Who in Hell Is Wanda Fuca?

by G. M. Ford

  Daniel leaned over, his eyes twinkling. "You don't get her out of here, Leo, she's gonna need five friends of her own to make a full set."

  "I've heard worse ideas," I said, downing the rest of my beer.

  I made my way back up to the front of the bar. Whatever pearls of ecological wisdom she was presently casting before the assembled masses were lost in a sea of angry shouts and curses. A finger-pointing session was about to degenerate into something considerably uglier.

  Caroline was attempting to drag a stool over by the entrance, so as to remove the offending bear head from over the door. several patrons were making sustained efforts to impede her progress by pulling the stool in the opposite direction. True to form, she was still babbling as I slung her over my shoulder and kicked the door open. " - is the twentieth century. How can a noble people, in tune with nature's forces - " Bouncing her head off the door frame put a momentary halt to the diatribe.

  "You do have a way with people," I said as I set her back on her feet in the parking lot. The rain had picked up. Driven by a stiff breeze, the small droplets angled in from the west like angry insects.

  "Did you see - ?"

  The door swung open again. Daniel and Hank Dixon came out. I turned to Caroline. "Go get in the truck."

  "I most certainly will not. I'm going right backing there and - "

  "Get in the truck now, or I'll leave you here when I go," I growled.

  She opened her mouth, shut it, started again, jerked her sunglasses from her face, turned on her heel, and flounced over to the truck, slamming the door behind her. We watched in silence.

  "What's her name?" asked the kid after the truck stopped rocking.

  "Caroline," I answered.

  He turned to his father. "She's the one," he said.

  The Dixons started across the lot toward the Nova. I followed. Halfway across the lot, Hank turned to me. "We can't help you, mister. Bobby got all moony over that sister you got in the truck there, and look what it got him. No," he said, shaking his head sadly. "We can't help you, mister."

  Daniel shrugged and headed for the car. I followed again. They both turned to face me. "Look," I said, "a friend of mine's dead, too. An old man. He wasn't much, and maybe I'm the only one who cares about him being dead, but I don't much give a shit. The same people that killed Bobby Warren killed my friend. That much I'm sure of." They exchanged glances. "I'm not going to threaten you or anything, but I'm not going away either. I'll follow you home. I'll sit in your front yard. I'll come back here every day. I don't much care what it takes, but I'm following this to the end."

  Hank started to leave, but Daniel stopped him with a gentle hand on the shoulder.

  "He means it," said Daniel. We stood in the rain. Two couples wandered out of the bar, laughing and gabbing. We watched them get into a blue Plymouth and drive out into the street.

  The tiny drops were finding someplace on my collar to mass and form the rivulets that were pouring down my neck. I stood and waited, wishing for a cowboy hat of my own.

  Finally, Daniel aid, "You need to see Miriam Stone."

  "Who's that?" I asked.

  "Bobby's grandmother," said Hank. "All Bobby told me was that he had a line on some illegal dumping that was going on to the reservation. He said he was going to take it to the Tribal Council. He wanted my father to go with him. But - " He stopped, looking at his father. Daniel picked it up.

  "But I told him that if he was right, then it was probably the Tribal Council behind it. Or at least a couple of them. Have to be. No way to keep that kind of thing quiet ‘less somebody on the council was helping."

  "So, why his grandmother?'

  "Miriam," said Daniel, "is a much-respected woman. She and Bobby were real close. I figure that whatever he knew, she knew. They were close," he repeated.

  "What did he tell you guys?"

  "Just what I told you," answered the kid. He glanced at the truck. "That and that he'd met this white sister who was going to help him get it out in the open." Anger filled his eyes. "He was all moony for her. I could tell. I never seen him like that before. He was - If it wasn't for her - " He stopped himself.

  "Go see Miriam," said Daniel. "She'll know what to do."

  "How do I find this Miriam Stone?"

  They exchanged glances again, and Hank sighed. "Follow us."

  I headed for the truck.

  Chapter 15

  Caroline was curled up against the far door, bundled in her jacket , picking at her lower lip, in a full snit.

  "Where are we going?" she demanded as I fired up the truck. Without waiting for me to answer, she added, "I insist that you immediately - " I interrupted and told her where we were going.

  "Ooooh, a medicine woman." She sat straight, her eyes now aglow. "I read a book last year - "

  I tuned her out as I bounced the truck out of the lot and followed the Dixons' Nova back toward the freeway. Slowly, as it began to dawn on me that we were taking the same route on which I'd followed Robert Warren the other night, the hair on the back of my neck began to rise. The rain had stopped. The sun poked intermittently through the clouds. The countryside appeared more benign in broad daylight, but the journey was the same.

  Caroline was still at it. " - the shamanic tradition of the coastal Indians - "

  My suspicions were confirmed when we passed the yellow police barrier tape strung across the front of Bobby's driveway. I could see the read ends of at least two vehicles parked down by where the cabin had been as we flashed by. Caroline took no notice. She was still running off at the mouth.

  " - in cedar bark lodges, which believe it or not were really - "

  The Nova's brake lights flashed, then stayed on, slowing as we rounded a sharp corner. A driveway angled off, straight uphill from the corner. The Nova nosed in. I followed.

  " - even wore cedar bark clothes. I saw pictures. I couldn't believe it. The chafing must have been terrible. I imagine - "

  As usual, Caroline was in the right desert but the wrong tent. At least she had the cedar part right. It was a four-bedroom home, two gables off the front, covered wraparound porch on three sides. Maybe a precut, sitting on a little knoll, well-tended grounds and a glassed-in solarium off the near side.

  The sight of the house put a momentary halt to her lecture. She started to open her mouth, thought better of it, and, mercifully, was finally quiet as we pulled to a stop in the driveway.

  Daniel emerged from the Nova. I told Caroline to come along. I pulled open the passenger door on the Nova and beckoned Caroline toward the vacated passenger seat. For once, she didn't argue. I closed the door behind her. Daniel arched an eyebrow at me. "Hank going to be all right?"

  "In a pinch, I figure he can outrun her," I said.

  We walked side by side up the inlaid brick walk. The cracks had mossed in, and the constant rain had created a roller-coaster effect in the once-flat surface. I had to watch my own feet as we walked.

  Daniel knocked softly on the front door. From the porch, high above the tree level, Puget Sound rolled in the late-afternoon sunshine. The wind had shifted from the south. I could smell the water. Daniel knocked again. A voice sounded from inside the house. We waited. Footsteps approached the door.

  She was tall for a woman. Five-ten or better, about Daniel's age, wearing a well-tailored blue dress with a white yoke. Her hair was artfully arranged into a French braid. At sixty or so, she was an elegant older woman; twenty years ago she'd been a walking heartbreak. I could see the sadness I her eyes. The sight of Daniel seemed to cheer her.

  "Why, Daniel," she said, ignoring me. "How nice of you to come."

  Daniel had removed his cowboy hat. The breeze pushed a long lock down in front of his face. He brushed it back in place.

  "Miriam," was all he could muster.

  "Come in," she said, stepped aside. I presumed the invitation included me and tagged along. Miriam Stone led us down the center of the house directly back into the kitchen, where she pulled two coffee mugs do
wn from one of the stark white European-style cabinets that lined the room and filled them with coffee from an automatic coffeemaker on the counter. She handed one to each of us. She waited for Daniel to speak. He tried.

  "Miriam - I - we - uh - this is Leo." He waved the cup at me. I stepped over and offered my hand. "Leo Waterman," I said. She took my hand and covered it with both of hers. She reached into my eyes.

  "Did you know Bobby?" she asked, still rummaging around somewhere in the back of my head.

  "Only indirectly," I answered. She looked to Daniel for an explanation.

  He started. "Leo has a friend who - " He stopped. "Bobby was . . . " He stopped again. He handed me the ball. I told her the story.

  She listened in silence, her moist eyes bouncing from Daniel to me and back. Daniel confirmed my narrative with small nods. When I'd finished, she turned away and silently busied herself at the sink. I started to speak, but Daniel waved me off. We waited. She dried her hands.

  Without turning, she asked, "So what is it you want, Mr. Waterman? Revenge for your friend? For yourself?" She turned to me, leaning back against the sink. "It can't be for Bobby. You didn't even know my Bobby. What do you hope to gain from this?" I didn't have an answer.

  "I don't know," I said. Somehow, for her, this served as confirmation.

  "They say it might have been an accident." A statement.

  "It was no accident," I said.

  "So you say," she replied. There seemed no point in insisting. I waited. She picked it up on her own. "We can't afford to be losing boys like Bobby. Boys like Bobby are the hope of the tribe."

  She turned back to the sink, her shoulders shaking slightly. Daniel stepped over and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. She covered it with one of her own, and then turned and put her arms around Daniel. They quietly embraced. I wandered out into the hall, sipping at the strong coffee.

  I studied a painting on the wall. A shaman of some kind, disguised under a wolf skin, holding four red sticks in his left hand, his right hand held out flat, parallel with the ground. Maybe . . .

  Daniel appeared in the kitchen doorway and waved me back in. Miriam Stone appeared to have collected herself. "Your friend, he was dear to you?"

  I thought about it. "Yes, he was," I said. Before she could respond, I went on. "To be honest with you, I don't think too many people are going to mourn Buddy's passing. To most people he was just another old drunk. To me he was - " I was stumped. "He meant more to me than that."

  "We have many people who have lost them selves to alcohol," she said. "That doesn't make them less than people. It merely makes them lost. Alcohol can rob a person of his soul, but not of being a person." I agreed.

  Her eyes clouded as she remembered her grandson.

  "Bobby had not lost his way, Mr. Waterman. He was a good boy. As good as the Tulalips have to offer." Suddenly, her sadness froze over.

  "What do you know of our tribe, Mr. Waterman?"

  "Not much, I'm afraid. I come up for fireworks once a year," I stammered. I'd confirmed her worst notions. She nodded.

  "Well, Mr. Waterman, let me fill you in a little. I don't want to make you the scapegoat for your entire race, but you, like most of your race, are painfully ignorant." When I didn't object, she continued.

  "There are no accurate figures, but it's estimated that there were upward of twenty thousand members of the tribe before your people brought your diseases. Before the smallpox, the chicken pox, and all the others were through, we were down to the two thousand or so that we are now." She paused to let the numbers have their effect.

  "We occupied many thousand square miles, from Whidbey Island all the way out to Snoqualmie Falls; it was all our homeland. That is what your people have never been able to understand. We are not like the others who have come to these shores. We are not immigrants. We are not transients. We are a land-based people, and this is our land. Not the fifteen thousand paltry acres we are left with, all of it." She was blazing now.

  "This is why we never melted into your great melting pot. This is why we don't want into your great salad bowl either. We were here. This is ours. We are a land-based people." She caught herself and stopped. She smiled wanly at me.

  I apologize, Mr. Waterman. I suppose I'm overly passionate on this subject, but it's quite important to me and my people. My students often ask me why the native peoples have had such a difficult time assimilating into Western culture. Do you know what I tell them?"

  Daniel piped in. "Miriam teaches at the University of Washington."

  "I tell them that, first of all, we have no desire to fit in. We have a desire to strengthen and solidify our cultural values and heritage. We have a desire to enhance the continuance of our cultural identity so that it can be passed down to future generations. What we do not have a desire to do is to become lost in the cultural mishmash of the society that surrounds us."

  "She has a Ph.D." Daniel again.

  "My students often view the treaty of 1855 as the tribe's great opportunity to join the mainstream. They wonder what it was about us that led us to squander all of our supposed opportunities. What cultural character defects can be found to explain our present state. What they're missing, Mr. Waterman, is that there were no opportunities. There was no plan. There never was. We were supposed to move onto the reservation and die. That's what they wanted from us, for us to die and sink back into the earth so that they could get on about their precious business."

  "You're still here."

  "Yes, and it confounds white society to this very day that we had the unmitigated gall to survive, to prosper even. Bobby" - there was a catch in her throat - "was attending the university, but he was also learning the Snohomish language. Did you know that we were whipped for speaking our language, for dancing our dances? Do you realize what voids are created in a people who are stripped of both their land and their culture?"

  "No, but I know about voids," I said.

  Her anger boiled to the surface, dragging mine with it.

  "What do you know of voids?"

  "I know that my friend Buddy Knox was every bit as invisible to the society that surrounded him as your people are. I know that Buddy had some kind of massive hole inside of him that he tried to drink full. Maybe the void wasn't forced on him. Maybe in some way it was. I don't know. It was there. The void is there for a lot of us. It's not an Indian thing or a white thing. It's a people thing. I know that you can live smack in the middle of white culture and not be a part of it. All you've got to do is get outside the limits. The minute you become something they don't want to look at, they stop looking at you. It's that simple. You join the void. That much I'm sure of." I decided to shut up before I got myself in trouble.

  Miriam Stone heaved a sigh and leaned back against the sink again.

  "Perhaps you're right, Mr. Waterman. Perhaps my view is too narrow." We both considered the idea in silence.

  Finally, she said, "What do you want from me, Mr. Waterman?"

  "I want to know what Bobby told you about some illegal waste dumping that he was looking into." Her eyes clouded over, but not with anger this time.

  "I should have listened to him," she said sadly. "I should have - "

  Daniel patted her shoulder. Miriam steeled herself.

  "Bobby said that he had proof that there was illegal waste dumping taking place on the reservation. He wanted me to go to the Tribal Council with him."

  "And you said?"

  "I said that he should do his homework on this thing. That he should document his charges. I told him that the Tribal Council would never listen to any vague allegations." She looked me in the eye. "The Tribal Council is both quite political and quite divided, Mr. Waterman. At times," she mused, "we can be our own worst enemies.

  "There is a faction - a large and vocal faction - that feels that we should beat the whites at their own game. If the white man values only money, then we should use our legal leverage to beat him at this game. These people are responsible for such things as r
eservation bingo. They are the ones who opened the reservation liquor store, which, by the way, put the Marysville liquor store out of business, which in turn further inflamed the already tense situation in this area. I'm sad to say that this is the group that presently controls the Tribal Council. They've gone so far as to hire an expert, an outsider, to advise them in these matters. A tribal resources manager."

  "Guy names Howard Short," Daniel said. "Had a lot of success back in the Southwest making tribes into conglomerates."

  "He's no worse than some of the others," Miriam said quickly. "There are those who wish to return totally to the old ways. No contact whatsoever. These misguided people think time can be made to move backward." She edited herself again.

  "The point is, Mr. Waterman, that it would take the proverbial smoking gun to get any action out of the Tribal Council. I told Bobby to document his charges. I didn't think - I didn't know - " Her eyes misted. "How could this be worth such a life? How could - "

  "You had no way of knowing," I said. She wanted to agree but couldn't manage it. I tried again. "What was the plan when and if he documented his suspicions?"

  "We were going to take it to the council together."

  "Why not just go to the law? These people are - "

  "Whose law? It's not our law."

  I tried a different angle. "Will that still be the plan if I document the charges?" I asked.

  "Most certainly, but Robert didn't tell me anything specific."

  "He may have done a better job than you imagine."

  I told her about the annotated maps. I left out the gun. "The maps have no legends. I'd need someone who knows the land around here."

  She turned immediately to Daniel. "Daniel knows the land," she said. Daniel silently agreed.

  "You have these maps?" he asked.

  "Not with me. I can get them," I said. Daniel was grim.

  "Get them," he said. "I'll know the places."

  I turned to Miriam. "Did he tell you anything else that might help us?"

  She misted over again. "Mostly he talked about this white girl he was fond of. He went on and one. I'd never seen him - "