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There must be grandparents, uncles." Leaphorn's Navajo mind struggled with the concept of a child with no family, found it incredible, and rejected it.
"No family," Susanne said. "My dad doesn't want me back." She said it without emotion, a comment on the weather of the human heart. "And the only grandmother I know about lives somewhere back east and doesn't speak to my dad and I've never seen her. And if I've got uncles I don't know about them."
Leaphorn digested this in silence.
"I guess
here's
my family," she said with a shaky laugh. "Halsey, and Grace and Bad Dude Arnett, and Lord Ben, and Pots, and Oats, until Oats left. That and the rest of them, that's my family."
"You sleep with Halsey?"
"Sure," she said, defiant. "You earn your keep. Do some of the washing, and some of the cooking, and sleep with Halsey."
"He has the money, I guess. Made the deal with Frank Bob Madman for the allotment, and started this place, and buys the groceries."
"I think so. I don't know for sure. Anyway, I don't have any. I have these clothes I've got on, and a dress with a stain on the skirt, and another pair of jeans, and some underwear and a ballpoint pen. But I don't have any money."
"No money at all? Not enough for a bus ticket someplace?"
"I don't have a penny."
Leaphorn pushed himself away from the arroyo wall and looked downstream. No one was in sight.
"How about Ted Isaacs?" he said. "You like him. He likes you. You could sort of look after one another until I can find George."
"No."
"Why not?"
"I don't know why I talk to you like this," Susanne said. "I never talk to anyone like this. No, because Ted is going to marry me. Someday."
"Why not now?"
"He can't marry me now," Susanne said. "He's got to finish that project and when he does he'll be just about famous, and he'll get a good faculty appointment, and he'll have everything he's never had before. No more being dirt poor and no more being nobody anybody ever heard of."
"O.K. Then why can't you just go over there and stay at his camper? I bet you don't eat much and you could help him dig."
"Dr. Reynolds wouldn't let him." She paused. "I used to work over there a lot, but Dr. Reynolds talked to Ted about it." Her expression said she hoped Leaphorn would understand this. "I'm not a professional, and I don't know anything about excavation really. It looks simple, but it's actually extremely complicated. And this is going to be a really important dig. It's going to make them rewrite all their books about Stone Age man, and I might mess something up. My just being there, an amateur who doesn't know anything, might make people wonder about how well it was done. And anyway, the establishment will be looking for things to criticize. So really, it's better if I stay away until it's finished." It came out with the sound of something memorized.
"Isaacs told you all that before we had two killings," Leaphorn said. "That sort of changes things. We'll go get your stuff and we don't need to tell Halsey anything except that I'm taking you with me."
"Halsey won't like it," Susanne said. But she followed him down the path.
Chapter Twelve
Contents - Prev / Next
Wednesday, December 3, 3:48 P.M.
IN ANOTHER two or three minutes the lower edge of the red sun would sink behind the strata of clouds hanging over western Arizona. Now the oblique angle of its late afternoon rays were almost parallel to the slope of the hillside toward Zuñi Wash. They projected the moving shadow of Ted Isaacs almost a thousand feet down the hillside, and beside it stretched the motionless shadow of Lieutenant Joseph Leaphorn. Every juniper, every bushy yellow chamiso, every outcrop of stone streaked the yellow-gray of the autumn grass with a stripe of dark blue shadow. And beyond the hillside, beyond the gridwork of twine that marked the Isaacs dig, two miles across the valley, the great bulk of Corn Mountain loomed, its broken cliffs sharply outlined in the reds and pinks of reflected sunlight and the
"No family," Susanne said. "My dad doesn't want me back." She said it without emotion, a comment on the weather of the human heart. "And the only grandmother I know about lives somewhere back east and doesn't speak to my dad and I've never seen her. And if I've got uncles I don't know about them."
Leaphorn digested this in silence.
"I guess
here's
my family," she said with a shaky laugh. "Halsey, and Grace and Bad Dude Arnett, and Lord Ben, and Pots, and Oats, until Oats left. That and the rest of them, that's my family."
"You sleep with Halsey?"
"Sure," she said, defiant. "You earn your keep. Do some of the washing, and some of the cooking, and sleep with Halsey."
"He has the money, I guess. Made the deal with Frank Bob Madman for the allotment, and started this place, and buys the groceries."
"I think so. I don't know for sure. Anyway, I don't have any. I have these clothes I've got on, and a dress with a stain on the skirt, and another pair of jeans, and some underwear and a ballpoint pen. But I don't have any money."
"No money at all? Not enough for a bus ticket someplace?"
"I don't have a penny."
Leaphorn pushed himself away from the arroyo wall and looked downstream. No one was in sight.
"How about Ted Isaacs?" he said. "You like him. He likes you. You could sort of look after one another until I can find George."
"No."
"Why not?"
"I don't know why I talk to you like this," Susanne said. "I never talk to anyone like this. No, because Ted is going to marry me. Someday."
"Why not now?"
"He can't marry me now," Susanne said. "He's got to finish that project and when he does he'll be just about famous, and he'll get a good faculty appointment, and he'll have everything he's never had before. No more being dirt poor and no more being nobody anybody ever heard of."
"O.K. Then why can't you just go over there and stay at his camper? I bet you don't eat much and you could help him dig."
"Dr. Reynolds wouldn't let him." She paused. "I used to work over there a lot, but Dr. Reynolds talked to Ted about it." Her expression said she hoped Leaphorn would understand this. "I'm not a professional, and I don't know anything about excavation really. It looks simple, but it's actually extremely complicated. And this is going to be a really important dig. It's going to make them rewrite all their books about Stone Age man, and I might mess something up. My just being there, an amateur who doesn't know anything, might make people wonder about how well it was done. And anyway, the establishment will be looking for things to criticize. So really, it's better if I stay away until it's finished." It came out with the sound of something memorized.
"Isaacs told you all that before we had two killings," Leaphorn said. "That sort of changes things. We'll go get your stuff and we don't need to tell Halsey anything except that I'm taking you with me."
"Halsey won't like it," Susanne said. But she followed him down the path.
Chapter Twelve
Contents - Prev / Next
Wednesday, December 3, 3:48 P.M.
IN ANOTHER two or three minutes the lower edge of the red sun would sink behind the strata of clouds hanging over western Arizona. Now the oblique angle of its late afternoon rays were almost parallel to the slope of the hillside toward Zuñi Wash. They projected the moving shadow of Ted Isaacs almost a thousand feet down the hillside, and beside it stretched the motionless shadow of Lieutenant Joseph Leaphorn. Every juniper, every bushy yellow chamiso, every outcrop of stone streaked the yellow-gray of the autumn grass with a stripe of dark blue shadow. And beyond the hillside, beyond the gridwork of twine that marked the Isaacs dig, two miles across the valley, the great bulk of Corn Mountain loomed, its broken cliffs sharply outlined in the reds and pinks of reflected sunlight and the
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