I looked down at the back of his fist against my chest and then at him.
He thumped the fist against me again, holding it out as if it held something. “Toss this into the tunnel and then say your piece.”
I opened a hand under his, and he dumped the sage leaves into it.
“Always have incense.” He started off toward my truck, turned slightly as he went, and looked back at me. “You can tell Heeci’ecihit you understand him, if you think it means anything to him.”
I stood there for a moment watching him go and then thought about just tossing the leaves and following, but then I remembered Kimama’s warning that I needed to respect the beliefs of people who had been in this part of the world thousands of years before mine.
Turning back, I planted both feet and made ready to speak when I noticed the same great horned owl sitting on the rocks above the opening of the tunnel. “Well, hello, you. I would’ve thought that all that sound and fury would’ve driven you off.” His large head turned, and the great golden eyes looked down at me. “I don’t suppose you’d like to deliver a message, would you?”
He only blinked once and continued to watch me.
“I guess I’ll have to do it myself.” Gazing into the tunnel, I cleared my throat and called out, “Heeci’ . . . Heeci’ecihit.” Giving up on the Native pronunciation, I dropped it and just spoke. “Bobby, if you’re in there, and I don’t think you are, then, um . . . thanks.” I took another step forward and looked around in the scorched darkness. “You did good. You always did good, but it’s over now and you can move along.” I tossed the sage leaves in, a few of them sticking to my hand, and stood there looking into the darkness. “And here I am, talking to an empty tunnel.”
Shrugging, I turned and started to walk away as a single 1888-O Hot Lips Morgan silver dollar fell out of the darkness; it bounced and rolled toward me, stopping on the thin layer of new snow and then falling over faceup just as the great horned owl unfurled his prodigious wings and batted them twice before sailing over my head and gliding up the canyon out of sight.
Now, a lot of people might believe that it was something else that caused what happened next, but I’m firmly of the belief that the concussion from the impact of the two vehicles and the subsequent explosions must’ve loosened their resting place, as close to a thousand of the same coins cascaded from the ceiling of the tunnel like a jackpot, bouncing and rolling in every direction.
At least that’s our story, the owl and me.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Craig Johnson is the New York Times bestselling author of the Longmire mystery series, which has been adapted for television by Warner Bros. as the hit show Longmire. He is the recipient of the Western Writers of America Spur Award for fiction, the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Award for fiction, the Nouvel Observateur Prix du Roman Noir, and the Prix SNCF du Polar. His novella Spirit of Steamboat was the first One Book Wyoming selection. He lives in Ucross, Wyoming, population twenty-five.