“Is there anybody who can corroborate where you’ve been in the last forty-eight hours?”
“No.”
“Do you own a. 38 pistol?” Stupid question; I knew by experience that Artie owned every gun in the Jane’s Small Arms Catalog, so the answer was predictable.
“Yes.”
“Would you mind if we had a look at it?”
He said nothing.
“Artie, you’ve got to admit that it doesn’t look good.” I rubbed my tired eyes with a thumb and forefinger. “Except for one glaring fact that I can’t see a single thing you could gain from killing these people.”
“That’s right.”
I took a breath. “There is the argument.”
He laughed again. “You’re saying I killed this woman and her husband for a crummy subsidy check?”
“It doesn’t sound all that convincing, does it?” I shrugged. “But there’s the tape. As I said, I haven’t heard it yet, but supposedly Clarence was going to give you quite a bit of money for killing his wife and child.”
He shook his head, and I watched the end of the cigarette move back and forth like tracer fire as he mumbled from one side of his mouth. “Bullshit. I don’t know him, and I never talked to him on the phone. Ever.” The tip brightened with his inhale. “Must be somebody else, somebody who had something to gain.”
I let the dust settle before making the next statement. “I think you should come in, Artie; turn yourself over to the authorities.”
“No way. I’ve seen how that turns out; once they get their hands on an Indian, it’ll be the right Indian-one- way trip to Deer Lodge.”
“I can see how this would have a limited appeal, but how do you see it ending? It’s a manhunt, Artie-you’re the guy that we’re going to have to catch and the more you run, the guiltier you look.”
“We?”
“Me, Henry, Lolo Long, the Feds, everybody who stands behind a badge-we’re all going to be looking for you.”
“You’ll never catch me, none of you.” He shook his head. “I heard what you did to my little nephew; you tell Standing Bear I owe him one.”
“I will.”
“Seems to me, I owe you, too.” Looking off to the right and his avenue of escape, he sipped his beer and rested my sidearm on his leg. “Drink your beer.”
“Artie, you’re also not stupid enough to do something to me. Turn yourself in.”
He shook his head, and I listened as he clicked off the safety on my Colt again. “Can’t do it. I done time and I can’t do it again. Even short time-I just can’t do it. Not for nothin’, and I don’t wanna braid horsehair key chains up in Deer Lodge for the next forty years.”
He started to stand, and it was then that Artie became aware of another large knife with an eleven-inch homemade blade that had been silently and professionally placed at his throat. From the sudden glow of Artie’s cigarette, I recognized the turquoise bear paw engraved in the bone.
“Do not worry about it; maybe they will let you do hatbands as well.”
12
“Took you long enough.”
After having packing-taped Artie’s hands behind his back with a roll he’d discovered on the porch, the Bear sat Artie on one of the kitchen chairs. “I decided I wanted my beer back.”
I collected Lonnie’s boom box from the living room where he used it to listen to KRZZ and baseball games and carried it in, setting it on the table. “How long were you out there?”
“Most of it. I saw somebody on the porch and figured it was too late for Lonnie, so I parked over at the casino and doubled back on foot. It seemed as if you were having a nice conversation with Chief Long, so I did not want to interrupt.”
I shot him a look.
“Then I did not want to interrupt the wide-ranging conversation you were having with Artie.”
I took the CD and pulled it from the paper sleeve that read OFFICIAL EVIDENCE-FBI. “He says he didn’t do it.”
The Bear watched as Artie stared at the surface of the table. “That is what most of the men in Deer Lodge say.”
I hit the EJECT button, dropped the CD in, and glanced at the silent Small Song. “Well, since Artie isn’t talking, let’s see what he had to say.” I punched the button, and we listened as there was a fumbling of a receiver, and then the conversation started; it sounded as if it had been picked up midway and had been recorded through a barrel of bourbon. Someone cleared his throat, and then the voice of Clarence Last Bull mumbled something that ended with, “So, do you think you can help me out with that thing?”
Artie’s voice resounded through the phone lines-he sounded angry but it was still hard to hear him over the music playing loudly in the background. “I’ll kill the bitch!”
Clarence’s voice dropped, as if he were trying to get Artie to lower his. “Yeah, yeah, that thing that we talked about. I was just wondering how much?”
Artie’s voice continued to rise. “Twelve hundred God-damned dollars!”
Clarence pleaded. “Hey, keep your voice down.”
“Fuck you. Twelve hundred dollars is what I’m talking about!”
I glanced up at Artie, who continued to look at the surface of the table. Henry was watching him with an impassive expression on his face, and I was one of the few who knew that it was when the Cheyenne Nation appeared the least emotional that he was the most.
Artie: “I’ll kill the whole family!”
Clarence: “Right, right. Look, Artie, we’re going for a picnic up on the cliffs at Painted Warrior and I was thinking that would be a good time to do the job. You know what I mean?”
The receiver rattled again as Artie must have changed his position. “I don’t give a shit!”
Clarence: “I know, I know. Look Artie, it’s gotta seem like it’s an accident or the whole thing is off.”
There was a loud noise as if Artie had struck something on his end. “Fuck it, man!” There was a woman’s voice in the background, but I couldn’t make out who she was or what it was she was saying, but it sounded as if she was in the same heightened emotional state as Artie.
Clarence’s voice rose a little now. “Artie, I need you to keep a lid on this stuff till we can get it planned out.”
“Fuck yeah, man.”
The two men hung up, and I reached over and hit the STOP button. I looked at the culprit. “That you, Artie?”
He said nothing.
I glanced at Henry. “That sounded like Artie to me.”
The Bear stood, taking him by the arm. “We should go.”
Artie didn’t move.
The Cheyenne Nation used a little more force and Small Song rose slightly and then, wrapping his feet around the chair legs in protest, slumped in his seat, “I’m not going to jail.”
I figured we were looking at a struggle but wasn’t sure what it was that we could do to get Artie over to the Law Enforcement Center against his volition other than an epic wrestling match. I glanced at Henry, and the Bear looked at Artie and then reached to the small of his back and slowly drew the bone-handled Bowie knife, letting it drape down beside his thigh, clearly in Small Song’s view.
Artie shrugged, and you could’ve cut the air in the room with, well, a knife. “Kill me; I ain’t goin’ to jail.”
I wondered how Henry was going to play the bluff when he suddenly raised the butt end of the elk-bone handle and brought it down on the back of Artie’s head with expert precision.
