Apache Country (7 page)

“Do the different tribes have different
rules, different customs?” he asked her.

“Not like the old days. They mingle more than
they used to.”

“But …?”

“Is not easy for white people to understand,”
she said. “Jicarilla not like a Chiricahua, Mescalero not like a
Lipan. Chiricahua go to live with Mescaleroes, he still a
Chiricahua. He marry someone from another tribe, his children be
neither one nor the other. Spite of that, all Apache think they one
people. Different, but the same – n’dee, The People. Or Shis’
n’dee’, People of the Woods.”

“I seem to recall I read someplace ‘Apache’
means ‘enemy’.”

“Lot of people think that. The Zuni name for
Navajos was apáchu, enemy. But that makes them sound bad. They not
bad people. They got sort of, como se llama, mandamientos?”

“Commandments?”

She nodded. “But not like Christian ones.
Life rules, maybe. They don’t believe in ‘love thy neighbor,’ got
no time for wimp stuff like that. But some their beliefs the same.
Respect your father and mother. No telling lies, no stealing.”

“I know plenty of instances where Mescaleroes
have stolen. And lied.”

“Nobody say Apache perfect, patrón,” she
grinned. “But generally, they try hard. Like if an Apache asks
another for help, the one he asks must give it. Not because he
maybe get punished later for not helping. It’s doing what’s right
because it’s right.”

“What do Apache consider great sins?”

“For a woman, adultery. To be unfaithful.
After that, mistreating her children.”

“And men?”

“Worst thing Apache can do is betray his own
people some way. He do that, he be banished, and that the worst
thing can happen. The next worst thing is to be locked up in a
cage. In a jail.”

Easton caught the accusing note. “He’s in
jail because he’s suspected of murder, Grita. I don’t make the
law.”

She took another sip of her whisky and said
nothing, but he knew what she was up to, letting her disapproval
work on him. He headed her off at the pass.

“This man we arrested,” he said. “Ironheel.
You know what he did?”

She nodded. “Saw it on TV. I so sad for Mrs.
Ellen.”

I must call her, Easton thought.

“We’re still trying to figure out why he did
it,” he said.

“Locos don’ need no reason,” Grita said.

Some truth in that, too Easton thought. These
days there was a whole new breed of animal prowling the streets,
unfocussed hatred burning inside them like a banked fire. The new
barbarians, marinated in racism, bigotry and envy, who would
without provocation or hesitation maim or kill anyone who was not
like them or showed them disapproval.

“He’s not a psycho, Grita,” he said. “Not
this one.”

She shrugged. “Maybe a drunk. Lot of those,
too.”

He made a negative gesture. “I don’t think
so.”

“Could be a burnout,” Grita said. “Apache got
their share, like everyone else. Some of them druggies, dropouts,
whatchamacallems like the ones the sheriff had to roust out of
Tierra Berrendo Park.”

“Not ‘whatchamacallems’,” Easton smiled,
remembering the incident. “He called them ‘homeless by choice’.”
Apodaca had taken a beating from the liberals on that one.

“Maybe your Apache a bronco,” Grita
suggested. “You see that a lot these days. Among the Navajos, too.
Clan systems, taboos, rituals, it all too much for them. They
reject the tribal ways. Then they ajeno, lost somewhere between
their world and our world.”

Ajeno. In Spanish it meant foreign, strange,
belonging to someone else. But the Apache Easton had talked to
didn’t fit any of these categories. He stood up and stretched
again.

“I better hit the sack,” he said. “Busy day
tomorrow.”

“Only kind worth having,” Grita said, getting
up to rinse the glasses and put them on the draining board.

“All the time I was talking to him I kept
getting the feeling there was something he was trying to tell me,”
Easton said, more to himself than her. “But it was like ... he
didn’t think I’d believe him. Or he was wondering if he could trust
me.”

“Apache,” she nodded, as if, again, the word
explained everything. Easton got up and kissed her on the
forehead.

“You’re amazing,” he said.

Grita snorted. “Hell, anybody know that.”

Charlie Goodwin’s “hotshot” public defender
turned out to be a short, overweight man in his late twenties with
pale skin and watery blue eyes behind rimless glasses, wearing a
rumpled tan lightweight suit with a white shirt and a plain dark
blue tie. He stood up as Easton came through the door leading from
the office into the tiny carpeted triangle that acted as the SO
reception area. He carried a black plastic document case under his
right arm.

“Chief Deputy, uh, Easton, is it?” he said.
His voice was tentative, as watery as his eyes. “My name is Jerry
Weddle. I’m with Goodwin Massie Delgado Oppenheimer.”

He didn’t offer to shake hands, just stood
there blank faced, waiting for a response. It wasn’t diffidence,
Easton guessed, more like he wasn’t sure what the protocol was. He
might as well have had a sign around his neck: Fresh Out Of Law
School. Easton determined not to let that predispose him one way or
the other. Everyone had to begin someplace, and the new boys were
often a lot better than some of the chancers the public defender
system threw his way.

“I thought I knew most of Charlie Goodwin’s
people,” he said, making it a question.

“I’ve been working over in Gallup,” Weddle
replied, as if that explained everything. Probably didn’t want to
let on how green he was, Easton concluded.

“Let’s go through to my office,” he said.

He punched in the numbers that let them
through the security door and led the way down the hallway. On
their left, framed black and white photographs of all the former
sheriffs of Cháves County hung in the alcove above the Xerox
machine. The main office was in its usual state of organized
commotion, phones ringing, computers and laser printers at
work.

Easton’s office was as basic as the ones
outside. He had done what he could to soften the flat whiteness of
the walls with a Navajo blanket and some posters and framed
certificates, but there was no way to camouflage the blown-on
insulation the contractors had used to conceal the old asbestos
ceiling tiles, or the unlovely fluorescent light fitments that went
with them. Weddle looked around, clearly underwhelmed.

Figured, Easton thought. The SO building
hadn’t been designed to impress – cops didn’t rate blond wood
furniture, fitted pastel carpets and smoked glass windows the way
the corporate high flyers in Penn Plaza Tower did.

“First time you’ve been here?” Easton
asked.

“I thought it would be bigger.”

“County with seventy thousand population,
this is about as big as a Sheriff’s Office gets. Can I get you
something to drink? Coffee, maybe?”

Weddle nodded, yes. “When can I see my
client?” he asked. “Ironheel, have I got his name right?”

“James Ironheel. You can see him whenever
you’re ready,” Easton told him as he filled a cup from the machine
on the bookcase behind his desk. “How do you take it?”

“Just as it comes,” Weddle said.
“Thanks.”

He sat down in one of the two guest chairs
facing the desk. He put the briefcase down carefully, then picked
it up again and held it on his knees as if he wasn’t sure it was a
good idea to let go of it.

“You can let me have a copy of Ironheel’s
stats?”

“No problem.”

“I’ll, uh, I’ll also need to see the arrest
records. Crime scene photos, forensic reports. Whatever is
relevant.”

“I’ll have a dossier made up for you,” Easton
said. “You can pick it up before you leave.”

He buzzed DeAnn, and told her what he wanted.
Weddle sipped his coffee and looked out the window like none of
this had anything to do with him.

“When is he being arraigned?” he asked when
Easton put down the phone.

“Monday morning.”

Weddle looked discouraged. “That doesn’t give
me a whole lot of time.”

There were only two possible responses: Gee,
I’m sorry or Tough shit. Easton decided not to bother. He could see
Weddle wondering if his silence was significant, and let it
stretch. The use of silence was an important skill. The judicious
pause, the lifted eyebrow, the sympathetic nod, all these were
levers to be used to get to the truth or to get your own way. A lot
of cops found out that without their realizing it, they were also
using them to manipulate or control people they loved. And by the
time they realized they were doing it, it was too late. Silence and
love are bitter rivals.

“You think he can get bail?” Weddle
asked.

Easton was tempted to ask him how many Apache
he knew who could raise a fifty thousand dollar bail bond. Instead,
he told himself to make allowances. This was all new to Weddle and
he was clearly feeling his way. He shook his head.

“My bet is no. But even if he could, the DA’s
office would almost certainly contend there’s a distinct risk of
flight.”

Weddle made an impatient gesture and put down
the coffee cup. It was the first positive thing he had done since
he came in.

“Oh, come on,” he said scornfully. “A
distinct risk of flight?”

“We’re dealing with a double homicide here,
Mr. Weddle,” Easton reminded the lawyer.

“This is an Apache, right?”

“Right.”

“Where’s he going to run to?”

“Maybe the same place he was going to run to
when he put the two State Police officers who tried to arrest him
into hospital.”

“They told me all that. I still contend—”

Easton interrupted. “Have you had many
dealings with Apache, Mr. Weddle? Know anything about them?”

The lawyer put on a defiant face. “Not
Apache, maybe,” he said defensively. “But I’ve done quite a lot of
PD work for the Department of Justice over on the Big Rez.”

In New Mexico the words Big Rez meant only
one thing: the Navajo reservation. The Navajos were the most
populous tribe in America, their lands far and away the largest
area occupied by Native Americans. Easton spent a moment wondering
what sort of public defender work Weddle might have done over
there. He didn’t talk like he had much experience and he didn’t
look like he spent much of his time outdoors. Didn’t even wear a
hat. Which probably meant he’d been doing paperwork. Depositions,
subpoenas, locating witnesses, that kind of thing. What the hell
was Charlie Goodwin thinking about, sending a greenhorn like this
to handle a homicide case?

“How long have you had him in custody?” the
lawyer asked.

Easton looked at the clock. “Call it fifteen
hours.”

“You’ve interrogated him?”

Easton nodded.

“Has he told you anything?”

It was such a fundamentally naïve question
Easton almost smiled. No matter how inexperienced, every attorney
knew the law required the prosecution to discover whatever evidence
it had to him. If Ironheel told them anything, they had to tell his
attorney. So the question Weddle was really asking was, How much
trouble am I in?

“We’ve gone around the block a few times with
him,” Easton said reassuringly. “But he’s refused to answer most of
our questions. You can watch the interrogation videos, if you want
to.”

And good luck, he thought. Although they had
spent three more hours with him following their conversation in
Patti Lafferty’s office, Cochrane and Irving had gotten nothing
more out of Ironheel, who had clamped his mouth shut and refused to
answer any more questions.

“Maybe later,” Weddle said, putting on a
brisk air the way you put on a hat. “Can I see him now?”

“Sure,” Easton said. “I’ll tell them we’re on
our way.”

He dialed 822 on the internal line and told
duty RO Hal Sweeney they were on their way over. When they got to
the jail he introduced Weddle and Hal led the way along the
corridor to Ironheel’s cell. The cell door gave off its mournful
clang as he slid it back and Ironheel looked up, his eyes still
dark and wary.

“Nt’é nánt’ii?” he growled. What do you
want?

“This is Jerry Weddle, Ironheel. He’s the
lawyer appointed to handle your defense,” Easton told him. He
watched the Apache carefully for any sign of the silent plea he
thought he had seen earlier in the dark eyes. There was none.

“Don’t need no lawyer,” Ironheel said.

His tone was resentful, as if the sheer act
of bringing in Weddle was an intrusion. Just as well nobody was
expecting gratitude, Easton thought.

“You’ve got one anyway,” he said, making his
own voice as ungracious as Ironheel’s. The Apache turned his head
away, staring pointedly at the wall. Easton knew what that meant
now. You are no longer here.

“If you’ll excuse us, Mr. Easton,” Weddle
said, looking uncertainly at Ironheel then back. “I’d like to speak
to my client alone.”

Fly at it, Easton thought. “Where can I reach
you if I need to talk to you later?” he asked the lawyer.

“I’m at the Frontier Motel,” Weddle said.

Easton hid another smile. The Frontier was a
no-frills twenty-eight-unit motel all the hell and gone to the
north of town, out by the Mall. Any decent employer would have put
Weddle in La Quinta or the Sally Port Inn, which had an indoor
pool, saunas, whirlpool and lighted tennis courts, but not Charlie
Goodwin. He and his partner Walter Massie were celebrated
penny-pinchers. Hell, even the firm’s letterhead was a front. There
was no Delgado and no Oppenheimer. They had simply added the names
to their shingle so they wouldn’t look too WASP and scare off
minority clients.

“Buzzer’s right there on the cell wall when
you want out,” Sweeney told Weddle as he slid the door shut,
locking him in. Easton walked back to the receiving area with the
deputy and got coffee from the machine in the hall. It tasted about
as bad as always. Above his head the CCTV cameras moved in their
ceaseless, tortoise-slow survey of the corridors. A few years ago
one of the custodies had smuggled in a nail file, used it to spring
the lock on the holding cell, then just walked out into the street.
The media had such a field day with the escape that the County
installed the cameras a week later. He looked at the clock. No
point hanging around here, he thought.