Chee turned the key in the door of Robinson’s trailer and heard the lock click. He saw Robinson lying on his back and instinctively stepped in front of Rhonda, blocking her entrance and her view with his body. Then he spoke calmly. “He’s hurt. Run to the office and ask BJ to call an ambulance. If there are any EMTs around, we could use them.”
“What? Why?”
“Do it. Then come back and keep everyone else out of here.” Chee had stepped into the room as he spoke, moving toward Robinson. From her gasp, he realized Rhonda had seen the blood.
“Oh, my God.” And then he heard her clatter down the steps and run.
Chee squatted down. Robinson’s chest rose and fell slightly with each breath. Chee scanned for something to use to stop the bleeding. There was a dish towel on the counter. He grabbed for it, knocking a sheet of paper to the floor, and pressed the towel against the chest wound.
Robinson looked at him, and Chee moved his mouth close to the man’s ear. “Hang on. I’m here to help you, and more help is on the way.”
He held the pressure, feeling the warm blood on his hands. Glancing around the room, he didn’t see any disturbance or signs of conflict. The door had been locked from the inside, but whoever did this could have locked it on the way out.
The towel was red and saturated now, and the bleeding seemed to have slowed. Robinson’s lips had a bluish tinge. Chee kept talking, encouraging him, but his eyelids fluttered and then closed.
The trailer swayed, and Chee heard footsteps on the entrance stairs. He listened to the door opening behind him, and felt someone approach. He kept his gaze on Robinson’s face, willing him to keep breathing.
A man with a first-aid box knelt beside them. He spoke loudly. “Mr. Robinson, it’s Kevin Green, the EMT.”
Robinson opened his eyes again.
Green had already slipped on gloves. “Gunshot?”
“Looks like it,” Chee said.
“Anyone else hurt?”
Chee realized he hadn’t looked. “I don’t think so. As soon as you take over, I’ll check. I haven’t heard any noise.”
“An ambulance is on the way from Kayenta. Can you find another towel?” The tone of Green’s voice said he had taken charge of the medical emergency.
Another EMT had entered with a blanket to wrap around Robinson’s lower body. Maybe they could keep him from going into shock, keep him alive.
Chee stood and found three towels on the counter, clean and folded. When he bent down to hand them to Green, he spotted the piece of paper he’d knocked to the floor earlier. He picked it up and, after he checked the empty bedroom and the bathroom, read what was on the page. Then he folded it and put it in his own pocket before making his way past the medics to the trailer’s door.
Rhonda was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. A few others had gathered there, too. She put her hand on his arm when he reached her. “What happened?”
“A chest wound. The medics are working with him.”
He saw the color drain from her face. She took an awkward step backward. Chee grabbed for her arm, catching her just before she collapsed and supporting her. “Sit down a minute. Put your head between your knees.”
“I’m OK. What happened to him?”
“I’m not sure. I need to call the police station.”
Bahe was out, so Chee spoke to Tsinnie, explaining the situation and saying that he would stay on the scene until the ambulance arrived.
“Hey, I have news for you.” Tsinnie seemed almost friendly.
“Go ahead.” He hoped it wasn’t more bad news about Paul.
“That guy with the nosebleed? The FBI wanted him on money-laundering, racketeering, and other heavy stuff.”
“No kidding. Did they say if Delahart admitted to putting the bones out there?”
“Nope. Not to me and Bahe, anyway. Bahe said he knew that man must be guilty of something, just from the way he acted. I don’t think they’ve charged him with murder yet, but I bet he did it.”
Chee wasn’t a gambling man, but he would have bet against Tsinnie.
Outside Robinson’s trailer a group of about a dozen people had gathered, standing in clusters and talking among themselves. They watched Chee approach.
“The EMTs are helping Mr. Robinson, and an ambulance is on the way,” he said. “I don’t know what happened yet, except that he has a chest wound. There’s nothing to see here.”
Rhonda stood, less shaky now. “We’ve got work to do, so let’s get to it. That’s what Robinson would want. Mike Turner will be the guy in charge.”
Melissa stayed behind. “Did someone attack him?” she asked Chee.
“I don’t know what happened for sure.”
“Who would want to hurt him? He’s the nicest—” She noticed Rhonda and turned toward her, raising her voice. “You. You witch. Your publicity caused all the problems with Delahart. You never get enough attention, do you? I couldn’t blame you for shooting Samuel, but why—”
Chee grabbed Melissa’s arm as she swung toward Rhonda. She was stronger than he expected. Rhonda stepped away and looked at Melissa, the sort of stare Chee remembered teachers giving him before he got the final warning. But her voice was surprisingly gentle.
“Calm down, Missy. I was mad enough to kill Samuel, but I only do that in the movies. I’m crazy about Greg, and I respect the job you’ve done, too. We’ve got enough drama here. We have to focus on wrapping this up, finishing the movie as soon as we can. We owe Robinson that, no matter what.”
They heard the wail of an approaching siren.
Things moved quickly after the ambulance came. The EMTs brought out the stretcher, ordering bystanders to clear the way. Robinson’s eyes seemed to be looking for something. They found Rhonda, and he gave her the ghost of a smile, then focused on Chee.
Chee walked up to the stretcher, had a word with one of the EMTs, put his head close to Robinson’s to hear what the man strained to say, and nodded once, twice. He slipped the piece of paper he’d picked up in the trailer into Robinson’s shirt pocket.
After the ambulance drove off and the crowd had dispersed, Chee spotted Melissa standing in the shade on the side of the trailer.
“Do me a favor and make sure nobody goes in there, OK? Wait for me. Robinson gave me a message for you.”
She nodded.
Chee got what he needed from his police car, then climbed Robinson’s steps. He took a few crime scene pictures, although he doubted that anyone would need them, found the gun that had done the damage, and sealed it in an evidence bag. Picking something up from Robinson’s desk, he locked the door behind him with Rhonda’s key.
Melissa stood where he’d left her.
“I need to give you a message from your boss, but before I do, are you ready to tell me the truth now?”
She sighed. “I don’t know where to start.”
“Start with the stuff you left out about the money.”
“I never thought it would come to this.”
Chee waited.
She sighed. “Remember I told you that I was trying to fix the shortfall we had because of the sponsorships I’d anticipated that were late?”
“I got that.”
“Well, other money was missing, too. It took me a while to click to it, but when I looked at the bank statements, I realized someone was using a debit card and withdrawing a bunch of cash. Robinson has a card on the account. Not much use for it out here, but it’s different in Vegas, of course, and he flew there every week.
“I could see that he was taken with Rhonda. I figured he was buying her gifts, maybe getting them a fancy room at a hotel there, using cash to avoid a stink. It wasn’t really wrong, since stars get pretty much whatever they want. But I need to be able to categorize where the money went. ATM withdrawals look suspicious, and I need to keep things on the up-and-up for the sponsors.
“But when I mentioned the ATM withdrawals to Robinson, he acted like he didn’t know what I was talking about. That hurt, and it made me mad.”
“Is he the only one with a debit card?”
“I don’t have one on that account. Not Samuel. Not even the Zombie Queen herself.”
“What about Delahart?”
“Uh . . . I don’t know.”
“You ought to find out. You might have made a faulty assumption.”
She studied her shoes for a minute.
“Whenever I talked to Delahart about money, he told me not to worry about it. He laughed at those ATM charges and said his investors would take care of everything.” She looked at Chee. “Do you think one of them shot Samuel? Or did Rhonda do it? She had as much reason as I did, and a shorter fuse.”
“None of the above.”
Melissa raised an eyebrow.
“The feds are investigating it. They’ll look at Isenberg, the father of one of those girls I talked to, the ones Samuel manhandled and embarrassed. Isenberg is furious about that, but he didn’t do it. Samuel’s death was an accident.”
“I saw you put a piece of paper in Greg’s pocket. Was it a confession? A suicide note?”
Chee considered his answer. “Ask Robinson about it when he recovers.”
“You don’t have to be cagey. I’m the gambler here, remember? I’m good at reading people and at keeping secrets. I’ll tell you what happened.”
Chee waited.
“Robinson went to talk to Delahart, man to man, to tell him Samuel was blackmailing me and that he’d taken those nasty pictures and that he planned to fire him before the production got sued, and probably turn him over to the police. He planned to tell Delahart he’d quit if Samuel stayed on.
“But Samuel answered the door, laughed in his face. Robinson got angry and said he’d call the police. Samuel pulled his gun. They struggled. Bingo.” Melissa was crying now, but she kept talking. “He didn’t mean to kill him and then he panicked afterward. It was the last straw. Money troubles and the layoffs, that stupid stunt with the grave, the production behind schedule, all of that. Robinson would have died if Rhonda hadn’t had the key to his trailer and if you hadn’t been here. And it was all because of me. If I’d only let him fire Samuel when he wanted, none of this would have happened.”
“He asked me to make sure you got this.” Chee handed her a bag he’d seen in the trailer with her name on it.
She took out a box and a small envelope, opened the envelope, read the note inside, and handed it to Chee. “Missy, none of this is your fault,” Robinson had written. “Enjoy your life and think of this beautiful place as often as you wear these.”
Inside the box were the earrings with the robin’s-egg turquoise, the ones she had started wearing after the day she and Chee stumbled over the grave.
In the tent, Rhonda and Turner were engrossed in conversation with BJ and half a dozen others. He’d wait. He pushed the button of the fancy coffee machine. This time he selected something called Ethiopian Yirgacheffe. It was great, almost as good as the coffee he remembered drinking as a boy when he helped his aunt and uncle at sheep camp each summer.
When he took Turner’s two citations out of his pocket, he found the poker chip. The chip made him think of Leaphorn’s e-mail about the necklace and the silversmith. Maybe the excellent coffee had clicked his brain into gear. He had misread the Lieutenant’s message and underestimated his mentor.
Melissa had come in and joined the meeting wearing the turquoise. Good. He finished the last of his delicious coffee and walked over to deliver the citation.
It was warm in the SUV, but Chee didn’t mind. He powered down the windows to let in the desert air and searched in his wallet for the card that the trespassing camper, Gisela, had given him. Before he left the movie parking lot—and the end of cell phone coverage—he dialed her number.
She and Heinrich were in Kayenta, staying at a motel, planning to leave in the morning.
“I’ve got something important and interesting to show you,” Chee said. “Can you meet me at Goulding’s in an hour?”
“What is this about?”
“I’ll see you up on the terrace outside the trading post.”
“Are we in trouble again?”
“No, ma’am. It will be worth your time, I promise.”
Then he made another call, this time to Bernie, to give her an update. She didn’t answer. He couldn’t wait to see her again.
He called Bahe and then Captain Largo to give him an update and arrange to get back on the schedule at Shiprock. After that, he called Haskie at Goulding’s and explained the situation.
By the time he’d done all that and driven to Goulding’s, Haskie was waiting in the hotel lobby. They walked together to the terrace, where the elderly tourists were sitting on the bench beneath a ramada. Gisela wore a sleeveless shirt that showed off her sunburn. She gave him a faint smile.
Heinrich got right to the point. “Why did you ask us to come here? Are we to be arrested?”
“No, sir. Mr. Haskie here has something that I think belongs to your wife.”
“That can’t be,” he said. “We have never come to this hotel before.”
Haskie took the bag with the necklace out of his pocket. He removed it from the plastic and put it on the table in front of Gisela. “Sergeant Chee thought you’d like to see this.”
Gisela picked it up. “Oh, it’s beautiful, but why—” She studied it for a moment, and her expression softened. She began to sob. Heinrich looked puzzled, then put his arm around her. She reached into her purse for a handkerchief and wiped her eyes. “I thought I would never touch this again.”
“There’s one thing you have to do before you can have it,” said Chee. “You have to tell us about the necklace.”
“I will tell you what I know. But where should I start the story?”
“When I met you at your campsite, you told me that your grandfather had been out here. Begin with him.”
The woman had regained her composure. “As a young man, Karl, my Grospapa, wanted to be an actor. His family found his dream quite shocking. Karl’s father served as a doctor in a little town in Missouri. He had immigrated from Germany, created a life from hard work, saving every penny he could. The idea of his son onstage, wearing a costume or a fake mustache out in California? Unsettling, unprecedented. But this was America, a new world. He let Karl sow his wild oats.”
Heinrich interrupted. “Karl became a farmer?”
“No, dear. That means he had a chance to rebel a little.” She leaned forward on the bench. “My grandfather went all the way to Los Angeles on the train. He wanted a role in a movie, and eventually he met someone who knew someone who knew John Ford. One thing led to another, and Karl had an opportunity to work on Stagecoach. He only had a small part as a cowboy, but it meant the world to him.”
Heinrich took up the story. “Meeting John Wayne and John Ford, that was the most exciting time in his life. He loved to speak of it, and he retold the story many, many times.”
“Did your grandfather make a lot of movies?” Haskie said. “Maybe he ran into some of my relatives out here. They got to be Indians.”
Gisela looked puzzled, then laughed. “No, he only worked on Stagecoach. He missed his family, so Karl returned to Missouri, became a doctor like his father. He married, had two sons. The younger was my father, Charles. He served in the army as a doctor. When I was a teenager, he was stationed in Germany. That’s where I had the good fortune of meeting Heinrich.”
“Get on with the story,” Heinrich said. “These men have important things to do.”
Gisela patted his hand. “My father often told me about the trip he made with Karl out here when he was a boy. How he loved the blue of the sky and the red of the earth. They camped, just the two of them, and Papa liked this place as much as Grospapa. Maybe even more. He showed me the pictures of the two of them standing at Ford Point.”
“Tell about the necklace,” Heinrich said.
“Well, when Grospapa Karl was in the movie, he met an Indian named Robert, and they got to be friends. He loaned Robert some money—not that he had much—and Robert gave him a necklace as collateral. Grospapa kept it, and when he and Grosmama married, he gave it to her. The necklace passed on to my father, and he gave it to my mother for their tenth wedding anniversary. She loved it, and she always said she wanted to see where it came from.
“Meanwhile, I graduated from high school and college, went back to Germany, and married Heinrich. After Papa retired, he and Mother came to Germany to visit us, and we talked about Grospapa Karl’s movie stories and Monument Valley. We’d pull out our copy of Stagecoach and watch it together, waiting for the barroom scene where Karl was an extra.”
Heinrich said, “You’re giving out too many details. Get to the point.”
“It’s fine,” Chee said. “It’s an interesting story.” Haskie nodded in agreement.
“Then, last year, Mother said it was time to see this place for herself. She was sick, but she tried to squeeze in every last minute of life. Papa hadn’t been out here since that camping trip. I hoped to return to the States to accompany them, but Heinrich was involved in a big project at work, so we couldn’t make it. Mother told me she planned to wear Grosmama’s necklace for the whole trip. So they rented a car—”
“Not just a car. A big Lincoln,” Heinrich said. “Charles told me he loved driving it.”
Gisela smiled. “They’d been frugal their whole lives. Never went on vacation. I can just see them in that Lincoln. And we always camped, but this time Papa splurged on a hotel. Anyway, by the time they reached Monument Valley, Mom was really weak. They drove out, took pictures, and called me, so happy and excited. Papa told me they could see the monuments from the hotel room. Mother died a few weeks later.”
Heinrich said, “If Gisela’s mother left the necklace here, why didn’t the hotel return it to her or her husband?”
Haskie explained. “For some reason, they registered with a fake name. They left the line for vehicle information blank except for ‘California’ and ‘Lincoln.’ We couldn’t follow up.”
Gisela said, “He wouldn’t have recalled the plate number. But why a fake name?”
“A lot of hotels won’t let you rent a room without a credit card,” Chee said. “How did they get around that?”
Haskie shrugged. The couple looked at each other, and then the woman laughed. “They had a card they somehow managed to acquire in the name of their dog. They got it years ago, kept it for emergencies, but they never had emergencies. Dad always paid cash. He told me that way he never spent more money than he had.”
“The address on the card was a post office box.”
“That’s right. The post office was on the way to his office.”
“The maid found a stain on the carpet,” Haskie said. “I’ve been wondering—”
Gisela interrupted. “I know. Papa told me how embarrassed my mother was to have made such a mess.”
“What happened?” Chee asked.
Heinrich sighed. “We don’t know all the details. A hemorrhage. If Charles hadn’t been a doctor, his dear wife would have passed to death there in his arms. He managed to stop the bleeding. He told us she insisted that he clean up the room as much as he could and that he leave a tip for the maid before they left for the hospital in Kayenta.”
“A few weeks after her funeral,” Gisela said, “I asked about the necklace. Papa thought it must be in one of their suitcases, but he never found it. He was depressed, sad, adrift after she died. A missing necklace was the least of his concerns. When we lost him a month ago, we intermixed his ashes with my mother’s.” She smiled at Haskie. “I’m sorry my parents caused you so much trouble.”
“I’m glad I can give this to you.”
Gisela took the necklace out of the bag and put it around her neck. Heinrich helped fasten the clasp. Then she pulled out the paper.
Haskie said, “That’s their registration card. You can take that, too.”
She studied the card her father had filled out for the room. “You wondered about the names they used to register. Here they are: Mr. and Mrs. Postkutsche.” Gisela chuckled. “That was their dog’s name. It means ‘stagecoach’ in German.”
Chee reached in his pocket and put the white chip with the eagle design on the table. “And you might want this. Or did you mean to leave it with the ashes?”
“You know about the ashes?”
Chee nodded. “Did you know what you did was illegal?”
“I told her we should bring them home with us,” Heinrich said, “not leave them here in the wilderness, but this woman has a mind of her own.”
Gisela sighed. “When I picked up the urn with their ashes from the mortuary, I thought I would send a bit of my parents off with the wind in a place that meant so much to them. As Heinrich looked for a campsite, we noticed that old grave. Since it was already there, it seemed like a gift, and so—” Her voice started to shake. She stopped talking and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
“Leaving the ashes and the bone fragments there showed great disrespect to our land and our culture,” said Chee. “The same goes for scattering ashes to the wind over Navajo land. But it’s done now.”
“I apologize.” Gisela picked up the chip. “I left this on the road by the grave. A talisman for my parents’ lucky travels in the great beyond. Was this how you found us?”
“Sort of. I have a very smart friend who helped me. Robert, the jeweler you mentioned, was Robert Etcitty. His work is well known. You can see his picture as a young man in the museum, along with some actor cowboys. Maybe one of them is Karl.”
“So now, do you arrest us for the ashes?” said Heinrich. “Do we pay a fine? Go to jail?”
“None of the above. I’m heading home. You two behave yourselves. Let the dead rest in peace.”
Gisela moved her thumb over the silver and turquoise pendant. “When I wear this, I will remember your kindness.”
Chee left Haskie and the couple and headed to the parking lot. He thought about Gisela’s parents and their farewell trip. Would he and Bernie be blessed with so many years together? Would they cherish each other more in a few decades than they did now? He couldn’t imagine loving her more than he already did, but he’d learned that many wonderful and surprising things were possible.
By the time he got back to the substation, Bahe had left, so Chee typed him a note explaining the source of the bone fragments. He told the captain he had delivered the original citation, the one that charged the company for the fake grave but did not mention the remains, since The Undead Return couldn’t be held responsible for that. He found a message: “Call Melissa.”
“Hey, I thought you might want to know that Robinson is going to be OK.”
“Glad to hear it. I told the feds about the gun I found in his trailer. It was Samuel’s.”
“Are you coming out here again?”
“No, not even for another cup of that good coffee. I’m going home.”
“We’re gone in a few days, too. Rhonda will put up the money to finish the movie. She’s the new producer. BJ’s staying, and Gerald is coming back. We’re going to use him as an extra.”
“Great. I’ve gotta run.”
“Just one more thing. You remember those girls that Samuel caught trespassing? Rhonda wants to send them a photo.”
Chee found Courtney’s phone number. “Can she send one to me, too?”
“A souvenir of your time in zombie land?”
“Not for me. I’ve got a sister-in-law who would love it.”