by Don Travis
Cheese screwed up one eye and gave Jazz a look. “My dad got a call from the big rez about a fellow called Jazz. Don’t guess that’s your real name, is it?”
“It ain’t,” Klah said. “Who was doing the asking?”
“Just some guy who knows my family.”
“Well, this ain’t him,” Klah said. “Don’t want my friend to get mixed up with that Jazz they’re hunting.”
“How you know he ain’t?”
“Because they asked about a guy called Jazz up at Dipping Water too. And he was supposed to be in his forties.”
Jazz knew “Dipping Water” was the approximate meaning of To’hajiilee.
“How come they’re looking for him?”
Klah shrugged. “Something about white cops wanting him for spitting on the sidewalk or something.”
“Okay, bro.”
Jazz felt like the minimart was doing highway robbery when they went inside for supplies. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was pretty sure the prices were a lot higher than they would have been in Farmington. Farmington. That name fit well on his lips. That had to be where he was from, where his mother and uncle lived.
After they loaded their purchases aboard the horses and hoofed it back down the road, Jazz asked, “How does it feel to be back home?”
“Cuts two ways. Some good memories, but it makes me remember why I didn’t mind leaving.”
“What do you mean?”
“My mom and dad are all around me. I see a place here where we picnicked. The school where my mom worked. The place where they….” His voice trailed away.
“That’s bad, man. Sorry I dragged you back to all this. But at least you got to see some of your old friends.”
Klah snorted. “Yeah. Friends. Cheese was bigger’n me in school and used to beat up on me all the time. I’m the one gave him that name.”
“Oh crap. Can you trust him?”
“About as far as I can heave that big can of water Bones is carrying.”
Chapter 26
PAUL DIDN’T manage to completely elude work at the country club but finagled a short shift. He left once he was satisfied everything was covered. He returned home just as Henry and I finished breakfast on Saturday morning. We piled into the Impala and set off for To’hajiilee with Paul in the back seat, so conversation with Henry was easier. I knew he’d talked to his father, Louie, early that morning.
“No sign of Jazz on the reservation yet?” I asked.
“None.”
“Did he find the Hatahles?”
“Didn’t have time. There was three ceremonies going on spread all over the place. Found out the Hatahle woman’s a hand trembler with a pretty good rep, so she’s probably at one of them. But if Jazz is with them, he hasn’t surfaced yet.”
I swerved to dodge a squirrel and took the off ramp at Jefferson onto I-40 heading west. “I don’t think he’s in the Four Corners area. It’s possible this Klah fellow left his pinto with someone else, but my guess is he and Jazz took off for parts unknown as soon as Nesposito’s nephew let them know Hard Hat was asking questions.”
“An Albuquerque cop on the rez probably shook them a little too,” Paul said.
“Henry, I think you said Klah is the Hatahles’ nephew. Do you know his background?”
He shook his head. “Don’t know nothing about him.”
“Guess that’s part of our mission. How about I drop you on the street while we go to the chapter house and try to convince someone there we’re the good guys. By the way, this is a Sunday before a national holiday. Is the chapter house going to be open?”
“Probably be lots of people there. This is still tourist season, you know.” Henry took off his hat and ran fingers through his hair. “Good luck with learning anything, but it’s worth a shot anyway.”
When we dropped Henry on the dusty streets of the little settlement, he immediately approached a girl at the side of the road. He tipped his big black Stetson and was engaged in earnest conversation before we were out of sight.
As soon as a young woman in a traditional velveteen skirt and blouse stepped out to greet us at the chapter house, I elbowed Paul and told him to take the lead.
“Good morning, gentlemen, welcome to the To’hajiilee Chapter House. My name is Irene, and I have a brochure right over here.” She indicated the way with a clank of silver bracelets heavily adorned with blue-green turquoise nuggets.
Paul flashed his best smile. “Thank you, ma’am, but we’re men on a mission. Maybe you can help us.”
Her welcoming attitude faded a bit as Paul set off on a discourse to convince her we had nothing but the welfare of our friend in mind when he started asking questions about Jazz Penrod. Her natural reluctance to share information with outsiders partially crumbled beneath Paul’s charm offensive.
“There was a man named Jazz—at least, that the name he went by—here for a while. But I understand he’s gone now.”
“Yes, he was staying with the Hatahles. Gad and Dibe have gone to the big rez, but we don’t believe Klah and Jazz went with them. Do you know where they are?”
She shook her head, apparently shaken that Paul knew so much.
“Jazz’s brother, Henry, is with us. He’s in town trying to find out what he can.” Then Paul took a gamble. “You see, Jazz was stolen by the traffickers, and we’re trying to get him back to his people.”
Something happened to Irene’s face. Her eyes flickered. Her lips froze. I thought I understood.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “That’s why Hard Hat Nesposito was asking around about Jazz.”
Mistake. She went round-eyed, and I belatedly recalled some Navajos weren’t comfortable talking about the recently dead.
“That’s… that’s terrible. I never met this Jazz person, but I understand he was a nice man.”
“That he is, Irene.” Paul took over again. “Klah’s pony is gone, so we assume they went somewhere on horseback.”
“I believe Mrs. Hatahle sold a family heirloom to Hosteen Abbo. She might have bought another horse,” the young woman said.
“Do you know who from?”
Confusion and uncertainty twisted her features. “My little niece was stole by the traffickers. Hope you find your friend.” With that, she turned and walked away.
HENRY DID a little better than we had. He located a couple of people over at the To’hajiilee rodeo grounds who knew Klah. They confirmed Dibe Hatahle bought a roan horse and some tack gear. That argued the Hatahle nephew and Jazz had set off somewhere on their own. One of the men Henry talked to knew that Klah had a place he liked to visit whenever he felt life was pressing on him hard, a little lean-to he’d built on a tiny, unreliable spring on the eastern slope of Plate Mesa.
“So where would he run?” I asked. “Solitude or to a big town where Nesposito doesn’t have relatives?”
“I’d go to my hideaway place,” Henry said.
Paul frowned. “I’d go to Albuquerque and hide out among people.”
“People talk,” Henry said.
“Okay,” I said. “We have two possible places they would go. But Henry’s right. We need to check out the one that’s closest at hand. You think you can find it?”
“I have general directions, but they’re mighty damned vague.”
“Let’s have at it.”
Henry’s directions led us north on Trail 56 past the chapter house, even beyond the school board’s building. Eventually Paul piped up. “I thought I’d seen the back of beyond before, but this is desolate.”
“This is home,” Henry muttered, “to a lot of us.”
That afternoon, after a couple of false trails, we located Klah Hatahle’s lean-to. Judging from the fact it leaned drunkenly lee of the wind, no one had been there in a long time. Henry cursed and punched his left palm with a fist, an increasingly familiar gesture of frustration for him.
Defeated for the moment, we agreed to go home and get some rest in order to start off fresh in the morning. Looking for Jazz in Albuquerque
was going to be an arduous task.
UPON ARRIVAL at home, I found a series of messages from Hazel. Apparently she hadn’t been able to reach us by cell. I’d failed to watch the bars on my phone. We were probably off the grid while searching for Klah’s hideout.
Most of the items had to do with office business, but she also relayed a message from Gene. He’d attempted to question Detective Zimmerman about his unauthorized poster on Jazz but hadn’t been able to locate him. According to his boss, Lieutenant Bolton, Zimmerman was on an undercover assignment and could not be contacted. Bolton merely looked at the poster and said that Vice did things their own way.
Chapter 27
JAZZ LEANED on the handle of his Bully Tools weed cutter, taking pleasure in watching Klah’s wiry, graceful figure swing his scythe-like implement. Jazz’s chest swelled with an emotion that defied definition. Nonetheless, he kept edging toward calling it what it was. But recollections of Juan’s betrayal got in the way every time. He smiled to himself and started swinging his weedwacker along the barrow ditch on his side of the road. The sharp smell of the cut weeds and the dust his weedwacker raised was somehow pleasing to him.
Klah had managed to get them work with the Alamo School Board clearing ditches alongside the busier roads on the reservation. Jazz mentally shook his head. The school board, for crying out loud. It not only ran the school, it was also responsible for roads. Klah told him the school board was the biggest employer on the reservation. They even hired the only policeman on the place.
Despite the heat of a late summer sun, Jazz enjoyed the work. That is, he enjoyed the activity. He’d stopped running daily and now relearned that exercise, along with the diet Dibe and Hosteen Pintaro laid out for him, kept his cramps… and usually his nausea at bay. He still craved the crack, but he’d come to understand it was a mental thing that sometimes utilized his guts to make itself known. Still, there was no question in his mind he was getting better, and swinging a weedwacker daily helped.
It didn’t take long for Jazz and Klah to learn that walking to the far end of their assigned section and working back toward the settlement eliminated a long walk home at the end of the day. Now judging the work shift to be over, they hoisted tools to their shoulders and headed for the school board building. After putting their equipment away, they wordlessly walked to the wellness center, where they showered and changed into clean clothes they’d packed with them.
Afterward they resisted the urge to grab a prepackaged sandwich at the minimart, instead returning to the trailer so Klah could fix a stew with the ingredients Jazz needed for his damaged system. Jazz came to hate green tea, but then perversely decided he liked it. The vitamins and minerals he required were expensive. Even so, they found it more convenient to get most of them in tablet form. Klah’s cooking skills weren’t sufficient to utilize all the natural sources of everything Jazz’s recovery required.
Tired but restless, along about sundown they wandered to the minimart. They didn’t need anything, but it was something to do. They gave the little store the once-over to make certain Cheese and his buddies weren’t around before entering. Because they were working men now, they splurged on a couple of strawberry soft drinks and went back outside to lean against the side of the building to sip at them.
“Good pop,” Klah said.
“I always liked Cokes, but you got me hung up on strawberry now. What have you done to me?”
Klah grinned, something Jazz enjoyed watching. “Improved your lifestyle. Uh-oh.” He pursed his lips, blushed red by the strawberry, and nodded.
“What?”
“Girl I used to know. And she’s got her sister with her.”
Jazz turned to watch two women in tight slacks walking toward the entrance. One of them did a double take and headed straight for them.
“Klah! I heard you come back. Why didn’t you look me up?”
“Hello, Thunder Thighs,” he responded.
She turned sideways and posed with one hand behind her head. “You can’t call me that no more. I lost my baby fat.”
“So I noticed. But you’ll always be Thunder Thighs to me.”
“All right, but only you. Nobody else can call me that. Who’s that with you?”
“Bicycle, this here’s Clarise Mockingbird, but I call her Thunder Thighs.” Klah looked over her shoulder. “Is that little Maudie I see?”
“Except my sister ain’t so little no more. Come on over here and meet Bicycle.”
Jazz caught Klah’s quick frown but didn’t quite understand it. Was his lover going to hold on so tight there would be no room for anyone else in their lives?
Maudie offered a soft hand, prompting Jazz to accept it. She held on a moment as he confirmed his pseudonym. He felt compelled to explain.
“He named me that because he found me right after I had a bicycle wreck on I-40 and can’t remember who I am.”
She batted big black eyes. “You don’t know who you are?”
“Well, sorta. It’s a weird story.”
“I like weird. Tell me all about it.”
“But you gotta buy us sodas first,” her sister said.
After Klah returned with two bottles—a Coke for Thunder Thighs and a grape for Maudie—they settled in the dirt at the side of the building. After staring at the ground for a minute, Jazz came up with a story.
“This old ram got away. I couldn’t catch it on foot, so I grabbed a bicycle and started after it.”
“Got away from where?” Thunder Thighs asked.
He ignored her. “He got out on the highway, you know, I-40, so I chased him right up the blacktop. Then this big semi roared up behind me and knocked me in the ditch. Don’t remember much after that.”
“Aw, that’s a big tale,” Maudie said.
“All right, it was a Bigfoot. You know, one of those sasquatch things.”
Maudie slapped his arm playfully. “Either you’re trying to make fools of us or else Coyote’s making a fool of you.”
“We really did find him riding a bicycle on I-40 after dark,” Klah said. “And a semi did roar by. The wash from passing threw him right off the road. Knocked him silly.”
“That’s your version,” Jazz said. “I like mine better.” He noticed Maudie’s little hand still rested on his forearm.
“What the hell’s going on here!”
The booming voice startled all of them. Jazz glanced around to see Cheese Apachito advancing on him. Without another word, the man clapped him up beside the head. He saw stars but managed to roll over and come to his feet.
“What was that for?” he demanded as he set his stance.
“Nobody fucks with my woman.” Cheese’s flushed face turned dark with blood.
“Didn’t know she was your woman,” he said.
“I’m not. He’s just being a big bully. Like he always does,” Maudie said with a pout in her voice.
Cheese lunged at him. Jazz sidestepped, missing a good chance to ring the man’s bells with a chop to the ear.
“No need for this, man,” he said. “I’m not—”
Cheese came for him again. Jazz didn’t know where it came from, but he dropped into a squatting stance and deflected the other’s blows with his forearms. When he saw an opportunity, he lashed out with this left and caught Cheese on the nose. The man grunted and came back with a solid blow to Jazz’s left shoulder. It rocked him. But he let go with a right, catching his opponent’s injured nose again. Cheese instinctively put his hands to his face, and Jazz doubled him over with a jab to the stomach. That ended things. Maudie and Thunder Thighs went to help the bully while Klah urged Jazz toward home.
“Man, you decked old Cheese. Where’d you learn to fight like that?” Klah asked after a few minutes of silence.
“Dunno. Think maybe my brother taught me.” He frowned. “Or maybe it was my uncle.”
“You have a brother and an uncle?”
“Yeah. Seems like I do. Sounds right in my head, anyway.”
“Bloods?�
��
“My brother is. Uncle’s not. Leastways that’s the way it seems.”
“That trouble back there, you know what it means, don’t you?”
“Yeah. I’ll have to face him down again.”
“Uh-uh,” Klah said. “Can’t wait for the cat to jump. He’ll call the big rez and tell them you’re down here. He didn’t buy that Bicycle name for a minute.”
“Crap. I’ll have to leave.”
“We’ll have to leave.”
“Man, I’ve screwed up your life enough. I’ll go by myself.”
“Uh-uh. You ain’t going nowhere without me.”
Jazz’s heart soared, and the oppression of his desperate situation washed away on a tide of love. Temporarily.
Despite Jazz’s worry, Klah insisted they had a day or so to prepare. The school board paid casual laborers after work every Friday, which was tomorrow. They decided to collect their pay before heading out. After discussing it for the better part of a day, they elected to go back to the Hatahle camp at To’hajiilee to see if Gad and Dibe heard any news from the trip to the big rez. Neither of them owned a cell phone—Jazz had long since lost his—and even if he hadn’t, the Hatahles didn’t own one.
Jazz was a bit leery about another long trip on One Sock. The roan gelding and Klah’s pinto rodeo pony had been living easy off the land in a nearby communal pasture. But Jazz had avoided the horse since they got to Alamo, so maybe his thighs weren’t so sensitive now.
THEY FINISHED work on Friday, collected their pay, and after a shower at the wellness center, decided to splurge on a prewrapped hamburger from the minimart. As they left the little store, burgers, chips, and sodas in hand, they ran into Cheese Apachito. The bigger youth just glared and entered without speaking.
“I don’t like that,” Klah said.
“What? He left us alone.”
“Yeah. That’s what I don’t like. He usually snarls and growls like a dog. Part of his bluff. This time he didn’t say nothing.”
Jazz slowed his pace. “Maybe I oughta wait and talk to him. You know, work things out.”
