Chee was doing a quick inventory of police women at Shiprock. There weren’t many. “How old?” he asked. “How big?”
Leaphorn knew exactly what he was asking.
“I’ve only seen her a time or two,” he said. “But I think it was Bernadette Manuelito.”
“Son of a bitch,” Chee said, voice vehement. “What are they using for brains?” He was pulling on his socks. “What the devil does she know about staying alive at a roadblock?”
Chapter Sixteen
The roadblock as Leaphorn described it was on Utah 163 about halfway between Recapture Creek and the Montezuma Creek Bridge. A sensible place to put it, Chee thought, since a fugitive who spotted it would have no side trails to detour onto. There was only the brush bosque of the San Juan River to the south and the sheer stone cliffs of McCracken Mesa to the north. What wasn’t sensible was assigning Bernie to such dangerous duty. That was insane. Bernie would be working backup, surely. Even so, this would be a three-unit block at best. Whoever they had would be up against men who had already proved their willingness to kill and their ability to do it. They’d used an automatic rifle at the casino, and a rumor was afloat that they also had night-vision scopes missing from a Utah National Guard armory.
Chee imagined a bloody scene and drove the first eight miles of his trip much faster than the rules allowed. Then, abruptly, he slowed. A belated thought worked its way through his anger. What was he going to say when he got there? What would he say to the officer in charge? It would probably be a Utah state cop, or a San Juan County deputy. He tried to imagine the conversation. He’d introduce himself as NTP out of Shiprock, chat about the weather maybe, discuss the manhunt a minute or two. Then what? They’d want to know what he wanted. He’d tell ‘em he didn’t think Bernie had any roadblock training.
Down the slope, Chee’s headlights illuminated a red REDUCE SPEED sign.
Then what would they say? Chee took his foot off the gas pedal, let the car roll, imagining a tough-looking Utah cop grinning at him, saying, “She’s your lady? Well, then, we’ll take good care of her for you.” And a deputy sheriff standing behind him, chuckling. An even more dreadful thought emerged. The next step. They’d tell Bernie she had to stay in her car, run and hide anytime a stop seemed imminent. Bernie would be outraged, furious, terminally resentful. And justifiably so.
The car was rolling slowly now. Chee pulled it off onto the shoulder, slammed it into reverse, made a pursuit turn, and headed back toward Bluff, giving his idea of saving Officer Bernadette Manuelito more thought.
That thought was quickly interrupted. The sound of a siren in his ear, the blinking warning light atop a Utah State Police car reflecting off his rearview mirror. Chee grunted out the Navajo version of an expletive, slammed himself on the forehead with a free hand, and angled his car off on the shoulder. Of course. He’d done exactly what one does to trigger pursuit from every roadblock from Argentina to Zanzibar. He put on the parking brake, extracted his NTP identification, turned on the overhead light, did everything he could think of to make it easier for whichever cop would show up at his driver-side window.
He’d guessed right for once. It proved to be a Utah State Policeman.
He shined his flash on Chee, looked at the identification Chee was holding out, and said, “Out of the car, please,” and stepped back.
Chee opened the door and got out.
“Face the car please, and put your hands on the roof.”
Chee did so, happy he’d left his belt and holster on the motel bed, and was patted down.
“OK,” the State Policeman said.
And then another voice, Bernie’s voice, saying: "That’s Sergeant Chee. Jim, what are you doing here?”
And Chee stood there, still leaning against the car, grimacing, wondering if there was any way things could possibly get any worse.
Chapter Seventeen
The eastern sky was glowing pink and red over the bluffs that gave Bluff, Utah, its name when Officer Jim Chee climbed into his patrol car. He inserted the key, started the engine, did what all empty-country drivers habitually do: he checked the fuel gauge. The needle hovered between half and quarter full. Plenty to get back to the rendezvous point on Casa Del Eco Mesa, where Nez and he were scheduled to resume the search of their canyon. But not enough to feel comfortable when you’re going a long way from paved road and service stations. He glanced at his watch, pulled out of the Recapture Lodge lot onto U.S. 163. The Chevron station-diner he’d pass should be open about now. He’d stop, fill the tank, buy a few emergency-ration candy bars to share with Nez and continue, not thinking about how foolish he’d looked last night.
Good. The station must be open. He couldn’t see whether the lights were on, but a pickup was driving away. Chee stopped by the pumps, got out. A man was sitting on the gravel beside the station’s door, back against the wall. If Chee had numbered the drunks he’d dealt with since he joined the Navajo Tribal Police, this one would be about 999. He stepped out of the car, wondering what the station operator was doing, and gave the drunk a closer look.
Blood was trickling down the man’s forehead. Chee squatted beside him. The man looked about sixty, hair graying, wearing a khaki shirt with LEROY DELL embroidered on it. The man was breathing heavily. The blood came from an abrasion cut over his right eye. Chee started for the car to radio this in and get an ambulance. Get a pursuit started.
“What? What are you doing? Oh!”
Chee spun around. The man was staring at him, eyes wild, getting up.
“What happened?” the man asked. “Where is he? Did he get away?”
Chee helped him to his feet. “You tell me who hit you,” he said. “I’ll radio it in and get you an ambulance and we’ll see if we can catch him.”
“The son of a bitch,” the man said. He waved his hands. “Look at the mess he made.”
On the other side of the entrance, under a sign reading REST ROOMS CUSTOMERS ONLY, a garbage can lay on its side, surrounded by a scattering of cans, bottles, newspapers, sacks, crumpled napkins - all those things people discard at service stations. Nearby, a newspaper-vending machine was on its back.
“Who was he?” Chee said. “I want to call it in. Give us a better chance to catch him.”
“I don’t know him,” the man said. “He was a big Indian-looking guy. Navajo probably, or maybe a Ute. Tall. Maybe middle-aged, or so.”
“Driving a blue pickup truck?”
“I didn’t see the truck. Didn’t notice it.”
“Did he have a weapon?”
“That’s what he hit me with. A pistol.”
“OK,” Chee said. "Why don’t you go in and sit down. I’ll get the police on it.”
The dispatcher sounded sleepy until the pistol was mentioned.
“Call him armed and dangerous,” Chee suggested. “You might mention this is in the area we’re hunting the Ute Casino perps.”
The dispatcher chuckled. “Those the perps the feds said were long gone. Flown away?”
“Don’t we wish,” Chee replied, and went back into the station to find out just what had happened.
Leroy Dell was sitting behind the cash register, holding his head.
“They’ll be sending an ambulance,” Chee said.
“Down from Blanding. About twenty-five miles from the clinic, and twenty-five back,” Dell said. He groaned and grimaced and described to Chee what had happened. When he was walking from his house up behind the station to open the place he’d heard a sort of a crashing sound. He’d hurried around the corner and seen a man going through the trash. He had shouted at him, and the man had said he just wanted to get some old newspapers.
“Just newspapers?”
“That’s what he said. And I said, “Well you’re going to have to clean up the mess, too.” And then I noticed the vending machine was turned over and went to look at that and I saw he’d broken into that. And I turned around and said he was going to have to pay for that and he had this gun in his hand and he hit me.”