Tall Man in Ray-Bans (A John Tall Wolf Novel)

by Joseph Flynn

  “For my ears only, Mr. Fuentes,” the judge told the lawyer.

  He listened and turned to the boy standing in front of him.

  “John,” the judge said, “I have one last question. You may choose to answer it or refuse to answer it. It’s your choice and whatever you choose is okay with me. Do you understand?”

  John nodded.

  “Very well. John, will you please tell us what the T in your name, John T. Wolf, stands for?”

  John smiled, stood as straight as he could and said, “Tall.”

  Perico Fuentes had been hoping John’s middle name was Thor.

  Or Trygve. Something a Norse father with the middle name of Erik might give a son. Something that might be used to show that the Wolfs were denying the child any sign of his ethnic and cultural heritage. But using Tall along with the family surname of Wolf was quite clever. Tall Wolf approximated a Native American name even if that wasn’t its intent.

  In most instances, Fuentes, like any other good lawyer, wouldn’t have asked a question to which he didn’t know the answer. In this case he took a chance and lost, but not in front of a jury. So be it. He still had a winning hole card to play.

  In his opening statement, Fuentes stood before the jury and said, “There is no claim to parental custody greater than that of a biological mother, and that claim is doubly significant when it is asserted by a member of a Native American tribe whose numbers have been reduced to a small fraction of what they had been at their peak. That diminished number is still threatened by the former depredations and current neglect of the federal government. The government and those people who arrived in this land thousands of years after its original inhabitants. I think you’ll understand that these dire circumstances add to the urgency of returning John Tall Wolf to the woman who gave him life.”

  As the trial proceeded, Fuentes put Bly Black Knife on the stand because he had no choice. A woman couldn’t expect a jury to award her custody of a child if she refused to make a case for her claim. Bly had to tell the jury that she’d loved her child even before he was born, a claim no one else could make. She had to make that claim in her own words, and explain the confusion and emotional torment that led her to abandon him.

  “Ms. Black Knife,” Fuentes asked, “how old were you when you gave birth to the child known as John Tall Wolf?”

  “Eighteen.”

  “Had you finished high school at the time?”

  “No.”

  “Did you have any plans for your future?”

  Bly shook her head. “No.”

  Fuentes asked, “Did anyone else have plans for you?”

  “My father did.”

  “Cesar Black Knife was your father?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your father was the senior member of the Northern Apache tribal council?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know what your father’s plan for you was?” Fuentes asked.

  “To make a good match for me.”

  “An arranged marriage?”

  “A marriage with political benefits.”

  In the gallery, Bly’s mother, Maria Black Knife wore a mask of unflinching disapproval as she looked at her daughter. That Bly should have brought the family to this public humiliation was nothing less than a disgrace. Despite her disapproval, Maria was, by far, more compassionate than her late husband would have been.

  “Would this have been a marriage without love?” Fuentes asked.

  Up to that point, Fuentes had instructed his client to give simple, factual answers.

  The question about love was the cue to let her emotions show.

  Bly said, “For me, it wouldn’t have been a marriage at all.”

  “Did you tell your mother and father how you felt?”

  She shook her head. “You didn’t tell my father anything; he told you.”

  “Were you afraid of your father?”

  Bly’s chin began to quiver. “Yes.”

  Sitting next to Maria Black Knife was her brother, also named Cesar. He knew his sister’s fear of their father was well founded. He thought, though, she should have known enough to be afraid of him, too. She should have kept her mouth shut about the kid and the family’s shame hidden.

  Fuentes asked, “When would you have been expected to marry to suit your father’s purposes?”

  Bly’s fear was replaced by a look of contempt.

  “Before I turned nineteen. My father had two suitors in mind for me; he had to decide which of them would bring a greater return.”

  “You saw no way out of your predicament?”

  “I thought of killing myself,” Bly said.

  Both her mother and brother had to refrain from nodding, thinking that would have been the preferable course.

  “Obviously, you thought not to do that,” Fuentes said. “So what did you do?”

  “I decided to disgrace myself, so no man in our tribe would want me.”

  “How did you do that?” Fuentes asked softly.

  Bly gathered the strength to look directly at the lawyer and answer, “By giving myself to a man not of our tribe, and that’s what I did.”

  “A white man?”

  “No.”

  “A Latino?”

  “No.”

  That was an important point, as Fuentes would make clear in his closing argument.

  Bly Black Knife had strayed from her tribe but only so far.

  She wouldn’t give herself to a man who wasn’t a Native American.

  Wouldn’t want her child to be raised outside the People.

  “Did you think you would become pregnant?” Fuentes asked.

  Tears welled in Bly’s eyes. “I didn’t think you could. Not just from one time.”

  “Would your father have accepted your child had you told him of your pregnancy?”

  Bly shook her head. “No.”

  “Your mother?”

  “She obeyed my father, always.”

  “Other family, friends or simply people of good will?”

  Bly’s face became as bitter as her mother’s. “For anyone else, of course. At the cost of angering Cesar Black Knife, no.”

  “So what did you do?” Fuentes asked.

  The bitterness dropped away from Bly’s face, leaving nothing behind.

  She spoke in a flat voice. “I met a smiling boy at a rodeo. He was the one. All I knew of him was that his first name was Billy. I had no way of finding him when I became pregnant. I was alone and terrified. I didn’t tell anyone. I dressed so no one could see my condition.”

  “If no one knew you were pregnant, why didn’t your father try to go through with his plans for you?” Fuentes asked.

  “I don’t think anyone knew about the baby,” Bly said. She lowered her eyes. “But everyone could see I wasn’t the same. I wasn’t pretty anymore. I didn’t laugh. I barely spoke. No one would want me. If I were smarter, I would have thought of doing that before I met Billy.”

  With the judge’s permission, Fuentes gave Bly his handkerchief to dry her eyes.

  She continued, “By the time my son came, I had made the preparations to offer him to the Great Spirit. I prayed that he would be taken quickly and without pain.”

  “But that wasn’t what happened, was it?” Fuentes asked.

  “No.”

  “What do you want now?”

  John wasn’t in the courtroom, but Haden and Serafina were.

  Bly looked right at them and said, “I want my son back.”

  Angeline Legget began her cross-examination by coming straight to the point.

  “Other than the Great Spirit, Ms. Black Knife, who deserves credit for John’s survival, his health and his general well being?”

  “They do,” Bly said without looked at Haden and Serafina.

  “You mean Dr. and Mrs. Wolf?”

  “Yes, them.”

  “Have you received through your attorney, Mr. Fuentes, the court’s assessment of exactly how well John is doing?”

&n
bsp; “I’ve seen the report.”

  “Good. Can you tell me then if you could have done better?”

  Bly Black Knife couldn’t cry poor because her family wasn’t poor, not by the standards of their people. But there was that other problem.

  “I couldn’t have brought my son home because of my father,” Bly said.

  “So, the answer is no, even if you had kept John, you couldn’t have done as well by him.”

  Bly’s face tightened in anger. “Not because I wouldn’t have wanted to.”

  Legget nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face.

  “Let’s take a look at that notion. In response to Mr. Fuentes’ question, you said that nobody on your tribal lands would have taken John in for fear of angering your father. Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, then, since you came quite close to Santa Fe, leaving tribal land, to tender John to the mercies of the Great Spirit, why not go just a bit farther and leave him, say, at a fire station or a hospital or a church? Someplace where you could count on a responsible adult to take him into safekeeping. Somewhere a coyote would be less likely to make a meal of your newborn child.”

  Fuentes objected; the judged sustained the objection. But the point had been made.

  Tears flowed from Bly’s eyes. She still had Fuentes’ handkerchief, but didn’t move to stem the flow. She said, “I don’t know.”

  Angeline Legget was sure Bly knew, but that was all right.

  The true answer to that question was the ace up her sleeve.

  “Ms. Black Knife, if your father were still alive, would you be in court now asking for custody of John?”

  Bly hung her head. “No.”

  “Wanting John back then is what, just a matter of circumstance?”

  Bly’s head snapped up. “I thought about killing my father. I thought about it many times.”

  A woman with homicidal notions wanted custody of a child?

  That should have been the ball game right there, Angeline thought.

  But juries often produced confounding results.

  The Wolfs’ lawyer kept going. “We’re all grateful there’s no other heartbreak for a court to consider. Now, Ms. Black Knife, on the morning you commended John into the keeping of the Great Spirit, did you wait nearby to see if your hope would be realized?”

  “Yes.”

  “Will you please tell the jury what happened while you were watching?”

  “The sun came up.”

  Legget nodded. “Making it easier for you to see what happened next.”

  Knowing she had no way to evade, Bly said, “Coyote came.”

  Not a coyote, Legget thought. Coyote with a capital C. Good lawyer that she was, Legget wasn’t about to let herself be diverted down a trail of mythology.

  “This coyote, did it just come and go, showing no interest in John?”

  “No.”

  “It came and it stayed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did the animal show any awareness of John’s presence?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Legget said, “Did it sniff, did it howl, did it growl, did it pee to mark its turf?”

  “Objection. Compound question,” Fuentes said.

  “Break it down, please, Ms. Legget,” the judge instructed.

  She did and Bly was forced to admit the coyote did all the things Legget had enumerated.

  “Did any of these actions strike you as threatening, Ms. Black Knife?”

  Bly waited long enough for the judge to prompt her to answer.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Did you think it was the Great Spirit’s intention to have a coyote eat your child, Ms. Black Knife?”

  “No!”

  “Were you afraid to intervene on your child’s behalf?”

  “Yes.” The flow of tears resumed.

  “Were you relieved when Haden and Serafina Wolf arrived and drove the coyote off?”

  Bly sobbed and nodded. “Yes.”

  Legget didn’t let up. “Did you think of going to thank the Wolfs?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you think that would be the right time to reclaim your child and curse whatever your family might have thought of him?”

  More than anger returned to Bly’s face; fury appeared.

  “Yes!”

  Lowering her voice, Legget asked, “But you didn’t do that, did you?”

  Bly shook her head. “No.”

  That might have been another place to stop, but there was one more point to make.

  Legget said, “Mr. Fuentes has asserted, if I have it right, that a Native American mother has a claim to her child that none can match, but would you agree, Ms. Black Knife, that a Native American father has an equal claim?”

  Emotional exhaustion shifted to bewilderment and Bly asked, “Billy?”

  “Yes, Ms. Black Knife, Billy.”

  “I don’t know where he is. I saw him only that one time.”

  “Technology is a marvel, Ms. Black Knife. We know the name of the rodeo you attended and the names of all the people who both worked and competed there.”

  Bly wasn’t sure what Legget was getting at, but Fuentes knew.

  The other side didn’t have Billy yet, but if his heart were still beating they would find him.

  Use him to stake a custody claim of his own. Maybe he’d do it because he’d love to have a son. Maybe he’d do it for money. But if the court ruled for Bly that wouldn’t be the end of it.

  Legget repeated, “Would Billy have a claim equal to your own?”

  “I guess.”

  “Of course,” Legget said, “were the two of you to marry, you’d have a stronger claim.”

  That idea was advanced for Maria and Cesar’s benefit. Give the two of them a reason to drop the case. Bly’s father might have died, but it was a good bet his attitudes lived on. Bringing up the idea at all carried a risk, but the Wolfs had given Legget their permission to use it.

  “I don’t even know Billy,” Bly said.

  Which was another point of character for the jury to consider.

  Legget said, “I have no further questions.”

  The jury deliberated for less than an hour and returned a decision in favor of the Wolfs: Their adoption of John Tall Wolf would stand. Judge Marquez thanked the members of the jury for their service. He ordered Bly Black Knife to pay the Wolfs’ legal fees.

  No sooner had he finished speaking than Bly shocked everyone in the courtroom, except Haden and Serafina, by standing and telling the Wolfs, “To you, Coyote is just an animal, but we know he is much more. He will never rest until he takes the child you claim as yours.”

  Before the judge could rebuke Bly, Serafina rose and said, “We do know.”

  Knew so well, Bly turned and left the courtroom. The judge let well enough alone.

  On the courthouse steps, though, Perico Fuentes had his own warning. He addressed it to Angeline Legget, but the Wolfs were with her, and they were Fuentes’ primary audience.

  Bly’s lawyer said, “I’m going to appeal this court’s decision. The Indian Child Welfare Act provides that in cases of concurrent jurisdiction, which is the case here, tribal courts shall be given preference. I’m sure we will win the appeal, and then we’ll see how you do in tribal court.”

  Perico Fuentes had just played his ace.

  So Angeline Legget played hers.

  “Your client, Mr. Fuentes, claimed she didn’t know why she didn’t bring John into Santa Fe and leave him with someone who could guarantee his safety. But she knew perfectly well why she didn’t do that. As a Native American infant, the local authorities would have had to return John to his tribe, and your client’s father would have learned the truth his daughter didn’t want him to know, not even at the cost of John’s life. Your client placed her interests above all else.”

  “You can’t prove my client knew the boy would be returned to the tribe,” Fuentes said.

  Legget smiled.
“Mr. Fuentes, my cross-examination of your client was kid glove treatment. We go into tribal court, I’ll take her apart. She thinks my clients should fear Coyote; she should fear me.”

  Fuentes grimaced but said, “We could still prevail.”

  “You might prevail, but the cost to the tribe’s reputation would be ruinous. Think of it, a tribal court awarding custody to a woman who was willing to sacrifice her child to save her own reputation rather than let the child continue to live with the only parents he’s ever known, the people who saved his life. There is no way to justify that, and I’ll shred anyone who tries.”

  Before Fuentes could attempt a rebuttal, Legget added, “And don’t forget Billy. We’ll find him; you know we will.”

  Haden leaned in and whispered into Legget’s ear.

  Legget left Fuentes with one last thing to think about.

  “My client makes an excellent point. If there’s to be another trial, we will need to examine the character of the late Cesar Black Knife to learn just why his daughter and others feared him so. You really ought to reconsider the wisdom of appealing the current decision. Talk with Maria Black Knife and her son. See what they have to say.”

  Fuentes turned and walked away without another word.

  Legal threats were all well and good, but Haden and Serafina weren’t about to take any chances that they might lose their son. Not confiding in anyone, including their lawyer, they employed other methods to make sure John stayed with them. They began the night the trial ended.

  Bly was visited by a terrible dream. Her son had been returned to her, but he hated her. Worse, everywhere she took him, Coyote lurked. Her own curse had come back to haunt her. One day soon, she knew, Coyote would take her child … and the Wolfs would be there to watch. They were always watching her now; there was no escape from them.

  They would see when Coyote came for her son again.

  Only this time they wouldn’t intervene.

  They would watch with pitiless eyes and see her fail to defend her child once more.

  The first time the nightmare came, Bly awoke screaming. When it came again on the next two nights, Bly realized that Serafina had sent it to her, and she would not stop. The woman was a bruja. She might even have taught the child magic. Who knew what he might do to her?