Risky Undertaking (6 page)

“How about Luther's children?” Tommy Lee asked.

“I'm checking on Darren. Wakefield's tracking Sandra.”

“I've heard Luther brag on both of them,” Reece said. “You'd think the boy was the kingpin of Washington DC and his sister's some big executive in an Atlanta dental equipment company.”

Tommy Lee waved us away. “Let's get to work, gentlemen.”

Reece hesitated. “Will you call the mayor?”

“Yes,” Tommy Lee said. “Why'd he come back the second time?”

“Because Luther called him.” Reece looked at me and I saw a rare expression of sympathy. “He said Luther complained that Barry had harassed him about his whereabouts last night.”

Tommy Lee smiled. “If Luther thinks Barry harassed him, he'll love it when I knock on his door.”

I swung by Deputy Wakefield's desk on my way to my own. “Any luck with Luther's daughter?”

He looked up from his computer screen. “Yeah. Sandra works for a company called G. A. Bridges in Atlanta. I called their headquarters and they said she was in a sales meeting. It started at eight and goes through lunch. That matches what Luther said, so I didn't leave a message.” He glanced back at the monitor. “Now I'm checking with neighboring sheriff and police departments in case Luther was involved in any traffic stops.”

“Good. I'll put on my best funeral director voice for my call to Darren's firm.”

Wilder and Hamilton's website listed key staff and contact numbers. Darren Cransford's name wasn't one of them, but Luther had said he was a junior member. I called the general number.

“Wilder and Hamilton.” The woman's voice was pleasant and, more importantly, she was alive. Not the recorded start of a list of impenetrable menu options to navigate before speaking with a human being.

“Good morning. I'd like to speak with Darren Cransford, please.”

For a few seconds, the line went silent. “Did Mr. Cransford handle your account?”

The “did” leaped out of the sentence. I rethought my play.

“Yes. Has Darren been transferred elsewhere?”

“I'm sorry. Mr. Cransford is no longer with the firm. If you'll give me the name of your company, I'll connect you with someone who can help you.”

I hung up.

Chapter Six

There is no easy way to get to Cherokee, North Carolina. The roads leading in and out of the reservation, or Qualla Boundary as it's officially known, frequently become clogged with tourist traffic. The Boundary borders multiple counties and is gateway to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the most visited in the entire fifty-eight-park system. I read that more than nine million people visit the Smoky Mountains each year, over twice the number that view the runner-up, a little national park called the Grand Canyon.

But on a Monday in late September, the roads were clear as Tommy Lee drove the patrol car into the town of Cherokee. The approach was itself a journey back in time. The ramshackle buildings lining the street sported signs hawking tee shirts, moccasins, inflatable rafts and tubes for the river, Indian trinkets, and local gemstones. Mom-and-pop motels were scattered among the national chains.

“I haven't been here since I was a kid and it looks the same,” I said. “Like Myrtle Beach without the ocean.”

Tommy Lee braked for a stoplight and a herd of Harleys crossed the intersection in front of us.

“But with the same bikers,” I added.

“There's a difference or two,” Tommy Lee said. “I'm confident that as a trained detective you'll notice them.”

He turned right and within a few blocks I saw twin towers rising above the mishmash of shops and gas stations. Behind them lay a complex of glass, stone, and brick that appeared to cover acres. Beside an entrance road, the sign HARRAH'S CHEROKEE CASINO & HOTEL rose several stories above the ground. Cars and buses lined up turning into the parking lot.

“Man,” I said, “this is a far cry from tribal bingo.”

“Las Vegas comes to the Smokies.”

Tommy Lee turned right again and I leaned forward to catch a closer glimpse of the posh casino. “You ever been inside?”

“No. I have enough trouble holding onto what little money I do have.”

“Do they have live games or just video?”

“They've got the works: blackjack, craps, roulette, poker. But I doubt if you'll find James Bond in a tuxedo at the baccarat table. Here Double O Seven going undercover would mean shorts and flip-flops.”

We left the casino behind and drove into the center of town. On the right, I saw Oconaluftee Islands Park, a strip of land in the Oconaluftee River reachable by a wooden footbridge from the bank. Families with children too young to attend school were wading in the shallow current. A few picnickers enjoyed late lunches at scattered tables. I imagined that in the summer the park would be swarming with tourists both in and out of the water.

About a hundred yards farther, a large oval sign read “Museum of the Cherokee Indian.” Behind it a well-designed building conveyed a sense of respect for the culture exhibited within its walls.

“Impressive,” I said. “I don't remember this being here when I was a kid.”

“It wasn't,” Tommy Lee said. “The heritage of the tribe has benefited from the influx of casino money. And increased tourism means increased opportunities to tell the real Cherokee story, not just sell rubber tomahawks and cheap jewelry.” He turned left and then made a U-turn in the museum's parking lot. “I got talking and missed the road to the police station.”

A mammoth carving of an Indian head bordered the entrance to the museum. Imagine a tall totem pole but with only one image, a long rugged face with a single feather pointing from a headband to the sky. Tears were permanently sculpted in the corner of the eyes, never to roll any farther down the high cheekbones.

“That's quite a statue,” I said.

“Sequoyah,” Tommy Lee said.

“The tree?”

He laughed. “Tree and subject. The carving was made on a single redwood log that was a gift from the Georgia-Pacific Company. That's Sequoia the wood. Sequoyah the man was the Cherokee who invented the alphabet for their language so they could match the writing advantage of the European settlers.”

“Why not just learn English?”

“Because the Cherokee are a proud people and losing their language would have killed their culture. Sequoyah is a heroic figure, a genius really, and they claim he's the only individual in known history to single-handedly create a written language.”

“I see the word
Indian
everywhere. I thought that was politically incorrect.”

Tommy Lee turned onto the main road and backtracked a block. “There's pushback on the label Native American. A feeling that once again they're being lumped into a category created by others and diluting their unique identity.”

“So, if I try to be politically correct I'll offend them?”

“Barry, I'm confident you'll find a way to be offensive no matter what you say.”

If the casino revenues were pouring money into the tribe, the flow was bypassing the facilities of the police department. The small single-story building sat on a ridge above the river and town. The metal front door could have used a fresh coat of paint, but impressing visitors wasn't its purpose. Restricting access seemed to be the primary function.

A sign instructed us to press the intercom button to announce our intentions. One didn't just walk into the station.

“May I help you?” A woman's voice vibrated through a tinny speaker.

“Sheriff Tommy Lee Wadkins and Deputy Barry Clayton to see Detective Sergeant Hector Romero.”

“Romero?” I whispered.

“Marriage on and off the reservation has created the same variety of surnames you'll find in any American community. I've worked with Hector before. He's a good man.”

The door buzzed and Tommy Lee yanked it open.

We entered a short hall that resembled an airlock. On the left, a woman sat behind a glass partition that looked more like a movie ticket booth than a receptionist's office. A clipboard with a sign-in sheet lay on a ledge. A coiled tether insured no one abducted the attached ballpoint pen.

“Write your name and the time, please,” the woman said. “I'll let him know you're here.”

Tommy Lee signed for both of us while the receptionist picked up the phone and spoke to someone.

“He'll be out in a moment,” she announced. “Make yourselves comfortable.”

Making ourselves comfortable meant sitting in the two battleship-gray steel chairs pushed against the far wall of the cramped space. Neither Tommy Lee nor I took advantage of such luxury.

We couldn't have waited more than a minute before the inner door opened only to be filled by a man of roughly the same size and proportions. Jet black hair topped a square head. His chest was long and broad, adding more to his height than his legs, which were each as thick as my waist. If a black bear were ever transformed into a human, the end result stood in front of us.

Bright white teeth flashed in the wide bronze face. “Well, if it isn't Rooster Cogburn and his one-man posse.”

My mind jumped to the original film,
True Grit
, and John Wayne playing the cantankerous one-eyed U.S. marshal. The comparison held a degree of truth.

“That's why I feel so at home in Indian country,” Tommy Lee said. He stepped forward and shook the Cherokee's hand. Both men turned to me. “This is my deputy and lead investigator, Barry Clayton. Barry, meet Hector Romero, the modern edition of Sequoyah.”

Romero laughed as his hand swallowed mine. “He's kissing up to me, which means the poor Indian is gonna get screwed again.”

“Save it,” Tommy Lee said. “You know the whole reason for my being here is to make you look good.”

“Rooster, with a face like yours, you make everybody look good.” He slapped Tommy Lee on the back. “Come to my office and we'll sort things out.”

We followed him down a narrow hallway with doors on either side. This wasn't a bullpen layout like our department, but a warren of small offices. Several policemen passed in the opposite direction and Hector had to turn sideways before they could walk by.

At the far end, he entered a room not much bigger than a barn stall. The decor of battleship-gray was carried out by a steel desk, a swivel chair, and two mates to the ones we'd been offered in the waiting area. Tommy Lee and I sat without an invitation.

Hector closed the door and squeezed past us to drop his bulk behind his desk. “So, how did Jimmy Panther manage to get himself shot in your county?”

“Probably by managing to be abducted from the reservation,” Tommy Lee said.

The Cherokee rocked forward in his chair. “What? This isn't confined to white man's land?”

White man's land? Indian country? Maybe I was in a John Wayne movie after all.

“We don't know for certain,” Tommy Lee said. “Preliminary indications at the scene suggest Panther was bound with Plasti-Cuffs, but they had been removed from his body. His truck was there. If he were caught and cuffed on site, why bother to cut him free either before or after shooting him?”

“To make it look like he drove there,” Romero said.

Tommy Lee gave an appreciative nod. “That's what I think.”

Romero smacked his palm on his desk. “Damn. And here I thought you were making a courtesy call to give me information I could share with the family.”

“Did you talk to them this morning?” Tommy Lee asked.

“Yep. Soon as we got the word.” He looked at me. “Well, if the homicide occurred in the cemetery, then you're still the lead investigator.”

“Yes,” I said. “The evidence is definitive. Panther died on Eurleen's grave.”

Romero's dark eyebrows merged together. “Who?”

“The woman whose burial Panther disrupted.”

“Better give me the whole story.”

I briefed him on everything that transpired from the unearthing of the Cherokee remains to the discovery of Panther's body. I stopped short of telling him about my interview with Luther Cransford or that his son was no longer employed where Luther said he was.

“What about suspects?” Romero asked, pushing into the area I'd avoided.

Tommy Lee jumped in. “We're investigating those angered by the demonstration. But I'm bothered by where Panther was shot. If he was in the cemetery already, then did someone lure him there?”

Romero rubbed his square jaw while he thought a moment. “Maybe he was and then bound until someone else arrived. Someone who wanted to witness the execution or even pull the trigger.”

The Cherokee raised an interesting possibility that undercut our abduction premise.

But, as soon as he voiced it, he waved his hand in dismissal. “As much as I'd like to think otherwise, the abduction fits better.”

“How?” Tommy Lee asked.

“Jimmy's family was surprised he would go into the cemetery at night. Any cemetery where there had been recent burials.”

“Was he superstitious?” I asked.

“Inasmuch as one person's spiritual beliefs might be viewed as superstitions by another. His grandmother said Jimmy had become more than a preserver of a bygone culture. She said he'd adopted the old ways, and that one of them was the belief that souls might linger for a time. Night held too much of the unseen, both in this world and the world of the spirits.”

“So, he especially wouldn't have gone to the grave of a woman who had died within the past week,” Tommy Lee said.

“That's the way I see it,” Romero agreed. “If you're pursuing this abduction possibility, have you brought in the FBI and state police?”

“Not officially,” Tommy Lee said. “I wanted to speak to you first.”

“Not officially? How do you do something unofficially with the FBI?”

Tommy Lee laughed. “My niece heads the office in Asheville. Lindsay Boyce.”

“Get out of here. Lindsay's your niece? Finally someone with brains in your bloodline.”

“I know. Hard to believe. She said she'll come into the case when she's needed.”

“And in the meantime?” Romero asked.

Tommy Lee looked to me. The case was my case.

“I'd like to retrace Panther's movements yesterday,” I said. “He might have gone to the cemetery before dark.”

“Sure,” Romero said. “But he ate supper with his grandmother and sister and didn't leave for home till nearly nine. It would have been after dark even if he drove straight to the cemetery.”

“Then his grandmother and sister might have been the last to see him alive. Do you think they're up to speaking with me?”

“They will be, if I go with you.” Hector Romero rose from his chair and grabbed his duty belt from a hook on the wall behind him. “The family will probably have kinfolk and friends around. I'll go in first and tell them we need to speak in private. People will understand. They want us to find out what happened. But we'll take my car. No sense broadcasting your presence.”

“Would they be resentful?” I asked.

“No. But you have to understand we Cherokee are a big family, and we can be tight-lipped when it comes to outsiders. Jimmy's grandmother and sister might suggest others we should talk to, and I don't want them clamming up if they think you're poking into their business without my blessing.”

“You know what we need to know,” Tommy Lee said. “We'll play it however you think best.”

“Good. I'm not saying they won't be cooperative, but we could be peeling an onion and uncovering layers of this story we don't even know exist.”

I stood. “You mean Jimmy Panther had enemies other than those he might have made at the burial protest?”

Hector Romero's face tightened. “Jimmy was an extremist who saw the Cherokee culture as being under attack from within and without. He came down hard against development and any perceived violation of Cherokee heritage. In other words, Jimmy was an obstacle and an obstruction to the powerful. He and a growing number of followers stood on one side. Money, and lots of it, stood on the other. You tell me. Do you know a better way to make enemies?”