Stalking Moon

by David Cole

  From memory, he wrote it down for me.

  "Listen, there's something you've got to know about her. From that week she stayed in Florence. Came to visit every day. By the third day, she was telling me a lot of stories, a lot of ... um, a lot of stuff she did."

  "Like, what stories?"

  "Why she called herself Begay. Said she admired my life with AIM. Like my way of dealing with the law, which as I remember was pretty much telling them to kiss my ass."

  "She still call herself Spider?"

  "Hated that name, she told me. Hated spiders, actually. She was calling herself Ashley. Or Kimberly. One of those yuppie names. Heather, maybe. Amber. I don't remember, except that she didn't ever want to be called Spider. Didn't want to have people think she'd turned into something creepy."

  "And what kind of girl did she turn out to be?"

  "I don't know whether to tell you, Laura."

  "Tell me what?"

  "She's a grifter."

  "What?"

  "Told me all the cons she'd pulled. Her partners, her lovers. Toward the end of that week, she was flinging her whole life at me, like it was my fault, except she was proud of it, proud of what she could do."

  "Had she been arrested?"

  "Don't know. I think so, I think maybe that was why she left Alabama."

  "A grifter. Like, who did she con? How?"

  "She never told me those things. Just the money she'd conned. People with money. That's who she went after."

  "Well. Maybe she's changed."

  "One thing I learned from living down here. People are what they are. You try to change them, they've got traditions, they've got family histories, they've got the class of people they were born into."

  "Even so. Maybe she's changed."

  "I hope you find her," Jonathan said after a long time. "I hope you do."

  He fell asleep for a time.

  A grifter. A con woman. I hated knowing that about her. Partly because I wanted her to be nice, to be civilized, I don't know, something at least different from me. In a way, with some of the scores I took down, I was also a grifter, a con woman. I'd sometimes do anything to get the digital information I needed.

  But my daughter a grifter?

  Unpleasant.

  I wished I didn't know that. But the flipside of that wish was the gratitude to know at least something about her.

  About three or four o'clock, Rey came out one last time, watched Jonathan's mouth open and close, snoring very lightly.

  "You know he's not sleeping either."

  "I know."

  "Who?" Jonathan asked, awake and instantly alert.

  "Garza." I said. "Hector Garza."

  "Which one was that?"

  "The man who took me away. The first time."

  "That guy. I'd never seen him before."

  "You don't ever want to see him again."

  "He wanted something from you," Jonathan said to us. "What?"

  "It was only about money. Not about you at all."

  "Just money?"

  "That's right. But a lot of money, he said. He knew about Basta Ya helping women get across the border. Maybe he thought we were doing it for profit. But he was talking about millions of US dollars, and I think he knew I wasn't anywhere near that kind of money."

  "Garza's not sleeping," Rey said. "He wants us, wants something from us."

  "What does he want? That's what I'd like to hear more about. I'm going to do some computer work."

  I logged into the chat room. Five differently numbered LUNA users were logged in, but as soon as my LUNA5 prompt appeared, they all disappeared but one.

  LUNA5: > this is laura

  LUNA13: > i've been waiting for you

  LUNA5: > good, and i've been waiting to ask you a question

  LUNA13: > stay away from us

  LUNA5: > who are you?

  LUNA13: > we are many people

  LUNA5: > yes, i know why you use this chat room, but who are **you**

  LUNA13: > we are many women

  LUNA5: > **you** are the woman who runs things

  LUNA13: > not important who any of us are

  LUNA5: > but who are "you**

  LUNA13: > what does it matter, you know what we do

  LUNA5: > yes, you help women get out

  LUNA13: > so our names are of no importance

  LUNA5: > Jonathan begay is sitting two feet from me

  A long, long pause.

  LUNA13: > is he safe?

  LUNA5: > safe from what?

  LUNA13: > Garza

  LUNA5: > how do you know about that?

  LUNA13: > is he safe?

  LUNA5: > yes, and he will head south into Sonora this morning

  LUNA13: > i have prayed for his safety—thank you, Laura

  LUNA5: > he was my husband

  LUNA13: > i know

  LUNA5: > WHO ARE YOU, THAT YOU KNOW SO MUCH?

  LUNA13: > not important

  LUNA5: > it is to me—listen, this chat room is being monitored by the us attorney's office, by some very powerful and sophisticated tracking software in Phoenix

  LUNA13: > you mean Carnivore

  LUNA5: > yes

  LUNA13: > i told you that i've been waiting for you, in this chat room

  LUNA5: > why?

  LUNA13: > to say goodbye

  LUNA5: > don't go

  LUNA13: > it's time to go, it's time for me to be free

  LUNA5: > i want to meet you

  LUNA13: > in a day or two, that will no longer be possible—btw, don't worry about feds and their carnivore

  LUNA5: > why?

  LUNA13: > they know little about us and understand less

  LUNA5: > please, don't go, i want to meet you

  LUNA13: > you already know me

  LUNA5: > who ARE you?

  LUNA13: > goodbye, laura

  The LUNA13 prompt disappeared. And I suddenly realized who it was.

  Alex stumbled outside before sunrise.

  "My mom's dying," she announced. "I need to get to Phoenix today."

  She went back inside to get dressed.

  Rey was wearing his cammies.

  "You can stay here as long as you want," he said to Jonathan. "I'm leaving you that old pickup."

  "Thank you."

  "But I'd advise you to move on. These people, they have ways of knowing about us. There'll be visitors here today. Tomorrow at the latest. Probably in the middle of the night. So take what you need. Leave as soon as you can."

  "Today we've got to cross the border," Rey said to me privately.

  "North," I said.

  "Let's go east."

  "East? Why?"

  "I was thinking—Florida."

  "No, Rey. I am not running away from this."

  "You're the one who told me about Garza executing that woman. You think he wouldn't hesitate putting a bullet in your head?"

  "North," I said. "It's foolish to go to Tucson."

  "Actually, further north than that. Back to Hopi. Back to the reservation. I want to talk to a policeman."

  32

  Once he recognized who I was, Floyd Seumptewa stared at me with amazement.

  "Return of the prodigal Hopi," I said.

  He glanced at some papers on his desk and turned them over.

  "Aren't you going to say hello?"

  "Laura Winslow. I didn't think I'd ever see you again."

  He wasn't wearing a uniform. His office in the Hopi Tribal Center was down the hall from the Tribal Police.

  "Are you still Captain Seumptewa?"

  "Had to leave that. Broke my leg in the rodeo last year. Just can't much get around, couldn't go on patrol."

  "So what do you do here?"

  "Special information officer. Miss Winslow, what are you doing here?"

  "I need some special information."

  He grasped the edge of his desk and levered himself upright, clicking locks on a full-length brace on his right leg. Stumping over to the window, he pretende
d to look out onto the main street of Kykotsmovi.

  "Did they ever find her?" I said.

  "Who?"

  "Judy Pavatea."

  One of the lost butterfly maidens.

  "No. Didn't find her body. Didn't find any of the other missing Hopi girls. That was a sad business back then. I heard that you'd found the man who killed them, up in Cheyenne. But then you just ... vanished."

  Rows of kachina dolls stood in a glass-fronted bookcase. Many of them were clowns. One looked like the Joker character from Batman movies. On the opposite wall was a tapestry about three feet high and five feet long with vertical lines in red and blue and gold and bordered on the left and right with tasseled fringing.

  "Gold embroidery threads in there," he said. "From Japan. My daughter-in-law made that one."

  An alabaster carving stood on his desk next to a pen set. Butterfly hairdo.

  "Sewa," he said, and went to sit down again. "Little sister. I keep it here to remind myself of Judy Pavatea."

  He thrummed his fingers against the desk, squinted at me, finally turned over the papers he'd been reading when I first walked into the room.

  "Laura Marana."

  He held up both hands, palms toward me. I must have looked in panic at the door I'd shut behind me.

  "Nobody up here cares about this notice. I picked it up from this morning's duty pile after I saw that the officers had no interest in it. It's a notice from the US Attorney's Office in Phoenix. Be on the lookout, that kinda thing. Who'd've thought I'd look up and see you right in front of me."

  "I can explain all of that."

  "You don't have to."

  "I don't?"

  "Whatever you've done, there's got to be an explanation. But in my heart, you helped us when nobody else wanted to. So to me, you're just a tourist in here looking for some kind of information about the Hopi villages."

  "Thank you. I can explain. But I don't have time."

  "So what do you want from me, Laura?"

  "I need to know about somebody who claims she was brought up here."

  "How long ago?"

  "She's about sixty years old. Says she lived here in Kykotsmovi until she was eleven. So that would make it... back in the '40s."

  "You don't want much, do you. Nobody kept records in those days."

  "Not written records. No. But there have to be people here of the same age. People who'd remember clans, families, names."

  "What's this woman's name?" he finally asked.

  "Pinau."

  "That's a pretty unusual name. She said it was Hopi?"

  "Yes. Insisted on it."

  "Full name?"

  "I only know what she calls herself now. She says she moved to Mexico City when she was eleven. I have no idea if she married, but her full name is Pinau Beltrán de Medina."

  "Got to be either a husband's name, or the family that took her from here. But Pinau. You sure that's her Hopi name?"

  "Yes."

  "And she lived in Kykotsmovi? In the '40s?"

  "That's what she said."

  "I know two women I can ask," he said. "They're down the hall in the craft preservation office. But maybe you can tell me why the person you're asking me about is the same person that signed this notification from the US Attorney's Office."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "If you're identified by any law enforcement agent, do not apprehend, it says here. Notify Pinau Beltrán de Medina. Half a dozen phone and fax numbers, some of them in Phoenix, some in Tucson, some in Mexico."

  He stood up again, grabbed an elaborately carved oak cane, and went down the hall. I read the papers, saw her name, understood nothing about it. Medina identified herself as part of a joint US and Mexican task force.

  I poured a cup of coffee, wandered out in the hallway. He was gone for nearly half an hour, and returned with a frown.

  "Didn't live here," he said.

  "You're sure?"

  "Part of the new Tribal Chairman's mandate. Compile a record of everybody living on the mesas. Since we're in Kykotsmovi, the women started here. Nobody ever heard of this Pinau. In fact, everybody I talked to insisted that it's not a Hopi name. That doesn't mean it's not a family name, a clan name. My guess, it could be a private name. But my opinion? She never lived here."

  "So why would she tell me that she did?"

  "Was she trying to gain your confidence? Get you to trust her?"

  "Yes."

  "Where were you at the time?"

  "In an illegal immigrant detention center."

  He laughed out loud.

  "I don't know about you, Laura. You sure got a knack for getting into trouble. Listen. You staying the night? Wife and I got a spare bedroom."

  "No. I've got to get back to Phoenix."

  "A long day's driving, if you just came up from there."

  "I came up from Mexico."

  "What kind of trouble are you into, Laura?"

  "Me? I'm not in trouble, I'm about to cause trouble."

  Rey drove me back south through the Apache reservation. In Globe we stopped for some Big Macs, and I called Don. I could tell by the clicks and signal shifts that the phone was rolling over from one number to another.

  "Hostess Catering," he said.

  "Don?"

  "Ah, finally. I've been waiting to hear from you."

  "Why is this phone number rolling over?"

  "I thought you wouldn't have time to clone your cell phone to the new number."

  "Don, I'm sorry. I should have told you I had no access to the cloning software."

  "Realized that. Doesn't matter. Look. I've got all the information you wanted. What do I do with it?"

  "I don't know if I'm on a secure phone any more."

  "Assume you're not. But I'll give you the info myself."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Can't tell you that on an unsecure phone."

  He hung up.

  Rey continued on into Phoenix, into Scottsdale, and to the Mayo Clinic Hospital.

  33

  "There's nobody here by that name."

  The information desk of the Mayo Clinic Hospital.

  "Mari Emerine? You're certain?"

  "Perhaps she wishes privacy?"

  "You mean, she might be using another name?"

  "Some patients do."

  I thought about that for a few minutes while I went to the Coke machine, but while the can of Diet Coke was thunking its way down the chute, I suddenly realized who to ask for.

  "Hey, lady," a teenaged girl shouted after me. "You all done left your Diet Coke in the machine."

  "Take it if you want."

  Somewhat breathless from running back to the information desk, I smiled at the clerk and patted my breastbone and shook my head.

  "Silly me," I said. "Of course she's using her married name. Mrs. Bobby Guinnness. She's divorced, but she still uses that name at times."

  "Yes. Mrs. Guinness. Oh. Family only, I'm afraid."

  "That's okay. I'm her sister Elizabeth. I just flew in from Des Moines. Her ex-husband called me and said to hurry."

  The clerk was crestfallen, but recovered immediately. She took a map of the hospital, circled a specific floor and wing, and wrote down the room number.

  "How is she?"

  "I can't really say." She avoided my eyes for a moment, then looked directly at me. "I do apologize. I've not been here more than three weeks. When you get to the floor, please check with the nurses' station. I'll tell them you're coming up."

  "How is she?" I asked again.

  "In good care. The nurse will page the doctor, you'll get a consultation. Oh. And the ex-husband is there also."

  "What husband?" I said without thinking.

  "Mr. Guinness, of course. In his wheelchair."

  "You found me," Mari whispered.

  "Yes."

  I barely recognized her. In a week she'd lost another twenty pounds, her face haggard, tubes and monitors attached everywhere to her body.

&n
bsp; "I'm Don," said the man in the wheelchair at the other side of the bed.

  "He's Bobby," Mari whispered with a large smile.

  I pulled a plastic chair next to the bed and stroked Mari's cheeks.

  "Are you in pain?"

  "No. Plenty of drugs for pain, when you're dying. But actually, yes, I'm in pain that I won't see Alex again."

  "Rey left to get her."

  "How ... long?"

  "She tires out after a few sentences," Don said. "And I was just going over some things with her, so she's already at the point where we have to leave her alone."

  "Don't ... go. How long?"

  "From here, almost four hours each way."

  "I'll wait. Talk ... talk ... to ... Don."

  "Why don't we go outside?" he said.

  "No. In ... here," Mari said.

  "Okay. Laura, why don't you bring your chair over here?"

  "Who are you, Don? Really, who are you?"

  "Captain, US Army. Served with Mari, went through Desert Storm as a tank commander. One of the few lucky hits by an Iraqi tank, jammed me inside mine, broke my back. Mari and I, both casualties of George Bush's war. I'm thirty-two years old, I'm single, I have an MBA from Wharton and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from MIT."

  "All that while you were in the army?"

  "Before. One of those child prodigies. Finished the Ph.D. when I was twenty-two, decided on a whim I'd join the army, thought I'd make a difference. A foolish notion, but we're all fools at one time or another. Here."

  He handed me a stack of envelopes, each with a name in tiny, neat black ink written on the envelope flap.

  "I'll look at them later."

  "Oh? I thought there was a specific thing you wanted about each of these people. Perhaps you've already learned what you wanted to know?"

  "Some of it."

  "Don. Tell ... her ... about ... the water."