Tony Hillerman - Leaphorn & Chee 11 - Sacred Clowns

by Sacred Clowns(lit)

  They spent almost an hour in the shop before Toddy declared the press of duty at Crownpoint and left. Streib decided he should question Mission volunteers again. He disappeared toward the living quarters. Leaphorn remained. Except for the sand-cast form, he had found nothing that provoked interest except some shavings from a wood much heavier and darker than the oak, fir, and pine that almost everyone seemed to be using. Nor did it match the various half-finished tables, benches, table-lamp bases, rolling pins, and kitchen shelves racked in the workshop storeroom. Leaphorn put a sample of it in an envelope and into his pocket. Later he would find someone to explain it. Or perhaps he would simply forget it. It had more relevance to his personal curiosity than to this homicide investigation.

  It had always seemed to Leaphorn that the question without a satisfactory answer in this affair was why it had happened. If a man was drunk enough, not much motive was required. But Ahkeah had to have had some reason. Dilly suggested that he'd run out of whiskey money, had come here to borrow from Dorsey, had been turned down, and had killed Dorsey in the resulting rage. And if a drunk Ahkeah's reason had been money, why hadn't he sold the silver ingots he'd taken? It would have been easy enough to cash them in. Why stash them away in a box under his house? Any pawnshop in Gallup or Grants, or any of the places that sold supplies to jewelers, would buy them. Or, if he was worried about the sale being traced, Ahkeah probably knew a dozen Navajos or Zunis or Acomas or Lagunas-white people, too, for that matter-who were making silver stuff and who wouldn't ask questions if the price was right.

  Leaphorn still had motive on his mind as he worked his way methodically through the grade books he'd found in a workbench drawer. He was reading the man's notes on class projects when he heard Father Haines. The priest was standing hesitantly at the door, a thin, gray man, slightly bent.

  "Any luck?"

  "None," said Leaphorn, who had never believed in luck. He motioned Haines toward the chair beside him and carefully removed the cube-shaped form from the drawer. "You have any idea what this form is for?"

  Father Haines inspected it, frowned, shook his head. "It looks like there might have been some writing pressed down in there. Maybe it was some sort of medal. A trophy for something."

  "It looks like the wrong shape," Leaphorn said. "I think it must have been something sort of round-like a small billiard ball. A silver ball."

  "He always tried to get the kids to make useful things. Or things they could sell." Haines laughed. "I think Bonaventure School is flooding the market with authentic Navajo sand-cast silver belt buckles and bracelets and so forth."

  "And it sounds like-" Leaphorn tapped Dorsey's class notes. "-these kids were making pretty good stuff."

  Haines laughed. "Actually, some of them were. Some of these kids are really talented. But Eric had this policy of trying to make these youngsters feel a little more artistic than they actually were. I don't think he ever saw a student-made belt buckle he couldn't find something good to say about."

  "There wasn't much turquoise here," Leaphorn said. "Was it all accounted for?"

  "Probably. He didn't ever have much. No budget for it. If one of the boys was doing something special, he'd usually just dig up some money and buy some stones in Gallup." Haines paused. "You don't think Eugene did it, do you?"

  "I don't know. You saw the box they found under his place. It looks like he was the one."

  They thought about it. Father Haines had been on the reservation long enough to have learned from the Dineh something that some whites never learn in a lifetime-that there's nothing wrong with mutual silence. The clock above the door made one of those sounds that old electric clocks sometimes make. The high notes of a shout and a dog barking drifted faintly through the glass. All the smells of a high-school crafts shop were in the air around them-machine oil, wood shavings, resin, turpentine, wax, paint, sawdust. Healthy smells, Leaphorn thought, that covered up the smell of a good man's blood.

  "Last winter Eric and some of the rest of us had gone down to that big Giant Truck Stop beside Interstate 40. We were having dinner at the coffee shop there. Eric got a phone call. Some kid-one of Eugene's nephews-was calling from here to tell him that Eugene was having car trouble. So Eric wraps his hamburger and his fries in a napkin and says he has to go. I remember I said, 'Eugene can wait a little while. Sit down and finish your supper.' And I said, 'He's probably half-drunk anyway-feeling no pain.' And Eric said, 'Yeah, that's why I've got to hurry.'"

  "So you don't think Eugene killed him."

  "I don't know," Haines said. "With whiskey involved, you can't tell. Mothers kill their children when they're drunk. Or drink when they're pregnant, which is about as bad as killing them."

  But, Leaphorn was thinking, even with whiskey there has to be some sort of reason. Something to ignite the lethal rage. He extracted the envelope from his pocket, shook the shaving onto his palm, and showed it to the priest. "Any idea what that's from?"

  "It looks like it came off a table leg or something like that. It looks like a shaving from a lathe."

  "What kind of wood?"

  Haines inspected it. "Dark and tough," he said. "I know what it's not. It's not any kind of pine, or fir, or cedar, or oak unless there's some species that has a darker color. It's not redwood. I'm pretty sure it's not mahogany and I know it's not maple."

  "Something exotic," Leaphorn said. "Maybe teak or ebony or something like that."

  "I guess so," Haines said. "I have an idea that ebony is real black and teak's lighter. Maybe ebony. But I'm no expert."

  "How often is this room swept out? Cleaned?"

  "Every evening," Haines said. "Dorsey did it himself. He was a very neat man." He made a gesture taking in all the room. "Normally if you walked in here when a class wasn't in session you'd find it slick as a whistle. No sawdust anywhere. Working surfaces all clear. Everything in its place. Not like this." He made a disapproving face at the cluttered room. "But after we found Eric's body, and the police came, they asked us to lock the room and not touch anything until the investigation was finished."

  Leaphorn laid the shaving on the desk. "There was quite a bit of this dark stuff over by the lathe and some more of it over on the bench with the woodworking vise. So I guess it had to get there the morning he was killed."

  "Yes," Haines said. "Eric always swept up. And he used one of those shop vacuums and a dust cloth. He said that was one of the things he wanted to teach the kids. You want to be a craftsman, or an artist, you have to be organized. You have to be neat."

  "Did he allow some of the students to take out the projects they were working on?"

  Haines looked surprised. "I don't think so," he said. "Maybe if they were sanding something. Something they could do at home. But the silversmithing projects, we kept them locked up in the storeroom."

  Leaphorn touched the shaving with his finger. He said, "I searched through the storeroom, and every place in here I can think of. I can't find anything that looks like this wood."

  "Oh," said Father Haines. He considered. "Maybe one of the students was working on-" He left the sentence unfinished.

  "Maybe," Leaphorn said. "We'll talk to the students and find out what everybody was doing in woodworking. But Dorsey kept a list of what the kids were making. Nothing looked like it would be using a fancy wood."

  "So you're thinking that maybe-"

  "I'm thinking I'll take another look around Eugene Ahkeah's place to see if I can find it there."

  And he was also thinking that he would do a little crossing of jurisdictional lines. Dilly Streib could arrange it for him. They'd make a trip to Tano Pueblo just as Jim Chee had suggested in that memo he'd left. Leaphorn had decided as soon as he'd read it that he wanted to find out what was in the wagon the clown was pulling. What was it that had caused the people of Tano to quit laughing and suddenly become serious? And he wanted to see if he could find something made of heavy, dark wood in the place where Francis Sayesva stayed when he came home to Tano. Came home to educ
ate his people, or maybe to warn them about something. And to die.

  15

  SAMMIE YAZZIE seemed to be in charge of radio station KNDN when Chee pulled up off of Farmington's Main Street into the parking lot. He was about Chee's age, with a neat mustache, a short haircut, and a harassed look. If he had enjoyed the excitement of broadcasting a confession earlier in the day it had worn off long ago.

  "I don't know what else I can tell you. Like I told the deputy, and the Farmington police, and the state cops, and the tribal policeman who got here this morning, the guy just walked in and went to the open mike there and did his thing."

  "I've got the police report," Chee said, displaying the copy he picked up at the Farmington police station. "It gives the facts: medium-sized, middle-aged male, probably Navajo, dressed in jeans and jean jacket and billed cap with CAT symbol on crown, wearing dark-rimmed glasses, driving a dirty green pickup, possibly Ford 150 or Dodge Ram. Parked in front, walked in, went to the open mike, said he wanted to broadcast an announcement. Was told to wait until end of record. Waited. Was given signal. Then he made his statement, walked out. Drove away. Right?"

  "Right," Yazzie said. "That's what happened. Except I think Ellie told the officers that she couldn't read the license plate when she went to the window to look. And the bumper sticker."

  "Yeah. That's in here." He read again: "'License obscured by dirt. Witness noticed sticker on tailgate: ERNIE is THE GREATEST.' That's a funny thing to put on a sticker. You have any idea where it's from?"

  Yazzie shrugged. "That's a new one to me. Maybe it's one of those you get made up. Like, 'My kid's an honor student at Farmington High.' Or 'My kid can whip your honor student at Farmington High.'"

  "Maybe," Chee said. "How about shoes? Boots?"

  "You better talk to Ellie," Yazzie said. "She got the best look at him."

  Ellie looked like she was about a year out of high school and was still enjoying talking to cops-especially a good-looking young cop.

  "Boots?" she said, and closed her eyes to show that she was thinking hard and had long, pretty eyelashes. "No. He had on high-top work shoes. I remember because I noticed he had tracked in dirt and I looked."

  "Anything else? That might be useful?"

  "How would the boots be useful?"

  "Well," Chee said. "What if he was wearing tall lace-up boots? That might tell us he worked for the telephone company. Or the power company. A lineman. Pole climber."

  "Oh," Ellie said. "Or if he wore those big heavy shoes with the steel cap in the toe, maybe for the pipeline company."

  "Right," Chee said, returning her grin. "Now if we're lucky you'll remember he had a patch on his jacket that said MEMBER SAN JUAN COUNTY SHERIFF'S POSSE, or LIONS CLUB. Something easy like that."

  Ellie displayed her eyelashes again, deep in thought. "No," she said. "I just remember he looked sort of nervous and scared, but that's not unusual. Lot of people are nervous when they pick up the mike. You know. About to broadcast on the radio. And he was kind of old."

  Chee looked at the report. "It says middle-aged here. Was he older than middle-aged?"

  "That's kind of old," she said, and shrugged. "You know. Maybe past thirty. And nervous."

  It would be natural to be nervous, Chee was thinking, when you're going to tell the world you killed somebody.

  "Nervous, you said. But he didn't ask anybody how to use the microphone? How to turn it on? How far to hold it from his face? Any of that?"

  "I don't think so."

  "He just picked it up and seemed to know how to do all the right things?"

  "Yeah," she said. "I didn't think about that. Some of the people who come in to make announcements need to be told. You know, they're from out in the country. Wanting to announce a funeral, or a sing, or a Girl Dance, or a meeting of the grazing committee at their chapter house. Something like that. And they don't know anything about using a microphone."

  "One other thing," Chee said. "I understand these open mike announcements are taped while they're broadcast."

  "That's a government requirement," Ellie said. "We have to do that. It's automatic."

  "Could I get a copy?"

  "We already made one for the sheriff," Ellie said. "And for the Farmington cops."

  "How about for me?"

  Ellie inspected him, and giggled. "Why not?" she said. "You'll have to wait a minute."

  While he waited, Chee peered out into the parking lot at his pickup and the other vehicles there. Through the glass at this range he couldn't read the COURTEOUS DRIVING SAVES LIVES or the BUCKLE UP, IT'S THE LAW stickers on his own bumper. He made out the National Rifle Association membership sticker on the adjoining truck only because it was familiar. If Ellie had read the Ernie sticker on the suspect's truck it must have been printed large. He'd ask about that when she got back, which was at that very moment.

  "Here it is," she said, handing him a cassette. "No charge to a policeman."

  "Thanks," Chee said. "You remember where the man's pickup was parked?"

  "Right there," she said, pointing. "The nearest spot."

  "You're certain about what the bumper sticker said? The report says the truck was muddy. There was dirt on the license plate."

  "Not on the sticker," Ellie said. "It looked brand-new. And it was great big. The letters, I mean."

  "Well," Chee said, "thanks a lot." He handed her two cards, one identifying him as a Navajo Tribal Policeman and giving his office number, the other identifying him as a hataalii and a singer of the Blessing Way and giving the number of the telephone in his trailer. "Home and office," he explained. "Would you give me a call if you think of anything else? Anything at all that might help me find this guy."

  "The only other thing I can think of that was funny was the cap he had on." Ellie blinked at him, exposing eyelashes against a smooth cheek.

  "Funny like how?"

  "I don't mean ha-ha funny. Funny strange. It was one of those baseball caps like everybody wears but it looked like somebody had sat on the bill. It went out straight from the crown and then it was bent up, like this." Ellie raised her right hand to her forehead. She recreated with her fingers the oddly bent cap bill. "It looked like the bill was broken." She made a disapproving face.

  "That was a good thing to notice," Chee said, smiling at her. "It's the sort of unusual thing which might help us find him. Can you think of anything else?"

  Ellie's expression said she was trying. She thought of something, considered it, looked doubtful, went back to thinking.

  "You thought of something," Chee said. "What was it?"

  She giggled. "I don't see how this will help. But I remember the funny way he smelled." She wrinkled her nose, and laughed. "He smelled like onions."

  "I'll bet he'd been eating a hamburger," Chee said. "Maybe a Lottaburger. They have lots of onions." Which was the reason Chee favored them himself.

  "No," she said. "It was morning. And it was his clothing, I think. Strong enough to make your eyes water." She was looking at the cards he'd given her. "You're a hataalii," she said, looking up at him. "Really? I didn't know you can be a medicine man and a policeman at the same time."

  "I'm beginning to think you can't," Chee said.

  16

  ON HIS WAY out to his pickup Chee decided his next step would be to check places in Farmington where bumper stickers were printed. Probably he'd find no more than one or two. He'd ask at the city police station and check the telephone book. And when he'd found the one that had printed the ERNIE is THE GREATEST business he would have another shot at finding the cold-blooded bastard he was looking for. Then he'd complete this investigation. He'd make the arrest. He would impress Lieutenant Leaphorn, sew on his sergeant stripes, and add about five hundred bucks to his monthly income. Then he would be in much better shape to persuade Janet to marry him.

  In better shape, that is, if the Hunger People Clan didn't link with one of his own and make her his sister and therefore sexually taboo. And if Janet would forgive
him for the clumsy way he'd handled that. If he'd done it as badly as he remembered, that didn't seem likely. Finally, there was the original question of whether a sophisticated, urbane graduate of Stanford Law School and member of the bar would marry a sheep camp boy turned cop, under any circumstances.

  And what if she was a clan sister? What would he do then? Chee didn't want to think about it. He drove down Main toward the police station deliberately not thinking about it. Instead, he got himself better organized mentally on the Lieutenant Leaphorn front. Leaphorn had made it abundantly clear that his help would not be welcomed by the BIA nor by the Albuquerque FBI in the Sayesva homicide. "Stay away from Tano" was the lieutenant's final instruction.