Wild Sorrow

by AULT, SANDI

  I sat still, my eyes making REM-like movements as I tried to fathom what was happening. I knew what Diane had said was true. “If those three men hadn’t run out of the woods—”

  “Exactly. And then you said Dorn drove up. You foiled the shooter, whose plan was to take you down. The elk was the lure.”

  I shook my head no. “But I—”

  “Look, you need to get past the shock and surprise here and start thinking on your feet again. Let’s start with the phone call you got about the elk.”

  “That’s the part I don’t get. The only people I have called on that phone are you, Charlie, Roy, and the power company. I left my number at the power company right before I got that call about the elk. Nobody else has that cell phone number.”

  “Okay, then we gotta check out the power company, and we can do that. But you need to think. Why is someone gunning for you? Who would want to kill you?”

  I thought for a moment. “Maybe this has something to do with the ATV driver yesterday.”

  “My thought exactly. What was he—or she—doing out there by the ruin and the old school? And didn’t you say the vehicle was idling along really slow?”

  “Yeah, really slow. Until the driver saw me coming.”

  “So whoever was driving that ATV thinks that you saw him. Or her.”

  “But what if I did? I could bust them for driving an ATV off-road on BLM land. But that doesn’t seem like enough reason to want to kill me.”

  “Murderer returns to the scene of the crime?”

  “Yeah, maybe. And thinks I’m onto him or her. So what was the ATV doing out there, possibly for a second time?”

  “Idling along slow . . . maybe looking for something?” Diane said.

  “They wouldn’t have been worried about covering their tracks—the wind took care of all the tracks. Maybe something else?”

  Diane nodded. “Keep thinking. In the meantime, maybe you ought to come stay with me for a few nights. If someone at the power company is involved, they know where you live.”

  “But . . . Mountain.”

  “So, bring him. Hang on a second and let me call the Silver Bullet.”

  As I thought of Diane’s offer, I wondered how the wolf would handle staying in a house in town. But the idea of electricity, hot showers, and flush toilets was irresistible. I started running down a list of things I’d have to pack for a few days’ stay.

  Diane flicked her phone closed. “The Bullet is going to have someone go to town on the power company, and by the time he’s through with them, they’ll have all their files alphabetized and we’ll know everything about everyone there, right down to their sock size. He’ll find out where all their people are now and have been all day. Agent Sterling said for you to call the sheriff and have him send someone out to back you up at your cabin while you get Mountain out and whatever things you need.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ll go get Mountain now. Then, while I’m out that way, I have an errand to run. Do I need a key to your place?”

  “No,” she said. “Remember? I have a heck of a time getting the front door to stay shut, and it won’t lock even if it does. You know where it is, right?”

  I nodded.

  “Okay, then. I have to go check out this elk now. Whenever you get there, just make yourself at home. Mi casa es su casa.”

  When I called the sheriff’s office, the dispatcher told me that there were no deputies available for a nonemergency assignment. Evidently an RV had overturned on the highway south of Taos, completely blocking traffic, and every available deputy was needed on the scene. I headed for my cabin, suddenly realizing that if someone were out to get me, they might harm Mountain. I drove at top speed, telling myself all the way that the wolf would be fine, that everything was going to be all right. As I turned off the gravel county road onto the long dirt drive that led up to my place, I felt an unaccustomed sense of fear, my eyes searching every rock and tree, scanning the forest behind my cabin, looking for any sign of danger in this place where I normally found peace and comfort.

  Instead of hooking around and facing my Jeep out, as I normally did when I pulled up to the end of my drive, I checked my rearview mirror to make sure no one had followed me in, then parked the car facing the cabin. I turned off the motor, eased my automatic from the holster, and sat watching the house for any action. After a few moments, I got out of the Jeep, but I didn’t bother to close the door. I raised my gun, pointing the barrel upward, and I braced the grip with both hands. Looking right and left, I made my way as quietly as I could across the porch. I saw Mountain looking out the window at me, wagging his tail, and I felt a weight drop away from my chest. I let out a huge sigh of relief, then looked once more to either side just to be sure. I opened the door. I was so happy to see that the wolf was all right, I almost didn’t care that my cabin had been pillaged.

  Mountain had been busy demolishing an assortment of my personal belongings. Angry that he didn’t get to go with me that morning, and then eventually anxious over being “abandoned,” he had chewed through a tube of body cream, smearing the contents of it across the hardwood floor in a trail from the bathroom to his lambskin rug beside my bed. He had also shredded a shower sponge, leaving a web of pink nylon netting stretched across the cabin floor. The wolf had turned over my laundry basket and rummaged through the contents, choosing those items that smelled most like me to bring to his bed, where he rolled on them, and—in the case of two pairs of my panties—chewed through them.

  His destructive tendencies due to his abandonment anxiety were a long-standing problem that had developed soon after he took up residence with me as a tiny pup. But his behavior had improved over time, as he began to trust that my rare short absences would eventually end with my return and our reunion. For months now, an occasional few hours alone in the cabin had not resulted in a destructive episode—but today, he surprised me by reverting to his old habits. Given the events of the past few days, I decided to make little of his misbehavior. I set about cleaning up the mess while he huffed nervously and wagged his tail, his ears down, hoping for me to forgive him.

  “It’s okay, buddy,” I said, as I took a damp rag to the floor and swabbed up the goop. “After I get this mopped up, we’re going to go see Tecolote.”

  His ears stood up, recognizing the name I had spoken. He stopped panting and looked at me with excitement.

  “Yes, we’re going to see Tecolote. And then, after that, we’re going to go on a little urban adventure.”

  15

  The Milagro, the Saint, and the Bruja’s Gift

  The tiny hamlet of Agua Azuela nestled in the mountains above a cerulean stream that fed into the Rio Grande. The ancient village centered around a deep fold in the earth where seventeenth-century Spanish settlers had built an adobe church, then a wall around it for protection against the Apache and Comanche raiders. The few dozen homes of the local weavers and wood-carvers were dotted around the santuario. Beyond this, Anglos had begun to build larger homes tucked into the foothills, but the center of the community remained small and humble, and the one-lane dirt road that led through the village ended at the gates in the churchyard wall.

  In the hills above the chapel, up a slender goat path, lived an old curandera named Esperanza. The villagers sought her out for removing warts, for healing from sickness or depression, for salves for wounds or scrapes, and for counsel on matters beyond the reach of the church or the medical services at the clinic down in Embudo. They called the old bruja Tecolote, which was the word for owl. Esperanza had engaged me with her visionary powers and trance-inducing teas and spells almost from our first meeting. She had given me aid and exhortation twice in life-or-death matters, and although her advice was often cryptic and confusing, I had learned to trust it.

  Mountain and I hiked up the snowy slope along the goat path to Tecolote’s tiny casita, and we found her—as we always did—waiting on the portal for us, as if she had known we were coming. She huddled in her woolen shawl, smil
ing, and when Mountain saw her, he bolted up the path and onto the portal to greet her. “Ah, Montaña,” she said. “What a good, big boy you are! You are getting to be a lobo grande, no?” She patted the wolf vigorously on the rump, and he nosed at her apron. Tecolote cackled. “Okay, I see there is no way to fool a good, big boy like you. You know Esperanza has a treat for you!” She reached into her apron pocket and removed an object that looked like a ball of gooey twine. The wolf grabbed it eagerly and retreated to a corner of the portal and began tugging at one of the thin strands on the outer surface.

  “What is that?” I asked, almost afraid to know.

  “Those are los tendones y los intestinos. It’s very good for him now, when he needs to stay home, not run off in the night.”

  This, too, was typical of Tecolote. She seemed to know things she had no plausible way of knowing. “Is it going to give him a stomachache? Because he just ate a lot of deer sausage the other day, and—”

  She held up a gnarled hand to stop me. “Shhhhh, Mirasol.” This was the name she called me. It meant sunflower in Spanish. “El lobo needs this, I assure you. Now, come inside. I made tea.”

  Tecolote’s tiny adobe casita consisted of only one room. On one side was the hearth, which she used for cooking and heat, and above it was a thick adobe slab known as a shepherd’s bed, upon which thin cotton bags filled with straw served as a mattress, and a thick woolen blanket was folded for her cover. I had never seen a pillow or sheets on this bed, nor could I see a place in her austere abode where they might be stored. For this reason, I felt sure that Esperanza would prize the deerskin pillow I had made and stuffed with the soft downy fur from the wolf’s spring and autumn sheds.

  I sat in one of the two stick chairs at the rough-hewn plank table while the bruja poured water into cups from a cast-iron kettle that hung from an iron hook directly over the fire. She set a small, deep bowl with no handle on the table, and the aroma of Indian tea, a wild plant that grew on the hillsides here in the spring, wafted from the steaming cup. I was thankful to recognize this potion, as it meant I was not being served a cura, which might have caused me to hallucinate or fall into a trance, as I had unexpectedly done in the past.

  Tecolote took the chair opposite me and set her own bowl of tea before her. “It is good to see you, Mirasol,” she said, smiling, her few brown teeth crooked against pink-white gums.

  “It’s good to see you, too, Esperanza. I brought you something.” I opened my backpack, which I had set on the floor by my chair, and pulled out the small deerskin pillow. “Feliz Navidad,” I said.

  Tecolote’s eyes widened. “Ohhhhh!” she exclaimed, genuinely surprised and delighted. “Oh, Mirasol! What a beautiful almohada para la cabeza!”

  “Yes, it’s a pillow for your head. Merry Christmas.”

  Tecolote took the gift from me and held it at arm’s length in her two hands. “It’s so soft,” she said. “It will be good for dreaming.” She jumped to her feet and put the pillow on top of the folded blanket on her hard slab bed over the fire. She patted it to fluff it with her hand, then picked it up again and pressed it to her face. “You put a wild thing inside,” she said.

  I smiled. For once, I knew something Esperanza did not.

  The old woman looked at me, cocking her head to one side, so that I could see the large hump on her back over the other shoulder. “You are not going to tell me?”

  I smiled again and shook my head no.

  She pushed her nose into the pillow and inhaled deeply. She lowered the pillow with a twinkle in her eye. “It is your hair.”

  I had to bite my lip to keep from spilling the truth. This was the only time I had ever had anything on the old bruja.

  Tecolote drew her head back and looked down her nose at me, and then she smiled. “Ah,” she said. “Ah.” She turned and put the pillow back on the blanket and patted it again, then ran her hand over the smooth deer hide. I could tell she was overjoyed with the gift.

  “You haven’t guessed yet,” I said, wanting the fun to continue.

  Tecolote turned to the nichos in the wall to one side of her hearth, where she kept candles lit and small carved statues of saints known as santos. “I don’t have to guess, Mirasol. I know.”

  “You’re just saying you know,” I teased.

  She turned to face me with a little bundle in her hand. “You have given me something very precious, Mirasol,” she said, her eyes engaging mine tenderly. “You have filled the almohada with the pelo of the one you love.”

  I smiled again. “Sí,” I said. “It’s the wolf’s hair. Isn’t it soft and downy?”

  She nodded. “Sí, it is very soft, very soft. As it turns out”—she smiled—“I have a little something for you as well.” She extended her palm.

  I took the bundle, which was made of woolly red cloth. It was tied with a piece of sinew. I took my knife off my belt and cut the tie and unfolded the cloth. Inside the red wrapper lay a tiny silver heart which seemed to have cracked into two pieces, with a jagged split right down the center. The two sides of the heart had been secured together with what looked like three turns of miniature silver barbwire. I pressed the tip of my finger on one of the petite barbwire points and felt a pinprick. I looked up at the curandera and smiled. “Is it a charm?”

  She nodded her head. “Sí, it is a milagro.”

  “A miracle?”

  “You are given a milagro for your particular ailment. Go into the church, say a prayer, pin the milagro onto a saint, and ask for a miracle to happen.”

  I felt my pulse quicken. This was one of Tecolote’s patterns. She was giving me instructions that I didn’t wholly understand, but I knew from experience that I soon would. The old bruja had mentioned “ailment,” which meant that she saw something sickening or troubling me. Often her “sight” extended into the future or the past, and was not terribly time-specific, though typically dead-on in its accuracy in all other respects. I waited for Esperanza to say more, but she didn’t.

  “What church should I go into?” I tried. “The one here in Agua Azuela?”

  Tecolote took our cups from the table, filled them with more tea, and then returned them.

  “A church is a church,” she said.

  “What saint, then?”

  She shrugged. Then she picked up her bowl and took some tea, slurping loudly.

  “Speaking of saints, do you know of this one: San Pedro de Arbués?”

  Tecolote stopped slurping and peered at me over the rim of her cup. She set it down on the table. “How do you know him?” she whispered.

  I told her about my dismal night in the Indian boarding school, about the body of Cassie Morgan, and the howling wind and the sadness I felt seeping from the walls of that place.

  “A long time ago, that one, he was a persecutor of los judíos, which many people over here called Los Marranos—that is a term referring to pigs.”

  I made a small gasp. “And they made him a saint?”

  “He was a part of el Santo Oficio, the Inquisition. They used to force los judíos to convert, you know, against their will. It was very sad. This was near the time when the conquistadors came here. They did the same thing to los indios. It is a black stain living on the heart of the Church. They have not repented for any of these things, and so the stain lives and the heart slowly is dying.”

  “No wonder they named that horrible place after him.”

  “They say he was assassinated, and many people over here believe he was a torturer and assassin himself.”

  I felt a heaviness sinking over me. “Speaking of torturers . . .” I went on to tell the bruja about the mutilated elk cow and calf and the note with the calf’s heart in my Jeep.

  The old bruja listened to my tale without blinking an eye. When I had finished, she raised a bony finger with a yellowed, curving hook of a nail on the end. “Do you know what you must do, Mirasol?”

  I shook my head.

  “You must listen to the trees and you must also watch the sky.” S
he wagged the finger back and forth for extra emphasis. “I advise you to treasure every gift you receive. Even if the thing, it seems small or insignificant, you must treasure it.”

  I looked at her, bewildered. How could this have any bearing on people leaving desecrated bodies in horrible places, or luring me out to the wild with tortured animals to take shots at me? I was shaking my head in confusion when the bruja went on.

  “And, Mirasol: consider your own childhood for the lessons and strength it offers you even now.” She struggled to her feet and picked up our teacups, even though mine was still full. She took them to the hearth.

  Taking her cue, I got up to leave. Mountain was standing in the open doorway, wagging his tail, having devoured his gummy gift.

  “If I don’t see you before then,” I said to the old woman, “Merry Christmas, Esperanza.”

  “I wonder,” Tecolote said, “if you would be willing to do me a small favor?”

  I didn’t answer, wondering the same thing myself. Tecolote was not the type of person to whom you wanted to issue a blank check.

  “I wonder if you would mind taking a gift to the sister at the mission church at Tanoah Pueblo?” She went to the doorway and reached behind the open door, where she had propped a gunnysack against the wall. She pulled out a long cardboard carton printed with faded colors and handed it to me. It was an old box with a cellophane window in the lid, through which I could see a puppet-doll dressed like a cowboy in jeans, a checkered shirt, boots with HD written on the sides, and a bandanna. The name of the doll was emblazoned on the lid in green lettering across the top: HOWDY DOODY. It was a vintage, unopened doll, probably from the 1950s, still in its original packaging.

  “You want me to take this to the church at Tanoah Pueblo?”

  “Sí. There is a sister who works there. It is a gift for her.”

  It seemed a harmless enough request. “Sure,” I said. “This is probably very valuable now, something this old and never opened.”