Whitehorse Part 10

The idiot in the headdress bent over Johnny so his breath rushed over his face, smelling like gasoline. "You don't dress like no d.a.m.n Injun. Where's your loincloth and wolf teeth? You do speak white man's English, don't you? Wanna say somethin', Cochise? Ug?"

"Hey, Howard," the cameraman yelled. "Put your headdress on him and I'll get a picture of you two together."

Howard dragged the bonnet from his head, prepared to do just that. Johnny grabbed it, crus.h.i.+ng the fragile feathers in his fingers as he slowly stood up, towering over the squat man who stumbled back, his grin sliding from his face.

"Hey, you broke my..." Howard licked his lips and glanced around. The room had become suddenly silent as the patrons all stared, antic.i.p.ating Johnny's reaction. "What's ever'body staring at? Geez, we're just having a little fun here. That's why we came here, ain't it? To look at the Injuns?"

Randy Moorhouse appeared from nowhere, sliding in between Johnny and the tourist. "Do we have a problem here, Mr. Whitehorse?"

"Seems one of your customers has had a little too much to drink, Randy."

"Sorry about that, Johnny." Randy shot a look at the nervous tour guide, who had frozen in her shoes the moment Johnny got out of his chair. "Carrie, you want to do something about the gentleman? And you, no photos, please." He pointed to Howard's friend.

The man looked at his camera, then back at Johnny. "I'll pay him ten bucks for a picture with my wife so we've got a snapshot of her with a real Indian."

"I don't think so," Randy replied, wagging his finger at the camera.

"Twenty bucks, but he's got to wear the war bonnet."

"Johnny?" Leah laid her hand on Johnny's arm. "There is something to be said for tolerating ignorance. Your grandfather once said that such tolerance helps to make you wiser and stronger."

He turned his back on Randy and the tourists, trying his best to ignore the explosive stab of anger and intolerance gouging at his raw mood. Like those years before, Leah's calmness slid around him like a cool blanket of crystalline water. How many times had he grasped that gentleness, that understanding, that acceptance she offered in a touch of her hand or a smile of her lips, and clung to it while his anger and frustration sent him on an emotional riptide. Had it not been for Leah those years ago he would have wound up in prison-a confused and furious young Native American like so many of his peers-fighting against a white man's establishment and prejudice that had destroyed their pride and future so many generations ago.

Her hand still on his arm, Leah smiled. "Think of who and what you are. What you've become. What you can and will stand for. Is punching him in the nose worth losing all of that? Besides, we both know you'll hate yourself in the morning."

He took her hand from his arm, folding his fingers around it. "Come home with me," he said.

Her eyes widened, her lips parted. For an instant he was again looking down into a girl's eyes full of intense love, and the wing beats of memories fanned his anger into a much hotter flame, an inferno compared to his desire to pulverize a white man's face. But then...

She stepped away, taking her hand and burying it in the folds of her sundress skirt. "Can't." She lowered her eyes. "Sam..."

Johnny raised his gaze to the used-car salesman with his tacky tie and sweating scalp, standing in the background with his pudgy hands on his pudgy hips, his pocket full of napkins Johnny had signed for his no doubt pudgy daughters back in Austin.

Randy slapped a hand on Johnny's shoulder. "Sorry about all this, Johnny. You know what they're like sometimes. They don't mean anything by it. He'll wake up with a hangover tomorrow and feel like a jerk. Look, I'm picking up the tab for this party-"

"I don't want your f.u.c.king charity," Johnny snapped, and dragged his wallet out of his back jeans pocket, fingered out a stack of hundred-dollar bills and tossed them on the table.

He needed air. Desperately.

Where the h.e.l.l was Dolores?

Turning his back on Leah, Johnny made his way out of the restaurant and stood for a moment on the front porch, allowing the night air to chill the heat from his face.

A group of eight young Native American boys, barely into their teens, gathered in the parking lot beneath a vapor streetlight, dancing in a circle while another pounded on a drum and chanted. Their young faces were painted in stripes of colors. They wore cloaks of eagle feathers over their shoulders and down their arms, which did little to conceal their tee s.h.i.+rts, jeans, and Nikes.

Around them gathered smiling tourists, cameras popping with light and whirring videocams zooming in on the children's faces, which looked older than they should.

The dance ended. The boys bowed, heads down, eyes down, shoulders bent, and fists hidden beneath their feathers as the onlookers tossed coins at their feet. The boys fell to their knees, scrambling to grab the glittering nickels and dimes and quarters, causing the tourists to laugh louder.

"Hey, Mr. Whitehorse." The valet moved out of the shadows, his hands in his pockets. "If you're looking for Ms. Rainwater, she's out in her car."

Johnny moved down the steps, shoved his way through the tourists, and grabbed a boy by the scruff of the neck, jerking him to his feet so hard the coins in the boy's hands sprayed across the asphalt.

"What the fu-"

"Shut up and listen to me." Johnny shook the boy and looked around at the others, all frozen in the process of stuffing their pockets with change. "Don't ever go on your knees for a nickel or a dime or a quarter. Don't ever go on your knees for nothing or no one. Remember who you are and what you stand for."

The boy twisted away and stumbled back, his look of anger exaggerated by the paint on his cheeks and brow. "Look who's talking. Johnny Whitehorse. Johnny Whitehorse. Big man who lives in big houses away from his people. You're nothing but an apple. Red man on the outside, white man on the inside. What do Big man who lives in big houses away from his people. You're nothing but an apple. Red man on the outside, white man on the inside. What do you you stand for? What stand for? What are are you? No Apache, that's for sure. You walk in the white man's world now. you? No Apache, that's for sure. You walk in the white man's world now. Tu no vale nada Tu no vale nada-you are good for nothing." He spat on the ground, then motioned to the others. Silently, they turned their backs on Johnny and walked off into the dark.

The tourists filed into the restaurant, leaving Johnny standing alone beneath the buzzing vapor light, coins s.h.i.+mmering around his feet.

NINE.

Dolores sat in the pa.s.senger seat of the Mercedes, the car door open as Johnny moved across the parking lot, focusing more on the sick feeling of disgust in his stomach than the fact that a man was swiftly walking away from the car, dissolving into the shadows beyond the deserted highway.

Music from the band drifted along the parked cars, the ba.s.s drum like a heartbeat tapping at the night as Johnny moved up to the SL where Dolores was hunkered over, so intent on what she was doing she did not hear him.

A mirror compact lay open on her lap, several threads of white powder lined up side by side on the gla.s.s. With a clear gla.s.s straw she snorted the cocaine up one nostril, then the other, her groan of pleasure like a sigh of s.e.xual gratification.

Johnny closed his eyes. No, no, he wasn't going to jump to any conclusions here. He was not seeing Dolores Rainwater snorting powder into her brain- "What the h.e.l.l are you doing?" he heard himself ask.

Her head flew around and she stared up at him, her nose dusted with powder and her eyes like gla.s.s reflecting the distant streetlight. "Oh. This ... this isn't what it looks like-"

"You idiot. You stupid-" He grabbed the straw from her hand and knocked the compact from her lap. It landed on the asphalt, scattering the remainder of powder over the mirror. He ground his boot heel into the gla.s.s, pulverizing it as he crushed the straw in his hand, slivers of gla.s.s biting into his flesh like stinging ants.

Dolores stared at the scattering of white powder and gla.s.s on the ground. "Look what you've done. How dare you. Do you know how much that cost?"

Grabbing her purse, open by her legs, Johnny dumped it on the ground, spilling makeup, credit cards, chewing gum, and a tiny plastic bag of more powder. Dolores flung herself onto it, s.n.a.t.c.hing it up and clutching it to her stomach as she turned on him, face twisted, teeth showing behind her smeared lipstick.

"You self-righteous son of a b.i.t.c.h. How dare you come strutting out here and proceed to demean me when I just left you in there wrapped up with Miss Goody Two-shoes like you were a couple of teenagers with the hots for one another. You're a hypocrite, Whitehorse. A two-timing egomaniac who thinks he was put on this earth to save the whole Indian nation. Well I've got news for you. You're nothing. You're not an Indian and you're not a white man. You're an ... it it with a d.i.c.k between your legs." with a d.i.c.k between your legs."

"Keep your voice down, dammit, and get in the car."

"Get your hands off of me." She kicked at his s.h.i.+ns and struck at his face as he shoved her back into the car and threw her purse in her lap. Slamming the door, Johnny dug the keys from his pocket and moved around the car, glancing at the restaurant where the valet was still standing, hands in his pockets, looking out at them as if not knowing, exactly, how to deal with the fact that Dolores Rainwater was screaming profanities like a drunken sailor.

Johnny gunned the accelerator and the Mercedes jumped like a cat onto the highway, spitting gravel, tires squealing, back end fishtailing onto the opposite lane, causing a trucker to swerve onto the shoulder and blow his horn. The cold night wind hit them with a blast that made Johnny catch his breath, but no way was he going to stop and put up the ragtop, not now.

Dolores crawled onto her knees, face in the wind. He grabbed at her arm. "Sit down, Dolores, and put on your seatbelt."

She stared at him, her hair plastered against one side of her face. "You're still in love with her, aren't you?" she yelled.

"Sit down-"

"I knew it the moment you saw her tonight. It was written all over your face. You want her. You want to be with her. Despite the fact that you intend to destroy her father." She threw back her head in laughter. "I hope I'm around to see her face when you prove that her father is up to his a.s.s in casino corruption. I wonder how eager she'll be then then to dance with you, much less f.u.c.k you." to dance with you, much less f.u.c.k you."

He grabbed for her arm; the car swerved, right tires slithering off the shoulder then back on again.

Dolores reached under the seat and withdrew an envelope. She waved it at him. "Just how badly do you want to prove that Senator Foster is corrupt, Johnny, honey? What's it worth to you?"

"What's that?"

"Information from my source. Proof that Foster is linked to Formation Media."

He stared at the envelope, forgetting, momentarily, the winding road ahead. Was this some sort of perverted joke?

Dolores slid down into the seat, her smile turning smug. "Well? What's it worth to you, Johnny?"

"That depends on the price," he shouted.

"That you never see or speak to Leah again. That you announce to the papers tomorrow that you and I are going to get married. And then you're going to call your agent and ask that he take me on as a client-as a personal favor to you, of course."

The car came out of nowhere, its bright lights suddenly reflecting off the rearview mirror, into Johnny's eyes. He hit the mirror with the b.u.t.t of his palm, a sign to the inconsiderate driver to dim his lights. No chance. The car moved up behind him, inches from his b.u.mper.

Both hands on the wheel, Johnny glanced at Dolores. She had turned to look back at the car, her expression less dazed and angry now than suspicious.

"Put on your seatbelt," he yelled. "Now."

"What the h.e.l.l do they think they're doing?"

"Put it on!"

She fumbled with the belt, yanking on it as it locked at her shoulder.

The car rammed them, slamming Dolores against the pa.s.senger door. Johnny fought with the wheel, keeping the car from weaving into oncoming traffic.

He checked his speed. Sixty. Sixty-five- He knew every bend in the road, how fast he could take the curves-lots of practice in his father's old truck, pus.h.i.+ng it to its endurance until it shuddered so hard he thought it would fall apart around him.

Seventy-couldn't push it much more than that, not with the sharp bend coming up-no way he could make it at seventy-the lights flooded the SL as the car roared up behind them again, slamming into them, filling the night and the close forest with the sounds of crunching metal-no warning this time, the son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h meant business-Dolores still fighting with the G.o.dd.a.m.n seatbelt- The car moved up beside him-a bulky, black thing with black windows-it careened against him, bouncing the Mercedes sideways, toward the shoulder that dropped off into nothingness.

He hit the brakes just as the demon car slammed him again, metal grating against metal with a shriek like fingernails on a blackboard, whining like an animal in pain. Then it hit him, the reality, that they were going over the side, airborne, floating momentarily like an eagle, car slowly rotating, rolling like a lazy old cat that might have tumbled from a tree limb while napping. Dolores screamed, her hands outstretched toward him-

The night gyrated with firelight and shadows, flames sluicing along trails of gasoline, s.h.i.+mming up the trunks of trees, lapping hungrily at the thick brown pine needles carpeting the ground.

Horn blaring, the Mercedes lay like some dead armored armadillo on its back, burning wheels resembling bonfires sending up acrid black smoke that formed a cloud close to the ground. The crumpled metal groaned and popped with the escalating heat. There came a hissing, like a snake, as if the machine were breathing its last- The explosion shook the ground. Sparks streaked into the sky and trees, drifting like dandelion fluff over the thatches of weeds and thistle before dying out. Hot waves radiated across the ground in a rush like heat from a suddenly opened oven.

Shamika had left the front door of the house open. Light and music from a Sesame Street Sesame Street CD spilled through the old screen door, forming a dim yellow box on the orange front porch where Leah and Sam stood, thanking each other for a wonderful evening. CD spilled through the old screen door, forming a dim yellow box on the orange front porch where Leah and Sam stood, thanking each other for a wonderful evening.

"It's early yet," Sam said, checking his watch. "We could still make that movie if we hurry."

"Perhaps another time." Leah smiled and tugged her sweater more closely around her shoulders. "Besides, I need to spend a little time tonight with my son."

Sam looked around her, into the house. "I'm real good with kids, you know."

"Are you?"

"Heck, I got this way of communicating with them. Guess 'cause I'm nothing but a big kid myself at heart. Your boy play sports?"

"No." She shook her head.

"One of those intellectual types, huh? Probably spends his time on a computer."

Leah looked around, into the house. She could hear water running. Shamika walked out of Val's bedroom, his pajamas tossed across her shoulder as she moved toward the bathroom, singing along with Bert and Ernie.

"I really should go, Sam. Shamika is getting Val ready for his bath."

"I'm real good at giving kids baths." He smiled into her eyes, and Leah realized that the aspect of returning to his efficiency apartment to watch television on this Friday evening when the rest of the single world was humming with activity was as appealing to him as a stomachache. She knew the feeling all too well. The emptiness. The sounds of clocks ticking in the silence. The hours that dragged on, measured by late movies and reruns of Andy Griffith Andy Griffith and and I Love Lucy. I Love Lucy.

Leah smiled back. "All right, Sam. Maybe it's time for you to meet my son."

He hitched up his pants and slapped his hands together as Leah reached for the screen door.

Shamika came out of the bathroom, drying her fingers on a towel emblazoned with Cookie Monster. She stopped in her tracks when seeing Leah and Sam, hands falling still amid the terry folds of the towel. "Hi," she said. "You're back early." She looked around Leah, and smiled at Sam. "I was just getting Val ready for bed."

"Then we're just in time," Leah replied, removing her sweater and tossing it over the back of a chair. She kicked off her shoes and walked barefoot toward Val's bedroom. "Coming, Sam?"

Sam, the used-car salesman with two normal teenage kids back in Austin fell in behind her, rolling up his sleeves, relaying his girls' escapades in the bathtub-how Debbie once poured so much Mr. Bubble into the water she'd filled up the entire bathroom with suds, and Lynda, the little minx, locked herself in the bathroom when she was only two and the water was running in the tub. They'd been forced to replace the carpet, not to mention remove the lock from the door.

Valentino Starr lay on his bed, naked but for his diaper, his legs twisted into odd curvatures due to the rigidity of his muscles. He let out a squeal when he saw her, and his arms floundered helplessly in an attempt to reach out to her. His blue eyes twinkled and he smiled with only one side of his face.

"Mama home!" he yelled.

"Yes, mama is home!" She grabbed his face and kissed his cheek.

He squealed again, and managed to turn his head, pressing his lips against her cheek. "Mama hold me?"

"Mama's going to bathe you."

"Val no bathe. Val rather stink."

"No Val of mine is going to stink." She tweaked his nose, then blew a raspberry against his stomach. He squirmed and bucked, filling the tiny room with laughter.

Leah slid her arms under his shoulders and lifted his upper body slowly, giving his rigid muscles time to gradually relax so he could bend at the waist and sit up. His head fell back onto her shoulder as she wrapped her arms around his chest for support. Only then did she look up at Sam.

Standing in the door, he stared at her with a look of shock and despair.