temperatures tended to drop. Tonight the humidity held the day's heat like a damp blanket. Surely it would rain. Another flash of lightning, repeated and repeated. Chee saw that the house to the left of the alley he'd used was also empty and abandoned. It would give him a better view of the Lincoln. Under the cover of the booming thunder, he slipped from his hiding place, crossed the narrow passageway, and stepped through the empty window.
He stood a moment, giving his eyes a chance to adjust to the deeper darkness here. Something teased his nostrils. A sweetish smell. Faint. Somehow chemical. Like a bad perfume. Lightning. Far away, but producing enough brightness through the open doorway to show him he stood on the earth floor of an empty room. A room littered with scattered debris, fallen plaster, wind-blown trash. To his left, a gaping doorway into what must be a back room. The smell might come from there. But the smell could wait. He moved to the doorway. It gave him a good view of the Lincoln and he stood staring at the dark shape, waiting for lightning to show him more.
Suddenly there was a breeze, surprisingly cool, wet, and carrying the rich and joyful perfume of rain. The breeze died as abruptly as it had risen and Chee heard the rattle, rattle, rattle, of the ceremonial patrolman's tortoise shells. The sound was very close and Chee shrank back from the doorway. As he did, the patrolman walked slowly past. A different patrolman. Chee could see only a dark shape, but this man was larger. Lightning lit the plaza briefly and Chee saw the man was peering into the empty doorway of the adjoining house.
Chee moved as quickly as caution and the darkness would allow toward where his memory told him he'd seen the entrance to the back room. He'd be out of sight there, even if the patrolman checked this house. He moved his fingertips along the rough plaster, found the wooden doorframe, and moved through the opening, placing his feet cautiously in the darkness. The smell now was strong. A distinctly chemical smell. Chee frowned, trying to identify it. He moved carefully, back into the blackness. Then stopped. Within a few feet of him, someone breathed.
It was a low sound, the simple exhalation of a deep breath. Chee froze. A long way over the mesa, thunder thumped and rumbled and died away. Silence. And into the silence the faint sound of breath taken, breath exhaled. Easy, steady breathing. It seemed to come from the floor. Someone asleep? Chee took the flashlight from his back pocket, wrapped several thicknesses of his shirttail over the lens, squatted, pointed the light toward the sound. He flicked it on, and off again.
The dim light showed a small, elderly man sprawled on his back on the floor. The man wore only boxer shorts, a blue shirt, and moccasins. He seemed to be asleep. Still squatting, Chee edged two steps closer and flicked on the light again. The man wore his hair in the short bangs of old-fashioned Hopi traditionalists, and seemed to have some sort of ceremonial decoration painted on his forehead and cheeks. Where were his trousers? Chee risked the flashlight again. The room was bare. No sign of clothing. What was the man doing here? Drunk, most likely. In here to sleep it off.
Chee put the flashlight back in his pocket. From outside he heard the ceremonial question being called by the patrolman. He returned to the outer room. Still forty minutes to wait. It would be safe again to resume his watch of the Lincoln.
Chee stood just inside the exterior doorway. It was full night now, but the open plaza, even on this cloudy night, was much lighter than the interior from which Chee watched. He could see fairly well, and he saw the patrolman-priest of the Two Horn Society walking slowly toward the Lincoln. The priest stopped beside the car, standing next to the door where the man in the straw hat sat, leaning toward him. In the silence, Chee heard a voice, low and indistinct. Then another voice. The watchman asking straw hat what he was doing there? Or telling him to move? What would straw hat do? And why hadn't West, or whoever had set this up, foreseen this snag in their plans?
As that question occurred to him, Chee thought of the answer to an earlier question. Several earlier questions. The man in the back room wasn't drunk. He wouldn't be drunk on such a ceremonial occasion. The sweet chemical smell was chloroform. The man hadn't been wearing trousers. He'd been wearing a ceremonial kirtle. And tortoise shell rattles. He'd been knocked out, and stripped of his Two Horn costume.
At the blue Lincoln, the Two Horn priest was moving away from the car window now, moving fast. No longer did he rattle as he walked.
There was a blinding flash of blue-white light, followed almost instantly by an explosive crash of thunder. The flash illuminated the Two Horn priest. He was hurrying past the kiva toward a gap in the buildings which led to the upper plaza. He must be West. But he should have been carrying two briefcases. He should have been carrying five hundred thousand dollars. He was carrying nothing. Chee hesitated a moment and then sprinted to the Lincoln. The first drops struck him as he ran across the plaza. Huge, icy blobs of water, scattered at first, and then a cold, thunderous torrent.
Again there was lightning. A tall blond man emerged from a ruined building just beyond where the Lincoln was parked. He had something in his hand, perhaps a pistol. He was moving fast, like Chee, toward the car. The flash told Chee little more than that—just the blond man in the blue and gray shirt and a glimpse of the Lincoln, where the hat was no longer visible.
The blond got to the car perhaps three seconds before Chee did. Chee didn't intend to stop—didn't have time to stop. The blue Lincoln, the straw hat, didn't concern Chee now. But the blond man stopped him.
He put up his left hand. 'Help him,' the blond man said. The rain was a downpour now. Chee extracted his flashlight, turned it on. The rain beat against the back of his head, streamed down the face of the blond man, who stood motionless, looking stunned. A pistol hung from his right hand, water dripping from it.
'Put away your gun,' Chee said. He pulled open the front door of the Lincoln. The straw hat had fallen on the floorboards under the steering wheel and the middle-aged man who had worn it had fallen too, sideways, his head toward the passenger's side. In the yellow light of the flash, the blood that was pouring from his throat across the pale-blue upholstery looked black. Chee leaned into the car for a closer look. The damage seemed to have been done with something like a hunting knife. Mostly the throat, and the neck—at least a dozen savage slashing blows.
Chee backed out of the front seat.
'Help him,' the blond man said.
'I can't help him,' Chee said. 'Nobody can help him. He killed him.'
'That goddamned Indian,' the blond man said. 'Why did he?'
There were two briefcases on the floorboards on the passenger side. Blood was dripping off the front seat onto one of them. West could have taken them by simply reaching in and picking them up. He'd asked for five hundred thousand dollars. Why hadn't he taken it?
'It wasn't an Indian,' Chee said. 'And I don't know why.'
But as he said it, he did know why. West wanted vengeance, not money. That's what all this had been about. The dark wind ruled Jake West. Chee left the blond man standing by the Lincoln and ran across the plaza. West
