Wild Penance

7

When I went to the command center tent to report the theft, the deputy on duty seemed relieved to have a visitor to break the monotony of his evening. But he was not particularly excited about taking a report on the theft of my book, especially when he learned that all the valuables that normally would have been stolen had been left intact. I recalled Jerry Padilla’s warning not to talk to anyone except the task force members about the incident that morning, so I didn’t mention what the book was about, or that I thought the theft of it could possibly be tied in some way to the crime that had occurred earlier that day. I decided I would wait and let Padilla know that the next time we talked.

I headed west to my cabin, which sat alone in the pines on a remote piece of property that backed to forested foothills and Forest Service land. As I drove up my long dirt drive, my headlights illuminated something white pinned to the door. I killed the lights, then the engine, stopping thirty yards from the house. I reached into the glove box, took out my handgun and readied it, then slid silently out the driver’s side and eased the car door shut. I panned the property in front of my cabin from east to west. No sign of anyone; however, it was so dark I couldn’t see far. I crouched low as I made my way on foot to the end of the drive. I stepped up on the porch, scanning the ground around my place once again, but there was no one in sight. Still holding my pistol up in both hands, I walked to the door. A note written with black marker on a white paper towel had been secured to the wooden door with several pushpins. It was too dark to make out the fuzzy letters where the ink had bled into the fibrous paper, so I opened the door of my cabin and flipped on the light. I scanned the one main room before I glanced at the note. It read:

Woman down! Help!

Bennie

I gave a sigh of relief. I knew Bennie. Bennie was a friend. This was the kind of thing Bennie did.

But just the same, perhaps because of the other events of the day, I didn’t relax until I crossed through the main room to the pass-through hallway on the other side that led to the bathroom-a shed-style addition that had been added on years after the original one-room cabin had been built. I looked in the narrow closet on one side of the hall as I went through, checked behind the shower curtain in the bathroom. No one there.

I went back outside and pulled my Jeep to the end of the drive, turning it around to face nose-out, ready to go, the way I always parked. I got my shotgun and rifle out of the back and grabbed the little cloth pouch that Momma Anna had given me with the prune pies in it. After I took all this inside, I went back once more for my backpack, boots, and duty clothes, and I took my sidearm with me when I went.

It was a rare night outside of the months of July and August that I didn’t want a fire in the woodstove at night. Here in mountainous northern New Mexico, the sunny days of early April held the promise of spring, but the nights clung to the cloak of winter. I opened the doors to the firebox and stirred the ashes around with a little shovel until I saw a few coals from last night’s fire pulse red. I left the doors open to let air onto the glowing coals, threw in a handful of twigs for kindling, and laid a couple logs on top of that. Next, I took the cast-iron kettle to the kitchen sink, filled it with water and set it on top of the woodstove, then got the mug I’d washed after my morning coffee and put a little pouch of tea in it for when the water came to a boil.

After washing up and putting on some old sweatpants and a hoodie, I sat down in the chair in front of the woodstove with my tea and the two little pies Momma Anna had given me.

This cabin was my haven, even if it wasn’t mine. I rented it from a Denver landscape designer who had inherited the land from his family and had no interest in living or vacationing here-too isolated. There was no water, but I paid someone to haul it to the cistern every other month, and I had learned to be frugal in my use of the precious substance. I had electricity, but there were no phone lines anywhere near me, and the mountains made getting a cell phone signal here impossible. Nor was there any point in trying to watch television, as there weren’t enough residents in this remote area to make providing services like that worthwhile. None of this bothered me. I had learned to love the quiet, and I liked my own company.

I sat in my chair, sore where I had hit the ground and from whatever had hit me. The events of the day replayed in my mind, beginning with the vision of the man on the cross-upside down-soaring silently into the gorge. I shuddered at the memory, and my mind wandered on to Momma Anna’s strange assignment and the stone she called the “Old One.” I got up and went to get the tiny black river rock out of the pocket of my jeans. I brought it back to my chair and rubbed the smooth surface between my thumb and index finger as I remembered the startled faces of the three men I caught going through my Jeep. All three looked Hispanic, in their forties, plainly dressed in jackets and jeans. What on earth did they want with my book?

I ate my pies and I drank my tea. And as the quiet of the night and the fatigue of the day settled on me, I grieved the loss of my book. It was the only copy I had, all those hours given to it gone now, and for nothing.

Father Ignacio had been right. I was lonely. Right then, I yearned for the book like a lost love. I wanted to pick it up, to feel the smooth, cool deerskin cover. I tried to remember how many shrines I had mapped, which ones I had sketched. I went through the book in my mind, page by page, trying to see what I had written.

The names the father had given me were in the stolen book. One of them was the tract by Padre Martínez, I remembered that. But for the life of me, I could not remember the other name. I tried to remember it as I sat there, staring at nothing, twisting at the ends of my hair with my finger, unable to think of anything else for the moment. Or perhaps not wanting to think of anything else, grateful for the distraction.

Finally I got up and took my mug and the cloth towel to the sink and set them on the counter beside it. On the table was the paper towel I had taken off of the door. I held it up and read again the curious summons from Bennie. What did “Woman down” mean? I would have to find out tomorrow.