I looked at one of the TVs, my mind playing pinball in an attempt to find something to say as the talking heads came back on the screen. “Who’s your favorite announcer?”
She quickly pulled the headphone back over her ear, her attention returning to the keyboards. “Anyone who talks slowly and distinctly.”
I watched her work for a while and then, with my interest not being piqued by either of the teams or by any of the Wyoming Wildlife turkey tips, I sidled into the corner of the sofa and pulled my hat over my face.
—
It was not a new dream, the one that overtook me; rather a continuation of an experience that I’d had back in the spring. There was snow, there was always snow in my dreams or visions, as my good buddy Henry Standing Bear called them.
In this one I was postholing my way in thigh-deep snow, old and laden—both me and the snow. The collar was up on my coat, and my hat was hard on my head, defending against the wind. The visibility was horrible, and I could see only about ten feet in front of me. I was following something, something that didn’t want to be followed. There were other shapes, darker ones that hurtled around me, but the creature continued on.
The shapes continued to dodge their way around me, and I could hear their breathing, heavy and dangerous. The tracks were difficult to see in the whiteout, and I reached down to clutch the side of my hip where my sidearm should have been resting under my coat, but there was nothing there—and that was when I saw that the thing had turned and what I was following had horns.
—
“. . . You know Gerald, Lucian. He never would’ve done something like this; it just wasn’t like him.”
I didn’t move, just stayed as I was—a stakeout under a hat.
Lucian’s voice sounded tired, and I started to weaken, thinking of all the conversations like this that he’d had to endure. “He was a good man, Phyllis, but I’m not so sure there’s anything anybody can do about this. I spoke with Sandy Sandburg and he said—”
“Don’t mention that man’s name in this house.”
There was a silence. “Nonetheless, he said that—”
“They wrapped it up too quickly, Lucian.”
He made a guttural noise in his throat. “Goddamn it, Phyllis, it was the investigators down in Cheyenne that did the autopsy at DCI. You know as well as I do that when a man like Gerald Holman dies they have to do a complete—”
“They didn’t like him; they didn’t like him, and they’re trying to cover something up, I can tell by the way they look at me. I was a court reporter, remember, and I developed an ability to read people; I can tell when people are lying, believe me, I’ve heard enough of it.” Another long pause. “You know as well as I do that these things happen for two reasons: either it’s trouble at home or trouble on the job. Now I know there wasn’t any trouble at home, so—”
“How’s your daughter, how’s Izzy?”
There was a pause, and then she answered. “Connie’s fine.” I could feel the two of them staring at each other. “We haven’t had to use the room, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Do you know what it was he was working on?”
“They won’t tell me. What did they tell you?”
“They said he was carrying a full caseload, including a missing persons—”
“The stripper—that whore, doesn’t it figure that that’s the case they would focus on.”
The old sheriff adjusted himself on the sofa in order to sit forward. “Were there other things you know about?”
“Things that would make a lot of very important people in this town more than a little nervous. Yes.”
Lucian sighed. “Things like what?”
“I’m not sure I want to tell you about them if you’re not going to help me.” Another longer pause. “He was a good man, Lucian. He helped you when nobody else would, and now he’s dead; I think you owe him something more than a phone call.”
I could feel him nodding. “Not as young as I used to be, Phyllis.”
“I’m assuming that’s why you brought him.”
Even with my hat over my face, I could feel their eyes shift to me.
“It is.”
“He as good as they say?”
I waited and listened.
“When I hired him I told him two things: no man has any sense till age thirty-five and damn few afterwards . . .”
“Amen to that, and the other?”
“Never go after a man to arrest him unless you are certain you are legally right, but then arrest him or die.” I felt him shift and was sure he was looking straight at me now. “In all the time I’ve known him, I’ve never seen him quit, which is where most of ’em ain’t up to snuff—they give out. If he’s got any give in him, ain’t nobody found it yet.”
“He’s big.”
“That he is, but that ain’t the half of it.” He got up from the sofa, and I could hear him limp over to her. “Is that the room over there, the one where you kept Connie?” She didn’t say anything, so he continued. “I want to warn you that if you put Walter on this you’re going to find out what it’s all about, one way or the other.” Another pause, and I could imagine the face that was peering down at her, a visage to which I was accustomed. “You’re sure you want that? Because he’s like a gun; once you point him and pull the trigger, it’s too late to change your mind.”
—
“Oh jeez, if it isn’t dangerous and dangerouser.” Sandy Sandburg, the sheriff of Campbell County, pulled out a chair, sat at our table, and propped up a large manila folder on the windowsill beside him, careful to pick a spot where the condensation wouldn’t do any damage.
It was cold in the little Mexican restaurant in Gillette’s industrial section beside the interstate highway; late on a Sunday night the patrons were few and far between—as a matter of fact, we were the only ones around. A skinny waitress came from behind the counter and sat a cup of coffee in front of Sandy. “¿Cómo estás?”
“Hola, guapa. ¿Qué tal?”
“Cansada.”
Sandburg reached out and gripped one of her thin arms and slid the sleeve of her sweater up to reveal a speckling of old scabs. “¿Te mantienes limpia?”
She shrugged, pulled her arm away, and yanked a pad and pencil from her apron. “Me bañe en la mañana.”
His eyes diverted to us as he let the girl go. “As you might expect, the burritos are pretty damn good.” He glanced back at the waitress and held up three fingers. “Tres, por favor. Beef with the green stuff.” He watched her go and then turned back to the two of us. “Gentlemen, there’s no mystery.”
Lucian cocked his hat back on his head, looking like Will Rogers ready to make a run on a casino. “Phyllis Holman, by God, seems to think otherwise.”
“The bereaved widow . . . Well, she would.”
I volunteered. “She doesn’t seem to like you.”
Lucian glanced at me, now sure I had been awake on the sofa.
“Yeah, I get that, too.” Sandy shrugged. “Hell, I don’t know what I did to her but offer her retired husband a job on the Cold Case Task Force.”
“Maybe that was it.” I eased back in my chair as far as I could without fear of breaking it. “How many on the Cold Case Task Force anyway?”
“One.” Sandy grinned with his matinee idol smile, the one that got other people in trouble, his teeth white against the tan he acquired at Coco View Resort in Honduras every Christmas. “Started it up just so Gerald would have something to do.” The smile faded. “Then this happens; I gotta tell you, of all the fellas I would’ve thought would go out this way, Gerry would’ve been the last.”
I sipped my already cold coffee. “Why?”
Sandy clicked his eyes to mine. “Ever meet him?”
“No.”
“He was so by-the-book that he might as well have published the damn thing.” He looked at Lucian. “Am I right, or am I right?”