The Dream Stalker

by Margaret Coel

  Vicky drew in a long breath. “I think you’re as worried about the facility as I am. It’s not that we don’t want jobs, but there has to be another way. A lot of people feel the same.”

  “Maybe so.” A third woman joined in, another face Vicky didn’t recognize. “But nobody’s gonna say nothin’. They’re scared.”

  “Scared,” Vicky repeated. The word hung in the air like a fist of moisture.

  “Some people been gettin’ threats,” Liz said.

  “Who?” Vicky heard the change in her tone, the insistence she usually reserved for the courtroom. This was more serious even than she had feared. She was not the only one being threatened.

  Liz shrugged. The other women’s eyes were on the ground. “Some people was talkin’ against the facility, sayin’ there wasn’t no guarantees it was gonna be safe, like you wrote in them articles. Then they got these notes tellin’ ’em to shut up, and everybody heard somebody tried to kill you this morning. So now folks are scared to say anything.”

  The moccasin telegraph, Vicky thought. Eberhart had called Banner, and the news had flashed past the receptionist and secretaries, past the police officers, and across the reservation.

  “The people who’ve been threatened, did they go to the police?”

  “Oh, God, Vicky,” Liz said, the words weighted with exasperation. “You was away too long. You forget Indians ain’t gonna talk to the police. It don’t matter the police are Indian. They ain’t gonna do it. Maybe you might call the police ’cause that’s how it’s done where you live, in the white world.”

  Vicky was quiet, stung by the woman’s words. After a moment she said, “Somebody wants the facility badly enough to threaten people’s lives. Why is that person, whoever it is, afraid of what we’re saying? Don’t you see? We can’t let someone like that stop us from speaking out.”

  “You don’t get it, Vicky.” Liz began stepping backwards, shaking her head. The other women had started to walk away.

  Vicky stretched one hand toward them. “You don’t have to say anything. Just come inside. Just be there. We have to stand together.”

  Liz continued moving backwards, sneakers snapping at the gravel. The other women had already struck out in a diagonal direction toward the front.

  Sensing Liz’s eyes still on her in the darkness, Vicky let the briefcase fall at her feet and gripped the edge of the door with both hands, pulling with all her strength until the door cracked halfway open.

  “You better not go in there,” Liz hollered as Vicky retrieved the briefcase and slipped inside.

  11

  Lights shone down like spotlights, creating pockets of shadow around the crowded hall. Arapaho families shifted on the folding chairs arranged in long, tight rows. Groups of men crowded against the walls. People were still pouring through the front entrance, including whites who thrust white signs upright the minute they were inside. BIA police officers stood around the hall, hands on hops, eyes following the crowd. The musty smells of perspiration and wet wool filled the hall, the sounds of coughing and clearing of throats.

  On the stage two long tables with metal legs flanked a podium. The six tribal councilmen sat at one table. Wilson Lee, the elderly chairman, occupied the middle chair, with Matthew Bosse on his right, surveying the audience, amusement and confidence mingling in his expression. It was Bosse, Vicky knew, who had proposed building a nuclear waste facility on the reservation. The councilman was in his sixties, the age of reverence, a good man, she knew, even though she found herself working against him now. It struck her she had become one of the upstarts, the younger generation, who challenged the elders, the kind of person her grandfather had always warned her about. The realization made her sad and uncomfortable.

  She stole a glance at her watch. The hearing wasn’t scheduled to begin for another twenty minutes, but she knew it would begin soon—according to Indian time, the time when everyone had arrived and was ready. It had nothing to do with the clock.

  Two men, Lionel Redbull and a white man she didn’t know, broke from a knot of people standing along the wall and started up the side stairs to the stage. She followed them, her heels clacking against the wood steps. The white man strolled to the vacant table, pulled out a chair and sat down, but Redbull turned around, as if he’d just realized someone was behind him. A tall man, half a head taller than she was in her heels. He had on blue jeans and a black wool blazer over a white shirt. The silver medallion of a bolo tie held the collar closed. His black hair hung in thick braids down the lapels of his blazer. He had the golden-brown skin of her people, the prominent cheekbones and hooked nose, the jutting jaw. He might have been a warrior staring out of an old photograph.

  “There’s been a change in plans, Vicky,” he said, hooking both thumbs into the side pockets of his jeans, elbows swinging free. He assessed her with a flat expression that concealed whatever he may have been thinking.

  “I’m on the agenda.” Vicky moved forward, forcing him to step back.

  The Indian squared his shoulders. “We don’t wanna stir up the enviromaniacs.” He nodded toward the crowd still coming through the door—the outsiders. “All we’re gonna do tonight is present the facts. Quick and simple.”

  “Matthew Bosse gave me his word.” Vicky took another step sideways trying to get past the Indian, her eyes on the councilman at the far table. He was talking with the chairman, his back toward her. Redbull stepped into her view.

  “You’ve already made your point in those talks and articles. Thanks to you we got crazy people runnin’ all over the rez tryin’ to shoot down our plans. The business council decided no sense in givin’ them any ammunition. There might be a meeting comin’ up where folks that don’t like progress can state their views, but this isn’t the time.”

  Vicky exhaled a long breath. There would be no other meeting. “I intend to speak tonight. If Matthew Bosse is going to break his word, I want to hear it from him.”

  Suddenly the councilman was beside them, as if he’d heard his name over the scrape of metal chairs on the linoleum floor and the crescendo of voices. He looked like an old cowboy in fancy dress—the light blue Western suit, the plaid shirt with the collar smoothed over his jacket collar.

  “You said I would be on the agenda, Grandfather,” Vicky said, addressing him with respect.

  “I’ve been tryin’ to explain to this lawyer lady . . .” Lionel began.

  The councilman made a slicing motion with one hand, a sign Vicky had seen her grandfather use, the Arapaho sign for silence. The buzz in the audience died back.

  “She can speak,” Bosse said.

  “But you agreed. . . .”

  “That was before.” The councilman shifted slightly to face the younger man. “Now I say she can speak her piece like I told her.”

  “It’s a mistake. We got all them outsiders here. We could have a riot on our hands.”

  “Get her a chair,” Bosse ordered. Abruptly he turned around and walked back to his seat. Vicky avoided Redbull’s eyes as she started for the other table. The white man who had preceded her up the stairs jumped up, grabbed his metal folding chair by the top rung and swung it next to his place. “Please take my chair,” he said.

  The name Paul Bryant came to mind as Vicky set her briefcase and purse on the table, then slipped out of her slicker and laid it over the back of the chair. She’d seen the name on the environmental reports—Paul Bryant, president of United Power Company. Not quite six feet tall, with brown hair, gray eyes shot with light and a smile breaking at the corners of his well-defined mouth. Dressed in a tailored gray suit, with a light blue shirt and burgundy tie, he was a handsome man, the enemy.

  She realized she was about to be wedged between him and Redbull, who had retrieved a couple of chairs from somewhere. The Indian slid one toward Bryant and placed the second next to her.

  “And you are Vicky Holden,” Bryant said, holding the back of her chair as she sat down. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”

/>   “I can’t imagine why.” Vicky snapped open her briefcase and extracted the stapled pages of her speech, a yellow notebook, a ballpoint. She lined them in front of her, just as she did in the courtroom as a case was about to begin. Then she let her eyes roam over the hall.

  The quiet drone of conversation was as soft as the wind blowing in the pines, but the tension was so thick she could feel it on her skin. Where were they, the other people opposed to the nuclear waste facility? Scattered through the crowd, too scared to speak out? She couldn’t spot Liz or the other women. All the opposition had grouped around the entrance—outsiders. She swallowed back the sickening realization she had aligned herself with the outsiders. It was not what she had intended.

  Gradually Vicky found the grandmothers. Several near the front, a couple partway back, others scattered through the hall, children on their laps. The eyes of the grandmothers, she realized, were on her. She felt a renewed sense of strength and determination. The grandmothers were with her.

  And then her eyes found John O’Malley. Not with the other white people, but seated at the end of a row near the front entrance, in a blue-plaid shirt, arms clasped across his chest. Where have you been? she thought. How has your life gone these last three months? What took you to the cabin last night, to the murdered cowboy? There was so much she didn’t know about this man, this familiar stranger. Suddenly he caught her eye and smiled, and she knew he was also with her.

  A loud rapping sounded, and Vicky turned in her chair, glancing past Bryant. Chairman Wilson, frail-looking with pink, watery eyes, gripped the podium with one hand. He was in his eighties, an old warrior honored with the title of chairman. He would believe whatever Matthew Bosse and Lionel Redbull told him about the facility, but forty years ago, Wilson Lee would have torn out the hearts of anyone who backed a plan that might bring harm to the People. He raised the gavel with his other hand and brought it down again. A hard knock. Quiet enveloped the hall like a heavy blanket.

  “We all come here,” the chairman said, “’cause we wanna know more about storin’ nuclear waste on our reservation. We’re gonna hear all the facts tonight and see why it’s gonna be a good thing for us.” The old man threw back his shoulders, glanced about the audience, as if to make sure everyone understood the purpose of the hearing, then shuffled back to his seat.

  Matthew Bosse strode to the podium next, the chairman in fact, if not in name, the public hearing now in his hands. He began talking about how the nuclear business had been going on for fifty years, how white people had gotten all the benefits—the money and jobs—how Indian people got atomic bombs tested close to their lands, got uranium mines and tailings; how maybe it was now time Indian people got some of the benefits. He said the nuclear waste facility would store 10,000 metric tons of spent fuel rods—he called them “ghost bullets.”

  “Ghost bullets can be deadly.” The councilman paused and raised one hand to his forehead, as if this were a matter for consideration. Then he went on, “Maybe that’s why Indian people oughtta handle them, ’cause we’re gonna do what’s right by the earth.”

  Maybe. Vicky scratched the word on the yellow tablet. What was going on? It was Bosse who had sought the grant from the United Power Company to conduct the environmental studies; Bosse who had handpicked Lionel Redbull to direct the project. And now Bosse was saying “maybe”?

  Vicky drew a slash under the word as the councilman introduced Paul Bryant. The white man rose from his chair and moved to the podium, thoughtfulness in his expression. He carried a file folder, which he flipped open. He pulled the microphone forward. “United Power Company and the Arapahos,” he began with a quick glance at the notes spread before him, “have the same goal: a facility that offers jobs and prosperity without posing any danger to the people or the environment. We have the scientific knowledge and technology to build such a facility.”

  Hissing noises erupted from the far end of the hall, and Wilson Lee began pounding the table. “I’m warnin’ ya,” the old man shouted with surprising vigor. “Any more outbursts and Chief Banner’s gonna clear all you outsiders from the hall.”

  Bryant began again, his tone calm, reassuring. Yes, the spent fuel rods contained radioactive materials, but the materials could not escape their specially engineered containers. Such containers had been used in Europe for years. None had ever leaked. He paused, glancing around the audience, allowing time for people to wrap their minds around the information.

  On he went, his tone still measured and calm: The casks would be transported to Casper on dedicated trains with special rights-of-way, past other trains in the sidings. Then trucked north across the reservation on haul roads, specially constructed for safe passage. Handled remotely on site, with heavy equipment, hydraulic lifts. Every precaution taken to insure workers were not exposed, in case the unthinkable, the impossible . . . The white man stared across the audience toward the outsiders grouped around the entrance, as if to defy anyone to finish the thought. “You have my word,” he said, closing the folder in front of him. “The facility will not harm anyone on this reservation.”

  Lionel Redbull was at the podium almost before Bryant could step away. “Advantages.” The project director’s voice boomed across the hall. “Let’s not forget the advantages.” Vicky saw the wonder and anticipation in the upturned faces as Redbull hammered out the familiar list, all the material goods the money would buy, the new homes and schools and clinics, the new lives. Such good fortune, it was beyond imagining.

  Vicky wrote the word FORTUNE at the top of a clean page. Next to it, she wrote REDBULL. Underneath, she put SALARY, PROJECT DIRECTOR, FACILITY MANAGER. Then she wrote POWER over and over down the page until the word resembled a utility pole supporting the other words. She glanced at the man still at the podium. How much did he want that kind of power? Enough to threaten anyone opposing the facility? Enough to run her down in the streets of Lander?

  Redbull slid both hands into the pockets of his jeans, pulling the black blazer away from his shirt. The silver bolo gleamed in the light shining over the stage. A relaxed man, the crowd in the palm of his hand, except for the protesters waving signs overhead.

  “Soon’s the joint council approves the facility,” Redbull was saying, “we’re gonna file the safety analysis report with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. That report’s gonna contain all the facts that make the Legeau ranch the perfect site for this facility. After we get our license from the commission, we’ll start construction. Then we’re gonna be in charge of operations. It’s about time, I say, Indians take charge of our own destiny.”

  People jumped from the chairs, cheering and clapping. Groups of men whirled about, fists raised toward the white protesters. Somebody shouted, “Get ’em out of here!” The words rang through the hall like a gong.

  Suddenly the crowd around the entrance began to shuffle sideways, and Vicky realized the door had swung open. Someone moved through the protesters and started up the center aisle.

  12

  Lionel shouted into the microphone: “Let’s hear from the man that’s gonna lease out his own ranch for the facility so the rest of us can get the advantages. Alexander Legeau and his beautiful wife, Lily, come up here and say a few words.”

  A murmur ran through the hall, like an underground current, as the couple came up the center aisle, Alexander reaching along the rows, shaking hands, patting kids on the head, his black Stetson bobbing above the crowd. Lily matched his pace, glancing about, smiling, hands occasionally reaching out to touch an outstretched hand.

  As if they were the king and queen of Wind River Reservation, Vicky thought. She hadn’t seen the couple in years. Once they’d loomed large in her mind: when she and Ben had struggled to raise a small herd of Herefords that never brought in enough money, calves that didn’t make it through the winter, alfalfa and hay that lay flattened under blankets of hail. Everything on the Legeau ranch had been beautiful—the house and barns and stock. An example to the world, the Legeaus, that Indians
could be prosperous.

  Alexander bounded up the stairs and across the stage to the far table. He stopped near the chairman, who sat quietly and waited. It was the rancher who first extended his hand—a proper sign of respect. Then Alexander greeted the other councilmen. Lily followed, slipping her hand momentarily into theirs, smiling. Gracious and dignified, with black hair pulled into a knot at the nape of her neck. Her skin was dark and clear, her eyes shiny. The deep red lipstick had been carefully applied. Her black raincoat hung open over a red dress with a wide ruffle at the bottom of the full skirt, another ruffle around the neck. A silver and turquoise squash blossom necklace rested in the crevice of her breasts. She wore silver bracelets on both wrists, a large silver band on her wedding-ring finger. If Vicky hadn’t known the woman was in her sixties, she would have guessed her twenty years younger.

  Alexander shook hands with Redbull and stepped to the podium, grabbing the microphone as if it were a tool he used every day. He was also in his sixties, with the slender, toughened build of a cowboy. Gray hair hung below his Stetson and trailed around the collar of his green slicker. He had the cheekbones, the narrow eyes—like slivers of charred wood—of the Arapaho. But the light complexion, the long, straight nose, the tight-lipped mouth must have come from one of the French traders in the Old Time who had given his name to the children an Arapaho woman had bore him.

  “You people that’ve worked for me over the years know all about our ranch,” Alexander began, his tone exuberant. “A real stable piece of earth, them expert consultants tell us. That’s ’cause the Creator didn’t see fit to give us any oil or gas.” Laughter rippled through the hall: The Legeaus didn’t have everything.

  Vicky found herself doodling in the margins of the yellow tablet, anger mingling with impatience. Legeau wasn’t on the agenda, yet he’d been welcomed to the podium. She’d had to insist upon her right to speak, and hadn’t yet had the chance. She looked up, her gaze traveling along the rows until she found John O’Malley. She saw the impatience in his expression—like her own. It was a kind of consolation.