The Shaman Sings (Charlie Moon Mysteries)

by James D. Doss

  “You could cut a much better deal if you unlock these cuffs. The FBI and tribal police are on their way,” Parris said, “probably show up any minute now.”

  Dexter’s eyes narrowed; his pinched face turned pale. “If that’s true, perhaps I should pull the trigger now, have done with it. The old Indian witch won’t be able to hide forever.… I’ll come back and find her another day. I have, you understand … supernatural assistance.” He pushed the shotgun muzzle into Parris’s face. “If you wish to beg for your life, I might change my mind.”

  Parris knew what the buckshot would do to his face. He clenched his hands into fists to keep them from trembling.

  Dexter waited; there was no response. “So you won’t beg. Laudable. Any last words at all, then? A pithy phrase I can remember when—”

  “Yeah,” Parris rasped, “kiss my ass!”

  The madman’s finger tightened on the shotgun trigger; Parris ground his teeth and waited for the explosion. His mind screamed as he anticipated the discharge, a blinding flash of pain, then dark oblivion.

  It did not come. Dexter studied the shotgun with an expression of bewilderment. Parris realized why he remained among the living. A mere detail: The safety was on.

  Parris licked his dry lips. “Well, don’t that beat all,” he offered lamely. “I forgot to load it.”

  Dexter grunted impatiently and pitched the shotgun onto the table. As it landed, the policeman noticed a pronounced wobble of the table leg nearest his right hand. The leg was loose. Very loose.

  Dexter pulled the small revolver from his pocket. He raised it to aim carefully at a point between Parris’s eyes. His movements were deliberate; this was a moment to be relished. He thumbed the hammer back. Something, perhaps a raccoon, clattered across the roof of the trailer. It was just enough to distract the physicist, who glanced toward the ceiling.

  Parris swung his right arm in a long arc, ripping the leg from the rickety wooden table. Time shifted into slow motion. He followed through until the heavy cylinder of wood connected solidly with Dexter’s shin. The madman’s howl was punctuated by the deafening crack of the revolver as the slug passed through the oven door half an inch from Parris’s left ear. As Dexter fell, the table also toppled, spilling the shotgun onto the floor. Parris flung the table leg, missing Dexter’s head by a whisker, then grabbed the shotgun by the stock. He pressed the safety button just as Dexter saw the barrel of the twelve-gauge swinging in his direction. The physicist lunged for the door as Parris pulled the trigger. The policeman’s aim was high, but he saw the fabric of Dexter’s trousers rip as a round of buckshot penetrated his buttocks. The man’s scream was barely louder than Parris’s angry roar. The policeman swung the shotgun barrel close to his cuffed left hand and pumped another shell into the chamber.

  He raised the barrel to get off another shot. Too late. Dexter had been swallowed up by darkness. The wind caught the door, swinging it back and forth like a great pendulum, banging it against the metal door frame. Would he have another chance? Dexter might enter the trailer by the bedroom door, use Anne as a hostage. Parris strained to consider the possibilities. Every second was an eternity while he considered his options: He dare not take his finger off the shotgun trigger, but it was essential to lift the stove leg off the handcuff. Every time the door swung open, Dexter had a chance to fire the pistol from the darkness. Parris made his decision. The first order of business was to get loose from the stove leg. Then the odds would be in his favor. He dropped the shotgun into his lap, got a firm grip on the stove, and gathered his energy to lift it.

  Parris was interrupted by a presence … a sudden palpable stillness … a deadly quiet. He thought he saw a shadow flicker across the porch. Was someone on the steps? No, there was no creaking sound from the wooden steps. It had to be his imagination. He gritted his teeth and pulled on the stove until he thought his finger joints would dislocate. There were creaking sounds as sheet metal bent; he had the stove almost high enough to free himself, but the handcuff was caught under the tip of the metal leg. He released his left hand from the stove, hoping to snatch the cuff from under the leg, but a single arm was not strong enough to do the job.

  There, as the door was swinging open, was the shadow again. It was very real, this shadow of … a man? There was no more time to get free.

  The stove came crashing down, the handcuff still secured by the leg. “Son of a bitch,” he muttered in desperation. He would not be shot like a fish in a barrel. Parris grabbed the shotgun with his right hand, set the butt against the floor, and aimed at the plastic light fixture on the ceiling. He yanked the trigger. There was an explosion as the buckshot shattered the light fixture and opened a ragged hole in the ceiling. He heard a startled grunt and a dull thud as someone fell off the porch. Shards of razor-sharp glass from the sixty-watt lightbulbs stung Parris’s face, but now he was protected by the darkness. He pumped another load of buckshot into the twelve-gauge chamber. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he could see the snow-sprinkled landscape outside the trailer each time the wind whipped the door open. The open door that had been an invitation for Dexter when the light was on would now be a portal of darkness.

  Now … let him come. This was no longer police business. This was personal. In his growing fury, Parris fervently hoped Dexter had recently had a full meal; he would gut-shoot the miserable bastard.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Parris leveled the pump shotgun at the door. “Come on in, you sorry son of a bitch,” he muttered to himself, “and I’ll cut you in half.”

  There was a slight pause before a deep voice answered. “Well thanks for the invite, pardner, but I s’pose I’d just as soon stay out here if you intend to shoot me.”

  He released the pressure against the trigger. “Who the hell is that?”

  “Sergeant Charlie Moon, Southern Ute Tribal Police. Are you Parris? The cop from Granite Creek?”

  He lowered the gun barrel. “Yeah. You better get inside; there’s an armed lunatic out there somewhere.

  This time, the steps groaned as the policeman climbed to the small porch. As the Ute policeman’s flashlight beam illuminated the kitchen, Parris laid the shotgun aside and used both hands to tug on the stove. Sergeant Moon closed the door and whistled as he swept the beam over the debris on the floor and then to the wrecked remains of the ceiling light. “Aunt Daisy’s sure gonna be pissed off when she sees this mess. Her table’s broke and you shot a big hole clean through the roof. If I was you, I’d make myself plenty scarce before she gets back. I’m not foolin’; she’ll likely kick your butt up between your shoulders.”

  Parris pulled the handcuff from under the metal support as Charlie Moon lifted the gas stove with one hand. “My man must’ve called hours ago; what took you so long?”

  Moon’s tone was good-humored. “Well, I just couldn’t get away. Us redskins were having this big dance to make us some rain and…”

  Parris smiled sheepishly. “Sorry. I’ve had a bad day. I expected to meet you when I got here, find out you had this thing all wrapped up. Instead, I had a set-to with this citizen who intended to stop my clock.”

  Moon accepted the apology. “Took us a while to get things sorted out. Your man called the wrong Ute reservation.”

  Parris rubbed his legs to coax some circulation into his numb muscles. “Slocum strikes out again.”

  “The Ute Mountain cops called our dispatcher; we finally put it all together after we called Granite Creek PD and had a talk with your guy. We figured you must be on your way to see Aunt Daisy.” Moon attempted to prop the table up with the disconnected leg. “What’s the situation here? Aunt Daisy all right?”

  “Mrs. Perika’s hiding in a shelter on the mesa; I expect she’s safe enough if she keeps still.” Parris found his keys and unlocked the cuff dangling from his left wrist. “Arnold Dexter is outside. White male, about five ten, one seventy. He’s packing a twenty-two revolver and some buckshot in his ass, so I expect he’d like to shoot somebody.”

>   “Seems like everybody around here is trigger-happy,” Moon said. “I almost wet my britches when you fired that scattergun through the roof.”

  “Sorry about that, Sergeant.” The Ute knew he wasn’t. “A friend of mine is in the bedroom.” He felt the lump in his throat. “We better go have a look at her.” Parris reluctantly followed the Ute to the bedroom. Anne was vainly attempting to get to her feet. Moon lifted her onto the bed and gently pressed a wiener-sized finger under her jaw. “Pulse kinda jumpy, but strong.” He ran his hand over her skull and she winced with pain. “Good-sized lump, could have a concussion. No bleeding, though.”

  Anne pushed herself up on one elbow. “I think,” she said weakly, “my head is going to fall off.”

  Parris, overcome with relief, leaned over and touched her hand. It was moments before he found his voice. “It was Dexter. We’ll need to get you looked at.” He turned to Moon. “Can you take her to a safe spot?”

  The Ute helped Anne to her feet. “There’s a nurse lives a couple of miles from here.”

  Anne leaned on Moon’s arm, gradually assimilating her thoughts. “Professor Dexter? But what…”

  “Dexter was behind everything.” Parris remembered pumping the shotgun, but he checked to be certain. The chamber was loaded. He addressed his next comment to the Ute policeman. “That fruitcake’s still out there somewhere. We’d best be real careful.”

  “We’ll turn all the lights off,” Moon replied. “You give me some cover with that scattergun while I get her to the squad car. Once I’m on the road, I’ll radio in for some help. In an hour or so, we’ll have us a posse here.”

  “Dexter must have a vehicle hidden close by,” Parris said, “if he hasn’t already left in it. I’ll see if I can find—”

  Moon’s tone, reflecting the fact that Parris was in his jurisdiction, was authoritative. “You stay put. If this hombre shows himself, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t blow him away just for the sport of it. You shoot him, I’ll be filling out paperwork for weeks.”

  “Don’t fret, Sergeant. I’m a sworn officer of the law. I want this guy alive.” Like hell I do, he thought.

  “Like hell you do,” the Ute observed dryly, “but if you do shoot him, I’d better find the suspect dead as a stump and with a gun in his hand … any damn gun.” Moon disappeared into the night with Anne, apparently unconcerned that Dexter might take a potshot at his large frame. Parris followed closely, sweeping the twelve-gauge barrel in a wide arc, ready to fire at anything that might move in the shadows.

  After the sound of the Ute patrol car had faded into the night, Parris circled the trailer. Nothing was moving in the darkness, but Dexter was out there. He could feel the madman’s presence. Was the professor hunting for the shaman? It was time to check on Daisy.

  The juniper thicket cast stark inky shadows on the thin blanket of moonlit snow. A slight depression in the frosty whiteness caught his eye. Parris dropped to one knee to have a close look. A fresh set of footprints was visible in the snow. These had to be Dexter’s prints, and the lunatic was heading directly toward the foot of the mesa, where Daisy was hidden. The killer, of course, could be waiting in ambush. He followed the trail through the thicket, expecting to hear the sharp report of Dexter’s .22 at any moment. Parris’s finger rested lightly on the shotgun trigger.

  Now there was another set of prints beside Dexter’s. They were very small. A child’s footprints? But that made no sense at all. And who was following whom? He squatted to examine the trail. It was a roundish print, three or four inches long and not so sharply defined as Dexter’s shoe print. Moccasins? There was no question about who was doing the following. One small footprint had partially obliterated the crisp imprint of Dexter’s heel. Dexter was being followed. Or stalked? The policeman moved slowly along the trail in the snow, pausing at intervals to listen. The deep silence was unnerving.

  Parris slid down the bank of a small arroyo and followed the prints until the ravine opened onto a sloping meadow. Now there were dark marks on the snow; Parris squatted and picked up one of the splotches. He rolled it between his fingers. Congealed blood. That, he observed with satisfaction, would be from the buckshot in Dexter’s buttocks. He sprinted across the open meadow and was less than thirty yards into a sparse stand of juniper when he saw the Ute woman. Daisy was standing over something … a body. He trotted toward the woman. It was Dexter, facedown in the crystalline snow. Was the old woman praying or singing? Perhaps the two acts were one and the same for a Ute schooled in the old traditions. She fell silent as he approached.

  Parris dropped to one knee, using the pump shotgun as a support. He had not entirely conquered the weakness. His head seemed to spin as he tried to study the body. The physicist’s hands were stretched outward as if he had tried to break the fall. The seat of Dexter’s trousers was wet with blood. A couple of the buckshot had found their target. His face was suspended slightly above the snow-packed earth. There was a dark pool of something under Dexter’s face … blood congealed in the frosty snow. How could that be? The buckshot couldn’t possibly have hit the fleeing man in the face. No … the professor had fallen onto a broken juniper snag. A short broken branch had penetrated his left eye, was apparently embedded in his twisted brain. It was complete now, justice as understood in ancient Zion. Dexter’s eye for Priscilla’s eye. Ojo por ojo. There was, evidently, a harsh symmetry in the universe.

  Daisy began to sing again. The choppy Ute phrases recalled heroic deeds, tales of past ages … lost except to those who could hear the spirits whisper.

  Parris tried to move Dexter’s head, but it was firmly impaled on the dead branch. He felt the nausea returning. Why had he touched the corpse? To verify that the man was dead? That was hardly necessary. He sat down in the snow and held his head in his hands until the weakness passed. “Don’t touch the body, Mrs. Perika. The Ute cops and the Bureau boys will be all over this one; the fresher the crime scene, the better.” Daisy, a Ute to her core, had no intention of touching the corpse.

  He used the shotgun again, pushing himself to his feet. He backed away from the body and surveyed it in a professional manner. The crusty old sergeant from the South Side of Chicago had explained it to all of the rookies in those days when Parris was still moist behind the ears: “Never let on that you’re the least bit unsure of yourself, no matter what happens; you gotta act like you know what you’re doing or the civilians will panic.” He turned his attention to the Ute woman, whose face was without expression. No worry that this particular civilian would panic. “Looks like we finally had a break,” he said. “After all of this, he trips and falls. Now is that the luck of the Irish or what?”

  Daisy squatted by Dexter’s body, taking care that her skirt did not brush against the corpse. She pointed. “Look right there. See that?”

  Parris focused his flashlight on Dexter’s feet and felt a chill ripple along his spine. A vine was wrapped tightly around the man’s ankles. Several times. He hoped she could take a hint. “He must have tripped over the vine. You understand? It was an accident!”

  Daisy, misunderstanding his intentions, was incredulous at this white man’s apparent lack of understanding. Clara Tavishuts had told her aunt that the new man from Chicago was a clever policeman. “Look closer,” Daisy said patiently, “then tell me if you think it was an accident.”

  Silently praying that she wouldn’t confess to this killing, Parris dropped to his knees and ran his fingertips along Dexter’s ankles. The cord, wrapped around the man’s ankles, was braided from several strands of a pliable green vine. He felt something hard and smooth … a flat pebble the size of a hockey puck. He lifted Dexter’s feet and directed his flashlight beam onto a black stone. The vine passed through a hole in the pebble; it was held in place by a heavy knot on one side. A picture was gradually forming in his mind. Daisy had come down from her hideout, heard the shots, watched Dexter flee from the trailer. Somehow, she had flung the stone-weighted cord around his ankles. But at just the precise
instant for him to fall and impale himself in an ironic imitation of Priscilla Song’s death? But there it was, the warm corpse of the physicist, his sick brain penetrated by a dead branch.

  The FBI investigated all major crimes on Indian reservations. When the hotshots from the Bureau found the stone-weighted cord on the professor’s ankles, there would be no end to their searching questions. They would have only one suspect for this killing: the Ute shaman who had been threatened by the crazed scientist. It would surely be a case of justifiable homicide, self-defense, but Daisy could be tied up with the legal system for months, maybe longer. That possibility seemed terribly unjust. There was only one way to salvage some measure of justice. He unwrapped the vine from Dexter’s ankles, wound it around the heavy pebble, and offered it to Daisy. “Get rid of this, and forget you ever saw it. A Ute policeman has already shown up, Sergeant Moon. If the Bureau finds out I tampered with evidence, there’ll be hell to pay and I’ll get the whole bill. Understand?”

  “Sure.” She patted him on the shoulder and pocketed the evidence. “You’re a good man, for a matukach. But you don’t need to worry about me. Charlie Moon is one of my nephews. I used to change his diaper. Anyway, I can take care of myself.”

  That’s right, he thought. You manage to take care of yourself. Me, I’d be dead if it weren’t for a rickety table leg and an amateur criminal who didn’t know about the safety on a shotgun. Luck, or something. Deep down, he knew it was more than luck. But what? Did the angels, along with their duties to take care of children and drunks, also watch over careless cops? Was it a touch of grace?

  Daisy fixed her gaze on the big dipper, hanging above Three Sisters Mesa. Akwuch was indeed pouring out the stars. From some lofty precipice, Coyote yipped, and the sound was like raucous laughter. The dark Presence had been swept away from her homeland! For the first time in weeks, Daisy felt the harmony return. She tilted her head sideways, brushed her coarse dark hair away from one ear, and cocked her head expectantly. “It’s started. Can you hear it?”