Sixteen

THE BLOODHOUNDS FOUND nothing. Though they sniffed along the ground for the better part of two hours, all the scents led them in a large circle around the last place Lily had been seen—Ruth’s camper.

“That’s because everybody carried her everywhere,” said one of the trackers as he loaded his weary dog back in his pickup truck. “If she’d been old enough to walk, she would have laid her own scent down. Moe could’ve followed that.” He looked at Ruth with mournful eyes that mirrored those of his canine friend. “I’m mighty sorry, ma’am.”

“Thank you.” Ruth shook his hand and forced a smile. “Thank you for trying.”

The trackers drove off, just as the radio in Dula’s squad car began to squawk. Dula scurried over to catch the call. A static-filled dispatch crackled through the campsite. Finally Dula signed off and walked toward them like a man with a pipe bomb up his ass.

“Okay, folks. Here’s the deal. Quite a scrap broke out down by the condo site. John Black Fox’s boys set a couple of bulldozers on fire and the construction workers are retaliating by tearing up the campground. Two men were assaulted, and I just got word that the governor has officially expressed a lack of confidence in our local authorities. He’s sending in the National Guard to keep order. It might be better for everyone involved, Mrs. Walkingstick, if you just went home.”

“Go home?” cried Ruth. “What about Lily?”

“Your husband has your child, Mrs. Walking­ stick. Go home and wait for him. He’ll cool off and come back.”

“Why can’t you understand?” Ruth shook her head wildly. “Jonathan would not do that. Joe Little Bear stole Lily! You’ve got to find her! I’m an American citizen. It’s my right to demand that—”

“Okay, okay.” Dula held up one hand, as if a crazed woman was one problem more than he could tolerate. “Go down to my office in town. You can set up your camper in my parking lot, at least until your baby shows up. Otherwise, I can’t assure your safety. Those construction boys are mad as hell and they’re lookin’ to crack some heads.”

“But you’ll keep searching for her?” Ruth asked frantically.

“As long as I can, Mrs. Walkingstick.”

Mary helped Ruth and Clarinda pack up the camper, then she followed them, along with Gabe Benge, down to Sheriff Dula’s office in Tremont. They parked at the back of the lot, un­derneath some tulip trees whose yellow leaves were big as dinner plates. As Mary got out of her Miata, Clarinda was already striding toward Gabe Benge’s van, her spike heels clicking across the pavement. Ruth paced around Jonathan’s truck in a tight circle, as if motion of any kind was preferable to standing still.

Mary went over and put an arm around her shoulders. “Come on, Ruth. Let’s go sit down.” They joined Clarinda inside Benge’s van. They all crowded around the tiny dinette, their knees bumping.

“When did you last call about Jonathan?” Mary asked Ruth.

“I called Aunt Little Tom, the state troopers, the tribal cops, and the Forest Service about fifteen minutes ago.”

“Anybody seen him?”

“Not a soul.” Fighting back tears, Ruth fin­gered the buttons on the cell phone. “They promised to send him here, though, if they do. Aunt Little Tom said she would call all the ladies in her canasta club and organize a prayer circle.”

“Ruth, is there anybody else you can think of who might have any reason at all to take Lily?” Mary asked.

“Nobody.” As she gripped Mary’s hand, tears rolled down Ruth’s cheeks. “Isn’t there anything else we can do? If I have to sit here and make cell phone calls all day, I’ll go crazy.”

Mary knew she was right. They needed jobs.

Busy fingers kept worried minds from wandering into territories that were simply too terrible to consider. Her gaze fell on the photocopied sketch of Joe Little Bear that was lying on top of Benge’s tiny refrigerator. She smiled. She’d just thought of something they could all do.

Half an hour later, Benge returned to the camper with thirty more copies of the Joe Little Bear sketch. Mary, Gabe, and Ruth divided them up and set out in three different directions, leaving Clarinda in the van with instructions to call Little Jump Off every fifteen minutes. Ruth and Benge headed to the big Baptist church on the edge of the square, figuring that most of this little town would be there on Sunday morning. Mary covered the religious recalcitrants, electing to go from house to house along Mountain View Drive. Most of Tremont was indeed in church, but she did get a few responses—two young mothers home with sick children, who clutched them tighter when she showed them her picture; a retired Army colonel who swore he’d shoot Joe Little Bear on sight, no questions asked.

“No, sir,” Mary protested, terrified that this man might, indeed, kill some innocent stranger. “If you see this man, just call nine-one-one. Please.”

Assured of the colonel’s cooperation, she worked her way down the rest of the street, then hurried back to Dula’s office. On the way she met Benge, headed back from the other end of town.

“I thought you and Ruth were at the Baptist church,” she said as he fell into step beside her. “We split up. Ruth took the Baptists. I canvassed the Methodists at the other end of town.”

“Any luck?”

He shook his head. “People are pretty upset about us coming to protest. I got the feeling no one wants to have anything more to do with any Native American problems.”

Traffic was heavy for Sunday morning in a small mountain town; Indians seemed intent on reaching the SOB rally, tourists seemed equally intent on getting away from the demonstrations. Benge stopped at a little café called the Green Trout Grill. “Let’s go in here. We can show them our sketch and maybe get a cup of coffee.”

The place was empty, except for a teenage boy who slumped behind the cash register, playing a game on the restaurant’s computer. Reluctantly he looked up from the screen. “Table or booth?”

“Booth,” said Gabe.

He handed them menus. “Order anything. We’re serving both breakfast and lunch.”

“Bring us two cups of coffee now, please,” Gabe told him. “And keep it coming.”

They sat at a booth beneath the front window. Once the boy brought them mugs of hot coffee, they ordered ham sandwiches, two for here, two more to go. The boy shuffled back to the kitchen; they sat in exhausted silence, watching the line of campers and cars that crawled past the window.

The coffee was hot and strong and reminded Mary of the stuff Jim Falkner used to brew in his office, when they worked late and needed an extra jolt of caffeine to keep going. She smiled at the memory; she loved and sorely missed her old boss. The thought of him brought back the office; the thought of the office brought back Dwayne Pugh. In less than twenty-four hours, his trial would resume. Although she felt reasonably confident about wrangling with Virginia Kwan again, she knew that unless either Lily or Jonathan turned up soon, she was going to have to stay here. She couldn’t leave Ruth alone, in the care of her nitwit cousin and a sheriff who didn’t seem at all convinced Lily had been abducted. She would give it a couple more hours, then she’d call Danika and instruct her to ask for a continuance. Mott would be pissed beyond all reason, but who cared? Lily Walkingstick was missing. Mary opened her purse and pulled out her phone to get Danika up to speed when she noticed that the e-mail icon was blinking. Odd, she thought. She’d deleted all her work e-mail yesterday afternoon, and no one ever sent anything from Deckard on Sunday mornings.

Must be Danika, she decided as she punched the READ option. Already working at the office. But when she saw the message on the little screen, her heart turned to ice.

“Good God,” she whispered. “I’ve got an e-mail.”

Benge gave her an odd glance. “So?”

She turned the phone so he could see it. “It’s a picture of Lily Walkingstick!”