Slickrock Paradox

by Stephen Legault

  Rain was silent. “Okay. Again, that’s helpful.”

  “Is your boss getting anywhere on this?”

  “Who, Taylor?”

  “Yeah.”

  “God, he’s not my boss. I report to the head of Trace Evidence back in Virginia. Taylor, is like, three steps down the pecking order from where I sit. I exist outside of the hierarchy for the most part. There are only three forensic anthropologists in the entire FBI, and I’m the first one to work out of a state field office. The others are at Headquarters.”

  “Lucky you. Salt Lake City.”

  “I like it there.”

  “Takes all kinds,” said Silas.

  “It does.”

  “Anything else?”

  “No. Thanks for calling back. Listen, I’m going to tell you something that maybe I shouldn’t. You have a right to know, I think.”

  “Taylor isn’t coming to arrest me, is he? Is this a trap, you keep me on the phone while he breaks down the door?”

  “You watch too much TV, Dr. Pearson.”

  “I don’t own one,” he said, looking around the austere room. “What do you want to tell me?”

  “Kayah Wisechild.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “The young woman you found.”

  Silas was silent. He sat down on one of the chairs at the tiny table at the center of the room.

  “Are you there?” she asked.

  “I’m here.”

  “She was twenty-four years old. A graduate of Northern Arizona University with a degree in anthropology. She was from Third Mesa.”

  “The Hopi Reservation.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Have next of kin . . . ?”

  “Yeah, we reached her mother and father this afternoon. Not married, three siblings, all living on the reservation.”

  “You do quick work.”

  “I try. Anyway, I thought you’d like to know.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “Thanks for your help, Dr. Pearson.”

  “It’s Silas.”

  “Okay. Silas. It’s Katie. And thanks again.”

  Rain hung up the phone and Silas sat in the dark. He drank his can of Molson’s and watched stars pop out of the firmament above the Mesa. She thought Silas would like to know the name of the woman he found and had believed to be his wife. She had a name and a family. But Rain was wrong. He wished she hadn’t told him. He wished that he could be left in peace to look for his wife and not be troubled by the murder of a young woman he had never met.

  ON FRIDAY MORNING SILAS WAS determined to restore some semblance of normalcy to his life. He intended to go into Moab and open the Red Rock Canyon bookstore for a few days, and he wanted to plan another week of searching for his missing wife. His sprained ankle was healing quickly. It might not allow rugged desert hiking, so he thought he would take the last week of August off from the bookstore and search a new section of the canyon country. By nine-thirty he was in Moab, flipping the sign on his storefront to “Open” and settling in behind his desk with a store-bought Americano and a muffin. An email from his oldest son, Robbie, popped up:

  Hi Dad. I saw the headline in the Salt Lake paper. Yes, I am keeping tabs. I guess I would have heard from you if it was Penelope. I just want you to know I’m thinking of you. Things are fine here. Summer has been pretty laid back. I’ve been working for a security company, mostly doing criminal record checks and background research. I start my master’s in the fall at Simon Fraser University in criminology.

  Jamie is well. He’s “taking a year off” to consider his options. I think he wants to study English but doesn’t want to seem like he’s following in your footsteps. He’ll come around.

  Anyway, I just wanted you to know I was thinking about you and hope that the news coming so close to home didn’t upset you too much.

  —Robbie

  Silas sat back. Robbie was keeping tabs on him, or at least on his search for Penelope. That gave Silas some comfort. Neither Robbie nor his younger brother, Jamie, had liked Penelope much. They had only met her twice, and both times the week-long rendezvous near Flagstaff had felt strained. Silas knew that both boys blamed her for the breakup of his marriage to his second wife, their mother. The truth was that their relationship had never really worked. The mechanics of producing offspring was reasonably simple; the means by which you create a life with another person much less so. When he had accepted the teaching position at NAU twelve years ago, he believed that his marriage to the boys’ mother was already over. A year into his tenure he met Penelope and officially filed for divorce.

  A year later, when Robbie was fourteen, and mature for his age, Silas and Penelope got married. Jamie was just nine, and fragile. He focused his anger on his father’s young wife. It made for very uncomfortable gatherings the following two summers. So much so that after the second time they decided not to do it again. Penelope was game, she claimed, but Silas was not. Twice a year he flew solo to Vancouver and took the boys sea kayaking or mountain biking or camping on Vancouver Island, and that was the extent of his parenting. For the last three and a half years, he hadn’t even done that. Silas had been distracted.

  The bell chimed on his front door. He looked up to see who had gotten lost or was looking for a bathroom. It was Jacob Isaiah. He walked down the long center aisle of books. Isaiah had been a broad-shouldered man in his youth, but age and an angry life had diminished him. He had neatly combed hair that was almost as white as snow, a clean-shaven face, and a wide but malevolent smile that showed off perfect teeth.

  “Silas, good morning,” he said, extending a huge, twisted hand. Silas half stood and shook it. Jacob Isaiah’s physicality radiated from him, and though Silas stood two inches taller than the man, he always felt diminutive in his presence. Isaiah was a powerful force in the community, having been the local real estate developer for nearly forty years. Silas forced a smile and then sat back down, nodding toward the chair used by the occasional customer.

  “Have a seat if you like, Jacob.”

  “Don’t mind if I do,” said the elderly man.

  “Would you care for something to drink? Tea, coffee, a soda?”

  “No thank you,” said Isaiah. He was still smiling, looking around the store. “How’s the book business?”

  “Quiet,” said Silas.

  “You picked the quietest part of town to open shop, you know.”

  “So you tell me.”

  Silas could tell there was something on Isaiah’s mind, but they would have to chit-chat for a while before he would spit it out. Normally Silas had little patience for that, but today, unable to hike, and disturbed by his discovery in Courthouse Wash, he almost welcomed the distraction.

  “Slow part of town. Nobody’s ever made a go of this location. You might consider moving to Main Street. Give Back of Beyond a run for their money.”

  “I’m pretty happy here.”

  “You’re not really in it to sell books, though, are you?”

  “I sell the occasional volume.”

  “It’s a pretty eclectic mix you got here. And none of the touristy stuff.”

  “I cater to a particular crowd.”

  “True story? These are all your books you brought with you from Flagstaff?” Silas didn’t say anything. “It don’t matter,” Isaiah continued, waving his hand is if shooing a fly.

  “What can I do for you, Jacob?” Silas’s interest in being distracted had only lasted two minutes. Now he wanted Isaiah to get to the point, and then get out.

  “So I hear that you found that body, out in Courthouse Wash up in the park.”

  “Where’d you hear that?” Silas asked. His name hadn’t been in the news.

  “Oh, word gets around. It’s a small town, Moab. Still a small town. Word travels fast, you know. Is it true that you found that woman?”

  Silas looked around the store.

  “What the hell were you doing out there Silas?”

  “Going for a h
ike.”

  “I’d have credited you with more brains than that. It was a hundred and ten on Monday, and fixing to thunderstorm. It true you got caught up in a flood?”

  “I did.”

  “Jesus, Silas, you’re going to get yourself killed if you keep this up.”

  “Man’s got a right to enjoy the country, doesn’t he?”

  “Well, sure he does. But you’re looking for something, ain’t you?”

  “That’s no secret, Jacob,” Silas responded.

  “Did you know this girl, the one you found in the wash? They printed her name in the papers this morning.”

  “Never even heard of her,” Silas said.

  “Never? She was big news two years ago, Silas. Goodness, you living under a rock?”

  “I don’t remember her. Did she live in Moab?”

  “On and off. She was an archaeologist. Worked with one of them consulting firms that look for bones and bunnies. Local outfit called Dead Horse.”

  “If my memory is correct, Jacob, they’ve done plenty of work for you, haven’t they?” asked Silas.

  “I believe they have. I think we had them in to do some work out near Blanding, or maybe it was over in Cortez. I don’t get involved with the details, Silas. I just say, ‘Let’s get this thing done!’ and golly, my boys just get the thing done.” He smiled and slapped his knee.

  “Must be hard to keep track of all your money, Jacob,” said Silas.

  “Now don’t be like that, Silas. A man’s got a right to earn a living.”

  “No argument from me, Jacob. I just don’t like the way you lord it over everybody in this town.”

  “I don’t hear my employees complaining. They seem to like having jobs just fine.”

  “Did you ever meet her? This girl, Wisechild?” asked Silas.

  “I seen her around the office once or twice. Said hello to me with a sweet smile. Nice Indian girl.”

  Silas felt the bile rise in his throat, but he swallowed it back. “You knew this girl?”

  “I didn’t know her, Silas. I knew who she was. What were you doing out there?” asked Isaiah.

  “Like I said, I was on a hike.”

  “You were looking for Penelope, weren’t you?”

  “Listen, Jacob, I don’t have time for this. As you can see, I’m run off my feet here today.”

  The man’s bright smile faded a quick as a wink. “That wife of yours, your Penelope de Silva, you are not going to find her here no matter how long you look.”

  Silas felt a wash of heat race up his neck and spread across his face.

  “She ain’t here is what I’m telling you.”

  “How would you know, Jacob?”

  “I know. I know these things. Some people around this town like to talk. Talk, talk, talk. And you know what the talk about your lovely wife was, don’t you, son?”

  Silas had heard it all before. He didn’t say a word.

  “Well,” said Isaiah, “the talk was that she had herself a boyfriend.”

  Silas picked up his cane and stood.

  “I know that the truth can ouch, son,” said Isaiah. “But I’m just trying to keep you from getting yourself killed. And you keep up this nonsense, crawling around all over this goddamned desert, and that’s what’s going to happen. You are going to end up just like that poor little girl you found down there in the rocks. Dead.”

  Silas walked to the front of the store. Isaiah remained seated. Silas looked back at him. “We’re closed,” he said, flipping the sign.

  “Are you now? And here I was just fixing to buy me a book.” Isaiah stood up, brushing his pants and straightening the collar on his shirt. “Well then, suppose I’ll just have to walk over to Main Street to see about getting me something to read there. Goodbye, Silas,” he said.

  He stopped and put out his hand. Silas just looked the man in the eye. There was a malicious light there, something dark and spiteful behind the guise of mirth. He didn’t take Isaiah’s hand.

  “Very well then,” Isaiah said, and walked out the door. Silas closed and locked it behind him.

  SILAS DROVE NORTH ON 191 and turned west on Highway 279, past the Moab Tailings Project, and drove along the banks of the Colorado River. For almost thirty years, from 1956 to 1984, the Atlas Mill processed fourteen hundred tons of uranium, day in and day out. All of it within a stone’s throw of the lifeblood of the American Southwest: the Colorado River. The US Department of Energy stepped in with this new project to move 16 million tons of uranium tailings from the banks of the Colorado River to a permanent disposal site thirty miles north, near the town of Crescent Junction. Every day two trains, each up to twenty-six cars long, transported highly radioactive waste away from its burial site along the river.

  The landscape that surrounded him was unimaginably grand and spectacularly beautiful, but of all the environments on earth this one was among the least tolerant of fools and their mistakes. The uncommon and exceptional wealth it made for a few brash men and women had even led to murder on occasion. Most often, however, what killed a person was their own foolishness.

  Silas called it the slickrock paradox: While the stone was innocent enough to look at, once you tried to get a grip on it, it took your feet out from under you.

  He stopped the Outback a couple miles down the river, at a place recently converted from a random camping site to an organized day-use area and tent campground. There were only a few vehicles so he parked close to the river. He sat on the bank of the Colorado and watched it flow. He recalled of one of his favorite pieces of Western literature, Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It, and the much-loved passage, “I sat there and forgot and forgot, until what remained was the river that went by and I who watched. Eventually the watcher joined the river, and there was only one of us. I believe it was the river.”

  Now there was a great American writer. He only wrote two books, but they stood up. Silas counted Maclean among his favorite “river poets”: Stegner, Maclean, and Ellen Meloy, the latter having passed much too soon.

  When he had met Penelope she told him he was missing the best: Abbey and his pieces on the Green, Colorado, Dirty Devil, San Juan, and Dolores Rivers. The jewel, she told him, was his eulogy for the Colorado River where it had carved out Glen Canyon. Abbey floated down it, she told him, just months before the completion of the dam, and had included the piece in Desert Solitaire. Silas read it. He read it all, but remained unconvinced. He did admit—though only to himself—that when the famous desert rat wrote about rivers, he was at his middling best.

  Silas watched the Colorado River as he would a telephone waiting for it to ring. He wanted answers. Silas wondered why Jacob Isaiah was suddenly so interested in him, and more important, why Isaiah was so interested in Penelope. The man had never been particularly neighborly toward him, nor had he ever been so openly hostile. Something had changed in his attitude toward Silas with Silas’s discovery of Kayah Wisechild’s body.

  How was it that Isaiah knew he had found the body? None of the newspaper reports identified Silas; they all just said that a hiker discovered the body after a flood. Maybe the young couple who found him had told their story, but they didn’t know his name. Maybe the doctor or the nurses at Moab Regional finked him out, but that too seemed unlikely. The only person he figured who could have given him up to Jacob Isaiah was Dexter Willis, sheriff of Grand County. He would have to find out.

  And lastly, Silas wanted to know why it was that his wife wanted him to find Kayah Wisechild. Silas had feigned steadfast resolution against Ken Hollyoak’s idea the other day, downplaying his dream and its portent. He hadn’t, in fact, stopped considering its possible meaning for more than a few minutes since learning the identity of the corpse. The direction this dream sent him on was as obvious as if there had been a road sign on 191 pointing him down Courthouse Wash. Penelope often appeared in his dreams, but she was usually mute. He felt that she had sent him to Sleepy Hollow. She wanted him to go there. She wanted him to find Kayah Wisec
hild. He simply had no ungodly knowledge as to why.

  “I DON’T THINK you ought to come by the County Office,” said Dexter Willis. “The feds are still all over this place. I’m lucky to still have my desk.”

  “Can you come by the store?” asked Silas. He had his new cell phone to his ear while he geared down coming into town.

  “Don’t see why not.”

  “Do me a favor, Dex. Don’t tell Taylor you’re coming to see me, okay?”

  “What’s going on, Silas?”

  “Nothing. I just need to ask you a few questions without getting the third degree.”

  “I’ll come by in ten minutes.”

  Silas was unlocking the door to his bookstore when Willis strolled up the sidewalk. They greeted each other and Silas opened the door.

  “You got a soda in that little fridge of yours?” asked Willis.

  “Should have,” said Silas, walking the length of the store and opening the fridge. “Dr Pepper do?”

  “Perfect.”

  Silas motioned toward the chair that Jacob Isaiah had vacated just a few hours before and handed the sheriff his cold drink. “I’ll get right to the point. Did you tell Jacob Isaiah that I was the one who found the Wisechild woman?”

  Willis looked taken aback. “It wasn’t me, Silas. What happens while I’m on duty stays there.”

  “He knew it was me in Courthouse Wash. He made a pretty big deal about it.” Silas told the sheriff about his conversation that morning.

  “Leave this with me, I’ll look into it. You know that uttering threats is a crime.”

  “People get riled. I just can’t understand why now.”

  “What else did he say?”

  “He said if I kept poking around in the rocks looking for Penny, I’d end up like the Wisechild girl. Dead.”

  Both men sat in silence a moment. “Did you get hold of this girl’s folks?” Silas finally asked.

  “The FBI did. They found them yesterday afternoon.”

  “In person?”

  “They don’t have a phone. Nearest one was at a crossroads store thirty miles from where they lived up on Third Mesa. Real middle-of-nowhere country. I believe the Hopi Tribal Police visited the residence.”