Indian Pipes (6 page)

“He told the gang at Alley’s that his niece had gotten herself tattooed, a large rose on her shoulder, a clump of ivy twining around her ankle.”

“Nose rings?” Victoria asked.

“What was Hiram doing here, anyway?” Casey asked, shifting down to steer around roots in the track.

“I don’t know. If he was looking for something, you’ll see why it might be difficult to find.”

“Oh?” Casey had reached the open area. The sun was behind the house now and threw a long shadow across the dry grass. It was difficult to see more than the looming bulk of the house. Each blade of grass, each weed, each stone, was magnified by its own shadow, until the shadows were the reality.

“This is a setting for a spook movie.” Casey slid out of the Bronco and surveyed the desolate-looking place. The house perched in the middle of the open flat, surrounded by dried grass, dead weeds, and low bushes.

Casey knocked on the door and entered. Victoria followed.

“Lord!”

“I know. It makes me feel tidy by comparison,” Victoria said. “Keep going, bear right through the mess to get to his desk where the telephone is.”

They edged their way between the stacks of paper.

“This is the stain I was telling you about.” Victoria stopped and knelt down next to it, bracing herself against an unstable stack of papers and an old television set.

“Watch it!” said Casey, holding her hand out to keep the stack from toppling over onto Victoria.

The stain had turned from reddish-brown to brown. A half-dozen blue flies buzzed around it.

“I don’t know how you do it, Victoria,” Casey said, half- admiringly, getting to her feet. She held out her hand to help Victoria up. “We don’t have a body, so we don’t call the state cops. It doesn’t look like cranberry juice or ketchup, and it smells a lot like blood.”

“Where do you suppose Hiram is?” Victoria asked.

“I’ll radio the police chief in Aquinnah. Hiram’s probably at home. In the meantime, I’ll contact Junior, have him check out this place. Don’t touch anything, of course, that sort of thing.” Casey made her way back through the shadowy house. Victoria followed closely. “I hate to think of the person who has to go through all this stuff. It’ll take weeks.”

“That computer is eerie with its ‘Fatal Error’ message,” Victoria said. “Should we get Howland Atherton to check it out?”

“The drug-enforcement agent? He knows computers?”

Victoria nodded.

“I don’t know, Victoria. I think it’s premature to poke around in Burkhardt’s computer.”

“We need to find a killer,” Victoria said.

“Nobody’s been killed yet, as far as the police are concerned.”

“But…” said Victoria, and snapped her mouth shut.

They returned to the Bronco and sat with both doors open while Casey radioed the Aquinnah police and her sergeant, Junior Norton.

While they’d been in the house, the sun had sunk lower. The sky was pink at the horizon and shaded up into darker and darker blue until it was deep purple above them. With the growing dusk, mosquitoes started to hum around them. Victoria swatted at her forehead, where one had landed.

“Have to be careful what I say over the radio.” Casey unhooked the mike from her dashboard. “Everyone on the Island has a scanner, and they’re all listening. Ouch!” She slapped at her upper arm.

“Jube probably didn’t imagine his life was in danger, or he wouldn’t have met the person where he did.”

“What are you talking about?” Casey turned to Victoria. “Met who? Do you know something more you’re not telling me?”

“There’s a mosquito on your neck,” Victoria said.

“You’re suggesting someone pushed him, right?”

“He didn’t fall from the cliffs.”

“You think he was killed on the beach?”

Victoria said nothing.

Mosquitoes whined.

“Let the police worry about this, okay?” Casey was visibly upset. “Just because you’re my deputy doesn’t mean you can try to solve crimes all by yourself.”

Victoria folded her arms across her chest, her mouth set. While they waited for Junior to arrive, she examined the outside of the darkening house, the sweep of bare grass. The shadow of a goldenrod spear stretched from the house to the barn across the open area. The barn door was ajar.

“What is it, Victoria?”

“There are no cars here. As I mentioned earlier.”

“You wouldn’t expect to see one. Hiram probably came and went, and Burkhardt must have taken his car to Aquinnah. Look in the glove compartment, Victoria. See if I have any bug spray in there.”

“His car wasn’t at the parking lot near the cliffs.”

“You have to push the button hard,” Casey said. “Maybe he met somebody and they went together. They’ll find his car someplace obvious.”

Victoria found the spray can and squirted some on her hands, rubbed her arms and neck, and passed the can to Casey. “No one would drive away and leave Jube without transportation.”

“Jube’s death was accidental, Victoria. Believe me. Those cliffs are treacherous.”

Victoria glanced at Casey. “Not for a person who knows the Island.”

“Okay, okay,” said Casey.

“And where is Hiram?”

“We’ll find Hiram at home or shopping or something.”

Victoria pointed to long indentations in the grass, picked out by the low sun. “Someone wheeled a motorcycle into the barn.”

“You’re imagining things.”

Victoria shook her head. “I’ll look in the barn while you wait for Junior.”

“Okay,” said Casey, getting out of the vehicle and opening the door on Victoria’s side.

Casey held her flashlight in one hand and swung the beam around. The line where the dry grass was mashed down in front of the barn showed clearly in Casey’s flashlight beam. She opened the door. The hinges squealed. A barn swallow flew out and soared away, pointed wings and forked tail silhouetted against the sky.

The interior of the barn was inky black and smelled of ancient hay and long-gone horses. When the door was fully opened, twilight washed across the dusty wooden floor. The flashlight beam made a circle of brightness that blotted out everything else.

“Look there.” Victoria pointed.

In the dust, showing clearly, was the track of a large motorcycle and a small splotch of oil.

C
HAPTER
7

“Dojan.” Chief Hawkbill reached up and put his hand on the tall man’s shoulder. It was the morning after Dojan had called on Victoria. “Some good may come of your being sent to Washington.”

Before he’d left Washington at the chief’s command, Dojan had shed his silky city suit as if it were an old skin, and was now wearing his black mesh shirt and black jeans. He had tied his black scarf, printed with white skulls, around his neck. The frayed ends whipped in the brisk wind rising up the cliffs.

“You knew he would be killed,” Dojan said.

The tribal chief watched the flock of eider ducks drifting on the rollers near the foot of the cliffs, far below. The surf crashed on the rocks. He could see the current eddying around Devil’s Bridge, and hear, far below, the bell buoy that warned vessels to stay away.

“No,” the chief said finally. “No. That possibility didn’t enter my mind.”

“But I came, and he was killed.”

The chief turned from watching the water below them and looked up into Dojan’s eyes.

“No one suspects you of killing him, Dojan. The police have called it an accident.”

“Someone killed him.”

The chief shrugged.

“Peter Little called me. He knew why I was sent to Washington. I flew here. And then Burkhardt was killed.”

“I asked Peter to call you, Dojan, because we need to involve the federal government. Jubal Burkhardt’s death has changed things, but only somewhat. He was threatening to hold up permits at the state level. I need you to push through environmental permits at the federal level.”

“For the casino. You support a casino.”

The chief held up his hand. “I am impartial, Dojan, I must be. You must be impartial, too.”

Dojan shook his head, and his bone necklace rattled.

“This must be judged on the basis of what the majority of the tribe wants, Dojan, not on what you and Obed and I think is right for them.”

Dojan shook his head.

“There are good reasons on both sides,” the chief continued. “We must not allow a personal bias to prevent the tribe from making its decision. Mr. Burkhardt was trying to suborn the process for personal reasons. That was why I called you, even before he was found dead. We must apply for permits as if we planned to build a casino. We can say no later.”

Dojan walked to the chain-link fence and peered over the edge. “Patience says the tribe doesn’t need permits.”

“Patience’s claim of sovereign immunity is being tested in the courts. We can’t predict what the court will decide.” The chief stood next to Dojan and put his hands on the railing. “Perhaps the police have a point, Dojan. They say he fell by accident to his death.”

“He didn’t fall by accident,” Dojan said.

“You don’t think so?”

“Look down.” Dojan pointed past the rosebush that marked the top of the sharp drop. “How many feet down?”

“A hundred fifty?” the chief said. “Two hundred?”

“A careless step, a fall.” Dojan waved his arms, as if he, himself, were falling. “A killing height. He would tumble down the cliff. Broken bones. Scrapes. Bruises. Torn clothing. His body would rattle like ice in a plastic bag. Yet he could crawl up the cliff?”

“Perhaps a freak landing. A stone broke his fall.”

“Was his body bruised? Was his clothing torn?”

“No, it was not,” said the chief thoughtfully. “And Mr. Burkhardt was not a careless man.”

“He wasn’t pushed off the cliffs.” Dojan turned his eyes on the chief.

The chief looked away from Dojan and gazed at the thin line of the Elizabeth Islands on the horizon. “You don’t think someone pushed him from here?”

“Would he go near the edge of the cliff with someone he didn’t trust?” Dojan shook his head.

“No. He wouldn’t.”

“A killer would be foolish to kill here. A fall is almost certain death. But a fall would not guarantee death.”

“Let’s go back to the tribal building so we can talk.”

Dojan shook his head again. “I am going down to the beach at the foot of the cliffs. He was killed there.” Below them, lacy scallops of foam washed high onto the shore, melted into the sand, and the next set of breakers washed up another scalloped line. “He was killed on the beach.”

While Dojan was conferring with Chief Hawkbill, Casey and Victoria were sitting in the Bronco, which was parked in front of the West Tisbury police station.

“Aquinnah’s not my territory.” Casey glowered at Victoria’s eagle-beak profile set in a mass of stubborn wrinkles. “The Aquinnah police chief stopped by Hiram’s place. Doors unlocked, of course. This Island is a cop’s nightmare. Anyway, he went inside, nothing seemed wrong. Nothing seemed out of place. The cat wasn’t upset; it has a big bowl of cat chow and plenty of water.”

“Was his van there?” Victoria asked. Her blue cap was perched on her head.

“No, which doesn’t mean anything, one way or the other,” Casey said. “He’s down-Island, shopping. Or he’s visiting a buddy in Vineyard Haven. Or he’s gone to the bookstore in Edgartown. Maybe he’s at Bert’s getting a haircut. He’s gone to the liquor store in Oak Bluffs.”

“He doesn’t drink.”

“I can’t do it, Victoria. If Hiram lived in West Tisbury, I could bend a rule or two, but I’m not taking you to Aquinnah, and that’s final.”

“All right.” Victoria reached into the backseat of the Bronco for her stick. She opened the passenger door and slid off the seat onto the oyster-shell paving. Her back was rail-straight. She took off her cap and thrust it into her cloth bag, which she slid partway up her arm.

“Where are you going, Victoria? I’ll drive you home.” Casey leaned out the window of the Bronco.

“No thank you. I’m taking myself to Gay Head or Aquinnah or whatever they’re calling it now.” She marched around the back of the Bronco, over the oyster shells, past the ducks that had settled in the shade of the police vehicle, stopped at the side of the road, and stuck out her thumb.

Casey dropped her head on her arms. Her coppery hair fell over the steering wheel. “When is she going to start acting her age?” she muttered. She wrenched open the driver’s door and got out in time to see a green pickup truck pull off the road with a squeal of brakes. The driver got out, took off his cap to Victoria, who was smiling up at him. He reached into the back of the truck and lifted out a black milk crate, helped Victoria step up onto the crate and into the passenger seat, and drove off in a cloud of dust.

“Lord,” said Casey, as the truck geared up and sped past the millpond. “I ought to give him a speeding ticket just because.”

“You sure you don’t want me to wait, Mrs. Trumbull?” The driver set down the milk crate and helped Victoria out. He had stopped by the side of the road where tour buses parked for visitors to view the cliffs.

“I’ll be fine. Thank you for the ride, Ira. Give my regards to your father.”

It had been Asa Bodman’s son Ira who had picked up Victoria by the police station. He was going as far as Seven Gates, he told her, but when she said she wanted to go to Gay Head, he had detoured the thirteen miles to take her there.

Ira moved off slowly, and Victoria watched him drive around the circle to where it rejoined the main road. He returned her wave before he disappeared from sight.

The parking area was utterly different from what it had been two nights before. Today the area was packed with cars and people. The Aquinnah patrolman was holding up traffic for people to cross the road to the short flight of steps that led toward the top of the cliffs. People were every possible age and shape, dressed in everything from flowing long skirts to embarrassingly small bathing suits. Most were wearing sunglasses, including the scads of small children that hung from parents’ hands.

Victoria fell in line behind a family, two harried young parents with three small children. One held his father’s middle finger with an obviously sticky hand while sucking his thumb, the other dragged a woebegone teddy bear by its ears. The father shook loose the sticky paw long enough to lift a baby stroller up the steps. The sleeping baby’s head lolled.