Indian Country Noir Read online

  "For you, Miss LaTerre," he said. "Compliments of Harry Garson."

  If she hadn't had so much coke and Dom in her system, Marissa might have listened to the alarm bells her street-smart former self, Morris Terry, was ringing as loudly as he could. But even then, it wouldn't have mattered. It was already half past too late. She couldn't have known that every stitch of clothing, every piece of jewelry, every wig and false eyelash, everything she owned was in the trunk of the stolen car and that she would soon be keeping her possessions company. She couldn't have known that the desk clerk at the hotel had been paid off to check her out and box up all of her worldly goods. It was only when she felt the ring of cold metal press against the back of her skull as she entered the car that Marissa finally heard Morris's alarm bells. With a flash, a snap, and a wisp of smoke, Marissa collapsed in a heap across the backseat.

  Harry Carson loved Tucson. He'd shot on location in Arizona about thirty times, but being here on his own and getting to step outside his own persona was a revelation. After the first few days wearing the Nagra recorder taped to his body, he'd learned to forget about it, and since he never knew where the film crew was, it was as if they weren't there at all. Somehow he felt, for the first time in his life, at home. In the past, on movie shoots, he'd always been a part of the crew and his exploration of the area tended to be of the local bars and brothels. Sure, there were a few times he and some of the other actors had taken their horses out into the surrounding mountains and desert when the day's shoot didn't involve Indian or battle sequences, but that too wound up being about someone having a few bottles and getting shickered. That's what Irv said the Yiddish word was for getting drunk.

  Irv These days, Harry found himself thinking a lot about his old agent. It was only with Irv that he had ever spoken about his Indian roots and his puzzlement over how he'd come to be raised by the sweet but clueless Garson family in northern Wisconsin. He knew his adoptive parents had been Lutheran missionaries, but they never spoke too much about it. They never spoke much about anything. What he remem bered most about his childhood was the silence of it.

  "I never felt a part of the life there," he'd confided to Irv.

  "Look, we're all members of a tribe."

  "Yeah, Irv, but what tribe?"

  Irv had just shrugged his shoulders. In Harry's seventyfive-plus years, it had been his one and only conversation on the subject. Now when Irv crossed his mind, Harry's thoughts inevitably turned to Marissa LaTerre. He was still pretty pissed at the fruitcake for abandoning him like she had and without a word. He tried figuring out why she'd done it and turned her back on the 10 percent he would have given her, but it was a waste of time and energy. Who could figure out someone like that? They couldn't even figure themselves out, Harry reasoned. Besides, the contracts had been signed; Harry having paid a C-note to a disbarred lawyer from the hotel to give the documents the once over to make sure they were in order. He'd done his studying up on Tucson and the Pima. For instance, he knew that Ira Hayes, one of the guys who held up the American flag at Iwo Jima, was a Pima Indian. That the name Tucson was taken from a Spanish bastardization of the O'odham name Cuk Son, meaning at the base of the black hill. He'd been an apt pupil and the second five-grand installment had been paid in full in cash.

  They'd flown him down to Tucson first class and set him up in a neat little adobe bungalow in the foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains. When the cab dropped him off, Harry found a 1980 Ford F150 pickup in the driveway with the keys in the ignition. It had been ten years since he'd driven, but with a little practice it all came right back to him. It was wonderful to be behind the wheel again, to feel in control of something other than his bodily functions. Driving, he thought, was like humping: it felt great no matter how rusty you were. He'd been supplied with property department ID of the best quality in the name of Ben Hart.

  Once or twice a week, he'd get documents of one sort or another delivered to the bungalow, and those deliveries were inevitably followed by phone instructions. They were usually about driving over to some federal building or municipal office in this county or that. He'd driven along the Salt, Gila, Yaqui, and Sonora rivers. He'd visited with tribal elders and councils and filed papers of every kind with every kind of bureaucrat-black-skinned, red-skinned, white-skinned, and just about every shade of skin in between. He'd stood in lines longer than the one at the Department of Motor Vehicles. He liked to laugh to himself that they were eventually going to ask for a urine sample, have him read an eye chart, and then give him some goddamn road test. No wonder they needed training films. This shit was confusing and stupifyingly boring. He could only imagine how much more boring it would have been had he actually had to read all the crap he was signing and filing.

  Still, it was worth it to Harry. Most days were his to spend as he pleased as long as he stayed in character. That was pretty easy, as he was a virtual stranger in Tucson. Even when his role didn't require him to do so, he'd take long drives in all directions. And that was another amazing thing about coming back to the Tucson area; Harry had somehow recovered his once impeccable sense of direction. Even when it let him down and he got lost, Harry looked at it as an opportunity to explore. Sometimes he'd head out at the dawn of the day and sometimes at dusk. The scenery and the landscapes were breathtaking, almost otherworldy. It was as if his eyes were reborn and could now see what he had missed or ignored during his many acting gigs. Duke Wayne once told him that if you live in the desert long enough, brown becomes just another shade of green. Only now did Harry see the truth of this. More than anything, he'd come to love the rich redness of the rock and soil, a shade not so different from the color of his skin as a young man. There was something comforting about it. From the moment he landed, Harry knew he fit here. He just didn't know how.

  There was a knock on the door and Mel Abbott shouted, "Come in!"

  "These must be them," Paul Spiegelman said, rubbing his palms together.

  The office door pushed back. A stocky Latino in blue spandex bicycle shorts, a wet Los Lobos T-shirt, a backpack, and a helmet stepped into the office and laid a fat envelope on Mel's desk. "Sign here." He pointed at the receipt.

  The pen shook in Mel's right hand. It took him so long to put his name down, it was like he was etching rather than signing.

  "Some time today would be nice, jefe," the messenger said, staring at his watch.

  Spiegelman smiled. Not Mel.

  "Here." Abbott shoved the receipt at the messenger. "What's the matter, you afraid you'll be late for your date with your chica?"

  The messenger snatched the receipt, balled a copy of it, and threw it in Mel's face. "I don't know about my chica, but your mama don't like me to be late. She dries up quick these days." He took his time leaving the office, not exactly fearing for his life.

  "Can you believe that motherfucker?" Mel said. But Spiegelman could barely contain his laughter. "Very funny, Paul. Very funny. Just shut up and give me the package."

  When he opened the envelope, Spiegelman started whistling "We're in the Money."

  "What should I do with all these fucking audio tapes we got from Harry?"

  "Toss 'em. I can't believe he still thinks he's being followed around by a camera crew. You gotta love actors!" Spiegelman said, then went back to whistling.

  Mel was already dialing Joey Pothole's number.

  There was a knock at Harry's door. He dreaded answering it. Not only because it was barely daylight, but because it had been five days since he had received a package of documents or a phone call. An actor, even one as old as dirt who hadn't worked for a decade and a half, knew when a shoot was winding down, and this shoot was definitely winding down. He hadn't wanted to think about it, but it couldn't be avoided any longer. The truth was that as much as he felt he belonged in Tucson, Harry wouldn't be able to afford to relocate here. Sure, it was all great now, but in the end it was an illusion, no more real than any of the other movies he'd been a part of. The house, the pickup, his groceries,
the utilities, his cable TV bill were all being paid for by the folks who cast him in the role. And as many cheese fries as fifty grand would buy him, it wouldn't go very far if he were responsible for the things the film people were footing at the moment. No, it was back to burgers, L.A., and cheap hotels for Harry. Who knew, he thought, maybe when he got back Marissa LaTerre would be back too and together they could rekindle Harry's career.

  But when he reluctantly pulled open the heavy, handcarved front door, it wasn't a UPS or Federal Express man who greeted him.

  "Can I help you?" he said to the impassive young Indian woman who stared at him across the threshold. She was quite pretty, with almond eyes, a broad nose, full lips, and a head of the blackest hair. In tight, faded jeans, a light denim blouse, and cowboy boots, she was dressed just like many of the young women in Tuscon.

  "My great-grandmother would like to speak with you. She's in my truck." The woman turned and pointed to a beat-up old Chevy in the dirt driveway next to Harry's Ford.

  "What's your name?"

  "Rebecca. Please come. She is very old and it is very hot in the truck."

  Harry followed Rebecca to the truck and there in the front seat sat a frail, ancient woman with hair as gray as her greatgranddaughter's was black. Her deep brown leathery skin was wrinkled and heavily lined. She looked familiar to him. He remembered seeing her, but not where or when. It might have been on his trip to the Gila River compound or maybe it was when he was standing on one of those endless lines in some county or federal office. As he was about to find out, it was less important that he remembered her than she remembered him. When Harry stepped up to the door, the woman held an old black-and-white photo out to him.

  "Isaac Hart," she said. "Your father."

  Looking at it, Harry nearly fainted. At thirty, Harry had been the spitting image of the man in the photograph.

  Mel Abbott and Paul Spiegelman sat across the table from the man who had acted as the buffer between them and the mining company. He was the man who had availed them of Joey Pothole's services and who had supplied them with the expense cash they needed to pull off the scam. He said his name was Walter Hogan. Con men themselves, neither Abbott nor Spiegelman-neither of whom were actually named Abbott or Spiegelman-believed him.

  "Do you have the package?" Walter asked.

  Mel's lip twitched. "I might ask you the same question."

  Walter placed an attache case on the table, flipped the latches, pulled the lid open, and spun the case around.

  "Five hundred large," Walter said. When Mel went to reach for a pile of bills, Walter slammed the attache closed. "This isn't the time to get sloppy or foolish. What were you going to do, fan a stack by your ear like some moron in a movie, or did you want to show off to the waitress?"

  ry "Sor "

  "And the other half?" Paul piped up.

  "When the documents check out. You'll get your percentage when the client starts pulling copper out of the ground. Now, don't make me ask again. The package."

  As Paul Spiegelman slid the fat envelope across the table to Walter, the man relaxed his grip on the attache case and smiled. "You sure everything's here?"

  "Everything," Mel said.

  "Everything," Paul chimed in. "Everything: a copy of the original birth certificate, the dummy contracts he signed, the original adoption papers, copy of the father's will, the deed on the house in Tucson in Ben Hart's name, a copy of the truck registration and insurance in his name, the tribal papers acknowledging Ben Hart's rightful heritage, the land deed that his father held on the acres your guys are going to mine. And, of course, the coup de grace: Ben Hart's will, which we wrote and he signed without a second look. In it, as per your instructions, he bequeaths all his assets to Robert T. Ramsland. A friend of yours, I imagine, who will no doubt turn right around and sell it to Francoeur Mineral and Mining."

  "A fair assumption," Walter agreed. "How did you get the guy to do all this?"

  "Shit, Walter, we even got the idiot to make its cosigners on his bank accounts, so we can draw out his money and give it back to you once he's dead. Actors are the easiest marks in the world! Jesus, they're so fucking narcissistic. Stroke 'em a little and they lay down like a two-buck whore. He probably never even read a single one of the documents. Besides, for him it was just a gig, a role."

  "Keep it," Walter said.

  "Keep what?"

  "The money in bank account, as a tip for a job well done." He actually shook both men's hands. "Good work, boys. Now I'm going to leave. Give me a ten-minute head start and then enjoy the rest of your lives!"

  Neither Mel nor Paul could figure out how they'd run out of gas this far short of Phoenix. They had filled up just before meeting with Walter outside of Palm Springs, but it was a moot point now. Help was here in the shape of a jeep pulling up behind their car. The tall, elegantly thin man with pocked skin shot Paul in the heart as he stepped out of the car. He put a second shot in the dying man's head as insurance. Mel ran. Joey didn't waste time chasing him. He was heading straight for the two holes he had already dug for them in the desert. First thing he did was put the attache case into the jeep.

  Now Harry Garson finally understood why he fit. He'd been born here and was of the Pima people, but he wouldn't be of them for very much longer if he didn't get a handle on what was going on. It occurred to him that Marissa LaTerre had probably not taken off of her own free will and that she had more than likely come to the end of the road prematurely and violently. Harry spent the rest of the morning and afternoon visiting many of the offices he had visited in the last few weeks, trying to collect copies of the documents he'd signed and blindly filed without taking a second look. And once he had gathered as much of the paperwork as he could, he made two last stops.

  While he drove back to the bungalow, a bungalow he was shocked to discover he owned free and clear, in a pickup truck he also owned free and clear, Harry ignored the thick envelope on the seat next to him and kept staring at the photograph of his biological father. Even after more than seventy-five years of life, it was an amazing feeling to fit in and to belong, to know your place in the world. Maybe all those years made it that much sweeter. Rebecca and the ancient woman, Issac Hart's youngest sister and Harry's aunt, explained that his father had fallen deeply in love with a teacher at the Indian school and had gotten her pregnant. He had wanted to marry her, but she refused. She'd had the baby, but disappeared a few weeks later. He had never stopped trying to find her and the child he had named Ben.

  "He worked hard to purchase many acres of land off tribal territory, so he could prove his worth to the teacher when she returned or he found her," Rebecca explained. "He never found her and she never returned, but in your father's will he left the land to you and your children. Until you returned, it was to be kept by the family. We were not allowed to sell it or use it. I have been told this story since I was a child. The fact that your father bought white land when he did has been a source of great pride for us, but I always thought it was only a story." It was no story and the proof was there on the seat next to Harry.

  It was dusk when he got back up to the little abobe house in the foothills, a place he had come to love. He also loved how the light of the vanishing sun lit up the sky with streaks of orange and purple, gold and blue. And although his eyesight wasn't great in the falling darkness without his glasses, he caught sight of the jeep parked across the road from his house. If he hadn't been looking for a strange vehicle, he probably wouldn't have spotted it, but after what he'd learned today, he expected it to be there. He rolled to the side of the road, reached into the envelope, and pulled out one particular document. He took his deep breaths, flicked up his famous on switch, put the truck back in gear, and pulled onto the dirt driveway. When he got out of the Ford, Harry held the document out in front of him like a shield. He had it all planned, the words he was going to say to save himself. Yet, now out of the truck, he decided not to speak. Harry Garson was an old man, too old to be fully transformed in
to Ben Hart at this late date. Belonging, being Ben Hart, son of Isaac Hart, even for only a few hours, had answered all the important questions that he'd kept locked up inside all these years. What he really hoped for was that the end wouldn't hurt too much when it came.

  The elegantly thin man with the pockmarked skin and cold fish eyes stood in the trashed living room and dialed the untraceable number Walter had given him. He had been thorough, making sure it looked like his target had walked in on a robbery, surprised the thief, and was shot to death in the process. Joey had even used a .45 on the old man, not the kind of weapon a professional killer would generally use.

  "You're fucked," Joey said when Walter finally picked up.

  "How's that?"

  Joey explained about the document the old Indian held when he got out of the truck.

  "He was holding a piece of paper in his hand, so what?"

  "It's a last will and testament," the assassin said, "a brandnew one, dated today."

  "Shit!"

  "Shit is right. He left the land to the tribe and some woman named Rebecca to do with as they please. I don't know how he managed it, but the will was witnessed by the mayor of Tucson and a tribal elder. He's got a Polaroid of the signing stapled to the will. You're fucked."

  "You said that already."

  "My money?"

  "You did your job. It'll be in your account in the morning."

  There was a click on the other end of the line.

  As Joey left, he took one last look at his victim to make sure everything was just so. And as he did, he thought he recognized the old Indian from a TV show he had watched as a kid.

  "Bearstein!" he whispered to himself. "Sorry, chief."

  Upper Peninsula, Michigan

  e was wearing a Western-style shirt, scarlet and black with a lot of gold piping, and one of those bolo string ties, and he should have topped things off with a broad-brimmed Stetson, but that would have hidden his hair. And it was the hair that had drawn her in the first place. It was a rich chestnut with red highlights, and so perfect she'd thought it was a wig. Up close, though, you could see that it was homegrown and not store bought, and it looked the way it did because he'd had one of those $400 haircuts that cost John Edwards the 2008 Iowa primary. This barber had worked hard to produce a haircut that appeared natural and effortless, so much so that it wound up looking like a wig.