Authors: Anne Hillerman
“TUR?”
“It stands for
The Undead Return
. The name of the movie.”
Chee liked the SUV Bahe had loaned him, a newer unit than the one he used at Shiprock. Nice ride. The air conditioning blew hot air on his feet and at his face, but it turned cool by the time he’d adjusted the seat, positioned the mirrors, and clicked on his seat belt.
Now that he was looking for them, Chee noticed the small yellow signs. Why, he wondered, hadn’t the lost woman, Melissa, just followed the signs back to base camp? He doubted that she was lost. More likely she’d had an argument with a boyfriend or somebody in the company and taken off. Or maybe she wanted a change of scene and drove into Kayenta or over to Mexican Hat.
Chee cruised down a sandy wash, up a hill, and around a few curves, picking his way through the ruts, holes, and rocks on the exhausted dirt road. The route had been designed to offer fairly close views of the magnificent sandstone formations and, not coincidentally, several wide, safe parking areas where visitors could pause for photos and buy jewelry, pottery, cold drinks, and souvenirs from local families who set up tables to sell their wares.
A little sign indicated the turnoff, and a few minutes beyond that he saw the movie base camp. A pale-green late-model sedan of some sort was parked just outside of the camp entrance. As he drew closer, a man with a ball cap climbed out and hailed him.
“
Yá’át’ééh
, Officer. What can I do for you?” The parking attendant had a name badge that read “Gerald.”
“
Yá’át’ééh
. I’m looking for the man in charge, a gentleman named Delahart.”
Gerald took off his cap, rubbed his head, put the hat back on. “You don’t want to talk to that guy, and he’s not here anyway. Mr.
Robinson is the supervisor. He can help you. Drive straight in and park by the trailer that says ‘Production Office.’ Just ignore the No Parking signs.”
“You might be able to help with something else.” Chee paused, making sure he had Gerald’s attention. “A woman could be missing. Somebody named Melissa Goldfarb. Did you see her leave?”
Gerald shook his head. “I just got here for the night shift. Missy is missing? No kidding? So are you working with Officer Tsinnie?”
“I’m just filling in for a few days. I haven’t met him, or anybody at the station yet, except Captain Bahe and Monica.” Tsinnie was a fairly common name; Chee knew several Officer Tsinnies.
“Him’s a her.” Gerald chuckled. “But I’m sure she’s been called worse.”
Chee pulled up close to a group of structures and parked near an unlit trailer with a sign that read “Production Office.” Beyond he saw a larger trailer, lights on inside and a standing figure profiled in the doorway. The person trotted down the steps and up to the car, not even waiting for Chee to turn off the engine.
“Officer, I’m glad you’re here.” The man was tall, something over six feet. He stooped over to speak into the window. “Greg Robinson, assistant producer.”
Robinson moved with the grace of a person who stayed in shape. Chee placed his age as early fifties. “So, the missing woman isn’t back yet?”
“No. I wish.”
Chee opened the door of the SUV, forcing Robinson to step back, and climbed out.
“She said she was taking the day off,” Robinson said. “She got in her car. That was it.”
“Did she tell anyone what her plans were?”
“Well, not exactly. She said she wanted photographs and some
time to collect her thoughts.” He paused. “It can get crazy around here.”
“Tell me about her.”
Robinson repeated the description Chee knew: blond hair, blue eyes, slim, early thirties, wearing shorts and a white T-shirt. “She’s full of life. A great gal. A hard worker.”
“Was she alone when she left?”
“I guess so. Nobody else is missing.” Robinson shrugged. “And, before you ask, no drug or booze issues, no teed-off lovers, no arguments with coworkers I know of. We’ve been on a tight schedule, lots of pressure. I can see why she wanted time to herself, a break. But Melissa didn’t show up for the evening meeting. That’s totally not like her.”
“Is she an actress?”
“No, she keeps track of the money. That’s one of the hardest jobs around.”
Robinson looked past Chee, out toward the vast empty landscape. “Are you going to call in a crew with some of those search dogs?”
“First I’ll drive around, take a look for her myself. Try to remember if Melissa mentioned where she was going to take her pictures. Was there some landmark she wanted in a photograph?”
“None of us have been out here long enough to really know our way around. It’s easy to get lost in this desert. I feel like I’ve been dropped onto another planet. Perfect for the movie, but it’s starting to get on my nerves.”
Chee gave Robinson a card with his cell phone number. “Let me know if she comes back, or if you think of anything else that would help.” That is, he thought, if his phone worked out where he was headed. “If you can’t get me and it’s important, call the office.”
He turned off the air conditioner and lowered the windows as he drove out of the movie compound, listening for another vehicle or
perhaps a woman calling out for help in the quiet desert. He savored the warm evening air that filled the SUV, dry as dust. No worry about mosquitoes here except after those rare, blessed days when the valley got some of its five inches of annual rainfall.
The view matched the dictionary description of
spectacular
—a brilliant sky packed from edge to edge with Technicolor pinks, magentas, and oranges that made the monuments look even more rugged, imposing, and otherworldly. Diné stories confirmed Chee’s observation that this place was special and blessed. The valley had been the interior of a giant hogan, with stone pinnacles tourists called Gray Whiskers and Sentinel as its doorposts. His people also considered the two soaring buttes known as the Mittens to be the hands of a Holy Person, left behind in stone to remind the Navajos that they weren’t alone.
The vivid colors gradually faded to soft pastel. Wispy clouds added ambience, like see-through scarves that make bare skin beneath more alluring. If he were a photographer, he’d be taking pictures.
Chee knew from past visits that the best sunset shots were on the Utah side of the valley, the vista points he wished he’d had the chance to show Bernie. He stopped at the Monument Valley Park security gate, explaining to the attendant who he was and describing the woman he was looking for. The guard seemed interested. “I started work at eight tonight,” she said. “I didn’t see any car like that leave, but she could have come through before my shift.”
“What about the person who had the earlier shift?”
The guard shrugged. “You can ask, but he has so many cars to keep track of. I doubt he would remember.”
Chee gave her a card with his cell number. “If you see Melissa come though before I get back, could you ask her to call me?”
“Sure thing.”
Chee turned north, crossing from the Arizona section of the
park into Utah on US 89. From here Monument Valley, foreboding and beautiful, spread to his right. Deep shadows accentuated the contours carved into the sandstone by wind, time, and water. The monuments looked muscular, supernaturally splendid, and eerie in the dying light. The movie people had the right idea, Chee thought. Why go to the trouble of building sets, or creating them with computers, when nature herself provided such a grand backdrop?
Looking for the red Chevy, he checked turnouts and cruised down side roads that promised the grandest views. Back on the pavement, he discovered an RV with a portable barbecue grill outside, the occupants settled in for the night at their improvised and illegal campsite. He ignored them, focused on finding Melissa Goldfarb.
Heading back toward the Arizona border and the park entrance, he drove faster now, rechecking turnouts and parking spots to make sure he hadn’t missed the little car.
Back at the park entrance, the guard waved him through. “Nobody’s come in since you left.”
Chee tried to think like a white woman from Los Angeles. What if she’d gone to one of the two hotels that served valley visitors? Maybe someone staying there invited her to a party. If that was the case, she probably wasn’t in as much danger as she would be if she’d wandered out into the dry, empty valley.
He considered what Robinson had said about the woman needing to get away. He should have asked if she was depressed, but nothing in Robinson’s description hinted at that. Just stress, modern life’s most common malady. Seeking quiet and solitude, she might have driven down one of the local, private roads, thinking that she could get an unusual photograph. Perhaps her car had gotten stuck in the sand. What if she had decided to leave it and walk out? What if instead of following the road, she’d taken a shortcut? Lots of what-ifs.
Chee cruised the seventeen-mile loop road again. All the vendors had packed their wares and headed home, leaving the park to the night creatures and movie stars. He drove more slowly, hoping his headlights would find the worst of the road’s ruts and obstacles. At all the obvious places a person would stop for a photo, he looked for a glint of chrome or window glass, finding nothing. The park encompassed more than 91,000 acres, according to Paul’s spiel for visitors. A good place to disappear.
In his years as a policeman, Chee had spent more nights on patrol than he could count. His grandmother had been correct when she had warned of
chindis
, restless, troublemaking sprits that emerged after twilight. Most of the crimes Chee responded to went down in the black hours beyond midnight. The darkness outside seemed to summon the darkness inside people.
Heading north past a shuttered crafts stand on a side road that looked as if it could lead to more views, Chee noticed a faint glow from the arroyo. Headlights? The illumination grew brighter as he approached. His unit’s lights flashed against the open tailgate of a truck parked off the road. Beyond it, he saw a tent lit from the inside. Past that, nothing but sand, a few shrubs, rocks. No red car.
He parked but kept his headlights on, positioning them to shine on the tent. He had left the other campers alone, but they were outside the Navajo Nation’s jurisdiction, beyond the park proper. He walked toward this tent with his flashlight shining.
“Navajo Police. Hello. Anyone in there?”
He saw shadows in the tent, shapes rising from the floor. Chee’s experience made him wary when facing the unknown. “Come out,” he called. “I need to talk to you.”
“What do you want?” The man spoke with an accent.
“I need to ask you some questions. Don’t you folks know it’s illegal to camp here?” Chee waited for the response.
“Sorry. Can we pay you the fee?” A female voice.
“Is that you, Melissa?” Chee said.
“No.”
“Come on out here and talk to me. Both of you.”
The tent rustled, and a gray-haired woman in shorts and a T-shirt emerged. “Heinrich is coming. He’s pulling on his shoes.” The woman took a few steps toward Chee. “My husband couldn’t find anywhere else to camp. We are doing no harm. We shall be gone by morning.”
An elderly man with a potbelly emerged from the opening and stood next to the woman.
“Heinrich Schwartz,” said the man after Chee introduced himself. “And this is Gisela.”
“I’m looking for a lost person. A blond woman driving a red car, or maybe walking around taking photographs. Have you seen her?”
“We haven’t seen anybody,” Heinrich said. “Nobody but you.”
The woman nodded. Chee thought she looked a bit like Louisa, Joe Leaphorn’s companion. He should call Louisa and find out how the Lieutenant was progressing.
“Have you seen any vehicles tonight?”
The man rubbed his scalp. “A truck with a trailer that stirred up dust. A motorcycle. One of those touring shuttle buses, empty. It made a lot of noise, too.”
“And that little car with loud music,” Gisela added. “It was red.”
“Which way was the car headed?” Chee asked.
The woman gestured with a pale arm. “It went by about an hour ago.”
“Did you see it again after that? Or hear it?”
“We did not,” the man said. His
w
’s sounded like
v
’s.
“Where are you visiting from?”
“We live in Germany.”
“Bavaria,” the woman said.
“Germany? Ma’am, from your English, I would have assumed you were American.”
She nodded. “You’re right about that. I was born in the States, but I grew up in Germany and moved back there when I met this wonderful man. Finally I persuaded him to see the West, and now we’re in trouble.”
“We went to the camp across the highway,” the man said, “but it was full. We went to the campground in the park, but it was closed too. Where else can we go?”
The couple looked tired. They stood in silence, backlit by the glow from inside their little tent. Chee looked at their neat campsite.
“The next closest camp ground is Navajo National Monument, on the way to Tuba City. But they might be full too, and that’s a long drive. Tell you what. You can stay here tonight if you promise you will pack up and move out first thing in the morning. And no more illegal camping. You understand?”
Heinrich spoke quickly. “Yes, sir. We promise. You are kind. We will pay you the camping fee?”
Chee shook his head. “You can buy something for your wife from the next vendor you see. Help the families who live out here. Welcome to Navajoland.”
He could see Gisela relax. “My grandfather worked here back in the 1930s. He loved this place and the people.” She held out her arm. “I have this Indian bracelet he bought many years ago. He said it was made by a Navajo man.”
Chee looked at the sand-cast silver. “That is beautiful.”
“I’d like to get something like this for my daughter.”
“If you don’t find what you like out here, I have a relative who’s a jeweler, lives in Gallup. He might be able to come up with a copy for you.”
The woman pulled a wallet from her pocket and gave him a business card. “That would be wonderful. He can use this e-mail.”
Out of habit, Chee made a note of the husband’s name and the license number of their truck on the back of her card.