Watching Eagles Soar (25 page)

She found Nee'ma folding the lodge skins into a compact bundle. “We can't leave now,” she cried, grabbing her mother's arms.

Nee'ma turned, surprise filling her eyes. She reached out and laid the palm of her hand against the gritty earth on Lizzie's cheek. Then, her voice serious, she said, “Medicine Man says we must go south to the Republican River country.”

“But Flying Cloud will come here.” Lizzie heard the sobs in her voice. Behind her, the baby's cry lengthened into a wail.

Her mother gathered her close, holding both her and the baby. “Do you really believe the warriors won't find our village? Foolish child. It's the soldiers who won't find our village.”

For a moment, Lizzie let herself go limp in her mother's strength. Finally she pulled away and started for her own lodge. It was the only lodge still covered. Inside she worked quickly, filling a parfleche with her extra dress, Little Feather's shirts, and the new moccasins she had beaded for Flying Cloud's return. In another parfleche she packed the cooking pan her husband had gotten from the traders and the spoons and bowls he had carved out of buffalo bones. Setting the parfleches outside, she began rolling the heavy skin coverings across the lodgepoles. Even before she saw the soldiers massed on top of the ridge, she knew by the sudden quiet that fell over the village that they had returned.

Lizzie stopped herself from bolting for her hiding place, afraid the soldiers would notice her darting among the cottonwoods and the bare lodgepoles. Holding herself still, aware of the sighs of the sleeping baby on her back, she asked the earth she had smeared over her skin to hide her as the soldiers rode into the village. In the lead was the lodgepole-thin soldier, the trader, and another rider. They halted close to where Medicine Man stood waiting, arms folded. As they dismounted, Lizzie saw the third rider was a woman. A gust of wind caught at her skirt, billowing it about her legs.

The woman was beautiful, with hair the color of the sun at dusk and hands and face as white as the winter snow. Lizzie's breath stopped in her throat. The woman was like the image she sometimes caught of herself in the creek when it was early morning and the water was more pale than the sky and perfectly clear.

She wasn't aware of Nee'ma at her side until her mother spoke. “Don't be afraid. You have hidden yourself well.”

The white woman was glancing about, her gaze taking in the Arapaho women who stood quietly around the lodgepoles, children clutching their legs. And then the woman's eyes fell on Lizzie. Lizzie gasped. The blueness in the eyes, the shape of the nose and chin, strong and defiant. She had seen them before. The faintest image flickered at the edge of her memory. A white girl, older and stronger, who had somehow been part of her.

Suddenly, the white woman seemed to fold into herself. She turned away and was about to mount when Lizzie started toward her, pulled by some force she did not understand. Medicine Man glanced around. “Are you certain, daughter?” he asked as she approached.

The white woman was already moving toward her, fear and joy mingling in her face. Abruptly Lizzie swung around and started for the willows, aware of the snap of footsteps on dry earth behind her. When she reached the hiding place, she turned. The white woman was slashing through the willow branches, as if they were some terrible obstacle to overcome. The breeze plucked at a strand of her red-gold hair.

“Lizzie,” she called. Tears filled her eyes and spilled into brown smudges on her white cheeks. Behind her was the trader.

Lizzie stepped back, horrified at what she had done. What had drawn her to this woman from the outside world who was babbling on, sobbing and speaking strange words that called to Lizzie from some past time.

And then the trader began speaking to her in Arapaho, saying her sister had never stopped looking for her, had never stopped believing she would find her. Suddenly, the woman turned to the trader. “Leave us alone,” she said. Lizzie felt a prick of surprise that she had understood the strange words.

The trader glanced between them, one hand on the revolver strapped to his belt, as if he feared leaving a white woman in the company of an Arapaho, even one with a baby cradled on her back. Finally he started toward the village. The white woman waited a moment, the breeze sighing in the space between them. “You are my younger sister,” she said. “The dirt on your face and hands can't hide the truth. I would know you anywhere.”

Lizzie was shaking her head.

“You understand what I'm saying,” the woman persisted. “You speak English.”

“I learned the white man's language,” Lizzie said, surprised again at the ease with which the words tumbled off her tongue. “In the past time,” she added.

The woman started to cry. She pressed one fist against her lips to stifle the sobs. Nodding toward the village, she said, “You don't belong here. These horrible savages killed our mother and father. You were so young, you don't remember. But I remember. We had stopped to make camp for the night. It was dusk and very quiet. Suddenly, there was a terrible shrieking and howling, and the warriors came galloping toward us. Father shouted for me to get you and hide under the quilts in the wagon. I pulled you down beside me. I tried to cover your ears so you wouldn't hear Mother and Father screaming as the warriors hacked at them.”

The white woman hid her face in her hands. Her shoulders were shaking, and Lizzie fought the temptation to reach out and comfort her. After a moment, the woman looked up. “The Indians poked at the quilts. I was sure they would find us, but they found the bags of sugar and flour Mother had hidden. I always believed they would have gone away if you hadn't . . .” She drew in a long breath. “You were so frightened. You wiggled out of my arms and started screaming, and they grabbed you. They pulled you out of the wagon. You tried to run away, but they caught you, and I—I was so scared, I made myself small and quiet.”

The woman was sobbing now. “Oh, Lizzie,” she managed, “I let them take you. I'm so sorry.”

“They didn't take me,” Lizzie said, her voice soft.

Astonishment came into the woman's face. “Of course they took you.”

Lizzie said, “My father, Chief Medicine Man, found me with the Sioux. He brought me to the people.”

“He's not your father,” the woman shouted. Then she stole a glance over one shoulder, as if she feared the trader might return. “Your father was Thomas M. Cook of Chicago, Illinois. Your mother was Mary O'Leary Cook. She came from another country far away from here.” She waved toward the plains that stretched into the distances, toward the clouds streaming across the pale blue sky. “We are their children. I am Mary Eileen. You are Mary Elizabeth. We called you Lizzie.”

“No!” Lizzie began backing away, nearly stumbling over a low-hanging branch.

“Oh, Lizzie.” The woman came toward her. “You will never know. So many sightings of a young white girl in some Indian camp. Traders would see a child that resembled the lost Mary Elizabeth Cook, but by the time the soldiers rode to the village, the village would be gone. Disappeared in the vastness of the plains. And I would receive a telegram about how close they had come to finding you, how they had only missed you by a day or two. And so I decided to come here myself. I knew I would find you.”

“You must go,” Lizzie said.

“Please.” The woman stretched out her arms. “You and the child are my family. You can live in my home. You'll have whatever you want. Your child will go to school and learn to read. You remember, don't you, how Father would set us on his lap and read to us? So many books he read to us.”

Lizzie moved backward toward the edge of the creek until the icy water lapped at her moccasins. Her stomach was churning; she felt as if she would be sick. “Go,” she said, startled by the harshness in her tone. A part of her did not want the woman to go.

The woman held her gaze a long while before finally turning away. She started through the willows, then swung around. “Before I go,” she said, “may I see your baby?”

Slowly, Lizzie took the cradle from her back. She had thought Little Feather was asleep, so quiet was his breathing, but he was awake, his eyes wide and fearful. She set the cradle on the bed of leaves and lowered herself beside the baby. “This is my son,” she said.

The woman knelt on the other side. There was the sound of water rushing over boulders, of horses whinnying in the distance. With the tips of her fingers she traced the outline of Little Feather's face—the nose, the square set of his jaw. “So like Father,” she said. Then, “My husband and I longed for a child.”

“You have a husband?” Lizzie asked. The news filled her with an unexpected gladness. The woman was not alone.

Glancing up, the woman said, “My husband was killed at Gettysburg in the war that just ended. You heard of the war, didn't you?”

Lizzie nodded. She had heard Flying Cloud and the other warriors talking about how the soldiers were killing one another. The war was good, they said. It meant fewer soldiers to attack the villages. But the war had killed the woman's husband. A shiver as cold as an icy stream ran through Lizzie.

“What is it?” the woman asked. Her voice was kind.

Lizzie said, “I think of my husband.” She stumbled, groping for words that felt strange and unfamiliar on her tongue. She tried to say that Flying Cloud had gone to lead the soldiers to the hostile tribes in the north country. “I wait for him,” she managed.

The woman gasped. “The north country? But that's where the worst battles have been! General Connor has been subduing Indians there all summer. There have been many casualties.” A mixture of horror and grief came into the woman's eyes. “Oh, Lizzie,” she said, “your husband . . .”

Lizzie held up one hand against the words. The sun seemed to stand still; the breeze stopped in the willows. She got to her feet and walked back to the creek, staring at the dried clumps of grasses on the other bank, at the golden plains that ran into the horizon. What would the world be like without Flying Cloud? There would be another father to show Little Feather the ways of a man. Another husband to provide for her, but the sadness that held her now would be her companion.

The woman was beside her. There was the gentle pressure of the woman's hand on her arm, the soft tone of her voice. “Lizzie, come home.”

Lizzie turned to her, trying to imagine—to remember—another world. The warm shelter of the house, the comfort of quilts on the bed, the rungs of a chair against her back, the table where she had taken food and made bright-colored marks on white sheets of paper. It was no longer her world. She was Arapaho. She said, “I am home.” And then she added, “Sister.”

The woman drew in her lips, as if to bite back a cry, and Lizzie placed her arms around her. They held each other a long moment before the white woman pulled away and started walking back to the village.

Lizzie picked up Little Feather's cradle and swung it on her back. As she started after the woman, she spotted the warriors galloping across the ridge, Flying Cloud in the lead. She knew him at a distance—hair black as the night flying in the wind.

And then Lizzie saw the soldiers whirl their horses about, saw the rifles raised, the heads bent to sight in the line of warriors. She stood frozen to the earth, her mouth open in a scream that locked in her throat.

Running ahead, like an antelope bounding through the grass, was her sister. The white woman reached the lodgepole-thin soldier and yanked at his reins. “No!” she shouted. “Don't shoot.” Now she flung herself along the line of soldiers, in front of the guns, waving and shouting, “Friendly Indians. Friendly Indians.”

The lodgepole soldier barked words Lizzie struggled to understand, and the others lowered their rifles. She moved closer as the white woman mounted her horse, snapped the reins, and pulled alongside the lodgepole soldier. “Let us leave this village,” she shouted. “You've brought me on a wild-goose chase. There are no white women here. Only Arapaho.”

Gratitude filled Lizzie's spirit as she watched her sister, surrounded by the soldiers, ride up the slope, pulling to one side to avoid the warriors. She watched until the soldiers reached the top of the ridge, until they disappeared over the horizon. Then she saw other women break away from the village and start to run up the slope. And then she was running with them, catching herself from falling with joy.

Flying Cloud was galloping toward her.

The Man in Her Dreams

V
icky Holden awoke with a start. Her heart thumped at her ribs, like a bird flailing against a cage. The tangle of sheets and blankets was damp with her own perspiration. A wedge of moonlight fell through the window and illuminated a corner of the bedroom. The rest was dark. Red numbers on the nightstand clock glowed into the blackness: 4:23.

From far away came the drone of a truck lumbering along the highway north of Lander. It passed, leaving an empty quiet. Vicky kicked the damp bedclothes aside and forced herself to take deep breaths, willing her heartbeat to slow. It was just a dream.

A dream about a man she didn't know, had never seen before. He had brown hair combed straight back and a long, narrow face. The wide nostrils flared above tightly drawn lips; the dark eyes bored into her with a malevolence that left her stunned and immobilized. It was the man's eyes, she realized, that had tripped her heart into an erratic spin.

The man came walking toward her, kicking up clouds of dust with each step. The dust rose around his boots, licked at his blue jeans and brown corduroy jacket, swirled about his head and shoulders. Still he moved forward, in and out of the dust, eyes fixed on her. She tried to run, but the earth shifted beneath her feet. She couldn't move.

After a while Vicky felt her heartbeat subside to a normal rhythm. She wondered if she had received a vision, then pushed away the idea. In the Arapaho Way, only men received visions. When the warriors went into the wilderness to fast and pray, the forces of nature might reveal themselves and share their power: the strength of the buffalo, the determination of the bear, the cunning of the coyote. Women received dreams. And yet, some evil force had been revealed to her. Its power was mighty. It frightened her.

First chance she got, Vicky decided, she would drive onto the Wind River Reservation north of town and ask Grandmother Ninni to interpret her dream.

Just as no man could interpret his own vision, no woman could discern the meaning of her own dream.

* * *

T
he phone on the nightstand jangled into the early morning quiet, and Vicky realized she had been hearing the noise in the distance for some time. She must have dozed off. It surprised her. She'd given up hope of falling back asleep. Every time she had closed her eyes, she had seen the man walking toward her and felt the evil force in his eyes. She shook herself awake and picked up the receiver.

“That you, Vicky?” A man's voice, someone she must know, but she had no idea who it might be.

She took a deep breath and said, “This is Vicky Holden.”

“Darrell Running Bull here. I been tryin' to get ahold of you for thirty minutes or more.”

Vicky swung out of bed, muscles tense, senses alert. A call from Darrell Running Bull meant one thing: Richard was in trouble again. Three times in the last four years, Darrell had called about his son. Richard had stolen a car. Richard had beaten up a man in a bar. Richard had been arrested on drug possession. Vicky had managed to keep Richard out of jail on the first two incidents, but he'd done time on the possession charge. “What's going on?” she asked.

“Police got Richard locked up over in county jail.” The words came like a burst of gunshot. “You gotta get him out, Vicky. He just got done with prison, and he can't be locked up no more. No tellin' what he might do . . .” Darrell's voice trailed off. She heard a muffled sound, a choked sob.

“Tell me what happened,” she said gently.

There was a half second of silence on the line. Then: “Somebody shot Clifford Willow. Police say Richard done it, 'cause it happened over at the construction site where he's been workin'.”

Vicky knew the site—a two-block apartment complex on the west side of town. A developer by the name of Stephen Jeffries—she'd heard he was from Los Angeles—had moved to Lander, bought a number of vacant lots, and seemed intent on covering every one of them with buildings. Not everybody liked the idea, but no one could deny that the man had created dozens of much-needed jobs.

“Police jumped to conclusions, all of 'em wrong,” Darrell was saying. “Arapaho gets hisself shot. Another Arapaho must've done it. But ever since Richard got outta prison, he seen Willow was leading him down a bad road. He got off them drugs and started a new life. Been goin' to work every day, learning how to be a carpenter. No way he shot that no-good Indian. He don't even own a gun.”

A picture had begun to form in Vicky's mind. Clifford Willow sought out Richard at the construction site and they got into an argument over—who knew what? Richard had a violent temper. He whipped out a gun that his father didn't know about and shot the man. But if that were true . . . The picture shifted, like pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope. Why would Richard shoot him at the construction site, where he might come under suspicion? Richard Running Bull might be a hothead, but he wasn't stupid. And he didn't want to go back to prison.

“You gotta get Richard out of jail,” Darrell said, his voice tense with fear and hope.

“I'll go see him,” Vicky said before hanging up the phone. First she intended to find out what evidence the police had against him.

* * *

T
he skeleton of the apartment complex rose into the steel-gray sky, like an ancient ruin on the plains. Workers in blue jeans, plaid shirts, and hard hats darted among the posts and half walls, shouts mingling with banging hammers and screeching saws. Vicky peered through the Bronco's windshield, trying to spot Detective Bob Eberhart. The desk sergeant at the Lander police headquarters had said she'd find him at the construction site.

She slowed past the pickups along the curb, past the silver trailer that looked dull under a trace of morning dew. Black letters above the door spelled Office. On she drove down the second block. Sounds faded and pickups gave way to three black-and-white police cars at the curb. Yellow tape enclosed a section at the end of the block. She parked behind the last police car and made her way across the hard-churned dirt, loose nails and scrap wood strewn about. Beyond the tape two policemen in dark blue uniforms guided metal detectors over the ground, shoulders stooped to the task.

She spotted Eberhart and another uniformed officer in the shadow of a framed alcove. The detective was a slight man in dark slacks and a tweed sport coat that hung loosely from thin shoulders. As she stepped across the tape, he glanced up and started toward her. “Don't think your legal magic's gonna get Running Bull out of this mess,” he said.

“What do you have?” Vicky ignored the comment.

“Your client called Clifford Willow and arranged to meet him here”—a glance at the alcove—“at six thirty last evening. He was looking to buy some cocaine, which Willow was looking to sell. We've been watching Willow. Had a tap on his phone. I had a car over here at six thirty sharp, but Willow had already been shot. A couple workmen flagged down the police car. Said they saw Richard Running Bull leaning over a body. We picked him up just as he was getting in his truck.”

Vicky felt her stomach muscles clench. Despite what his father had said, Richard was still using drugs. And the police had a phone tap. Witnesses. “What about the weapon?” She braced herself for the answer.

“Expect we'll find it soon enough.” Eberhart nodded toward the policemen with the metal detectors. “Richard shot Willow over by that pile of boards.” Another nod. “Soon's he realized somebody saw him, he made a beeline for the truck.” The detective raised one hand and traced the direction of Richard's supposed flight. “He stashed the gun right here somewhere. Dropped it in a hole, stuck it under some lumber. Might take a few hours, but we'll find it. Expect we'll find a bag of coke in the same place.”

“Wait a minute,” Vicky said. “Are you saying you didn't find the gun or any drugs on Richard?”

The detective nodded. “Correct.”

“No drugs on Clifford Willow's body?”

“We wouldn't still be lookin' for 'em, now would we?”

“What if Richard didn't make the buy?” Vicky said, marshaling her thoughts. “What if Willow was already dead when Richard got here, and somebody else had taken the cocaine?”

“Nice theory.” Eberhart was shaking his head. “I'm willing to bet this badge here”—he patted the pocket of the tweed sport coat—“that soon's we locate the gun, we'll find a baggie of coke. Richard ditched them fast. He would've come back for them later.”

Suddenly the officer snapped to attention and stepped out of the alcove. “Mr. Jeffries,” he called.

Vicky glanced around. A tall man in blue jeans and a brown corduroy jacket strode toward them, boots kicking up clouds of dust. The long, narrow face, the brown hair flattened along the top of his head, the flashing evil eyes: the man in her dream. Vicky felt her mouth go dry, her breath form a hard rock in her chest. She staggered backward, struggling to find purchase in the chunks of dirt and scraps of wood, stealing herself against the force of evil drawing closer.

“How much longer you gonna keep this area shut down?” The man's voice boomed. “I got fifty men on the payroll sitting on their asses. I'm losin' a lot of money here.”

“Sorry, Mr. Jeffries.” There was the hint of deference in the officer's tone. “We're still looking for evidence.”

Jeffries snorted, then raised a fleshy hand and began patting his nose. He sniffed several times. “What the hell more you need? You got the guy that shot that Indian. I can't afford to pay a bunch of men for not workin'.” He was stomping back and forth now, punching both fists into the air.

Eberhart took a couple of steps forward and put out one hand in a gesture of peace. As soon as they found the gun, he began—cajoling, assuring—they would release the area.

Vicky stared at the man. The hair and eyes, the dust billowing around—she had seen it all in her dream. With a certainty that froze her in place, she knew that Stephen Jeffries had killed Clifford Willow.

* * *

“Y
ou got everything fixed?”

Richard Running Bull rose from behind the metal table in the visiting room at the Fremont County jail. He was half a head taller than she was, with a thick chest and muscles that rippled beneath his blue denim shirt. His black hair was parted in the middle and caught in two braids that hung down the front of the shirt. He was about thirty, she knew, but he stared at her out of the solemn eyes of a man twice his age.

“Hello to you, too,” Vicky said. She knew he expected her to walk in with a ticket for his release, but it wasn't going to be that easy. The metal door slammed behind her, a low thud that reverberated through the windowless room.

Richard's expression slid from understanding to panic. “I been locked up all night. You gotta get me outta here.” He crashed one fist down onto the table. The peaks of his knuckles showed white through his dark skin.

“Sit down, Richard.” Vicky nodded toward the chair he had just vacated. She sat across from him and extracted a pen and legal pad from her briefcase. “Let's start at the beginning.”

The Indian dropped slowly onto his chair, shoulders hunched, head forward, as if he were about to launch himself out of the room. “They got it all wrong,” he said. “I just knocked off work yesterday when these two clowns in uniforms showed up and slapped on the cuffs. Said I shot some Indian named Clifford Willow. Hell”—both hands flew into the air—“I don't know any Clifford Willow.”

Vicky locked eyes a long moment with the man. He was lying. An innocent man did not lie. Last night's dream had overcome her ability to think rationally. She shoveled the pad and pen back into the briefcase, rose from the chair, and started for the door. In an instant, Richard Running Bull was around the table, blocking her way. “Where the hell you going?”

Vicky stepped past him, and he grabbed her arm. “I said, where you think you're going?”

“Take your hand off me.” Vicky wheeled toward him. They both knew the guard was just outside the door.

Richard let his hand drop. “You got to help me,” he pleaded.

“I can't help somebody who lies to me. I want the truth from my client. I want you to tell me about the call you made to Clifford Willow, about the drug buy you set up for yesterday.” The Indian flinched, as if she'd slapped him. A look of resignation came into his eyes. He turned and sank onto the chair. “All right,” he said.

Vicky resumed her own seat. She retrieved the notepad and pen as he began explaining. He used to hang around with Willow, a long time ago. He gave a little shrug, as if it weren't important. The two of them—well, the truth was, they did drugs together. A little marijuana. Some coke. No dealing. That was Clifford's bag, not his. Just using once in a while, when he got stressed out, when he needed to party a little.

“What happened yesterday?” On the pad, Vicky wrote:
Willow sold drugs.

The man drew in a long breath. His eyes travelled to a corner of the small room before resting again on hers. “I've been real stressed out lately. The boss, Jeffries, wants more work done every day. Walks around the site shoutin' and yellin'. ‘Speed up, speed up. I'm not paying you guys to sit on your asses.' Fact is, he hasn't paid anybody for two weeks. Says his money's all tied up. Says he'll pay us next week. Only reason I been staying around is to get what's owed me.”

Vicky wrote down:
Jeffries—money problems.
She said, “So you called Willow.”

Richard stared at her a moment, as if weighing his options. “Yeah, I called him. I been clean three months now, and where's it gettin' me? Workin' for a crazy man and not gettin' paid. Willow was supposed to meet me over by the alcove after work, but he didn't show. I waited five, ten minutes. I was heading for my truck when I seen him over by a pile of boards. Geez, there was blood everywhere. I got outta there fast. I was just about to get in my truck when the cops showed up.”