Death on the Greasy Grass (18 page)

Manny forced himself to turn from the glass, shaking his head, clearing his mind of the scene. He had been witness to another scene from the past, and he'd talk with Reuben about it later.

He started walking away from the case when two scalp locks, grisly, long, wrinkled, and dried, fluttered inside the glass case. Manny struggled to turn away, but the need to know the scalps' story grew too strong. He turned, staring at them, his hand poised inches from the glass. Had the scalps actually fluttered? Had they called to him, or was that just another imagining like the woman sewing her hunter-husband's belt?

Manny's pulse quickened. Images flashed in his mind. The urge to run as strong as the need to stay. But his feet remained solidly planted in front of the case like cornstalks anchored into black soil. He reached out his hand, drew it away, dropped it onto the glass. A shock rose up his arm, through his body, the scalp locks talking to him.

Manny shuddered as a Crow warrior faced a charge by two Lakota overlooking the Battle of the Little Big Horn. The two warriors shot the Crow, one dropping off his pony and running to the corpse, knife in hand. The other Lakota, still seated on his horse, raised his rifle. Manny tried to scream a warning, his throat closed to any sounds, spitting the taste of black powder from his mouth as a cloud settled over the scene. When a breeze moved the powder cloud away, the Crow warrior lay on his back beside the lifeless Lakota his companion had shot, accusing eyes fixed on his killer.

Manny swayed, his knees buckling, weakening, and he leaned against the display case.

“That glass might break!”

Manny shook his head, the image gone, his balance returning.

Wilson hooked his arm through Manny's and steadied him. “Hate to have you fall through and cut yourself up. You okay?”

Manny looked back to the scalp locks sitting silent and immobile behind the glass. “Blood sugar spike. Damned diabetes.”

Lumpy took Manny's other arm. “You want me to drive you to Indian Health?”

“No.”

“Need a candy bar?”

“I might,” Manny said, staring back at the display case.
As long as I keep away from those scalps I might not.

Wilson followed Manny's gaze and nodded to the scalp locks. “I kept asking Grandfather Biford about those scalps. Grandfather was a
wicasa wakan
. I thought for sure a holy man would tell his grandson about them. But the only thing he'd say is that Great-Grandfather Conte scalped an enemy in battle at the Little Big Horn. I kept pressing him about it. I always thought there was more to the story, but he never said more. And my father never explained them. He always kept me away from the scalps.”

“Was he?” Lumpy asked. “Was your grandfather a sacred man?”

Wilson laughed. “I guess, if there really is any such thing. Tradition has it that someone's got to be a holy man, so I guess it was my grandfather's turn.”

Manny nodded to the display case. “You must hold some store in tradition?”

Wilson laughed again and chin-pointed to the glass case. “I keep this collection because it meant something to my family. My family collection. That's as far as tradition will allow me to go.”

“But you dress traditionally,” Lumpy said.

“This?” Wilson flicked his hair ties and ran his finger under his choker. “These are just props. An Indian running for Senate is expected to look Indian.”

“Doesn't sound like something you want to stump on the campaign trail.”

Wilson's smile faded and he frowned at Manny, then at Lumpy. Gone was his naturally resonant voice, replaced by a low, guttural sound as he stepped toward them. “My attitude stays in this house. Got it?”

“I do,” Lumpy said.

Wilson glared at him.

Lumpy put up his hand and forced a smile. “Honest Injun.”

Wilson turned to Manny, silent, assessing Wilson's sudden change in demeanor. Wilson blinked.

“We'll leave you—and your attitude—as soon as we have the information we need on Degas.”

Wilson turned away and walked to his desk. “Here's the information you need.” He thrust a slip of paper into Manny's hand. “The date I hired Carson. His duties. Is there anything else, Agent Tanno?”

Manny, still unsteady on his feet, wanted to be out of the house and away from the scalps. “I may be back for more questions.”

“Call next time before you come. Understood?”

When they walked out of the house, Reuben stood from the steps. He looked at Manny and wrapped his arm around his shoulder, leading him down the steps toward the car. “Again?” he whispered.

Manny nodded as Lumpy climbed behind the wheel. How Reuben always knew when Manny experienced a vision baffled him.

“I don't think you're in any shape to drive.”

Manny could find no argument with that.

“We'll have to talk about it later, you know?”

Manny nodded again. For a brief moment before he climbed back into the car, he thought the scalps called out to him, but he wasn't entirely sure what they said.

C
HAPTER
23

Manny sat toweling himself off as he sat on a tree stump overlooking the creek in back of Reuben's trailer house. They had emerged from the
initipi
, the sweat lodge that Reuben had permanently erected along the bank of the meandering creek. Reuben had tied willow boughs together and draped plastic sheeting and heavy canvas over that so no light could escape, so the cleansing heat would stay until he threw back the door. As always, this sweat had been brutal. Just how Reuben liked it.

Manny turned his head and shoulders to the west, savoring the cooling breeze. Reuben had soaked him with a garden hose, and Manny wanted to sit all afternoon with his shirt off enjoying the air. But he had an investigation to conduct, an investigation that competed with his attention to Willie lying on his deathbed.

Manny grabbed his Dockers and shirt draped over a bicycle with one wheel missing. The rusty bike provided the perfect clothes hanger, having been left there for so long the cottonwood tree had grown up around it. He tucked his shirt in and slipped his ID wallet into his trousers.

Reuben sat in a lawn chair, his butt sticking through missing slats, sipping a Coke and fiddling with his sunglasses. As was Lakota custom, Manny had brought a gift when he visited Reuben, his Ray-Bans the only thing he had on him to give.

“What are you smiling about?”

“You.” Reuben straightened one bow and slipped the glasses on. “You are still fighting against it.”

“I told you, I didn't have a vision at Eagle Bull's.”

“Then what do you think happened—Disney animated those scalp locks so they could talk to you? You got to come to grips with the fact that visions find you now and again, even when you don't want them. And there is meaning to every one of them.”

“That my big brother talking shit?”

“This is your brother the sacred man talking. And I do not shit you.”

Manny held up his hands. “Don't start with your holy man analysis.”

Reuben sat relaxed in his chair as if talking with a group of schoolkids. “Then what do you think happened?”

Manny sat back on the stump and started pulling on his socks. Sometimes, Reuben was such a pain in the ass, prodding on subjects that Manny had no desire to talk about. “Just what I said, that my blood sugar spiked. I felt better once I had a sandwich.” Manny tried to convince himself as much as Reuben that he had not had a vision at Wilson's.

But Reuben was right—Manny denied his visions taking over his mind, taking over his body at the least opportune times, visions of things he couldn't explain. Since returning to Pine Ridge last year, a lifetime of disallowing his native roots had caught up with him. What he couldn't figure out was if it was a curse—as he thought it was—or a blessing from Wakan Tanka as Reuben believed. Either way, it scared the hell out of Manny.

“Why don't you admit what happens when you see these things?”

“If what you call visions don't help me solve cases, I got no time for them. I came here to sweat. Maybe come up with an answer for my hallucination today. Besides my diabetes acting up.”

Reuben uncapped a root beer and handed it to Manny. “You got the right answer,
kola
. Those scalp locks told you a story. Now you'll have to make room in your heart to hear what they had to say.”

Manny drank half the root beer in one gulp, feeling his strength returning. The
initipi
always rejuvenated him, just as Reuben espoused, with the heat and the water and the dome representing Mother Earth and the breath of life healing his body. But today, his mind was in more need of that healing.

“Something else bothers you,
kola
.”

Manny turned to him. “You the Amazing Kreskin or something? How'd you know I . . . got problems?”

Reuben shrugged. “I just know things. I know something has upset you besides Willie's condition.”

Manny turned to him, taking a deep breath before he confessed. “I felt pride when I was in Harlan's shop among the artifacts. I felt pride when I looked upon Wilson's display of relics.”

“Pride in what?”

Manny pushed an ant out of his boots before slipping them on. “That the Lakota—our ancestors—defeated Custer so soundly. When I went to the Little Big Horn Memorial the other day, I only felt pride in those warriors.”

“Pride is not necessarily a bad thing.” Reuben toweled the sweat off his chest and shoulders, the water pooling in deep scars across his chest and neck. “As long as you do not use pride for your own gain.” He stood and stretched as he looked at the steep bank they'd have to climb to get back to Reuben's house. “I have always felt pride in what our warrior-ancestors did. They did nothing else that other people would not do. They protected their families, and were willing to die for it. Tell me that is not something to be proud of.”

Manny nodded. As always, Reuben was right. Now all Manny had to do was get past the feeling of pride that Manny had for Reuben for his involvement in the American Indian Movement. But that would have to be a discussion for another day, for another sweat. For the moment, he had an investigation to conduct.

* * *

Manny left his rental parked at Big Bat's after he'd finished his breakfast burrito and walked across the street to the justice building. It had seemed so strange having breakfast at the convenience store alone. Whenever he worked a Pine Ridge case, he and Willie would usually have breakfast there together, two men on Indian time and in no hurry. This morning Manny realized just how much he missed his talks with him. He shuddered when he thought of Willie being fed his breakfast through a tube stuck down his throat.

He walked up the flight of stairs and into the building. Someone on the other side of the smoked glass buzzed him through the security door, and he walked the long corridor to Lumpy's office.

“I wouldn't get too close.” A secretary stuck her head out of a cubicle. “The bear got here just twenty minutes ago, and he's crankier than usual. If you can believe that.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Manny called over his shoulder. He continued until he reached the door with A
CTING
C
HIEF
L
OOKS
T
WICE
in letters painted across the door. He rapped, but got no answer, and rapped again. Silence. He turned the knob and cracked the door. Lumpy sat in his velvet Elvis chair, hands cradling his head as his elbows rested on his desk, looking like Manny felt. Dark circles under Lumpy's eyes melted into puffy cheeks sporting yesterday's stubble. A large yellow stain followed his gig line on the front of his shirt, which could have been breakfast or last night's supper. “Bad night?”

Lumpy used the edge of the desk and stood. He shuffled to the coffeemaker and began scooping grounds into the pot. “The worst. While you were at Reuben's doing God-knows-what, I sat with Willie all night.”

Manny dropped into a chair opposite Lumpy. “You gonna give me the update?”

The coffeemaker started dripping dark liquid into the carafe, but Lumpy kept his back to Manny. He sighed deeply. “Willie's lungs filled with liquid last night. We damned near lost him.” Lumpy turned around, tears starting at the corners of his eyes, and he turned back to the pot.

Now maybe you'll treat Willie better if he pulls out of this
, Manny thought, but he said nothing as he walked to the coffee cart and grabbed two cups. “Maybe I'd better get up there . . .”

“I wouldn't.” Lumpy filed both cups and turned back to his chair. “Doreen spelled me this morning, and she's even more pissed at you than she is at me. She thinks I should have let Willie go from the department, and blames you for encouraging him to stay.”

Lumpy dropped into Elvis and Manny swore the King shed tears in solidarity. “I'd still be up in Rapid if I didn't have to put out fires here.”

Manny wrapped his hand around his coffee cup, feeling the warmth, waiting for Lumpy to tell his problems at his own speed. “I got a call from the tribal councilmen from Porcupine and LaCreek Districts. And the Fifth Member. All about Wilson Eagle Bull.”

“Don't tell me: Eagle Bull complained we harassed him?”

“You got it. He complained about the acting police chief coming to his house with a known felon, and about you implying he knew where Degas was but wasn't saying.”

“I didn't imply anything. I know Wilson knows where Degas is and I said so.” Manny smiled. “I'd say that's a direct accusation.”

“Either way, this is strictly a federal case from here on. Wilson's got a good chance of being the next state senator from Pine Ridge and they don't want bad PR mucking it up for the tribe.”

“So your department won't help me?”

Lumpy stood quickly, Elvis rolling and hitting the wall with a dull thud. “Dammit it, I got no choice. The tribal council made it plain: with Eagle Bull and Chenoa both active in the National Congress of American Indians, their working together will bring animosities between our tribes down. Either I toe the mark, or they'll replace me with someone who can.”

“So you won't help?”

Lumpy remained silent over the coffeepot.

“We weren't raised that way,” Manny said. “You and me, we were raised to help people. And especially now, we need to help each other to find Degas. Or whoever shot Willie.”

Lumpy turned around, empty coffee cup dangling beside his leg.

Lumpy turned back to the coffeemaker and grabbed the carafe, putting it down before he could refill his cup. “If something comes up that I can help on the sly, I will,” he said over his shoulder. “But it's strictly unofficial.”

Manny nodded. “Thanks.”

“Unlike the official bitch they pitched to your senior agent in charge.”

“So I can expect the SAC to chew my ass as soon as I hit the office?” But Manny already knew the answer: “Hard Ass Harris” would salivate with the opportunity to chew Manny's butt again. “Last time I couldn't sit for a week.”

Lumpy nodded. “I wouldn't answer any cell phone calls either.”