The Spirit Woman (19 page)

“I just came from Willie Silver's ranch out on Sacajawea Ridge,” Vicky hurried on. “He saw Laura Wednesday. She had agreed to meet him again on Thursday, but he says she never showed up.” Vicky nodded a few times, thanked the man, and hung up.

“There's no word on her.” Vicky slowly faced him. “Eberhart will contact Gianelli. They'll send somebody to talk to Willie.”

Father John found another quarter and dialed the mission. He told Kevin he was running a little late. Would he take the new parents meeting?

He hung up and turned around. Vicky was leaning against the opposite wall in the narrow entry, the color leached from her face.

“You okay?” he said.

“Laura could be dead.”

“Vicky, don't.” He stepped over and took her arm. She was trembling. “We don't know what happened. Don't let yourself think—”

“Don't preach to me,” she said. Then she reached up and laid her hand over his. “I'm sorry, John. I'm just worried about her. She would call me if she could. What did he do with her?”

“Who are you talking about?”

“Toussaint. What did he do with her?”

 

It had started to snow, large white flakes drifting through the headlights, like cotton falling from the trees in the summer. Vicky slowed past Ben's truck at the curb in front of the house and pulled into the driveway. The light filtering past the windows seemed dreamy and surreal in the snow. She gathered her black bag and crossed the yard, hugging her coat against her. As she let herself inside, the odor of whiskey came at her like a fist.

“Where've you been?” Ben stood in the shadows of the dining alcove beyond the living room. In his hand was a glass of amber liquid.

She slipped out of her coat and hung it in the closet next to the door.
Take your time. Stay calm.

“You didn't answer me.” His footsteps padded across the living room.

She turned slowly and, walking past him, went through the alcove into the kitchen and switched on the light. Next to the sink was an open, half-empty bottle of Jim Beam. She opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of water.

“I called your office. You've been gone all day.” Ben leaned over the counter that jutted between the kitchen and the dining alcove.

She took a sip of the cold water and faced him. “My friend Laura Simmons is in some kind of trouble.” She formed the words slowly, struggling to conceal—was he too drunk to notice?—the tremor in her voice. “I've been trying to find some way to help her.”

“Don't give me that bullshit.” Ben set the glass down hard. A thin stream of whiskey curled over the counter. “You been out all day with him.”

“What are you talking about?” She forced herself to relax her grip on the water bottle, fearing she might crush it.

“You heard me. I know what you've been up to. One of my relatives called me. You and John O'Malley were having dinner together over at Lana's, gazing into each other's eyes. A real romantic scene.”

The Indians in the back booth, she thought. She hadn't paid any attention; her thoughts had been filled with Laura. “Don't be ridiculous,” she said. “He's a priest. We're both trying to help Laura.” As she started to brush past he grabbed her, digging his fingers hard into her shoulders. The water bottle slipped from her hand and slid on the floor, sending a cold spray of icy water against her legs. “Let me go, Ben,” she said, fighting back the rising panic.

Gradually—reluctantly—he released her, and she stepped into the living room. “I think you'd better leave,” she said.

He was beside her, shadowing her. She moved backward, bumping into the chair at the desk. Slowly she moved around until the chair was between them. “Please go now.”

“You owe me an explanation,” he said in a whiskey-roughened voice. Specks of white light flashed in the dark eyes. “You keep me hanging around, thinking everything's gonna work out fine between us, and all the time you're running out with him.”

“I don't have to explain my life to you. We're not married.”

The muscles in his face grew rigid, the vein in the center of his forehead pulsing. “Well, that's the problem, isn't it? We need to get right to the wedding. We've been waiting around too long. Hell, I've been waiting for thirteen years. That's a long time to wait for a woman to come back to you, don't you agree?” He kicked the chair away from the desk and pulled her to him, crushing her against his chest. The heavy smell of him—perspiration and whiskey and aftershave—made her stomach turn. She forced herself not to struggle; there would be bruises if she struggled. “Let go, Ben,” she said, her voice muffled against the roughness of his shirt.

“We're gonna get married again, Vicky. That's what you want, and you know it.” His arms tightened around her as she fought for breath. “You'll belong to me again, and I'll take care of you. Once we're married, everything's going to work out just fine. Tell you what”—his grip seemed to relax—“first thing Monday we'll go to the courthouse and take out the license. Then we'll find a judge to do the honors.”

“No, Ben.” She wrenched herself free.

“That's not what you want?”

“It's not what I want.”

“I get it.” He threw his head back and gave a shout of laughter. “No judge for you. We eloped once, and that wasn't good enough. Right? You want a big church wedding. Yeah, I can see you coming down the aisle all dressed in white.” He was smiling now, gazing off into a corner, as if the scene were already unfolding in the living room. “We'll get that priest friend of yours to do the honors. That'll be the last thing he does before he gets out of our lives.”

Vicky felt her stomach turning over. She was going to be sick, she knew, and she struggled to swallow back the taste of hamburger rising in her throat. She could not end things now. Now was not the time.
When the women try to leave, that's the most dangerous time.
“You're drunk, Ben,” she said. “We can discuss this tomorrow when you're sober.”

“We're discussing it now. Now, Vicky.” He reached out and grabbed her by the shoulders again.

“Let me go.” She pulled hard, and his grip tightened, digging into her flesh. “There's not going to be a wedding, Ben!” Shouting now. “Can't you understand? It's over between us! It will always be over!”

Suddenly he released his grip, and she stumbled backward, her legs knocking against the hard edge of the desk. He stood over her, clenched fists raised above her face, and she heard the sound of screaming, wild and disembodied, like a bobcat screaming into the night, and felt herself drifting into another time, another house, with fists pounding into her body, bones cracking beneath her flesh.

T
he residence was quiet when Father John let himself through the front door. An oblong of light floated down the hallway, throwing shadows over the walls and staircase. He tossed his hat and jacket onto the bench, trying to shake off the uneasy feeling that had come over him as he'd watched the Bronco pull out of the parking lot at Lana's and turn in to the highway, yellow headlights shimmering in the snow.
Laura could be dead
. He could still hear the hopeless-ness in Vicky's voice.

“That you, John?” A chair scuffed the floor in the kitchen. Father Kevin appeared at the end of the hall, backlit by the pale light, just as Walks-On bounded past. The dog set his wet muzzle into Father John's hand. He patted him a moment, then followed the other priest back into the kitchen, where he poured himself some tepid coffee probably left over from dinner.

“How'd the meeting go?” he said, starting back down the hallway for the study.

“Pretty well.” Kevin was behind him. “The couples seemed to like what I had to say about child rearing.”

“Well, that's a subject we're certainly experts in. That and marital relationships.” Father John sat down behind the desk in his study and turned on the lamp. Walks-On flopped beside him.

“Fortunately they had an expert speaker.” Kevin took one of the twin wingback chairs facing the desk. “A child psychologist talked about rearing responsible children, so I left early. I wanted to transcribe some interviews while they're still fresh. By the way, you had some calls.”

“So I see.” Father John was already sorting through the stack of messages. He pulled out two from the provincial, two from Gianelli. He didn't want to hear any more about the plans for his new life. He picked up the phone and dialed Gianelli's number.

“Any news about Laura Simmons?” Father Kevin's voice punctuated the buzzing noise.

Father John shook his head.

The other priest pitched to his feet. “Beats me why anybody'd want to harm a scholar. We're a harmless bunch.” He brushed the palm of his hand along the edge of the desk, announced he was going back to his computer, and backed into the hall as the answering machine came on. Father John hit the disconnect button. He found the agent's home number in a notebook in the desk drawer and dialed again.

“Ted Gianelli.” The voice cut off the second ring.

“It's John. What have you heard?”

“Want the short-and-sweet answer?” A sigh came over the line. “Not one damn word. Where you been all afternoon? I want to know everything you know about the woman.”

He told her what Vicky had told him. It wasn't much, he realized. He didn't know Laura Simmons at all.

“I want the rest,” Gianelli said. “I spoke to Eberhart a little while ago and I was at the cultural center this afternoon. You and Vicky been snooping around, playing detective all day. So let's have it. What'd you find out?”

Father John took a sip of coffee. He told the agent about Willie Silver. “Vicky thinks Laura could be on the ranch someplace,” he said.

“BIA boys are already on the way. We'll check it out.” There was the sound of a pen clicking in the background. “Anything else?”

Father John exhaled a long breath, then began explaining his theory: someone called Toussaint had promised to give Charlotte Allen Sacajawea's memoirs. Charlotte had written about him in the journal. Laura was also looking for the memoirs. The man had murdered Charlotte, and now he wanted the journal, the only link between him and the woman.

“Sacajawea's memoirs,” the agent said, a musing tone. “Valuable document, right?”

“Priceless.”

And then Father John remembered Hope Stockwell. “Look, Ted,” he said. “There's a young Shoshone graduate student, Hope Stockwell, who's convinced she's about to get the memoirs. Maybe someone wanted to make sure the memoirs stayed with the Shoshones. Maybe that's why Charlotte Allen was killed and Laura Simmons has disappeared.”

“Yeah, maybe.” A note of skepticism in the agent's voice. “Or maybe we've just got us a violent boyfriend who got carried away.” He let out a long sigh. “Until we find Laura Simmons, we don't know what we've got. I'll let you know if I hear anything,” he said before the line went dead.

As Father John set the receiver in the cradle, the phone started ringing. He let it ring. One, two, three times, feeling the same dread he'd felt two weeks earlier. Finally he answered.

“What's going on out there!” The provincial's words burst over the line like buckshot.

“What are you talking about?”

“Don't play dumb with me, O'Malley. I know what you're up to, and frankly I'm outraged. I want a straight answer.”

Father John set both elbows on the desk. “Tell me what this is about, Bill, and I'll do my best.”

“You hear that?” The voice drifted away. A machine was rattling in the background. “The fax has been clogged the last two hours, letter after letter from people with names like Yellowtail and Standing Bull and Elkman and Knows-His-Horse. Don't tell me you didn't put your Arapaho friends up to this.”

He understood. Howard Elkman had mentioned something about calling his boss. He said, “I won't tell you I didn't put them up to this.”

“This has your historian's fingerprints all over it. The letters are coming with letters from 1910.”

“What?”

“That's right. You're very clever, digging in the archives for a situation similar to your own. Sure enough, you found one. The Arapahos didn't want their favorite priest transferred in 1910, one Father Perelli, so they deluged the provincial's office with letters. Probably took a couple of weeks to arrive. We're more fortunate. We have fax machines, so the letters can arrive immediately.”

Father John threw his head back and laughed. He'd badly underestimated the elders, and Lindy Meadows, for that matter.
The elders are interested in some letters,
she'd told him. While she was going through the files, looking for documents for Laura Simmons, she must have come across the letters about Father Perelli. She'd obviously called Howard Elkman, who, along with other elders, had spent the last two days at the museum reading through them. He'd thought the elders were interested in Arapaho history. Well, he'd been right, in a way.

“I'm glad you find this humorous.” The provincial's voice again.

“What happened, Bill?”

“What do you mean?”

“The letter-writing campaign in 1910.”

“You know perfectly well what happened. The provincial backed down. Father Perelli spent the rest of his days out there in that godforsaken place. I thought I was doing you a favor by getting you back on the track you never should've fallen off of in the first place.” The line went quiet with anger and frustration. “I expect you in Milwaukee next Tuesday.”