“HEARD ANYTHING MORE from the anonymous caller?”
Ted Gianelli nodded Vicky into a hard-backed chair, inched past the desk in the closet-sized office, and dropped into his chair. He clasped his hands over his stomach, a calm, unhurried look about the man, the inexhaustible patience of an experienced investigator. The music of an opera drifted across the office. Rigoletto, Vicky guessed, although she didn’t recognize the aria.
“I’m here about Ruth Walking Bear,” Vicky said. She perched on the chair and allowed the music to wash over her. Feeling calmer, more settled. She had waited in the parking lot a good fifteen minutes, watching the vehicles streaming down the street, unsure of what Ruth might be driving. The sun beating down, white clouds skimming through the blue sky. There was no sign of Ruth. Finally she had gone into the small entry, pushed the button on the metal communicator in the wall, and said she was here to see Agent Gianelli. A few moments later, she was following the agent down the long corridor to his office in the back.
Now she told the agent that someone had broken into Ruth’s house and ransacked it. Ruth should be here, she was thinking, telling her own story.
Gianelli’s eyebrows lifted a quarter inch. “She report it to the tribal cops?”
Vicky said she wasn’t sure.
The fed leaned into the laptop, tapped a few keys, and stared at the screen. “Reported at two forty-five this morning. Officers responded at three fifteen. No sign of burglar. Homeowner said nothing had been stolen. She believes dead husband’s cousins, Bernie and Big Man White Horse, are responsible.”
He looked up, and Vicky said: “I think Bernie’s husband was looking for the map.” She could still see the couple seated across from her, the greed flashing in their eyes. The hard look of disgust when she told them she couldn’t help them. And Big Man saying there were other ways to get the map. “Bernie took Ruth out last night and kept her out late. Ruth thinks she was giving Big Man time to ransack the house. Any results from forensics?”
Gianelli drew in his cheeks as if he were sucking on a cigar. “Paper dates from the last part of the nineteenth century. Not enough pencil traces to provide a conclusive date. So the scrap of paper doesn’t prove anything definite. Pencil marks could be from last week.”
“Or from the 1890s. If the pencil marks can’t be dated, then we don’t know when they were made.”
The fed beat a rhythm with his pen on the desk, and Vicky went on: “It’s possible Robert had the original map drawn by Butch Cassidy, and Big Man was desperate to find it. Which means . . .” She had his full attention; she could feel the intensity in his gaze. “Whoever ransacked the house didn’t know the map could have been destroyed.”
Gianelli was nodding, his gaze still fastened on her. Finally he said, “The anonymous caller called Father John this morning. If a lawyer can’t spur us in the right direction, he thinks a priest might be able to.”
Vicky looked away. It made sense the caller would get in touch with John O’Malley. The caller was desperate and frightened. He needed help, and that’s what her people did when they were butting their heads against the wall of white officialdom, the impersonal, automatic machinery of the law—they called the white man they could trust.
“Even if the burglar didn’t know the map had been destroyed,” Gianelli was saying, “it doesn’t mean he wasn’t at the lake. He could be the anonymous witness if”—he lifted his hands—“Robert was murdered. The coroner says there is little evidence of trauma, but Robert was wearing a bulky vest that could have prevented any bruising. There was muddy debris under his fingernails, but that could have resulted from his trying to lift himself out of the lake. We haven’t found any real evidence he was murdered.”
He waved a hand now and started to his feet. Vicky remained seated. “There’s only one reason anyone would destroy the map.”
Gianelli dropped back down, curiosity working through his expression. “Are you going to tell me that Robert found the treasure and somebody killed him for it? What’s the killer going to do with gold coins and bills from the 1890s? The minute he walks into a bank or visits a coin dealer, questions will be raised. Word will get out, people will know an old treasure had been found. Quite a risk to take, when the guy might be involved in murder.”
Vicky took a moment before she said, “He won’t do anything. Not until the investigation is closed and Robert’s death is declared an accident. Then he’ll go to another state and cash in a treasure where no one is likely to connect it to Butch Cassidy or Robert’s death.”
The fed lifted his eyes to the ceiling. “For how long? A hundred years? Folks have trekked through the Wind Rivers looking for buried treasure based on a rumor that an outlaw had hidden his loot hereabouts.” He leaned forward and clasped his hands over the desk. The edge formed a crease across the front of his shirt. “Everybody loves the old outlaws of the West like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Why? Because they outwitted the law? That’s part of it. But the most important thing is, they robbed the banks and railroads that ordinary folks considered bloodsuckers. So folks cheered them on. They were heroes. And they live on because no one wanted them to die in a shoot-out in Bolivia. I’m sure you’ve heard stories about Butch visiting friends in Fremont County in the 1930s. That is all they are, Vicky. Stories of treasure buried by an outlaw who never died.”
He stood up this time and made a point of checking his watch. “Sorry, Vicky. I’ve got an appointment, so unless there is something else . . .”
Vicky got to her feet. “You’ll be the first one I call.”
* * *
SHE HAD TO shield the phone from the sun in order to read the text message from Annie. “Father John called.” Still gripping the phone in one hand, Vicky crossed the parking lot to the Ford, started the engine, and rolled down the windows. Heat emanated off the leather seats and accumulated in the air like a compressed fireball. She tapped on John O’Malley’s name and waited a half minute until the buzzing noise sounded. Then the familiar voice was on the other end: “Vicky. Thanks for getting back to me.” She asked if he had time for lunch. He was about to head to Ethete to visit elders at the senior center, he said, but he could meet her first. She suggested the restaurant at the casino.
* * *
VICKY FOLLOWED BLUE Sky Highway north, then zigzagged east toward Ethete when she spotted the crowds ahead, the traffic stalled. She slowed behind a pickup and looked out the open window. The documentary film crew, filming horseback riders trotting over the prairie, crossing the road, and trotting on toward the mountains.
The line of traffic began inching forward along the road the riders had crossed. She started to follow the pickup truck when a man stepped out and held up a red stop sign. She slammed on the brake and rapped her fingers on the steering wheel. No telling how long the delay would be.
The riders were coming back. No special order now, no cameras trained on them, and she understood the director must have decided to reshoot the scene. One of the riders looked like Butch Cassidy, broad shouldered, muscular, and confident in the saddle, blond hair escaping from the rim of his cowboy hat. She must have seen a photo of the man, she was thinking, or maybe the actor crossing the road just happened to look the way she imagined Butch Cassidy. Riding close behind was a thin, smaller man, darker complexioned, impatience stamped on his features. Sundance Kid, most likely. She wondered if the real Sundance had looked as surly and restless. Other men followed, and on their faces, the haunted, desperate looks of men on the run.
A short gap, then another group galloped past: Arapahos, riding tall and easy in the saddle, the horses at their command. They were good with horses, her people. Experts. She recognized several of the men from the powwows, and a few had been at Ruth’s the day Robert died. Dallas Spotted Deer rode past. Then he spurred the horse and galloped around the other Arapahos. In the last bunch of riders was Eldon Lone Bear, staring straight ahead, as if the road that interrupted the endless prairies had never existed.
Behind them rode a bunch of cowboys, silver badges on their shirts glinting in the sun, holsters moving up and down on their hips. Still more cowboys followed, horses snorting and prancing. And in the rear, two official-looking men with broad cowboy hats, holstered guns, rifles in scabbards.
She put the scene together now: they were filming a getaway following a robbery, Butch and the gang on the run, and behind them a posse of deputies and civilians and finally, Pinkerton agents. She tried to remember what she had read about Butch Cassidy, how Pinkerton agents had tracked him and Sundance to Bolivia. But Butch had once been part of this place, a friend to her people. Riding behind the outlaws came Arapaho warriors. Shielding Butch from the posses and Pinkertons. Throwing them off the trail.
Finally, all the riders crossed to the other side, and the man stepped back and turned his sign around: Slow. Vicky inched forward, then pressed down on the accelerator and drove toward Ethete.