The driver’s-side window whirred down on the official vehicle, and Lolo Long looked at me. I leaned an elbow on the sill. “You pulling double duty?”
“My one-man staff, Charles, is following Nate Small Song.”
I held up the two cans. “You want a beer?”
“No, thanks.”
I nodded and blew a breath out, extending my cheeks. “Clarence is dead.”
She gestured toward the radio. “I know.” She reached up and turned the motor off. “I think the BIA called the family.”
“Is there anybody besides Charles?”
She rolled a shoulder. “A few cousins, but nobody close.” She watched me thinking.
“No offense, but should we consider adding Charles to our ever-narrowing list of suspects?”
She laughed. “I told you, he doesn’t have enough imagination to carry on a conversation. Anyway, why would he kill his half-brother, sister-in-law, and nephew?”
“I thought maybe you’d have an idea about that.”
She shook her head. “Nope, dead end.”
There was a pause, and I could feel the exhaustion creeping into my marrow. I stood there for a moment more and then asked permission, since it seemed like she wanted to talk. “All right if I come around and sit down? I’m not so sure I can stand up for much longer.”
She pushed her shooting bag and aluminum clipboard onto the floor with a certain panache, and I circled around, opened the door, and sat. She glanced up at the dome light. “It’ll go out in a minute.” Another pause filled the cab, and I thought for a second I was going to fall asleep. “If you were going to pursue the investigation after all, did it ever occur to you to let me know?”
“It was a spur of the moment kind of thing; we went and talked to Inez Two Two, who gave us a lead on two of the places where Clarence might’ve been-one he wasn’t and, as it turned out, one he shall ever be.”
“It’s a lonely spot.”
“Yes, it is.”
I took the time to study her some more; mostly the muscles in her neck. She was tall with a broad-trunked body, but it was sexy the way she carried herself, like she was built for go. She took a deep breath, which gave me plenty of time to study the sickle-shaped scar, almost as if her face itself had been marked with the crescent of Islam.
She looked at me. “I don’t sleep.”
“Ever?” I looked out the window. “I didn’t either until 1972.”
“What happened in 1972?”
“I got tired.”
She laughed a deep, throaty laugh.
“Later, I got married, had a kid; I guess it took my mind off of it.”
“Been there, done that.” She unbuckled her seat belt and turned a little to look at me as I stared at her. “You should see the look on your face right now.”
“You have a child?”
She ran a hand over the leather-clad steering wheel. “He’s with my husband in Billings.”
“What’s his name?”
“Cale Garber; ranch kid from up near Judith Gap. We met in school; I was already ROTC, so he knew he was marrying a soldier…” The words trailed off.
“I meant your son.”
“Danny.”
“How old?”
“He’s five.” She smiled, but the joy was missing in it. We sat there for a long time before she felt the need to fill the silence. “Before my first deployment I went over to Radio Shack and bought one of those talking picture frames and put a photo of me in it. I was smiling.” She cleared her throat and touched the scar on the side of her face. “Before I had this.” She dropped her hand and picked at imaginary lint on her uniform pants. “I recorded this stupid message, you know… I love you; I love you so much-please don’t forget about me! The frame had a motion detector, and every time they’d walk into the living room the thing would go off. I love you; I love you so much- please don’t forget about me! It became a joke around the house; you know, a catchphrase.”
I sat there staring at the elliptical scar and remained silent.
Her hand came back up and stayed at her temple. “We were in Sadr City when this thing went off, concave, like a dinner platter with something like sixty pounds of explosives underneath-made to go through a Hummer like it was lard.” She turned her head to look at me, consequently hiding the scar. “It killed the driver, Garston, instantaneously; didn’t even know what hit him. Took Van Holt apart and sliced off Kestner’s legs. Stevenson got it in the chest and bled out fast. I mean, we’d been hit by EFPs before, even multiple arrays, but this thing, this one…” She placed her hand on the wheel again, but kept her eyes on me. “It sounded like something ripping-like the air was made of canvas.”
She said the lines again, with the same singsong tune. “I love you; I love you so much-please don’t forget about me!”
I continued to study her.
“Garston was dead, but his foot was still on the accelerator. The wheel turned, and we were suddenly doing this graceful arc into the desert. So there I was, Medical Specialist Lolo Long with my one eye full of blood-but with the other seeing the vivid blue of the sky and the straw color of the sand.” She breathed, and I watched the muscles in her throat bunch as she swallowed. “It felt like that part went on forever; riding across the desert in a shape just like the scar on my face.”
I watched as a tear welled in the nearest eye.
She chanted again, and I knew I was hearing the mantra that had kept Specialist Lolo Long alive in that crippled, still-moving Hummer. “I love you; I love you so much-please don’t forget about me!” She laughed. “Sometime during my second deployment the battery ran out on that damn picture frame, and Cale said they didn’t replace it because it had become such an annoyance, a reminder every day that I wasn’t there.” She took a deeper breath and blew it out between her lips, pushing the emotion away. “When I got home, I threw it in the garbage.”
We sat there like that for a long time, and I pretended to study the dash as she wiped her eye. I waited a respectful amount of time before asking. “How often do you see him?”
“Twice, since I’ve been back.” She wouldn’t look at me. “My mother visits him, Barrett, too…” I waited as she composed herself. “I’m just… I think that maybe I’m not cut out to be a mother.”
Thinking I better redirect the conversation a little, I took my hat off and dropped it in my lap, rubbed my face with both hands, and then ran them through my hair. “I was in my office one day when my wife came in and sat in the chair across from my desk and told me she was pregnant.” Her eyes came back to mine. “I’ll never forget what she said next: people have been screwing this up for thousands of years; I guess it’s our turn.”
She laughed again, but this time there was a little more heart in it. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
The crickets were chirping, and I could even hear a few frogs down in the barrow ditch. We both watched as a couple of bats made mincemeat out of the miller moths dodging patterns in the dusk-to-dawn light in Lonnie’s driveway.
“I looked you up.”
I smiled, thankful to be on safer ground, and put my hat back on. “I’ve got a file; you told me.”
“I looked up your service record, too. You were the Sam Spade of USMC Investigators, huh?”
I nodded. “In a fitting tribute, there is an illustrious manila envelope in a file cabinet in the basement of the United States Marine Corps Archives in Quantico, Virginia, with my name in it, yes.”
“Grunt.”
“Hump.” I figured we were done here, and I was going to have to start up the hill to Lonnie’s while I still had the energy. I pulled the handle on the Yukon and stepped out, closed the door, and leaned in the window, knowing full well I was heading back out on thin ice. “When this is over, however it’s over, you should go see your son. He loves you. He loves you so much-and you better not forget about him.”
