley had said about the Vineses. Questions that explored from every possible angle what Chee knew about the blond man in the green-and-white Plymouth.

  What kind of voice did he have? Sena asked.

  Chee opened his eyes. Never talked to him. He’d told Sena that before. Twice, in fact.

  That’s right, you didn’t, Sena said. His alert eyes were studying Chee’s face. Why did Sena think they had talked? Why was that so important to the sheriff?

  More questions. Why had the blond man burned Chee’s car? The answer seemed obvious to Chee, but he answered it. To prevent pursuit and the quick radio call that would have inevitably snared the Plymouth at a roadblock. Why did the blond man seem inclined to pursue Mary Landon? Obvious again. She and Chee had had a good look at the killer. He was trying to eliminate witnesses.

  Sena hitched his chair closer to the bed. He leaned forward. Did you find the box?

  No, Chee said.

  Had Tomas Charley opened it? Did he tell you that?

  He opened it, Chee said. They had already covered this.

  What was in it?

  Chee was dizzy. He wanted Sena to go away. The sheriff’s avid face went slightly out of focus.

  Did he tell you that? What was in the box?

  What I said; mostly just some rocks, Chee said. A bunch of black rocks, and some old military stuff—medals, a paratroop badge, a shoulder patch, and a few old photographs of people. Family, Charley thought they were.

  Rocks? Sena said.

  Mostly full of black rocks, Chee said.

  Sena was silent. His hard dark eyes stared at Chee. You got any brothers?

  No, Chee said. Two sisters. No brothers. The question surprised him.

  I had one, Sena said. Older brother. His name was Robert. He was smart. Smartest kid in Grants High School. Made the valedictorian speech. First time in years it hadn’t been some Anglo girl. Got a scholarship to the university here, but he didn’t go at first. Our old man had heart trouble. Robert worked in the onion fields, in the oil fields, things like that. He looked after us kids. Took care of us. Kept us out of trouble. The old man died and left some social security, so Robert finally went to the university. He was studying engineering.

  Sena had delivered that information in a flat staccato. Now his voice trailed off. He looked down at his hands, drew in a long breath, held it and then let it go. When he looked up again, his eyes were no longer hard. I’m going to ask you a favor, he told Chee. I don’t do that much.

  Chee nodded.

  I want to tell you how Robert died, Sena said. He described the oil well explosion and how the chief of the Navajo roustabout crew had kept his men away that day. For a while I thought he did it. Now I just think he was in on it somehow. Knew about the plan. Knew Robert was going to be killed. That fella was Dillon Charley, Tomas’ granddaddy.

  Sena looked down at his hands. The muscles in his jaw were working.

  What do you want me to do? Chee asked.

  Sena didn’t look up. I want to know who killed Robert, he said. I want to nail the sons of bitches. You talked to Mrs. Vines. You talked to Dillon Charley’s grandson. There’s some secret here that’s got to do with being Indian, and with that peyote religion. One of them told you something. You’ve figured something out. You know more than you’re telling. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have found Vines’ box so quick.

  I don’t know a damned thing, Chee said. Not about that oil well explosion. You think the Vineses had something to do with it?

  Sena shook his head. He didn’t live here then. And she didn’t get here until his first wife died. I think Dillon Charley told Vines something. Anyway, it’s a damned cinch Mrs. Vines knows something. Why else would she connect stealing that box with that bunch of peyote freaks?

  I don’t know, Chee said.

  The room fell silent. An ambulance turned off Lomas toward the BCMC emergency room entrance, its siren abruptly growling out.

  Nothing to tell me, then? Sena asked.<
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  Not that I haven’t already told you, Chee said.

  Sena pursed his lips, glanced at his watch. It’s a hell of a way to kill a man, he said. Blowing ‘em to pieces like that. We didn’t hardly find enough of Robert to bury. And part of what we buried might not have been him. Had one of his legs with the boot still on it. Part of the torso we could recognize because his belt buckle was in it. Never found a lot of him. The coyotes and the buzzards and things had had a couple of days to carry it away. Sena’s eyes were hard and bright, staring into Chee’s eyes. His jaw muscles were rigid. My mother used to go out there and look. She’d walk around in the creosote bush looking for pieces of bone. Sena produced a series of sounds that might have been a laugh. I think she wanted to put Robert all back together again. What do you think of that?

  Chee could think of nothing to say. White people’s attitude toward their dead was beyond his understanding.

  Two things, Sena said. One I’m asking you, and one I’m telling. If you can tell me anything about that peyote bunch, or the Vineses, or anything that will help me, well, I’d appreciate that. I’d remember it. I never forget a favor. And two, I’m telling you to stay out of my jurisdiction. This whole business is mine. The burglary and the killing and everything else. It’s mine. It’s been mine for most of my life, and I don’t want you in it. I told you that once, and you didn’t pay attention to me. Sena’s voice was shaking. He stopped talking for a moment, gaining control.

  Now, I got a name for being hard, he continued. I’ve killed a man or two in the line of duty, and there’s some that says I’ve killed some that didn’t need to be killed. However that is, I’ll tell you this. You think you’re unlucky that blond man run into you out there on the malpais. Fact is, you’re lucky it wasn’t me.

  Sena got up and placed his chair neatly against the wall under the television set. He went through the door without a glance or a word.

  On the television screen, a barrage of commercials replaced Hollywood Squares and gave way in turn to what seemed to be a soap opera. The screen was filled with the tear-wet face of a woman. Her lips moved soundlessly, and she dabbed at her eyes. Chee shifted his own eyes to the left, and stared out across the central campus of the University of New Mexico. He thought first about Gordo Sena’s hatred. And then about the pattern of his questions. It had not been a debriefingone officer collecting information from another. It had been an interrogationthe probing of a hostile witness, skillfully done. But exactly what had Sena wanted to learn?

  Part of that was obvious. Part of it wasn’t. Chee sorted it out in his mind. Three times, in three different ways, Sena had tried to learn if there had been any communication between him and the blond man. Why was that so important to Sena? Was the blond man working for the sheriff? Had Sena hired the man to get the box away from Tomas Charley? There was no way to answer that question. It would seem more logical that he had been hired by Vines.

  The telephone rang. Chee groaned.

  I’m Sergeant Hunt, the voice said, with the Albuquerque Police Department. You feel like having a visitor?

  It was a soft voice, very polite.

  Why not? Chee said.

  You’re going to have to tell that nurse, then, the voice said. She wouldn’t let me in.

  I’ll tell her, Chee said.

  Be right up, then, Hunt said, and hung up.

  Chee pushed the button to summon someone from the nursing station. Why would the apd send a man to talk to him? It was an fbi case, or, as Sena insisted, the Valencia County sheriff’s. That would depend on whether you counted the abduction, which had happened in federal jurisdiction on the reservation, or the murder, which was probably in Sena’s territory, depending on where the lines fell on the checkerboard. Either way, it would be of zero interest to the Albuquerque law.

  Hunt was a small man, with pale-gray eyes and a narrow, bony face.

  Looks like you forgot to dodge, Hunt said. In case you wondered, the bullet broke up, but it looks like a .22. Probably a hollow point.

  It looked like it might have been a .22 pistol with a silencer on the barrel, Chee said. Felt like a cannonball.

  I’ve got the report you gave to the state police here, Hunt said. Sounds like you got a pretty good look at him.

  Yeah, Chee said. Close enough. He tried to remember what he had told the state policeman. It was all hazy. They had started to walk back to the highway, Mary Landon and he. It had quickly become slow and painful. Each step produced a stabbing pain in his chest. Soon he had been dizzy. He had sat beside the track. Mary had spread her coat on the ground and made him lie down, and she had gone, running, intending to flag down some driver and get help. He had dozed and awakened and dozed again. Finally, when the sun was almost directly overhead, he had awakened to see a man in the black uniform of the New Mexico State Police bending over him. He remembered talking to the policeman, and Mary’s worried face, and driving to the interstate, and being transferred to an ambulance. He remembered Mary riding with him. But that was about all he remembered. Where was Mary now?

  We’d like to get another description, Hunt said. Have you go over it again.

  Medium-sized, Chee said. About thirty. Probably weighed about 150. Five ten, probably less. Looked to be in good shape. Hair was very blond, medium short. Sort of prominent bone structure, as I remember. Strong chin, blue eyes, light eyebrows. No mustache. No beard. Light complexion. Pale. Ears fairly large and laid close to his skull.

  Hunt had been making notes. Chee closed his eyes, seeing the face again as he had seen it at the auction, the light-blue eyes watching him. I can’t think of any more details. He looked smart, if you know what I mean by that.

  Hunt had opened a manila folder. He look anything like this? he asked. He handed Chee a sketch done in pencil on thin white cardboard. It looked like a sketch made by a police artist. It also looked a lot like the blond man.

  Chee handed it back. Could be him, he said. Probably is. Who is he?

  We don’t know for sure, Hunt said.

  Chee’s rib throbbed. He felt a sudden wave of sickness. His ears were ringing. He was not in the mood for coyness. God damn it, he said. Let’s not play games. Who was the sketch supposed to look like? And how come it’s apd business? It’s a hundred miles out of your territory.

  That takes a minute to explain, Hunt said. We have a file on old unsolved homicides in the detective division, and I’m the one who keeps track of it. You know, review it every six months or so to see if anything new fits in. Anyway, last summer we had a funny double killing. Two guys on a wrecker were going to tow an old pickup out of a reserved parking zone, and the thing blew up and killed ‘em both. We got lucky and found a witness who’d been sitting at a window watching the world go by. She had seen somebody who looked like this Hunt tapped the sketch put a package in the back of the pickup before it went boom.

  Ah, Chee said. He was no longer conscious of the ache in his left side, or of the nausea. Part of the pattern that had been trying to form in his mind for hours took firm, clear shape. Hunt was looking at him expectantly, waiting for a comment. That’s interesting, Chee said.

  It is, Hunt agreed. We never could figure it out. Obviously the bomb wasn’t intended for the wrecker crewalthough we finally even checked on that. You’d figure if a guy puts a bomb in a pickup, he wants to waste the pickup driver. But the driver was a poor-boy Navajo who was already on his last legs with cancer. Already dying. No motive to hurry it along. Then we checked on the guy who had the parking space reserved. Big shot doctor. Money. Wife trouble. Maybe she wanted an instant divorce. No evidence, but we figured the doctor was the target. Now it looks like we got our bomber killing another Navajo, and he’s got the same last name.

  They’re father and son, Chee said.

  Hunt slapped his leg. That’s exactly what I hoped you’d say. That, or maybe brothers. You know for sure?

  I know it for sure, Chee said.

  Well, now, Hunt said. That tells us a couple of things.<
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  Yes, Chee was thinking. It should tell us a lot. But he couldn’t think of what.

  Like what? he asked.

  Like that bomb wasn’t intended for the doctor. If that hit man was aiming for Charley Junior, he must have been aiming for Charley Senior.

  Yes, Chee said. His head ached. Who would hire a professional killer to murder a man who was already dying? Why would anyone want to hurry the death of Emerson Charley? There were no apparent answers. Hunt was watching Chee, waiting for more response.