Land of Echoes

48

The endless night still hadn't given way to dawn when Tommy started moving again.

They had left the hogan's door open. The predawn stillness stole over the land with an eerie serenity as gray light filtered into the darkness. Lying on the floor, Cree could feel chill currents move through the door and roam the room despite the faint heat of the woodstove.

Just as she rolled over to look at Tommy, the eyes in his gaunt face popped open and shocked her. When he labored to sit up, she did the same, struggling to make her arms and legs obey. Her body fit her badly, like someone else's clothes.

Cree heard muffled movements just outside the door, Ellen and Ray keeping watch. She had asked them to stay nearby, or follow from a distance if Tommy still had the strength to walk. Now, watching him as the darkness paled, she doubted he'd even be able to stand. She wondered how soon they'd be able to take him down off the plateau, back to the grandparents' place, and begin the long drive to the nearest hospital. For a moment, she wondered distantly where Julieta was and whether she'd arrive in time. She wasn't sure that whenever she might arrive there'd be enough of Cree or Tommy left to help find the way through this.

Then she gave up on the problem as the ghost's world engulfed her and she surrendered herself to it.

Peter's heart surged with joy when he got out of the last car. Just south of Hunters Point, from here his old house was only a mile ahead. He knew the land to the east well. Walking it would take a couple of hours longer than when he used to ride Bird, but going overland cut ten miles off the distance, and he knew he'd likely have to walk anyway on the seldom-used back roads to Julieta's place.

The bus ride from San Diego to Flagstaff had taken forever, and from there he'd still had two hundred miles to hitchhike. He'd walked back to the highway and had felt lucky when a van pulled over right away. And full of Indians, too. But they weren't Navajos-some Midwest tribe he'd never heard of. They had punched him up a little and taken his last thirty-two dollars, a kind of half-serious mugging, more threat than hurt. The worst part was when they shoved him down the interstate embankment, because the knees of his good jeans burst as he somersaulted down the slope. Looking like some just-dumped rodeo loser, it didn't help get rides. He felt as bad as he looked.

I'm coming to you with nothing, Julieta. But I am coming to you. Back like an echo.

There was poetic justice in his humiliation. Starting again with nothing, from nothing-that felt right, too. All new. Leave the baggage behind. Plus, maybe she'd feel some sympathy for him, it might help ease them over what would probably be a rocky first few minutes.

Return of the prodigal Indian, he'd say to her. The stuff of which legends are made, yeah? Standing before her looking like hell, knees torn. Make her laugh.

This was not how he'd imagined it. When he'd first decided to come back, he'd conjured a vision of a tender and heroic homecoming: appearing at her door in crisp new clothes, full of tales of the coast, of dramas in the casting lots, of close brushes with fame and disaster. She'd be angry at first, but she'd see how much he wanted her, she'd be swayed by his passion. She'd forgive him, against her will. She'd be pretty pregnant by now, maybe only three months away, and she'd see how he had changed by how tender he'd be with her. He'd tell her he knew how wrong he'd been, that he'd left Bernice, that he was back for keeps.

The thought of Julieta stirred him and fired his resolve. He remembered her body against his, and it seemed the power of that memory would allow him to overcome anything.

He was close now, maybe eight miles overland. If he hurried he'd get there before dark. He'd ridden Bird this way a dozen times, winding between the hills near the road, then breaking through into the open country beyond. When the land smoothed into the endless miles of rolling swells, he'd let Bird find her own pace and it was always a gallop, that horse loved to run. He'd ride her like the wind in a straight line, shortest distance between two points, the heart line, straight east. He'd fly like an arrow. First he'd see the mesa standing clear of the surrounding land, and that would steer him to the house.

He felt bone tired, bruised and sore, and the closer he got the more nervous he became. She had a lot to be angry about.

But he'd explain. She'd understand. His love would overcome her resistance. She'd see it in him.

Everybody had warned him it was not so easy off the rez, but he'd always dismissed that as the song of losers who didn't have the spark or good looks or willpower to succeed in a world without BIA housing and government handouts. But in fact it had been tough. He couldn't get a grip on L.A. at all. Down in San Diego there were more jobs, but coming into Southern California with bronze skin, you came into a labor pool overflowing with Mexicans, and nobody gave a damn whether you were a noble Native American or some newly arrived wetback. And as for having ambitions in broadcasting-hey, who didn't? Plus there was the unrelenting pace of things, and the crowded, controlled feel of the city. Hard rules. No slack. In aggregate, white people were crazy, drank too much coffee. It made them efficient but graceless. He had always looked at the typical Navajo way of doing things with affectionate superiority, but in San Diego he found he missed being around the People, the spacious gracious slow funky chaos of rez life. He missed hearing his own language spoken. On the rez, he'd grown tired of living where everybody was some kind of cousin, too claustrophobic, no privacy, the clan thing with every woman you met. But in white America, it went too far the other way, nobody knew anybody. Being an outsider in San Diego, you went around lonely and empty and unrecognized. Even whites who lived there didn't know each other. He missed Bird and their wild gallops over open land where there was no one to tell him what to do and his spirit took wing.

And most of all, he missed Julieta. Even when he met Bernice and they had a thing for a while, he'd think of Julieta and feel a rat gnawing in his stomach, the sense of missing her and fearing that he'd made a disastrous mistake.

But I'm back. Take two. I'll do it right this time.

Now the walk was taking forever. Early November, after six months on the Coast he wasn't used to the cold. But whenever he bottomed out, he'd picture an image of her: the breathtaking curve of her hip as she shrugged out of her jeans the first time they'd made love. Oh, man. Or the light in her eyes when he'd be at work with the other guys around and couldn't talk to her and she'd look a blue fire of love at him that set him ablaze from thirty feet away. Plenty enough to keep him going.

I'll do it right this time, he promised. Babies, they're not so bad. People have been having babies, raising families, for years. Decades, even. I'll try it, Julieta.

Walk, walk, walk. It took three hours to reach the last rise, about a mile from the house. He was aching and tired, but the instant he saw the place, the kinks and pains fell away. The last light of sunset painted its walls, the windows glowed with welcoming yellow. He laughed out loud for joy. He'd made it! There was warmth of every kind inside. There was starting new. Birth and rebirth.

If she forgave him. The thought shivered him. But of course it would be hard at first. He deserved it. He didn't blame Joe Tsosie for not talking to him, trying to keep him away-he'd screwed up royally. She'd be mad because she was hurt and scared. But he'd make it better.

He ran the last half mile.

As he came up to the door, he stood straight and brushed the dust off his clothes. He tugged his hair loose from its ponytail and shook it out over his shoulders, the way she liked it. He tried to catch his breath but couldn't. When he knocked, he was burning. He felt the love light come over him and knew it made him beautiful and strong, irresistible.

Garrett McCarty opened the door.

It was so unexpected that the best Peter could do was stammer, "What are you doing here?"

"What am I doing here? I own this house." Garrett McCarty looked him up and down and his eyes narrowed. "I'd ask what you're doing here, but I think I already know."

A big shape moved behind McCarty and Peter saw Stephanovic, the big Irish guy who everybody knew worked as a sort of enforcer type at McCarty mines. He came to the door, looked at Peter without expression, then swept his eyes over the driveway as if checking for cars or other visitors.

Garrett McCarty turned away and made a sharp gesture with one hand. "Nick, invite this kid in, huh? And shut the door, it's cold out there."

One of Stephanovic's huge paws whipped out and came around the back of Peter's neck and yanked him stumbling into the house. Peter cuffed the hand off and stepped away.

McCarty stood belligerently, legs braced wide, face red and full of veins. He was wearing jeans and cowboy boots and a checked shirt opened a couple of buttons to reveal a mat of gray chest hair. "You've got a lot of goddamned balls, don't you. Coming here, knocking on the door. I knew she had a brave in the woodpile. I knew it. Is this some macho rite, you want to lock horns with the old buck?" The thought made McCarty laugh. "Or, what-you're the honorable type, looking for permission to take my pony for a ride? That it?"

"Don't talk that way about her," Peter snapped.

McCarty threw himself at Peter. He was heavier, but Peter was younger and quicker and his first punch flattened the old man's nose. McCarty reared away, roared, charged again, and they reeled back against the wall, raging and pounding each other. McCarty's nose sprayed blood. Peter felt the power of his own anger, hate brewed from all the things Julieta had told him about the man. He hammered the red face with his forearm and knocked the old man reeling. McCarty staggered into the middle of the room and charged again like a wounded bull. They fell against a coatrack and went to the floor, rolling, tangling in it. Things were breaking, falling from the walls. Peter rolled on top of McCarty and punched the raging face.

Then something hard hit the side of his head, knocking him sprawling on the tiles. Stephanovic aimed another steel-toed kick at him and he barely got his arms up in time to protect his face.

Peter had just gotten to his hands and knees when the big man kicked him in the center of his chest. The force of it lifted him off the floor. He fell on his side and struggled to get his breath. Couldn't inhale. Couldn't move.

Still the rage and ardor burned in him. He wouldn't lose. He wouldn't give up. He would find Julieta.

Stephanovic was standing across the room, giving him a stay cool half smile and watching him as he got to his feet. Then McCarty appeared in the living-room doorway holding a kitchen towel against his nose with one hand and a big silver pistol in the other. Stephanovic's eyes went wide and he moved toward his boss, saying, "Whoa, hey, Garrett-" but the gun exploded, sound and flash and impact all at once. Peter felt his insides blow apart. Then another huge noise and another detonation in his gut.

Peter curled around the pain. He felt as if he'd leapt off a cliff and plunged deep underwater. The air was thick and resistant, and the sound of the men's voices was a big rounded booming, slow. One rumbled, No Navajo punk… screw my wife… talk to me like that. The other said, Didn't have to do that… mess to deal with.. trouble.

Another man appeared at the inner door. Peter's eyes focused enough to recognize him: Donny McCarty, the old man's son, a pale clerkish nerd who Julieta had always felt sorry for. He swore at his father and boomed, Never think first… could have used it against her… cost yourself millions! Then both McCartys were giving orders. Stephanovic complained but gave in. Donny was already picking up the broken things.

Peter hated them with all his might. He couldn't make sense of anything. He pulled himself down to a secret cave under the water and wrapped himself into a ball. Inside, he found a place of resolve and fire and he knew it could not fail him, it was so strong he knew he could survive anything, find Julieta again.

A kind of empty space and then he noticed he wasn't in the bright lights of the house but outside, under the sky. It was dark and stars. The sharp wild lights gave him strength, too. Stephanovic and Donny McCarty had put him in the open back of Julieta's little workhorse Jeep. The Jeep started and then they were bumping. The metal bed pounded up at him and the pain came in bolts and blasts. Stephanovic was going to kill him, Peter knew, but he was going to surprise him because he had strength inside that no old white businessmen could imagine. He was smart and durable as a coyote. He was strong and young and had fire in him. He had love. Love would win. He'd wait until Stephanovic stopped and he'd kill him and then he'd kill both McCartys and he'd go to Julieta.

The jarring and bumping quit and the night was quiet. Stephanovic was opening the tailgate and lifting Peter out. It hurt. Peter stayed curled around his secret strength, husbanding it. He was barely breathing. He would explode suddenly from his stillness. His love would give him power.

Stephanovic was carrying him between walls of rock, and Peter recognized the ravine that came down near the north end of the mesa. The big man labored on the slope, working his way deeper in and higher up, stumbling and swearing. He dumped Peter onto the ground and then lit a flashlight. Peter opened his eyes into the impossible light, couldn't see Stephanovic but knew he was looking down at him.

"Aw shit!" the voice behind the light said. "We thought you were dead. Son of a bitch!"

Peter willed his body to move. But he couldn't lash out and he couldn't stand up. All the effort did was bend and straighten him. He was aware that he was writhing on the ground as the big man stood over him. Back and forth, trying to straighten his body, then feeling the unbearable pain and curling back around it.

Stephanovic was grunting and swearing. He didn't want to do this, Peter could tell. Which meant he could be persuaded. Peter tried to find the thing that would convince him to disobey and to help him. He had to find the thing that mattered most in the world. That was Julieta. But he didn't want to say her name. Didn't want to use her to save himself. But she was pregnant, she needed Peter to be father to the baby. He had to be father to the baby. Any man would understand that.

Peter tried to tell him. "Baby," he said. "Baby." Regret tainted the pure clarity of his determination. He hadn't just been stupid, he had been cruel.

He heard Stephanovic's breathless swearing coming closer and thought he'd reached the man, but then a big rock landed next to him, bruising his shoulder.

No, Peter screamed inside. "Baby!" he said out loud. Stephanovic's face was just a white blob in the darkness above him, but he tried to catch his eye, convey his passion. Still the big man didn't understand, so Peter made a gigantic effort: "Don't kill me! I have to take care of her! I have to be with my kid." But his meaning was changing, what mattered most was still deeper. What he really meant was, Let me live so I can do it right, fix the mistakes. Don't kill me with that undone. Don't kill a man who hasn't undone his cruelties.

Another rock fell, this one landing directly on his legs. "I don't understand Navajo," Stephanovic said. Then he was gone again. His swearing got distant and then came back.

The effort to shout had tired Peter. He needed to rest, gather his energy. He found the secret place of strength again and held himself curled there. He'd outwait Stephanovic. If he had to, he could wait forever. He'd curl up and hold himself still and come exploding back. He'd be with Julieta and the kid and set all the mistakes right.

An empty time later, he opened his eyes to find he was covered with rocks. But not entirely. He could see up into the sky in the gaps between them. The rocks were all over him, but they mostly supported each other's weight and weren't that heavy. There was no sound. Stephanovic had gone, left him for dead.

But he wasn't! He was alive, and he could move. One arm was pinned beneath him, but he was able to fight the other arm free. The rocks shifted slightly, allowing him to bring his hand up. He pushed at the big rock that lay just above his chest. It lifted, pivoted, dropped back down. He did it again. He could lift it, but then it just pivoted back and his arm gave way. Again. Again. The rock made a gritting noise as it lifted and a hard, final noise when it fell back. So now he'd rest again. Stephanovic hadn't killed him and hadn't even buried him deeply. He'd get out. He'd find his cousins over near Hunters Point and they'd take him to a doctor and then he'd go to Julieta.

Garrett McCarty would never stop him. Nothing could stop him.

Something was happening up in the sky. No, near the sky. Bright light washed over the lip of the ravine sixty feet directly above him. Red boulders and slabs, the crumbling undercut edge, sharply lit against the black sky. The shadows shifted. He heard motor noise. A Jeep up there. Stephanovic had driven around to the south end of the mesa, where the slope was not so steep. The lights eclipsed and shafted bright and the motor labored. Grinding, grating noises. Then all the rocks were moving, the whole section of cliff was falling, gathering other rocks and hurtling down.