The Man from Forever by Vella Munn

couldn’t go too far wrong with that.
    â€œAin’t that the truth.” He brushed an insect off the side of his neck. “The gnats were out in force last night. Damn, I hate those things.”
    She hadn’t noticed an insect invasion but maybe she’d been too preoccupied. Before she could come up with any observation about things that crawled or flew or both, he gave her what she’d be willing to bet was a calculated smile. “I’m glad I met you. Really glad. I don’t know if I told you, but I majored in archaeology until halfway through my junior year. That’s when the light bulb went on and I realized the chance of making a name for myself in that field was somewhere between damn little and none.”
    â€œWell, no. It’s not a field to get into if your primary goal is to get rich.”
    â€œAnd it is. Rich and famous,” he said with a laugh. “However, that isn’t as easy as I’d like it to be. All I can do right now is hope I come up with the right combination that’ll get me noticed, and rewarded. I’ll tell you, if I was sitting on the gold mine you are, I’d be jumping through every hoop there is to make sure I’m riding the crest of the wave.”
    Fenton’s speech was riddled with clichés. She could only hope that his presentations were more original. “I’m not sure we’ve reached the crest yet,” she explained. “Maybe we’ll never get everything resolved.”
    â€œExactly!” His eyes glittered as if she’d said the most brilliant thing he’d heard in a year. “I’ve been thinking. I know how to grease a few squeaky wheels. Did I tell you, my uncle’s a state senator. That’s how I got this job—a little pulling of the strings. Not much, I want you to know. I can do it. Damn straight I can. But it doesn’t hurt to have someone capable of getting your name to the top of the pile, you know.”
    â€œNo, it doesn’t.”
    â€œSure, my uncle is in California, but Senator Baldwin knows a lot of Oregon’s politicians. What I’m saying is, if I ask, he’ll tell me who has pull in these kinds of things. A little behind-the-scenes negotiating on my part and that Indian organization will pack up its bags and go home.”
    Not only didn’t she believe that, but she seriously doubted that Fenton had enough clout to influence the politicians who’d deliberately been taking a neutral stand on things. Wondering if Fenton’s uncle hadn’t gotten him this job because he wanted his nephew out of his hair, she pointed out that this was an issue for the courts, not politicians. Fenton had just begun to tell her she didn’t know what she was talking about when a battered, once-blue pickup with a pathetic excuse for a muffler pulled into the parking lot. Instead of turning off the engine, the driver sat behind the wheel of the roughly idling vehicle.
    â€œDamn him. He never gives up.”
    â€œWho?” Tory asked, glad for any change in the conversation.
    â€œHim.” Fenton jabbed his finger at the driver. “Black Schonchin. He lives over by Tulelake on some farm he and a bunch of his relatives own. He’s been nothing but trouble.”
    Tulelake was the nearest town, a small ranching community with little to show for itself beside a couple of cafés, a hardware store, post office and grocery. Even from this distance she could see that the elderly man was Indian. “Black Schonchin,” she said. “That’s an unusual name.”
    â€œI think he made it up, not that you’d get him to admit it. Apparently some Modoc named Peter Schonchin was the last survivor of the war. Black must have decided he’d rather go by that instead of whatever name his parents had. As for the Black, there was a Black Jim who got hung alongside Captain Jack.”
    â€œThen he’s Modoc?”
    â€œOh, yeah. He