The Lost Bird (27 page)

T
he evening air rushed past the half-open windows and filled the Bronco with a sharp, refreshing coolness. Outside the dark expanse of plains melted into the black, star-spangled sky. As Vicky left the sounds of Lander behind—the wailing of a siren, the hum of traffic curving off the highway—and drove deeper into the reservation, she began to feel calmer, more in tune with herself.

She’d found it hard to concentrate when she arrived home. She’d checked in with Laola and gotten her messages. A couple of clients inquiring about pending cases, people wanting appointments. Edna Linder had called with some excuse about why she and Wylan couldn’t make the appointment for the blood test tomorrow. Vicky wasn’t surprised.

She had jotted down notes as the secretary talked, then hung up and paced the living room, her thoughts consumed with the stolen infants. What John O’Malley told her about the nurse and Father Joseph confirmed her theory. Now she understood why, despite the publicity about Sharon David, no one other than the Linders had come forward. Sharon’s real parents thought their daughter was dead.

Why hadn’t she suspected earlier that the infants born at the Markham Clinic might have been stolen? There had always been a black market for healthy, white-looking infants. Always well-meaning couples turned down by legitimate adoption agencies because of age or some infirmity or disease. Always monsters like Jeremiah Markham ready to traffic in any commodity that brought money—drugs, human body parts, infants.

She continued pacing—the front door, the desk, the sofa. It was still just a theory. There were no witnesses, no evidence. If she could find Sharon David’s parents, she could prove the theory. She had the names of families that had lost infants, but most had left the reservation. They could have remarried, changed their names. They could be dead. It would take time to find them. And in that time anyone who knew about the stolen infants could be in danger. The coroner and nurse were dead; Father Joseph was dead. But Joanne Garrow was still alive.

Vicky had stopped pacing and stared into the shadows of the dining room, which opened off the living room. Garrow was a frightened woman, maybe even remorseful. John O’Malley might convince her to tell the truth before Markham realized she had any remorse.

John O’Malley. The thought of him hovered at the edge of her thoughts, like a shadow that drifted away as she approached, eluding her grasp. He had told her about himself this afternoon, and the words had been like a hard knife of reality cutting through her. A man who would not give up the priesthood for the woman he loved—a woman who may have been carrying his child—why had she ever thought . . . ? Why had she
ever dared to hope such a man would turn away from the priesthood for her? She’d been a fool. She had missed the chance to put her own life back together, to repair the brokenness in her own family.

Suddenly Vicky had realized there was someone who might be able to help prove her theory. Ben. If she could get Ben to agree to the exhumation of his brother’s grave, she could take the theory to Gianelli, along with the means of proving it. Gianelli might stand a chance of getting a court to order the exhumation if the family didn’t object. She’d decided to drive out to the Arapaho Ranch and have a talk with her ex-husband.

Now she swung north, burrowing deeper into the reservation, the stars a bright carpet of lights overhead. At the base of the Owl Creek Mountains she turned onto a wide dirt road and passed the Arapaho Ranch bunkhouse, a sprawling log cabin with light streaming through the windows and pickups and 4×4s lined up in front. About a mile farther she bore right and started the climb into the foothills. Ponderosas crowded the sides of the road, dark sentinels outside her windows.

As she came around a bend, she saw the flickering lights, like fireflies darting among the trees. She rounded another bend and stopped in front of the foreman’s cabin. Ben’s truck was parked a few feet away. The cabin door opened, and her ex-husband stood in a well of light. Stepping outside, he started toward her. “Vicky!” he said, his tone fresh with surprise.

Vicky got out and leaned against the Bronco, scrunching the soft leather of her bag against her chest. In the slant of light from the cabin door, she
saw the questions in his eyes. The odor of aftershave and the musty smell of his wool shirt drifted toward her. “I’d like to talk to you,” she managed.

“It’s a little awkward,” he said. A glance toward the cabin.

Vicky felt a sharp sting of embarrassment. He’d told her there was someone else. “I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I should have called first.”

“It’s okay.” He stretched out his hand, and the touch of his fingers on the ridge of her shoulder sent an electrical current coursing through the emptiness inside her. She felt weak with an old, half-remembered desire and startled by the force of its power. She had to stop herself from darting into the Bronco and driving away. She stood in place, savoring the warmth of his hand emanating through her jacket.

He said, “You drove all the way out here tonight to see me.” It was a statement. “Is that true? Because if you tell me it’s true, that woman in there”—he nodded toward the cabin—“is going to leave.”

He leaned closer. “I want to hear you say it, Vicky.”

“I need you, Ben,” she said.

•   •   •

Vicky waited in the Bronco. After about five minutes the door to the cabin flung open. A woman stepped out and marched around the side. In a moment a puff of exhaust burst past the corner and red taillights blinked into the darkness. A sedan began backing out, then started down the road. Ben walked toward the Bronco. He opened the door, took her hand, and led her into the cabin.

The odor of fresh coffee filled the small room. In one corner was the kitchen: sink, stove, refrigerator, rectangular table, and two chairs. Across the room,
the bed covered with the star quilt Ben’s mother had given them for their wedding. A fire crackled in the stone fireplace on the wall close to the bed.

Vicky sank into one of the chairs at the table and waited while Ben poured a couple mugs of coffee.

“I found James and his white girlfriend for you,” he said, placing the mugs on the table and taking the chair across from her. His dark eyes reflected the firelight.

“Where were they?”

“Hiding out at a cousin’s ranch. Scared of Sonny Red Wolf. I took them to the fed’s office this afternoon to make sure they got there. The girl gave a statement about seeing Sonny’s white truck on Thunder Lane about the time of the priest’s murder.”

Vicky took a sip of the hot coffee. She could be wrong. Maybe Father Joseph’s murder had nothing to do with Markham’s clinic. Maybe her theory was some half-baked notion that Gianelli and the other white authorities would dismiss as preposterous. Yet John O’Malley hadn’t dismissed it.

Ben said, “Does he mean that much to you?”

Vicky kept her eyes to his. “Who?” she asked. She knew who he meant.

“The priest you’re worried could get killed.”

“No.” She stopped herself from adding,
Not anymore
. The room was quiet, except for the snap of the fire, the muffled sounds of the wind outside. She was debating whether to tell him about her theory. An hour ago it had seemed so logical: enlist Ben’s help in proving her theory had merit. She had been certain of the truth as she’d read through the newspapers today. And when she’d learned of the birth and death certificates,
she’d been convinced that Jeremiah Markham had left nothing to chance.

But Sonny Red Wolf had been seen on Thunder Lane. What if her theory was wrong? What if the infants had died? She had driven out here to ask Ben to agree to exhume his brother’s grave, to relive the pain of the past. In the waves of warmth from the fireplace, she felt a cold shiver run across her shoulders.

“What is it, Vicky?” Ben reached across the table, as if he were reaching for her hand, then stopped. “What brought you out here?”

In his eyes she saw a reflection of her own searching, questioning. He had a right to know. Even if it was only a slim possibility that his brother might be alive, only a theory, he had the right to know. “I’ve something to tell you, Ben,” she said finally. Then she began explaining what she’d found: the sealed caskets, fifteen dead babies in one year, all born at the Markham Clinic, the possible murder of the nurse and the coroner, the murder of Father Joseph. As she talked, she felt him grow stiller, leaning back against the chair, moving away from her into someplace inside himself. He remained quiet for a long while after she’d stopped talking, his eyes fixed on some point across the room.

“I don’t want to have the grave dug up,” he said, finding her gaze again. “Mom’s old and sick. I don’t want her to get her hopes up that her son is alive somewhere. Not until we know for certain that this happened.”

Immediately Vicky regretted having told him. She had raised his hopes, given him the possibility that his brother was alive, and if her theory turned out not to be true, he would lose his brother again. The air
seemed cooler; the fire had died back. Ben asked if Sharon David was one of the infants.

“I think so,” she said. “But there’s so little to go on. She found a piece of paper in her mother’s things with some notations she thinks are about her birth. It has the initials ‘WRR.’ She thinks that could refer to the reservation. There are numbers that could be her birth date, and the name Maisie.” Suddenly Vicky realized who had written the note that had stayed with the infant girl, tucked among a tiny shirt, a blanket, piles of diapers: the person who had delivered the baby to Markham’s contacts—a nurse, Dawn James.

“Maisie.” Ben repeated the word. “Don’t know anybody by that name.”

“There was also a small drawing of a bird,” Vicky said. “I checked the obituaries on the babies. No families with bird names. No Crows or Hawks or Eagles. No Redbirds or Yellowbirds.”

“Ummm.” Ben made the sound he always made, she remembered, when he was trying to recall something. He took a draw of coffee. Then: “Used to be some Indians lived down the road from us. One of their babies died same time as”—he hesitated—“my brother. Mom used to visit the woman. I went along sometimes. I remember them crying together in the living room. After a while the people moved away. Went to Casper, I think. Their name was Mason. But their Indian name, if I remember right, was something like Little Bird.”

Vicky held her breath. Mason was one of the names on the list. In her mind she saw the tiny figure of a bird. “Was the woman named Maisie?”

Ben shook his head. “I think it was Marie.”

“Marie!” Vicky leaned over the table. “The name
could have been misspelled. My God, Ben. Sharon’s mother could be Marie Little Bird.”

Now Ben reached over and took her hand. “You might be able to find the Little Bird family in Casper. If they turn out to be her people, well, we’ll know it happened. Then I’ll talk to Mom about the grave. I’m sorry, Vicky. It’s the best I can do.”

“It’s okay.” Vicky nodded. He’d already helped her more than she had guessed he could.

“It was so hard on Mom, losing the baby.” He tightened his grip on her hand, and she felt the warmth of him spreading through her body, chasing back the coldness. Something inside her began to melt: the reserve, the determination.

“Hard on all of us,” he was saying. “I don’t want Mom to go through it again unless there’s a real chance my brother’s alive.”

“We never talked about these things before,” Vicky heard herself saying.

“There were lots of times I wanted to tell you what I was thinking and feeling.” He gave his head a hard shake. “I guess I didn’t know how.”

Vicky allowed her hand to stay in his a long moment. Then she pulled away and got slowly to her feet. She walked around his chair, set her hands on his shoulders, and leaned over him, kissing the top of his head, the warm curve of his neck. “Oh, Ben,” she said. “There’s so much we didn’t know about each other.”

They made love on the bed pushed against the far wall, under the star quilt. Afterward Vicky huddled close to him, the palm of her hand resting on the smooth, light brown skin of his chest. Outside the wind rose and fell, an eerie, disjointed chorus. There was the occasional
tap-tap
sound of a branch against
a window. An occasional ember crackled in the fireplace.

Vicky listened as Ben talked about his life since she’d left, about his longing for her. The past—the years of their marriage—remained a silent presence between them. She knew that sooner or later they would have to confront that time. But not now. Not tonight.

•   •   •

The soft daylight filtering through the ponderosas glowed in the window when Vicky awoke. The bed beside her was empty, and she realized the swishing noise she had thought was the wind had been the sound of the shower. There was a strong odor of freshly brewed coffee, a small fire burning in the grate. She got up and pulled on an old woolen robe thrown over a chair, tying the belt tightly at her waist. Ben was gone. On the table she found a note in the familiar, generous handwriting:
I love you. Come back to me.

From outside came the growl of an engine turning over. She stepped to the window and watched the brown truck move through the ponderosas, the metal trim catching the sun until finally the truck disappeared from view. Still she stayed at the window, thinking of other times when she had watched Ben’s truck drive away. She had been someone else then, not the woman she was now, not a lawyer with an office in Lander and clients waiting to see her. That other woman’s days had been planned for her: caring for the children; looking in on her own parents and on Ben’s; helping the other women prepare the feasts for the tribal celebrations.

It had been a busy little life that she had assumed
would go on until she was a grandmother, sitting back at the feasts, waited on by the younger women. She had given scant thought to the wider world—a quick glance at the morning papers, a TV newscast—until she had found herself thrust into it:
hisei ci’ nihi
, woman alone. And now, here she was in Ben’s life again, where she had sworn she would never be. What a mess she had made of things. She had seen the future she had hoped for with another man slip away, and so she had tried to reclaim the past. As if the past could ever be reclaimed.