I waited out by their SUV and watched the cars go by. The air was brisk, and I was starting to regret not bringing my coat from the Bullet. The aspen trees around the cabins and adjacent campground were a bright butter and shimmered in the light wind. They had been tenacious in the face of the small snowstorm of the evening before, trying to hold onto fall. Only a few loose leaves tumbled across the gravel toward the alley behind the motel. But the sun was shining this morning, and the whole place just seemed to glow.
He remembered his jacket. After he closed the door to the cabin, the curtain flipped back just a touch and then hung slack as it had before. “You want the other guys, too?”
I introduced my most ingratiating smile. “No, I figure you’ll do.” He didn’t seem happy with this turn of events. “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, mister?”
“Anderson, Mike Anderson.” He was quick with it, and the name matched the registration of the vehicle.
“Mr. Anderson, do you mind taking a little walk with me here?” I gestured toward the office, where the Bullet was parked and, more importantly, where my jacket lay on the seat. He started, and I figured this guy’s never had any dealings with law enforcement in his life other than traffic violations. I figured to start easy. “Why don’t you tell me about last night?”
He bit his lip, nodding his head in agreement. “I am really sorry about all that noise.”
“Um-hmm.”
Um-hmm
was one of my secret weapons. I could give out with a noncommittal
um-hmm
with the best of them.
“We didn’t tear anything up . . . I mean we made a lot of noise?”
“Willis did mention it . . . But that’s not why I’m here.” Now he looked really worried. “I just need to ask you about the areas that you might have hunted in your visit here.” We had arrived at the Bullet, where I opened the door, fished out my coat, and pulled it on. “Sorry, it’s getting a little cool. The areas? Sections for your hunting permits?”
His eyes stayed in the truck, taking in the radio, radar, and especially the Remington 870 that was locked to the dash. After a moment he spoke. “You mean the numbers?”
“Yep, that would be helpful.” I waited. “You’re not sure what the numbers are?”
“No, but they’re in the truck.”
As we started back, the tone became a little more conversational. I commented on the weather, and he related how he and his friends had been surprised by the little storm last night, how the roads had been slick with snow coming off the mountain. “You fellows were hunting on the mountain?”
“Yes, sir.” He unlocked the Chevy and dug into the center console where I caught a glimpse of a red box indicating Federal brand ammunition. After a moment, he produced four bright and shining bow-hunting permits.
Bow hunting permits. I pursed my lips and blew out. “You fellows are bow hunters?
“Yes, sir.” I checked the permits; they were all mountain, 24, 166, 25. “Look, is there something we’re being charged with? Should I be getting a lawyer or something?
“I’m hoping that won’t be necessary, Mr. Anderson. Do you or any of your party have any firearms?”
“No.”
Maybe he was just nervous. “You’re sure?”
“Yes. Well . . .” Moment of truth. “Randy has a .38 in the glove box.”
“Is it loaded?”
“It might be.”
“Are you aware that a loaded, vehicularly concealed weapon constitutes a misdemeanor offense in this state?” Vehicularly—was that a word? Where did I get this stuff? I smiled again to let him know I didn’t think he was Al Capone. “So, let’s say you and I make a deal? I won’t examine the legendary Randy’s pistol to see if it’s loaded and you answer a few more of my questions.” He figured it was a good deal. I pulled the section map out of my coat pocket, spread it out, and, with Mike’s help, held it on their hood. He said they had asked at the Game and Fish about sections 23 and 26 because Anderson’s father had hunted there years ago, claiming the deer on the Powder River draw were much larger than those on the mountain. Anderson’s father was right, but I didn’t share that with Mike; my ranch was in that section. They had driven out there Friday at noon and circled up along the Powder River coming back past Arvada, Clearmont, and Crossroads.
“Did you get off the main road at any point?”
“Um, three times. Once to watch some antelope just at the top of the hill after that little town at the main road?”
“Arvada.”
“Once where there was an old bridge headed south.”
Maybe something. “An old kings-bridge structure?” His face was blank. “A trestle system of steel girders that goes over the road with an old car stuffed into the bank on the far side?”
“Yes, sir. Now that you mention it.”
“Did you see anyone, or anything else, out there?” He paused to think. I was going to have to talk to all of them. Was I ever going to get to sleep?
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did anybody see you?”
“No. I mean there were some cars and trucks that went by . . .” He was thinking hard but wasn’t coming up with anything.
“But you didn’t speak to anyone?”
“No.”
“What about the third stop?” His face brightened. I guess he figured the governor had called with the reprieve.
“We had lunch at a little place about twenty miles out.”
“The Red Pony?”
He pointed a finger at me, and I started figuring that Anderson sold something for a living. “That was it.”
I asked him what they had, and he said cheeseburgers. I asked how they were, and he said they were okay.
“Just okay?”
“Yes, sir. Why? Is that important?”
A gust of wind fluttered the map. “No, I just want to give the chief-cook-and-bottle-washer some flak. You ate at this place on the way back to town? About what time was that?
“Right after noon, maybe one.” I took out my pen and made some notes on the map. “Your picture is on the wall. Out there at the bar with all the medals, maps, and stuff, isn’t it?” I continued to scribble away. “You two were in the war together? You and the Indian guy?”
“Yep, the war to start all wars.” I don’t think he got it.
“I mean the food wasn’t that bad . . .” He started sounding apologetic. I couldn’t wait to give Henry an earful. “It took him a little while to get it out to us, but I think he had just opened. You sure get your money’s worth. He cut the fries out of potatoes right there on the bar, and I got this cheeseburger that had about a half pound of jalapeños on it.”
I stopped scribbling.
3
There was a clattering as someone tried to pull what sounded like pots and pans from one of the many boxes that lined the kitchen wall. My head slumped against my pillow; almost fourteen hours of sleep and I still felt like shit. It looked like a nice day though. From my perspective near the floor, I had a clear view of brilliant blue skies without a cloud in sight. There was more noise from the kitchen, and whistling. Unless I missed my guess, it was Prokofiev’s Symphony Number One, sometimes in D, and it was being butchered. I dragged myself to a sloped sitting position and stretched my back, allowing the little muscle just left of my spine and halfway down to decide how it was going to let me live today. The prognosis was fair.
I looked through the opaque plastic coating that still clung to the glass door between the bedroom and kitchen, pushed to my feet, and stumbled. I turned the glass knob, stolen almost a decade ago from our rented house in town, and confronted the Cheyenne Nation who was resplendent in his old Kansas City Chiefs jersey, complete with YOUR NAME printed on the back. “Hey, people are trying to sleep in here.”
“After fourteen hours you have constituted clinical death.” He was popping open a can of biscuits on the particle board edge of the counter and lining an old pie pan with them.
“Did you wash that?”
He paused. “Should I have?”
“Well, there’s mouse shit on most of that stuff.”
His shoulders sagged as he pulled the biscuits out of the pan and inspected the underside of each one. “How do you live like this?” He turned to look at me. “Will you please go put some clothes on?” I retreated into the bedroom, retrieved my bathrobe from the nail in the stud wall, and ambled back to the kitchen.
I took a seat on the stool by the counter and poured a cup of coffee into a Denver Broncos mug. I figured it was my job to do everything possible to irritate him this afternoon. I was feeling better. “What’s for brunch?”
“You mean besides mouse shit?” He had dropped about two pounds of pork sausage into a frying pan that I couldn’t recall ever having seen before. I took a sip of the French roast; it seemed like all I did was drink the stuff. Cady sent me fancy, whole-bean coffee from Philadelphia in trendy little resealable bags, but I hadn’t gotten around to getting a grinder.
“Game Day.” It was a tradition. Twice a year we found ourselves locked in the death struggle of the AFC Western Division: Broncos vs. Chiefs. Pancake Day and Game Day on the same weekend.
“Yes, I know. You are going to get your ass kicked today.”
“Oh, please . . .” I tried the coffee again; it wasn’t so bad. “Where did you find a grinder?” He ignored me and continued to look through the Folgers can that held my meager selection of utensils, so I asked, “Spatula?”
“Yes.”
I looked at the scattered containers resting haphazardly against the wall, at the strata of Rainier beer crates that were stacked in every available space. It was daunting, but he had found a frying pan. “Box.”
“Jesus.” The pork sausage began to sizzle. He approached the boxes and began going through them in a methodical fashion, top row first, left to right. “Walt, we need to go over a few things.” This had an ominous tone to it. “There was a time when this particular lifestyle had its place, the grieving widower valiantly sallying forth through a sea of depression and cardboard. This gave way to the eccentric lawman era, but now, Walt my friend, you are just a slob.”
I hugged my coffee cup a little closer and straightened my robe. “I’m a lovable slob.”
He had made it through the top row and was now working the collapsed fringe toward the backdoor. “At the risk of sending you into a tailspin, Martha has been dead for four years.”
“Three.” He stopped and leaned against the door facing, the other hand at his side.
The sausage popped, sending a small splatter to the plywood floor. I looked at the splatter mark; it was relatively contained, with a few scalloped edges due to the height of trajectory, ray-emitting tendrils reaching for the center of the room. If the object emitting the splatter is in motion, the drops will be oval and have little tails, which will project in the horizontal direction that the drop was moving. As the top of the teardrop lands last, splatters on a wall can tell you if the assailant is left- or right-handed. I knew a lot about splatters. I wondered how Vic was doing. I looked at the unopened manila envelope sitting in my chair, a priority set of pictures illustrating the next-to-final resting place of Cody Pritchard. I had been so tired by the time I had gotten home that I had thrown them on the recliner, too exhausted to concentrate. Ruby’s handwriting looked personal and out of place: Scene Investigation Photographs, 9/29/2:07 A.M.
“Four.” His eyes were level, and his voice carried a tired resignation to the battle joined. “Walt, it is time to get on with your life . . . I mean college kids live better than this.” I didn’t know what to say; I had had a kid in college and then in law school, and she had lived better than this. “But I have a four-fold plan for your redemption.”
I sipped some more coffee and stared at the floor. “Does this involve getting me a woman?” He pulled the spatula out of the nearest box. I advised him to wash it, which he did after making a face, then set about breaking up the brick of meat in the pan.
“Getting you a woman is the third part.”
“I like this plan, but I think we should move the third part up.”
“We have to get you to the point where you are worthy of a woman.”
“Why do I get the feeling that I’m not going to like the other parts of this plan?”
“Walt, your life is a mess, your house is a mess, and you are a mess. It is about time we did some cleaning up.” He looked around the cabin, I’m sure for dramatic effect. “Let us start with the easy stuff. This was a nice little house when you first got started, but that was five years ago.” I thought it was four. “You have got to get some gutters so the run-off stops cutting a moat around the house. You are going to have to use a bleach solution to cut the gray off the things and then put some UV protection on them. You need a porch, and a deck out back would not be such a horrible thing . . .”
My head hurt. “I don’t have the time for all that, let alone the energy.”
He found the opener on the counter and began opening a number of small cans. “We are not talking time, energy, or money, which will be your next argument. We are talking inclination. Now, I know these two young men . . .”
“Oh, no. I’m not going to have a bunch of thieving redskins roaming around my place while I’m not here.”
He choked laughing, his arms spread wide to encompass the entirety of the room. “What would they steal?” He had a point. “These boys just started up their own contracting firm; they are hungry, cheap, and they are good. I can have them over here tomorrow morning at eight.” I looked around the room at the stud walls, exposed wiring, and dirt-encrusted plywood floors.
I sighed. “Okay, what’s part two?”
“We get you in shape.”
I took another sip of coffee; it was getting cold. “Oh, I’m past that shit.”
“I want you to think about part three.” He smiled. “I want you to think about part three while we’re going through parts one and two.” He bumped me in the shoulder, and I spilled a little coffee. More splatters. He turned and dumped a small can of green chilies into the pan.