“Who, Grandmother? Who were they looking for?” Father John kept his eyes on the old woman’s. A name. He needed a name. Then he could go to the family. He could find out who else might be in danger and he’d find some way—there had to be a way—to warn them.
The old woman was shaking her head. “Soon’s I find out—” The drums stopped, and silence poured over the crowd. There was a screech of a microphone.
“Welcome to the Arapaho spring arts-and-crafts fair.” An Indian in blue jeans and a red western shirt, a cowboy hat pushed back on his head, strode into the center of the hall, trailing the mike cord across the tiled floor. He rattled off a string of names, thanking the elders and grandmothers for their hard work so that folks could buy traditional Arapaho art for their homes. “Let’s give a big hand”—he raised one hand in the air—“for the kids from Arapaho school that are gonna demonstrate the traditional dances.”
The crowd began to cheer as the drums started up. The high-pitched voices of the singers floated above the thud. Slowly the line of kids moved into the center of the hall, moccasined feet tapping in precise steps. They wore tanned hide dresses and shirts decorated with tiny tin bells that jangled as they danced. The boys held staffs, the girls, elaborate fans made of feathers.
As Father John stepped back to let the kids pass, he saw the bulky, dark figure of Chief Banner framed in the entrance. The chief gestured with his head toward the outdoors, then backed away. Father John waited for the last kid to dance past before he went outside.
Banner was standing next to a white police car parked in front of the hall, hands jammed into the pockets of his navy-blue uniform jacket. The silver insignias on his collar and cap glinted in the sunshine.
“I figured you’d be here,” he said as Father John approached. “You gotta tell me everything you know about the missing Indian.”
“You found him?”
The chief gave a quick nod. “Ben Holden took a half-dozen warriors up to Bear Lake this morning after the guy didn’t get back from a vision quest. Found his body in a boulder field below the spirit cliff. Looks like he’s been dead a couple days.”
“Who is he?”
“Nobody from around here. Arapaho from Oklahoma. Name’s Duncan Grover. Age about twenty-five.” The chief glanced away a moment. “Fremont County Sheriff’s Department brought the body out. This is their investigation, with Bear Lake being county land. Got a detective on it named Matt Slinger.”
Father John understood. There was a jurisdictional maze that the law enforcement agencies in the area had to navigate. Who was in charge depended upon where a crime took place.
“What do you know about Duncan Grover, John?” The chief’s eyes bore into his.
“Look, Banner,” Father John began, “this isn’t something I can talk about.”
Banner moved closer. The odor of stale coffee hung between them. “You do know what really happened up there, don’t you?”
“What does the detective say happened?”
“The detective? You wanna know what the white detective and the white coroner say? They say Duncan Grover jumped off the cliff. Committed suicide.”
“Suicide!” Father John could feel his heart speed up. He turned away a moment. They had it all wrong. The killer was going to walk away, and other people were going to die. There’s gonna be more murders.
He looked back at the Indian watching him with narrowed eyes. “What makes them think it was suicide?”
“Body was two hundred feet below the ledge,” the chief said. “If he’d accidentally stepped off, he probably wouldn’t have fallen more than ten, fifteen feet before he would’ve been stopped by a big outcropping. But he flew over the outcropping, which took some force. They say he jumped.”
“And you don’t think so,” Father John said after a moment.
“I don’t think any warrior’s gonna go on a vision quest at a sacred site like Bear Lake, where the spirits are all around, then throw himself off the cliffs.” Banner’s voice was tight with fury.
Father John was quiet a moment. “You explain that to the detective?”
“Yeah.” The chief threw his head back in a nod. “So did Gus Iron Bear, the medicine man that gave Grover instructions. So did Holden. Three Indians explaining how things are to white men. You think they listened? Case closed, as far as they’re concerned. Just another dead Indian who killed himself.”
“There has to be some evidence at Bear Lake.” Father John pushed on, struggling to find another way to the truth, groping toward the logic. “Footprints or tire tracks. Something that would make the detective and coroner change their minds.”