Dry Bones: A Walt Longmire Mystery (24 page)

“Just tell Lucian to stop referring to us as triple A with guns.” He laughed. “McGroder figured that if the going got rough, that’s where you’d be coming out.” He glanced in the back at the huddled Lone Elks, and finally at Omar, who was sitting between Henry and me. “Looks like it got rough, all right.”

I threw a thumb toward the back. ”Enic shot the helicopter and Omar, Henry shot Enic, and then we had to go spelunking for Taylor and Jennifer.”

He shook his head. “His mother is fit to be tied.”

“I bet.” I glanced at the Highway Patrol car. “They say anything else?”

“They’ve just been bitching about being held, but I told them it was for their own safety.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Is it all right if I let them out so that they can come see that the boy wonder is safe and sound? ’Cause if that prick Randy kicks the back of my seat one more time, I’m going to find a hole to stuff him into.”

I thought about it as the rain settled into a light sprinkle. “Sure.”

As I got out, I flipped the safety strap on my holster, checked my .45, and then reholstered it. Bob approached the cruiser, opened the back door, and let Eva and Randy out. Thunder sounded over the high plains, and the smell of the wet grass and sage was intoxicating. I climbed out, opening the rear door and inviting the Lone Elk clan to get out of the vehicle. “C’mon, let’s have a little family reunion.”

Eva rushed over and grabbed Taylor’s face and held it close to hers. “Where have you been?”

He said nothing, but as she pulled his face down to her shoulder, she saw Jennifer. “What are you doing here?”

I interrupted. “Um, there have been some developments, Eva. It would appear that these two have gotten married.”

Yanking him out at arm’s reach, she glared at him. “You’re seventeen. You can’t get married without my consent!”

The teenager nodded toward the older man still seated on the edge of the backseat of my truck. “Uncle Enic signed the papers.”

I interrupted. “You three can work this out later, because right now we’ve got a more pressing question as to why Taylor attempted suicide.”

Eva turned to me. “He what?”

“Taylor here attempted to drown himself about ninety minutes ago.”

She turned to look at him. “What?”

I stepped between her and the boy, keeping my right hip toward Randy. “He said that somebody advised him to run because he gave his grandfather the whiskey and that’s what killed him. He also says that neither he nor Jennifer destroyed her computer back at the rock shop.”

I felt the tug as Randy, even handcuffed, deftly pulled the Colt from my holster and backed away from all of us. The Bobs immediately went for their sidearms, but I raised a hand and they stopped.

It was one of those moments where everything kind of comes to a halt; the breeze had stopped and it was almost as if the mist had frozen in midair. “What are you doing, Randy?”

He glanced at me, but his eyes shifted back to the Bobs. “I’m not taking the blame for this.”

Taylor took a step toward him, dumbstruck. “You told me—”

“Shut up, I didn’t tell you anything.”

I squared off, placing myself between him and the rest of his family. “Then why are you holding my gun, Randy?”

He backed away toward the Turtle Pond. “I’m not getting railroaded.”

I shook my head and stepped toward him. “You’re not—I really already knew it was you, because you’re the one who always placed that ceremonial turtle rattle in your father’s hands when he was sleeping, and you’re the only one in the family who would’ve known about the dangerous amounts of arsenic, lead, DDT, and mercury that those artifacts have after having been treated by the museums.” I took another step toward him. “It was only after Dave told me about the contamination that I started putting two and two together, but the only ones I could think of who would possibly know about that problem were Dave and Jennifer here. But then I remembered that you had worked in the labs up in Bozeman.”

“Stay back.”

I took another step forward, forcing him to the edge of the pond. “And the two of them would never have had the access to your father like you.”

He glanced at the Bobs, both still with their hands on their sidearms. “Don’t either of you move.”

I, on the other hand, took another step, narrowing the twelve feet between us. “Those years after college you said you had a job up in Montana? I’ve got a sneaking suspicion it was doing archival work. When you told me you didn’t want me touching the rattle, it wasn’t so much because it was a treasured family relic, was it?”

He raised the barrel of my Colt, pointing it directly at my face. “You don’t have any proof.”

“Not a lot, which is why I didn’t arrest you before now, but once Taylor here tells us it was you who talked him into giving your father the poisoned whiskey, we’ll be well on our way—besides, innocent men don’t grab an officer’s gun and point it at him.”

He pulled the hammer back on my Colt. “I’m going to do more than that.”

I took another step toward him. “You got greedy, didn’t you? The rattle and the mercury-laced turtle food had been doing their work for a year’s time, ever since you found out about your father’s meetings with the Conservancy, but once the dinosaur was discovered you thought you’d speed things up, huh? The Conservancy was going to get the ranch, the museum was going to take Jen, and you’d be left with nothing. But what if you could stop that from happening? The clock was ticking. Danny could sign the papers any day, you thought, so you decided to help things along by putting mercury in the flask. Lucian drank some, but his stomach wasn’t acidic enough to cause the mercury or the arsenic to absorb enough to kill him.”

“I don’t want to shoot you, Walt, but I will.”

I took another step, bringing me within arm’s reach. “It makes me sad to think of that old man out wandering the countryside with symptoms of alcoholism even when he wasn’t drinking, talking to himself, and being baffled by the fact that every time he woke up in his chair he was holding that magical turtle rattle.”

“Don’t come any closer.”

“I’m betting that your father was only tempted this once.” I sighed. “The first time I met him he told me that he worried about disappointing his ancestors.” I took the final step, pressing my chest against the barrel of my .45 and looking him in the eye. “I think that’s something you should’ve considered.”

He pulled the trigger, and we both stood there looking at each other, the loud click of the hammer falling on an empty chamber sounding like the turning of a key that could never be reversed.

“You should have trusted your father to not disinherit you, Randy. He wasn’t going to cede the ranch to the Cheyenne Conservancy and leave all of you penniless. He knew that none of you really wanted to be here, so he was planning to sell the ranch to the Conservancy and give you the proceeds. That is, until Jen was discovered, and he decided to give the ranch to the Conservancy and divide the proceeds from Jen among all four of you. I guess he figured more than two million apiece was pretty good.” Calmly placing my hand over the slide action, I twisted the weapon away from him, took the magazine from my pocket where it had been all along, replaced it in my sidearm, and slipped the 1911 snug in my holster.

I started back toward the others, but the lesser part of my nature took hold and I stopped. I took a deep breath and expulsed it with my words. “I don’t normally do these types of things, but I’m really tired and I’ve had a bad couple of days.”

Putting everything I had into it, I spun around with a haymaker that caught him on his chin’s sweet spot, sending him backward where he flattened out with his heels four feet from the bank, hitting the surface of the Turtle Pond like a depth charge.

As I walked past the others toward my truck, I made my final pronouncement on the matter: “You can fish him out or you can let the turtles have him—I really don’t care.”

We were all sitting at the Red Pony Bar and Grill, because it was the only place that had a television where we could all fit. The auction was being held in New York and most of the components of what was the largest and most complete tyrannosaurus ever discovered, named Jen for the young woman who had found her, now rested on red velvet-cushioned metal cradles.

Say what you wanted about the auction house, the largest broker of fine goods on the planet, they knew how to put on a show.

At least I’d gotten my holding cells back.

I had a front-row seat at the bar because I’d gotten there early along with Ruby and Lucian, my two cohorts. And thank goodness we’d gotten there when we did because I was pretty sure that the entire population of Durant and the Northern Cheyenne Reservation were now in the bar, many of them wearing the green and white S
AVE
J
EN
T-shirts the vendors had been selling on Main Street.

It didn’t look good.

There were at least four major museums worldwide that were seeking the acquisition, some with silent partners from the private sector, some private collections, and even a Dubai sheik who wanted her for the entryway of his mansion. The High Plains Dinosaur Museum had a contingency in New York, but their hopes weren’t too high—the little museum just didn’t have the pockets needed for this kind of endeavor.

I’d caught a glimpse of Dave Baumann and some of his backers from the Wyoming oil and gas community in the crowd in Manhattan, but they looked somewhat out of their depth.

The Cheyenne Nation rested a cold can of Rainier in front of me, and then I watched as he stretched high for the top shelf where he kept the good stuff, including the bottle of Pappy Van Winkle’s Family Reserve twenty-three-year-old. I turned to my old boss. “Are you sure you want to try that stuff again? The last round of rye didn’t agree with you.”

He watched as the Bear turned and poured him three fingers, straight up. “Gotta stay in practice.”

The Cheyenne Nation returned the bottle to the top shelf and then poured a club soda for Ruby, who as far as I knew had never been in the Red Pony before. She lowered her voice and leaned in to me. “What is Dino-Dave’s limit?”

I took a sip of my beer and rested it back on the bar, also keeping my voice low, so that the figure wouldn’t become public knowledge. “He says he and his partners can go six point two, but nothing more than that.”

Lucian spoke out loud before sipping his liquor. “Six million dollars for that bunch of bones?”

So much for keeping it quiet.

Ruby sighed. “So, that won’t be enough?”

I shook my head. “Probably not.”

The auctioneer approached the podium and addressed the room, welcoming all the bidders and explaining the rules, especially those for the bank of phones with operators in the gallery to the right. It would appear that the auction for Jen would be worldwide.

The Bear continued to serve the legions as a few people patted me on the back. “I spoke with Dave and some of the others, and they seemed sure it would go over eight.”

“Maybe nine.” I turned on my stool and found Agent in Charge McGroder smiling at me. He was truly undercover, if a little incongruous, in a polo shirt and a light windbreaker. He had left after the ruckus had faded, but I guess was back for the show. He raised a fist. “Save Jen.”

I returned the salute, but with little enthusiasm. “What the heck are you doing here?”

“Oh, I thought I’d come back up, take a few days, and get a little fishing in.”

I smiled at him. “And watch a dinosaur get sold?” We shook hands. “Where are your other agents?”

“They don’t fish.”

“They hardly eat, as I recall.”

He nodded and motioned to the Bear for a beer. “Heard anything from your buddy, Skip Trost?”

“No—when the media dried up he disappeared.”

“In more ways than one.”

I turned on my stool and looked at him. “Meaning?”

He leaned in between Ruby and me, taking the proffered can from the proprietor. “Joe Meyer requested that he be removed.”

I was stunned. “You’re kidding.”

“As you well know, Joe holds some sway back in Washington, and I guess he didn’t give Trost the best of report cards—what the AG giveth, the AG taketh away.” McGroder sipped his beer. “It’s a powerful position, even on a state scale.”

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Over my shoulder, I could see the auction was about to begin, but Henry stood by the cash register with the phone receiver in his hand, motioning to me. Foolishly, I pointed to myself and he nodded, too much noise to speak. I stood and stepped around McGroder. “Save my seat for me, would you?”

He slipped in and sat as I made my way down the bar and turned the corner near the back door, Henry meeting me with the phone, which he handed to me without comment. I held the receiver to my ear and gave the Bear’s usual salutation. “Red Pony Bar and Grill and continual soiree.”

“You moonlighting?”

I laughed. “Well, howdy, Mr. Attorney General, we were just talking about you.”

“You and your constituency watching this auction?”

I glanced up at the TV. “Looks like it’s about to get underway.”

“Well, I don’t want to keep you, but I’ve got a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Do you think your daughter would like to come work for me as an assistant attorney in the Criminal Division?”

Of all the things the highest law enforcement official in the state could’ve asked, that was the last I’d expected. I cleared my throat, just to give myself a little time. Thinking about what I wanted to say next, I mumbled a response. “I’m not sure.”

“I don’t want to offer it to her if you think she wouldn’t consider the position.”

I thought about the Greatest Legal Mind of Our Time. “Well, she’s got a will of her own.”

“I realize she’s going through a lot right now, and I don’t want to add to those pressures.”

“How long would she have to decide?”

“Long as she wants.”

“Well.” I sighed. “I think you should ask her.”

“I was kind of hoping
you
would.”

I laughed. “Oh, no. I don’t want her to think I had anything to do with this.”

He was silent for a moment. “If you don’t mind my asking, as one old bull to another, is it something you would be in favor of?”

I felt my eyes tear and my breath catch in my throat as I stood there leaning against the bar for support. I was thinking that he’d had this in mind since our conversation in his car in front of my office that day. Faced with a Machiavellian master, I did the easiest thing and just fell back on the truth. “More than anything in the world, Joe.”

“I thought about sticking her in Water and Natural Resources or Tort Litigation, but I thought she might turn me down.” There was a pause. “Anyway, I like the idea of the two of you locking horns every once in a blue moon. You got a number I can call?”

I recited Cady’s cell phone number and listened as the attorney general scribbled it down. “I should warn you, she’s kind of a pain in the ass.”

“Like her old man?” He laughed. “Get back to your auction, and I hope you win your dinosaur. Save Jen.” The phone went dead, and I turned to find my oldest and dearest friend next to my elbow.

“What did the AG want?”

“Cady.”

He thought about it and smiled, giving me the impression that he’d already figured that was what Joe Meyer had had in mind—the Bear, always five moves ahead. “Hmm . . . It would be nice to have the two of them nearer.”

I hung the phone up and leaned against the jutting jaw of the cash register. “I guess Cheyenne is nearer. Don’t know, Henry, she’s so used to the big city, and Cheyenne is just Des Moines with a rodeo.”

He patted my shoulder as he moved past with another beer and a glass of wine, picked up the remote from the counter, and turned up the volume on the TV. “Trust me, she’ll be fine.”

The dulcet tones of the auctioneer, with his prim and proper British—possibly not so prim and proper Australian—accent filled the crowded confines of the Red Pony, and the crowd grew quieter. “And here she is, the star of the evening, the undisputed queen of the Cretaceous period and the most recognizable dinosaur in popular culture. Jen, as she is affectionately known, was found in Absaroka County, Wyoming, by a young woman named Jennifer Watt and her dog, Brody, and from these humble beginnings has been determined to be the largest and most intact specimen of her kind ever to be discovered.”

Lucian looked across the bar at me. “Did that limey just call us humble?”

“I believe he did.”

“Cocksucker.”

Ruby reached past McGroder and swatted him. “Watch your language.”

The auctioneer continued. “The apex predator of her time, Jen is over forty-two feet in length and weighed close to eight metric tons. By far the largest carnivore in her environment, Jen is, simply put, priceless. But we will attempt to put a price upon her this evening—and the opening bid is—”

The Bear reached up to the top shelf again, and I was getting a bit worried about Lucian’s intake when I noticed he plucked the phallic-looking original eighteenth-century decanter-style bottle from the good-stuff
shelf, the legendary AsomBroso Reserva Del Porto, instead of the Pappy’s. There was only one person I knew of who drank from the thousand-dollar bottle of tequila, and I watched as the Bear walked to the end of the bar and passed the tumbler, which went from patron to patron to where Omar Rhoades, talking on his cell phone, sat at a table by himself with his leg propped up on a stack of beer crates.

I waved, and he gestured back with the expensive liquor and a raised fist, mouthing the words “Save Jen.”

“Who will start?” The auctioneer smiled and casually mentioned a figure. “One million, two hundred and fifty thousand?” He pointed at an individual in the audience who raised a paddle. “One million, two hundred and fifty thousand—good evening Mr. Gallmeister, good to have you with us.”

I grumbled. “Smithsonian.”

Those in close proximity nodded.

The auctioneer quickly pointed again. “One million, three hundred thousand, Mr. Matteson . . .”

“Field Museum, Chicago. I guess they want a pair.”

He pointed again, this time to the gallery at the side. “One million, three hundred and fifty thousand.”

Ruby arched an eyebrow and asked out of the side of her mouth, “So, who gets the money?”

I leaned against the bar and helped Henry by pulling out a few beers and handing them to the patrons as I turned to my dispatcher/receptionist/moral compass. “Eva and Taylor—the ranch goes to the Cheyenne Conservancy, with Enic having a lifetime interest according to Danny’s desires.”

“Where are the young lovers?”

“I’d imagine seeing if being rich is going to allow for their relationship. I guess after the video established sole ownership of Jen to the Lone Elk family, they decided to continue giving it a try.” I gestured toward the millionaire in the corner. “And Omar decided to not press charges against Enic for shooting him in the leg and the helicopter in the rotors.” I sipped my beer. “We’re a forgiving folk, here in Wyoming.”

“And Randy?”

“Not that forgiving—he goes to the big house in Rawlins. He was the one who convinced Taylor and Jen to run—he’s also the one who destroyed the computer in hopes of getting rid of the video of his father at the meetings, and it was his blood at the rock shop.”

Ruby shook her head. “But how did he get to the point of killing his own father, Walter? It‘s a part of this business that we’re in that I don’t think I’ll ever understand.”

I nodded my head and drew my face in close to hers in a show of solidarity. “Danny was a drunk for a lot of his life, a charming, funny and entertaining drunk, but a drunk nonetheless. That kind of thing can do things to families that can’t ever be repaired. In the long run, Danny sobered up and became a good man, but the damage was already done and Randy just didn’t trust him.”

We glanced up at the TV as the auctioneer continued taking bids like picking posies. “Three million, two hundred and fifty thousand to Ms. Weisheit.”

They all looked at me. “Fernbank Museum in Atlanta.”

The auctioneer pointed at another paddle. “Three million, five hundred thousand to Mr. Baumann.”

A cheer rose up from the crowd in the bar, but the bidding was off and running again. “Three million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to Mr. Aslanides . . .”

I continued my running commentary. “Iziko Museum in Cape Town.”

Lucian shook his head as the bidding continued at a heated pace. “Poor ol’ Danny.”

“Yep.”

“So, who was out there wandering around the place that everybody kept seeing?”

“Maybe Enic . . .” I thought about the warnings I’d received in my dreams from the eyeless man and thumbed the Mallo Cup card in my pocket.
You will stand and see the good, but you will also stand and see the bad—the dead shall rise and the blind will see.
“But then again, maybe not.”

There was another roar as Dino-Dave and the Wyoming contingency made their last-gasp effort in obtaining Jen. “Six million, two hundred thousand to Mr. Baumann.”

I switched to the bar side but was distracted by two individuals at the end of the counter. I knew their plebian habits and limited income, so I fished two Rainiers out of the cooler and set the beer in front of them. “Who’s minding the store?”

Saizarbitoria smiled and held up the pager that connected our 911 system to the carrier. “I’ve got the rock. We just stopped by to take in the action for a little bit and get a vote.” He gestured beside him to his companion.

I glanced at Double Tough and slid down, leaning in to see the newest addition in the available light, stunned that it was an exact replica of the real deal in the other socket. “Good job, troop. Vic would be proud.”

There was a tap on my shoulder, and I turned to see Henry, this time holding his cell phone out to me. “You are popular this evening.”

There was a resounding booing of displeasure as the bidding continued and the hopes of keeping Jen in Absaroka County were dashed by another bid from the back of the TV house. “Six million, three hundred thousand.”