"What time is it?" Dashee said.
"It's late," Chee said. "I need some information. What's going on tonight at Hopi?"
"My God," Dashee shouted. "It's only a little after six. I just got to bed. I'm on the night shift for the next week."
"Sorry," Chee said. "But tell me about tonight."
"Tonight? " Dashee said. "There's nothing to night. The Chu'tiwa—the Snake Dance ceremony—that's at Walpi day after tomorrow. Nothing tonight."
"Nowhere?" Chee asked. "Not in Walpi, or IIotevilla, or Bacobi, or anywhere?" He was disappointed and his voice showed it.
"Nothing much," Dashee said. "Just mostly stuff in the kivas. Getting ready for the Snake ceremonials. Private stuff."
"How about that village where West lived? His wife's village. Which one was it?"
"Sityatki," Dashee said.
"Anything going on there?"
There was a long pause.
"Cowboy? You still there?"
"Yeah," Cowboy said.
"Anything at Sityatki tonight?"
"Nothing much," Cowboy said.
"But something?"
"Nothing for tourists," Dashee said.
"What is it?"
"Well, it's something we call Astotokaya. It means Washing of the Hair. It's private. Sort of an initiation ceremony into the religious societies of the village."
It didn't sound to Chee like the sort of thing that would be useful to West.
"Does it draw a big crowd? I think that's what we're looking for."
Dashee laughed. "Just the opposite—they close the roads. Nobody is supposed to come in. Everybody is supposed to stay indoors, not even look out the windows. People who live in houses that look out on the kivas, they move out. Nobody stirs except the people working on the initiation in the kivas and the young people getting initiated. And they don't come out until dawn."
"Tell me about it," Chee said. The disappointment was gone. He thought he knew, now, where West would set up his rendezvous.
Cowboy was reluctant. "It's confidential," he said. "Some of that stuff we're not really supposed to talk about."
"I think it might be important," Chee said. "A funny thing happened yesterday. I was at the cultural center, and the clerk got called away from the desk, and the telephone was ringing, so Miss Pauling went over there and worked the switchboard and—"
"I heard about that fire," Dashee said. "You start that fire?"
"Why would I start a fire?" Chee asked. "What I'm trying to tell you is Miss Pauling overheard this guy telling Gaines that the people who owned the cocaine could buy it back for five hundred thousand dollars. He said they should have the money available in two briefcases by nine o'clock Friday night. And he said he'd be back in touch to say where the trade-off would be made."
"How'd you know when to start the fire?" Dashee said. "How'd you know when that call was coming? You son of a bitch, you almost burned down the cultural center."
"The point is why hold off until nine o'clock Friday night? That's the question; and I think the answer is because they want to make the switch in a place where the buyers will figure there's going to be a bunch of curious people standing around watching, when actually it will be private."
"Sityatki," Cowboy said.
"Right. It makes sense."
Long pause, while Cowboy thought about it. "Not much," he said. "Why go to all that trouble if they're just going to swap money for cocaine?"
"Safety," Chee said. "They need to be someplace where the guys buying the dope back won't just shoot them and keep the money and everything."
"No safer there than anyplace else," Dashee argued.
Maybe it wasn't, Chee thought. But why else wait until nine Friday night? "Well," he said, "I think the swap's going to be made in Sityatki, and if you'd tell me more about what goes on, maybe I'll know why."
So Cowboy told him, reluctantly and haltingly enough so that Chee's pancakes and sausages were cold by the time he had prodded it all out, and it added nothing much. The crux of the matter was the village was sealed from darkness until dawn, people were supposed to remain in doors and not be looking out to spy on the spirits who visited the kivas during the night, and the place was periodically patrolled by priests of the kiva—but more ceremonially than seriously, Cowboy thought.
Chee took his time over breakfast, killing some of the minutes that had to pass before he could call Captain Largo at his office. Largo would be just a little bit late, and Chee wanted his call to be hanging there waiting for the captain when he walked in. Sometimes little psychological edges like that helped, and Chee was sure he'd need some.
"He's not in yet," the girl on the switchboard reported.
"You're sure?" Chee asked. "Usually he gets in about eight-oh-five."
"Just a minute," she amended. "He's driving into the parking lot."
Which was exactly how Chee had planned it.
"Largo," Largo said.
"This is Chee. There's a couple of things I have to report."
"On the telephone?"
"When I came in last night, there were two men waiting for me in my trailer. With the lights off. With a gun. One of them, anyway."
"Last night?" Largo said.
"About ten, maybe."
"And now you're reporting it?"
"I think one of them was Drug Enforcement. At least, I think I've seen him with Johnson. And if one was, I guess they both were. Anyway, I wasn't sure what to do, so I took off."
"Any violence?"
"No. I figured they were in there, so I headed back to my truck. They heard me and came running out. One of them had a gun, but no shooting."
"How'd you know they were there?"
"Smelled coffee," Chee said.
Largo didn't comment on that. "Those sons-a-bitches," he said.
"The other thing is that Miss Pauling told me she overheard a telephone call from some man to Gaines. He told Gaines he could have the cocaine back for five hundred thousand dollars and to be ready with the money at nine p.m. Friday and—"
"Where?"
"He didn't say. This isn't our case, so I didn't ask too many questions. I told Cowboy Dashee and I guess they'll go out and talk to her."
"Heard they had a little fire out there," Largo said. "You know anything about that?"
"I'm the one who reported it," Chee said. "Bunch of tumbleweeds caught on fire."
"Listen," Largo said. "I'm going to do some seeing about the way the dea is behaving. We're not going to put up with any more of that. And when I talk to people I'm going to tell them that I gave you strict orders to stay away from this drug case. I'm going to tell people I'm going to kick your ass right out of the Navajo Police if I hear just one little hint that you're screwing around in federal territory. I'm going to tell people you understand that perfectly. That you know I'll do it. No question about it. You know that if you get anywhere near that drug case, or anybody involved with it, you are instantly and permanently suspended. Fired. Out of work."
Largo paused, allowing time for the speech to penetrate. "Now," he continued. "You do understand that, don't you? You understand that when I hang up this telephone I am going to write a memo for the files which will show that for the third and final time Jim Chee was officially and formally notified that any involvement on his part in this investigation would result in his immediate termination, said memo also showing that Chee did understand and agree to these instructions. Now, you got all that?"
"I got it," Chee said. "Just one thing, though. Would you put in the memo what I'm supposed to be doing? Put down that you've assigned me to working on that windmill, and solving the Burnt Water burglary, and finding Joseph Musket, and identifying that John Doe case up on Black Mesa. Would you put all that down, too?"
Another long pause. Chee guessed that Largo had never intended to write any memo for the record. Now he was examining Chee's motives.