The Round House (29 page)

These are the decisions that I and many other tribal judges try to make. Solid decisions with no scattershot opinions attached. Everything we do, no matter how trivial, must be crafted keenly. We are trying to build a solid base here for our sovereignty. We try to press against the boundaries of what we are allowed, walk a step past the edge. Our records will be scrutinized by Congress one day and decisions on whether to enlarge our jurisdiction will be made. Some day.
We want the right to prosecute criminals of all races on all lands within our original boundaries.
Which is why I try to run a tight courtroom, Joe. What I am doing now is for the future, though it may seem small, or trivial, or boring, to you.

N
ow it was Cappy and me, the two of us trying to break ourselves on the bike course. I'd ridden over to our construction site with him because he'd chopped up every piece of wood in his yard and reduced length after length to kindling. Still this was not enough and he wanted to go out and ride Sonja's ponies. In his state of mind I thought he'd ride them to death. Besides, I didn't want to see Sonja, or Whitey either, but I was desperate to distract Cappy so I told him that after we had cruised around and found Angus, we'd catch a ride to the horses though I didn't mean it. From time to time, when we paused or wiped out, Cappy folded his hand on his heart and something crackled. I finally asked him what it was.

It's a letter from her. And I wrote one back, he said.

We were breathing hard. We'd raced. He pulled out her letter, waved it at me, and then carefully folded it back into its ripped envelope. Zelia had that cute round writing that all high-school girls had, with little
o
s to dot the
i
s. Cappy waved another envelope, sealed, with her name and address on it.

I need to get a stamp, he said.

So we biked down to the post office. I was hoping Linda would not be working that day, but she was. Cappy put his money out and bought a stamp. I didn't look at Linda, but I felt her sad pop eyes on me.

Joe, she said. I made that banana bread you like.

But I turned my back on her and went out the door and waited for Cappy.

That lady gave me this for you, said Cappy. He handed me a foil-wrapped brick. I hefted it. We got on our bikes and rode over to find Angus. I thought of throwing the banana bread at the side of a wall or in a ditch, but I didn't. I held on to it.

We got to Angus's and he came out, but said his aunt was making him go to confession, which made us laugh.

What is that? He nodded at the brick in my hand.

Banana bread.

I'm hungry, he said. So I tossed it to him and he ate it while we made our way toward the church. He ate the whole thing, which was a relief. He balled up the foil and put it in his pocket. He'd redeem it with his cans. I had assumed that while Angus went inside the church and made his confession, Cappy and I would wait outside under the pine tree, where there was a bench, or down at the playground, though we didn't have a cigarette to smoke. But Cappy put his bike into the bike rack right alongside Angus's and so I parked mine too.

Hey, I said. Are you going inside?

Cappy was already halfway up the steps. Angus said, No, you guys can wait outside, it doesn't matter.

I'm going to confession, said Cappy.

What? Were you even baptized? Angus stopped.

Yeah. Cappy kept on going. Of course I was.

Oh, said Angus. Were you confirmed then?

Yeah, said Cappy.

When was your last confession? Angus asked.

What's it to you?

I mean, Father will ask.

I'll tell him.

Angus glanced at me. Cappy seemed dead serious. His face was set in an expression I'd never seen before, or to be more accurate, his expression and the look in his eyes kept shifting—between despair and anger and some gentle moony rapture. I was so disturbed that I grabbed him by the shoulders and spoke into his face.

You can't do this.

Cappy terrified me then. He hugged me. When he stood back, I could tell that Angus was even more dismayed.

Look, I think I got the time wrong, he said. Please, Cappy, let's go swim.

No, no, you've got the time right, said Cappy. He touched our shoulders. Let's go in.

T
he church was nearly empty inside. There were a few people waiting for the confessional and a few up front praying at the feet of the Blessed Virgin, where there was a rack of votive candles flickering in red glass cups. Cappy and Angus slid into the back pew, where they knelt hunched over. Angus was closest to the confessional. He looked sideways at me over Cappy's bent head, made a rolling-eyed grimace, and jerked his head at the church door as if to say, Get him outta here! After Angus went into the confessional and closed the velvet drape after him, he poked his head out and made that face again. I squeezed close to Cappy and said, Cousin, please, I beg you, let's get the hell out of here. But Cappy had his eyes closed and if he heard me he made no sign. When Angus emerged, Cappy rose like a sleepwalker, stepped into the confessional, and shut the curtain behind him.

There were arcane sounds—the slide of the priest's window, the whispering back and forth—then the explosion. Father Travis burst from the wooden door of the confessional and would have caught Cappy if he hadn't rolled out from under the curtain and half crawled, half scrambled along the pew. Father ran back, blocking the exit, but already Cappy had sprung past us, hurdling the pews toward the front of the church, landing on the seats with each bound in a breathtaking series of vaulting leaps that took him nearly to the altar.

Father Travis's face had gone so white that red-brown freckles usually invisible stood out as if drawn on with a sharp pencil. He didn't lock the doors behind him before he advanced on Cappy—a mistake. He didn't count on Cappy's speed either, or on Cappy's practice at evading his older brother in a confined space. So for all Father Travis's military training he made several tactical errors going after Cappy. It looked like Father Travis could just walk down the center of the church and easily trap Cappy behind the altar, and Cappy played into that. He acted confused and let Father Travis stride toward the front before he bolted to the side aisle and pretended to trip, which caused Father Travis to make a right-hand turn toward him down one of the pews. Once the priest was halfway along the pew, Cappy flipped down the kneeler and sped toward the open door, where we were standing alongside two awestruck old men. Father Travis could have cut him off if he'd run straight back, but he tried to get past the kneeler and ended up lunging along the stations of the cross. Cappy exited. Father Travis had the longer stride and gained but, instead of running down the steps, Cappy, well practiced as we all were at sliding down the iron pole banister, used that and gained impetus, a graceful push-off that sent him pell-mell down the dirt road with Father Travis too close behind for him to even grab his bike.

Cappy had those good shoes, but so, I noticed, did Father Travis. He wasn't running in sober clerical blacks but had perhaps been playing basketball or jogging before he dropped in to hear confessions. The two sprinted hotly down the dusty gravel road that led from the church into town. Cappy boldly crossed the highway and Father Travis followed. Cappy cut through yards he knew well and disappeared. But even in his cassock, which he'd hoisted and tucked into his belt, Father Travis was right behind him heading toward the Dead Custer Bar and Whitey's gas station. We marveled at Father's pale thick-muscled calves blurring in the sun.

What should we do?

Stay ready, I said.

Angus and I took our bikes from the rack and held Cappy's between us. We hoped he'd gain enough on Father Travis so he could jump on and we could pedal away. We watched the bit of road we could see far over the trees because it was there Cappy would appear if Father Travis didn't catch him. Soon, Cappy popped across. A moment later, Father Travis. Then they vanished and Angus said, He's trying to lose him by zigzagging through the BIA housing. He knows those yards too. We turned to watch the next patch of road where they would appear and again it was Cappy first, Father Travis not far behind. Cappy knew the front and back entrances of every building, and fled in and out of the hospital, the grocery, the senior citizens, the tiny casino we had back then. He doubled back through the Dead Custer and in and out of Whitey's. He took the road we'd taken past old lady Bineshi's, hoping he'd surprise the dogs and they'd fix their teeth in Father Travis's robe, but they made it through. Cappy hopscotched downhill through the graveyard and then the two of them made a loop that took them through the playground—it was mesmerizing to watch. Cappy set the swings going and sprang through the monkey bars, lightly touching down. Father Travis landed like an ape with knuckles on the ground, but kept going. They sprinted uphill, two tiny ciphers who now enlarged as Cappy ran toward us ready to jump on the bike we held and speed off. We would have made it. He would have made it. He came so close. Father Travis put on a burst of speed that brought him within a handsbreadth of Cappy's shirt collar. Cappy floated out from under that hand. But it came down and grabbed his back wheel.

Cappy jumped off the bike but Father Travis, purple in the face, wheezing, had him by the shoulders and bodily lifted him. Angus and I had dropped our bikes to plead his case. Although we couldn't have known for sure what Cappy planned to confess, it was now obvious. He had confessed what we feared he would confess.

Father, this does not look good, said Angus.

Let him down, please, Father Travis. I tried to imagine my father's voice in this situation. Cappy is a minor, I said. Perhaps that was absurd, but Father Travis had hold of Cappy's shirt now and had raised his fist and his fist stopped in the air.

A minor, I said, who came to you for help, Father Travis.

A Worf-like roar seized Father Travis and he threw Cappy on the ground. His foot went back but Cappy rolled out of range. We picked up our bikes because Father Travis wasn't moving now. He was standing there, breathing in deep gasps, head lowered, glaring from under his brow. We'd somehow gotten the upper moral ground in that moment and we knew it. We got on our bikes.

Good day, Father, said Angus.

Father Travis stared past us as we rode away.

S
hit and hell, I said to Cappy later. What were you thinking?

Cappy shrugged.

You told him about the church basement, where you did it?

Everything, said Cappy.

Shit and hell.

Clemence frowned at my language.

Sorry, Auntie, I said. We had gone to Clemence and Edward's in hopes they were eating, which they weren't, but that didn't matter because Clemence knew why we came around and she immediately warmed up her usual hamburger macaroni, poured her usual swamp tea, only mixed, for us specially, with a can of lemonade. She fed Mooshum because he ate whenever anybody else ate, but his tremor had become so pronounced that he couldn't eat soup.

Why'd you tell him? I asked.

I dunno, said Cappy, maybe what he said about his woman. Or what he said to me about
You be the one to notice her
, remember?

He said notice her, not, you know. I was delicate around Cappy, even though Clemence wasn't listening right then. Although Cappy had had sex, it was on a higher plane, so I didn't use any sex words. He got upset when they were associated with anything that had happened between himself and Zelia.

You could have gone to your dad, gone to your older brother, talked with them, I said.

I'm glad I went to Father Travis though, said Cappy, grinning.

Cappy's run was already becoming history and his reputation would soar. Father Travis was not damaged by it either, as we'd never had a priest in such fine athletic shape.

The size of his calf muscles! said Clemence.

The last priest could not have run ten yards, said Mooshum. I saw him laid out in our yard once, dead drunk. That old priest weighed more than you and your skinny friends all put together. He cackled. But this new one has his pride. It will take him many prayers to get over Cappy's run.