28
Jane drove fast across the flat plains of northern Texas. The night was just beginning, and she knew that she would need to use this time well. The trip from California to the Texas bank had taken them all day.
She tried to imagine what Barraclough was doing now. She was convinced that Mary knew enough about money to be reliable in her guess that Barraclough had driven to a bank in San Francisco that morning. He and Farrell could not have returned before about noon to find Mary gone and his two trainees dead.
He would have found Farreirs white station wagon by one o'clock and figured out that Jane and Mary had gotten into another car. Then he and Farrell would have spent more time disposing of the two bodies, cleaning the farmhouse of evidence that a woman had been held there, and removing any objects or prints that connected him with the property. That still left him with a van and two cars, with only Farrell to help him drive. He needed at least one person, perhaps two more people, he could trust to drive the vehicles back to Los Angeles. The most likely candidates would have to come all the way up from Enterprise Development in L.A.
She guessed that Barraclough would have been finished with all of this by nine or ten in the evening, about five hours after the time when all of his stolen money had disappeared. She said, 'Is there some way Barraclough would know his account in Switzerland was gutted?'
Mary didn't answer. Jane glanced over her shoulder and saw that she was curled up like a child, asleep on the back seat. The question would have to wait. Probably the bank would send him some kind of written closing statement.
Jane couldn't risk going back to the airport and flying Mary out of Dallas tonight. If Barraclough had the presence of mind to ask for confirmation that the gigantic deposit he had made was credited to his account, he would be told that his account was closed. Even if the Swiss bank didn't know that the transfer to the Internal Revenue Service had been initiated in Dallas, there would probably be a way to find out. She had to assume Barraclough would have people searching Dallas before the sun came up.
She looked at Mary again, then returned her eyes to the road. She had been holding down the feelings for days, but now she let them surface. What she had done was unforgivable. She had used this woman for bait and let the beast have her. All she could do now was try to preserve what was left. Whatever had been holding Mary together - the delay of physical sensation that came from shock, or maybe merely the energy of sheer hatred - had apparently drained out of her now. Before she had fallen asleep she had been weak and vague enough to make traveling a risk. Jane would have to get her indoors before morning. She used the last eight hours of darkness to run north out of Texas and up the short side of Oklahoma.
It was still dark when Jane bumped up off the road onto the smooth asphalt surface of a gas station and turned off the car's engine. She heard Mary sit up in the back seat, so she turned around to watch her squinting and blinking at the lighted island, then reach up to run her fingers through her hair. Jane watched her slowly begin to remember. She was suddenly agitated. 'Where are we? Why are we stopping?'
Jane chose to answer the first question. 'Miami, Oklahoma.'
'Where are we going?'
Jane was glad to hear the annoyance in Mary's voice. It was a vital sign, like a pulse or a heartbeat. 'This is it for now. It's safe here.'
At a little past nine a.m. they walked into the gift shop in the Inter-Tribal Council Building. The young woman who was cleaning the display case turned and smiled, then went back to her work. Jane waited until the woman sensed that she wanted to talk. She looked up from her work, let her eyes rest on Jane for a second, then said, 'I'll bet you're here visiting relatives.'
Mary smiled involuntarily.
'Yes,' said Jane. She saw Mary's face turn to hers in surprise. 'I was hoping to catch Martha McCutcheon here.'
'Oh, Seneca,' said the woman.
'That's right,' said Jane. She held out her hand. 'Jane Whitefield.'
The woman took it and smiled. 'Rowena Cloud. Ottawa.'
'I'm very pleased to meet you,' said Jane. 'Is Martha in the back?'
'Martha hasn't been well this week,' said Rowena Cloud. 'She has arthritis bad in the winter, and it's been bitter cold for a couple of days, so she might be in bed. She didn't mention anything about going anyplace. If she's not home, though, come on back. You can stay at our house. I can give you directions, and the key is over the door.'
'Well, thank you,' said Jane warmly. 'We'll go see if she's up to visitors.'
As they walked down the street, Mary asked softly, 'Are you really an Indian, or is that some kind of assumed identity too?'
Jane looked at her, amused. 'Think I could fool her?' She opened the car door and waited while Mary eased into the seat, then started the car and pulled out onto the road.
'How did she know? You have blue eyes.'
'This is Indian country. She's seen about every kind of Indian there is, so she's an expert. There are reservations all around us.'
'Seneca?'
'Some. The Iroquois all lived in New York State in the beginning. But there were some Seneca and Cayuga families who used to go into Ohio every fall to hunt. After the Revolutionary War they didn't see any point in going home. They were on reservations at Lewistown and Sandusky until they got pushed out in 1831 and sent to Oklahoma.'
'But this isn't your hometown?'
Jane shook her head. 'Not me. My family stayed in New York.' She watched Mary closely. 'Look, Mary. There are going to be a few things you see and hear that won't make sense to you. Like that girl back there saying we could stay with her, when she had never laid eyes on us before.'
'It did seem a little odd,' said Mary.
'Smile a lot and ignore anything that seems unfamiliar. I didn't want to bring you here, but we've run about as far as we can for now. Barraclough already knows I killed his men, and pretty soon he'll know you took all his money and gave it to the government. He's going to be searching, and this time he won't let anything distract him. He wants us dead.'
'I know that,' said Mary.
'A few of the people here know me. Most of them don't. A few are - in the way that we figure these things, not the way you're used to - relatives. We need to get you to a doctor, and we need a place to rest. This is it.'
They left the car parked on the road and walked along a path to the trailer park. It took Jane a few minutes of searching before she found the mobile home she remembered on the very edge of the lot. There was a small stenciled sign on the door that said 'mccutcheon.' She knocked quietly and listened.
The door of the mobile home opened and an old woman in a cardigan sweater and a flowered dress stood in the doorway three steps above them. Her long straight hair was thick and gray, tied back in a tight pony tail as though it belonged to a much younger woman, but her mouth was toothless and her jaws were clamped together so her chin nearly touched her nose. She said simply, 'Hello.'
Jane spoke to her in Seneca. 'My name is Jane White-field, Grandmother. Do you remember me?'
The old woman squinted, smiled happily, then said in English, 'Just a minute.' She went away and came back with her false teeth in. 'I remember you, Granddaughter,' she said in Seneca. 'I'm glad to see you again.'
Jane said in English, 'This is a friend of mine, Mary Perkins.'
The old woman scrutinized Mary in mock disapproval. 'Not another anthropologist.'
'No,' said Jane. 'She's only a safecracker.'
Martha laughed happily. 'Dah-joh.' She repeated it in English, stepping back to make way. 'Come in. I'm having trouble with the lock on this door. Maybe you're the one to fix it.'
Jane and Mary climbed the wooden steps into the tiny, neat kitchen. Mary could see that the television set was on in the living room, but Martha seemed to notice it at the same time. She reached into her sweater pocket, pulled out the remote control, aimed it carefully, and killed the machine. She said, 'Sit down, sit down. I'll get you something.'
Mary drew a breath to say 'We just ate,' but Jane touched her arm and gave her head a single shake.
Corn bread, honey, and strawberry and blueberry preserves appeared so suddenly and with so little
