At sixty-five years of age, Nana Dahd usually knew her own mind. She lived with a Papago’s stolid and abiding faith in life’s inevitabilities. This sudden attack of uncertainty caused new beads of sweat to break out on her forehead.
While Davy dozed contentedly in the sunlit rider’s seat, Nana Dahd struggled with her conscience. Down by the shrine where Gina had died, Rita had crossed herself and prayed to the Anglo God, to Father John’s God, her mother’s God, asking for His blessing on Gina’s eternal soul. But here, on Ioligam, on I’itoi’s sacred mountain, the Anglo God seemed far away and deaf besides.
“Ni-i wehmatathag I’itoi ahni’i,” she whispered, her voice almost inaudible beneath the groaning engine of the laboring GMC. “I’itoi, help me.”
But she wasn’t at all sure He would.
Chapter 3
At almost seven thousand feet, a brisk breeze struck their faces as Rita and Davy stepped down from the GMC. After the heat of the desert floor far below, the cool mountain air felt almost chilly.
In the sparsely occupied observatory parking lot, Rita left Davy to unload baskets while she limped toward the gift shop. A little blond-haired girl sitting on sun-soaked steps regarded the Indian woman curiously as she tapped lightly on the visitor center’s side entrance. At this hour, visitors inside would be watching a movie. Rita disliked walking past them on her way to the craft shop.
Edwina Galvan, manager of the shop, came to the door. Edwina, a Kiowa transplant to the Papago, had fallen in love with and married a young Papago fire fighter who now, as a middle-aged man, served as tribal-council representative from Ban Thak.
Even in her forties, Edwina’s classic Plains Indian features and good looks met and exceeded all the visiting tourists’ “real Indian” expectations. She augmented a stunning natural beauty with a varying wardrobe of antelope bone or squash-blossom necklaces that she wasn’t shy about removing and selling on the spot if a likely purchaser showed sufficient interest.
Since coming to the Papago and assuming management of the Kitt Peak gift shop, she had developed a reputation as a shrewd and knowledgeable basket trader, one with an unerring eye for superior craftsmanship. For years, the Kiowa woman had been Rita Antone’s sole customer.
Edwina smiled when she saw Rita’s broad weathered face waiting outside the door. “So,” she said. “If you’re here, it must be June. It’s sure a good thing. Your baskets are all gone.”
She didn’t say that because of their unrivaled superiority, Rita Antone’s baskets were always the first to sell. Such high praise would be considered excessive and rude. It was enough to say that Rita’s baskets were gone. The old woman nodded a brief acknowledgment of the understated compliment.
Davy appeared just then, lugging the first box of baskets. He waved at Edwina, then hurried back after the next load.
“The bald-headed baby isn’t bald anymore,” Edwina observed as the door closed behind him. “He’s sure big. Is he in school?”
“He just finished kindergarten. He’ll be in first grade next year,” Rita answered.
Davy returned with the second box of baskets, smiling shyly at Edwina as he put it down on the floor. Edwina had heard all the reservation grumblings about Rita Antone, often called Hejel Wi’ithag, or Left Alone, by other Papagos. Gossips said it wasn’t right for her to squander all her hard-earned knowledge on Davy Ladd, an Anglo at that-a boy whose father, convicted or not, was ultimately responsible for Rita’s own grandchild’s death. No one could understand why she would abandon her people to go live in Tucson with the killer’s Anglo widow and her white-skinned baby.
Edwina, still considered a reservation newcomer after a mere twenty years, accepted as a given the special bond that existed between Rita Antone and Diana Ladd. She remembered how the people had unaccountably closed ranks against the bereaved woman after Gina Antone’s death, saying that the old woman was bad luck. Diana and Rita, united by nothing more than mutual grief, had been each other’s strongest allies in that time of trouble. Edwina Galvan didn’t fault either woman for their continuing alliance, nor did she begrudge Left Alone her devotion to the blond-haired boy. In fact, Edwina rather liked him herself.
It took Davy several more trips before all the baskets were assembled in a pile on the floor in front of the counter. By then, Rita was seated on a chair behind the counter drinking a glass of water and fanning herself while Edwina went through the boxes one by one, examining each basket in turn, writing the price on a piece of masking tape that she affixed to the bottom of each basket after first making a note in the ragged notebook that served as her master record.
“You’ve sure been busy,” Edwina commented offhandedly as she worked. “What are you going to do with all your money?”
“Saving it for my old age,” Rita answered. At that, both women laughed. Rita was sixty-five years old. Among the Papago, in a population with the highest blood-sugar count of any known ethnic group in the world, one decimated by the ravages of both diabetes and alcoholism, Rita Antone was already well into a venerated old age.
“Does she give you any of that cash?” Edwina asked Davy with a smile. He shook his head seriously. Edwina reached into her pocket and extracted a quarter. “Here, I’ll give you some,” she said. “Go get yourself a Coke. The machine’s right outside.”
Davy dashed eagerly out of the gift shop. Rita and his mother didn’t let him have sodas often, so this was a special treat. He found the machine with no trouble and felt terribly grown up as he inserted the coin all by himself and pressed the selection button. A can rolled into the slot with a satisfying thunk. Grabbing it and turning at the same time, he ran headlong into the little Anglo girl who had watched him make trip after trip carrying loads of baskets. The impact of the unexpected collision knocked the soda can out of his hands. It fell to the ground and rolled away.
“Watch where you’re going, dummy,” he muttered. He retrieved the can, but when he opened it, half its contents blew into the air. Disappointed, he flopped down onto the steps to drink what was left. Moments later, the little girl joined him, bringing her own soda with her.
“Is that woman you’re with a Indian?” she asked.
It was bad manners to ask such questions, but Davy answered anyway. “Yes.”
“Are you a Indian, too?” she persisted.
“Maybe I am,” Davy answered, growing surly. “And maybe I’m not, either. What’s it to you?”
With that, he stomped away, not sure what about the question had made him so angry. He hurried across the parking lot to where two quarrelsome ground squirrels argued over an abandoned crust of bread. Suddenly, the automatic door of an outbuilding opened, and an ambulance eased into the sunlight.
At first Davy thought he was going to get to see it drive off with lights flashing and siren blaring. Instead, the driver parked directly outside the door, shut off the engine, then went back into the garage. He returned moments later carrying a bucket of soapy water, a brush, and a fistful of rags.
Disappointed, Davy finished what was left of his soda and went looking for Rita.
Andrew Carlisle took his time. He was in no hurry to leave the scene of his triumph and return to the car. After drinking his fill from the rocky pool, he washed the blood from his back, shins, and knees, letting the hot sun dry the moisture from his chafed skin. He took real pleasure in knowing that his victim had fought him and lost. He was a slight man, but the years of working out in prison, especially his total concentration on strengthening his hands, had paid off.