Eddie Laguna’s trailer had come to permanent rest under some large cottonwoods. Someone had erected a sort of lean-to shelter meant to protect it from the weather, but to no avail. Now both trailer and lean-to had succumbed to the ravages of time. Bilious green paint flaked away in small sheets from the trailer’s corrugated skin. Rot and termites had consumed the base of the wooden columns supporting the shelter, so the roofline now formed a shallow inverted V. Eddie’s place wouldn’t make Better Homes and Gardens, maybe Indian Dumps and Hovels. Frank was ashamed of Eddie’s poverty because Eddie was an Indian, and this realization deepened his shame. They lived in separate worlds.
A hand-lettered sign proclaimed that Eddie Laguna was a taxidermist. Frank wondered if he was any good or if he was another one of those home-schooled taxidermists who made fish look like plastic and cobbled together various snarling beasts—snarling bobcats, snarling mountain lions, snarling jackalope. Maybe he could throw some government work Eddie’s way—that is, if he had the skills. Who was he trying to help? Well, he couldn’t sit in the car looking at Eddie’s place all afternoon.
The trailer was set well back from the road, which afforded Frank a short stroll under the cottonwoods, leaves rustling in an early-afternoon breeze coming off the Sierras. A large black-and-white cat sat on the roof of Eddie’s battered Ford pickup, watching his progress. Frank knocked on the door several times and was about to leave, but then it opened partway. He could see an emaciated
brown body clad in yellowed Jockey shorts through the tattered screen.
“You’re Eddie Laguna, right?”
“Yeah.” The small man nodded, his quick dark eyes taking in Frank’s uniform.
“Sign says you’re a taxidermist. That right?”
Eddie squinted at Frank through the cigarette smoke curling into his right eye. “Yeah, that’s right. What’ve you got?”
“Nothing right now. Just wanted to ask a couple of questions.” Eddie stepped back from the door, getting ready to close it. “But maybe I could put you in the way of quite a bit of work, if you’re good.” He waited. “Do you have any of your work handy?”
“Wait a minute.” The door closed, and Frank looked over at the cat, which was still keeping an eye on him from the top of the truck.
Eddie stepped down from the trailer, barefoot. He’d pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of faded Levi’s.
“Come on out back.”
Evidently, Eddie was pretty handy when he wanted to be. Someone—Frank presumed it was Eddie—had built a fair-size shop building. The materials were mostly scrap and discards, but they had been trimmed and fitted carefully together. Paint of differing hues covered the outer walls, reminding Frank of Joseph’s coat of many colors or of motley, a multicolored jest, bright in its newness.
Inside the shop, three of the walls had been insulated and paneled with drywall, but the studs were bare on the end wall by the door. Frank assumed the owner hadn’t come across the right building site yet. A woodstove stood in the corner. Double-walled chimney pipe exited the ceiling through a metal surround. Done right.
The far wall was covered with Eddie’s work, mostly fish. The Owens River yielded big browns. Frank knew that doing fish right was a difficult task, and these fish looked good, lifelike, not like plastic toys. He spotted a sage hen on the workbench, its feathers ruffled up in mating posture. Laguna was good. His work captured animals in the way a good photograph catches the life of its subject.
“This is really good. How about the big stuff? Elk? Bighorns?”
Eddie Laguna lit a fresh cigarette from the one caught in his tobacco-stained fingers. He tossed the butt on the dirt floor and ground it out with his bare heel. “I do it all.” He squinted at Frank again. “You’re Frank Flynn, aren’t ya?”
“Yeah, that’s right, Eddie. I’m surprised you remember me. Long time no see. How ya been doin’?”
“Sure I remember you. You’re a BLM cop now, right?” Frank nodded. “You’re not here about my work, are you?”
So much for easing into it. “Well, I could be, Eddie, but you’re right. It’s not about this work.” Frank considered his options. Lying never seemed to work out, and he wasn’t good at it. He could withhold information with the best of them, but lying convincingly wasn’t one of his accomplishments.
“You’ve been taking people up-country to hunt bighorn sheep. It’s illegal.” Eddie opened his mouth to protest, but Frank held up his hand. “Don’t say anything yet, Eddie. Hear me out. I’m not here to arrest you, or turn you in. It’s too late for that. You’re going to be talking to Fish and Game, and your picture will be in Saturday’s newspaper. You’ve already been caught.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t remember being caught.” Eddie let the cigarette dangle from the corner of his mouth. It wiggled up and down as he talked around it. It was obvious to Frank he was striking a pose, the tough guy, hard con, although as far as Frank knew, Eddie had never been in jail other than for the kind of minor offenses that kids commit.
“I was there, Eddie, up in Surprise Canyon, and so was a reporter from the Courier. She took your picture, yours and the guy you were working for. When that picture shows up on the front page, people are going to recognize you, just like I did. Then Fish and Game is going to know who you are.”
“Is that right? Then how come they don’t know now, Mr. Indian cop? You’re still an apple, Frank. If you know, they know.”
Frank felt the old sense of confusion, Eddie’s taunt reminding him that he didn’t really belong, “red on the outside and white on the inside,” but that would have to wait. “They don’t know because I haven’t told them, Eddie. The story comes out on Saturday. Come
Saturday, I’ll know one of the guys in the picture, but I haven’t seen Saturday’s newspaper, have I?”
Eddie’s wizened face became shrewd. He regarded Frank with cautious curiosity. “So why’re you here?”
“I want the other guy, Eddie, the guy who paid you, the guy who shot the sheep and left them there to rot.” His chest was tightening with anger. It welled up like a red cloud. “I want the son of a bitch who thinks he can do whatever the hell he wants, treat the land like butt wipe and people like outhouse attendants. That’s you, Eddie, wiping up his dirt. Guys like that are dead inside, so they bring death to things to feel alive. It’s not hunting. It’s ownership. Does that prick own the land?” Frank breathed deeply, regaining control. He was sounding like his da now, Irish to the core. Eddie probably thought he sounded like an Indian, like him. But underclass was underclass. Maybe someday they’d all figure it out, then look out Mr. Big Shot.
“I want to see Mr. Big Shot in jail. Mostly, I want to see him caught, his picture in the paper. Then he loses face, big man made small in the eyes of his tribe. Think about that, Eddie. A little humiliation for the big man. And maybe some white man’s justice. Pays a big fine, does a little time. What do you think, Eddie?” The door creaked open as the cat squeezed into the shop and calmly regarded master and guest. They stood there looking at the cat, the silence broken by the sound of trucks gearing up for the grade to Tom’s Place at the crest of the pass.
“That’s Prowler, like a cop car, black and white.”
“Knows his job. He’s been keeping an eye on me since I arrived.”
Smoke swirled in the sunlight from the shop window above the bench. Eddie’s cigarette joined the myriad butts on the dirt floor. “I could see you didn’t like the smoke.” Eddie waved his hand around, swirling the smoke about. “Prowler hates it.” Frank waited. His gift, waiting. “I don’t know much, Frank. Don’t know his name.”
“How’d you come across him?”
Eddie shrugged. “There’s this guy, Bates. He brought me work from L.A. He’s a gunsmith, specializes in sporting rifles, expensive custom stuff, fancy stocks—you know, the kind of rifle needs a special
case. Not like the old thirty-thirty or a Springfield.” Eddie smirked knowingly at Frank, on the same side now, almost, brown guys and white guys, cowboys and Indians. “Anyhow, he tells me that he’s got people willing to pay a guide five thousand for a hunt and ten thousand for a good head. So I figure, Why not? The permit money goes to the state. Our people never see any of it, so I thought, Yeah, I’ll take some.”
Frank shook his head. “Eddie, the auction money goes to the bighorn sheep program. It’s a way the state pays for it. I know it seems like it’s for rich white guys, but the money goes to the sheep program.”
“It’s all the same shit. The government takes, and we get nothing. Fuck the program.” Eddie’s voice was thick with anger. It was easy to touch Eddie’s anger, easy for Frank, even easier for Eddie. He’d been stupid to start preaching; now wasn’t the time for a lesson in civics.
“So what about this guy Bates?”
“He was the middleman, that’s all. Set things up.”
“Come on, Eddie. How did he set you up with the guy at Surprise Canyon, the big straw-haired guy with the fancy rifle?”
“A three hundred Weatherby Magnum.”
That’s a fit, Frank thought. Bits and pieces. He was getting closer. “So how’d you hook up?”
“Like I said, Bates set it up. I met this guy, called himself Smith, at the Trona Airport. That’s what Bates said to call him, Smith, but it wasn’t his real name.”
“So we’ll call him Smith. What kind of plane was he flying?”
“How would I know? By the time I got there, he was waiting by the hut with his stuff. Threw his pack in the back, put the gun case behind the seat, and climbed in.”
“What’d he say?”
“Nothing much. ‘You Redhawk?’ I told Bates to have him call me Redhawk. People think you’re the real thing if you have an animal name. Genuine Native American guide.”
“So what then?”
“So nothing. I took him up to the spring.”
“I know that. Didn’t you talk about anything?”
“Just about having to park the truck out in the brush. Didn’t see it, did ya?” Eddie looked like a triumphant kid.
Frank hadn’t seen it, but then again, he hadn’t been looking for it. He was chagrined, though. He should have noticed, should have been more alert. “Nope, didn’t see it. Where was it?”
“Down in a parallel sand wash, alongside a cutbank about fifty feet from the jeep trail.”
“Well, you did a good job of hiding it, Redhawk.” Frank grinned encouragement. “So then what? How did Smith handle himself? Was he in shape? Handle the rifle okay? Say anything else?”
Eddie’s expression opened up. An easy face to read, like a kid’s. “To tell you the truth, I was surprised how good a shape he was in. Kept right up, never breathing hard. He could shoot, too. The old ram, the one he had me take the head of, an easy shot. It was kneeling down, taking a drink. But the one running, that was a good shot. Smooth and quick.”
“What happened to the head?”
Eddie grinned. “That’s the good part. When you showed up, or when we knew someone else was in the canyon, Smith got worried.”
“How’d you know we were there?”
“Light reflection. I thought it was from binoculars, but I guess it was from the camera lens.”
“So then what?”
“Like I said, Smith was worried he’d get caught, but he didn’t want to leave the head behind. So I told him to stash the head and his precious rifle in one of the tunnels from the old Silver Queen mine and hike on out over the top to Mahogany Flat Campground. I figured he could do it in good time if he left the head, pack, and rifle behind. I followed you down the canyon. Didn’t know it was you though, just that there was someone else. I stayed way back. When I saw the truck pull out, I took my truck and drove up to the campground, but Smith wasn’t there, so I came home.”
“Pretty slick. Guess you didn’t count on having your picture taken.”
Eddie looked deflated. He stroked Prowler’s back. The cat had jumped up on the workbench. “Nope, didn’t figure on that. Bad damn luck.”
“Maybe not all bad. Listen, Eddie, as soon as the paper comes out, turn yourself in. It’ll go better for you, especially if you’re willing to testify against Smith.”
Eddie shook his head. “No way, Frank. I’m not going to be a chickenshit stool pigeon for the government.”
Stool pigeon? Eddie had seen too many movies. He looked at life like a teenager. Things divided up into being chickenshit and whatever was the opposite of that—tough, hard-bitten, a stand-up guy, a man with sand, anything but chickenshit. Eddie was living in a make-believe world where things were supposed to be fair.
“Look, Eddie, this guy used you, and he gets away. Is that right?” Eddie was silent, glaring at Frank. “Is it fair? Come on, Eddie. Mr. Big Shot hires a ‘genuine Native American guide,’ and the guide is so smart, he winds up doing time, while the big shot gets off and goes bragging about his trophy. That story’s so old, it doesn’t have a beginning. You gonna be the dummy who does time for a rich white guy? Eddie the sucker, taken by the smart guy, the guy with the money. Is that you, Eddie the sucker?” The Eddies of this world dreaded being suckers, looking dumb; for that matter, so did the Frank Flynns. Victims were usually pathetic, not their fault always, but still pathetic, something to be pitied.
“Remember when we were in junior high? The kids would get Doug Funmaker to throw rocks at stuff—streetlights, windows, cars—and he always got caught. Everyone hiding in the ditch or the bushes, laughing. Poor fucking dumb Doug. Hey, Eddie, that’s what people thought. It’s what you thought. And he’s dead now. Dumb Doug is dead. Is that it, dumb Eddie wants to go to jail for the big white hunter?”
“Fuck you, Frank, fuck you.” Eddie’s voice was choked with rage and frustration. He took a deep breath and let it out. His eyes wandered away from Frank and came to rest on his cat. “Christ, I don’t know what to do.” Eddie looked like a tired little guy who needed a
shower. He began absently stroking the big black-and-white cat, gently rubbing behind its ears. “Who the hell will feed Prowler?”
Frank exhaled in silent relief. “I will, Eddie. I’ll come every day. Take him to the vet. Whatever he needs. I’m not just saying it. I like cats.” Prowler butted his head up against Eddie’s arm. Smart cat, good cat, Frank thought. “I can’t make any sort of promises about what happens, but if you turn yourself in, you’ll be better off. My guess is, you’ll probably get a suspended sentence.”
Eddie sagged. The defiance had seeped out, leaving a small brown body and a face made haggard by smoke, booze, and anger. Frank put a hand on Eddie’s shoulder. For a moment, he was consumed with compassion. The ghost of his mother whispered in his mind, There but for the grace of God … “I’ll put in a good word. You can count on it.”
Eddie shook his head in resignation. “Shit, there goes the ten thousand dollars. He was going to pay me ten thousand dollars, Frank. Man, I could’ve done a lot with ten thousand dollars.”
“You see any of the money yet?”
“Nope, but he was bringing it with him. He was going to give it to me after we got the head.”
“After you get the head?” Frank’s pulse quickened. “Let me get this straight. Smith’s coming back?”
Eddie stroked the cat’s back, and Prowler arched and turned with pleasure. “Yeah, he called and wanted me to go with him and help him get the head. I told him that wasn’t part of the deal. Told him that I didn’t know who else was in the canyon, but that Fish and Game would know about the dead sheep soon enough and that going back up in the canyon was a good way to get caught. Then he says there’s nothing to be afraid of and that if I don’t help him, no money. No head, no money. Then he offered me another five thousand just to help out. Take it or forget it. It was going to be fifteen thousand or nothing, so I told him I’d do it.”
“When was all this going to take place?”
“Don’t know. He was going to call me this afternoon.” Eddie mimicked Smith. “‘At exactly four o’clock. Be sure you’re there,
because my schedule is tight.’ I tell you what’s tight. His asshole, that’s what’s tight.” He lowered his voice, sounding thoughtful, looking at Frank. “But you can bet he’ll call. He wants that head. I can see why. It’s the biggest set of horns I’ve ever seen.”
Frank felt his compassion harden. “I know that, Eddie. I’ve been watching that ram for a couple of years. Now his head is rotting in an abandoned mine, and the other ram, killed for no good reason, left to rot on the ground. Not a good day’s work.”
The small man looked down at his dusty feet. All the bravado gone, just a guy in his shop with his cat on a hot September afternoon. All that was missing was the cold beer. Frank sighed. He wished there were a way to get Eddie out of it, but there wasn’t. This was the best he could do. He could feel the warm sunlight on his arm and the side of his face. Prowler closed his eyes in contentment. Frank pulled at the tip of his nose. If Eddie helped, Smith could be caught red-handed. After he turned himself in, Fish and Game would be all over him about Smith, and they’d be out of luck, unless something could be set up, catch Smith with the goods—head, rifle—enough to make it airtight.
“Eddie, I’ve got an idea. You’ll be here to take Smith’s call. He’ll want to set up some sort of meeting. Go for it.”
“What’s the point if I’m going to be in jail?”
“Maybe yes, maybe no. Here’s the deal. If we could catch him with the head and the rifle, catch him when he comes back to the mine, then he’s the dummy, Eddie. He’ll do time.” Frank thought about Donnie Miller’s sunbaked corpse. “Maybe a lot of time.”
“Who’s going to take him back to the canyon?”
“Maybe you, maybe me.” He was thinking out loud. “Maybe you could have sprained your back, hurt yourself somehow, and your cousin from the reservation is filling in.”
Eddie shook his head. “I don’t think so, Frank. He’s a very suspicious guy. When we started up the canyon in the truck, he asked me about how many times I had done this. Wanted to know if I’d ever been caught or been in jail. He kept looking around all the time. And like I told you, as soon as he knew someone else was in the canyon, man he was nervous, but not scared; cool, you know, moving fast but cool.
“He says, ‘What’s the best way out?’ So I told him about hiking out by Telescope Peak. Then he says, ‘What about the head?’ So I told him to stash it. Then he looks at me and says, ‘Don’t get caught. It’s better if you don’t get caught.’ He had mean eyes when he said that. Like if I get caught, I get more trouble from him.” He looked at Frank and shook his head again. “Naw, I don’t think he’ll go for it.”
Probably not, Frank thought. Then what? The two of them stood there in the afternoon sun, thinking about what to do. Frank felt the pressure of time. He had to go take a look at the mischief in Jawbone Canyon and see if he could get a handle on it. And he wanted to run down Mitch Cooper, see what else he knew about the Miller brothers and company. The thought of them produced a knot of anxiety. It was the look on Mitch’s face. There had been real fear there, almost shock, and Mitch didn’t seem like the kind of guy who was squeamish.
“Tell you what, Eddie. I’ll wait here until you take the call. Just go along with him. Don’t say anything to make him suspicious. Then we’ll work something out.” He looked at his watch: 1:45. “You had lunch yet?”
Eddie brightened. “You want, I’ll make some sandwiches.”
“Sounds good. Got any cold ones?” It was out of his mouth before he really thought about it.
Eddie shook his head. “Naw, drank the last one this morning to chase away the headache.”
“Okay, you fix sandwiches, and I’ll get the beer.”
Bologna on white bread. Frank wasn’t at all sure about the mayonnaise, but Eddie served them up on paper plates, along with some stale Pringles. Frank had used Pringles to start fires with—straight grease. His stomach roiled. A couple of Coronas helped wash it down. He hoped it would stay down. Eddie was happy as a kid, delighted to be entertaining company, really into outsmarting Smith. The sandwiches—Eddie had eaten three—apparently had no effect on his stomach. He rattled on, his voice becoming background noise. Frank felt like nodding off, but his stomach said no. He hovered in the
twilight zone. No dinner tonight. Stomach wouldn’t take it, and he didn’t need it. It had been 3:30 by the time they finished up, and he had a long way to drive, at least a couple hours in his truck, holding it at sixty. His chosen chariot was sure, but definitely not speedy. He glanced at his watch: almost four o’clock. His lids felt heavy.
He awoke with Eddie poking his shoulder. The phone was ringing. Frank cleared his head. He pointed at the phone, motioning for Eddie to answer it. “Let him do most of the talking.”
Eddie picked up the phone. “Yeah, hello.” He nodded. “Yeah, sure.” He looked over at Frank and winked, nodding his head. “Um-hm. Sure. That sounds okay.” There was a long pause while Frank watched Eddie’s head bob up and down. “Yeah, that should work good. No problem.”
Frank handed him a piece of paper and a blunt pencil he’d picked up from the floor near the phone. Eddie shook his head and looked away. “What’d you say?” His back was to Frank, shoulders taut with concentration. “Yeah, I got it, about six o’clock.” He turned back to face Frank, still nodding his head. Frank briefly wondered why people nodded or shook their heads when talking on the phone. Who could see?
“Right.” Eddie had put on the street-smart voice. He was even standing with a swagger. “It’s a done deal. See you at six.”
Eddie hung up the phone. Frank retrieved the paper and pencil and waited for Eddie to speak.
“So I’m supposed to meet him at Ballarat Sunday morning. He’s driving a car this time. Let’s see, he wants me to bring canteens and a packboard.”
“Uh-huh. How’s he want to do it, get the head out?”
“He wants to leave his car at the mouth of the canyon. He liked the way I hid the truck.” Eddie looked pleased with himself. “So we’re going to hide the car same way I did my truck. Then I’m supposed to take him up to Mahogany Flat, and he’s hiking down the canyon, picking up the head on the way down, no uphill hiking.”
“How’d you traverse the rocks when you went up?”
“With all the gear, we took the long way. The trail up around the left of the slide.”
Frank gave it some thought. “Yeah, and that’s the way he’ll come down.” He smiled at Eddie. “Guess you fooled Mr. Big Shot, right? He’s going to be caught. Fish and Game’s bound to consider this when the time comes to press charges. First thing Saturday, go on over to the AM/PM for the morning paper. When you see your picture, call Fish and Game.”
Eddie picked at his ear, not saying anything. Frank waited. “You won’t forget about Prowler?”
“Nope. You show me where his stuff is.”
“I’m shutting him in the shop. Someone hit him with a pellet gun awhile back.” Eddie ran his hand along the cat’s shoulder and upper forearm. “He’s okay now, but I don’t want anything to happen to him. Maybe you could come on Saturday, check his water and stuff. Make sure he doesn’t find a way out. He gets pissed when I leave him alone too long.”
“He’ll be okay. That’s a promise.” The cat would be okay. He just hoped that things didn’t get too tough for Eddie. Seemed like the law landed harder on the little guys than the big ones.
“Oh, and Eddie, leave the keys to your truck. I might have to borrow it for a bit. Okay?”
Eddie grinned, bad teeth exposed in unconscious pleasure. “You’re going to be the surprise up in Surprise Canyon, huh, Frank?”
“We’ll see. Probably won’t be me, be some agent from Fish and Game.”
“Uh-huh,” Eddie said, still grinning like a kid, but with really bad teeth.