Windigo Island (23 page)

“Not a word.”

She returned to her seat. Her gut began to knot. She stared into her coffee, into the little world reflected on its dark surface. “I still think we should bring the police into this.”

Neither of her companions spoke immediately. Then Shinny said, “You don’t look Indian.”

“My grandmother was true-blood Iron Lake Anishinaabe. I’m one-eighth.”

He nodded. “Around here, looking the way I do, the way so many of us do, being Indian pretty much defines how we’re perceived. You walk into an off-rez community, and you get looked at. You get watched. You get judged. On the basis of your genes alone. Most of us have been stopped by white cops for no other reason than we’re driving a truck with reservation plates. We’ve had altercations with white people, and more often than not, the guy who shows up wearing the badge, a white guy, doesn’t much bother to see our side. Not all cops out here are like that, but enough that you just never know. So trusting law enforcement runs against the grain.”

“So does vigilantism,” Jenny said. “Look, I want to help Mariah, I really do, but I’m concerned about going at it on our own. I have this overwhelming sense that people are going to get hurt.”

“Someone has already been hurt, Jennifer O’Connor.”

They all turned and found Henry Meloux walking slowly into the kitchen.

“That coffee,” the old man said. “I would pay gold for a cup.”

“Have a seat, Henry,” Shinny said, rising. “And the cost is your company.”

“Migwech,”
the old man said. He looked at Jenny. “You slept better than your father.”

“You knew he was gone?” she said.

“I heard him drive away. It was very dark.”

“Black, Henry?” Shinny asked. “Your coffee?”

“Yes.”

Shinny brought Meloux the mug with Wile E. Coyote on it. The old man studied the image and said, “Thin. Not a good hunter, I would guess.”

“Abysmal,” Shinny said with a laugh.

The old man drank his coffee and closed his eyes, savoring the flavor, the warmth, the caffeine promise.

“You meant Raven Duvall?” Daniel said. “Already hurt?”

Henry lowered his mug and opened his dark eyes. “Before that girl, they hurt others. Hurt is what they know, all they know.”

“So hurt for hurt, Henry?” Jenny said. “And we do the hurting?”

“When we walk the Path of Souls, Jennifer O’Connor, we leave the hurt and the hurting behind.”

“You’re advocating killing these men?”

Meloux cupped his mug as if warming his old, blue-veined hands. He looked deeply into her eyes and spoke softly. “If you kill a wolf for the pleasure of it, that is one kind of killing. If you kill a wolf because it has attacked you, that is another kind of killing. If you kill a wolf that has been caught in the jaws of a trap and injured beyond healing, that, too, is a different kind of killing.”

“There are good killings, Henry?”

“There are necessary killings.”

“And who decides what’s necessary?”

“That is always a matter of the heart.”

“I can’t accept that, Henry.”

“You have never killed.”

“And I hope I never have to.”

“Granddaughter, I hope that, too.”

“Look, we’re not going to kill anybody,” Daniel said. “If I thought that, I wouldn’t be here. There’s a way of getting Mariah away from Windigo without resorting to bloodshed.”

“You brought your gun,” Jenny pointed out. “Are you familiar with Chekhov?”

“What’s Chekhov got to do with this?” Shinny asked.

Daniel stared at Jenny while he answered Shinny’s question. “Chekhov said that if you hang a gun on the wall in the first act, you have to use it by the third.”

They all heard the sound of the Explorer returning, the sudden cutoff of the engine, the thud of a door closing, then another. They heard the little cry of hinges as the front screen door opened and shut. They heard the tread of footsteps across the floor of the living room. They waited for Jenny’s father to come into the kitchen. When he finally appeared, he wasn’t alone.

Chapter 37

T
he girl with him was no older than Mariah Arceneaux, but she was not Mariah. She wore a tight yellow skirt that barely covered her butt, a tight red top, red heels with straps. A little white purse hung over one shoulder. Her face was a mask of heavy, but carefully applied, makeup. She was Indian. And she was pissed.

“Got a chair for our guest, Shinny?” Cork said.

“Take mine.” Daniel stood up.

The girl eyed the vacant seat as if it were the electric chair and made no move to fill it.

“Sit down, Breeze,” Jenny’s father said.

“Fuck you.”

“You’re going nowhere. You might as well be comfortable.”

“Coffee?” Shinny asked.

Breeze swung her gaze toward him, appraised him, and said, “What the hell.” Then she did, in fact, flop down into the chair Daniel had offered. She clutched her purse in her lap and stared at the Formica tabletop.

“Everybody, this is Breeze,” Cork said. “Breeze, these are the people who’ve come a very long way to help you.”

“Fuck your help.” She spoke toward the red Formica.

“Where have you been, Dad?” Jenny asked.

Cork said, “Could I get a cup of that coffee while you’re at it, Shinny? Black?”

“Sure thing, Cork.”

Jenny’s father stood directly behind Breeze, as if to block her
escape should she try. “I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to drive over to Windigo’s place and check it out for myself. I no sooner get there than one of the SUVs loads up and takes off. I decided to follow it.”

Shinny brought Cork a mug and then one for Breeze. “Black?” he said to her.

“You got cream and sugar?” A sulky request.

“Coming right up.”

Cork stood sipping from his mug. He looked dark, haggard, but the coffee seemed to brighten him some. He went on: “The SUV drove to one of the thrown-together workers’ camps Shinny told us about. Dropped Breeze off there at a place hardly bigger than an outhouse, then took off. I peeked in a window—Christ, the place didn’t even have curtains—and saw what was about to go down, knocked on the door. Guy opens up. I flash this at him.” He took a badge wallet from his shirt pocket and flipped it open. Jenny had no idea what it actually was, but it looked like official law enforcement. As fast as he’d opened it, he flipped it closed. “I tell him I’m working for Williams County Social Services. I tell him the girl’s a runaway, underage, I’m taking her with me. I tell him if he doesn’t want to be cited for soliciting sex from a minor, he’ll just step aside and let me do my job. He bought it, and here’s Breeze.”

“And here’s Breeze’s cream and sugar,” Shinny said, setting before her on the table the little ceramic pitcher, a small, matching sugar bowl, and a spoon.

She fixed her coffee, stirred, took a sip. They all watched in silence, as if this was some exotic ritual.

“They’ll kill you,” she said.

“They might try,” Cork replied.

She put her mug down and finally looked at each one of them carefully. “Who are you? What do you want?”

“We want to know about Windigo and that trailer,” Cork said.

“Windigo? I don’t know anything about anyone named Windigo.”

“Maybe you know him as Angel,” Cork said.

It was clear that she did, but it was also clear that she wasn’t going to give them what they wanted.

“What’s your name?” Cork asked. “Your real name?”

“Fuck you,” she said.

“Sounds Chinese,” Shinny said.

Jenny smiled, but the joke didn’t register with Breeze. She drank more coffee, sullen and silent.

Cork moved to the kitchen doorway and leaned there, casually. “I want to know about the men who keep you in that trailer.”

“They don’t keep me there. I stay because I want to.”

“Of course you do. Who are your roommates?” When she didn’t reply, Cork said, “Let me show you something, Breeze.” He disappeared into the living room and came back a moment later with a photograph in his hand. He laid it on the table in front of her. It was a photo of Raven Duvall, taken at the clinic on the Iron Lake Reservation, as she lay beaten and bruised on the examination table. “One of Angel’s girls when he didn’t need her anymore.”

“She did something to deserve it,” Breeze said.

Jenny said, “There’s nothing anyone could do to deserve this.”

“Fuck you, bitch.”

Henry spoke for the first time since the girl had joined them. “Are you hungry, granddaughter?”

“I’m not your granddaughter.”

“Are you hungry?” he asked again, unfazed.

She didn’t look particularly well fed, and the idea of food seemed the most agreeable thing suggested to her since she’d arrived.

“I guess I could eat.” As if it nearly killed her to admit it.

“How about scrambled eggs with cheese, some Canadian bacon, toast with huckleberry jam?” Shinny suggested brightly. “Best breakfast in all of Indian country, I promise.”

Jenny gave him a hand, and in a short while, the kitchen smelled wonderfully of the meal. Shinny filled a plate and set it
in front of Breeze. As he did this he said,
“Haw mushkay. Doe ksh kay ya oun hey?”

The girl looked up at him, startled.

“Lakota,” he said to her with a smile. “Rosebud?”

She lowered her eyes and concentrated on her food.

They all put breakfast on their plates, and eating seemed to bounce their spirits up a bit.

Then Daniel said exactly what Jenny had been thinking. He said, “They probably know about us by now.”

Cork set his plate on the counter. “Probably. I made a play a lot sooner than I would have liked. I hoped maybe it was Mariah in that SUV. When I saw what was going to go down out there in that camp, even though it wasn’t Mariah, I just couldn’t let it happen. Sorry, Breeze.”

Oddly, she didn’t appear upset. The food seemed to have had a positive effect on her disposition. She said offhand, “I’ve done him before. I’ll probably do him again.” She’d eaten her food, every last crumb. Jenny wondered if she might be thinking of licking the plate.

“There’s more, Breeze,” Shinny said. “If you’d like.”

“Hell, yes. I don’t eat this good ever.”

“Who cooks?” Jenny asked.

“Me or one of the other girls. Mostly we make Hamburger Helper, pizza out of a box, shit like that.”

“None of the men cook?”

“Right.” She rolled her eyes. “Who are you guys? Not cops, I can tell.” She glared at Jenny’s father. “Well, you, maybe.”

“Not anymore, Breeze,” Cork replied. “We’re just people trying to find a lost kid. Know any?”

“Like a little kid, you mean?”

“Like you.”

“Right,” she said and gave a hoarse laugh, full of derision.

“Her name’s Mariah,” Jenny said. “Mariah Arceneaux. But she probably goes by another name. Candi, maybe. I’ve got a picture of her.”

Jenny dug in her purse and pulled out the shot of Mariah they’d been showing everyone. She put it on the table in front of Breeze.

The girl glanced at it, and Jenny could see recognition register on her face.

“She’s with you and the others at the trailer?” Jenny asked.

Breeze stopped talking. Shinny set another plate of food in front of her, but she didn’t make a move to eat.

“Those men won’t hurt you,” Cork said. “We won’t let them, I promise.”

She mumbled something.

“What did you say, Breeze?” Jenny asked.

“I don’t need your fucking promises.”

Because promises have been made to you before, and they’ve been broken,
Jenny thought. And she wondered, had it been that way all her life?

“All we want is to take Mariah home,” Cork said. “If you want to go home, too, we’ll take you.”

“Home?” The very word seemed poison. “Are you fucking kidding me? Home is why I ran away.”

Meloux said, “Granddaughter, if you could go anywhere, where would you go?”

She stared at the old man as if he’d spoken a foreign language.

“Dream a little,” he said gently. “Where?”

She looked out the window at the distant, dun-colored hills. She was quiet a long while, then she said, “Denver.”

“Why Denver?” Meloux asked.

“An aunt there. I visited her a couple of years ago. She has a nice place. You can see the mountains.”

“What does she do in Denver?” The old Mide’s voice was so soothing it made Jenny want to curl up in his lap.

“Works in a hospital. Like a nurse’s aide or something. A real good job.”

“If we got you to Denver,” Cork said, “to your aunt’s place, would you help us?”

She came out of her dream. “I don’t even fucking know you.”

Meloux said, “Every promise I have ever made I have kept, granddaughter. If you help us, we will help you go wherever you want. This, I promise.”

She looked into Meloux’s soft brown eyes, and her own eyes became windows to the terrible struggle going on inside her. A lifetime of broken promises pitted against a child’s deep desire to be safe and to be free.

Please let her believe this old man,
Jenny prayed.
Please let her believe this one promise.

But in the end, her history killed her hope. Her answer was still “No.”

That tiny word took the air from the room.

Then Cork’s cell phone rang. He glanced at the display and left the kitchen to take the call.

“So,” Breeze said, “I suppose you’re going to turn me over to social services, right?”

“No,” Jenny said. “We’ll just keep you safe until this is over, then we’ll let you go.”

“Just go?”

“That’s what you want, isn’t it? And no matter who we turned you over to, in the end, you’d just run away, wouldn’t you?”

“Well, yeah.” Something seemed to come to her suddenly. “You’re really going to fuck with Angel?”

“We’re going to get our friend away from him, whatever that takes.”

“You know about the cops, right? That’s why you’re not just turning us all in?”

“What about the cops?” Jenny asked.

“Angel’s got ’em in his pocket. Don’t you know how it is out here? Everybody’s making money, so why shouldn’t the cops? That’s how they figure it, anyway.”

Jenny glanced at Daniel. The argument for doing this on their own had just become immeasurably stronger.

Cork came back in. “That was Duluth PD. Simon Wesley
turned himself in this morning, spilled everything about Carrie Verga and John Boone Turner and the
Montcalm
. Duluth PD wants to talk to me at my earliest convenience.” He leveled a look at Breeze, one Jenny couldn’t read. “We’re going to take your friends down,” he said. “You can go down with them, or you can buy yourself a ticket to freedom. The choice is yours.”

“You really aren’t cops?”

“We really aren’t.”

“And you really would get me to Denver?”

Cork gave a nod toward Henry Meloux. “I’ve never known this old man to lie. He’s made you a promise. You can believe it.”

She looked again at the barren hills all around them, thought about it a long time, and finally said, rather wistfully, “Denver.”