Watching Eagles Soar (7 page)

The young man gave a little nod, stepping back, stumbling against the bumper of the Toyota. The muscles in his face constricted in fear. For a moment, Father John feared he would turn and run. “It's going to be okay,” he said quietly.

“Where were you tonight?” the other cop asked.

“Here.” The word was choked, almost inaudible. Father John could see the young man's Adam's apple bobbing under his skin. “Here,” he said again, louder this time.

“FBI agent wants to ask you some questions,” the first officer said. “We'd like you to come along with no trouble.”

Larson swung his head and shoulders around, his eyes locked on Father John's. “I didn't have nothing to do with Scott's death,” Larson said, a pleading tone.

Father John nodded, but they both knew Larson was a primary suspect. He laid an opened hand on the young man's shoulder. He could feel the tenseness beneath the ridges of the corduroy jacket—the muscles of a mountain lion ready to spring. “I'm going to call a lawyer. You don't have to say anything without a lawyer present.”

Larson drew in a long breath. The squared shoulders dropped, and he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jacket. “Okay,” he said, starting toward the police car.

Father John watched the two officers hustle the young man into the backseat, slam the door, and lower themselves into the front. The car was already rolling when the doors shut, and then it shot out onto the highway, sending back a spray of gravel that peppered Father John's face. He fished a quarter out of the pocket of his blue jeans and walked over to the pay phone that hung lopsidedly from the wall close to the bar entrance. He pushed the coin into the slot and punched in the number for Vicky Holden.

* * *

I
t was still early in the morning when Father John wheeled the Toyota to the curb in front of the redbrick building on Lander's Main Street. The sun bored through the back of his cotton shirt as he hurried up the outside steps to the one-lawyer, second-floor office. The secretary glanced up from behind the desk in the far corner, a confident look in her eyes, as if she had known he would arrive. “She's been waiting for you,” she said, giving a little nod toward the opened door to the private office.

Father John rapped on the doorframe as he walked into the small office. Vicky sat behind an oak desk, her dark eyes watching as he settled into a barrel-shaped chair on the other side. Her black hair was pulled back and fastened somehow. She was wearing a blue blouse that made a little V at her neck where a silver necklace showed. He had known her for almost five years now. They had worked together on more cases—more divorces and accidents, more murders—than he wanted to think about. She was the lawyer, he the priest. Usually they were both necessary.

“You look about the way I feel.” She gave him a slow, knowing smile.

Father John rubbed his hand across his chin, wondering whether he had remembered to shave this morning. He'd been up most of the night, sitting at his desk in the study, sipping on coffee that turned lukewarm, wondering whether the phone would ring, wondering about Larson, trying to make the pieces fit into some logical explanation. He realized Vicky had also been up most of the night.

“How's Larson,” he said.

Vicky didn't answer for a moment. Then: “Larson's in a lot of trouble. The fed has a witness who swears Larson was at the house about the time Scott was murdered. And the police found a revolver down by the creek. They're pretty sure it's the murder weapon. It was in a brown paper bag with a pair of gloves. If the fed traces that gun to Larson, he'll be charged with first-degree murder so fast it will make his head spin around.”

“Larson didn't kill Scott.”

Vicky raised her chin, regarding him a moment. “What makes you think so?”

“I talked to Larson. He said Scott was alive, watching TV, when he left the house. I believe him.”

“You believe him,” she said. “Well, that's sure to carry a lot of weight in a courtroom.” She gave him a half smile. “Gianelli's working on the drug angle. He's convinced Larson shot Scott over drugs. He asked Larson a lot of questions about drugs last night, but Larson insisted he didn't have anything to do with drugs, and neither did Scott. The problem . . .” She hesitated.

“What's the problem,” Father John said.

“Tammy says Scott was dealing.”

Father John got to his feet and walked over to the window. A truck crawled below on Main Street, and as he watched it slide to a stop at the light, he wondered why Tammy would want Gianelli to believe Scott was a drug dealer. He could feel Vicky's eyes on him, and he turned to face her. “What do you know about the girl?”

Vicky let out a long breath. “She has a penchant for getting mixed up with the wrong people. About a year ago, she was picked up for selling cocaine.” Vicky shrugged. “Her parents called me.”

Father John stepped back to the chair and sat down. “What happened?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she said. “There wasn't any evidence, except for the story of some drugged-out kid the BIA police had picked up. The kid tried to buy himself out of trouble by implicating Tammy. She wasn't even charged. But I had the feeling she was on coke herself—not selling it, just using it. Somebody else was supplying her.” Vicky pulled her eyes away, remembering. “In my opinion, she was a good kid. Just fallen in with a bad crowd. Maybe . . .” Another hesitation. “Maybe the fed's right. Maybe Scott was her supplier.” She locked eyes with him again. “I suggested to her parents that they get her some help.”

Father John leaned forward and tapped a finger on the edge of the desk. “Larson said Scott was trying to help her.”

“Help her? The drug supplier trying to help her get off of drugs?”

“Help her get away from her parents.”

Vicky gave a little laugh. “That's ridiculous. Arapaho families are close, John, very close. No parent wants to lose contact with a child, and I can't imagine any kid wanting to break with her parents.”

“He said they were going to kill her.”

“What?” Vicky jumped to her feet. “They came the minute she called them last night. They stayed with her all night. Last year they called me when she was in trouble. They love Tammy.”

Father John stood up and walked back to the window. This was what had bothered him during the night—the nagging feeling that something was wrong, something didn't fit—but now, like a perfect syllogism developing in the far reaches of his mind, it was beginning to make sense. He looked at Vicky. “Suppose Tammy's parents are the drug dealers.”

He expected her to argue, to protest that he didn't know what he was talking about. Instead, Vicky stood at the desk, gripping the edge, her knuckles turning white. “Last year I tried to get Tammy to tell me where she was getting her cocaine. She said she could never tell. If she had been charged, John, she might have gone to prison, but she would never have given up her parents. She would never have wanted to break with her parents. She would have wanted to protect them. She would have done whatever it takes . . .” Vicky flinched, as to ward off the force of the truth. Neither of them spoke for a moment, and then she said, “If Scott knew what her parents were doing, he might have threatened to go to the police.”

“He told Larson he would do whatever it took to save her,” Father John said.

“But she didn't want to be saved, John. They were her parents. She couldn't allow Scott to destroy them.”

“She must have gone to the house and waited until she saw Larson drive away. Then she went inside. Scott was sitting in front of the TV. He probably never saw her before she shot him.”

Vicky closed her eyes. She swayed slightly, as if a gust of wind had broken through the office. “Execution style,” she said, the words barely audible. She opened her eyes and sank down onto her chair. “All we have is conjecture, John. A theory about a girl terrified of losing her family. We have no proof.”

“We have to talk to Gianelli.” Father John started across the office.

“And tell him what?” Vicky swung around the desk and sprinted ahead, blocking the door. “He'll laugh us out of his office, unless . . .”

“What?” Father John could almost see the idea forming behind her eyes.

“Suppose Tammy used her father's gun.”

“You said the police can't trace the gun.”

“That doesn't mean it doesn't belong to her father. It would have been the easiest way for her to get ahold of a weapon. It's possible, John. And if that's the case, she just may confess.”

“Why would she do that? She killed a man to protect her parents.” Suddenly Father John understood. He drew in a long breath; then: “Tammy will keep protecting them.”

“Exactly,” Vicky said.

* * *

T
he door stood open, creaking into the wind that swooped over the stoop. Father John could see the shadows lying like a blanket over a corner of the living room, spilling like blood on the dark carpet, the plaid sofa against the near wall. He glanced at Vicky waiting beside him on the stoop. In her eyes, he saw his own concern. The girl wasn't home.

From inside somewhere came the scuff of footsteps, and then the girl stepped out from the shadows—small and waiflike in blue jeans and a brown tee shirt that hung loosely over her hips. Her face looked thin and drawn, too small for the frizzed black hair that hung over her forehead and draped around her shoulders. Under the dark complexion was a hint of paleness. She was rubbing her hands together, as if to warm them. Her eyes were wide and blank. “If you're lookin' for the fed, him and a couple cops are out back talkin' private to my folks.”

Father John realized she must have been in the back of the house, probably watching her parents out the window. “We'd like to talk to you,” he said.

The girl was rubbing her hands furiously now, as if she were mashing something hard between her palms. “I don't need a priest.” She looked at Vicky. “I don't need a lawyer, either.”

“The fed knows who killed Scott,” Vicky said.

The girl began stepping backward. “Larson did it.” There was a tentativeness in the girl's voice. “They got into it over some stuff, so Larson killed him.”

“Larson didn't kill Scott,” Father John said. He followed Vicky inside. A faint, musty odor permeated the room, as if the doors and windows hadn't been thrown open in a long time.

“The police found the gun,” Vicky said. “That's why the fed's talking to your father now.”

The girl stopped rubbing her hands together. A look of comprehension spread slowly over the thin face; her breath came in short bursts. “No,” she said, backing up, stumbling, dropping onto the sofa. “My dad didn't have nothin' to do with it.”

Father John said, “Your father may be arrested, Tammy. Perhaps your mother, too, if the fed thinks she was involved. They could both stand trial for murder.”

“No. No. It's crazy.” Tammy shook her head, staring into the shadows across the room. Her eyes seemed to go in and out of focus.

“Why did your parents want Scott dead?” Vicky asked, a quiet, assured courtroom voice.

“They didn't do it,” the girl shouted. “Just 'cause the police found some old pistol, that don't mean it's Dad's.” Her voice cracked like that of an adolescent boy's. She raised both hands and began pulling at her hair, tangling her fingers in the frizz. “My parents don't know nothing about it. They didn't know what Scott was gonna do.” She stopped, her eyes darting about the room. “Scott's the one wanted them dead. Worse than dead. He wanted them in prison. He was gonna tell the police a lotta stuff was nobody's business. He was gonna ruin everything, ruin our family. He's the one that . . .” Another pause, longer this time, filled with the words still unspoken, the truth.

Tammy looked at Father John, and then at Vicky. “He was the one that made me do it.” She lifted her hair and piled it on top of her head in great clumps of curls that cascaded over her face as her hands fell. She began to sob. Behind the strands of hair, moisture glistened on the thin cheeks. Finally, she said, “The gun's been around here forever; somebody give it to Dad a long time ago. I never thought the police was gonna think it was his.”

Suddenly the girl's head snapped up. She pulled her hair away from her face and, fixing her eyes on the opened door, began struggling to her feet. “Mommy! Daddy!” she cried, stumbling forward.

Father John glanced around. Standing just inside the door were a broad-shouldered man in jeans and a plaid shirt and a reed-thin woman with the same black, frizzed hair, the same blank eyes as Tammy's. Their expressions were frozen in stunned disbelief. Ted Gianelli stood next to the couple, and behind them on the stoop were two uniformed police officers.

The girl pushed between Father John and Vicky and crumpled against her mother. Her father reached around, enfolding both mother and daughter in his arms. “Oh, God, oh, God,” he kept repeating.

Gianelli brushed the girl's shoulder with his fingertips. “Tammy—,” he said softly, “I'm placing you under arrest for the murder of Scott . . .”

Her mother pulled the girl closer, running one hand over her hair, patting her back. She might have been soothing a fretful child. Looking at her husband, she said: “What have we done, Donald? What have we done?”

Dead End

The Sixth Commandment: Thou shalt do no murder.

F
ather John O'Malley felt his jaw muscles clench. He'd known it was serious when he saw the police car racing around the bend on Seventeen-Mile Road, sirens screeching. He'd turned after it down Bull Bear Road, a narrow, gravelly stub that ran into a dead end on the banks of the Wind River. Someone might need a priest, he'd thought; maybe one of his Arapaho parishioners at St. Francis Mission.

Now he stopped the Toyota pickup behind the three police cars blocking the road, red and blue lights blinking on the roofs, radios crackling. Several police officers and a young woman huddled near the ditch, eyes turned downslope at the brown truck. Its grill jutted upward into the August sun.

“What happened?” Father John called as he slammed out of the pickup. Art Banner, chief of the Bureau of Indian Affairs police on the Wind River Reservation, was sidling past the police cars toward him.

“Got us a shooting.” The chief gave a quick nod toward the truck. “Amos Starbird's inside with a bullet in his head. Neighbor lady got home from work about five thirty and seen his truck in the ditch. You know him?”

Father John knew him: a breed—half-Arapaho, half-white—with a quick temper and a grudge as big as the outdoors. He seldom came around the mission. It was Amos' wife, Nancy, who shuffled their two little boys into the front pew every Sunday for ten-o'clock Mass.

Pulling the brim of his cowboy hat against the sun, Father John started toward the truck. On the other side of the ditch, the parched plains crept into the cloudless blue sky; the wild grasses and stalks of sunflowers rode sideways in the hot, steady breeze. He slid down the gravelly slope, aware of the policemen and the young woman watching from above.

Inside the truck, Amos Starbird curled over the steering wheel, head a mass of gray, bloody matter, shirt black with blood. Father John reached one hand through the opened window and made the sign of the cross over the body. “Lord have mercy on his soul,” he prayed out loud. “Grant him peace.”

As Father John climbed back, the chief said, “Must've just happened.” A tentativeness in the words, as if he were testing them. “Most likely Amos was comin' home from work. Been working at Hank's Garage over in Riverton. Somebody might've followed him.” The chief glanced across the flat expanse of sun-splashed plains toward Seventeen-Mile Road in the distance. “Amos could've turned down here to get away, not thinkin' it was a dead end. I sure hope . . .” He let the thought trail off a moment.

“. . . hope Nancy didn't have anything to do with this. We had a few too many domestic disturbance calls out at their place.”

Father John regarded the police chief a moment. So the rumors on the moccasin telegraph—the reservation's grapevine—were true. Still, it was hard to imagine Nancy Starbird pulling out a gun, slamming back the trigger, and sending a bullet into her husband's head. Yet he'd heard enough confessions to know what human beings might do, might be driven to do.

“No telling what might've got into Nancy.” The chief was shaking his head. “She's part of that Echo Hawk Clan lives up in Squirrel Canyon in that compound of theirs. They go their own ways. Stick to themselves, like Arapaho clans used to live in the Old Time. Anyway, the fed's gonna have to sort it out.” He glanced down the empty road—an expectant look, as if a vehicle might materialize out of the hazy heat.

Father John nodded. Murder on an Indian reservation fell under FBI jurisdiction. But that didn't mean Banner wouldn't help with the investigation. “Anyone see anything?” he asked.

The chief waved toward the three small houses hunkered down among the cottonwoods where the road dead-ended. “My boys already knocked on the doors. Nobody home this afternoon 'til she got here.” He shot a glance toward the woman talking with one of the police officers. “The fed's gonna be outta luck for witnesses.”

* * *

T
he telephone jangled into the quiet as Vicky Holden stuffed into her briefcase the legal papers she wanted to review at home tonight. Her secretary had already left. The answering machine could take the call, she told herself, snapping the lock. She picked up the briefcase and started around the desk as the phone emitted another jangle. She stopped, swung around, and lifted the receiver. “Vicky Holden here,” she said, struggling to mask her irritation.

“You that Arapaho lawyer?” It was a woman's voice, not one she recognized.

“Yes.”

“You gotta get over to Nancy Starbird's place.”

Vicky felt her heart sink. When was it—three weeks ago?—she'd filed Nancy's divorce papers and gotten the restraining order against Amos. “Is Nancy all right?” She held her breath.

“Amos got killed.”

A wave of relief washed over Vicky: Nancy was okay, and whatever had happened to Amos—God help her for thinking it—he had it coming.

“You better get to Nancy's place,” the caller said.

* * *

T
he sun bulged orange-red over the Wind River Mountains, shooting red, orange, and pink flares through the blue sky as Vicky left the Bronco behind a line of pickups at the side of Willow Road. The small green house stood in the middle of a bare dirt yard with an old pickup on one side. Lined up across the yard like guards were about a dozen men: plaid shirts and blue jeans, black braids hanging from beneath cowboy hats. There were the little nods, the flick of eyebrows, the slanted eyes on her as she hurried past. A medley of hushed conversations floated outside through the screened door. The entire Echo Hawk Clan was here, Vicky thought as she rapped on the thin frame.

The screened door swung outward, and Nancy stood in the opening, two black braids spilling down a thin chest, a bruise purpling the side of her face. Wordlessly, she reached for Vicky's hand, and Vicky followed her into the small living room crowded with young women, grandmothers, and elders. The smell of fresh coffee seeped into the air. Across the room, sitting in a circle of elders, was Father John O'Malley. She caught his eyes a moment before turning to Nancy. “Tell me what happened,” she said.

“Somebody shot Amos.” Nancy sank back against the doorjamb, eyes puddling with tears. Vicky was about to put her arms around Nancy when a puffy-faced woman with narrow, dark eyes and a cap of gray hair stepped between them. Edna Echo Hawk, the clan matriarch, began cradling Nancy. “Now, now, we're gonna take care of you and the kids,” she said.

Suddenly Vicky was aware of the tall, redheaded white man beside her. Father John was always present, she thought, when someone needed him. Glancing up, she asked, “When did it happen?”

“About five thirty. Out on Bull Bear Road,” Father John said. His voice was soft.

Vicky felt a little chill course through her. Nancy's trips to the emergency room, the disturbance calls—enough for her to finally seek a divorce, a restraining order. And now the bruise on Nancy's face. What had she decided to do next?

“I got real worried when Amos didn't get home,” Nancy was saying.

“What?” Vicky stared at the young woman.

“I was gonna tell you, Vicky,” she began in a thin, childlike voice. “We got everything patched up, Amos and me. He come back home last week. He promised we was all gonna move up to the compound with the clan, so things was goin' real good.”

“Real good?” Vicky heard the sharpness in her tone. “He hit you again.”

“We told her not to get back with that no-good husband of hers,” the grandmother said. “What good's that restraining order when he kept comin' round anyway? He'd tell her anything, and she'd believe him.” Turning toward Nancy, she said, “He wasn't never gonna bring you up to the compound, 'cause he knew he couldn't kick you and the kids around up there. No way was we gonna let him.”

Just like in the Old Time, Vicky was thinking, when the family clans lived together—clung together—following the buffalo across the plains, setting up tipis along the streams, the warriors always standing guard, protecting the women and children. But Nancy didn't live in Squirrel Canyon with the rest of the clan. She and Amos were
Kono'utose'i Oi
—modern people. They had their own home, their own little family. Except Nancy had no one to protect her and the kids. Only herself.

“Was anyone else here this afternoon?” Father John asked Nancy. In his eyes, Vicky saw the reflection of her own worry.

The young woman shook her head. “The boys was playing over with LuAnn Runner's kids.” She paused, eyes darting between Father John and Vicky. “What d'ya think? I went out to Bull Bear Road and shot Amos just 'cause he hit me again?”

“Don't talk crazy,” the grandmother said. “Mary Wilson come over for coffee this afternoon.”

Surprise and confusion crept into Nancy's face. “Mary Wilson wasn't here.”

“Course she was. What're you talkin' about? She was here all the time that no-good husband of yours was gettin' himself shot.” Locking eyes now with Vicky, the old woman said, “Mary Wilson'll tell everybody so.”

“Look, Nancy,” Vicky said, a lawyer tone, “don't talk to anyone—the police or the fed—without calling me. Do you understand?”

Father John and Vicky walked past Nancy's clansmen—her brothers and cousins—silently holding their line in the dirt yard. The sky glowed orange with the fading sunset; the air was still hot. When they reached the Bronco, Vicky said, “As soon as the fed learns about the divorce filing, the restraining order, the emergency room visits, Nancy will be facing a murder charge. Who had more reason to kill Amos? Obviously the clan thinks she killed him. That's why they called me. That's why Edna Echo Hawk is insisting she has an alibi.”

Father John was quiet a moment. Then, taking Vicky's arm and leading her past the Bronco to the Toyota, he said, “Let's go have a talk with Mary Wilson.”

* * *

F
ather John had knocked a second time on the front door when an old woman with thin shoulders hunched inside a pink cotton dress appeared around the corner of the white frame house. “Vicky? Father John? You lookin' for me?” Mary Wilson clutched a black bag to her sunken chest.

Father John began explaining that they'd come about Amos Starbird.

Yes. Yes. Mary Wilson nodded. She'd heard about Amos. She was on her way over to Nancy's now, poor girl, even though the whole clan was most likely there looking after her and the kids, but you never know, she might help fix some food, or . . .

“Grandmother,” Vicky said, using the Arapaho term of respect. “Did you go to Nancy's this afternoon?”

Worry and confusion mingled in the old woman's face. “Maybe I should've stopped in, like she asked me, but . . .”

“Who asked you?” Father John said.

“Well, I didn't ask who was calling, just one of Nancy's grandmothers wanting me to check on her. I figured Amos was acting up again.” Disapproval flashed in Mary Wilson's eyes. “So I drove over about four thirty and seen Nancy out in the side yard by that old pickup her clan give her. Looked like she was fixin' to go somewhere, so I come on back home.”

They watched Mary Wilson's old Chevy pull onto the road, jerking forward in a blue cloud of exhaust, before they got back into the Toyota. “Nancy had all the time in the world,” Vicky said, a sense of dread as heavy as a buffalo robe pressing down on her. “She grabbed one of Amos' guns and drove across Seventeen-Mile Road to meet him. He must have seen her. Probably had a good idea what she had in mind, so he turned off on Bull Bear Road. She followed him to the dead end, shot him, threw the gun into a ditch somewhere, and drove back home before anybody could show up with the bad news. Oh, God, John.” She drew in a long breath. “Tell me I'm wrong.”

Vicky saw the little vein pulsing in his temple, recognized the look that always came into his eyes as he searched for the faulty proposition, the hole in the logic. Wheeling the Toyota into the center of the road, he said, “We don't know when Amos left the garage.”

The low-slung building sat on an apron of cement at the eastern edge of Riverton. Black letters spelled HA K'S on a plate glass window in front. Father John drew up next to the opened garage door. In the dim interior, he could make out the shadowy hulk of a truck. As he and Vicky climbed out of the Toyota, a stoop-shouldered man in overalls came around the edge of the door, hands crumpling a red, grease-streaked rag. “Closed up,” he said.

Father John introduced himself, then Vicky, and the man nodded, a grudging recognition: Indian priest, Indian lawyer lady. Stuffing the rag into a back pocket, he said, “What can I do for ya?”

“We'd like to talk to you about Amos Starbird,” Father John said.

“Yeah? What about him?”

“Amos is dead,” Vicky said. “Somebody shot him this afternoon.”

The man shifted his gaze a moment to Vicky. “No great loss to the world.”

“Where were you this afternoon about five thirty?” Vicky asked. She was grasping, she knew, looking for someone else with a motive to kill Amos.

“You ain't the police. Nobody's business where I might've been.”

“The FBI agent will want to know,” Father John said.

The man eyed Father John for a long moment, considering. “Right here,” he said.

“When did Amos leave?”

Leaning sideways, the man shot a wad of spit across the pavement. “How'd I know? I was on the dolly under that truck.” He waved a bony hand toward the shadowy interior. “Phone rung, and next thing I know, Amos says he's gotta get home. Guess that wife of his must've called.”

* * *

T
here was an eagerness to the way people moved across the sun-baked cemetery at St. Francis Mission toward the pickups parked in the drive, Father John thought, as if no one wanted to linger at the grave of Amos Starbird. Members of the Echo Hawk Clan were already piling into the beds of old pickups and sliding three and four together onto the front seats.