McGinnis rocked a little while, considering the question. And probably wondering, Leaphorn thought, if Leaphorn had noticed that the old man's pickup was double-tanked, like most empty-country vehicles, and wouldn't need many refills.
'Well, hell,' McGinnis said. 'You know how folks are. Come in here with a dry tank and seventy miles to a station, you got to have something for 'em.'
'I guess so,' Leaphorn said.
'If you haven't got any gas to give 'em, then they just hang around and waste your time gossiping. Then they want to use your telephone to get some kinfolks to come and bring 'em a can.'
He glowered at Leaphorn, took another sip of bourbon. 'You ever know a Navajo to be in a hurry? You got 'em underfoot for hours. Drinking up your water and running you out of ice cubes.'
McGinnis's face was slightly pink—embarrassment caused by his admission of humanity. 'So finally I just quit paying the bills and the telephone company cut me off. I figured keeping a little gasoline was cheaper.'
'Probably,' Leaphorn said.
McGinnis was glowering at him again, making sure that Leaphorn wouldn't suspect some socially responsible purpose in this decision.
'What'd you come out here for anyway? You just got a lot of time to waste now you're not a cop?'
'I wondered if you ever had any customers named Tijinney?'
'Tijinney?' McGinnis looked thoughtful.
'They had a place over in what used to be the Joint Use Reservation. Over by the northwest corner of Black Mesa. Right on the Navajo-Hopi border.'
'I didn't know there was any of that outfit left,' McGinnis said. 'Sickly bunch, as I remember it. Somebodyalways coming in here for me to take 'em to the doctor over at Tuba or the clinic at Many Farms. And they did a lot of business with old Margaret Cigaret and some of the other shamans, getting curing ceremonials done. They was always coming in here trying to get me to donate a sheep to help feed folks at the sings.'
'You remember that map I used to keep?' Leaphorn asked. 'Where I'd record things I needed to remember? I looked at it this morning and I noticed I'd marked down a lot of skinwalker gossip over there where they lived. You think all that sickness would account for that?'
'Sure,' McGinnis said. 'But I got a feeling I know what this is leading up to. That Kinsman boy the Hopi killed, wasn't that over there on the old Tijinney grazing lease?'
'I think so,' Leaphorn said.
McGinnis was holding his measuring cup up to the light, squinting at the level. He poured in another ounce or two of bourbon. 'Just think so'?' he said. 'I heard the federals had that business all locked up. Didn't that young cop that used to work with you catch the man right when he did it? Caught him right in the act, the way I heard it.'
'You mean Jim Chee? Yeah, he caught a Hopi named Jano.'
'So what are you working on out here?' McGinnis asked. 'I know you ain't just visiting. Aren't you supposed to be retired? What're you up to? Working the other side?'
Leaphorn shrugged. 'I'm just trying to understand some things.'
'Well, now, is that a fact?' McGinnis said. 'I was guessing you were trying to find some way to prove that Hopi boy didn't do the killing.'
'Why would you think that?'
'Cowboy Dashee was in here just the other day. You remember Cowboy? Deputy with the sheriff's office?'
'Sure.'
'Well, Cowboy says the Jano boy didn't do it. He says Chee got the wrong fella.'
Leaphorn shrugged, thinking that Jano was probably kinfolks with Dashee, or a member of his kiva. The Hopis lived in a much smaller world than the Navajos. 'Did Cowboy tell you who was the right fella?'
McGinnis had stopped rocking. He was staring at Leaphorn, looking puzzled.
'I was guessing wrong, wasn't I? Are you going to tell me what you're up to?'
'I am seeing if I can find out what happened to a young woman who worked for the Indian Health Service.
She was checking on plague cases. Drove out of Tuba City more than a week ago and she still hasn't come back.'
McGinnis had been rocking, holding his measuring cup in his left hand, left elbow on the rocker's arm, his forearm moving just enough to compensate for the motion—keeping the bourbon from splashing, keeping the surface level. But he wasn't watching his drink. He was staring out the dusty window. Not out of it, Leaphorn realized. McGinnis was watching a medium-sized spider working on a web between the window frame and a high shelf. He stopped rocking, pushed himself creakily out of the chair. 'Look at that,' he said. 'The sonsabitches are slow learners.'
He walked to the window, crumpled a handkerchief from his overalls pocket, chased the spider across the web with it, folded the cloth carefully around the insect, opened the window screen, and shook it out into the yard. Obviously the old man had a lot of practice capturing such insects. Leaphorn remembered once seeing McGinnis capture a wasp the same way, evicting it unharmed through the same window.
McGinnis retrieved his drink and lowered himself, groaning, back into his chair.
'Sonofabitch will be right back first time he sees the door open, 'he said.
'I've known people to just step on them,' Leaphorn said, but he remembered his mother dealing with spiders in
