“Back to my question,” Chee said. “Did you ever ask Highhawk what he meant by that reference to the uncommitted crime? Did he ever explain what he meant by that?”
Janet seemed happy to shift the subject. “I said something like I hoped he wasn’t intending to dig up any more old bones. And he just laughed. So I said—frankly, this whole thing bothered me, so I said I didn’t think it was laughable if he was planning to commit a felony. Something stuffy-sounding like that. And he laughed again and said he didn’t intend to be guilty of making his attorney a co-conspirator. He said the less I knew the better.”
“He seems to know something about the law.”
“He knows a lot about a lot of things,” Janet agreed. “Nothing wrong with the man’s mind.”
“Except for being crazy.”
“Except for that,” Janet agreed.
“Can you arrange for me to see him again?” Chee said. “And I’d like to get a look at that genuine Tano fetish figure. You think that’s possible?”
“I’m sure there’s no problem seeing Highhawk. About the fetish, I don’t know. It’s probably stored somewhere in a basement. And the Smithsonian must be pretty selective about who has access to what.”
“Maybe because I’m a cop,” Chee said, wondering as he said it what in the world he could say to make anyone believe the Navajo Tribal Police had a legitimate interest in a Pueblo Indian artifact.
“More likely because you’re a shaman,” Janet Pete said. “You still are, aren’t you?”
“Trying to be,” Chee said. “But being a medicine man doesn’t fit very well with being a policeman. Don’t get much business.” Even that was an overstatement. The curing ceremonial Chee had learned was the Blessing Way. In the four years since he had declared himself a hataalii ready to perform that most popular ceremonial he’d had only three customers. One had been a maternal cousin, whom Chee had suspected of hiring him only as an act of family kindness. One had been the blessing of a newly constructed hogan owned by the niece of a friend, and one had been for a fellow policeman, the famous Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn. “Did I tell you about singing a Blessing Way for Joe Leaphorn?”
Janet looked shocked. “The famous Leaphorn? Grouchy Joe? I thought he was—” She searched for the word to define Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn. “Agnostic. Or skeptical. Or—what is it? Anyway, I didn’t think he believed in curing ceremonials and things like that.”
“He wasn’t so bad,” Chee said. “We had worked together on a case. People were digging up Anasazi graves and then there were a couple of homicides. But I think he asked me to do it because he wanted to be nice.”
“Nice,” Janet said. “That doesn’t sound like the Joe Leaphorn I always used to hear about. Seems like I was always hearing Navajo cops bitching about Leaphorn never being quite satisfied with anything.”
But it had, in fact, been nice. More than nice. Beautiful. Everything had gone beautifully. Not many of Leaphorn’s relatives had been there. But then the old man was a widower and he didn’t think Leaphorn had much family. Leaphorn was a Red Forehead Dinee and that clan was pretty much extinct. But the curing itself had gone perfectly. He had forgotten nothing. The sand paintings had been exactly correct. And when the final singing had been finished Old Man Leaphorn had, in some way difficult for Chee to define, seemed to be healed of the sickness that had been riding him. The bleakness had been gone. He had seemed back in harmony. Content.
“I think he just always wants things to be better than they naturally are,” Chee said. “I got used to him after a while. And I’ve got a feeling that all that talk about him being a smart son of a bitch is pretty much true.”
“I used to see him in court there at Window Rock now and then, and in the police building, but I never knew him. I heard he was a real pragmatist. Not a traditional Navajo.”
And how about you, Janet Pete? Chee thought. How traditional are you? Do you believe in what Changing Woman taught our ancestors about the power we are given to heal ourselves? How about you leaving Dinetah and the Sacred Mountains because a white man wants you to keep him happy in Washington? But that was none of his goddamn business. That was clear enough. His role was to be a friend. No more. Well, why not? For that matter, he could use a friend himself.
“What did you mean about getting to see the fetish as a shaman?” he asked.
“Highhawk would be very impressed if he knew you were a Navajo hataalii,” she said. “Tell him you’re a singer and let him know you would like to see his work. He’s setting up a mask exhibition, you know. Tell him you’d like to see the Navajo part of the show.”
“And then ask to see the fetish,” Chee said.
Janet looked at him, studying his expression. “Why not?” she asked, and the question sounded a little bitter. “You think I’m thinking too much like a lawyer?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, I am a lawyer.”
He nodded. “You think I could see Highhawk tonight?”
“He’s working tonight,” she said. “On that exhibit. I’ll call him at the museum and see if I can set something up. Will you be at your hotel?”
“Where else?” Chee said, noticing as Janet glanced at him that his tone, too, sounded a little bitter.
“I’ll try to hurry it up,” she said. “Maybe you can do it tomorrow.”
It proved to be quicker than that.
Janet had shown him the Vietnam Memorial wall, the Jefferson Memorial, and the National Air and Space Museum, and then dropped him off at his hotel. Chee ate a cheese omelet in the hotel coffee shop, took a shower in his bathroom tub (which, small as it was, was huge compared to the bathing compartment in Chee’s trailer home), and turned on the television. The sound control was stuck somewhere between loud and extremely loud and Chee spent a futile five minutes trying to adjust the volume. Failing that, he found an old movie in which the mood music was lower-decibel and sprawled across the pillow to watch it.
The telephone rang. It was Henry Highhawk.
“Miss Pete said you wanted to see the exhibit,” Highhawk said. “Are you doing anything right now?”
Chee was available.
“I’ll meet you at the Twelfth Street entrance to the Museum of Natural History building,” Highhawk said. “It’s just about five or six blocks from your hotel. I hate to rush you but I have another appointment later on.”
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” Chee said. He turned off the TV and reached for his coat.
Perhaps Janet’s idea of being followed had made him edgy. He looked for the car and he saw it almost as soon as he left the hotel entrance. The old Chevy sedan with the bent antenna was parked across the street and down the block. He stood motionless studying it, trying to see if the small man was in it. Reflection from the windshield made it impossible to tell. Chee walked slowly down the sidewalk, thinking that the small man hadn’t made any effort at concealment. What might that mean? Did he want Chee to know he was being watched? If so, why? Chee could think of no reason for that. Perhaps it was simply carelessness. Or arrogance. Or perhaps he wasn’t watching Chee at all.
His route to the Museum of Natural History would take him the other way, but Chee detoured to walk past the sedan. It was empty. He leaned against the roof, looking in. On the front seat there was a folded copy of today’s Washington Post and a paper cup. A street map of the District of Columbia was on the dash. The backseat was empty except that an empty plastic bag with a Safeway logo was crumpled on the floor. The car was locked.
Chee looked up the street and down it. Two teenaged black girls were walking toward him, laughing at something one had said. Otherwise, no one was in sight. The rain had stopped now but the streets and sidewalks still glistened with dampness. The air was damp, too, and chill. Chee pulled his jacket collar around his throat and walked. He listened. He heard nothing but occasional traffic sounds. He was on Tenth Street now, the gray mass of the Department of Justice building beside him, the Post Office building looming across the street. Justice seemed dark but a few of the windows in the postal offices were lit. What did post office bureaucrats do that kept them working late? He imagined someone at a drafting table designing a stamp. He stopped at the intersection of Constitution Avenue waiting for the Don’t Walk signal to change. Two men and a woman, all wearing the Washington uniform, were walking briskly down the sidewalk toward him. Each held a furled umbrella. Each carried a briefcase. The little man was nowhere in sight. Then, under the shrubbery landscaping the corner of the Justice building to Chee’s left, he saw a body.