Light of the World (18 page)

Where do you go on a Sunday if you want to find a man like Wyatt Dixon? I saw Albert working in his flower bed and asked him. “There’s a holy roller meeting up on the rez this afternoon,” he replied. “You might try there.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“What do you want with Dixon?”

“Information.”

“The boy had a hard life. Don’t be too rough on him.”

“Dixon doesn’t impress me as a victim.”

“That’s because you don’t know anything about him. You loved your parents and your parents loved you, Dave. Dixon didn’t have that kind of luck.”

“You’re a good man, Albert.”

“That’s what you think,” he replied.

T
HE HOLY ROLLER MEETING
was held at a pavilion on the Flathead Indian Reservation not far from the Mission Mountains. It involved what people down south call dinner on the ground and sometimes devil in the bush. At five
P.M.
Clete and I drove in the Caddy up a
long grade through wooded hills that were a deep green from the spring rains into a valley that rose higher and higher as the road progressed toward Flathead Lake. The sky was clear and blue, and fresh snow had fallen on the tops of the Missions during the night; in the sunlight, you could see the ice on the waterfalls melting. The mountains were so massive, the rock chain they formed against the sky so vast, that you lost perspective and the forests growing up the sides resembled green velvet rather than trees. It was one of those places that seemed to reduce discussions about theology to the level of folly.

The service was almost over when Clete parked the Caddy in a pasture lined with rows of cars and pickup trucks. Someone had extended a huge vinyl canopy from the pavilion over the grass, where at least a hundred people were seated in folding chairs, listening to a minister preach into a microphone. The sunlight looked like hammered bronze on the surface of the Jocko, the wind cutting serpentine lines through the fields, the canopy ballooning and popping overhead. The work-worn faces of the congregants were like those you would expect to see in Appalachia, the eyes burning with a strange intensity, and either awe or puzzlement or vulnerability, that reminded me of the paintings of Pieter Brueghel’s Flemish peasants.

The real show wasn’t the preacher. When it was time to give witness, he paused and held on to the sides of the podium, lifting his chin, sucking in his cheeks, his mouth puckered, as though he were teetering on the bow of a ship bursting through the waves. “Paul and Silas bound in jail!” he called out.

“That old jailhouse reeled and rocked all night long!” the congregation shouted.

“Hebrew children in the fiery furnace all night long!” the preacher shouted.

“Lord, who will deliver poor me?” the congregation shouted back.

“There’s worse bondage than the jail. It’s bondage of the spirit,” the preacher said. He pointed his finger into the crowd. “There’s a man here gonna give witness to that, too. A man who had to be struck dumb in order to speak, and by heavens, each of you knows who I’m talking about. Come on up here, Wyatt.”

“These people vote in elections,” Clete whispered.

“Be quiet,” I said.

Dixon faced the crowd, his eyes close-set, the sleeves of his cowboy shirt rolled above his elbows, the veins in his forearms pumped with blood. Then I witnessed the strangest transformation I had ever seen take place in a human being. He looked briefly at the canopy rippling and snapping in the wind, then his mouth went slack and his eyes rolled up into his head. He began to speak in a language I had never heard. The syllables came from deep down in the throat and sounded like wood blocks knocking. He held his arms straight out from his sides, as though about to levitate. I would like to be able to say his performance was fraudulent, nothing more than a manifestation of tent-show religious traditions that go back to colonial times. Except the glaze in his face was not self-manufactured, nor was the energy that seemed to surge through his body as though he had laid his hand on a threadbare power line. Had I been a neurologist, I probably would have concluded he was having a seizure. I was not alone in my reaction. The congregation was transfixed, some pressing their hands to their mouths in fear. When Dixon finished his testimony, if that’s what it could be called, there was dead silence except for the wind popping the canopy.

Dixon balanced himself on the side of the podium, his pupils once again visible, a crooked smile on his face, like a man who was sexually exhausted and trying to recover perspective. Clete screwed a cigarette into the corner of his mouth and flipped open his Zippo.

“Are you crazy?” I said under my breath.

“You think these guys are paying any attention to us?” he replied.

“I don’t care. Show some respect.”

He slipped the cigarette back into his shirt pocket. “Check out the broad in the last row.”

She was wearing a hat and dark glasses, but there was no mistaking the creamy white skin and the mole by her mouth and the demure posture. “What is Felicity Louviere doing here?” I said.

“Maybe she thinks Dixon was mixed up in her daughter’s death.”

“You see the husband anywhere?”

“He’s probably getting laid.”

“We don’t even know the guy. Why be so critical?” I said.

“He’s a piece of shit, and you know it.”

We were standing at the back of the crowd. A fat woman in a print dress with lace on the sleeves turned around and stared at us. “Sorry,” I said.

“Here comes our man,” Clete said. “I hope you’re up to dealing with this crazy bastard.”

“Clete, will you stop it?” I said.

Dixon worked his way through the congregants while they folded and stacked their chairs, returning congratulations, shaking hands, even though his eyes never left our faces.

“I declare, it’s Mr. Robicheaux, fresh up from the bayou,” he said. “Or is it a swamp or a cesspool and such as that where you live at?”

“More like an open-air mental asylum. Is that Aramaic you were speaking?” I said.

“Some people say it’s Syriac. Some says Aramaic and Syriac is the same thing. I couldn’t comment, ’cause when it’s over, I don’t have no memory of it.”

“I really dug it,” Clete said. “It put me in mind of one of those Cecil B. DeMille films. You know, Charlton Heston up on the mountain shouting at the people down below in the middle of an electrical storm.”

Dixon was standing six inches from my face, his head tilted to one side; he seemed to take no heed of Clete. “You been bird-dogging me, Mr. Robicheaux? You still think I’m out to hurt your daughter?”

“That’s one reason I came out here. I think you got a bad rap on that.”

“I declare. I’m overwhelmed.”

“We have the same objective. We want to find the man who killed the Indian girl,” I said.

“Who says I’m trying to find anyone?”

“Gretchen Horowitz.”

“She was talking about me?”

“She said she thought you were a decent guy. Does that bother you?” I said, my control starting to slip.

“Nothing bothers me. Not when I’m in the spirit.”

“That brings up an interesting question,” Clete said. “If you’re
giving witness in a language no one can understand, and you have no memory of what you said, what’s the point of giving witness?”

“Who says nobody understands it?” Dixon said.

“I got it. These guys are international linguists,” Clete replied.

This time Dixon looked directly at him. “Is that your Cadillac out yonder?”

“It was when I drove it here.”

“Nice ride. I hope the people driving the junkers next to it don’t skin it up. Maybe that’s the price of slumming.”

I saw the crow’s-feet at the corner of Clete’s eyes flatten, the color in his face change. “Maybe you and I should walk over in those trees and talk about it,” he said.

“Mr. Dixon?” I said, edging into his line of vision.

“What?” he replied, his eyes locked on Clete’s.

“Why is Felicity Louviere here?”

“Who?”

“Angel Deer Heart’s mother.”

“How the fuck should I know?” He turned his gaze on me. “Y’all don’t have no business here. This is our place. When we’re here, we do things our way. I don’t like people looking down their noses at my friends.”

“Clete grew up in the Irish Channel, Wyatt,” I said. “I got this white patch in my hair from malnutrition. When I started first grade, I couldn’t speak English. I respect you and your friends, and I think Clete does, too.”

“What you don’t seem to understand, Mr. Robicheaux, is I ain’t bothered y’all or put my nose in your business. I didn’t bother your daughter, and I didn’t bother them cops that drug me out to Albert Hollister’s place. But every time I turn around, one of y’all is in my face. It’s Sunday, and we’re fixing to have a community meal. All we want is to be left alone.”

Clete lit his cigarette and snapped the cap closed on his Zippo. “Why don’t you peddle your douche rinse somewhere else and let these poor bastards alone?” he said.

How’s that for diplomacy? I gave up and walked away. “Dave, where you going?” I heard Clete say.

I was so irritated with Clete that I kept walking toward the Caddy and didn’t turn around. I heard somebody walking fast behind me.

“Mr. Robicheaux,” said a woman’s voice.

She was a tank in her late forties, dressed in a frilly blouse and a suit with big buttons, her hair piled on her head, her face flushed and as round as a muskmelon. She had a notebook in one hand and a ballpoint in the other. For whatever reason, she seemed to be wearing amounts of perfume that could knock down a rhino. “Talk to me, please,” she said.

I tried to smile. “What can I help you with?”

“I’m doing an article on the Indians and the spread of fundamentalist religion. Also on the death of that young girl,” she said.

She told me her name was Bertha Phelps. She seemed agitated and breathless and out of her element. She started to write something on her notepad, then realized her pen was out of ink. “I hate these. Do you mind?” she said, looking at the Uni-ball in my shirt pocket.

“No, not at all,” I replied, handing it to her.

“Was that the mother of Angel Deer Heart I saw sitting in the back row?”

“That’s correct. How did you know my name?”

“I saw you in the grocery with Albert Hollister and asked someone who you were.”

Though that didn’t quite come together for me, I didn’t pursue it. “I’m in a bit of a hurry, Ms. Phelps. What’s up?”

“It’s terrible what happened to that young girl. I don’t understand why her mother is here listening to that man.”

“Wyatt Dixon?”

“A sheriff’s detective told me Dixon was the last person to see her alive.”

“I’d say he’s not a viable suspect.”

“Why wouldn’t he be?”

“I’m not qualified to comment, Ms. Phelps. It was nice meeting you.” I turned to go.

“It was just a question,” she said at my back.

The Caddy was locked. I looked back at the pavilion and saw Clete talking to Felicity Louviere. I also saw Wyatt Dixon carrying
a paper plate stacked with fried chicken to a picnic table.
One more try,
I told myself.

I made my way through the crowd and, without being invited, sat down next to him. He never looked up from his food. “You weren’t truthful about your testimony,” I said.

“I’m done talking with you,” he said.

“You indicated you had no memory of it. That was a lie, wasn’t it?”

His forearms rested on the edge of the table, his hands empty and poised above his plate. He kept his eyes straight ahead, the late sun catching in them like reflected firelight. “I’d be careful what I said to the wrong man.”

“You’re an honest-to-God believer, Wyatt. You see things out there in the world that other people don’t. Does the name Asa Surrette mean anything to you?”

“Never heard of him.”

“You’re sure?”

“You got a hearing disorder?” he asked.

“The man who left that message in the cave was no ordinary man, was he?”

“You got it wrong.”

“Got what wrong?”

“It wasn’t no man that was up in that cave,” he said.

“Want to spell that out?”

“He’s goat-footed and has a stink on him that could make a skunk hide. Think I’m taking you on a snipe hunt? Ask Albert Hollister if he ain’t seen presences in that arroyo behind his place. Indians and such.”

“A goat-footed creature was in that cave?”

“There’s a hearing specialist in Missoula I can recommend,” he replied.

I decided it was time to get a lot of distance between me and Wyatt Dixon.

I
TRIED TO STAY
mad at Clete for provoking a situation with Dixon, but I couldn’t. Clete was Clete. He didn’t like religious fanatics and believed most of them were self-deceived or mean-spirited and did great harm in the world. I didn’t believe Wyatt Dixon fell into either of those categories. He may have been psychotic, or he may have been an uneducated man who’d found a form of redemption among the only friends he’d ever had, blue-collar people to whom the struggle of Christ was their own story. Regardless, Dixon had said something I couldn’t get out of my mind. He had mentioned Indian presences behind Albert Hollister’s house.