The Big Dirt Nap

based on specific federal criteria,' she said. 'Membership in a tribe is simply determined by the members of that tribe.'

'So if the leader enrolls you as a member, you're a member?'

'No one wants to think it happens like that, but yes, it can. Bobby used to call them the Wantabees and the Ihopesos.'

Most people who claimed Native American heritage were only one-eighth or one-sixteenth. Betty herself was only one-quarter Quepochas. The Crawfords were going head-to-head with a faction of the tribe who wanted to admit hundreds of new members to get their numbers up in the hopes of solidifying their case before Congress.

'That's why they got in touch with me. Bobby Crawford was the tribal leader at the time.'

'So why snatch you?' I asked. 'Wasn't there a lawyer they could simply call?' I waited for her to refute my use of the word snatch, but she didn't.

'I was on my way back to New Haven. I hadn't spent more than four weeks on tribal lands since I'd left for college seven years earlier. I was an apple—red on the outside, white on the inside. Maybe they wanted to make a statement.'

She swung around in her chair and pointed to a picture hanging on the wall behind her desk. 'That's my father, Daniel Smallwood. He's the only other lawyer in Shaftsbury. He's also the leader of the rival faction.'

Then again, maybe that was it.

'At the time I felt no more Quepochas than you probably feel . . .' She looked me up and down. 'Scotch- Irish?'

'Close. Italian-Irish.'

'Don't get me wrong. There weren't a lot of squaws at Yale, and if a professor wanted to give me extra points for it, I let him. My way of helping to assuage his white Anglo guilt. But I didn't play it up with a lot of fringed leather and beaded jewelry.'

I believed her. She wasn't denying her heritage, it was just that she didn't think about it that much. Until the Crawfords came back into her life.

'My father was disappointed when Bobby married someone outside of the tribe. I guess he had hopes Bobby and I would one day bring the tribe together.' Betty said this so unemotionally I had a hard time believing her.

'Bobby and Chantel had a child right away. No surprise, she had a bump on their wedding day. Then he died and she really embraced the tribe, as they say.'

I bet she did. Free room and board courtesy of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the knowledge that she and her little boy would be enrolled as members of the Quepochas tribe. And possibly a very rich member if she sided with Daniel Smallwood.

'As a licensed attorney I went before the tribal council to make the Crawfords' case. We won and the tribe agreed not to add any new members without a rigorous approval process.'

'DNA testing?' I asked.

'Not that rigorous.'

Betty told me they'd tried that ten years earlier and the results sent shock waves through the small community. Some leaders had less blood than they claimed, some members found out their fathers weren't their fathers, and other even more awkward bits of news surfaced, so the testing was halted and never resumed.

'Were the Crawfords ever arrested for the incident with you?'

'Arrested, but not charged. I wouldn't press charges. Without that it was purely a tribal issue. Red on red offense on tribal lands . . . the council had jurisdiction. They held a pretrial intervention on behalf of the Crawfords. We made it go away. It wasn't in anyone's interests to pursue.'

On top of that, she'd come over to their side. She learned a lot about her own heritage from them. Bobby, really. He was the smart one; the other two were not as bright. Or as passionate about their cause.

The original stunt had worked. Now I wondered if the surviving brothers were dumb enough to try something similar on a nonnative off tribal lands, where it wouldn't be a tribal issue swept under the rug but a federal offense.

'Is the reservation near here?'

I tried to sound casual, but Betty Smallwood knew what I was thinking.

'They wouldn't do that.'

'Why not? They shamed and charmed you into seeing their side. Maybe they thought they could do the same with a TV journalist.' Lucy would have been happy to be referred to that way, although she'd be the first to admit that she cranked out low-budget reality television shows.

I waited for Betty to answer, and she searched my face trying to guess how I'd use the information.

'It's adjacent to the Titans Hotel, on the north side.'

'Thank you.'

We heard huffing and puffing, and the stairs creaking as they had when I climbed them. I thought it was the elderly salesclerk, then the door swung open.

'You better have some water up here.' It was Detective Stacy Winters. She leaned against the doorjamb, hands low on her bony hips, and Betty pointed to a cooler near a dirty casement window.

'Where are they?' she asked.

'Papercups?'

'C'mon, let's not waste each other's time. Billy and Claude. They were seen at the hotel and as of this morning I've got physical evidence linking them to Nick Vigoriti's murder.'

So now the Crawfords were officially wanted for questioning in the murder of Nick Vigoriti. My temporary status as a 'person of interest'—bestowed on me by the local press, who had to say something even if it was vague and ultimately untrue—was rescinded. And if Lucy's disappearance had briefly registered on Stacy Winters's Richter scale, it had gone poof with this new evidence against her favorite suspects.

'Physical evidence, right at the scene. So I'll ask you again. Where are they?' Winters said. It was a scene I had a feeling they'd played out before, with Betty leading in the head-to-head matchup.

'What is your problem with them? One of them not ask you to the prom or something? I don't know and I wouldn't tell you if I did. I wouldn't have to. Presumably you do know something about the law, since you're in law enforcement.' Betty was in lawyer mode, but this smacked of something a tad more personal.

At a loss for words, Winters turned to me. 'And what are you doing here?' She walked over to the watercooler, ran a finger across the top of the dusty glass jug, and decided against it. 'I heard about your little escapade in Springfield last year. Some cop friend of yours called me. I hope you don't think you're going to start sticking your nose in police business up here.'

Betty's crack about the prom and Winters's inability to deliver a quick comeback made me bold. 'Lay back. I just came to send you the fax. It's not like there's a Kinko's in this burg.' I was tempted to say, If your office had a working computer I wouldn't be here. I handed her the picture of Lucy that I'd just faxed to her office. She didn't even look at it—just folded it in four and stuffed it in her inside pocket.

'Okay. Mission accomplished. I got the fax.'

She stood with her hands on her hips, dismissing me. Jeez, what a bitch. Part of me wanted to stick around for the cat fight, but I didn't need to be hit over the head—she wanted me gone and I was happy to oblige. I yanked out the power cord and shoved the cord and the computer in my bag. 'What do I owe you for letting me use the computer, Ms. Smallwood?'

'Forget it.'

I made my way down the stairs, nearly bumping into Georgie, who'd crept up to eavesdrop. 'You might want to let them talk for a bit,' I said, trying to spare him.

'Is it about Billy and Claude?' he whispered, walking back down the stairs. 'She don't like them.'

I nodded. 'Does everyone know about them?' I asked.

'I know everybody. They all come in to buy the Powerball tickets. I can tell who's having fun and who's desperate.' He fell just short of telling me what he meant by that. 'You're not a cop, too, are you?'

'Me? I'm a gardener.' That got me a smile but no more information from Georgie. I didn't want to be around when Winters and Betty finished up, so I kept walking, to the front of the store, where I handed Georgie a dollar for a bottle of water. Across the street I saw the Big Y shopping cart and the walking bundle of rags.