Divorce Horse

by Johnson, Craig

  I straightened my hat. “So, what’s the story on the div . . . Um, on the horse?”

  His face came back to life. “Oh, that horse. He’s got an adjustable lug on his left shoe, but if we’d had him in this last heat we would’ve won straight up.”

  “What happened?”

  He shook his head at the injustice. “We had ’em all tied to the back side of the horse trailer over here and when we went to go take ’em to the start, he was missing.”

  I looked past Saizarbitoria at the two muggers, looking like embarrassed twin towers. I remembered one of their names. “Randy, you guys look for him in the infield?”

  The giant answered. “Yeah, but he’s an escape artist, that one. The only one he really liked was Lisa—he’d follow her and nicker and toss his head. Only bit me.”

  The other giant added. “He can untie knots like a sailor, but I had him clipped. We looked everywhere, but he’s not here.”

  Tommy’s voice rose from behind me. “Somebody stole him. He’s not in the infield and there’s no way he would’ve crossed the track on his own.”

  I glanced around the sizable infield—no trees, just dirt and prairie. “No way he could’ve pulled loose, jumped the railing, and joined in as the horses raced by?”

  Jefferson shook his head. “The pickup riders would’ve gotten him. He was stolen, I tell ya.”

  I glanced at Henry and watched as he walked between the two giants and rounded the horse trailer. Shrugging, I started after him, noticing my daughter’s hands behind her back, three fingers extended on one hand and three on the other: tied.

  Ruthless.

  I glanced at Saizarbitoria. “You can head back over to the grandstand, Sancho, but turn your radio up so you can hear it.”

  * * *

  I joined the Bear between the infield railing and the side of the trailer where the horses were tethered to a piece of rebar steel attached to the side just for that purpose. Two-year-olds, the horses were skittish, and moved away, stamping their hooves and showing us the whites of their eyes.

  The Cheyenne Nation reached up and ran a hand over the nearest horse, a dark bay, nut brown with a black mane, black ear points and tail, who immediately settled with a sighing rush of air from his distended nostrils; the Bear had magic in his hands, and besides, the animal was probably happy to meet an Indian who wasn’t trying to catapult onto his back.

  Henry stepped forward and then ducked under the halter leads attached to the bar. Some of the other horses backed away, and one tried to rear but was held down by the length of the rope strung through his halter. The Bear mumbled something and they settled. Magic, indeed.

  At the ends of the leads were the metal snaps that could only be manipulated by an opposing thumb, and I didn’t see a lot of those around on that side of the trailer.

  At the other side of the horses, Henry kneeled and placed his fingertips in the impacted dirt. I felt like I always did whenever I followed his intuitive skills. The Bear was a part of everything that went on around him in a way that I could only witness. He had described scenarios to me so clearly from the remnants of events that I would have sworn that I’d been there. Crouching behind the trailer and looking at the hitching bar, he sighed. “If they had him clipped to the end of the bar—somebody took him.”

  “Where?”

  His dark eyes shifted as he stood, and he walked past the rear of the trailer to run his hand along the inside railing, finally stopping and lifting the top loose. He stared at the ground. “Here, the horse was led through here.”

  I joined him and looked past the dimpled, poached surface of the track at a forgotten gate leading to a fairground building that hadn’t been used since the renovation of the place back in the eighties. “Across the track and through there—toward the old paddocks.”

  We stepped through the gate, walked across the track, and opened the top rung of a rail that you’d never have noticed unless you were looking for it. The Bear paused at the end of the walkway that stretched a good hundred yards, the darkness permeated by the rectangular light shining through the windows of the old barn in staccato. “Which do you think will get us first, the black widows or the field mice?”

  The place looked its age, deserted, and as if it might collapse at any time, the peeling white paint scaling from the untreated lumber like parchment in abandoned books. “Termites would be my bet.”

  In the powdery dirt you could see where a horse with an adjustable screw attachment had been walked through. I kneeled this time and studied the boot prints that ran alongside the pony tracks, smallish and worn down on the heels.

  “Female, or a very small man.”

  We were away from the road and parking lots, which would make it difficult to load an animal and whisk it away. That was the beauty of horse stealing, though—you could always ride your stolen property. Of course, that might be difficult to do with a headstrong, half-broke two-year-old that bites. “Did you see how those horses fought the muggers in front of the grandstand?”

  “Yes.”

  “And this horse is the worst of the bunch.”

  “Yes.” He smiled, having the same thought.

  * * *

  We got back to the infield, rounded the trailer, and found Team New Grass and my daughter where we had left them. The muggers were still attending the horses, getting them ready for the next race, while Tommy and Cady sat talking under the tent.

  Tommy looked at me, and I had to admit that the Big Horn County Jail dentist had done a wonderful job on his teeth. “So, what do I do? Come into the office and fill out some paperwork?”

  I pulled up short, took off my hat, and wiped the sweat from my forehead with my shirtsleeve. “Your horse is in the abandoned paddocks across the track in stall number thirty-three.”

  He looked past my shoulder toward the condemned buildings. “Over there?”

  “Yep.”

  “How the hell did he get over there?”

  “No idea.”

  “How come you didn’t bring him back?”

  I shook my head. “He wouldn’t let me anywhere near him, but we got him blocked off in the stall.”

  He stood and glanced at the wristwatch on his arm, which looked incongruous in the middle of the war paint. “If we hurry we can get him in this next race.” He looked down at Cady and took her hand. “I gotta go, but good luck with your marriage.” He smiled with the new teeth and held her hands long enough for her to know that he meant what he said next. “There’s no way you’ll screw it up like I did.”

  We watched as he walked past the muggers, who were busy currying the next team. They asked if he needed any help, but he shook his head no and lithely jumped over the railing, injured leg notwithstanding.

  Randy turned and looked at me. “I’m really sorry about this, Walt. I don’t know how it is that he could’ve gotten out.”

  “That’s okay. We were in the area, and it gave the two of them a chance to catch up.” Cady threw her water bottle in the trash bucket, and we made our way across the infield toward the gate where we’d come in.

  Saizarbitoria was standing near the judge’s tower and joined us as we walked by. “You find the horse thief?”

  “In a way.”

  Cady volunteered. “The Bear and Dad found the horse over in the old paddocks.” She glanced up at Henry and then to me. “He must’ve wandered off on his own.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

  The Basquo looked at me a little puzzled, and I gave him a soft punch in the chest. “I’ll tell you about it on Monday.”

  I’d almost made a clean getaway when he shouted out to my daughter. “Congratulations on the engagement.”

  Acting as if she was admiring her nail polish, Cady held up four fingers on one hand and three on the other as we walked across the track onto the ramp. Over the loud speaker, the announcer called all the contestants to the last heat of the World Champion Indian Relay Race.

  “Did he just say ‘Indian Really
Race’?” Cady caught my arm as Ken Thorpe shut the gate behind us.

  “Just sounds that way with his accent.” I kept walking.

  “Can we stay for the last go-round, Daddy?”

  “Why?”

  She made a face. “Don’t you want to see if Tommy wins?”

  We watched as the other teams rode into the area in front of the grandstand, leading their remudas, but Team New Grass was suspiciously absent. Cady glanced around and then toward the infield and Tommy’s tent. “Do you think he couldn’t catch the horse?”

  The Cheyenne Nation’s voice rumbled as he continued up the ramp. “Possibly.”

  Cady paused, her hand remaining on the top rail. “He’ll miss the race.”

  The announcer called for Team New Grass to make themselves present at the grandstand or face elimination through forfeiture. I waited a moment more at the gate and then pointed toward the team’s muggers and two horses approaching from the infield—followed by Tommy, a blonde woman, and a frisky two-year-old the color of store-bought whiskey.

  I looked past the track and the infield, toward the dilapidated stalls on the far end of the fairground. “I guess he just figured out what he really wanted.” I held four fingers on one hand and four on the other against my back as I followed the Cheyenne Nation up the ramp.

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  Read on for the first chapter of As the Crow Flies, available from Viking in May 2012.

  1

  “I wanna know what Katrina Walks Nice did to get kicked out of a joint like this for sixty-one days.”

  I began questioning the makeup of the negotiation team I’d brought with me to convince the chief of the Northern Cheyenne tribe that he should allow my daughter to be married at Crazy Head Springs. “Don’t call the White Buffalo a joint; it’s the nerve center of the reservation.”

  My undersheriff, Victoria Moretti, shook her head. “It’s a fucking convenience store.” She smiled, enjoying the muckraking. “She must’ve done something pretty shitty to get eighty-sixed out of here for two months.” Vic gestured toward the white plastic board above the cash register where all the reservation offenders who had been tagged with bad-check writing, shoplifting, and other unsavory behaviors were cataloged for everyone to see—sort of a twenty-first-century pillorying.

  My eyes skimmed past the board, and I watched the crows circle above Lame Deer as the rain struck the surface of Route 212. It was the main line on the Rez, and the road that truckers used to avoid the scales on the interstate. Before 212 had been widened and properly graded, it had been known as Scalp Alley for the number of traveling unfortunates who had met their demise on the composite scoria/asphalt strip and for the roadside crosses that ran like chain lightning from the Black Hills to the Little Bighorn.

  As my good friend Henry Standing Bear says, on the Rez, even the roads are red.

  I was trying to pay attention, but I kept being distracted by the crows plying the thermals of the high plains sky; it was raining in the distance, but the sun appeared to be overtaking the clouds—a sharp contrast of blue and charcoal that my mother used to say was caused by the devil beating his wife.

  “She must’ve stolen the cash register.”

  My attention was forced back inside and under cover, and I twisted the ring on my pinkie. My wife, Martha, had given it back to me before she died so that I could give it to Cady whenever she got married.

  I looked up—the negotiations weren’t going well. It would appear that Dull Knife College had suddenly scheduled a Cheyenne language immersion class at Crazy Head Springs on the day of the wedding. We had reserved the spot well in advance, but the vagaries of the tribal council were well known and now we were floundering. The old Indian across from me nodded his head in all seriousness. I was negotiating with the chief of the Northern Cheyenne nation, and he was one tough customer.

  “That librarian over at the college is mean. I don’t like to mess with her; she’s got that Indian Alzheimer’s. Um hmm, yes, it is so.”

  I trailed my eyes from Lonnie Little Bird to the rain-slick surface of the asphalt—Lame Deer’s main street being washed clean of all our sins. “What’s that mean, Lonnie?”

  “That’s where you forget everything but the grudges.”

  I smiled in spite of myself and took a deep breath, slowly letting the air out to calm my nerves, as I continued to twirl the ring on my finger. “Cady’s really got her heart set on Crazy Head Springs, Lonnie, and it’s way too late to change the date from the end of July.”

  He glanced out the window, his dark eyes following my gray ones. “Maybe you should go talk to that librarian over at the college. You’re a large man—she’ll listen to you. You could show her your gun.” He glanced down at the red and black chief’s blanket that covered his wheelchair. “She don’t pay no attention to an old, legless Indian.”

  Henry Standing Bear, my daughter’s wedding planner, who had made the arrangements that were now being rapidly unraveled, sipped his coffee and quietly listened.

  “But you’re the chief, Lonnie.”

  “Oh, you know that don’t mean much unless somebody wants a government contract for beef or needs a ribbon cut.”

  Up until this year, Lonnie’s official contribution to the tribal government had been limited to falling asleep in council. A month ago, when the previous tribal leader had been found guilty of siphoning off money to a private account belonging to his daughter, an emergency meeting had been held; since Lonnie had again fallen asleep, and therefore was unable to defend himself, he was unanimously voted in as the new chief.

  “She’s in charge of all the books over there and she’s full blood—that’s pretty much the worst of both worlds.”

  A heavyset man with long hair and a gray top hat with an eagle feather in it stopped by the table and rapped his knuckles on the surface. “Mornin’, Chief.”

  Lonnie sighed. “I wish you wouldn’t call me that, Herbert.”

  Herbert His Good Horse, the morning drive announcer on the low-power FM station KRZZ, smiled and turned to the rest of us in the crowded booth. “Do you know the story about the three Indian women who died at the same time?”

  Herbert was a mainstay on the Rez, where almost everyone tuned in to 94.7 FM just to hear the outrageous jokes he told between songs.

  Lonnie responded for the table. “Nope.”

  “St. Peter was sitting on his throne at the gates of heaven—”

  “Is this a true story, Herbert?”

  He nodded his head vigorously, the eagle feather stuck in the band of his hat bobbing up and down like a crest on his head. “It’s from one of those priests over at St. Labre, and those Catholics, they sometimes tell the truth.”

  Vic barked a laugh. “Fuckin’ A.” She raised an empty coffee cup to get Brandon White Buffalo’s attention in hopes of a round of refills, but the big Crow Indian was attending to another customer.

  Herbert His Good Horse produced an elongated cigar from his silk brocade vest along with a cutter. “One of the women was Lakota, one was Crow, and the other was full-blood Cheyenne. St. Peter looked at them and said that they were heathens and there wasn’t anything he could do to let them into the white man’s heaven, but that he was curious because they had all three died at the same time. He asked the first one, the Lakota woman, if she had anything to say, and she said she didn’t know anything about the rules but she had always lived her life attempting to seek a balance in the red and black roads. St. Peter listened and was impressed by the spirituality of the woman and told her she could go in after all.”

  Lonnie smiled and nodded as Herbert repocketed the cutter and produced a chopped-down, brass Zippo lighter, the one that he had carried in the seventies in Vietnam. “St. Peter leaned down to the Crow woman and asked her if she had anything she wanted to say, and she told him that to her, there was a spirit in the air, the land, the water, and all the creatures that populated mother earth and that she had spent her life attempti
ng to be respectful of all these things. St. Peter was so impressed that he waved her into the white man’s heaven, too.”

  Lonnie sipped his coffee, and Henry, smiling, glanced at me.

  “Then St. Peter turned on his throne and looked at the Cheyenne woman. He asked her, ‘Do you have anything you’d like to say?’ The Cheyenne woman nodded and said—‘Yeah, what are you doing in my chair?’”

  Lonnie laughed so hard, rolling his head from side to side with his mouth hanging open, that no sound came out. After a while he began slapping Henry on the leg; I suppose just because the Bear had both of his and because he was also Cheyenne. “Um hmm, yes, it is so.”

  Herbert, who had recovered from laughing at his own joke, lit his cigar, rapped the table, and signed off with his signature slogan—“Stay calm, have courage . . .”

  The entire booth responded with the rest: “And wait for signs.”

  Henry, probably glad for the interruption, put his own cold coffee on the table, smiled indulgently, and watched the disc jockey stroll away. It really wasn’t the Bear’s fault that our site had been suddenly appropriated at the last minute; as he’d explained to me, clearing all the events of all the organizations on the reservation was akin to herding prairie chickens.

  I stared down at the platinum ring with the smallish diamond that was between two inset chips. “What’s the librarian’s name, Lonnie?”

  At the mention of our collective obstruction, the laughter died away in his throat. “Oh, it’s my sister Arbutis. Umm hmm, yes, it is so.”

  Henry raised a hand and massaged the bridge of his nose with a powerful thumb and forefinger. “Ahh-he’, I had forgotten.”

  I knew Arbutis Little Bird—more as Lonnie’s daughter’s aunt than as his sister. Melissa, with whom I’d been involved in a complicated case a couple of years ago, was now away in Bozeman playing point guard for Montana State. The news couldn’t have been worse for our cause—Arbutis was a steely-eyed, iron-bottomed gunboat of a woman whose natural response to everything was an absolute negative that brooked no discussion.