Ice and Stone

by Marcia Muller

  All at once I remembered the Irish friend I’d had in college; in his parlance women were “dollies”—and “riding” was a euphemism for “fucking.”

  Oh my God!

  7:24 p.m.

  I set out north on the highway from Bluefork toward Sheik’s Peak. When I saw the old Mobil gas sign loom ahead, I slowed and soon turned onto Powder Gap Road. It was paved but potholed, and its condition deteriorated even more as it zigzagged upward onto the long, steep hillside that stretched out below the monolith. Made of rough gray granite, Sheik’s Peak towered above its desolate surroundings.

  The clearing where the road ended was ringed by pine trees. It was deserted—no sign of Gene and Vic. But the Jeep’s headlights picked out a rutted crisscrossing of recent tire tracks. At this elevation there were still patches of snow on the ground, even though it hadn’t snowed in several days. The peak jutted up from atop a wide rock formation whose sides were steep and eroding. It had been battered by the elements over thousands of years; there were deep fissures in the granite, filled by ferns and lichen, and broken rocks were scattered across the rising ground above. It was at once a symbol of the effects of eternity and a reminder of how we humans crap up the planet.

  I parked and got out into an icy wind that made me wish I had a warmer coat and mittens instead of gloves. I couldn’t see the cabin Jake had told me about from here; it must be hidden behind the wooded area off to my left. The beam from Hal’s flashlight picked out two hiking trails that led across the damp, rutted grass, one upward into the pines, the other in a lower, northerly direction. I took the upper one, aiming the light just ahead of my feet when I entered the copse of pines.

  The trail was tough going. I stumbled over rocks, slipped on the icy pine-needled ground, ducked to avoid branches. Fortunately it wasn’t a long trek. The copse soon thinned, the ground leveled into another, smaller clearing, and then I saw the cabin—a dark, rectangular shape huddled against the steep wall of granite in the monolith’s shadow.

  I made my way to it along a barely discernible extension of the trail. It was in far worse shape than my former hideout, built of weathered logs, its sagging roof topped by a lopsided tin chimney. No lights showed through the gaps between the logs. There was no visible window, just a door hung crookedly in its frame.

  The door wasn’t locked. I took my .38 from the plastic pack in my deep pocket, then threw the door open, recoiling from the cold, fetid air as I flashed the light inside.

  Just a single room, the floor warped and caked with dirt and rodent droppings. A rough table with two mismatched kitchen chairs and an extinguished oil lamp. A red-and-white cooler on a makeshift counter. A cot—with its covers hanging to the dirt floor. And on it—

  “Sasha!”

  The young woman I’d met in the Good Price Store lay on her back. Lengths of clothesline bound her at the wrists and ankles. When I said her name, her eyes fluttered open and she cringed like a frightened animal.

  “Don’t be afraid,” I told her, “I’ve come to help you. I’m going to get you out of here.”

  She shook her head violently and her eyes moved from side to side, as if looking for a way out. Her face was grayish, her hair matted; she licked dry, cracked lips but didn’t speak.

  Her eyes met and held mine as I went to the cot. Hers were swollen, bloodshot.

  I sat on the edge of the cot and managed to untie the knots in the clothesline. She shivered. All that she wore was a man’s ragged red plaid flannel shirt. Once I had her free, I took off the wool-lined coat the Sisters had provided me and placed it around her shoulders.

  “They hurt me.” Her voice was hoarse from crying out to be released from this place, or from disuse. “They both…hurt me.”

  Gene and Vic. Goddamn them!

  A panicked thought widened her eyes. “What if they come back?”

  “They’ll regret it if they do before we get out of here. Can you walk?”

  “Think so.”

  I helped her up, supported her with both hands, and led her out of the cabin and down the trail through the trees. Although she’d been badly abused, Sasha was able to walk and didn’t stumble or fall. When we reached the clearing below, I belted both of us into the Jeep and drove away from there as fast as I dared.

  Sasha slumped against the passenger window, her arms tightly folded across her breasts. She breathed raggedly and coughed a few times, but otherwise was silent.

  I said, “Did those two men take you from the cemetery when you were delivering the flowers?”

  “Yes. I knew them from town; they’d been giving me the eye, and I’d tried to be polite, but this time they didn’t say anything, they just grabbed me…There was nobody else around. They put a cloth over my face before I had a chance to scream, and I guess I passed out.”

  “Did you smell anything on the cloth?”

  “…Yes, something like the chlorine in the community center pool.”

  Chloroform. The bastards had gone to the cemetery fully equipped.

  “And then?”

  “When I woke up in that godawful place they were drinking. Really bombed. They…they’d raped me. The pain, it was awful, but I lay still pretending I was still out and praying they wouldn’t do it again. After a long time they left. One of them said, ‘We’ll be back, sweetheart.’”

  I was sickened by what she’d gone through. Sickened, and determined that the two would pay. I put my free hand on Sasha’s arm, and we rode the rest of the way to Aspendale in silence.

  9:55 p.m.

  Willa Sharp Eyes, the nurse who had attended me after the fire at the shack, was standing at the admissions desk at the clinic when I brought Sasha in. Immediately she asked who had harmed her. I told her I’d found Sasha near Sheik’s Peak and didn’t know who was responsible for her condition. If I’d named Gene and Vic, it would have meant reporting the kidnapping and rape, and I didn’t want to be detained and questioned by Arneson or his deputies. There’d be time enough later to make sure those two bastards were arrested and charged.

  Willa dispensed with the usual protocol of forms and insurance information and took Sasha directly to an examining room. When she came back, she phoned Dr. James Williams at home, and he agreed to come in and attend to the patient.

  I checked for voice mail messages when I left the clinic. There were two. One was from Ike Blessing, finally, saying he and his partner would be at the Bluefork airstrip tomorrow. But what time tomorrow? I called the mobile number he’d left and was told Blessing was scheduled on an early-morning flight from Washington, D.C., to SFO, ETA as yet unspecified.

  The other message was from Mick. “I’ve got that last batch of info you wanted about Dierdra Two Shoes and Sam Runs Close,” he said when I reached him. “They both had allotments of land up there.”

  “Did they claim the allotments?”

  “No, they were killed before they could. But they must have been aware of them.”

  “What are the allotments worth?”

  “There’s no way of telling. There aren’t any comps. I mean, it’s not like measuring the value of a house on Tel Hill versus one in Visitacion Valley.”

  “Any indication that either woman was approached about selling?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

  “What about Sally Bee? Did she have an allotment?”

  “No riches there.”

  “Josie Blue?”

  “Nope. And I’m fresh out of information.”

  WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16

  8:25 a.m.

  Jane woke me by shaking my shoulder. “Your friend Rae is here and wants to see you. She says it’s important.”

  Yawning, I brushed hair from my face, rubbed sleep grit out of my eyes. “Send her in.”

  Rae looked perky, as if she’d had a good night’s rest. She sat cross-legged on the end of the bed and said without preamble, “That Paul Harcourt is one weird dude.”

  “So you did get next to him last night.”r />
  “As next to him as I ever want to.”

  “Did he hit on you?”

  “Oh yeah. Tried to. Wasn’t easy fending him off.”

  “Is that what you meant by weird?”

  “Partly. He’s so wildly unpredictable. He ranges from being charming to extremely aggressive. Shouted at the bartender when he didn’t bring him a refill quickly enough, then left him a ten-dollar tip. Called Meruk County a ‘shithole,’ then praised it as being a wonderful place to live. Came on to me, then started treating me as if I were his best friend’s baby sister. He was all over the map. Some people he knew came in and tried to talk to him, but he didn’t show much interest in what they were saying. He didn’t eat anything while I was with him, just drank. People who are in an advanced state of hysteria often don’t.”

  “You think the term ‘hysteria’ characterizes his condition?”

  “Volatile reactions? Attention-seeking behavior? Everything out of proportion?”

  “Right. And I thought the other brother, Kurt, was the crazy one. He was institutionalized a while back.”

  “Well, I haven’t had the dubious pleasure of meeting Kurt. Maybe his psychotherapy worked.”

  “Do you think Paul’s capable of harming other people?”

  “Oh yes. Definitely.”

  “Harming them seriously, fatally?”

  “Shar, I don’t have to tell you we’re in rough territory up here. Some of these people wouldn’t have a second thought before picking up a tire iron, a hammer, or a gun.”

  “Look, I don’t want you going anywhere near the Harcourts again. Or those two cowboy rapists who work for them.”

  “Rapists?”

  I told her about my rescue of Sasha Whitehorse.

  “Rough territory, like I said. I guess I’m lucky they didn’t try to kidnap me.”

  “I think they mainly go for Natives. Just stay away from them as long as they’re still walking around free.”

  “You don’t have to worry about that. So what’re we going to do next?”

  “We?”

  “Sure. That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, but it’s too early for me to strategize. I’ll get back to you when I’m thinking more clearly.”

  9:10 a.m.

  Jane had gone to her studio, and I was in the kitchen, rustling up some sourdough for toast, when Kiki of the moccasin telegraph called. I let the message go on the machine, then picked up when I heard the urgency in Kiki’s voice. “I’m sorry to phone so early, but I figured this information couldn’t wait. There is a rumor—a very substantial rumor—that something big is going to happen in Meruk County today.”

  “Something involving the tribe here?”

  “Yes. Our informants seem charged up about it.”

  “Do they have any idea what it is?”

  “Not specifically. Just rumors of a big gathering at a ranch that has some sort of connection.”

  “Trouble for the tribe?”

  “I don’t think so. To me it smells of money.”

  “Big money?”

  “Hey, hon, is there any other kind that gets people charged up?”

  “Was the ranch named in the rumors?”

  “No. I thought you might know.”

  “I’ve got a pretty good idea. Thanks, Kiki.”

  “Glad to help. I’ll let you know if I hear anything more.”

  Something big…today…

  Informants…charged up…

  Today…

  9:31 a.m.

  While eating toast and drinking coffee, I’d been aware of the droning of airplane engines. More of the same sounded as I finished dressing. I looked out the bedroom window, but all I could see was yew tree branches. I started outside to get a better view, and the phone rang. For me again. Naturally.

  “Big birds are descending from the sky,” Hal said, “a regular flock of them.”

  “Going where?”

  “SupremeCourt.”

  “What kind?”

  “Mostly twin engines, at least one small jet.”

  “Any of them land at your strip?”

  “One, a Beechcraft Baron 58P. The pilot wanted to refuel, said the Harcourt place would probably run out of avgas soon. Then they took off again.”

  “How many passengers?”

  “Two. Guy named Michael Stein and his companion.”

  I knew the name; Michael Stein was a major financier, into about every profitable venture in the city, maybe the country.

  “Has this happened before?” I asked Hal. “So many big birds coming in all at once?”

  “No, not this many at one time. I’d say the Harcourts are throwing a party—but judging by the looks on the faces of Stein, his companion, and the pilot, I don’t think that’s the reason.”

  “Did you talk with the pilot?”

  “Sure I did, while he was refueling. What he told me is interesting. He said the guy with Stein was a goon.”

  “A goon?”

  “His word, not mine. As in armed bodyguard. He said the goon never moved a muscle during the flight up from L.A., just sat like a statue while Stein talked on his mobile.”

  “Did the pilot hear any of the conversation?”

  “Just a bunch of business stuff—stock options, dollars per acre, transfers of deeds, tribal rights. Didn’t mean much to him, or to me.”

  But to me it did. “Hal, I’ve got to go now.”

  9:44 a.m.

  How to confirm what I suspected? I needed evidence. Concrete, in-your-face evidence that would stand up in court and yell, “Hey, look at me!”

  Look at me. Well, why not?

  I got through to Derek at the agency. Avoiding the usual pleasantries, I said, “You know that night scope that’s in the equipment closet? The Whisper 3500?”

  “I do.”

  “Will you contact that air courier firm we use and send it and its carrying case up to Bluefork Airport here in Meruk County?”

  “Yeah. When do you need it?”

  “Tonight.”

  “Short notice.”

  “Tell them there’ll be a big bonus for them.”

  “Will do.”

  Okay, that was taken care of. Now…

  I seemed to be spending half my time on the phone lately. Why stop now? I rang up the district attorney’s office in the county seat of Ames and asked for an investigator. A woman named Vivian Song answered. She knew my name and why I’d come to Meruk County, said she would have contacted me by now if another matter hadn’t demanded her immediate attention. When I explained what I thought was about to happen at the Harcourt ranch, she said crisply, “I’ll come down there and we’ll talk in person. I can catch a ride on the D.A.’s chopper and be at the airport there in a couple of hours.”

  Noon

  Vivian Song was a petite woman with short black hair and a face that reflected Southeast Asian heritage. She was comfortably attired in green sweats and a heavy shearling coat that she removed and hung on the coatrack by the woodstove in Hal’s office.

  “As I told you on the phone,” she said, motioning for me to sit in the chair next to her, “our office is aware of the recent Native homicides as well as the other murders and disappearances over the years. The D.A.’s office has been quietly investigating, in cooperation with the state D.A., but there have been certain obstructive elements.”

  “Such as Sheriff Noah Arneson?”

  “Right. He’s currently out of the loop, however. After you called me, our office discovered there’s been some racial unrest down south in Fleetwood, and he’s been sent there to quell it.”

  “My God, he’s one of the worst racists—”

  “There’s been no unrest. But it will take him a long time to figure that out and return here.”

  “And then?”

  “Warrants are being prepared. It seems we received an anonymous tip that our esteemed sheriff and some of his cohorts have been fencing goods dropped off at a warehouse in Allium by long
-haul truckers whose employers aren’t too careful with their manifests.”

  “I believe I discovered that warehouse two nights ago.”

  “So you were the anonymous tipster. We staked the place out and caught two truckers as they attempted to deliver goods. Why didn’t you give your name?”

  “My history with law enforcement departments has been complicated.”

  “So I’ve heard. Now tell me about this drug Arbritazone.”

  I explained what I knew about it.

  “So the drug is not necessarily benign,” Song said.

  “It’s like a lot of drugs—can be used either for good or bad purposes.”

  “Is anyone marketing it now, do you know?”

  “It was used successfully in trials in China, also Australia. The FDA has started testing what few samples they have.”

  “But it’s currently unavailable in the US?”

  “Right.”

  “And you believe a large supply of it is available in Meruk County.”

  “Yes. Much of it from land that belonged to the deceased tribal members.” I told her of the allotments and my suspicion that they, not hatred of Natives or sex trafficking, were the reason for the murders of Samantha Runs Close and Dierdra Two Shoes.

  “That sounds plausible. But how is the raw material being harvested? It can’t be lying on the ground for just anybody to pick up.”

  “In a way it is,” I said. “Arbritazone deposits are formed in highly alkaline waters and, if you know what to look for, they can be had by digging through the pebbles in streambeds.”

  “So people are hunting through rocks for it?”

  “I doubt many ordinary people even know what it is. But the powers that be have been trying to buy up land where there are rich deposits.”

  “The powers that be?”

  “The Harcourts and probably others. I don’t know exactly who the others are yet, but later I might be able to supply their names.”

  She looked at me, quiet and thoughtful. “You don’t give away much, do you, Ms. McCone?”

  “Not unless I’m sure my facts are right.”

  “Okay, I get it. When will you be sure?”