Death Walker (21 page)

“You think it was the same person who killed the historian?” Justine asked.

“Probably. Carolyn found a bone in his mouth.”

“But nothing else matches. There’s no ash painting here, just that medicine pouch in his hand,” Justine said. “You think it’s a copycat killer?”

“No. I never mentioned the bone in the press release. It’s the same killer,
I’m certain of it. What we must do now is trace everything the Singer did during the last twenty-four hours of his life.”

“Yeah, the 24/24 rule. The two most important things in an investigation are the last twenty-four hours of a victim’s life, and whatever clues we find within twenty-four hours after the body’s discovered.” Justine’s tone was pensive.

“The Singer’s wife has been dead for years,
but I want you to talk to his daughter. You may get more from her than I could. And ask about the extra medicine pouch,” Ella added. “I’m going to put out an APB on the killer’s car. We know it must have sustained visible damage. Then I’m going to start calling every garage and body repair place in the county.”

Ella radioed in, requesting that patrol officers check out any car with recent front-end
damage, and blood or cloth fibers adhering to it. The message would also be passed along to every law enforcement agency in the area.

Finished, she racked the mike. Ella glanced around, trying to decide what to do next, and saw Carolyn place the body in what had been dubbed the “croaker sack.” She then signaled Atcitty to help her carry it into the wagon. For a moment, Ella felt sorry for Carolyn
and for herself. They were both doing jobs that needed to be done, but no one seemed particularly appreciative of it.

“I’ll have results as soon as possible,” Carolyn said as she approached.

“Thanks,” Ella replied.

“Do you think this will be the end of the killings?”

“Unfortunately, no. I wish I was making faster progress, but so far the most likely suspect is safely in custody. I’m going
to pay him a visit next. If he knows something, I’ve got to squeeze it out of him one way or another.”

Ella approached Justine as soon as Carolyn drove away. “Justine. I want you to take the evidence we have back to the lab and start looking it over. Try to identify the contents of that medicine pouch. If the herbs inside came from a certain area, that’ll give us a starting point. I’ll continue
using your car. You can ride back in the crime-scene van.”

“Okay, boss. I’ll get right on it.”

“In the meantime, I’ve alerted patrol units, and I’m going to walk around the community below, where Haske was staying. Maybe I’ll get something useful from some of the residents,” Ella added.

“That’s a tight-knit area of conservatives,” Justine warned. “I’ve heard my older sister talk about it. It’s
not going to be easy to get them to open up to you.”

“I’ve got to try.”

Ella drove back down to the community, left Justine’s car parked near one of the mailboxes, then strolled around. Two women were hanging laundry. They’d been speaking in hushed tones, but as Ella approached, they suddenly lapsed into silence.

Ella held up her gold shield. “Excuse me, ladies, but I’d like to ask you some
questions.”

“We don’t know anything,” the older one said.

Ella studied the woman. She was in her late fifties, with more salt than pepper in her hair. There was something indomitable about her expression. It would have been easier to crack a piñon nut open with a straw than to get her to divulge anything.

“You probably heard what happened to the
hataalii
this morning,” Ella continued. “I’m
going to need help to track down the killer. Will you help me?” Ella had decided that the direct approach was her best chance here.

“How can we tell you what we don’t know?” the younger one countered. Her hair was fastened tightly in the traditional way, and her belly was swollen in the last trimester of pregnancy. “I was hoping he would be around when my child was born. Now there is no one.”

“There are other Singers,” Ella said gently.

“Not like our friend. I’ve known him all my life, and
no one
is his equal,” she answered staunchly.

The veiled reference to her brother was unmistakable, but Ella chose to let it pass. “Then you understand why I must find whoever did this. Did the Singer have any enemies?”

“No, of course not,” the younger one said.

The elder woman finished hanging
up a pillowcase. “That’s not quite true. A Singer makes enemies; we all do. Sometimes patients don’t get well, sometimes he turns men aside who want to learn to become healers.” She shrugged. “There are many possibilities.”

“Are you referring to anyone in particular?” Ella persisted.

“You are the detective. Go find out,” the older woman said curtly, then turned and went inside her home.

Ella
decided to canvass the street. She walked up a well-worn path that doubled as a sidewalk and saw a Navajo woman in her mid-thirties working in a small vegetable garden.

The woman saw her approach and stood up. “You’ve come to ask about my neighbor,” she said wearily. “You can ask while I work. I still have weeds to pull before the ground dries up again.”

Ella walked across a section of desert
grass that made up the front yard. “I need to know more about him—who visited him recently, anyone he argued with, anyone who visited him often, whom he visited. Any information you can give me will be appreciated.”

The woman nodded. “I’m Lois Mike. Do you remember me? I was a year behind you in school. My last name was Pioche then.”

Ella wanted to say yes, but at the moment, the best she could
do was associate the name with the family. “I remember your brother, Billy. He could really play basketball.”

“Yeah, he graduated the same year you did.” She continued to weed the little patch filled with tomatoes, snap beans, and summer squash. “Things were simpler then, weren’t they?”

“In a lot of ways,” Ella admitted. “Will you tell me about the Singer? How did others here see him?”

“We
wanted him to stay. He understood us so well. We figured that now that Rosemary had her son, the Singer would want to be around to see him grow up. We really had great hopes he’d move here.”

“Where’s his home?”

“Near the Wood Spring trading post.”

Ella glanced at the empty streets. No one would come out until she left. “It’s a close-knit community, isn’t it?”

“Very.”

“But you’ve really set
yourselves apart here,” Ella commented.

“That’s what Rosemary’s father didn’t like about us at first. He thought there were too many divisions among the
Dineh
already.” Lois shrugged. “But we started winning him over. It’s true we prefer traditional ways, but we’re no different here than if we lived in the new housing areas in Shiprock.” She paused. “Eventually he started to see that too. I think
he was seriously considering moving here.”

“Did you happen to see him yesterday?”

“Off and on. He spent most of the day in the hogan preparing herbs. He was getting ready to do a Sing for Betty Poyer. She hasn’t been feeling so good lately. Vernon was right there, too, helping him with the herbs and making prayer sticks.”

“Can you think of anyone who might have done this to him?”

Lois grew
serious. “A Singer like my neighbor has many friends. His enemies are those who are also enemies of the tribe.”

Ella understood the reference to skinwalkers. “Have you heard any gossip about anyone in particular, maybe someone who lives in this area?”

“If we had someone like that around us, he would have been driven out,” she said flatly. “Our community wouldn’t have allowed it to continue.
We listen to what is going on in our world. Everybody knows about the historian and his eye, and now about the
hataalii
and what happened to him. It’s spoken about in whispers, but people know. That’s why they’re afraid. More bad things will happen now, like the bus accident. You can count on it. People sometimes say that fear of the unknown is the greatest fear of all. But in this case they’re
wrong. It’s what they know that terrifies them most.” She glanced around. “Now you better go before I end up in trouble with my neighbors.”

“One last thing. If someone’s vehicle, a car, suddenly turns up missing, will you call me?”

“Sure. I’ll get hold of you, one way or another.”

Ella walked back to Justine’s car, checking out the vehicles she passed. Once again, she was faced with a man who
had many friends and few enemies, a man who was nonetheless dead.

TWELVE

It was midafternoon by the time Ella entered the station. Stopping briefly by the front desk, she picked up the keys to her “new” police car then continued down the hall. Justine was coming out of the lab, newspaper in hand, as she walked by.

“Anything new?” Ella asked, handing Justine’s car keys back to her.

“Big Ed is now doing the press releases himself,” she said, accompanying Ella
to her office. “He wants you to concentrate solely on the case. Also, Carolyn … Dr. Roanhorse called. It’s a cat bone again. She thought you’d want to know as soon as possible.”

“Anything else?”

“Carolyn sent over the victim’s clothing and I managed to get pieces of the grille and another tiny piece I’m sure came from a turn-signal light. I sent it to the lab, and they’ll get back to us. There
wasn’t much to work with, so they warned it would take some time.”

“Great. At least that’s something.”

“We are getting answers, though admittedly we’ve had to work for each little piece. We are now pretty sure that both victims were killed by the same man,” Justine said.

“And that he may be targeting authorities on Navajo culture. Get me a list of known authorities in every area of our culture
as soon as possible. Wilson Joe may be able to help you compile it.”

“You’ll have it. When it’s ready, do you want me to put those people under protective surveillance?”

“We don’t have the manpower. What we have to do is warn them of the danger, ask them to keep a close lookout, and make sure they know to call us at the first hint of trouble. Of course if anyone has been threatened, or feels
they’re in immediate danger, we’ll place them in protective custody right away.”

“I’ll get started on that. Meanwhile you might want to take a look at the tribal newspaper.” Justine placed it on Ella’s desk. “Check the headlines, then the editorial page.”

Ella glanced down at the front page briefly. Another disaster of sorts made the top story. “
COAL MINE TO SHUT DOWN. HUNDREDS WILL LOSE JOBS.
” Ella felt her flesh prickle. This story came on the heels of the
hataalii’s
death. Fear would hold the People in a tight grip now.

No arguments supporting logic would matter. Some would claim that evil was methodically destroying the tribe from within. In a way, it was true. Belief and fear had always been her most dangerous adversaries. Struggling against the heaviness of spirit that weighed
on her shoulders, she turned to the editorial page.

A long letter written by Walter Billey suggested that Ella’s brother, Clifford, could be involved in the murder of Kee Dodge, and might be indirectly responsible for the bus accident the same day in the same area. Billey then hinted that other troubles would follow unless the entire Destea family, including Ella, was driven off the reservation.

“I’ve checked on the author of that letter,” Justine said, walking back inside Ella’s office. “There is no one in the records by the name of Walter Billey. There’s a Warren, and two Wesleys, but that’s it. The name is as phony as the charges.”

“You sure? No distant relatives of the Billey clan?”

“I tripled-checked it. Trust me.”

Ella nodded, lost in thought, as Justine dropped off the daily
report for Ella’s signature and left the office. Ella’s thoughts were racing. The writer had obviously expressed the sentiments of at least a few people in the area. He’d probably just been too afraid of retaliation to use his own name. Personally she hoped the gossip monger got a sunburn on his tongue while spreading his lies.

Ella picked up the list of phone messages Justine had collected for
her. Bruce Cohen had called three times. She picked up the phone and dialed his number.

“I’ve been trying to get hold of you, Detective Clah. Where have you been?” Bruce demanded.

“You’ll hear about it soon enough on the news. That’s my concern anyway. If you needed me right away, you should have said it was an emergency. The dispatcher always knows where to reach me.”

There was a long pause.
“It’s not an emergency, just something I thought you should know. Peterson asked me to mail two letters yesterday. One went to the tribal paper, the other went to you.”

Ella cursed herself for not checking her telephone messages yesterday afternoon, but things had been so hectic. “Do you know anything about their contents?”

“No. All I can tell you is that they were in plain white legal-sized
envelopes. But the one that went to the paper can’t be very private.”

“I’ll look into it. Thanks for letting me know. How are you holding up?”

“I tried the tactic you suggested with my client, and so far it’s worked. The creep likes having people who worry about what he might do to them. There have been no further threats.”

“There probably won’t be any more, unless he feels you’re getting too
complacent or cocky.”

“I wish I’d never heard of this case,” Cohen muttered.

“We have something in common then.” As Ella hung up the receiver, she felt genuine sympathy for the man. He was stuck trying to protect his family, forced to deal with a dangerous killer whose legal rights he was also sworn to protect. But Yazzie had underestimated the strength of family ties. Perhaps not ever having
experienced that love was his biggest weakness.

Ella checked in with tribal patrol units, county law enforcement agencies, and body shops, hoping they’d found the vehicle used as a murder weapon, but there was still no trace of it. She was sitting back in her chair, sorting her thoughts, when Clifford walked in.

“Hi, Special Investigator Lady. I was driving back home and since I had to go by
your office, I thought I’d pay you a visit.’