No Mercy

FOUR

Sophie gave up trying to get me to wear a dress to the community dance. If boots and jeans were good enough for the guys, they were good enough for me.

Instead of showing up in my beloved Viper, I drove my dad’s truck down County Road 11, country music on KICK 104 my companion.

Despite the dust and bugs, I rolled the windows down. I slowed for a baler taking up half the gravel road. I waved at Tim Lohstroh as I passed, inhaling the deliciously sweet scent of yellow clover.

The breath-stealing heat had abated, leaving a perfect summer evening, where the air is velvety soft. I glanced across the horizon at the myriad of colors: a swirl of sapphire, salmon, and scarlet, indicating the sky’s magical transformation from day to night. I’d seen sunsets all over the world. Nothing beats a summer sunset on the high prairie. Nothing.

I parked in the dusty field at the Viewfield Community Center. The knee-high bromegrasses were dead in places from lack of moisture and flattened from Buicks, pickups, and ATVs leaving skid marks on the concretelike ground.

I slid the beer cooler across the truck bed. Alcohol wasn’t allowed inside these family events, so we all snuck out for a nip between songs. Or we tucked a flask in our boots. The Wild Turkey in my ropers sloshed with every step.

It was hard to believe that barn dances were still the summer highlight in Eagle River County. Was it because country and ranch people clung to traditions, rejecting anything new or different on principle?

Nah. These gatherings were actually fun. As a kid I’d loved dances, even when Dad-as sheriff-kept an eye on every cowboy who asked me to two-step.

Tonight’s festivities weren’t taking place in a barn, but in a steel building a few enterprising souls had remodeled from an abandoned wool-shearing shack into a much-needed community center. As it was the biggest building in the county, we’d held the finger sandwiches and sympathy assembly here after my father’s funeral. At the time I hadn’t paid much attention to the surroundings.

The interior owed more to function than decor. A big, open kitchen, lined with assorted old stoves and refrigerators and a huge concrete dance floor with a wooden platform serving as a stage. Flags hung from the metal rafters: Old Glory, the pale blue South Dakota state flag, local chapters of FFA, 4-H, Stockgrowers Association, SD Beef Council, SD Pork Producers, VFW-banners that meant something and were hung with pride.

In the far back corner chipped white Formica folding tables were piled high with sweets. Crisp, sugary cookies covered in sprinkles, drenched with powdered sugar, and bursting with nuts and chunks of chocolate. Pans of bars coated with frosting in every color of the rainbow. Thick, gooey brownies and rows of fruit pies with perfectly browned crusts-all homemade goodies, not a Keebler bag in sight.

Four watercoolers abutted the wall between the men and women’s bathrooms. Six industrial-sized coffee urns were set up beside the dessert station. Each pot would be emptied and refilled at least three times before the evening’s festivities concluded. My mother used to say, “Those Lutherans sure love their coffee.” Not all the attendees were Lutheran. Methodists, Catholics, Presbyterians, and Episcopalians were welcome, too. We do have some religious diversity in South Dakota.

Coffee was one thing we all agreed on: black. The rage for lattes, espresso, cappuccino, and confections topped with whipped cream and flavored syrups hadn’t caught on. A few people preferred cream and sugar, but mention a half-caf, sugar-free, caramel macchaito with light foam, and you’d get a blank-eyed stare like you were speaking Farsi.

I’d barely stepped foot inside when people descended on me like a pack of locusts. Most everyone in the county felt entitled to grill me on my plans for the ranch. When I hedged, they gave me a suspicious look usually reserved for outsiders. Then they left me standing alone like I’d developed mad cow disease. In that moment I missed my father with an ache so painful I almost turned and ran out.

A Gunderson never runs.

As I debated ignoring Dad’s phantom words of wisdom, Hope materialized by my side.

She looked worse than dog crap. Makeup didn’t mask her waxy complexion, and the thick black mascara accentuated the hollowness in her eyes. Why couldn’t Doc Canaday figure out what was wrong with her? “You sure you should be here, sis?”

“I’m sick of being at home. I want to have some fun and dance.”

A hairy head the size of a moose popped between us. “Did someone say dance?” Tubby Tidwell wrapped a flabby arm around each of our shoulders. “You’re in luck tonight, ladies, because ‘Tubby the Texas Two-Step Master’ is here. Who’s first?”

Hope giggled and leaned into him.

I resisted pulling out my flask right then.

Without warning the lights dimmed and the band launched into “Whiskey River.”

“Mind if I steal this gorgeous young thing for a while, Mercy?” Tubby yelled over the music.

I glanced at Hope. Her eyes pleaded with me. I smiled tightly. “She’s all yours, Tubby.”

He whooped and dragged her to the crowded dance floor.

Hope’s defection spurred mine. No such luck I’d get away easy.

Our neighbor Iris Newsome cornered me. “Mercy. I’m surprised to see you here, although I am glad I ran into you. I’ve been meaning to come by. How are you holding up?”

I’m drinking more than usual and my career is toast, but besides that, I’m peachy keen.

Nah. Not a good response. “I’m taking it day by day.”

“I know how that goes.” She smiled sadly and turned to focus on Hope and Tubby twirling around on the dance floor.

Dealing with Iris always set my teeth on edge, mostly because I didn’t know how to deal with her.

When Hope was five, she was playing cowboys and Indians in the shelterbelt behind our oldest barn with her best friend, Jenny, Iris’s daughter. Somehow Jenny had managed to sneak her father’s eight-inch Bowie knife into her Barbie backpack.

Hope’s jealousy that Jenny had the real thing, while she had to make do with a plastic toy gun, spurred Hope to sneak inside and grab Dad’s snub-nosed Ruger revolver from his nightstand drawer.

After Hope captured Jenny, she’d tied her up and interrogated her. Just like on TV. When Jenny’s answers weren’t to her liking, Hope placed the gun barrel to Jenny’s forehead. Just like on TV. But unlike on TV, when Hope pulled the trigger and fired, she blew Jenny’s brains all over the barn and all over herself.

When Jenny didn’t hop up and laugh, just like on TV, Hope started to scream. She screamed until her voice gave out and she went into a catatonic state.

Dad literally picked up the pieces.

Even through their grief, Jenny’s parents hadn’t blamed Hope. They knew everyone in our part of the world kept their guns loaded; the circumstances could’ve easily gone the other way and we’d have been buying a pine box and planning a funeral.

The incident became another turning point in our lives. Dad burned the barn to the ground and purchased a gun safe. Within two months he quit wallowing in the grief and whiskey that’d followed my mother’s death and signed on with the sheriff’s department as a deputy. Hope still suffers from random periods of depression. Rather than medicating her, we all tread lightly during these episodes and use our family strength to shield her from others and herself.

The catastrophe hadn’t dimmed my love of firearms; it merely increased my respect for the deadly consequences of misuse. Killing, even accidentally, will make some people delicate, like my sister. But killing is the one thing I’m good at, even if the payoff is some sleepless nights.

Iris faced me. “I’m calling a meeting next week with Bob Peterson about some of the changes those LifeLite people who bought the old Jackson place have made.” Her eyes narrowed. “Have you been by there yet?”

“Ah. No.” It was hard to imagine the kind of changes that could require the attention of our county commissioner.

“It’s an abomination. Eight-foot-high electric fences and manned gates twenty-four hours a day? They’ve got to be doing something illegal, especially with so many new outbuildings popping up practically overnight… heaven only knows what for.”

“What can Bob do?”

“First of all, he can check to see if their permits are up to snuff.”

“And if they aren’t? What then?”

“He can bring it to the county commission and stop any additional building. Hopefully all of the landowners with adjoining property, who are affected by the blight on the landscape, can make our voices heard. Or at least encourage the county to enforce legal actions and heavy fines for building violations. If enough of us sign the petition to enact some sort of covenants to keep it from happening again, we can bring it to a countywide vote.”

I snorted at her casual use of the word covenants. No rancher I knew would ever consider voting for that type of restriction. Sure, they may hate what those outsiders were doing to the property, but they’d never allow their own personal freedoms to be dictated by local government. Or the local busybody.

“I got you thinking, didn’t I?” Iris asked smugly.

“No. I don’t see what this has to do with me.”

“But as a landowner-”

“Which is in question right now, isn’t it?”

Her mouth tightened. “You aren’t seriously considering selling?”

I offered her a greasy politician’s smile. “I’m seriously considering peeing my pants if I don’t get to the bathroom pretty damn quick.”

Iris retreated, taken aback by my rudeness.

She was probably thinking if my mother hadn’t died, I would have better manners. Or if her daughter Jenny had lived, she certainly wouldn’t have uttered such a crude comment.

Mumbling “Excuse me,” I made a break for the bathroom, locked myself in the stall, and dug the whiskey flask out of my boot. After sucking down three gulps of liquid fire, I closed my eyes and enjoyed the burn.

Mature, Gunderson. How often in the last month had I looked to Jack Daniel’s or Jim Beam for strength? Too many.

Reluctantly I exited the stall. At the crowded sink, I glanced in the mirror as I dried my hands. Molly, the oldest daughter of my oldest friend, Geneva, winked at me and grinned. “You hiding in here?”

“Yep. Are you?”

“We both are.” She nudged the lanky Indian girl standing next to her. “Sue Anne, this is my mom’s friend, Mercy.” Molly added slyly, “She’s also Levi Arpel’s aunt.”

Sue Anne’s brown eyes widened. “Really? Is Levi here?”

I’d forgotten to ask Hope if Levi had tagged along. “I don’t know. I could ask his mom if you want.”

“No, no, don’t, it’s okay. Maybe we’ll see him around.”

“Sue Anne thinks he’s a total hottie,” Molly said. “They’re actually sneaking-”

“Shut up!” Sue Anne blushed and pushed her.

My nephew a hottie? Whoa. Hanging out with these girls for even two seconds made me feel every one of my thirty-eight years. “If I see Levi, I’ll tell him you’re looking for him.”

I ducked out of the bathroom and considered leaving. As I debated, I saw Hope slow dancing with some guy I didn’t know. Weird. I scanned the group of kids lined up against the far wall like they were facing a firing squad, but didn’t see Levi.

“Hey-o, you are here.”

“I told you I would be, Sophie.”

“You’re not smiling. No wonder you’re standing here alone while everyone else is out dancing, eh?”

“Don’t you have grandchildren to harass or something?”

Sophie shuffled into my line of vision. “Shee. They don’t fight back. They say ‘yes Unci’ or ‘no Unci,’ where you snarl like Devlin’s pit bull. You’re more fun.”

I gave her a droll stare. “Comparing me to a dog to see if I bite? You must be bored.”

“Curse of the elders. Got nothing to do but stir up trouble.” Her wrinkled face brightened, and she waved to someone across the way.

“Well, have fun mixing things up. I’m going home.”

“Wait.” Sophie grabbed my sleeve. “There is someone here who wants to talk to you.”

Visions of Sophie’s (bad) matchmaking attempts twisted my guts into a knot. “Who?”

The song ended. A round of applause broke out.

Jake sidled up behind Sophie and squeezed her hunched shoulders. “Ready for that dance, Unci?”

“Afraid you’re too late, takoja. I’m off to sit with some friends. But Mercy told me she would like to dance.”

Talk about stirring up trouble.

I opened my mouth to protest, but Jake led me to the dance floor. Tempting to glare at Sophie, but her genuinely happy smile doused my burning look. Plus, if I stuck around, she’d probably fix me up with someone worse than Jake.

One dance. What could it hurt? It’d probably be something fast like the “Cotton-Eyed Joe” anyway. But the singer belted out the mournful, slow ballad, “A Thousand Miles from Nowhere” by Dwight Yoakam, and I ground my teeth.

Jake put his hand in the small of my back, pulling me close. I set my free hand on his shoulder and pretended this was no big deal. Like we danced together every weekend, not once every two decades.

We started to move, a slow, one two three, one two three. I shut my eyes for a moment as we fell into the familiar rhythm. But when I couldn’t see him, my other senses kicked in. The feel of his rough palm on mine. The heat from his hand on my spine. Clean cotton, tangy lime aftershave, male musk, and the underlying hint of horseflesh. Scents that were uniquely Jake and hadn’t changed in twenty years. Scents I’d spent a lot of time trying to forget.

His smoothly shaven cheek grazed mine. “Sorry. I’m probably the last man you wanted to dance with tonight, eh?”

“It’s fine.”

“Then relax. I remember when you used to think this was fun.” He twirled us into the middle of the dance floor.

I’d relaxed when he blew it all to hell by softly whispering in my ear, “Are we ever gonna talk about it?”

“I haven’t made my decision on the ranch yet.”

“You know that ain’t what I meant.”

His disappointed tone grated on me but proved I wasn’t any more anxious to spill my guts now than I’d been years ago. “Drop it.”

He did.

During the slide steel guitar solo, we’d glided to the outskirts of the dance floor again. Soon as the song ended, I pushed away from him and made tracks for the exit.

The balmy evening cooled the sweat on the back of my neck. In the darkness, I stopped to get my bearings, angry about the resurgence of memories. Of me as a hopeful teen. Of Jake. Of what we’d had and what we’d lost.

When footsteps shuffled behind me, I snapped, “Go away. I already told you I didn’t want to talk to you.”

“Sorry. I thought Sophie said…”

I whirled around. Not Jake forcing me to face my demons and our past. It was Estelle Yellow Boy.

“I’m sorry, Estelle. I thought you were someone else.”

Sophie sidled up beside her. “Estelle wants to talk to you about something.”

Sophie’s meddling knew no bounds.

Estelle sidestepped the bluish circle of light next to the doors and hid in the darkness. “Bet you think it’s weird, me wanting to talk to you, hey?”

“Maybe a little.”

“It’s about Albert.”

I figured as much.

Estelle spoke to the ground. “I ain’t gonna lie to you. Albert was going through a rough patch. Running off all the time. Growing up on the rez is hard. We thought it was a phase and he’d straighten out. He won’t get the chance now. So, I wanna know if you’ll help me find out who killed him.”

“Run that by me again?”

“That’s why I come here. To see if you’d help me.”

Happy people milled past, laughing, joking, living, as we lurked in the shadows. Sobering, that Estelle wasn’t at the dance to kick up her heels, to forget about her sorrow for a while, but for the express purpose of talking to me. “What do you think I can do?”

“Anything you’d be willing to do would be something. As it sets, the acting sheriff, Dawson, ain’t done nothing. He ain’t talked to none of Albert’s friends. He ain’t even really talked to us. If I ask him questions, he looks at me like if I’da been a better mother, Albert wouldn’t be dead. Looks at me like I’m wasting his time. Acting like my boy is just another dead Indian.”

My feeling of disquiet grew.

“Your father was a good man and a good sheriff. Fair. If he was still alive, he’da done everything to find who done it.”

“Though I appreciate that you thought so much of my dad, I honestly don’t know how I can help.”

“I can give you the names of them kids he’d been hanging with. They started some club. Albert didn’t talk much about it, which makes me think them boys might of had something to do with him getting killed.”

“Estelle, I don’t know the first thing about-”

“I don’t expect you to do it for free. I ain’t got no money, but I can give you this.” She withdrew a piece of white flannel from her jacket pocket and carefully unfolded it.

Nestled in her palm was an elaborately beaded necklace. Beautiful primary-colored beads surrounded a simple circular design. Pieces of polished bone attached the medallion to the chain, which looked to be a thick black braid fashioned from the hair of a horse’s tail. Red, black, yellow, and white beads-colors attributed to the Earth’s four directions-dangled from curly buffalo leather strips below the pendant.

I touched it. I couldn’t help it. It was magical.

“This belonged to my great-great-great unci,” Estelle said. “Been in my family longer than the Gunderson Ranch has been in yours.”

“I can’t possibly-”

“You have to. I need somebody’s help, and only someone who’s lived through a buncha horrible things knows what I’m going through.”

I bristled, expecting her to mention specifics about the woes that’d plagued the Gunderson family for generations: death, death, and more violent death with a dash of crazy stirred in just to spice things up.

Instead, her voice broke. “His neck was snapped like a twig. Whoever done this left his body like it weren’t no more’n a deer carcass. I can’t forget about it and move on like everybody wants me to.”

Shiny tears skimmed the pockmarks before dripping down her brown face. “Paul don’t know I’m here talking to you. He thinks we oughta stay out of it.” She sniffled. “I tried, but I just can’t.”

Maybe it was the crack in her stoicism. Maybe it was because I’d seen broken and forgotten bodies scattered all over the world-more than most people could imagine. Maybe it was a need to connect with another woman to band together against men’s indifference. Whatever it was, something inside me shifted. The theme song from Underdog began to get louder and louder inside my head.

“Okay. I’ll see what I can find out. No promises though.”

Estelle’s chin dropped to her chest. “Thank you.”

“Do you have a list of his friends? A place for me to start?”

“Estelle? Where are you?”

She looked up. Panic flitted through her eyes. She hastily swiped her tears and pressed the flannel into my hand. “I’ll call you. Or get the list to you somehow. Please don’t say nothing to nobody about this.” She hustled away to deflect Paul’s suspicion.

Before I could give the necklace back to her, she vanished. So I hid the package in my boot. Desperate for a cold beer, I wove through the cars and trucks. Tripped over my own damn feet when I didn’t see a pothole because of my altered vision. I probably looked like just another drunk. Or maybe the guilt of taking that family heirloom even temporarily added extra weight to my imbalance.

After I wiped the dirt from my knees, I locked the necklace in the glove box. As I reached for my cooler, a couple of shouts caught my attention, followed by the unmistakable sound of a body hitting metal.

A fight.

No kidding. Nothing cowboys liked better than to get drunk and brawl. Mostly the young cocky ones, but I’d seen my share of forty- and fifty-year-old guys duking it out over a slight, real or imagined.

I zeroed in on six or seven kids circling two punks mixing it up in the dirt. Couldn’t tell if any of the gawkers were adults who should’ve stopped the asinsine show of testosterone. I peered over the edge of the crowd to see if I had to be the voice of reason.

And I noticed his shoes right off. Good thing. His face was so damn bloody I doubt his mother would’ve recognized him.

Levi.

He’d pinned the other guy on the ground. He was so tired the wild punches he swung didn’t land.

The situation left me in a dilemma. If I broke up the fight, Levi’s friends wouldn’t let him live it down. If I didn’t break it up and Levi ended up hurt… I couldn’t live with that option either. As I debated, I heard a sharp male voice bark, “What’s going on back there?”

Both boys jumped up. Wiped blood from their faces, glaring at each other from bruised eyes. “Keep your fucking mouth shut about this, Arpel.”

“You don’t tell me what to do, fuckface.”

A short-lived respite. More words were exchanged, and they were back at it again. Pushing. Shoving. Swinging. Missing.

I attempted to diffuse the situation by trying to insert myself between them. Yeah, I probably should’ve waited the full thirty seconds until the Samaritan showed up, but I’d broken up my fair share of fights. Mostly between drunken adult male military personnel, so I didn’t consider the danger of coming between a couple of pissed-off hormonal high school boys.

I should have.

“Stay out of it. It don’t concern you.” This free advice was snarled from a bystander the size of an oak tree.

“Shut your big mouth, Moser,” Levi panted, keeping his eye on his opponent. “You stay out of it.”

“Make me, Arpel.”

Levi growled.

“Ooh. Tough guy.”

“Don’t hafta be tough to take a pussy like you.”

Then Levi charged Moser. I ended up in the middle and fell into a tangle of punching arms and kicking legs. Took a shot to my shin. An elbow to the gut. A glancing blow off my jaw. That one hurt. I braced myself for an opportunity to (a) escape or (b) inflict some damage.

Before I’d implemented either plan, both guys were pulled off me and I stared at the angry face of Sheriff Dawson.

Crap. I huddled on the ground, trying to make myself inconspicuous.

“What’s going on here?” Dawson had one meaty fist twisted in Levi’s tank top and the other in Moser’s baggy Denver Nuggets basketball shirt.

When neither answered, he shook Moser. “You. Tell me.”

Moser flashed Levi a nasty, bloody grin. “Nothing’s going on, Sheriff.”

Dawson scowled and focused his attention on Levi. “What about you? Gonna tell me why a couple of you guys are covered in dirt and blood and the rest are standing around watching?”

“Nothing going on. Sir.”

He released them. “Either go inside or get on home. I see any of you guys out here again, doing nothing, and I’ll throw you in the back of my patrol car and you can do nothing from a cell, understand?”

A bunch of murmured “yes sirs” then boys scattered like aspen leaves in a windstorm.

Dawson finally noticed me. “What the hell are you doing down there in the dirt, Mercy?”

“Nothing.”

He scowled and extended a hand to help me up, but Levi beat him to it.

I hid my shock that my nephew actually acknowledged my presence, and grunted as Levi jerked me to my feet.

“You all right?” Dawson asked me.

“I’m fine. Nothing ice and Excedrin won’t cure.”

Dawson’s gaze pinned Levi like a bug. “Want to say anything now that your buddies abandoned you?”

Levi dropped his chin. His tangled hair fell in his face.

“Didn’t think so.” He sighed. “Levi, I need to talk to your aunt alone.”

From beneath his fall of hair, Levi glared a you’re-gonna-rat-me-out look.

I couldn’t do that to him. “Sorry, Sheriff, it’ll have to wait. Levi’s face is hamburger. If I don’t get ice on it, his jaw will swell up like a toad’s.”

“You headed home?”

I didn’t answer. Let him think we were leaving. “See you around, Sheriff.”

He cupped my elbow before I’d made it two steps. “I haven’t forgotten you promised me a dance.” His husky whisper vibrated in my ear, sending a pleasant shiver through me. “Don’t think I won’t collect. Drive safe.”

Huh. His declaration was as curious as my reaction to it. I tried not to think about either as I led Levi to my truck.