She drove faster now that she knew the road, her brain repeating the soothing words of the old prayers. When she passed the house, Aaron’s truck was gone, the porch empty, the place dark.
At the burned car, Bernie slowed down to study the ridge above. Its rocky profile cut into the blue-black of the early evening sky.
16
The People Mover sat in Paul’s yard like a prehistoric monster. Chee parked beside it. Next time someone wanted to make a horror movie, he thought, they should consider using all the dead cars and pickups in Navajoland. Have them come back to life and stalk their former owners, punishing them for neglect and abuse.
His cousin rested under the ramada with a book: John Wayne’s Kitchen: Favorite Recipes of Monument Valley. A covered pot simmered over the wood fire.
“Hey, is there a recipe for True Grits in there?” Chee said.
“Haven’t gotten to that yet. I’m looking for something easy I can fix when I start having guests in the hogan. And when you abandon me, bro.”
Chee sat next to him. At that level, he could smell something interesting coming from the pot. “An officer I work with told me you had some trouble with the People Mover.”
“No worries. It came out all right. Ron Goodsprings took the customers, and I rode along as sort of his assistant. He said you’re working with his niece. Was she the one who told you?”
Chee nodded. “I thought I had fixed the problem for you. I’ll take another look and see if I can figure out what went wrong.”
Paul gave him his classic grin. “You don’t have to play mechanic. The one who helped me with the customers figured out what the problem was. All fixed.” He went back to the book. “You remember pigs in blankets?”
“I sure do. Hot dogs with a biscuit on the outside. Your mother made them all the time, and we loved them. Is that what you’re cooking?”
“Nope.”
“So are you going to explain what went wrong with the beast?”
“I was hoping not to, but here goes.” Paul put the book down so he could use his hands to tell the story. “The man who helped me had an idea that maybe the thing wouldn’t run because it was out of gas. He loaned me a gas can and took me to the station after the tour. I bought gas. Then he gave me a ride back to the People Mover. I poured it in and—gr, grr, grrrr, grrrrrr, vroom! Off we went. That sucker uses a lot of gas, and the gauge doesn’t work.”
Chee smiled. Another lesson in the futility of guilt and worry. “So what’s for dinner?”
Paul handed Chee a rag. “Take a look.”
Chee tripled the thickness of cloth against his skin and lifted the handle on the heavy pot. Inside was a concoction he couldn’t recall seeing before. “I give up.”
“I call it Monument Valley Surprise. It’s an experiment. If we like it, I might serve it as dinner to the folks who come to stay here overnight. The recipe says to cook it another half hour.”
As it turned out, half an hour wasn’t enough. But Paul declared it fit for visitors and had three helpings. In addition to a bit more cooking, Chee suggested fewer onions and chiles and more potatoes and meat.
Chee slept poorly, troubled by images of Samuel’s body and upset at the idea that the man had hurt and embarrassed little Alisha, and probably other girls too. He missed Bernie and wondered if she missed him. When he finally did fall asleep, he dreamed that Darleen was in jail for stealing Melissa’s earrings.
He awoke feeling unsettled, said his prayers with corn pollen, started a fire from last night’s embers, and cooked enough eggs for breakfast for two. Paul joined him, and they watched as morning brought the color back to the monuments.
Chee took the smoother route back to the office. When he reached the pavement, he noticed the undelivered citations on the seat next to him, the original and the new citation, which included the addition of human remains to the illegal gravesite. He’d check in at the office and start the paperwork with Bahe that meant he could go home. He could deliver the citation on his way back to Paul’s. Or maybe Tsinnie could be the gofer. As he pushed the button to lower the window, he realized that he’d miss driving this unit—it worked better than the one he used at Shiprock. And he’d miss Bahe. He would recommend that the station look into luring Erdman away from the hotel, putting her to work for the Navajo police. She wasn’t Navajo, but you didn’t have to be to join the department. She was smart, she knew the area, and she had good instincts. Perhaps a woman would get along better with Tsinnie.
Bahe was on the phone when Chee got to the office, so he read the digital edition of the Navajo Times and then checked his e-mail. Something from “leaphornj.”
He opened it. The Lieutenant’s reply to his request for help dispensed with pleasantries and got right to business:
necklace 1930s. museum-quality heirloom Persian turquoise? Robert Etcitty
Etcitty was a jeweler Chee had heard of, a man too young to have been born in the 1930s.
Leaphorn had typed a line of inverted triangles to separate the next section:
∨∨∨∨∨
poker chip = Stagecoach
Chee pulled out the chip and looked at it to make sure. No, it didn’t have a stagecoach on it. The impression was of an eagle. The photograph he sent must have been blurry or something.
Chee walked outside, gathering his ideas, considering what to send as a reply. The June heat radiated off the walls and terraces of the visitor center. He noticed it more outside the station than in the valley itself, probably because of the added warmth generated by the air-conditioning units and the pavement and concrete. He climbed the steps to the vista point and spent a moment taking in the procession of vehicles stirring up dust on the vista road and the view of the Mittens and Merrick Butte against the cloudless turquoise sky. Merrick Butte took its American name from a soldier turned silver miner who died at the spot. But unlike the grave Chee had inadvertently discovered, Merrick’s place of death had an impressive natural marker, a massive tower of red sandstone rising over the desert. Chee took the poker chip out of his pocket and studied it again.
Back in the office, he first thanked the Lieutenant for the information.
I must have not given you a good photo of the chip. The design is an eagle with three arrows in its talons. I just sent it to offer you an idea of the size of the necklace. Are you sure about the silversmith? I know a man by that name, and I believe he would be too young to have made it.
He inquired about Leaphorn’s health and Louisa and clicked send. He felt a twinge of sadness. In all the years they had worked together, he had never questioned the Lieutenant’s mental fitness, but evidently the brain injury changed things. He hoped the change was temporary.
Chee saw the neat pile of papers he expected, the forms he had to complete to mark the termination of his assignment at Monument Valley, on Bahe’s desk. But the captain didn’t give them to him immediately.