Stealing Fire (27 page)

They looked at each other, wanting to say more, not wanting to say more. Olgivanna squeezed her husband's hand.

My mind was screaming one thing. Who did it? And they were talking about everything but.

“They had a very explosive relationship. One day yelling at each other, sounding like two cats. Next day the cold-shoulder routine. Next day they couldn't keep their hands off each other.”

“Who killed him?” I said.

Mrs. Wright said, “I told them it would be easier to work it out if they'd made a commitment to each other.”

“I suggested the same thing,” said Mr. Wright. “Their spats and making up never interfered with their work. He was good. She was brilliant. They were a solid team, able to put all else aside.”

What was wrong with these people? I couldn't help raising my voice. “Who did it?”

“Please don't ask again,” said Wright. “We don't know.”

Okay. “So, why didn't they get married?”

Wright said, “Her father.” The two words fell like anvils. “No one crosses Mr. Fine, and he was against it.”

“Do you know why?”

“Payton was an orphan, basically, but he was from old money, went to Yale. Hoity-toity, had a trust fund, but it wasn't a bottomless pit.”

“Sounds pretty close to most fathers' dream.”

“You'd think,” Wright said, “but Payton was an Episcopalian, and she was Jewish. Marriage was never going to happen, not if Helen wanted to keep her father.”

Wright stood up and paced the cabin floor, each board complaining under his steps. I wanted to leave, but I needed information.

“Religion!” he said. “Can you imagine anything sillier?
How do we raise the children? Which holiday do we celebrate? Will we spend eternity together?
Raise the children with love and they'll find the belief that nurtures their spirit. Celebrate every holiday, and make up a few, too. As for eternity? Eternity happens right now, it happens all the time, and it continues to happen.”

“My husband, I'm sure, told you he is a Druid.”

“He did.”

“He believes, actually, we believe, that time is like…”

“Time is like a band, like a ring on your finger. It is circular and happens in a forever loop,” I said.

“How did you know that?”

“There's a lot of Indians believe that—all different tribes.”

“We Celts, I've always thought,” Wright said, “are the Indian people of Europe.”

Silence filled the room like a fourth person.

“Mr. Wright,” I said, “where is Payton's body?” It was a crude thing to ask, but necessary.

“His body … They found his body near Flagstaff. Just out in the open, exposed to the elements. His ID was in his wallet. He … he was difficult to recognize,” he said. “Impossible to recognize. But his wallet and keys were tossed to the side.”

This didn't make sense. He was killed in a motel room. He hadn't been out in the desert that long. Surely they could tell if the man had been shot or knifed. Where the death-wound was, and if he had tried to defend himself.

“I don't understand,” I said.

“Immolation.”

“Pardon me?”

“His body was burned beyond recognition. The police could not determine if he died before the fire or if he was burned alive.”

My heart went down to my stomach. “I am so sorry.” And I was. Helen had seen Iris with Payton's body, so someone had dragged him out to the desert and torched him. If they'd wanted him to go unrecognized, they wouldn't have left his wallet and keys. One very sick person was on the loose.

Practicalities. “What about a funeral?”

“Helen called a mortuary in Flagstaff. It seems redundant, but he is being cremated properly, and his ashes are being brought up here. Mrs. Wright, Helen, and I were the closest thing he had to family, so one of us will take his urn. I don't even know where to put it.”

“Are they sending a hearse up with it?”

“No, no, no. Helen's father said he would pick up the remains and bring them to her,” he said, “although I don't know that she wants them. Jake Fine is a steamroller, but he's trying to make amends.”

“So, now that Payton is dead,” I said, “it doesn't matter that he was an Episcopalian from old money.”

“Apparently,” said Wright. “When it comes down to it, we are all ashes to ashes. The earth doesn't give one damn what we are, and to the earth we return. The great mother, she loves us all.” He pursed his lips. “Yazzie?” Wright said, “would you send Mose over, if he's not busy? I find him a great comfort.”

“I'll send him, and I'll tell him to ask you to think about who must have done it.”

 

Forty-eight

I got Iris from the mess tent, and we gathered up her sketching materials.

I filled her in on the details on our way to the Gouldings' house to get Grandpa. He was coming down the stairs while I was racing up.

“You just about knocked me over, Yazzie. Where's the fire?”

Iris and I looked at each other.

“You going to clue me in?” he said, looking from one face to the other.

I did.

“Jesus God.”

“You got that expression from your old girlfriend.”

“No, I got that from life.”

“What do you want to do, Yazzie?” my grandfather said.

“I want all of us in a group when Jake Fine arrives. I don't know what's going to happen, but we should be together,” I said. “Frank Wright would like your company now. How about you go to their cabin and stay until we come and get you?”

“Absolutely.”

We were heading away from Goulding's just as John Wayne was leaving his small stone cottage. He was happy to see us for about ten seconds, and then he caught our expressions, the ones that say,
life has gone south, and fast
. “Trouble,” he said. “Lay it on me.”

I did. “I should go tell Mr. Ford,” I finished.

“Yazzie, I know Ford,” Wayne said. “My guess is that he loved meeting Mr. Wright, but now he isn't crazy about having him around. Wright would feel the same way if Ford brought a movie crew to Taliesin. It messes up the work.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. I think this mess, however it plays out, will go a lot easier if you let me give Ford the news.”

“What are you going to tell him?”

“That Mr. Fine is arriving to bring a friend's ashes to his intended, and then you'll be headed out, the whole lot of you,” he said. “Doesn't sound like a big deal, does it?”

“I think there will be trouble in spades.”

“So do I, kid, so do I, but let's let it happen when it happens. I have two hours before my next shot. The lighting guy knows my skin by heart—he can get someone else to stand in for me. I want to meet this guy Fine.”

“You sure that's all right?”

“I'm sure they're not going to can me,” Wayne said.

We walked together to the Wrights' cabin. Olgivanna took one look at Wayne, and I swear her panties almost fell off. He pretended he didn't notice, and so did her husband. I told them that Mr. Fine should arrive this afternoon with Payton's remains. Until then, we could sit on the outskirts of the set, just outside their cabin.

We sat on folding chairs. Wayne brought us lunch from the mess tent. We sat eating roast beef sandwiches and bananas. Wayne pulled out a cigarette, lit it off the end of the one he was already smoking. I wanted to talk to him about the sacred nature of tobacco. Like everything else, including going to church, moderation was enough. But now was not the time.

Wayne tried to ease us all by telling us the names show business had given him before everyone settled on John Wayne. He talked about being a kid. Growing up in the Mojave Desert, riding horses with his brother along the irrigation ditches. Grandpa nodded his head in satisfaction. No wonder Wayne looked so natural on a horse.

Then company arrived. Mr. Wopsock joined us, and he'd left his fancy duds in his motel room. He and Grandfather greeted each other as if they were brothers. Wopsock had a nice pair of Tony Lama boots, worn to that perfect place where they're still in one piece, but they've stretched enough to fit just the way a boot should.

Wayne gave me a look and asked to have a private talk with me.

“Only a few feet away, though, just beneath those piñons,” I said.

“Okay by me, kid.”

“What is it?”

“Couple of things. First of all, you okay with that other Indian sitting with you?”

“He and my grandfather made friends. He's a businessman from Salt Lake. Has a chain of department stores through Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho. Grew up here. He wants a change. Back to his roots.”

“Okay, then. I got another question for you,” he said. “That guard with red hair?”

“Finnerty. Security.”

“It's the right shirt and ID tag for security, I'll give you that.”

“Problem with him?”

“Don't know. He's been eyeing your wife. You've got it all over him in every way, but don't be surprised if he makes a play for her.”

“Iris?”

“And don't
ever
let your wife think no guy would be interested in her but you.”

“I didn't think—”

“I know. Here's the thing. I come out of nowhere because of a reason, and it's not just looks and height and all that other hooey,” Wayne said. “Million guys out there better-looking than me. I came out on top because I take stock of people. Kid, I don't know how to say this.”

“Just spit it out.”

“Your wife's been drawing the crew when we're not shooting.”

“That's okay with Ford. She did that during his last shoot.”

“I got it. But she's mostly drawing pictures of that guard who's been looking at her.”

“Oh,” I said.

“Just … pay attention.”

I looked at the ginger head and beard, and wondered what Iris found interesting enough to draw over and again. Maybe it was, like Grandfather said, the fact that there was something weird about him, something off. Artists like things that feel odd. Makes their work more interesting.

“Okay, that's it,” Wayne said. “I'll sit with you, if you don't mind, until my next scene comes up. I'm going to really nail Ward Bond this time around—it's my turn. He's gotten me three times in a row now.”

“Looking forward to it,” I said. If I had a big brother, I'd want him to be like Wayne. Full of smarts and fun.

When it was almost time for his scene, Wayne caught a glimpse of Finnerty heading toward the camera. He mumbled, “I swear the Pirate Queen would be envious of that guy's head of hair. Must be straight off the boat.”

“The Pirate Queen?”

“Maureen O'Hara. Great guy, my best friend, and she has a mean right hook.”

Wayne walked over to Mr. John, had a couple of words, went through the routine of starting the take, did his lines perfectly—“Cut and print!”—and then disappeared into the crowd of actors. Iris sat next to me, holding my hand, keeping a steady eye on Finnerty. That was it.

“What is it with you and that guy?”

“What guy?” she said.

I looked right into her eyes and waited.

“Oh, that guy,” she said. “Nothing. His face interests me, that's all.”

“Well, cool it, all right?”

Grandpa coughed into his hand, and I had a feeling he approved of me putting my foot down.

 

Forty-nine

I didn't know what was taking Fine so long to show up. Maybe we'd figured wrong. If he took forever, my nerves would be shot. I hadn't seen Helen, either. My stomach felt like it was tied in a knot up around my gullet. Wayne was tired of the same old, same old—his words, not mine—and joined us. Only one more shot, and he was finished for the day. My stomach relaxed a little.

I asked Grandpa if he had seen Helen. He had not. The Wrights had not. Wayne had no idea who Helen was. I scanned the crowd, hoping Helen was close by, hoping she was safe.

It crossed my mind that Fine might be later than I'd expected because he wasn't coming alone, but dismissed that stray idea. If Jake Fine struck at anyone, he wouldn't be the striker, and it would be far from the madding crowds, not in a throng of a hundred people, some of them famous.

Time was coming on to the magic hour. The glow on the stone bluffs was beginning to make the upper mesas vibrate with liquid light.

No one around but the necessary cast and crew. Except for the actors, the same guys I'd met last year.

Wright leaned in close to Wayne. “Excuse me,” Wright said, “you're quite famous. Rich. I don't know where it's coming from, but I sense we're heading into trouble. Meaning my wife and I and Yazzie and Iris. Why would you take this situation on?”

“That's why.”

“Pardon me?”

“Because you're in trouble, it's the right thing to do.”

“You're a good man. Old-fashioned.”

“I'm a very flawed man, but right is right, and that's the end of the story.”

“You see everything in black and white.”

“God, yes,” Wayne said. “You gotta stick up a fence and stand on one side or the other.”

“I envy you.”

“You're probably thinking I'm too dumb to see all those shades of gray.”

“Seeing them is a blight,” said Wright. “You and I, we both have the same creed.
I am what I am.
That's what I tell the Feds when they roust me over nothing.”

Wayne sat back and studied him. “Hang tight, friend, you're an old man who's hit a rough patch. Goldman here will get you through.”

I had scanned the thinning crowd in the last of the golden light, magic hour. No Helen. I looked for Finnerty. He was still on guard, leaning in the doorway of the mess tent. He was checking the folks, too, first a look inside the tent, then a look outside. His eyes often came back to Iris. I'd have a talk with him when this whole thing was over. No tough-guy stuff, just a low-key conversation. Tough-guy stuff would send Iris up the wall.