Los Alamos

by Joseph Kanon

  “But you don’t like mysteries,” she said.

  “I don’t like this one.”

  She laid her head back again. “Is it so important to you? He’s dead, isn’t he? Like my Indians. What does it matter what happened to them?”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  “I suppose not. But sometimes—oh, why not let things be? Let them be mysteries.” She looked out the window, arguing with the landscape.

  “This didn’t happen eight hundred years ago. Whoever killed him is still around.”

  “I thought he was robbed in the park. Whoever did it must be long gone.”

  “Maybe. Maybe he’s on the Hill.”

  She was silent. “Is that what you think?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “That’s horrible. Then it wouldn’t be an accident—some robbery, I mean. You think someone murdered him? Planned to kill him?”

  He was quiet for a minute, thinking. “Planned? That’s interesting. No, I don’t think so. Not planned. I think it just—happened.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “He may have provoked someone. Like the snake,” he said, a sudden thought. “They only attack if they’re provoked. Isn’t that what you said?”

  “Well, surprised. They’re defending themselves, that’s all.”

  “Yes,” he said, his voice drifting off again.

  “Anyway, it wasn’t a snake. Murder,” she said softly. “No. Why would anyone want to murder Karl?”

  But he wasn’t listening.

  “What is it?” she said, bringing him back.

  “What you said. I hadn’t thought of that. What if he surprised someone?”

  “Doing what?” she said. He didn’t answer. “I hate all this. It scares me. You just want to believe he was murdered. It’s too absurd. Things like that don’t happen.”

  “Yes they do.”

  “Not here.” And then, before he could contradict her, “But why not a robber? It’s the obvious answer.”

  “I thought you didn’t approve of obvious answers.”

  “But you’re just guessing. Is that how this works? You make a guess and see if it fits?”

  “No,” he said, “that’s how science works, or so they tell me. I need a little more than that.”

  She looked over at him. “Is that why you’re here? It is, isn’t it.”

  “The army just wants to know what happened.”

  She turned away to look out the window again. “So you’ll turn over every rock in the place. I wonder what else you’ll find.”

  “I haven’t found anything yet,” he said lightly. “Not even one skeleton in the closet.”

  She looked back at him. “Be careful you don’t surprise someone too.”

  “That would be one way of finding out, wouldn’t it?”

  “I’m serious.”

  “So am I,” he said, still light. “Don’t worry, I can take care of myself.”

  “God, listen to you. It must be the Irish cop in you.”

  “Which don’t you like, the Irish or the cop?”

  She smiled. “The cop, I suppose.”

  “Good. Not much I can do about the Irish. We can retire the cop, though. Today, anyway.”

  She shook her head. “Maybe it’s all of a piece.” She laughed. “I never thought I’d end up going to bed with a cop.”

  “Technically speaking, we haven’t actually been to bed yet,” he said, smiling.

  She put her hand on his knee, a promise. “No, we haven’t, have we?”

  “You’ll make me go off the road,” he said, turning to her.

  It was then, his eyes off the road, that they hit the rock. There was a loud pop, as startling as gunfire, then the sudden lurch as they felt the car swerve to the right, sinking to the flapping tire.

  “Christ,” Connolly said, stopping the car. “Now what the hell do we do? Do you have a spare?”

  “In the boot.”

  “Christ. He got out to look.

  “Can you fix it?”

  “This one’s shot,” he reported. “We’ll have to change it.” He looked around the empty landscape in the dwindling light. “Do you have a jack?”

  “Whatever’s back there. There’s some sort of toolbox, I think.” She opened the trunk. “This? I don’t know what any of it is. What’s the matter—don’t you?”

  “I’ll figure it out.”

  “I thought Americans knew everything about cars.”

  He didn’t answer but instead started struggling with the jack, trying to assemble the handle, and getting down to look under the chassis.

  “Can you manage it, do you think?” she said.

  “Let’s hope so. Unless you want to spend the night.”

  “Can I help?”

  “You can stand out of the light.” He looked up. “What’s so funny?”

  “You. Nothing. You should see your face. Like a cross little boy. Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”

  “I’ve seen it done. You have a better idea?”

  “I could walk back to the ranger station and bat my eyelids and get him to fix it. He’d come like a shot.”

  “I’ll figure it out,” he said, fixing the jack in place.

  She sighed. “Men. What makes you all like that, anyway?”

  “Like what?” he said, only half paying attention.

  “You never want to ask for help. Directions. A man will never ask directions. Just drive round and round and never ask.”

  “Want to hand me that?” he asked, pointing to a wrench. She jumped up, ready to help.

  “Scalpel,” she said, handing it to him. “Sponge.”

  He looked up at her. “You’re having fun.”

  “I know. Isn’t it awful? I am. I’ve always wondered what it would be like, stuck in the middle of nowhere. Rather exciting.”

  “It’s going to be a lot more exciting if we don’t fix this before it gets dark.”

  “Never mind. We can always sleep in the car.”

  “There’s something to look forward to,” he said absently, unscrewing the lugs on the wheel.

  “Oh, poor Michael, still longing for bed. Jinxed, that’s what it is. Still, there’s always the car. I’ve never done it in a car, have you?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes.”

  “Really? What’s it like?”

  He stared at the wheel, trying to determine the next step. “Right now, I don’t know which is more annoying, you or this tire.”

  “All right,” she said, “I’ll be quiet. That’s the thanks one gets for being cheerful. What is it like, though? In a car.”

  “Cramped.”

  She got a cigarette out of the car, then sat near him, watching him work. The heat had gone with the sun and she drew her legs up, huddling over them and smiling to herself in unexpected contentment. After a while he needed the flashlight, so she held it for him, training its beam on the tire while she studied his face in the shadow.

  “I wonder what else you can’t do,” she said, “besides fix cars. I mean, I don’t know anything about you. What do you like? What are your politics? Why aren’t you in the army, for instance?”

  “Eyes. I have a lazy muscle in my left.”

  “What’s that? You mean you don’t see properly?”

  “No, the right compensates. It’s not serious, just serious enough to keep me out of the army. They figured I’d make a lousy shot.”

  “Did that bother you?”

  “For about ten minutes. Then I felt grateful. There, now you know something I’ve never told anyone.”

  “What else?” she said softly.

  “I don’t know. Hate team sports, except baseball. Not very handy fixing things around the house either. That help?”

  She shook her head. “Uh-uh.”

  “What, then?”

  “Nothing, I guess.”

  “That’s a load off my mind,” he said absently, still concentrating on the lugs. “Damn.” The wrench clattered to the
ground.

  “Have a break,” she said, handing him her cigarette. His sunburned face glistened with sweat in the narrow light. “This is jolly, isn’t it?” She looked around and up at the sprinkling of early stars. “I love the desert at night. It comes alive then.”

  “Don’t tell me with what.” He took a drag on the cigarette, following her gaze upward, then settling back on her face.

  “There, that’s better,” she said. “We may as well enjoy it.”

  “What, breaking down?”

  “Mm. Being marooned. Can you think of a better way to get to know someone?”

  “Hundreds.” He handed back the cigarette. “Is that why we’re here? To get to know each other?”

  “It’s away. I wanted to get away. From the Hill. I couldn’t know you there.”

  “And now you do.”

  “A little. You always learn something out here.”

  “Such as?”

  “All sorts of things. You’re stubborn. You like to finish things.”

  “Don’t you?”

  She paused for a minute. “Not always. Sometimes I just—walk away. Go somewhere else.”

  “Stubborn. That’s not much.”

  “And you’re jealous.”

  “Of whom?”

  “The ranger.”

  “Well, he was after you.”

  She smiled. “You see? That’s what I mean.”

  “You just didn’t notice.”

  “Oh, I noticed all right. That was just cabin fever, you know.”

  “Cabin fever. He couldn’t take his eyes off you.”

  “Window shopping,” she said. “There’s a difference. One can tell. Like you.”

  “I’m that obvious.”

  She nodded. “Your eyes.”

  “When?”

  “At the ranch, the music—every time. I always feel your eyes.”

  “Do you like that?” he said, his eyes touching her now, moving over her face.

  “What do you think?” She leaned forward to kiss him. “But you are jealous.”

  “I can’t believe everybody doesn’t see you the way I do.”

  “Oh, that’s nice,” she said, kissing him again. “Tell me some more.”

  “Are you flirting with me?” he whispered, his breath close to her.

  “No, I told you,” she said, brushing his cheek, “I’m just getting to know you. Isn’t it lovely here? This place? Didn’t I tell you?”

  Then he kissed her full on the mouth, she lay back on the packed earth, and there it was again, the quickness to his touch, as if her whole body were always waiting for even a trace of a signal. He lay over her, his elbow poking into the ground, everything dark except for a sliver of moonlight. His feet felt the rim of the tire behind them.

  They heard the car before the headlights swept up the road, catching them in the beams like the surprise flash of a camera. Connolly looked up, his eyes dazzled, then rose to his knees, brushing himself off as he stood.

  “You folks all right?” the ranger said, pretending he had not seen. Connolly caught the eager tremor in his voice. He got out, keeping his motor running, his lights still shining on the small screen of an unexpected blue movie.

  “Flat tire,” Emma said, getting up and dusting her blouse, her voice cool and matter-of-fact.

  “Well, sure,” the ranger said. “These roads. Let me give you a hand. Lucky I happened along.”

  “Yes, isn’t it?” Emma said, and Connolly could hear the faint beginnings of laughter.

  The ranger looked at her, not quite sure whether he should grin, then at Connolly to see what would be allowed. But neither said anything, and Connolly saw him fall into awkwardness, backing away from the silence with an embarrassed shuffle, as if he were the one who’d been caught. For a moment they stood there, listening to the hum of the idling motor, unable to move. In a second, Connolly knew, Emma would laugh, turning the scene, the ranger’s own excitement, into an off-color joke. But suddenly the ranger took charge, bending down to inspect the tire, moving the spare into place. Emma watched, amused, as he twirled the lug wrench, fitting the tire with sure, swift movements in some exaggerated sexual display of competence. Connolly stood nearby, not even asked to help, frowning as he followed the performance. Then, in a minute, the ranger pumped the handle of the jack and lowered the car with an absurd sigh of climax. He stood up, wiping his hands on his pants.

  “There. That ought to hold it. You want to be careful in the desert. Not a place to be at night.”

  Connolly glanced at him, alert to innuendo, but the ranger had lapsed into official courtesy, unaware of any effect he might have had.

  “You best follow me out. I’ll just go on ahead. Holler if you need anything.” And then, his point made, he swung into the carryall and started down the road.

  Emma looked at Connolly, her eyes laughing. “Well, there you are,” she said, wiping her hands against each other as if she had done the job.

  “Cabin fever, my ass,” Connolly said, throwing the tools in the trunk and slamming it.

  So they drove north for half an hour in the path of the ranger’s red taillights, dipping and swerving while Emma coaxed Connolly into the laughter of a private joke. The stars rolled out in front of them, the darkness dissolving the horizon so that everything was sky. Connolly hunched over the wheel, watching for holes in the road, and when they finally reached the pavement of the highway and waved goodbye to the ranger, his shoulders were sore. They had the road to themselves again, the Nageezi post no more than a darkened shadow when they passed it. Emma fiddled with the radio, but in all this space even the soundwaves seemed to have been swallowed by the dark, trapped on the other side of some tall unseen mesa.

  “I could use a drink,” he said.

  “It’s Indian land. Not a drop for miles. Maybe when we get to Madrid.”

  “Will anything be open by then?”

  She ignored him, leaning closer to the open window. “You can smell the sage.”

  “We have to eat sometime.”

  “Hmm,” she said, but her voice was content, as if the rich night air were enough.

  And after a while he didn’t mind either, following the small circle of their headlights in a trance. Once he saw a rabbit bounce near the side of the road, but then it vanished, just a dreamy speck of white, and they were alone again. He forgot the time, stretched out now to match the distance so that they became interchangeable, and the car sailed lazily by itself through both. There were no signs or markers. They had driven off the map.

  It was almost another hour before he saw the light, a firefly wink, and then a candle until, finally, it became shafts of light pouring out the windows of a long building. A few dusty pickup trucks were parked alongside, their hoods catching the dim neon reflection of a beer advertisement. When they got out of the car, he could hear Western music. The place was as raw and makeshift as the buildings on the Hill, and for a moment he was afraid he had imagined it. There seemed no reason for it to be here in the empty landscape, just something conjured up because they were tired and hungry.

  Inside, there was a brightly lit general store and next to it a dimmer bar area filled with smoke, beer signs, a gaudy swirl of jukebox, and a few wooden booths that looked filled with slivers. At the far end of the bar several Indians in jeans and ranch shirts were drinking silently, barely talking to one another, the bar in front of them a sea of beer bottles. Nearer the door, two old ranchers in Western hats were parked on stools. Everyone looked up when they came in. The Indians quickly retreated into their quiet huddle, but the ranchers looked openly at Emma, then smiled and tipped their hats. Behind the bar was a tall Indian woman, clearly of mixed blood, her long Anglo face set off by unexpected high cheekbones and long braided hair. Her breasts, drooping from years of nursing, spilled into a white blouse decorated with beads.

  “Can we get a drink?” Connolly asked.

  “Sure,” she said, her face as expressionless as her voice. Without asking, she s
et up a boilermaker of whiskey and a beer. There was no sign of anything else. Connolly handed one whiskey to Emma.

  “You’re like to catch your death in them shorts,” one of the ranchers said to Emma, nodding toward her legs.

  “Like ’em?” Emma said, stepping back to display them.

  The rancher laughed, surprised at her boldness. “I guess I do.”

  Emma took a drink. “Thanks. Me too. That’s why I keep them to myself.”

  The rancher laughed again. “Well, I guess so.” Then, to Connolly, “I don’t mean nothing by it. You don’t see that every day around here.”

  “Oh, I don’t mind a look,” Emma said.

  “Well, I guess not,” the rancher said good-naturedly. “Where you folks coming from so late?”

  “Chaco.”

  “Well, now, isn’t that something? I thought they closed it. Not too many goes out there these days. With the gas. They say it’s real nice, though.” Everybody in the West, it seemed to Connolly, wanted to talk. Only the movie cowboys were silent.

  “I know it’s late,” he said to the woman behind the bar. “Is there anything to eat?”

  She hesitated.

  “Come on, Louise,” the rancher said, “you give these nice folks some of that stew. Ain’t nobody here going home anyways.”

  “Anything would be fine,” Connolly said to her.

  “Sure,” she said, pouring two more whiskeys. She pointed to a booth.

  “Nice meeting you. That’s a pretty wife you got there,” the rancher said to both of them. “You ought to cover her up, though. Never know who you’re gonna run into.”

  “Oh, she can usually take care of herself.”

  The rancher found this funny. “I’ll bet she can. Yes, sir.” His eyes followed them as they went over to the booth to nurse their drinks.

  “Another window shopper?” Connolly said, smiling.

  “Well, this one might be after a sample. Not like our Boy Scout.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh, he’s harmless. He just wants watching.”

  “Can you always tell?”

  “Of course. Any woman can. It’s what we’re trained for.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He looked at her, aware now of the drink. The booth seemed surrounded by a faint haze. He took another sip. “What do you think this stuff is?”