Текст книги "The Coyote"

Автор книги: Michael McBride

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 10 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

If that’s not proof of the frailty of the human condition, then I don’t know what is.

I listened until all was said and done and I was alone in the silent darkness, hardly even able to make myself breathe. Then, with a muffled crumpling sound and a click, it was all over. Mercifully. I felt the warmth of tears on my cheeks. The dispassionate nature of the deed was almost a posthumous insult to the victim, a violation even more repugnant than dipping a coyote's paw into the wounds, as though the man’s physical vessel were no more than a mere paint can. I looked at the readout to confirm that I had listened to the only file, then put the recorder back up on the ledge.

I think I would have preferred the rattle-less diamondbacks.

It didn’t take long to find the tunnel he must have used to drag the body in here after ending the recording. I wasn’t looking forward to crawling through another tunnel covered with the victim’s blood and dripping with copious amounts of coyote urine, but right now, I just really needed to get the hell out of here. I felt dirty and sick to my stomach, as though the very air inside the cave had absorbed the Coyote’s evil and it was leeching into my pores.

It was time to end this nightmare.

Permanently.

TWENTY-FOUR

I was waiting in the parking lot of the Tohono O’odham Community College when the first cars started to trickle in. I had managed to change clothes and wash my hands and face, but I still felt tainted by the night’s adventures. I could only imagine how I must have looked. Or smelled. Not that I really cared, mind you. At this point I was of singular focus and I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to find exactly what I was looking for inside.

It struck me at the second crime scene, before I even set off for the casino, that no man, no matter how long he had lived here or how long he had spent exploring the desert, would have the kind of precise geological knowledge that the Coyote possessed without some form of outside assistance. The kind of assistance that the United States Geological Survey supplied to anyone who had the gumption to get off his ass and look for it. The kind of assistance that was readily available to every federal agency, or for an agent trying to fly under the radar, or any private individual at just about any library on the face of the planet. Which was why the moment I saw the elderly woman approaching the doors to the college library with a set of keys in her hand, I was jogging straight up the walkway toward her.

The library itself wouldn’t rival most public branches I’ve been in. The law library at DU was probably at least twice the size of this one by itself, but I only needed to look at one thing, and I would have wagered a vital organ that they had it.

The librarian greeted me with a smile, despite the fact that I was a stranger creeping up behind her with the stench of death seeping from my pores. She had one of those faces that was a fulfillment of her aging process, not merely the result of it. She was warm and open and her smile was the kind I associated with freshly baked cookies. She was large, but wore the weight well. And for some ungodly reason, wore a shawl even though it had to be in the mid-nineties already. I believed in making snap judgments about people. They’d saved my life on more than one occasion. This was one of those rare people who reminded me why I do some of the horrible things I do. Right about now, that was exactly what I needed.

And she was helpful to boot. She could have led me straight to any number of geological surveys and topical maps, the kind bound in musty binders like carpet samples or rolled up in long dusty tubes. Instead, she took me down an aisle lined with books on archeology and anthropology that smelled of field use and to the reference room through the back door. She sat in front of one of the Gateway computers, which must have come as part of the donated set in the police station, and blew through a series of prompts and menus with the speed of a teenage hacker on Mountain Dew and methamphetamines.

“I have to be able to keep up with the kids these days,” she said in answer to the question I hadn’t posed. That way of thinking obviously didn’t extend to her wardrobe, but, then again, mine was starting to date me as well. She glanced back at me and smiled. “Can’t let them think they can do all of their learning on Wikipedia, you know.” She winked. “Here’s what you’re looking for. Kind of a popular subject lately.”

She rose from the chair with the grace of a woman half her size and gestured for me to take it.

“How so?”

“You aren’t the first to come looking for these maps. How do you think I knew exactly where to go?” She patted me on the shoulder. “It’s nice to see so many people taking an interest in their heritage. Won’t be long before it’s entirely assimilated. Did you know only ten percent of our youth can speak our native O’odham language?”

“What’s that about our heritage?”

“The Hohokam, of course. They are our roots. They are the ones Elder Brother brought up from the underworld with him.”

“Elder Brother?”

“I’itoi. Elder Brother. The Pima call him Se:he. He also graced us with the gift of the Himdag, the guidelines that allow us to remain in balance with nature and the world around us. He is the Man in the Maze. You see his design throughout the southwest. You even walked right underneath it when you entered the library.” She winked again. She was one of those few people who could pull it off. “It seems to me you have a whole lot more research to do before you even begin looking for the mystical underworld of lore.”

“Who else has been looking?”

“A good number of people. Mostly students, although I suspect they’re looking for some things the smugglers might have hidden. You know…” She leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially. “…drugs.”

I nodded sagely to let her know that I appreciated the gravity of her statement.

“I’m hunting for something altogether different.”

“Oh, I understand. A handsome, clean-shaven young man like you? I wouldn’t have pegged you for a criminal. I’m sure you’re looking for the same thing as Chief Antone, aren’t you?”

“The chief looked at these maps, too?”

I tried to keep the surprise out of my voice, but she caught it. She now appraised me with a skeptical eye. Her smile dimmed and the deep lines of age advanced in its stead.

“I knew your father, you know,” she said, and turned away. “Trouble followed that boy like a coyote. Always nipping at his heels. You’re just like him, aren’t you? You’ve got that good in you—I can see it—but you’ve got that coyote following you too. Kindly don’t bring it in here with you. We have enough coyotes of our own. A whole nation full of them anymore.”

And just like that, her smile returned.

“Rafael was always one of my favorites. He was curious about every little thing. Always wanted to learn what was out there beyond the desert. He and that brother of his. Roman. Two peas in a pod they were. Shame they let something so silly get between them. I cried when I heard he’d moved on from this world. I always knew he’d end up dancing in the sky.” She dispelled the sadness from her voice with a sigh. “I’m just glad you finally decided to investigate your roots.”

I smiled at her. I didn’t know what to say. Obviously, telling her that I had little interest in a culture that seemed strange and alien to me was the wrong thing. I was simply on information overload. The chief already investigating the sub-Sonoran geology. My father and trouble nipping at his heels. Students looking for buried cartel caches. An obscure creator god who kept cropping up out of the blue. Elder Brother. It was my father’s elder brother whose son was out there right now, killing people on the open desert and absconding with their bodies.

And here I had thought I was the one nipping at the Coyote’s heels.

I heard voices from the front of the library.

“Let me know if you need any more help.” She placed her hand on my arm and I had the urge to place mine on top of it. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

I nodded. The sincerity in her voice rendered me speechless. Maybe there was a part of me that felt as though something was missing from my life, a void I had attempted to fill with my work. Friedrich Nietzsche said that if you gaze long enough into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. Every time I turned my eyes inward, I found the Coyote looking back at me.

She was nearly out the door before I found my voice.

“How did you know who I was?”

She smiled and winked.

“You have your father’s eyes.”

And then she was gone, leaving me alone with the computer and a maelstrom of thoughts that positively made my head spin. I had to focus on the task at hand, though. And right now that task was tracking down a serial killer who was lurking somewhere out there in the mythical underworld of the Hohokam.

I plugged my USB drive into the computer and began downloading the information as I scrolled through it. There were several different types of map. From the simple two-dimensional topographical to the three-dimensional digital elevation models and everything in between. While both would undoubtedly help in my search, it was the ancillary material that was of the utmost importance. Landsat 7, a polar, sun-synchronously orbiting satellite controlled by a joint effort between the USGS and NASA, was equipped with specialized instrumentation that allowed it to provide more than mere superficial imaging. The ground-penetrating radar was capable of mapping up to sixty feet beneath the surface with surprising accuracy, while the magnetometer analyzed and mapped the composition of the strata based on discrete magnetic properties distinct to every kind of soil and rock. In essence, one showed you where to find the underground cave you were looking for; the other showed you where to dig in order to reach your destination via the route of least resistance.

A cursory glance essentially proved my theory. The mountains were pretty much riddled with subterranean formations, while the open desert was essentially solid earth beneath the sand. It wasn’t much, but it was nice to finally be right about something.

I pulled the storage device and slipped it back into my pocket. I could download the maps onto my laptop without arousing any suspicion and further evaluate them away from prying eyes.

But first, there were a couple of people I needed to track down.

I exited the research room and walked straight toward the front door. The librarian was busy helping people at the main counter while a girl I assumed to be her student aide unpacked her backpack and clipped on her name badge.

I stopped in the foyer and stared up above the front door toward the pinnacle of the vaulted ceiling. Nestled into the inverted V was a round textile woven on a loom by hands that had undoubtedly turned to dust long ago. It was created in the yellows and reds and browns of the Sonoran sands themselves. A red stick figure stood in the mouth of a large circular maze that reminded me of those old plastic party favors you had to tilt to guide the miniature BB into the slot in the center.

I’itoi. Elder Brother. We meet at last.

I glanced back to find the librarian watching me. She smiled and nodded.

I returned the gesture and pushed through the glass doors into dry air that felt as though it had been superheated in a blast furnace.

TWENTY-FIVE

Chief Antone’s car wasn’t in the lot at the station when I arrived, so I sat across the street and waited for a few minutes. I watched Louis of the plastic cup working at the closer of the two desks and a woman I assumed to be Olivia manning the phones at the front counter while several people I didn’t know milled around the lobby. They both looked harried, but that was the status quo at every police station around the world. The difference was written in the impotent expressions on their faces and the way they repeatedly glanced at their watches. They had expected some sort of help that had yet to arrive. I figured the chief had probably belatedly heard about the craziness of the previous night and was out at the crime scene now. He was undoubtedly pretty upset with me for not passing along the news as soon as I heard it. As far as I was concerned, that made us even. I had a few choice words to share with him about the research he had done that could have been extremely beneficial to me had he not kept it to himself. And I wanted to know why he had done so. He was hiding something and I intended to find out what it was.

I figured I had some time to kill before the chief returned, so I decided I would pay a call on my good old Uncle Roman. This whole I’itoi thing wasn’t sitting right with me. It could be entirely coincidental, but I’m sure I’ve made my views on that subject perfectly clear. Somehow that myth was connected to this case and the Coyote had made sure to point it out at every turn with the metaphorical recreation of the ascension of the Hohokam from the underworld and the petroglyphs. And who had led them but one mischievous creator god they affectionately referred to as Elder Brother.

Roman was sitting out on the porch, smoking, when I turned down his driveway. I pulled in right behind his truck, leaned across the seat, and popped the passenger side door for him without waiting for the cloud of dust to settle.

“Let’s go for a ride,” I said.

Roman walked straight to the car and climbed in, his face devoid of expression. He had a bottle of Coors Light in his hand, despite the early hour. He didn’t say a word. He just closed the door and reclined the seat so that he had room for his long legs. His braids had begun to fray and the skin on his face had noticeably paled. I recognized stress when I saw it.

I also recognized guilt.

I headed back down the driveway and turned right, away from Sells.

“How long have you known?”

He was silent for a long moment before he finally spoke.

“I didn’t know. Not for sure anyway.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was hoping I was wrong. You know? He’s my son.”

I waited for him to elaborate, but he said nothing more. Not for another five miles or so down the gravel road into the open desert. There was a little white cross staked to the side of the road. The flowers strung around it were withered and desiccated.

“Turn right here.”

I didn’t have to ask why. We both knew where we were going.

I slowed and turned onto some sandy ruts that hardly qualified as a road. I could see the foot-shaped impressions in the matted brown grass of the center stripe where walkers had jumped over the ruts to avoid leaving clear prints. A stratified butte stood off to my left in the distance, a constant reminder of a long gone age when this land of sand and sun had been under the sea. The western horizon was ridged with the Ajo Mountain Range where Randall had led me to the second crime scene. In between, there was a whole lot of nothing. Pitchfork saguaros. A ribbon of mesquites and naked cottonwoods marked the passing of a vaporized stream. A ridge like the vertebrae of a skeletal snake from which cacti and yellow palo verdes grew. A glimmer ahead and to my left; a reflection of the sun from the manmade object I was sure was my destination.

I watched it grow larger as we neared until it took form from the sand. It was a formerly white mobile home painted a mottled reddish-brown with dust. There were tumbleweeds tangled in the skirt. Piles of rocks marked where animals had tried to tunnel under it. The wooden front porch leaned toward the stairs leading up to it. An old television antenna dangled over the side by its wires. I could faintly see orange curtains through the dust on the windows.

I coasted to a stop twenty feet from the front porch and waited for the dust to wash over the car from behind. We sat in silence with the engine idling. I studied the trailer home while he stared blankly out the passenger side window.

“We used to live here together. Once upon a time. Just the two of us. Seems like so long ago now. I haven’t been out here in probably close to a year.”

“He lives here alone now?”

“Last I knew, anyway. Ever since my parents died and I moved into their house.”

“Where did he live before that?”

“Had a place in Why for a while. Another in Sells. Did a spell down in Lukeville. Across the border in Sonoyta. I don’t know exactly what he was looking for, but he never did find it.”

“Why didn’t things work out with the Border Patrol?”

“How long do you think any O’odham would last with a gang of thugs like that? They treat us like dogs. Worse. Like we’re somehow the enemy. Like it’s our fault these traffickers are abusing our land and forcing them to be out here protecting us. Like we’re weak for not protecting ourselves.”

I nodded. What could I say?

I opened my door and climbed out. The day was strangely quiet. I couldn’t hear a single car engine or airplane. No rustling of the breeze through the shrubs. It was as if the world itself had stopped turning.

Roman closed his door and walked around the hood to join me.

“You still have the key to that thing?”

He patted the front pocket of his jeans in response.

“Mind opening her up?”

Had he declined, I could have obtained a search warrant without much difficulty. I also could have just kicked the door in, but I would have had a hard time explaining that with a witness standing right here next to me.

He probably figured it was best to just open it up and be done with it. Or maybe he was curious himself. I suppose Frankenstein had been fascinated by the monster he had inadvertently created, too.

Roman’s footsteps echoed from beneath the wooden stairs and porch. Rusted nails creaked in their moorings. The keys jingled as he found the right one and slid it into the lock. He turned the key until it made a clicking sound.

“Okay.” I drew my pistol. “Step away from the door.”

He nodded and backed up against the railing. I knew there was no one inside, but that didn’t necessarily mean it was empty. I sighted down the Beretta, took hold of the latch with my left hand, threw open the door, ducked to the side, and pressed my back against the trailer.

The door banged against the opposite side of the frame and shivered back toward me.

No gunshots. No explosions. No shouting. No snakes. No nothing.

Just a smell that told me no one had lived here in quite some time.

It was dark inside, save for the thin strip of light that slanted across the room from the open doorway. My shadow stretched across carpet worn bare in spots and thick with dirt and dust. I eased cautiously across the threshold, leading with my pistol, and toggled the light switch with my elbow. Once. Then again.

Nothing.

Fortunately, I was becoming accustomed to this scenario and drew the Maglite from my pocket. I shined it backhanded into the room with my left, braced my right forearm on top of it, and advanced into the main room.

I took in my surroundings as quickly as possible.

A half-wall to my right. Beveled rails. The kitchen beyond. Single doorway to my left. Bathroom. Hallway. Dark room at the very end. Bedroom. Doorway to the right of it. Presumably another bedroom. No sign of movement.

Buzzing sound. Flies?

The smell. Something rotting. Garbage, not decomposition. Spoiled food.

Definitely flies. Crawling on the refrigerator, swirling over the sink.

Another step. A creak from the floorboards. I exhaled slowly to steady my nerves. Glanced back at Roman on the porch. Elder brother was the wild card. I didn’t like him behind me with the unknown ahead.

The furniture: threadbare and old. Seventies-style fabric. Wood showing through the armrests. A recliner chair with broken springs. Coffee table; chipped lacquer, stained with rings. Television; dark, small. No pictures hanging on the faux wood paneling. Cobwebs draped from the ceiling, meeting at the broken light fixture. Back window, boarded and braced with an empty bookcase.

Another step. Creak. Hollow space below.

Glance back. Roman still on the porch, nose crinkled. His expression: revulsion. Resignation.

Turn back to the kitchen. Sweep the light. Patina of dust and grime on the table. Two chairs, duct-taped vinyl. Linoleum floor, orange and gold, peeled away from exposed, water-stained wood near the sink. Brimming with rusted pots. Two more steps. Roiling cloud of flies. Cupboard beneath open, overflowing trash can, the source of the smell. Cross into the kitchen, sight down my pistol from left to right. Clear. Cabinets closed; too small to hide inside anyway. Refrigerator—squeal—ugh. Rotten mold, cheese. A puddle of lettuce, fruit? Grape skeleton. Slam the door closed. Turn around.

Roman standing in the main doorway, silhouetted against the brilliant daylight, hand over his mouth.

Walk quickly across the living room. Kick in the half-bathroom door. Grime-stained sink. Toilet open. Cracked mirror. The door struck the inner wall, rebounded, closed again. Move on.

Hallway. No pictures. Crevices in the ceiling. Broken fixture. Glass shards from the shattered bulb on the carpet.

Bedroom to the right. Boarded window. No bed. Bookcase in the corner. No books. Closet door, open. Empty.

Hallway again. Glance back. Roman in the entryway. Turn away. Two more steps. Kick in the main bathroom door. Plastic tub, cracked, ringed with grunge and rust. No head on the shower. No curtains or rings. Sink. Medicine cabinet, triangular shards of broken mirror lining the edges of the face, reflecting my flashlight beam. The smell? Christ. Nothing I want to see.

Back out. Peek over my shoulder. Roman in the main room, looking around as though walking into an unfamiliar place.

Master bedroom. Mattress on the floor. Stained. Crumpled sheet. Pillow, no case. Brown bottles. Scorpions skittered across the room toward the open closet, vanished into the shadows. Dark, imitation walnut paneling, chipped and faded. Crumpled plastic dropcloth in the corner. Black and crusted. Smell of rot. Not garbage this time. Decomp. Light fixture, gone. Nothing but wires. Spider webs; hairy occupants the size of my hand.

Step into the room.

Creak. Creak.

Stomp on the floor.

Thoom.

Hollow.

Glance back at Roman, his eyes awash in shadows, tears glistening on his cheeks.

Creak. Creak.

Chase away the darkness in the closet with my light.

Creak. Creak.

Bare shelf. Two wire hangers on the rack. One plastic. Zero scorpions.

Creak. Creak.

Edge of carpet, curled up in the corner. Smell of decomp stronger.

Creak. Creak.

Glance back. Roman, out of sight. Damn it.

Closet again. Stomp.

Thoom.

The floorboards shuddered underfoot. Stomp the curled carpet in the back corner. No crunching or squishing sounds. Grab the carpet, yank it back.

The smell hit me so hard I had to cover my mouth and nose with the bend of my left elbow. A gap in the floorboards. Easy enough to slide to the side with my foot, exposing the dark area beneath the trailer and contained by the skirt.

I shined my light down there and the brown scorpions raced away, clicking and clacking.

Even though I had a good idea of what I would find, I was unprepared for what I saw.

“Christ...”