Moody watched as Ooljee entered the ignition combination and waited for the control LCD to light. Without waiting for the engine to warm up, he backed them out of the official parking space and headed for the exit. Map lights winked on the navigation screen. Moody recognized the uncertainty pattern and queried his companion.
“I’m not set up to patrol in Klagetoh,” Ooljee explained, “so they don’t issue me road software.”
The exit gate flashed them through. Ooljee deftly negotiated the maze leading out of the airport, avoiding the town as he headed for the Interstate.
Once clear of commercial traffic he entered their destination into the dash. The onboard navigation unit confirmed the entry and they began to accelerate. Ooljee let go of the wheel and relaxed. Beneath their feet, the ROM laser tracked the guide strip laminated to the pavement, coordinating speed and direction with all vehicles ahead and behind. Unless Ooljee altered the entry manually, they would travel the rest of the way into Ganado on automatic.
“You always work out of a pickup truck?” Moody asked conversationally.
“Old traditions die hard. This is standard issue transportation for plainclothes work. A department road cruiser would look more familiar to you, except that it would also come with four-wheel drive and steering. The roads on the Rez are much improved over the last hundred years, but there are still plenty of places that will destroy a normal vehicle. That is tradition too. Like the sandpainting.” He looked to his right as they passed a private vehicle stuck by the side of the road.
“Family breakdown. Help will arrive soon. Tradition is why I was able to get into this Kettrick business. For a lot of the people who work in the department, tradition is who won the league title two years ago. Now me, I have always been interested in the old ways.”
At a touch, a locked compartment in the dash dropped open. He fumbled through a disorganized, highly compacted mass of papers, opdisks, and mollyboxes until he found a color fax. Moody recognized the Kettrick painting.
“I have been working with this a lot since your department contacted ours asking for information. I’ve already run it through the files at the Museum of Northern Arizona, the Navaho Museum in Window Rock, and the University of New Mexico at Gallup. My friend, there are hundreds of sandpaintings, each distinctively different, and this one does not match up with any of them. There are individual elements which do, but they are drawn oddly and make no historical sense in the context in which they appear. It is very peculiar. I have talked to specialists in all three places about it and they agree they have never seen anything quite like it.
“Of course, I am only a policeman and they are only academics. We all agree that only a hatathli with much experience and a very active imagination could make anything out of this. His interpretation might not be accurate, but it would certainly be entertaining.”
Moody shifted in the seat. It was worn but comfortable. “So what you’re telling me is that nobody has any idea what it means.”
“That is what I am being told.” The engine hummed as they began to climb. He ran his finger over the fax. “There are figures and shapes and designs in this painting that some say are wholly nontraditional in origin. Other experts are not so certain. That is not to say the designs are meaningless; only that I have been unable so far to find anyone able to tell me what they mean.”
Moody stuck out his lower lip. “We assumed that it sure as hell meant something to the son of a bitch who murdered Kettrick and his housekeeper.”
“I tend to agree. I do not subscribe to the theory that we are dealing with a crazed collector.”
“Why not?”
“Because I do not see a collector, even an insane one, destroying what he has gone to so much trouble to collect. I think it was the substance of the sandpainting the killer wanted, more than the original itself.” He looked thoughtful. “When we catch him I will be very anxious to ask him about that.”
“Ask all y’all want. I’ll settle for catching him.” Ooljee glanced at his colleague. “Your interests parallel but do not always duplicate mine. That is understandable.”
He turned forward again, lost in his own thoughts.
It gave Moody time to study the countryside through which they were passing. Paralleling the Interstate to the south were the four major east-west maglide tubes, shooting cargo and the occasional passenger car between Los Angeles and Albuquerque or the Montezuma Strip.
They hadn’t spent five minutes on the Interstate before the truck ducked down an off-ramp and crossed onto highway 191 running north. A glowing sign flashed past. METROPOLITAN GANADO—40 MILES
“That’s where you’re based?” Moody inquired.
The sergeant nodded. “Window Rock’s still the capital, but Ganado’s the commercial center of the Rez. Has been for over a century. You’ll be seeing high-rises pretty soon.”
They were already in among sprawling assembly and manufacturing plants, Moody noted. “Nothing personal,” he said as they passed mile after mile of faceless industrial facilities interspersed with residential dormitories and service structures, “but surely you folks don’t own all of these?”
“No, but we are in most of them. There are not enough of us to fill the demand for skilled techs, let alone the uhskilled positions. A lot of Hispanics and Filipinos live and work on the Rez. Plus Anglos, of course. And Nicarags, ever since the big eruption that wiped out Managua back in sixty-five. Asians mostly in the administrative posts.” With a wave of his hand he encompassed the teeming industrial landscape.
“Most of the businesses here are tripartite joint ventures between Navahopis, Anglos, and Orientals. Isn’t it the same where you come from?”
Moody shook his head. “Greater Tampa’s still primarily a retirement and recreation city. Oh, there’s plenty of industry, but not a lot of high-tech. Humidity’s not good for electronics.”
“That is a problem we do not have here.”
They drove in silence interrupted only by Ooljee’s occasional checks with his office. Only much later did he venture to ask, “I don’t suppose any neighbors reported hearing any singing from the victim’s house around the time of the murder?”
Moody was taken aback. “Singing? Why? You think our nut’s the kind who celebrates over a kill?”
“Not exactly that. It is only that we are operating on the premise that our suspect is Navaho, or at least someone with detailed knowledge of Navaho custom. A hatathli always chants when destroying a sandpainting. I would give a lot to know if our killer is a hatathli. It would narrow the list of potential suspects considerably.”
Moody could not keep the irritation out of his reply. “No, as far as I know, nobody heard any singing.”
This sandpainting business was beginning to get to him. He’d been in the Southwest less than an hour and already he wanted out. Medicine men and chants! If any of this ever made it back to Tampa he’d have to deal with the jokes for years.
He tried to concentrate on the terrain. It was spectacular, but far too sweeping and barren for his taste. He preferred calmer horizons softened by the irregular green of tropical trees and framed by the glint of sunlight on still waters, not endless mesas that ran like veins of rust through a harsh blue sky. It was beautiful, sure, but to him, lifeless. And the lack of moisture in the air was making him itch.
He was only here to serve as a liaison, he reminded himself; to offer what aid he could while reporting back to Tampa on any local progress, which according to Ooljee was practically nil. He could back off from this hatathli nonsense and stick to standard police procedure.
If, he told himself suddenly, Ooljee wasn’t simply having some fun at his expense and setting him up for a few good gags with his buddies at the station. Sure, that made plenty of sense! He could envision it clearly: the paleface sucker from Florida somberly questioning other Navahos about sandpaintings and medicine men. He smiled to himself. Ooljee was good, and his guest had nearly bought it. Nearly.