Land of Echoes

by Daniel Hecht

  Joseph, where are you? What's going on? Maybe he was up at the Keedays' with Tommy? But he hadn't said he planned to go today. And why wouldn't he answer his cell phone? Maybe the place was out of service range. She didn't know.

  She wanted to run out, dash to her truck, leave the school, go find him. But she didn't know where to look! At home? The hospital? The Keedays'?

  The really scary part was that this was not like Joseph. Sometimes he had to go away, or do work he couldn't be disturbed at. But he always let her know in advance. And he would never disappear at a time like this. He knew what she was going through. He wouldn't do this.

  Unless something was wrong. Something was wrong. She'd heard it in his voice when they'd talked yesterday.

  She pecked at the phone one more time, but she misdialed and got computer noises. Too shook up to even dial right! She slapped it shut and shoved it into her jacket pocket. She went into the bathroom, where she checked her face and hair, took three deep breaths, and practiced her smile before going back out to the clamor of the cafeteria and the MacPhersons.

  Four hours later, the Land Rover pulled out of the parking lot as Julieta and a handful of students waved good-bye. In their last private tete-a-tete, the MacPhersons had talked about four hundred thousand, half to go to the endowment and half to the scholarship fund. It was a whopping gift, and she knew she should feel high as a kite. Instead she felt split like a tree hit by lightning after dividing herself into two utterly disparate beings for five hours. And the fact was, it would take weeks for the MacPhersons' attorneys to conduct the financial audit and for the check to be cut. It left plenty of time for Donny to follow through on his threats and monkey-wrench everything.

  Four o'clock. She took one look at the growing stack of messages on her desk and backed out the door, retreated to the refuge of her room in the faculty residence wing. She called Joseph's numbers and got no answer. She called the Navajo Nation Inn to see if Joyce Wu or Dr. Mayfield could give her a cell number for Cree, but they didn't answer their room phones. She called Tommy's aunt's number in Burnham and got no answer.

  She stripped off her formal clothes, took a shower, blew her hair dry. She dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, then sat on the bed, trying to decide what to do.

  What she wanted to do was get in the car and drive. To Joseph's house. Or to the Keedays' place, but that would take two or three hours, it'd be dark before she got there—not possible tonight.

  Joseph's, then. Just the thought of seeing him made her feel better. He probably wasn't there, but the decision felt good. She needed to do something. She got up and scanned the room for her truck keys.

  A quiet knock at the door brought her heart to her throat.

  But it wasn't Joseph. It was Lynn Pierce, in her nurse's uniform, her silver braid stiff on one shoulder. Julieta stepped back to let her in.

  The brilliant blue eyes took in the room before darting at Julieta's face. The bronze fleck sparkled distractingly. "So, how'd it go? Land the big fish?"

  "Is there something I can do for you, Lynn? I was just on my way—"

  "What do you hear from Tommy? How's he doing?"

  "I can't talk with you about Tommy. I know what you did, Lynn. I know you talked to Donny. You and I need to discuss this, but now is not the time."

  That brought a widening of the startling eyes, surprise followed by satisfaction. "Gosh, news travels fast out here. What did I say, exactly?"

  The disingenuous deadpan awoke a flash of anger in Julieta. "You're fired, Lynn."

  "No, I'm not!" Lynn almost laughed at the idea. "Don't be silly!"

  "Yes, you are. What you've done is a clear breach of patient confidentiality. Not to mention an outrageous demonstration of disloyalty to this school and everything it stands for. Now if you don't mind—"

  "Urn, remind me—what does it stand for again? Your desire to pose as some Great White Mother for all the cute little Indian kids? Or just one particular Indian kid?" Lynn paused as if to savor Julieta's stunned expression. "And no, you can't fire me. Because if you do, I will share what I know in additional select circles. It's not a breach of confidentiality, it's an obligation imposed by professional ethics. You wouldn't want the MacPhersons to know you hired a . . . an exorcist for a student health problem, would you? Or the people at, say, the Osbourne Trust?"

  Julieta's outrage flared and she turned disdainfully for the phone, picked it up, punched Frank Nez's extension. She'd ask him to come escort Lynn off the school grounds. But she had doubts as soon as it began ringing, and before anybody could pick up, she put the receiver back in its cradle. She turned back to face Lynn, anger replaced by heartbreak. In all probability, this was broken beyond fixing. All of it. Lynn, the school, Joseph. Tommy.

  Her life.

  "What did I ever do, Lynn?" she asked softly. "Did I ignore you? Is that it?"

  "Don't flatter yourself!" the nurse snapped. But Julieta could see she'd been wounded.

  "I didn't know it mattered so much. Really. I would have been a better friend. It's just that doing my job, it takes everything I've got and then some. Sometimes I lose sight of—"

  "I have a theory. Want to hear it? It's about you and Joseph."

  "He's part of it for you, isn't he? That he and I are close. Is that it? I know you admire him as much as I do. Is that why you hate me? Jealousy?"

  Lynn's hands trembled as she took a cigarette pack and a folded foil ashtray from her pocket. She lit a cigarette, drew hard on it, turned her head to blow smoke toward the door. She looked back at Julieta. "You're quite the unusual pair. Lot of history there. Very devoted to each other. So close and yet so far, huh?"

  Julieta was surprised at the painful wrench that seized in her chest. So close and yet so far! The sense of urgency became intolerable: Joseph! She had to find him. She had to leave here. She turned away from Lynn to hide her face as she put on her jacket, found her purse, and checked in it for her keys. "I have to go now, Lynn. Consider this your two weeks' notice. I'll put it in writing tomorrow. I can't tell you how sorry I am that it all blew to pieces for you."

  "More accurately, my theory is about you and Joseph and Tommy. The two of you are so deeply concerned about Tommy, aren't you. And you're so sure no one knows why. But I think I do. And you know what? I'm not the only one. People have known for a long time."

  Julieta lost her breath. She hoped Lynn couldn't see the shock register in her shoulders. She desperately wanted to ask just what she meant by that. But the last thing she should do was show interest or weakness.

  "I have no idea what you're implying. But I'm leaving now, and so are you. I'm sorry you lost your husband. You must have loved him a great deal for his death to do this to you. To turn you into this." Julieta turned, saw the damage on Lynn's face, and regretted saying anything. She hadn't meant it cruelly. She went to the door, opened it, and stood aside.

  Lynn crossed her arms over her chest and tipped her head forward, a posture at once defensive and defiant. She marched past Julieta and into the hall like that, the cigarette between her fingers trailing a slender banner of smoke.

  Julieta followed her down the interminable hall to the side exit, neither of them able to say one more word.

  44

  "HEY," Cree said. "Hi." Tommy had surfaced behind the brown eyes. She was very glad to see him.

  His bed was a nest of sheepskins and snarled blankets on the dirt floor. Behind the bed and all around the room, the hogan's log walls were hung with tools, coats, sheepskins, chairs, brooms, bundles of kindling, coils of rope. Shelves held cans of food, bottles, flashlights, matchboxes, magazines. Suspended from the sloping, smoke-blackened rafters were several old kerosene lamps and Coleman gas lanterns. At the center of the room, a boxlike woodstove supported a length of rusted pipe.

  When Tommy's fit had subsided, they had carried him back to the bed, and now Ellen and Ray stood near the door, watching. Cree knelt at the edge of the blankets, trying to arrange the uncooperative limbs, stuff
ing folded sheepskins behind him to prop his head up.

  Tommy didn't seem to recognize her immediately, but when he did he managed a tiny, quick smile. "Dr. Black," he croaked.

  "Think you can eat anything? Your aunt says you haven't been able to keep anything down. You must be starved."

  He shook his head and grimaced at the prospect.

  "Water?"

  "Yeah. Please." His voice cracked, dry and reedy.

  Cree took a plastic canteen from the windowsill, held it to his parched lips. He steadied it with his left hand; his right arm hung loose from the shoulder. He was able to drink a fair amount.

  "How's the thing?" she asked. She gestured at the limp hand and arm. He frowned at it and seemed about to say something. Then he glanced over at Ellen and Ray, their frightened eyes round in the dark hogan, and clamped his mouth shut.

  Cree thought about that for a moment. "Listen, why don't I take the next shift with Tommy, you folks rest up. We'll be all right. We'll call you if we need you, okay?"

  They got the message. Ellen gave Tommy a weak smile as she shut the door.

  "You must be glad to be up here, huh?"

  "Yeah."

  "Me, too. It's so quiet. Did you spend much time here when you were a kid?"

  He nodded weakly and pointed up at several pieces of yellowing paper tacked to the walls. The drawings were clearly his, a younger hand's rendering of family members, sheep, trucks.

  As if exploiting his momentary inattention, the right arm rolled slowly so that the hand lay palm up, and the fingers spread slightly, a sleeping infant's gesture. Tommy's eyes darted at it and quickly away again.

  Shit, Cree thought. She hoped it wasn't awakening. She needed some time with Tommy. " Can you tell me what you're feeling?" she whispered.

  "Like my head is in two places at once," he mumbled. "Like my eyes are crossed or something, I can't see right."

  "Do you know what's the matter with you?"

  "Hastiin Begaye said there's a chindi in me. Said it's the ghost of an ancestor."

  "If it is, do you know who the ancestor might be?"

  His shook his head, defeated. As if taking its turn, the ghost rolled the head to the right.

  "Could it be your father or mother?"

  "Don't think so."

  "Why not?"

  He shrugged, baffled. "Just doesn't . . . feel like them."

  "Tommy, ghosts always want something. Do you have any idea what this one wants?"

  "Hastiin Begaye said it died in an evil way. An unjust way. It wants the injustice to be made right."

  "Is that what you think it wants?"

  "All I know is, it wants to . . . come back."

  Cree nodded. That much was obvious. "Anything else?"

  He started to shake his head again, but hesitated. "It tells, like . . . a story."

  Narrative! Cree thought. "What story?"

  The hand moved again, that lethargic roll and lazy spreading of fingers. It looked as if it could spring suddenly to vigorous life. Tommy's jaw started vibrating up and down, as if he were chilled to the bone, teeth chattering. But he was able to answer: "Walking. Got to walk a long way in a big hurry. It's cold. Then something bad happens. Like a fight."

  "Walking where?"

  Before he could answer, a shadow eclipsed the window light. They both startled. Cree looked up to see Raymond through the dusty glass, averting his face, lugging a heavy plastic water carrier. In another second he was gone.

  Tommy had lost the train of thought.

  "What does it feel, Tommy? Do you think it's just angry or is there another feeling there?"

  That idea troubled him. "Doesn't always seem angry."

  "So what else? Hate? Love? Fear?"

  One of his eyes stayed fixed uncertainly on her face while the other spun away as if tracking the flight of an invisible butterfly. He made a deep, guttural noise, uh-uh-uh-uh, then muttered something incomprehensible.

  Cree waited, but when he didn't say any more, she pressed on: "Do you think I could talk to the chindi? If I did, if you heard me talking to you like you're someone else, you don't ever have to worry. I'm not forgetting about you, okay? I'm always on your side. You know that. Can I talk to it?"

  He didn't answer. Now she wasn't sure it was Tommy in the eyes. She felt him slipping away and the strange body beast arising with its numbing charisma, its colossal confusions.

  "Tommy," she said quickly, "when it's you I'm talking to, you tell me. Okay? Say, 'I'm Tommy.' Can you do that? So I know who you are."

  Tommy's eyes took on a sad and distant look, too old for fifteen, and he didn't answer her directly. But he seemed to steady. "I did what you asked," he said.

  "What was that?"

  "You said I should draw what it felt like."

  "Right! Can you show me?"

  His left hand gestured weakly at a notebook on the floor against the north wall.

  Cree retrieved it, opened it. The renderings were almost too ghastly to look at: painfully labored pencil sketches of what looked like conjoined twins. Too many limbs, multiple deformed heads, bulbous shapes like cancerous growths. She tried to hide her shock.

  "It's not so good. I had to do it left-handed." He shut his eyes, exhausted. "You want to know who's Tommy, that's who."

  The claim frightened her, even though she wasn't sure just what he meant. There were so many questions. "If I asked you to draw what you want to be, what would that look like?"

  He looked stricken. Then his face stiffened, a mask intended to keep her out. "I don't know," he mumbled. It was a terrible admission.

  He observed her reaction in her face. "I'm Tommy," he managed. Wanting to please her. He looked so worn, ravaged. "Tired now. Got to sleep." He shut his eyes and she thought he was gone until his croaking voice startled her: "Sorry."

  She stayed kneeling there for a time, just probing the shifting tides of presence inside him: irregular waves lapping a beach, higher and lower, uneven eddies and flows. When she was sure he was asleep and breathing reliably, she crossed to the other side of the hogan, laid a sheepskin on the floor, and sat on it. At intervals, Tommy's right hand and arm startled her, turning suddenly, flexing, making what looked like abortive movements, and each time her fear spiked at the thought of it coming alive. But so far it hadn't. She tried to relax and get some control of herself. Her body desperately wanted sleep, but she had a lot to consider.

  Narrative: So far, she hadn't really glimpsed a story unfolding in the ghost's impulse—no reliving of the period just before death, no crucial memory from earlier times, not even a random visual image of the world the ghost thought it was in. There was its cycle of physical actions, which matched Tommy's description of walking, then maybe fighting. Afterward, there was the repeating sequence of convulsing and the arm pushing up. But she'd learned nothing that would help her identify the entity or determine what motivated it.

  But she had gotten a tantalizing general sense of its character. This ghost conveyed a sense of vigorous physicality. It also had a burning will, or drive. Determination. Oddly, though, running through all that vigor and drive was desperation, as if the vitality were deliberately mustered to overcome resistance. Fatigue, maybe. Or the cold Tommy mentioned. Or sickness.

  Or age. Garrett? This ghost's nature was reasonably consistent with a man accustomed to making things happen his way, getting what he wanted. Garrett had been fit for his years but was having to work harder and harder to keep signs of aging from view. Climbing the dragline boom was clearly the act of a man desperate to defy the encroaching limitations of age.

  She wished Tommy had been able to tell more about the ghost's affective complex. Not just angry. But there was anger there at times, rising to murderous rage. And remorse, too, she'd felt it. Of course there was. Most people left life with some measure of regret for things done or left undone; regret and the desire to atone was the engine that animated many revenants. If this was Garrett, homing on Julieta, it could be remorse for the
things he'd done—his betrayals and cruelties, the years of feuding. Because Garrett had still felt some love and desire, as Donny had more or less admitted. And, unquestionably, there was a powerful strain of tender longing in this ghost. Also some fire in the belly, lust or desire; Cree was increasingly sure the ghost was male.

  Of course, one of the people who died at the ravine could also have had all those characteristics, too. The determination she felt could be their desire to retrieve the goats or to fight off the soldiers; the desperation could be the simple will to survive against long odds.

  What about the parents? Could that driven quality be something as mundane as a drunken man's attempt to overcome his alcoholic stupor in order to operate his car? It didn't seem likely. Everything this ghost felt was sharp, acute, impassioned, not at all fogged and numbed. And this ghost seemed to be reliving a lengthy pre- or perimortem experience of walking and fighting, utterly inconsistent with the parents' instant death due to massive head trauma.

  But it was all speculative. She really couldn't say without a deeper encounter with the entity. Deeper and deeper. She had reflexively pulled away during Tommy's last crisis, but she couldn't afford to keep her distance any longer. Tommy was fading away. He was dying. His survival depended on what she could learn directly from her encounters with the entity. She'd have to open herself completely to the ghost. Submit to its invasions.

  She shuddered as she recalled that terrifying, incomprehensible strangeness of her own arm, then started as someone rattled the hasp on the door. A crack opened and Ellen's face looked warily inside. Behind her were Raymond and Ellen's eldest son, Dan, a young man in his early twenties with a painful-looking, flaring red nose.

  Ellen offered a cautious smile and beckoned to her. "Time for the next shift," she whispered.

  45

  THEY SAT on the bare ground. The family had set up camp back by the big sheep shed: smoldering fire pit, pots and pans hung on posts, plastic water carrier, rumpled sleeping bags. Cree smelled the coffee before she sat down and her whole being cried out for a dollop of it. Ellen found a pair of tin cups and poured murky coffee from the smoke-blackened percolator.