The Night Visitor (8 page)

“Oh yeah… I think I saw the movie.” McCullough turned away slowly. “Well, if they're both Injuns, I guess they're all yours, Charlie.” His rolling gait took him out the door.

Horace Flye allowed himself a grateful sigh of relief.

Tillie showed up at Moon's side with a grease-stained plastic tray. “Charlie, honey, I got your burger and your fries. And coffee. Been holdin' it for you, whilst you been doin' your poleece work.”

He sniffed appreciatively. “The coffee still hot?”

“Should be.” She stuck her grubby thumb into the cup, and waited for the thermometric information to reach her brain. “Well, it's warm. I could stick it in the microwave.”

“Well, I'd sure like to… but I need to get my prisoners over to the clinic. One's got trauma to the ear, the other needs his eyeball popped back into the socket.”

Horace rubbed his bleeding ear.

Curtis Tavishuts blinked the bulging eye, which ached like an abscessed tooth.

Tillie shrugged her massive shoulders. “Oh well, I guess I'll just eat it myself.” She took a huge bite from the burger.

Moon's mouth watered. His stomach was past growling.

It was late afternoon when Charlie Moon locked the prisoners into adjacent cells. Horace Flye's ear was now cleaned, stitched, and bandaged. The young physician, after a glance at Tavishuts' yellowed teeth, had also given Flye a tetanus shot. Curtis Tavishuts' eye had been inserted back into its socket by
a consulting ophthalmologist and pronounced sound enough, though it was watery and extremely bloodshot. And did not look in precisely the same direction as the sound eye.

Tavishuts glowered through the bars at the white man with his good eye. “Goat-faced hillbilly cheat—I bet you married your sister!”

Flye, holding his palm over the bandaged ear, leaned forward on his bunk and returned the one-eyed glare double measure. “Blanket-assed Injun, go stick a feather in it!” The white prisoner had—if only for the moment—forgotten his Native American heritage.

The Ute prisoner raised his heavy crutch like a club. “Soon's I get a chance, fuzz-face, I'll knock your pea-sized brain out.”

Flye sneered. “You couldn't hit your ass with a bass fiddle, you cross-eyed hoptoad!” He tapped his temple. “Better men than you has tried, and I still got my brain right here between my ears.”

“Between
one
ear,” the Ute prisoner shot back. Pleased with what he thought to be admirable eloquence, Tavishuts licked his lips. “That ear I chewed on woulda tasted better with some ketchup.”

Flye raised his right hand, which was not missing the offending finger. “Bite
this
, you one-legged cannybubble.”

Tavishuts muttered a vulgar curse in the Ute tongue. It had something to do with Flye's ancestors and domesticated animals.

Charlie Moon—weak from hunger and drained of his last ounce of patience—gave them a steely-eyed glare. He did not raise his voice, but it had an edge like a straight razor. “Be quiet.”

The prisoners fell silent, but continued to exchange poisonous looks.

Moon proceeded to list the rules. Keep quiet. Do as you are told. Otherwise… well, you don't want to know about “otherwise.” Though a sullen pair, they seemed to hear him.

Flye, in fact, listened politely.

Tavishuts figured it was mostly bluff. But he had a grudging respect for the big policeman. It was said that one pop on
the chin from Moon's fist and a man would forget his name and address for a month or more.

The Ute policeman congratulated himself for handling a bad situation fairly well. He'd hold them for twenty-four hours while his “investigation” of the brawl was completed. Tillie, of course, wouldn't file any charges—she had been grateful for the entertainment value of the brawl. What these fellows needed was a good night's sleep. If they behaved at breakfast, he'd turn them loose tomorrow morning. But now, he was headed for Angel's Cafe and an early supper. Chicken-fried steak. Home-fried potatoes. Lots of brown gravy. He was leaving the cell block when he heard Flye's urgent call.

“Hey there… waitaminute… Ossifer Moon!”

He turned wearily. “Yeah?”

“I just thoughta somethin'.”

“What?”

“Well, what with all the excitement, I'd plumb forgot. I'd appreciate it if you could bring my pickup and trailer over here. And park my rig right outside. And you gotta be careful how you handle that old truck. She's got a manual choke—pull it out just about a inch and a quarter, then pump the gas pedal three times before you try to start 'er up. And when you get the rig over here, don't set the hand-brake on the pickup. Sometimes the shoes stick and I gotta crawl underneath and bang on the brake calipers with a ball-peen hammer before I can get the wheels to roll.”

“Half-assed hillbilly truck,” Curtis Tavishuts muttered with a sneer. “You ought to get yourself a team o' Arkansas mules to pull it.”

Moon silenced the Ute prisoner with a glance. “We're kind of shorthanded, Mr. Flye. When we can get around to it I'll send somebody over and …”

Horace was on his feet now, his brow furrowed into a field of wrinkles. His hands were white-knuckled on the door-bars. “You cain't wait that long. She might get cold or hungry or somethin'.”

“Who?”

“Why, my daughter. She's in the trailer.”

So this fuzzy-faced con artist had a daughter. And she'd
kept herself holed up in the camper while her father was carted off to jail.
If blood tells, she'll be every bit as wacky as her old man.
“Well, I'll take your pickup keys to her. Then she can drive your rig wherever she wants.” Maybe all the way back to Arkansas.

“Oh no.” Horace Flye shook his head. “She couldn't do that. She's a good cook and housekeeper and such, but I ain't taught her how to drive the truck.”

“What's your daughter's name?”

“Butter,” Horace Flye said proudly.

Moon was not surprised. It had been that kind of day. Horsefly begat Butterfly. The last—one might hope—of the ill-fated Mugwumps.

Moon was pleased to see Officer Elena Chavez filling out her daily log. He paused by her side and waited.

She signed the log, looked up, and smiled.

Elena had long, black hair. And very pretty eyes set in an oval face—which was also pretty. Moon, temporarily distracted, gathered his thoughts, cleared his throat. “You busy, Officer Chavez?”

“Not if you
need
me, Charlie.”

Her eyes seemed to grow into big pools that a man could fall into. Unconsciously, Moon backed away a half-step. “I got to go see a young woman in a camp-trailer. I could use some help.”

This piqued her interest. “Oh. You going to make an arrest?”

Moon grinned. “Don't plan on it. But somebody'll need to drive the rig over here. So she can visit her father.”

She zipped her leather jacket and made a mock salute. “Let's ride.”

They were nearing Tillie's Navajo Bar and Grille. The home of unforgettable cheeseburgers. And fries made with real lard. Moon sighed.

Officer Elena Chavez loosened her seat belt. She scooted across the Blazer seat. An inch closer to the tall man. “Bad day, Charlie?”

He grinned weakly at his fellow officer. “You ever hear of a tribe called the Mugwumps?” Elena was attending the university every other semester, working on her law degree. And she was very proud of her recently acquired knowledge. Liked to show off a bit, in fact.

A thoughtful frown furrowed her brow. “Mugwumps. Hmmm. I think that's what they called Republicans who wouldn't support James Blaine for president.”

“Blaine? Never heard of him. Was he from Arkansas?”

“I don't think so.” She looked suspiciously at Moon's profile. It was hard to tell when the man was teasing her. “But it all happened a long time ago. Back around 1884.”

“But you never heard anything about the Mugwump Indian tribe?”

She shook her head.

“Well, I guess they can't teach you
everything
at the university.”

Moon—flanked by Officer Elena Chavez—approached the camp-trailer. He glanced at the Arkansas license plate. The small trailer, like the rusting Dodge pickup truck, had seen better days. Someone—Horace Flye, he assumed—had used duct tape to seal joints along the edges of the gray metal structure. He tapped lightly on the aluminum door. There was no response. So maybe Miss Butter Flye had fluttered off somewhere. Probably inside Tillie's joint, having a burger and a beer.

He tapped on the door again. “Miss Flye… are you there? This is Officers Moon and Chavez, of the Southern Ute Police Department. Your father is in custody and …”

A face appeared in the square window in the door. A small, roundish face. With stringy yellow hair unaccustomed to a comb, watery blue eyes, and pumpkin-colored freckles. The chubby face pressed itself against the glass. The little nose flattened into an ugly white splotch.

Moon shook his head in astonishment. This was a child. Five years old, maybe. Six tops. They'd have to coax her outside and into the squad car. Then turn her over to a county Social Services representative. He took off his hat and smiled. In
what he hoped was a fatherly fashion. “Miss… ah… could we have a word with you?”

No response.

Elena cooed: “Oh, Charlie—she's just
adorable.”

There was no accounting for taste. Moon cleared his throat. “I guess you're… uh… Butter.” This grubby little Flye was still in the larval stage.

The cold blue eyes stared up at him.

“Your father sent us over here. So we can take you to see him.”

The child's face was deadpan.

Moon tried again. “Would you like to put your coat on and go with us and …”

She shook her head.

“Well,” he said gently, “your father is real lonesome without you.”

The child glared at him. Without blinking.

He turned the doorknob. Locked. He tried all the keys he'd taken from Flye. No luck. The kid had the door latched from the inside.

“Butter,” he said gently, “you'll have to unlock the door.” She shook her head again, rubbing her flattened nose along the glass.

A gust of wind, tasting of ice, whipped across the graveled parking lot. A few curious patrons were gathering at the window of Tillie's Navajo Bar and Grille to enjoy this diversion from late afternoon TV. Moon buttoned his jacket. “You see, Butter, it's going to be real cold tonight. You can't stay out here …”

With a pudgy hand, she cranked the window open a notch. The little mouth actually spoke. “It's warm
in here.
You're the ones who'll get cold.” This said, she laughed in his face.

The policeman—accustomed to dealing with coldhearted felons—realized that some measure of firmness was called for. “Now look, young lady—if you don't open the door, I'll have to force the lock and …”

“Wuff!” she snapped.

Moon blinked at his fellow officer. “The kid's barking at me.”

To clarify her intent, the child snarled: “You're the Big Bad Wuff.”

Moon was mystified. “Big bad what?”

Elena laughed, and the sound was like little bells in his ear. “Honestly, Charlie—you don't know the first thing about dealing with children. The Big Bad Wolf was the heavy in that Three Little Pigs story. Anyway,” she said in her lawyer's voice, “you can't break into the camper without a valid warrant. It is—for legal purposes—a private domicile.”

“Wolf, huh?” Moon looked down his nose at the little girl's face.

“Big
Bad
Wuff,” the child hissed.

A half dozen of Tillie's customers had meandered outside, the better to see and hear what was going on. A merry old drunk waved a long-necked beer bottle and yelled at the Ute policeman: “Don't take no shit off'n that kid, Charlie. Shoot 'er through the winder.” He aimed his trembling forefinger at the trailer. Cocked his thumb. Pulled the trigger. “Ka-bam!” His hand jerked backward from the imaginary recoil.

Moon gave this unwelcome advisor a flinty look.

The drunk belched and addressed his words to a sour-looking truck driver. “Cops ever' where 'er all alike. No sensa yoomor.”

A truck driver—who had a blue swastika tattooed on his forearm—nodded his agreement in a low growl: “Damn gestapo.”

“Charlie,” Elena murmured soothingly, “you'd better let me handle this.” The man simply did not have a way with children.

Moon stepped aside and made a sweeping gesture with his gloved hand. “Officer Chavez, you are in charge.”

She patted his arm in a gesture of consolation. “Let a pro show you how it's done, big man.” Elena smiled sweetly at the little face in the window. “Hi there, honey. See, we're here to
help
you. Your daddy is in ja—… well, he can't come to you—so you need to go see him. Daddy misses his little Butter-pat real bad—and he's so
worried
about you being out here all by yourself.”

The pudgy little face had a slit of a mouth. An ugly red tongue stuck out of the slit. “You,” the child said, pointing her grubby finger accusingly, “are the Wicked Witch.”

Elena gasped.

Moon grinned.

“Wicked Witch,” the child screamed, “Wicked Witch. Help, help… the Big Bad Wuff and the Wicked Witch are tryin' to get me! Eeeeeeeeeeee!”

The tattooed trucker, determined to involve himself in the commotion, left the cluster of comrades huddled in front of Tillie's Navajo Bar and Grille. Not at all intimidated by Charlie Moon—and disdainful of addressing a police
woman
—he swaggered up and confronted the gigantic Ute. “Hey, whatcha doin', pickin' on a little kid? You got nothin' better to do? Why doncha go somewheres an' arrest a real crim'nal or somethin'?”

Charlie Moon had met such troublemakers a hundred times—filled with righteous indignation and spoiling for a fight. When they regained consciousness, they were always tearfully contrite. Couldn't apologize enough for their rude behavior, blamed it on demon rum. When released, they headed for the nearest tavern. Moon—who was not in the mood to lower the boom—was the soul of politeness. “Oh, you've got me wrong, sir. See,
I'm
not in charge here. I am the Big Bad Wolf.”