Kiss the Bees

9

While Mualig Siakam and Old Limping Man were talking, some Indians came carrying a child. The child seemed asleep or dead. The people said she had been that way for a long time. They laid the child on the ground in the outer room of Medicine Woman's house.

Mualig Siakam took a gourd which had pebbles in it that rattled. She took some small, soft white feathers, and she took a little white powder. Then she sat down at the head of the child and she began to sing.

The Indians could not understand Medicine Woman's song because she used the old, old language which is the oneI'itoi gave his people in the beginning. All the animals understand this language, but only a very few of the old men and women remember it.

As Medicine Woman sang, she rattled the gourd which had on it the marks ofshuhthagi — the water-and ofwepgih — the lightning. For a long timeMualig Siakam sang alone, but when the people who were sitting around had learned the song, they sang with her.

And then Medicine Woman took some of the white feathers and passed them softly over the child's mouth and nose. She passed the feathers back and forth, back and forth. Sometimes she passed the feathers down over the child's chest. Then again she passed them back and forth across the child's face.

And the face of the child changed. Her body moved. Medicine Woman gave a silent command to the child's mother, who brought water. The child drank, and everyone looked very pleased.

The next morningOld Limping Man went to the house ofMualig Siakam. Medicine Woman was feeding the child, who was sitting up. And that day, the child's people took her home.

Halfway to the highway, walking in scorching midday heat, Manny Chavez took a detour. The wine was gone. He was verging on heatstroke. In the end it was thirst and the hope of finding water that drove him off-track.

Under normal circumstances, no right-thinking member of the Desert People would have gone anywhere near the haunted, moldering ruins of the deserted village known as Ko'oi Koshwa — Rattlesnake Skull. An Apache war party, aided by a young Tohono O'othham woman, a traitor, had massacred almost the entire village. The only survivors, a boy and a girl, had sought refuge in a cave on the steep flanks of Ioligam several miles away.

More recently, in the late sixties, a young Indian girl named Gina Antone had been murdered there. Anthony Listo, now chief of police for the Tohono O'othham Nation, had been a lowly patrol officer during that investigation. From time to time, he had been heard to talk about the girl who had been lured from a summer dance to one of the taboo caves on Ioligam, where she had been tortured and killed. Her body had been left, floating facedown, in the charco — a muddy man-made watering hole-near the deserted village itself.

A whole new series of legends and beliefs had grown up around that murder. The killer, an Anglo named Carlisle, was said to have been Ohbsgam-Apachelike. People claimed that the killer had been invaded by the spirits of the dead Apaches who had attacked Rattlesnake Skull Village long ago.

All the caves on Ioligam were considered sacred and off-limits. They had been officially declared so in the lease negotiations when the tribe allowed the building of Kitt Peak National Observatory. In the aftermath of Gina Antone's death, however, the caves close to Ko'oi Koshwa became taboo as well. People said Ohbsgam Ho'ok — Apachelike Monster-lived there, waiting for a chance to steal away another young Tohono O'othham girl. Parents sometimes used stories about the bogeyman S-mo'o O'othham — Hairy Man-to scare little boys back in line. On girls they used Ohbsgam Ho'ok.

Manny Chavez, thirsty but no longer drunk, considered all these things as he headed for the charco near what had once been Rattlesnake Skull Village. It was late in the season. Most of the other charcos on the reservation were already dry and would remain so until after the first summer rains came in late June or July. But no one ran any cattle near Ko'oi Koshwa. Without livestock to reduce the volume of water, Manny reasoned that he might still find water there-at least enough to get him the rest of the way to the highway.

Earlier, as Manny walked, he had heard and seen a four-wheel-drive vehicle making its way both up and down part of the mountain. Suspecting the people inside of being Anglo rock-climbers, Manny had given the tangerine-colored older-model Bronco a wide berth. He'd be better off on the highway, trying to hitch a ride in the back of an Indian-owned livestock truck, than messing around with a carful of Mil-gahn.

Now, though, as Manny approached the charco, he was surprised to see that same vehicle parked nearby. A man-an Anglo armed with a shovel-was digging industriously in the dirt. Manny may have been nawmki — a drunkard-but he was also Tohono O'othham, from the top of his sand-encrusted hair to the toes of his worn-out boots. The thought of this Mil-gahn blithely digging for artifacts on the reservation offended Manuel Chavez.

"Hey," he shouted. "What are you doing?"

The man with the shovel stopped digging and looked up. "You can't dig here," Manny said. "This is a sacred place."

For a moment the two men stared at each other, then the Anglo, who was much younger than Manny, climbed out of the hole he was digging in the soft sand. He came at Manny with the shovel raised over his shoulder, wielding it like a baseball bat.

There was no question of Manny standing his ground. He looked around for a possible weapon. Off to his right was a small circle of river rock surrounding a faded wooden cross, but the rocks were too far away and too small to do him any good. Turning away from the Mil-gahn's unreasoning fury, Manuel Chavez tried to run. He tripped and fell facedown in the sand.

The first blow, the only one he felt, caught him squarely on the back of the head.

David Ladd lay in the darkened hotel room waiting to fall asleep and grappling with the overwhelming fear that another panic attack would come over him and catch him unawares. The plague of attacks and dreams had left him feeling shaken and vulnerable. He knew now that another attack was inevitable. The only question was, when would it come? What if it happened while he was with Candace? What would she think of him then? He was young, strong, and supposedly healthy. This kind of thing wasn't supposed to happen to people like him, but it was happening.

At last, emotionally worn and physically exhausted, David Ladd fell into a deep and dreamless sleep. Sometime later, he was jarred awake by the sound of a key in the lock and then by the opening door banging hard against the inside security chain.

"David," Candace called through the crack in the door. "Are you in there?"

Groggily, he staggered over to the door and unlatched the chain. "It's you," he mumbled.

Dropping several shopping bags to the floor, Candace stood up on tiptoe and kissed him. "Who else did you think it would be?"

"I was just taking a nap," he said. "I'm still half asleep. I'll go take a shower and see if it wakes me up."

"Sure," Candace said. "Go ahead."

He had finished his shower, shut off the water, and was just starting to towel himself dry when Candace knocked softly on the door. "Can I come in?"

"Sure," he said, wrapping the towel around his waist.

Candace burst into the room wearing little more than a glowingly radiant smile on her face.

"Oh, Davy," she said, throwing both arms around his neck and crushing the soft flesh of her warm breasts against his damp chest. "I love it. It's absolutely gorgeous. And it fits perfectly. How did you know what size?"

For a moment or two, David Ladd didn't understand what was going on or grasp what she was talking about. Then, catching a glimpse of Astrid Ladd's ring on Candace Waverly's finger, he realized she had found it just where he had left it-on the nightstand table with his watch.

Crying and kissing him at the same time, Candace seemed totally oblivious to the droplets of water on his still-wet body. "And the answer is yes," she whispered, with her lips grazing his ear. "Yes, yes, yes! Of course, I'll marry you, even if it means living in your one-horse hometown."

Marry!At the sound of the word, David Garrison Ladd's legs almost buckled under him. For the length of several long kisses he was too stunned to reply. And by the time Candace's impassioned kisses subsided, it was pretty much too late. By then she was leading him back across the artificially darkened room to the bed.

Sinking down on the mattress, she pulled David down on top of her naked body, drawing him into her while her eager hips rose up to meet him. That wasn't the time to tell her that this was all a terrible mistake-that he had never planned to give her Astrid Ladd's ring in the first place. He did the only thing that made sense under the circumstances-he kissed her back.

Other than that, he kept his mouth shut. And after their lovemaking, while he was drifting on a pink haze, she snuggled close and kissed his chest. "What a wonderfully romantic surprise," she murmured. "But I have a surprise for you, too."

"What's that?"

Candace reached over on the nightstand and picked up a piece of paper. A check. "What's that?" he asked.

"Look at it," she said. "It's made out to both of us."

When he looked at it more closely, David Ladd's eyes bulged. It was a personal check in the amount of twenty-five thousand dollars, made out to David Ladd and Candace Waverly Ladd and drawn on a joint account belonging to Richard and Elizabeth Waverly.

"What's this?" David asked.

"A bribe," Candace answered with a grin. "For eloping. Daddy says it'll only work as long as Mother knows nothing about our engagement and hasn't had time to plan anything until it's too late. Once she gets wind of it and starts arranging things, the deal is off. He's already married off two daughters, and he doesn't want to do another one. And I don't blame him."

"Eloping," David Ladd echoed. "What are you talking about? Us? When?"

"Today, dummy," she said, snuggling under his chin and nuzzling his neck. "Right now. I thought you'd catch on as soon as you saw all the suitcases. I have it all figured out. We can drive through Vegas on our way to Tucson and get married there. It's not that far out of the way. I already have a dress and everything."

"What about your job?" David Ladd mounted one small but clearly futile objection.

"With Dad's firm? What about it? I got laid off," Candace beamed. "Yesterday afternoon. So not only do I get the time off, I can collect unemployment benefits, too. Isn't that a great deal?"

"It's great, all right," David Ladd muttered while that post-coital pink haze disintegrated into a million pieces around him. He managed to infuse the words with a whole lot more enthusiasm than he felt, although "great" wasn't exactly the word he would have chosen.

"And I love the ring," Candace continued. "It's gorgeous."

"I'm glad you like it" was all David could manage. After all, what else could he say?

After making a quick trip down the Sasabe Road to take a report on a one vehicle/one steer accident in which only the steer had perished, Deputy Brian Fellows stopped off at the Three Points Trading Post to buy himself a much-needed Coke to get him through the rest of his long afternoon shift.

As summer heated up, daytime temperatures on the arid Sonoran Desert made working the night shift suddenly far preferable to working days. One of the local radio stations held an annual contest, offering a prize to the listener who successfully guessed the correct day, time, and hour when the "ice broke on the Santa Cruz." Loosely translated, that meant the day, hour, and minute the thermometer finally broke one hundred for the year. From that time on, from the moment daytime temperatures crossed that critical century mark until well into September, Brian, along with any number of other low-totem-pole deputies, found himself working straight days.

With school out for the summer, the trading post was full of ten or so kids-two Anglo and the rest Indian-milling around between the banks of shelves. Brian smiled down at them. The Anglos grinned back, while the Indians shied away. The deputy liked little kids, and it hurt his feelings that the Tohono O'othham children were frightened of him. Because he knew some of the language, he tried speaking to them in Tohono O'othham on occasion. That always seemed to spook them that much more. Was it the color of his skin? he wondered. Or was it the uniform? Maybe it was a combination of both.

Back in his county-owned Blazer, he sat looking up and down Highway 86, watching passing vehicles made shimmering and ghostlike by the waves of heat rising off the blacktop. This quiet Saturday afternoon there didn't seem to be much happening in his patrol area, which covered Highway 86 west from Ryan Field to the boundary of the Tohono O'othham Reservation, and along Highway 286 from Three Points south to Sasabe on the U.S./Mexican border.

It was boom time once again in the Valley of the Sun. Tucson and surrounding areas in Pima County were experiencing a renewed population growth, but this part of the county-the part included in Brian's patrol area-wasn't yet overly affected. Sometimes he would be called out to an incident on Sandario Road that led north toward Marana. There he could drive for miles without seeing another human or meeting another vehicle. The same held true for Coleman Road at the base of the Baboquivaris. And the back and forth chatter on the radio seldom had much to do with the area assigned to Deputy Brian Fellows. Those long straight stretches of highway leading to and from the reservation yielded more drunk drivers than other parts of the county. They also had more than a fair share of auto accidents. Those mostly happened at night on weekends.

Brian had been a deputy four full years. Other officers who had come through the academy after him were already starting to move up while Brian was still stuck in what was-in terms of departmental advancement-the equivalent of Outer Mongolia. But Brian was resigned to the fact that it could have been much worse. If Bill Forsythe had wanted to, he could have figured out a way to get rid of Brian Fellows altogether. In fact, considering Brian's close connection to Brandon Walker, it was a little surprising that the ax hadn't fallen in the wake of Brandon's departure.

Still, Brian didn't dwell on the unfairness of it all. He was too busy being grateful. After all, he was doing what he had always wanted to do-being a cop and following in Brandon Walker's footsteps. As for the rest? Nothing much mattered. Brian was single and living at home. Taking care of his disabled mother in his off-hours pretty much kept him out of the dating game, so the low pay scale for young deputies didn't bother him all that much, either.

There were times when Brian was struck by the irony of his position. He was persona non grata with the current administration of the Pima County Sheriff's Department because of his relationship to the previous sheriff, who was, after all, no blood relation but the father of Brian's half-brothers.

Tommy and Quentin had been four and five years older than Brian, and they had been the banes of the younger child's existence. But if it hadn't been for them, Brian never would have met their father, a man who-more than any other-became Brian's father as well.

None of the other boys-Davy Ladd included-had ever seemed to pay that much attention to anything Brandon Walker said or did. In fact, they all seemed to be at odds with him much of the time. Not Brian. For him, the former Pima County sheriff, even in defeat, had always been larger than life-the closest thing to a superhero that ever crossed the path of that little fatherless boy.

"How's it going, Mr. Walker?" Brian Fellows had asked several months earlier, when he had stopped by the house in Gates Pass on his way back from patrol.

Brandon, working outdoors in his shirtsleeves, had looked up to see Brian Fellows, a young man he had known from early childhood on, step out of a Pima County patrol car.

"Okay," Brandon said gruffly, reaching down to pull out another log of mesquite. "How about you?"

"Pretty good," Brian replied, although the answer didn't sound particularly convincing.

"How's your mother?"

Brian's mother, Janie Walker Fellows Hitchcock Noonan, had been Brandon Walker's first wife. Years earlier, when Brian was a sophomore at Tucson High, his mother had been in what should have been a fatality car wreck. She had been paralyzed from the waist down. Janie's boyfriend du jour-a lush who had actually been at the wheel of the car and who had walked away from the accident without a scratch-had skipped town immediately.

In subsequent years, most of the responsibility for his mother's care had fallen on Brian's narrow but capable young shoulders. Some people rise above physical tragedy. Janie Noonan wasn't one of those. She was a difficult patient. For months she had railed at Brian, telling him that if he didn't have guts enough to use a gun to put her out of her misery, the least he could do was bring her one so she could do the job herself.

By now Janie was fairly well resigned to her fate. She appreciated the fact that Brian had stayed on, patiently caring for her when most young men, under similar circumstances, would have moved out. That didn't mean she treated him any better, though. Janie had grown into a helpless tyrant. In the absence of her other two sons, Brian became her sole target, but he was used to that. It seemed to him that his mother had simply taken up the role formerly filled by his older brothers, Quentin and Tommy.

"Nobody likes a Goody Two-shoes," Quentin had told him on more than one occasion. "They think you're nothing but a stupid little wimp."

The difference between Brian Fellows and his best friend, Davy Ladd, was that Davy would usually rise to Quentin's challenge and fight back, regardless of the bloody-nosed consequences. Brian was a survivor who kept his mouth shut and let the taunts wash over him.

By now, though, at age twenty-six, he was tired of being a "good boy." He was beginning to see that there wasn't much percentage in it, although he didn't really know how to be anything else other than what he was.

"Mom's about the same," he said, answering Brandon Walker's question in a matter-of-fact manner that didn't brook sympathy.

Looking at this handsome young man in his deputy sheriff's uniform, Brandon couldn't help remembering a much younger version of the same young man, a little lost boy who had stood forlornly on the front porch of his ex-wife's home each time Brandon had come by to pick up his own two sons, Quentin and Tommy.

Brandon no longer remembered where they had been going that day-maybe to a movie, maybe to the Pima County Fair, or maybe even to a baseball game. What he hadn't forgotten was the solemn, sad-eyed look on Brian's face that had changed instantly to sheer joy the moment Brandon asked him if he wanted to come along.

"You're not taking him, are you?" Quentin had demanded, his voice quivering in outrage.

Brandon's older son had a surly streak. Of all the kids, he had always been the sullen one-the spoiled brat with the chip on his shoulder. Janie had seen to that.

"Why shouldn't I?" Brandon asked.

"Because he's a pest," Quentin spat back. "And a baby, too. He'll probably wet his pants or have to go to the bathroom a million times."

Brian had wavered on the porch for a moment, as if afraid that Quentin's argument would carry the day. When Brandon didn't change his mind, the boy had raced into the house to ask Janie for permission to go along. Moments later, he had come charging back outside.

"She said it's all right. I can go!" Brian had crowed triumphantly, racing for the car.

"I get to ride shotgun!" Quentin had snarled, but Brian hadn't cared about that. The backseat was fine with him. At that point he would probably have been grateful to sit in the trunk.

"You'll take turns," Brandon had told Quent, trying to instill in him a sense of sharing and fair play. And that was how it worked from then on-the boys had taken turns. But Brandon Walker's lessons in enforced sharing had been lost on Quentin. Rather than teaching him how to be a better person, Brandon Walker's kindness to Quentin's half-brother fostered an ugly case of burning resentment that spanned the whole of Brian Fellows's childhood.

"How about a cup of coffee or glass of iced tea?" Brandon had asked finally, emerging from a tangled skein of memory. Brian's face had brightened into almost the same look Brandon remembered from that day on the porch.

"Sure, Mr. Walker," he responded. "Coffee would be great."

In all those intervening years, while the other three boys had gone through their various stages of smart-mouthed rebellion, Brian had never called Brandon anything but a respectful "Mr. Walker."

Shaking his head, Brandon led the way into the house. One of his main regrets at losing the election had been missing the chance to watch this promising young man mature into the outstanding police officer he would someday be. That was something else Quentin had cost him-the opportunity of seeing 'little' Brian Fellows grow into Brian Fellows, the man.

"People at the department are asking about you," the young deputy said, as he settled onto a chair at the kitchen table.

"You don't say," Brandon replied gruffly. "Well, go ahead and tell them I'm fine. On second thought, don't tell them anything at all. If you're smart and want to get anywhere in Bill Forsythe's department, you won't even mention my name, much less let on that you know me."

After Brandon poured cups of coffee, the two men were quiet for a few moments. Brandon didn't mean to pry, but in the end he couldn't resist probing.

"How are things going out there?" he asked. "I mean, how are things at the department really going?"

Brian shrugged. "All right, I guess. But there are lots of people who miss you. Sheriff Forsythe's"-Brian paused, as if searching for just the right word-"he's just different, I guess. Different from you, that is," he finished somewhat lamely.

"You bet he is," Brandon replied, not even trying to keep the hollow sound of bitterness out of his voice. "The voters in this county wanted different. As far as I can see, they got it."

Once again the two men fell silent. For a moment Brandon Walker felt vindicated.

A parade of boyfriends and briefly maintained husbands had wandered through Janie's life and, as a consequence, through the lives of her three sons as well. One of them-Brian no longer remembered which one-had told him that children should be seen but not heard. Brian had taken those words to heart and had turned them into a personal creed. What had once been a necessary tool for surviving Quentin's casual and constant brutality had become a way of life. Brian Fellows answered questions. He hardly ever volunteered information, although Brandon Walker could tell by looking at him that the young man was clearly troubled about something.

"So what brings you here today?" the older man asked at last.

Brian ducked his head. "Quentin," he answered.

"What about Quentin?"

"He's out," Brian answered. "On parole."

"Where's he living?"

"Somewhere in Tucson, I suppose. I don't know for sure where. He hasn't come by here, has he?"

Brandon shook his head. "He wouldn't dare."

Brian sighed. "He has been by the house a couple of times, wanting money and looking for a place to stay. I had to make him leave, Mr. Walker, and I thought you should know what's going on."

"What is going on?" Brandon asked.

Brian swallowed hard. "He came by to hit Mom up for money, for a loan, he called it. She had already written him two checks for a hundred bucks each, before I caught on to what was happening. She can't afford to be giving him that kind of money. She still has some, but with the nurse and all the medical expenses, it's not going to last forever. I don't know what to do."

"Go to court and get a protection order," Brandon Walker said at once. "Janie has given you power of attorney so you can handle her affairs, hasn't she?"

Brian nodded. "Yes."

"As her conservator, you have a moral and legal obligation to protect her assets."

With a pained expression on his face, Brian nodded again. "But Quentin's my brother," he said.

"And he's my son," Brandon replied. "But that doesn't give him a right to steal from his own mother."

"So you don't think I did the wrong thing, by not letting him stay at the house?"

With his heart aching in sympathy, Brandon looked at the troubled young man sitting across from him. "No," he had said kindly. "I don't blame you at all, and neither will anyone else. With people like Quentin loose in the world, you have a responsibility to protect yourself. If you can, that is. And believe me, Brian, since I happen to be Quentin's father, I know that isn't easy advice to follow."

Months after that last courtesy visit to Gates Pass, Brian was sitting in his air-conditioned Blazer next to the trading post at Three Points, sipping his Coke and wondering how soon his friend Davy would be home when the call came in over the radio. An INS officer was requesting assistance. The dispatcher read off the officer's location.

"Highway 86 to Coleman Road. First left after you cross off the reservation. It gets confusing after that. The INS officer says just follow her tracks. You're looking for a charco.

"By the way," the dispatcher continued. "Are you four-wheeling it today?"

"That's affirmative," Brian said, putting the Blazer in gear.

"Good," the dispatcher told him. "From the sounds of it, if you weren't, I'd have to send in another unit."

With lights flashing and siren blaring, Brian Fellows sped west on Highway 86. At first he didn't think anything about where he was going. He was simply following directions. It wasn't until he turned off the highway that he recognized the place as somewhere he had been before. He had gone to that same charco years earlier, the summer Tommy disappeared. The four of them had gone there together-Quentin and Tommy, Davy Ladd and Brian.

By then, though, he was too busy following the tracks to think about it. Kicking up a huge cloud of dust, he wheeled through the thick undergrowth of green mesquite and blooming palo verde. He jolted his way through first one sandy wash-the one where Quentin had gotten stuck-and then through another, all the while following a set of tracks that could only have been left by one of the green Internationals or GMC Suburbans the Immigration and Naturalization Service sends out on patrol around the desert Southwest, collecting illegal aliens and returning them to the border.

Brian spotted the vehicle eventually, an International parked next to the shrine he remembered, Gina Antone's shrine. The small wooden cross, faded gray now rather than white, sat crookedly in the midst of a scattered circle of river rocks.

Maybe while Davy's home,Brian thought, parking his Blazer, we can come out here with flowers and candles. We can paint the cross and fix the shrine up the same way we did before.

It was nothing more than a passing thought, though, because right then, Deputy Brian Fellows was working. When he stepped out of the Blazer, there was no sign of life. "Anybody here?" he called.

"Over here," a woman's answering voice returned from somewhere in the thick undergrowth. "And if you've got any drinking water there with you, bring it along."

Brian grabbed a gallon jug of bottled water out of the back of the Blazer and then started in the direction of the woman's voice. "Watch out for the footprints," she called to him. "You're probably going to need them."

Glancing down, Brian saw what she meant. Something heavy had been dragged by hand through the sandy dirt, leaving a deep track. A single set of footprints, heading back toward the charco, overlaid the track. As instructed, Brian Fellows detoured around both as he made his way into a grove of mesquite. Ten yards into the undergrowth he came to a small clearing where a woman in a gray-green uniform was bending over the figure of a man. He lay flat on his back, with his unprotected face fully exposed to the glaring sun. A cloud of flies buzzed overhead.

"What happened?" Brian asked.

The woman looked up at him, her face grim. "Somebody beat the crap out of this guy," she said.

Brian handed over his jug of water. By then he was close enough to smell the unmistakable stench of evacuated bowels, of urine that reeked of secondhand wine.

"He's still alive then?" Brian asked.

"So far, but only just barely. I've called for a med-evac helicopter, but I don't think he's going to make it. He can't move. Either his back's broken or he's suffering from a concussion, I can't tell which."

The man lying on the ground, dark-haired and heavy-set, appeared to be around sixty years old. The large brass belt buckle imprinted with the traditional Tohono O'othham maze identified him as an Indian rather than Hispanic. One whole side of his face, clotted with blood, seemed to have been bashed in. His eyes were open, but the irises had rolled back out of sight. He was breathing, shallowly, but that was about all.

"Thanks for the water," the woman said, opening the jug and pouring some of it onto a handkerchief. First she wrung out some of the water over the man's parched lips and swollen tongue, then she laid the still-soaking cloth on the injured man's forehead. That done, she sprinkled the rest of his body as well, dousing his bloodied clothing.

"I'm trying to lower his body temperature," she explained. "I don't know if it's helping or not, but we've got to try."

It was all Brian could do to kneel beside the injured man and look at him. His mother's condition had taught him the real meaning behind the awful words "broken back." He wasn't at all sure that keeping the man alive would be doing him any favor. What Brian Fellows did feel, however, was both pity and an incredible sense of gratitude. If the man's back was actually broken or if he had suffered permanent injury as a result of heatstroke, someone else-someone who wasn't Brian-would have to care for him for the rest of his life, feeding him, bathing him, and attending to his most basic needs.

"What can I do to help?" he asked.

"Keep the damn flies and ants away," the woman told him. "They're eating him alive."

Brian tried to comply. He waved his Stetson in the air, whacking at the roiling flies, and he attempted to pluck off the marauding ants that peppered the man's broken body. It was a losing battle. As soon as he got rid of one ant, two more appeared in its place.

"Because there's water in the charco, a lot of undocumented aliens come this way, especially at this time of year," the woman was saying. The name tag on the breast pocket of her uniform identified her as Agent Kelly.

"I usually try to stop by here at least once a day," she continued. "I saw the tracks in the sand and decided to investigate. When I first saw him, I was sure he was dead, but then I found a slight pulse. When I came back from calling for help, his eyes were open."

Suddenly the man groaned. His eyes blinked. He moved his head from side to side and tried to speak.

"Easy," Agent Kelly said. "Take it easy. Help is on the way."

Brian leaned closer to the injured man. "Can you tell us what happened?" he asked. "Do you know who did this?"

The man trained his bloodshot eyes on Brian's face. "… Mil-gahn," he whispered hoarsely.

The sound of the softly spoken word caused the years to peel away. Brian was once again reliving those carefree days when he and Davy had been little, when they had spent every spare moment out in the little shed behind Davy's house, with Brian learning the language of Davy's old Indian baby-sitter, Rita Antone. When they were together, Davy and Rita had spoken to one another almost exclusively in Tohono O'othham — they had called it Papago back then-rather than English. Over time Brian Fellows had picked up some of the language himself. He knew that the word Mil-gahn meant Anglo.

"A white man did this?" Brian asked, hunkering even closer to the injured man.

"Yes," the man whispered weakly in Tohono O'othham. "A white man."

"He hit you on purpose?" Brian asked.

The man nodded.

"Do you know who it was?" Brain asked. "Do you know the man's name?"

This time the injured man shook his head, then he murmured something else. Brian's grasp of the language was such that he could pick out only one or two words- hiabog-digging, and shohbith — forbidden.

"What's he saying?" Agent Kelly asked.

"I didn't catch all of it. Something about forbidden digging. I'll bet this guy stumbled on a gang of artifact thieves, or maybe just one. The Indians around here consider this whole area sacred, from here to the mountains."

"That's news to me," Agent Kelly said.

Overhead they heard the pulsing clatter of an arriving helicopter. "They've probably located the vehicles, but they'll have trouble finding us. I'll stay here with him," she directed. "You go guide them in."

The helicopter landed in the clearing near where the cars were parked. After directing the emergency medical technicians on where to go, Brian went back to his Blazer and called in. "I need a detective out here," he said.

"How come?" the dispatcher wanted to know. "What's going on?"

"We've got a severely injured man. He may not make it."

"You're talking about the drunk Indian the Border Patrol found? We've already dispatched the helicopter-"

"The helicopter's here," Brian interrupted. "I'm asking for a detective. The guy says a white man beat him up."

"But he's still alive right now, right?"

"Barely."

"Go ahead and write it up yourself, Deputy Fellows. The detectives are pretty much tied up at the moment. If one of 'em gets freed up later, I'll send him along. In the meantime, this case is your baby." The dispatcher's implication was clear: a deputy capable of investigating dead cattle ought to be able to handle a beat-up Indian now and then.

Brian sighed and headed back toward the charco. Brandon Walker was right. With Bill Forsythe's administration, the people of Pima County had gotten something different, all right.

In spades.

From somewhere very far away, Lani heard what sounded like a siren. She opened her eyes. At least, she thought she opened her eyes, but she could see nothing. She tried to move her hands and feet. She could move them a little, but not much, and when she tried to raise her head, her face came into contact with something soft.

Where am I?she wondered. Why am I so hot?

Her body ached with the pain of spending hours locked in the same position. She seemed to be lying naked on something soft. And she could feel something silky touching her sides and the bare skin of her immovable legs and arms. A cool breeze wafted over her hot skin from somewhere, and there was a pillow propped under her head.

A pillow. "Maybe I'm dead," she said aloud, but the sound was so dead that it was almost as though she hadn't said a word. "Am I dead?" she asked.

The answer came from inside her rather than from anywhere outside.

If there's cloth all around me, above and below and a pillow, too,she thought, I must be in a casket, just like NanaDahd.

For weeks everyone, with the possible exception of Lani, had known that Rita Antone was living on borrowed time. The whole household knew it wouldn't be long now. For days now, Wanda and Fat Crack Ortiz had stayed at the house in Gates Pass, keeping watch at Rita's bedside night and day. When they slept, they did so taking turns in the spare bedroom.

Over the years there had been plenty of subtle criticism on the reservation about Rita Antone. The Indians had been upset with her for abandoning her people and her own family to go live in Tucson with a family of Whites. There had also been some pointed and mean-spirited criticism aimed at Rita's family for letting her go. The gossips maintained that, although Diana Ladd Walker may have been glad enough to have Rita's help while she was strong and healthy and could manage housekeeping and child-care chores, they expected that the Mil-gahn woman would be quick to send Rita back to the reservation once she was no longer useful, when, in the vernacular of the Tohono O'othham, she was only good for making baskets and nothing else.

Knowing that Rita must have been involved, ill will toward her had flourished anew among the Tohono O'othham in the wake of Brandon and Diana Walker's unconventional adoption of Clemencia Escalante. Not that any of the Indian people on the reservation had been interested in adopting the child themselves. Everyone knew that the strange little girl had been singled out by I'itoi and his messengers, the Little People. Clemencia had been kissed by the ants in the same way the legendary Kulani O'oks had been kissed by the bees. Although there was some interest at the prospect of having a new and potentially powerful Medicine Woman in the tribe, no one-including Clemencia's blood relatives-wanted the job of being parents to such a child.

By now, though, with Rita Antone bedridden and being lovingly cared for by both her Indian and Anglo families, the reservation naysayers and gossips had been silenced for good and all.

On that last day, a sleep-deprived Fat Crack came into the kitchen where Diana and Brandon were eating breakfast. Gabe helped himself to a cup of coffee and then tried to mash down his unruly hair. It was still standing straight up, just the way he had slept on it, slumped down in the chair next to Rita's bed.

"She's asking for Davy," Fat Crack said. "Do you know where he is?"

Diana glanced at her watch. "Probably in class right now, but I don't know which one or where."

"Let me make a call to the registrar's office over at the university," Brandon had told them. "Once they tell us where he is, I'll go there, pick him up, and bring him back home."

Fat Crack nodded. "Good," he said. "I don't think there's much time."

Forty-five minutes later, Brandon Walker was waiting in the hall outside Davy's Anthropology 101 class. As soon as Davy saw Brandon, he knew what was going on.

"How bad is it?" he asked.

"Pretty bad," Brandon returned. "Fat Crack says we should come as soon as we can."

They had hurried out to the car which, due to law-enforcement privilege, had been parked on the usually vehicle-free pedestrian mall.

"I hate this," Davy said, settling into the seat, slamming his door, and then staring out the window.

"What do you hate?"

"Having old people for friends and having them die on me. First Father John, then Looks At Nothing, and now Rita."

At age ninety-five, Looks At Nothing had avoided the threat of being placed in a hospital by simply walking off into the desert one hot summer's day. They had found his desiccated body weeks later, baking in the hot sand of a desert wash not a thousand yards from his home.

"I'm sorry," Brandon said, and meant it.

At the house, Davy had gone straight into Rita's room. He had stayed there for only ten minutes or so. He had come out carrying Rita's prized but aged medicine basket. His face was pale but he was dry-eyed. "I'm ready to go back now," he said.

He and Brandon had set out in the car. "She gave me her basket," Davy said a few minutes later.

"I know," Brandon said. "I saw you carrying it."

"But it's not mine to keep," Davy added.

Brandon Walker glanced at his stepson. His jaw was set, but now there were tears glimmering on his face. "I get to have Father John's rosary and Rita's son's Purple Heart. Everything else goes to Lani. It isn't fair!"

Brandon was tempted to point out that very little in life is fair, but he didn't. "Why, then, did she give it to you today?" he asked.

"Because Lani's only seven, or at least she will be tomorrow. She can't have the rest of it until she's older."

"When are you supposed to give it to her?"

Davy brushed the tears from his face. "That's what I asked Rita. She said that I'd know when it was time."

Brandon pulled up in front of the dorm, but Davy made no effort to get out. Instead, he opened the basket, picked through it, and removed two separate items, both of which he shoved in his pocket. Then he put the frayed cover back on the basket.

"Dad," he said. "Would you do me a favor?"

"What's that?" Brandon asked.

"I can't take this into the dorm. No one would understand. And somebody might try to steal it or something. You and Mom have a safety deposit box down at the bank, don't you?"

"Yes."

"Would you mind putting this in there and keeping it? I mean, if it isn't really mine, I don't want to lose it. I need to keep it safe-for Lani."

"Sure, Davy," Brandon said. "I'll be glad to. If you want me to, I'll drop it off this morning on my way to the department."

"Thanks," Davy said, handing the basket over. "And tell Fat Crack that I'll come back out to the house as soon as I'm done with my last class. I should be done by three at the latest."

But Rita Antone was gone long before then. She died within half an hour of the time her little Olhoni left, taking Understanding Woman's medicine basket with him.

Nine years later, the bank had gone through several different mergers and had ended up as part of Wells Fargo. The bank had changed, but not the medicine basket, at least not noticeably. Maybe it was somewhat more frayed than it had been a decade earlier, but the power Oks Amichuda had woven into it years before still remained and still waited to be let out.

The day after Nana Dahd died was the worst birthday Lani ever remembered. It seemed to her that a terrible empty place had opened up in her life. The cake had been ordered well in advance, and everyone had tried to go through the motions of a party, just as Rita would have wanted them to. When it came time to blow out the candles, however, Lani had fled the room in tears, leaving the lighted candles still burning.

Brandon was the one who had come to find her, sitting in the playhouse he had built for her in the far corner of the backyard.

"Lani," he called. "Come here. What's the matter?"

She crept outside and fell, weeping, against him.

"Nana Dahd's dead, and Davy's mad at me," she sobbed. "I wish I were dead, too."

"No, you don't," he said soothingly. "Rita wouldn't want you to be unhappy. We were lucky to have had her for as long as we did, but now it's time to let her go. She was suffering, Lani. She was in terrible pain. It would be selfish for us to want her to stay any longer."

"I know," Lani said, "but…"

"Wait a minute. What's that in your hand?"

"Her owij, " Lani answered. "Her awl. She gave it to me yesterday. She said I must always keep making baskets."

"Good."

"But why was Davy so mean to me?" Lani asked. "I called him at the dorm and asked him if he was going to come have cake with us. He said he was too busy, but I think he just didn't want to. He sounded mad, but why would he be? What have I done?"

"Nothing, Lani," Brandon said. "He's upset about Rita, the same as you are. He'll get over it. We just have to be patient with each other. Come on, let's go back inside and have some of that cake."

Obligingly Lani had followed him into the house. The candles were already out. She managed to choke down a few bites of cake, but that was all.

Three days later, at the funeral at San Xavier Mission, Lani was shocked to see Rita lying in the casket with her head propped up on a pillow.

"But Nana Dahd doesn't like pillows," Lani had insisted, tugging at her father's hand. "She never uses a pillow."

"Shhhh," Brandon Walker had said. "Not now."

On the face of it, that was all there was to it. There was never any further discussion. Brandon's "not now" became "not ever," except for one small thing.

From that day on, Dolores Lanita Walker never again used a pillow.

Not until now.