by Julie Weston
Furnishings were sparse in the tiny house. On one table, pushed to a pile beside a kerosene lamp, was a stack of pouches. Three polished chairs stood around a low table, and in the corner, three mattresses had been rolled, tied, and stacked. Dried herbs hung upside down along a side wall above a cupboard, explaining the intense smell. When she finished drinking, Mrs. Ah Kee took the cup. Nellie’s chest was beginning to feel tight, as if caught in a vise, but her dizziness was gone.
“Now, will you photograph my husband?” Her face had lost its cruel expression and her eyes, hooded and dull, reflected only defeat.
“Yes.” Nellie stood. “Now, I can do it.”
Back in the room with the body, Nellie placed lights and asked Sammy to prop his father’s body closer to a sitting position. Only then did Nellie see what looked like a deep gouge at the back of his head. If there had been blood, it was gone now. She wanted a photo of the cleaned wound, without making it obvious she was taking it, because his head looked as if it had been hit with much force. She moved her camera around, trying different angles, taking long enough that Mrs. Ah Kee left the room. After a full frontal photo, she suggested a side view. Sammy shrugged. Nellie set up the camera, deciding to trust her judgment that she had the right angle, removed the dark slide and took the photo, then moved to a full side view. She doubted Sammy noticed the extra click of the shutter lever and reversal of the film holder.
Touching the dead man brought back his humanity to Nell, and she keened inside for this victim of hate, something she had never done for her own father. The Chinese man was much older than her father had been; wrinkles laddered up both of his cheeks, sunken now with his skin shrinking back to reveal his skull. The impression of a Buddha had disappeared while she worked, causing her to wonder what religion these Chinese in America practiced. Sending bones to China reminded her that at least these two people considered China home, not Idaho, not America. Or perhaps the wife and son did, but the ancient traditions still applied to old men.
In the automobile on the return trip to Ketchum, Nellie coughed, trying to relieve the tightness in her chest. It didn’t help. “Mrs. Ah Kee, did your husband treat the woman who died at Last Chance Ranch? Was she Rosy’s wife?”
“My husband treated Lily. Without him, she would have died sooner and in excruciating pain.” With the last two words, Mrs. Ah Kee’s voice again held the singsong timbre.
“But surely Rosy didn’t—wouldn’t—” Nellie didn’t even want to mouth the words that Rosy might be the person who killed Ah Kee. The man was a drunk and a loafer, but surely not a murderer.
“Who knows what men do in sorrow or in rage? Sheriff Asteguigoiri took Ah Kee away from here.” She pronounced the Basque name carefully. “The sheriff said Mr. Kipling needed a doctor. Which man suffered rage? Which one sorrow? Enough to lie? To kill?” Indifference had recaptured Mrs. Ah Kee. “But someone will repent in burning fire and agony.”
Nellie said nothing more, afraid once again of attracting Mrs. Ah Kee’s hatred, but now she had more information to ponder. Heat suffused her head, clouding logic. Maybe the sheriff was the murderer and even warned Nellie. No wonder he told her not to tell anyone anything. He knew who the iceman was. But others knew too: Sammy and maybe Rosy. Or Rosy knew because he did it.
The time was past midnight when Sammy and Mrs. Ah Kee delivered Nellie to the boarding house. The porch light was a beacon in the night. Tire tracks marred the streets and the wind swirled the “cold smoke” around Nellie’s legs as she climbed onto the porch and opened the door. Her earlier delight in the winter scene had disappeared hours ago. Sammy carried the lights and tripod into her studio and left without a word. As the door closed, Nellie trembled, cold again, but she remembered other questions she should have asked.
Wasn’t Lily the name of Gwynn Campbell’s daughter? Could it have been the old sheep rancher who murdered Ah Kee? And why did Rosy need a doctor?
The boarding house was silent as a cemetery until Nellie began coughing on the stairway. Too much night air, she concluded. She tried to hold the coughs in until she unlocked and scooted into her room, closing the door behind her. Moonie greeted her with his tongue and she hugged him for a while, absorbing his warmth and murmuring her questions to him. He probably knew all the answers.
“You need to go out, I’m sure, and you must sleep on the porch. If you don’t, I’ll get kicked out of here. Maybe there’s some syrup in the kitchen for my cough. Let’s look.” Nellie padded around the kitchen after she let the dog out, and found a bottle of bright red tonic labeled “coughs.” A smell of the contents revealed something that was mostly alcohol, but she took two big tablespoons anyway.
A noise, maybe a sensation, woke Nellie several hours later. She lay still, at first thinking she was back at Last Chance Ranch and she had an axe to hand. When she couldn’t find it by groping around, she awoke even more and knew she was in her room. She waited for a repeat of the noise, a sliding sound like a sled runner. Although she tried to make her breathing sound like a person still sleeping, she wanted to hold her breath. There was the same breathless quality hovering somewhere near her. Should she cry out? Would a knife plunge into her? She didn’t have to decide.
Her cough began again, a deep, harsh grating in her chest. Under cover of her hacking, she felt as much as heard the sound again and knew it was a drawer sliding. A strong smell of an evil unguent pervaded the air.
The overhead light flashed on, blinding Nellie. She screamed and tried to leap up, covering her head with her arms. “Stay away from me!”
“Miss Burns! Miss Burns. It’s just me, Gladys Smith!” The apparition near the door was indeed her neighbor from across the hall, dressed in black silk pajamas. Around her neck was wrapped a flannel cloth and on her head she wore a black nightcap. She might have been an Arab assassin. She carried a wrapped towel, reeking of the smell.
“What do you want? What are you doing in here?”
“Now, now, dear. You coughed loud enough to wake the dead. I went to the kitchen and Goldie and I made up this mustard plaster for your chest. You’ve come down with the ague, it sounds like.” Her voice changed from placating to irritation. “No one can sleep.”
“What time is it? It’s the middle of the night.” Nellie pulled her feet back under the covers, still coughing. “You opened the drawers. What are you looking for?”
Gladys’s shocked expression set Nellie back. “I did not. How could you say such a thing?” She bustled to the bed. “You were dreaming. Lie down now, and I’ll just place this on your chest.” Up close, Gladys smelled like mothballs, as bad a smell as the mustard. “It’s almost six in the morning. I don’t know how I’ll work all day, what with listening to you cough out your lungs for hours.” She slipped into a whine easily. “It was hard enough to convince them to hire me. I must be bright and cheerful at all times.”
“I heard the drawers open and close.” Nellie pulled her legs in close to her body.
The bedroom door opened and Goldie hurried in. “What in the world is going on in here? Land sakes, Nellie. We’re just trying to help. Here, Gladys, give me that. You go back to bed. Now shoo!”
Gladys almost threw the concoction to Goldie and scurried out of the room. Nellie stretched out again and let Mrs. Bock administer to her. Her head felt stuffed with cotton and her chest hurt. Even so, she knew Gladys had never been bright and cheerful in her life, and beyond a doubt, that woman had been in her room for some time. What was she looking for in the dark?
CHAPTER 18
“Every time I think I’m shut of you, you’re somehow involved again,” Sheriff Azgo said.
“I’d like to think I’m finally ‘shut’ of you as well. I have work to do.” Nellie had been pulled from the darkened bathroom where an intense day of developing negatives was proceeding with time out every several hours for more cough medicine. Fortunately, no undeveloped film had been exposed to the unexpected light. Her landlady had ignored all of the signs and warnings. “I’
m extremely busy, Sheriff. What do you want this time?”
Nellie stood in the kitchen, feeling lightheaded. To stay warm in the unheated bathroom, she had donned her wool pants and a sweater. Her work apron was stained with developer, her legs were weary from standing, and her shoulders ached.
“The dead Chinese doctor has disappeared. Mrs. Bock told me you went out with the Ah Kees last night and came back late.” The sheriff took off his Stetson and pushed his black hair back. “Did you three steal the body?”
“I did not steal any body.” She turned to Mrs. Bock so that her knowledge of Ah Kee dressed so elegantly and so lovingly would not show. This man always seemed to know what she was thinking. “Is there any hot tea or coffee available? Your bathroom is cold as a tomb.”
“Then what were you doing with them?”
“I was taking photographs. Something nearly everyone in town wants, with the possible exception of you.” Nellie was disappointed he had not made an appointment.
The sheriff blushed. He probably did read minds. Nellie felt her own face grow hot. Mrs. Bock looked at him and then at Nellie and laughed. “Here’s your coffee. You better set a minute. This lawman has you in his sights. I’ll just leave you two to wrangle it all out.” She chuckled as she left the room.
“Miss Burns, you have withheld information from me in the past. Are you doing so now?”
“You didn’t tell me that you took Ah Kee out to Last Chance Ranch. How do I know you didn’t kill him?” As soon as the words were out, she regretted them.
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed, and if brown skin couldn’t turn white, his did a fair imitation. He replaced his Stetson. “You are like the others in this town.” His voice shook. Was it rage?
Nellie felt contrite. Whatever loyalty she felt for the Ah Kees or for the dead Chinese man, she should ignore. Loyalty to her was probably not in their lexicon, although the kindness of tea last night when she was frightened and cold had softened her view of Mrs. Ah Kee.
“I did not steal Ah Kee. I did photograph him.” Nellie dropped into a chair at the table. If an argument was forthcoming, she wanted to rest her feet at least. “I assumed you had released the body to his wife. Apparently, that was not so.”
When the sheriff continued to stand, saying nothing, Nellie looked up. “That is the truth.”
“I don’t doubt it’s the truth.” Some of his color returned. “Why do you want to photograph dead men? Isn’t this a strange way to earn money?”
Nellie took a deep breath. “I apologize, Sheriff Azgo, about what I just said. But you have no right to make judgments about me, either. Men can have a job for the asking. The only jobs available to me are someone else’s maid, or cook, or seamstress, or secretary, and forever to be treated as someone’s chattel, incapable of thinking, only recently able to vote in my own right. I earn money how and where I can, at a calling that is honored in some places. Your disapproval means nothing to me.” Her ire expanded along with the level of her voice and she stood up to face him. “And you kept a dead man away from his wife and family who needed to mourn and bury him with the solemnness his tradition demands. How could you be so insensitive?”
Her anger left almost as abruptly as it arrived. This was one of the few men she’d met who probably understood what she was talking about. She’d heard what some people thought of the Basque. And she knew she was being hypocritical about the Ah Kees. They wanted to find the murderer more than the sheriff did.
“I don’t understand you,” the sheriff said, again removing his hat. “Women should be at home and men should take care of them. That is always what I have been taught and what I see of the world.” He raised his hand to stop Nellie from responding. “If you had told me of the body in the snow as soon as you found it, he would not have lain there several days. I am responsible for finding the murderer—not you and not the Chinese, whatever they may think. I am sheriff because no one else wanted to be sheriff. Many times, I am sorry I fought against those who said a Basque cannot do such a job. They are only fit for sheepherding. But I say to myself, I will be a good sheriff. To prove a murder, I must have the body. Now it is gone.”
And if there is no man to take care of the woman? Nellie wanted to ask, caught by the first of his statements. Then, the woman must take care of herself. This was an argument she could not win. She hadn’t persuaded her mother. How could she persuade a stranger? Even one who had contrary evidence staring at him every day: Mrs. Bock, Mrs. Ah Kee, the elderly twins, Mrs. Smith, the schoolteacher, any number of unmarried women and widows.
“I know how Ah Kee was murdered—with an axe,” she said instead. “I’ll have a photo to show you. I think I know who murdered Ah Kee, too. He was treating Rosy’s wife, Lily, for some sickness. Lily’s father was Gwynn Campbell, a sheep rancher who hates Chinese, because he thinks opium killed his daughter. I believe Mr. Campbell tried to steal my negatives in the photo studio in Twin Falls. He somehow learned I’d been in the cabin and took pictures, but he made the same mistake Sammy did. Both thought I had a picture of Ah Kee and that it would show something.” She folded her arms. “That’s all I know.” No, she knew the name of the dead man. But the sheriff knew the name if Sammy did. “I’m going back to work.”
Sheriff Azgo stepped back to let Nellie pass, his stare hard as stones. Just as she was going through the door to the hallway, he said, in a low voice, “And the iceman? And the dog toy?” His face contained a primitive look that made her think of masks she’d seen in a Chicago museum, masks used for killing rituals. There was less emotion in his features than in Mrs. Ah Kee’s, but a similar dislike was mapped there. Moonie barked and then growled, a low muttering warning, as he strode out the back way. Poor dog, Nell thought, distracted. Maybe Rosy would take him back and love him. Someone once did. Only then did she remember the belt, but she was too tired to chase after the sheriff.
“Little Nell.”
Nellie jumped and turned. “What?” Rosy stood behind where she sorted negatives in her newly made studio the next day. Mrs. Bock had gone out. “Don’t call me that.”
He grinned. She couldn’t tell if he’d been drinking or not, but he had a black patch over his eye, something she’d never seen before.
“What say I take you out to the Triumph Mine. Show you where my face got bunged up.” His grin held in place, stretching his whole countenance.
“Now? Today?” Nell wanted to see a mine. This might be her one chance to photograph miners. Her camera was packed for her trip to Twin Falls, so she needed little more to get ready. The negative sorting she could finish that evening.
“Yup. Gotta take a package to Miz Smith. Goldie said you’d like to get out.”
Nell couldn’t imagine Goldie saying any such thing, but it was a good idea. Also, it was a way to avoid the sheriff before she left town for a couple of days. “Yes, I’ll come. Should I take my snowshoes? I might want to take a photograph of the mine buildings.”
“I ain’t no damned beast of burden. And you won’t need no snowshoes in the mine.”
Nellie grabbed her pack and tripod, picking up her coat and boots along the way, and followed Rosy to his auto before he could change his mind. The whiskey and tobacco smells hadn’t changed much.
“I thought you said no one would permit a woman in . . .”
“I’ll tell ’em you ain’t no woman. You’re a professional photographer.” He drew out the last two words. Was he making fun of her?
“Your negative looks good, Rosy. I think you’ll like the picture. I’m going to Twin Falls tomorrow to work on developing prints for everyone.” Rosy might not like the picture at all. He looked mean and somehow beaten down, but still, there was a touch of the noble in his scarred face. “Why are you wearing that patch?”
“Can’t stand my bad eye. Looks white.”
“Do you want another photograph with the eye patch?” If she could get more photos, she would.
“Nope. You got my picture there?”
“No. Th
e portraits are in the house. I just have . . . older negatives with me.” Now why did she tell him that? At least she hadn’t spouted out that she carried the negatives of the iceman and the moonshadows with her. They were too valuable to leave unguarded. On the other hand, were they? The Ah Kees had the photo of Three-Fingered Jack. So did the sheriff. Since people knew who the dead man was, no one should care about the negatives anymore. Not everyone knew, though. Maybe not the murderer. She could hardly shout out the news from the porch. The murderer still might not hear. And Rosy? Was he safe to travel with?
The trip to the mine, up a narrow road alongside the East Fork of the Wood River, took over an hour. For the first half, Rosy didn’t talk, but Nellie was relieved he’d dropped the dreadful grin and was more his usual half-surly self. When she asked him about the mines, he explained that those near Hailey had closed down years before when the silver ran out. The valley had fallen on hard times before the war, and the population that had once been over 2,000 people in Ketchum had dwindled to the bunch of die-hards she saw now. “There’s maybe three hundred on a good day. Times is gettin’ better, though, what with all the sheep that go through town and out to the world. Summers is busy around there. But you’ll probably be gone by then, don’t you think?” He flashed his sham smile.
“Why no. I want to photograph the sheepherders and their sheep and dogs. Maybe travel over the Galena Pass and see the Sawtooth Mountains with all the other tourers.” She saw visions of herself riding a horse, hiking in wildflowers, taking landscapes unlike those of any other photographer. “Maybe you’d take me, Rosy. You’re getting used to my photography aren’t you?”
He snorted. Then he mumbled a few words, groped under the seat, and brought out the ever-present liquor.
“I wish you wouldn’t drink while you’re driving.”
“I’ll do what I like, girlie.” He took a huge swig, but screwed the lid back on and shoved the bottle back between his feet.
