Gray Magic

by Sarah Dreher

  "I would have, too," Stoner said, and wondered where this was leading.

  "He was a mess, matted and dirty and flea bitten. It looked as if he'd been beaten. I didn't want to advertise for his owner because of how he'd been treated and because I'd already fallen a little in love with him, but my folks said we had to. But nobody showed up, and he refused to run away. Every time I got in the car, he'd jump behind the steering wheel until I asked him politely to get in the back with me. If you left the windows down, he'd get in whether anybody was going anywhere or not, and sit there in the driver's seat, and that’s why we called him Driver."

  “Well," Stoner said lamely, "I guess you always knew who was in charge." She passed the rolls.

  "He was a good dog," Gwen said. "I'll bet he wouldn't have cared whether or not I'm a lesbian."

  Ah. "Dogs are like that. Too bad people can't learn from them."

  Gwen put her fork down. "I wish I could get angry. I mean, I do, for moments at a time. But I can't keep it up." She pulled tiny chunks off the roll and crumbled them, between her fingers. "Every time I try to think about it, my brain turns to pinwheels."

  "I know what you mean."

  Gwen looked up. "I'm sorry, Stoner. I just can't seem to make any sense of this."

  "I know. It's all right."

  From the yard came the bang of a car door. Tom Drooley's ears flew skyward.

  Gwen sighed and pushed her chair back. "That's probably Ted. Why don't you give him a hand, and I'll do the dishes."

  * * *

  Another sleepless night. The guest room clock was old and loud. Each tick sounded like someone dealing from a deck of new cards. She found herself counting, a guaranteed no-sleep situation. She tried to focus on other, less rhythmic noises, and picked up the low rumble of the old refrigerator. After a few minutes it, too, settled down to a steady and countable throb.

  A night creature called and was silent.

  Called again and was silent.

  Called again...

  She threw back the covers, slammed her feet into her boots—remembering at the last minute that scorpions were fond of hiding in shoes, and getting away with nothing worse than a flood of adrenalin-pumping, sleep-destroying panic—and stumbled out to the sitting room.

  She closed the guest room door-quietly, she hoped, without waking Gwen-and flicked on the table tamp.

  The pine board walls glowed with a soft ocher light. The store and kitchen were caverns of darkness on either side. The bookcase was inviting.

  She scanned the shelves. Most of the books were old, their titles faded, their content Victorian. She wasn't in the mood for Victorian. On the bottom shelf lay a stack of Harlequin Romances, next year's Victorian no doubt. She wondered if Claudine read them. Or Gil. Or if they read them aloud to each other on long, cold winter nights. She was pretty sure they weren't Stell's. But anything was possible.

  She missed Stell. Glad she wasn't here and in danger, but it was lonely without her. The world was a diminished place without Stell Perkins.

  Tom Drooley, as if reading her thoughts, crawled out from under Stell's bed and came into the sitting room and threw himself down with a pitiful moan. Stoner knelt to stroke his head, and found herself looking at the spine of a well-thumbed paper back called, Walking in the White Man's Shoes: A study of the impact of White contact on Hopi and Navajo customs and ceremonialism, University of Southern Arizona Press.

  If that didn't put her to sleep, nothing would.

  She turned to the back cover. There were the usual words of praise. "Great contribution..." "The definitive work..." "Only a handful of books on the market today match the thoroughness, accuracy of detail, and readability of Mary Beale's..."

  Mary Beale? The name rang a bell. Mary Beale.

  Laura Yazzie had said she “Walked in Mary Beale's path".

  Mary Beale was an Indian woman, who had left the reservation and made a name for herself in the White world.

  She curled up in an easy chair.

  Let's see if Mary Beale has anything to say about the current goings on.

  She flipped to the glossary. Powaqa, a witch, may be good (healer) or bad (sorcerer).

  Ya Ya, Hopi Ceremony, now outlawed, which forms the basis for modern sorcery. Originally associated with the Fog Clan.

  Not very helpful.

  Skin-walker, Navajo sorcerer, also called Two-Heart. Believed to possess two hearts, one human and one animal. Not to be confused with 'to have a divided heart', a White expression.

  Big Star Chant, one of the Evil Way ceremonies used to exorcize evil spirits. Navajo.

  And Ben Tsosie had been called to Tuba City for a Big Star Chant. Interesting.

  She wondered if there could be any connection between that and the Ya Ya sickness. Or was it purely coincidental?

  Laura Yazzie had seemed certain the Hopi and Navajo Ways were separate. But wasn't it possible, especially with modern communication and transportation, that there might be a point at which they intersect? If not in the tribes as a whole, at least between individuals? After all, the Hopi sickness was affecting whites. Why not Navajos? And wouldn't that require the services of a Hosteen Tsosie?

  And who was to say Laura Yazzie was telling the truth? She could be a Two-Heart herself.

  Or Siyamtiwa. Or Rose and Tomas Lomahongva.

  Even Tom Drooley could have two hearts.

  Feeling a little foolish, she reached down and rested her hand on the sleeping dog's side. His heartbeat was strong and sure. And there was only one.

  “Well," she said half-aloud, "at least we can trust Tom Drooley."

  She let the book's pages sift through her fingers, glanced at the inside back cover, and caught her breath. The photograph of Mary Beale—a middle-aged, dark-haired woman with sharp black eyes, small mouth, thin lips, high cheekbones… Siyamtiwa.

  It couldn't be.

  She read the biographical note:

  Mary Beale, PhD., is a full-blooded Native American, born and raised in the Laguna Pueblo near Santa Fe, New Mexico. Educated in the Santa Fe Public Schools and the University of New Mexico, she earned her degree in Cultural Anthropology from McGill University, and is currently the curator of the Pueblo Collection of the Kearney Museum of the North American Indian in Omaha, Nebraska. Walking in the White Man's Shoes is her doctoral dissertation.

  The book was published in 1981. Stoner looked at the picture again. Now it didn't resemble Siyamtiwa at all. She shook her head. Stereotypes.

  A high-pitched, siren-like sound brought her out of her thoughts and made the hair along Tom Drooley's spine stand up.

  The sound came again, this time preceded by puppy-like yipping. Coyote?

  She went to the door and listened.

  The cry was repeated, distant and tantalizing.

  Tom Drooley stuck his nose into the night and whined.

  "Come on," Stoner said.

  She stepped outside.

  The desert glowed with its own faint light, a dull blue so dim it might be an illusion. It swirled around her ankles like mist.

  She walked to the road and looked out over the Painted Desert.

  It lay lifeless and empty as the moon, bathed in moonlight.

  A dead, alien, terrible place.

  A place of hidden danger and invisible moving things.

  An old place, old as the universe. A place built on the skeletons of long-dead sea creatures. Built on jungles turned to stone, built on desiccated plains and sandy beaches, on exhausted volcanoes. Built by time and wind and blowing dust.

  Built by the Spirit People.

  Spirit People? She rubbed the back of her neck. "I don't know about any Spirit People."

  She looked around. Damn it, there's something here.

  Tom Drooley pressed against her legs.

  She could hear her own heartbeat, quick unsteady, tentative.

  The coyote's cry came again, closer now.

  She looked toward Long Mesa and thought she saw... something ...hunched aga
inst the sky.

  She squinted, thought she saw it move, decided she hadn't.

  Tom Drooley sat on her foot.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, then looked quickly, hoping to catch and identify the object through her peripheral vision. She recognized the shape... a clump of mesquite, or juniper, or rabbit brush, or some other bushy plant.

  Maybe.

  So what? So what if it's a plant, or a coyote, or even a Great White Buffalo? Why are you making yourself crazy with this stuff?

  A second heartbeat joined her own.

  She turned quickly.

  No one was there.

  A third heartbeat kicked in, this one high and sharp, dancing through and around the other, grace notes to the stronger beats. “Who is it?” she whispered.

  The heartbeats quickened, her own and the Other's.

  She rubbed her arms to still the trembling in her hands.

  "Look, I know you're out here. Show yourself."

  Silence answered her.

  "Damn it, either tell me what you want, or leave me alone."

  Something padded away into the darkness.

  EIGHT

  Morning arrived fast and hot.

  By sunrise, the humidity had risen to an all-time record twenty percent. Which would have brought a breath of relief from Massachusetts dampness, but by the time that bit of moisture connected with the Arizona sun, the result was worse than midday in July on the Boston Common. Heat built up on the roads and spilled over into the shade. Lizards panted. Flies hung suspended in the air, or crawled lazily across table tops and windowsills. Men mopped sweat from their faces with wrinkled bandannas. Women fanned themselves with magazines. The faces of children ran with mud.

  Gwen grumbled over morning coffee.

  Stoner made an attempt at being cheerful, gave up, and grumbled back.

  She opened the store for business and wrote inane postcards to the folks back home, and then couldn't find stamps.

  Around nine-thirty, a couple of Indians dropped by to trade for coffee and roofing nails.

  A contingent of Navajo and Hopi women—Rose Lomahongva among them—held what seemed to be a prearranged meeting on the trading post porch. When Rose came in for change for the soda machine, she mentioned that there had been two more deaths on the reservation since yesterday. Both had been women.

  Gwen swept out the kitchen, which improved her mood.

  It kept getting hotter.

  Stoner hid in the sitting room, the darkest room in the house, and told herself it was cooler there, although there was really no noticeable difference anywhere except inside the refrigerator. She made another stab at Walking in the White Man's Shoes, but decided it was too esoteric for the climate. Even the Harlequin Romances were too esoteric for the climate. She stared at the picture of Mary Beale, and wondered how she could ever have mistaken her for Siyamtiwa.

  She settled for rocking and waiting for the heat to lift.

  Gwen, meanwhile, had worked herself into a frenzy of cleaning, beginning with the kitchen and progressing through the bathroom, guest room, and Ted and Stell's bedroom in record time. She approached the sitting room with a fierce and determined gleam in her eye.

  Stoner tried to make herself invisible.

  "Are you doing anything in here?" Gwen demanded, hands on her hips and dust cloth dangling from her pocket.

  Stoner got up. "Nope. I'll clear out of your way." She headed for the kitchen.

  "Don't make a mess. I just finished out there."

  She looked around for a book to take with her. 'What's with you, anyway? This is a killer."

  Gwen attacked the book case. "Must be premenstrual." She yanked books out by the handful and dusted them viciously. “What time does the mail come?"

  “When Larch Begay gets around to delivering it, I guess." She rescued an old photograph album which would never survive Gwen's assault.

  "Maybe we could pick it up.” Gwen slammed books back onto shelves. "Save him a trip."

  The mail. The grandmother. Of course. “We could do that. When you run down."

  Gwen waved her off. "I might as well finish this room now that I've started it."

  Stoner poured herself a glass of iced tea and wandered around to the group of women on the porch. All conversation ceased immediately. She smiled apologetically and went back to the kitchen.

  The photograph album aroused her curiosity. Most of the pictures were old sepia prints of Model A Fords, men in large sweeping mustaches and wide-brimmed hats. Groups of Indians in ceremonial dress. A smiling priest. A picnic. A Mexican fiesta. All of the pictures labelled in a spidery, deeply-slanting script.

  Toward the back were treasures. Claudine as a child, playing on the trading porch with 'Cousin Stell'. Cousin Stell in Levi's and plaid shirt and a cowboy hat three times too big for her. Cousin Stell at ten, bareback on a pinto pony. Cousin Stell as a teen-ager, lounging on the porch in penny loafers, circle skirt, and crinolines. Gil and Claudine's wedding, with Stell in a puff-sleeved bridesmaid's dress and Ted looking—in his rented tuxedo—as uncomfortable as a kid forced to play the violin for guests.

  Then snapshots of babies, some with Claudine, some with Gil, some held by a Hispanic nursemaid named Maria Hernandez. Maria was a stocky, middle-aged woman...

  ...who looked exactly like Siyamtiwa.

  Stoner rubbed her eyes. Either my racism has taken a giant leap forward and every non-white in Arizona looks the same to me...

  ...or something very strange is happening.

  Events of the past few days led her to lean strongly toward the "something strange" hypothesis.

  She called Gwen over and pointed to the better of several pictures. "Doesn't that woman remind you of Siyamtiwa?"

  Gwen looked hard at the snapshot, then shook her head. "I don't know, Stoner. I only met her once."

  “Well, it does look like her. Exactly like her. Doesn't that strike you as odd?"

  "I guess so."

  Heat and apprehension made her petulant. She went to the sitting room and snatched up Mary Beale's book. "Look." She put the book and photo album side-by-side. "Look at these two women. They look exactly alike.”

  Gwen pulled her reading glasses from her pocket and slipped them on and took an eternity staring at the faces. "They don't look alike to me.”

  "Of course they do. Clean your glasses.”

  ”I just did."

  "Gwen..."

  Gwen glanced at her, then back at the pictures. "Well maybe."

  "Don't placate me.”

  "For heaven's sake, Stoner, what difference does it make? You'll probably never meet either of these women."

  Stoner raked her hand through her hair. She felt slightly hysterical. "Hah. Heavy irony. I've already met them. They're Siyamtiwa.”

  Gwen smiled uncertainly. "It's too hot for this."

  Unsure of herself now, she looked at the pictures again. The photo of Mary Beale was posed. The photo of Maria Hernandez was old and faded. Well, maybe...

  Suddenly she didn't want to think about it any more. "You're right," she said, and closed the book and album. "Let's ask Rose to look after things, and go for the mail. Maybe a drive'll cool us off."

  * * *

  Grandmother Eagle felt the bottom fall out of her stomach and snapped awake just as the ground raced to meet her. Her eyes were sore and puffy. It was an effort to lift her wings. She searched for an air current to rest on, but the day was too still. Sleep became a gnawing hunger. The sun pressed her toward the earth.

  Big Tewa Peak beckoned seductively. There would be coolness there, among the canyons and junipers. Maybe water in a high lake. A rock ledge which faced east, away from the brutal sun. At least a bare, dead tree in shadow, a shady spot for a little nap.

  She tried to shake off the temptation. Old Woman Two-leg will have much to say to you if you let trouble slip in the back door.

  Old Woman Two-leg is probably having a lovely rest for herself at this very minute.

&nb
sp; The sun caressed her back hypnotically.

  Old Woman Two-leg expects me to do everything. Did I volunteer for this? I did not.

  She smelled the sweet, sharp odor of cedar rising from the mountains.

  This is Two-leg business, not Eagle business. What did Two-legs ever do for us? Nothing but kill my Old Man. Nothing but poison my babies. Nothing.

  A sparkle of blue from below. Water, reflecting the sky.

  I'm an old bird, and the Two-legs would begrudge me even an hour's rest at the end of my life.

  She flew lower over the mountains, feeling the coolness.

  A drink of water.

  Fish drifted in the shallows. She ate her fill.

  The rock ledge lay in shadow, just her size, just right for a little nap.

  Eagle yawned. Skin walkers walk by night, not day.

  She folded her tired wings and closed her burning eyes.

  Down on the desert floor, the coyote roused itself...

  …and walked.

  * * *

  Stoner felt it as soon as they got back to the trading post. Something had been here. Was still here.

  She looked around, but there was nothing to see. Because whatever it was, it couldn't be seen.

  "I can't believe it," Gwen called from the front porch. She waved a brown paper bag. "It was here all along."

  No, Stoner thought, it wasn't here all along. Because I checked before we left for Begay's and there was nothing on that porch. And we didn't pass him on the road.

  Rose Lomahongva strolled by, on her way home. Stoner called her over. “Would you like a ride?"

  "No, thanks," the girl said. "If I walk, I can feel the breeze."

  “While we were gone, did anyone come by? Like Larch Begay?"

  Rose shook her head. "Nobody carne by."

  "Do you know how the mail got on the porch?"

  "Nope. The women left, and I went inside, just like you asked. Didn't see anything." She started to turn away. "Have a nice evening."

  Stoner caught her arm. "Rose, have you noticed anything... well, strange going on around here?"

  The girl looked at her with a puzzled smile. "Sure."

  “What is it?"