Night of the White Buffalo: A Wind River Mystery (22 page)

FATHER JOHN URGED
Vicky toward the pickup. “Come on!” he called over one shoulder to Reg.

“I'm not going.”

He looked back at the cowboy outlined in the dim light, a shadow plastered against the dark earth. The truck skidded to a stop behind the pickup and blocked the road. He stepped between Vicky and the woman in the cowboy hat, who swung both feet out of the cab and dropped to the ground with the agility of a rodeo rider jumping off a bronco.

“What's this?” Sheila Carey threw a glance at Father John and Vicky, then glared at Reg. “You got up a welcoming party?”

“Time for answers.” Reg's voce was low and steady and filled with menace.

“Take it easy,” Father John said, not taking his eyes from the woman. The cowboy hat, the short figure in the bulky jacket, the way her shoulders propelled her forward. Not long ago she had tried to run them into the ditch. She had intended to kill them. Before that, she had shot Steve Mantle.

Vicky had moved up alongside him. In the way she kept her eyes fixed on the woman, he knew that she knew the truth.

“Get off my ranch, all of you. Go back to wherever you came from.” Sheila Carey did a half turn and brushed past the cowboy. “I could shoot you for trespassing.”

“Is that what you did to Josh? Shot him?”

The woman halted, as if she had been pulled up by a rope. She took her time turning back. “You're crazy.”

“I found Josh's saddle,” Reg said. “Who killed him? Your husband? Is that what he did? Shot the hands instead of paying them?”

“Get out of here.” Sheila Carey folded herself into a crouch, shoulders pulled together, head thrust forward, like a buffalo ready to charge.

“What about the other missing cowboys?” Vicky said. “Did you shoot them? Where did you bury them? Out behind the barn where you buried your husband's ashes?”

Sheila took a long moment, her gaze fixed on the darkness that spread over the pasture behind them, a mixture of thoughts moving through her face, as if she were weighing which one to settle on. The dim silvery starlight glowed in the night; the edges of the pickup's headlights played over the ground. “You don't know anything,” she said finally, her voice laced with panic. The light flashed in her eyes—something wild in her eyes. “Dennis did what he had to do. You don't understand. This is all we had, this ranch. We sank everything into this ranch, all our hopes and dreams. All those cowboys wanted was money. Money. Money. Money. They were all the same. Threatened to take us to court. Take the ranch away.”

“My God,” Father John said under his breath. He could hear the breathless voice—the agony—of the man in the confessional.
I committed murder . . . I had no choice.
Dennis Carey. He had come to the mission twice, a man with something on his mind, stumbling around the words, unable to bring them forth. He had come a third time, and in the dim solitude of the confessional, he had blurted out the words. How many times had he committed murder by then? What was it that had finally driven him to the confessional?

“So it was your husband who shot the cowboys,” he said. “It weighed on his conscience.”

“Please!” Sheila Carey threw out both hands. “Spare me your psychobabble. Dennis couldn't shut up. Kept feeling the need to talk about it, saying he needed forgiveness. Jesus, he was going to blow up everything we worked for. Destroy the ranch, his own dreams, like they were nothing.”

“The guilt was tearing him apart,” Father John said. “He came to the mission wanting to talk about it. You were afraid he'd go to the police, confess everything.”

“Shut up! Shut up!”

“You shot your husband,” Vicky said. A controlled voice, calm, Father John thought, but he knew it was like a heavy blanket she pulled over her to cover the shock and fear. “You tried to kill us tonight. You killed Steve Mantle and stole his computer. Why? To destroy the employment records? A lot of folks around here knew the cowboys who worked on the ranch.”

“I keep my own records. I could deny any cowboys worked here. Without Mantle's records, what would the police have? Cowboys bragging about their jobs? Bar gossip.”

“What about us, Sheila? You tried to kill us tonight. We were asking too many questions, getting too close to the answers, isn't that right?”

Reg twisted his shoulders about, as if he were trying to break out of a nightmare. “What about me? Coming around here, asking questions. You put me next on your list?”

A look of uncontrolled panic glinted in the woman's eyes. Father John wasn't sure where the gun that materialized in her hand had come from. What pocket had she pulled it out of? Which folds in the bulky jacket? He realized she'd probably had her hand on the gun when she descended from the truck.

Vicky gasped.

“Look, Sheila,” Father John said, trying to ignore the gun—the silvery metal with the dark shadows and the enormous black hole—as if they were in his office, talking, exploring options, reaching for an understanding. “The BIA police will be here any minute.” He hoped that was true. “They will excavate the depressions in the field where you buried your husband's ashes. It's over now. You don't want to kill anyone else.”

She was holding the gun in both hands, knees bent in the shooter's stance, the wildness still in her eyes. “I'll tell you what we are going to do. We are going to walk to the barn. I keep a shovel outside in case I need it. We will get the shovel and walk over to the . . .” She hesitated and, for a moment, Father John thought she might crumble, fall to the ground. “Cemetery,” she said. “That's what Dennis called it. The cemetery. This ranch was all we had. No one was going to take it from us. Soon as we hired on the first cowboys, we knew they were going to make trouble if they didn't get their pay. And how were we supposed to pay them? Nothing but work on this place, and very little money trickling in. You know what happened? Some fool Indians took a shot at the cowboys.” She tossed her head and gave a sharp crack of laughter. “We figured they'd up and leave. What idiot wouldn't take off after getting shot at? But they didn't leave. Threatened to report us to the police if we didn't pay up. That's when we figured out how to make them disappear so they couldn't cause us any trouble, and people would think they'd been scared off.”

The woman seemed to be bearing down, gripping the gun harder. “Dennis was smart,” she said. “He figured everything out. Hire white guys so the Indians will keep shooting. Don't hire anybody from around here. We didn't want girlfriends snooping around after they disappeared. It worked perfectly.” Her eyes were dark marbles, unblinking, unmoving, staring at an image inside her head. “You understand, don't you? We had to save the ranch. Dennis wanted that more than anything. He just couldn't take it—he couldn't take what we had to do.”

She seemed to come back from wherever she had drifted. “Walk!” she said. “Don't think you are smarter than this gun. I can shoot you here and drag your bodies to the cemetery.”

“Drop the gun, Mrs. C.” Carlos strolled into the stream of headlights. He was gripping a rifle. “Drop it, I said!” His voice sounded ragged and harsh.

Sheila Carey looked stunned and confused, as if she had lost her way down a familiar path. She didn't move.

“Do what he says.” Reg was glaring at her.

Slowly, reluctantly, she lowered her arm and let the gun slide out of her hand.

“Kick it over here,” Carlos said, but she was already toeing the gun in his direction. “Kick it!”

She pulled one leg back and kicked at the gun. It slid forward several feet.

“Get it!” Carlos threw a sideways glance at Reg, who stooped over and picked it up. Both cowboys holding a gun now, and it struck Father John that either might be capable of shooting the woman. “So that's what you had planned for me and Lane and Reg and the rest of the hands? Work our butts off, promise to pay up soon's you sell a bull or butcher a cow. October a good month for sales. But we'd be out in the cemetery with a bullet in our heads. How did you plan to carry that out? Dennis not here to do the dirty work. In the middle of the night? Next morning we'd hear another cowboy had packed up and left?”

A tremor had started through Sheila Carey, legs shaking first, then hips, shoulders, head rolling about. “Don't be fools. We can forget about this.” The words were broken, like the words on a cracked CD. “There's money, lots of it. Visitors are going to keep coming. Oh, they love Spirit. They'll never stop coming to the ranch. Close to a hundred thousand dollars left for Spirit so far. A few more months, we'll hit a million. You'll get your cut.”

Carlos snorted. “Like the cowboys got their pay?”

“I swear,” she said. “We didn't have the money then. Now the money is coming in, just like we always dreamed, Dennis and me.”

“You killed my buddy.” Reg steadied the gun in both hands and aimed at the woman's chest. “I should kill you.”

“I told you . . .” She was still shaking. “Dennis and me did what we had to do. I wasn't the one that took out the cowboys.”

“Your no-good, weak sonofabitch husband! You put him up to it.” The gun lurched upward, then settled back down.

“Don't shoot,” Father John said. “You're not like them, Reg. You don't want to become what they are. All we have to do is wait for the police to get here.”

Reg didn't move, and Father John wondered if the man had heard anything he said. Sheila Carey crouched a few feet away, shaking, wide-eyed, shifting her gaze between the two guns, hands fletching as if she were grasping for air.

Carlos nodded. “Cops are close. I can feel the tremor in the ground. Couple minutes we'll hear sirens, see lights flashing out on the plains.”

“You're lying,” Sheila said.

“You better hope I'm telling the truth. If the cops don't get here soon, Reg here might take justice in his own hands.”

He could feel the earth rumbling himself, Father John thought, or was he imagining it? Willing the BIA to show up before anyone else on this ranch died? “Let me have the gun, Reg. You aren't a murderer.” He took a step forward, but the cowboy jerked the gun in his direction and motioned him back.

“Josh's mom is dying. She's been hanging on 'til Josh comes home. I have to go back and tell her Josh isn't ever coming home. I don't want to see her face when I tell her. I don't want to watch her die.”

“They're here.” Vicky had made a half turn and was looking out toward the road. Father John glanced around. Lights glowed on the horizon beneath the brilliance of the stars. Another half second and he heard the faintest wail of sirens.

He turned back. “The police will handle this, Reg. Let go of the gun.” God. The man's finger was on the trigger. A nervous twitch, and Sheila Carey would be dead.

“All we gotta do is keep her here,” Carlos said. “No sense in you getting yourself into trouble. She will get what's coming to her.”

“It won't bring Josh back to life. Same for the other cowboys out in the cemetery. What right did these sons of bitches have to take their lives?”

The sirens were closer now, three police cars grinding down the narrow two-track, headlights jumping on the braided earth.

“No!” Sheila Carey let out a scream, like a wild, terrified animal. She threw herself around and started running toward the pasture.

Out of the corner of his eye, Father John saw the gun rise in Reg's hand. He spun sideways and chopped at the cowboy's arm, driving it downward. The sharp crack split the air like thunder as the bullet smashed into the ground, ricocheting about, crazy, invincible. Little clouds of dust exploded around them. There was an acrid smell of dust. Father John gripped Reg's wrist with both hands. “Let it go!” he shouted. “Let it go.”

The noise of the sirens reverberated through the night; headlights bathed the ground. Father John was aware of the large, dark shadow moving in close, the cowboy hat bobbing forward. “You heard the father,” Carlos said. “Let go of the gun.”

He felt the release then, muscles giving way as Carlos slipped the gun out of Reg's hand. For a moment, he thought Reg might collapse, then he seemed to gather his energy. He let out a loud howl. “She's getting away!”

Father John looked up. The small, dark figure zigzagged along the barbed-wire fence, darting in and out of the shadows, running wild. Then she stopped. She was at the gate, lifting the wire loop off the posts, yanking at the gate, which scraped over the ground. “No!” he shouted, running toward her now, half-conscious of Vicky running beside him and the sound of the cowboys' boots pounding after them.

“No!” Carlos shouted. “Don't go in there.”

But Sheila Carey was already in the pasture. A dark shadow running toward the herd. The buffalo had started to stir, nosing forward, heads tossing. Moving toward the woman, who was still running and screaming, arms flailing against the blaze of silver stars. The sound of her voice drifted over the grunting, thudding noise of the buffalo as they circled around her.

“My God, she's crazy.” Carlos had slammed the gate shut. “She's got the herd all riled up. They're coming for her.” He turned to Reg. “I'll get the tractor. We have to get her out of there.” He took off running in the direction of the barn.

Father John gripped the bars of the gate and stared out at the pasture. Buffalo bumping together, great brown masses of flesh and bone knocking against one another, separating and bumping together again, like a shadowy monster growing and spreading over the pasture. A small figure—a stick figure—stumbled in the middle of the herd that rolled around her. Then Sheila Carey was flying, lifted against the sky, arms flailing, legs distorted, twisted. She dropped into the herd and disappeared beneath the buffalo trampling and crushing the earth.