The Thunder Keeper Part 2

"You found him?"

The chief gave a quick nod. "Ben Holden took a half-dozen warriors up to Bear Lake this morning after the guy didn't get back from a vision quest. Found his body in a boulder field below the spirit cliff. Looks like he's been dead a couple days."

"Who is he?"

"n.o.body from around here. Arapaho from Oklahoma. Name's Duncan Grover. Age about twenty-five." The chief glanced away a moment. "Fremont County Sheriff's Department brought the body out. This is their investigation, with Bear Lake being county land. Got a detective on it named Matt Slinger."

Father John understood. There was a jurisdictional maze that the law enforcement agencies in the area had to navigate. Who was in charge depended upon where a crime took place.

"What do you know about Duncan Grover, John?" The chief's eyes bore into his.

"Look, Banner," Father John began, "this isn't something I can talk about."

Banner moved closer. The odor of stale coffee hung between them. "You do know what really happened up there, don't you?"

"What does the detective say happened?"

"The detective? You wanna know what the white detective and the white coroner say? They say Duncan Grover jumped off the cliff. Committed suicide."

"Suicide!" Father John could feel his heart speed up. He turned away a moment. They had it all wrong. The killer was going to walk away, and other people were going to die. There's gonna be more murders.

He looked back at the Indian watching him with narrowed eyes. "What makes them think it was suicide?"

"Body was two hundred feet below the ledge," the chief said. "If he'd accidentally stepped off, he probably wouldn't have fallen more than ten, fifteen feet before he would've been stopped by a big outcropping. But he flew over the outcropping, which took some force. They say he jumped."

"And you don't think so," Father John said after a moment.

"I don't think any warrior's gonna go on a vision quest at a sacred site like Bear Lake, where the spirits are all around, then throw himself off the cliffs." Banner's voice was tight with fury.

Father John was quiet a moment. "You explain that to the detective?"

"Yeah." The chief threw his head back in a nod. "So did Gus Iron Bear, the medicine man that gave Grover instructions. So did Holden. Three Indians explaining how things are to white men. You think they listened? Case closed, as far as they're concerned. Just another dead Indian who killed himself."

"There has to be some evidence at Bear Lake." Father John pushed on, struggling to find another way to the truth, groping toward the logic. "Footprints or tire tracks. Something that would make the detective and coroner change their minds."

"You forget it's been raining all week." A look of exasperation came into the Indian's dark eyes. "The searchers and sheriff's boys were up there trampling around all morning. If there was any evidence, it's gone." He nodded toward the sound of the drums, the jangling of the dancers who spilled out of the hall. "Those kids in there, they're gonna hear suicide and they're gonna think, warrior offs himself, so it must be okay. Goin' gets tough, and it's the way out."

The chief came closer still and took hold of his arm. Father John could feel the anger pulsing through the man's fingers. "You know the truth, John. What're you gonna do about it?"

Father John didn't say anything. The penitent's words-more murders, more murders-boomed silently in his head.

The chief whirled about and started around the car, and Father John felt as if a door had slammed between them, and something was drawing to a close, a friendship ending, the trust people here had in him fading away. He said, "I'll have a talk with the detective."

Banner stopped and stared at him over the roof of the car. "What're you gonna say that'll make any difference?"

He didn't know. But he knew how white men thought. It didn't surprise him that they'd ignored what the Indians had tried to tell them about spirits and vision quests. The detective and coroner would want concrete facts and logic, a straight, uncluttered path to the truth. He was like them. Somehow he was going to have to get the kind of facts that would convince them that Duncan Grover had not committed suicide.

"I'll think of something," he said. He started toward the parking lot, then walked back. The chief was behind the steering wheel, turning the ignition. The engine rumbled into life.

"What's Ben Holden got to do with this?" Father John leaned toward the driver's window rolled halfway down.

"Holden and Grover's dad were army buddies," Banner said over the top of the gla.s.s. "Soon's the kid got to the res, he went out to the Arapaho Ranch to see Holden about a job."

Father John thumped the rear door with his fist as the car started sliding by. He watched as the chief made a turn around the last row of parked vehicles and gunned the engine past the senior center and out onto Seventeen Mile Road.

Before he went to see a white man by the name of Detective Matt Slinger, he'd find out what Ben Holden knew about Duncan Grover.

4.

It took Father John almost an hour to drive north to Thermopolis, another hour heading west into the Owl Creek Mountains. A rainy haze lay over the pinons and junipers pa.s.sing outside the windows. The sounds of La Boheme rose above the hum of the tires on wet asphalt. He spotted the turn into the Arapaho Ranch ahead, eased on the brake pedal, and made a sharp right onto the gravel road that dead-ended at a two-story log building. The smell of wet sage and new gra.s.ses. .h.i.t him as he walked up to the wide porch along the front of the building and knocked on the door. There were no sounds except for that of water washing out of a downspout and the aluminum chairs banging against the porch railing in the wind.

He knocked again, then tried the k.n.o.b. It turned in his hand, and he stepped into a cavernous room with overstuffed sofas and chairs and Indian rugs scattered about the plank floor. On the right was the kitchen with U-shaped cabinets that wrapped around a long, narrow table with chairs pushed into the sides. Ahead, a stairway rose to a second-floor balcony that overlooked the living room. Beyond the railing were closed doors that Father John guessed led to the bunk rooms.

"h.e.l.lo!" he called. "Anybody here?"

One of the doors opened. An Indian who looked about sixty, dressed in blue jeans and plaid shirt, sauntered over to the railing. "You lookin' for somebody?"

"Ben Holden around?"

The Indian gestured with his head toward the window at the end of the balcony. "Out in the barn. Loadin' up hay for the back pasture."

"Thanks." Father John tipped the brim of his cowboy hat and stepped back outside. Hunching his shoulders in the rain, he walked down the driveway past a series of outbuildings just as a group of cowboys emerged through the side door of a barn streaked yellow with age. He spotted Ben Holden at once: the tall frame slightly stooped inside the black slicker, the black cowboy hat tilted low over his forehead.

The Indian glanced around. Then he started toward him. "What can I do for you?" His tone was businesslike, the dark eyes that regarded him steady and unreadable.

Father John felt a pang of admiration at Ben Holden's control, more certain than his own. There was a lot of history between them; they cared about the same woman, but not well enough, either of them. Ben-in and out of rehab, a violent drunk; and he, a priest.

He said, "I'd like to talk to you."

Ben gave a noncommittal shrug and veered along a diagonal path to a shack. "In here," he called, throwing his voice over one shoulder and opening the door.

Father John followed him into the small room jammed with a table and two chairs. Stacks of paper covered the tabletop and crept onto the chairs and then onto the floor. A potbelly stove hissed in the corner. The air felt warm and close.

Ben pushed a chair back with a muddy boot, lifted some papers onto the table, and sat down. He unsnapped his slicker but made no effort to remove it, a sign that the conversation would be short.

"This about Vicky?" he said, a hard edge in his tone.

Father John cleared a stack from the other chair, swung it around, and straddled it, facing the Indian. "No," he said.

A mixture of barely concealed relief and curiosity came into the man's dark eyes. His whole frame seemed to relax against the rungs of his chair. "I get it," he said. "You're here about Duncan Grover."

"I understand you knew him."

Ben shifted sideways, stretched out his legs, and crossed one muddy boot over the other. "Duncan's dad and I were stationed in Germany together. The only Indians in the whole country"-he stared across the room at the memory-"couple Arapahos. Grover was from Oklahoma. His kid showed up at the res last month and looked me up. Said he'd been working in Denver and had enough of white people." Ben gave a snort of laughter.

"Did he say where he'd been working?" Father John asked.

"Construction jobs. Looked like he was used to hard work, mostly outdoors." He paused. The fire hissed into the quiet. "Nervous kid, looking over his shoulder all the time, like he expected an evil spirit to jump out at him. I figured he was on the run. Took a bad road in the city, came to the res to hide out and start over. I've started over a few times myself." He glanced away again. "Anyway, the kid needed a job. I told him to come back in a couple weeks when we started moving the herd to the upper pastures, and I'd take him on."

Father John didn't say anything for a moment. "What was he running from?"

"I didn't push him. He was serious about starting over, that's all I cared about. Told him to go see Gus Iron Bear so he could get back on the Arapaho road. He took instructions from the old man, then went up to Bear Lake for his vision quest. When he didn't come back, Gus asked me to take some of the skins and go looking for him."

Ben pulled in his long legs and leaned over the table. "Detective Slinger and the coroner say Grover killed himself. What a load of bulls.h.i.t. The kid was in a sacred place. The spirit was looking down on him. No way did he kill himself."

"What else, Ben?" Father John said. "Give me something else that'll make them change their minds."

"What's this to you?" Mistrust leaked into the Indian's voice.

Father John shook his head. "I don't like to see a man's death labeled suicide if it isn't true."

"I see." Ben leaned back against his chair, never taking his eyes away. "You're a real white do-gooder, aren't you, Father O'Malley? You're like the cavalry riding out against injustice wherever it raises its ugly head."

Father John swallowed back the phlegm of anger that rose in his throat. "Give me something to take to the white detective, Holden," he said. His voice was tight.

The Indian looked away a moment, considering. "I've been thinking," he said finally, a conciliatory tone now. "I think Duncan got himself into some serious trouble, and somebody followed him here from Denver. Waited until he went out to Bear Lake and killed him."

"You tell that to Detective Slinger?"

"Why don't you tell him? Maybe he'll listen to you."

Father John got to his feet, pulled open the door, and went outside. It was raining harder now, and he tipped his cowboy hat low over his forehead and started walking down the driveway. He didn't have much, but he had something: a guy who was looking for a job and planning to start work. Hardly somebody who was thinking about suicide. And there was more. Someone had followed Grover from Denver. It made sense. "The boss killed him," the man in the confessional had said.

He could imagine the conversation with Detective Slinger: Who, Father O'Malley? Who followed Grover? And he wouldn't be able to say . . .

Unless Grover had mentioned a name to Gus Iron Bear while he was taking instructions.

Father John decided to drive out to the medicine man's place before he went to see Slinger.

"You heard from her?" The voice sliced through the rain, and Father John looked around. Ben Holden stood in the middle of the driveway, about twenty feet away, slicker still unsnapped, black cowboy hat pushed back. Wetness glistened on his dark face.

"No," Father John said.

"Our boy Lucas is taking a job in Denver." Ben came a few steps closer. They might have been old friends, talking about a mutual acquaintance, somebody they both liked but hadn't seen for a while. "He'll keep an eye on her. She's been alone in the city, n.o.body around that cares about her. I've been worrying about her."

Father John nodded, then turned and continued down the driveway. "So have I," he said to himself.

5.

The intercom buzzed twice. On the third buzz, Vicky Holden forced her eyes away from the computer screen, swiveled around, and pushed the b.u.t.ton on the small machine with the blinking red light.

"What is it?" She heard the irritation in her voice. She'd left instructions with her secretary, Laola, to hold all calls. There was an important meeting in a few minutes on the appeal in the Navajo Nation v. Lexcon Oil case. The outcome would determine who controlled the methane gas on a lot of Indian land: the tribes or the corporations that had managed to purchase the coal beds beneath the lands years ago. It was the most important case she'd ever worked on.

She'd come into it late, only a week after the federal district court had ruled against the Navajo Nation. Wes Nelson, the managing partner at Howard and Fergus, had asked her to handle the appeal to the Tenth Circuit. She'd jumped at the opportunity. Filed the notice of appeal and designation of record, started writing the brief. And then, the call from Jacob Hazen, the tribal lawyer. The Navajo Nation might not want to go ahead with the appeal after all.

Vicky had felt her heart sink. The federal district court ruling affected all the tribes in the judicial district. It could impact the entire country. It could not stand! If the Navajos were getting nervous about moving ahead-the legal expenses, the uncertainty-well, she intended to present the strongest arguments possible to change their minds.

The meeting would start in ten minutes; the other lawyers were probably filing into the conference room now, and she still had some notes she wanted to finish.

"I'm very sorry, Vicky," Laola was saying, a new patina of city sophistication in her voice. The girl had been her secretary for almost two years, managing her one-attorney office in Lander with the precision of a drill sergeant. She insisted on coming to Denver when Vicky had decided to rejoin Howard and Fergus, where she'd worked after graduating from the University of Denver law school. Vicky had done her best to talk the young woman out of coming. Not even twenty-one-an Arapaho, like herself, used to the open s.p.a.ces of the reservation. She could get lost in the city. There were times when Vicky felt lost herself. The girl had insisted.

In the end, Vicky had talked the firm into hiring her. Most of the time she was grateful for Laola's presence, grateful not to be the lone Indian riding the elevators to the thirty-seventh floor of the steel-and-gla.s.s tower that rose over Seventeenth Street. Still, Laola could be like a young filly pulling in her own direction.

"Who is it?" Vicky said.

"He won't give his name."

"What? Tell him to call back later."

"I tried that. He says I should tell you it's a matter of life and death."

Vicky threw her head back and stared at the ceiling. Her train of thought was derailed anyway. "Put him through," she said, but the phone was already buzzing.

She lifted the receiver. "Vicky Holden," she said, her tone now sharp with irritation.

"This is Vince Lewis." The voice boomed over the line, as if the man were shouting from the outer office. "I must speak with you."

"What is this about?" The name meant nothing to her.

"I have to see you today."

"Mr. Lewis," Vicky began, struggling to contain the growing sense of exasperation. "I have a full schedule. Perhaps my secretary can set up an appointment for next week." Next week, she was thinking, was already booked. She had to file the brief with the appellate court, unless the Navajos decided not to proceed. The possibility sent a little shiver through her.

"You're an Arapaho from Wind River Reservation, aren't you?"

Vicky took a moment. The conversation had lurched in an unexpected direction. Vince Lewis, whoever he was, had taken the trouble to find out about her. Whatever he wanted to talk about could affect her people.

"Hold on." She cradled the receiver into her shoulder, turned back to the computer, and tapped the keyboard. Today's schedule floated onto the screen. This morning's meeting-already starting-the brief to finish, two o'clock with a landlord about a lease, three o'clock with a couple in need of a new will. She was an expert on leases, wills, divorces, and custody matters, the everyday cases she'd handled the last five years in Lander and had hoped to escape in Denver. But every senior partner had an important client or friend who needed mundane legal help, and somehow the cases fell to her, inserting themselves around important matters like the Navajo Nation.

The couple could probably be rescheduled, she decided. Wills were seldom urgent.

She said, "I could see you at three." That would still give her an hour before she had to leave for DIA to pick up Lucas, who was flying in from Los Angeles at five. "You know where we're located?"