Death Along the Spirit Road Read Online Free Page A

Hayes.”
    “Or Hoot Gibson.”
    They drove past summer hay, baled and waiting pick up from feed buyers in a five-state region. In most places of the country, the hay would have been a sign of prosperity for Indians, but here non-Indians farmed the bulk of the reservation. Indian reorganization of the last century had stripped most Lakota of land ownership. Most families’ paltry section of land was divided and subdivided through the decades until the average Indian on Pine Ridge owned one-one-hundredth of a section of the land his ancestors were deeded originally.
    “You know, not everything you see belongs to Whites. Some belongs to Oglala. That’s one of the reasons I decided to stay here.”
    “You ever want to leave? See what’s over the next hill?”
    “Once,” Willie answered. “Once I wanted to be an FBI agent. So I went to college in Vermillion right out of high school. Belted out my criminal justice requirements. I even filled out a federal application. But whenever I’d come back during break, I’d always hear dead elders calling me, like they wanted me to stick around. You ever get that feeling, that some lost soul was tugging at your arm, forcing you to return?”
    “Not really,” Manny lied.
    “Well, I’d get those feelings, like something digging at me, something was holding me tight and wouldn’t let me go.”
    Since crossing onto the reservation yesterday, something had tugged at Manny, too. He couldn’t identify it, and the gnawing persisted.
    “So now I’m enrolled at the Oglala Lakota College. Someday I’ll be an investigator with the tribe.”
    “So you don’t intend leaving the reservation like I did? Accept a cushy federal position with the bureau? Maybe the Marshals. There’s not many Indians in federal law enforcement. You could name your ticket.”
    Willie blushed, and Manny lightly touched his arm. “Don’t feel bad, I’ve heard it all before. Uncle Tomahawk. Apple Indian—Red on the outside and White on the inside. I’ve been called everything from a stinking bureaucrat to an out-and-out traitor to the Red race.”
    “I didn’t mean …”
    “Of course you didn’t,” Manny answered, and changed the subject. “How long have you been on the force?”
    “Be a year next month.” A grin lit Willie’s face. Manny had Willie’s enthusiasm for law enforcement—once. “With the college credits I already have, and some online work, I’ll have my bachelor’s within a year. Even though I’m the newbie, college will help when an investigator slot opens up.”
    As long as Lumpy isn’t the one deciding.
    There wasn’t a campus on Pine Ridge back then, in Manny’s college days as a tribal cop, and he had to drive to classes at Black Hills State in Spearfish twice a week. Lumpy had ridiculed him, taunted him, told him good cops didn’t need college. Even though Lumpy still had no education, his intelligence, combined with his ruthlessness and ability to play reservation politics, had allowed him to float to the top. Like a turd in a toilet.
    “I’ve been studying the old ways, too,” Willie volunteered. People told Manny things, all sorts of things, most times without his asking. His balding hair and potbelly dropped people’s guard and they opened up to him.
    “Who are you studying with?”
    “Margaret Catches.”
    “One of the Porcupine Catches whose dad was a holy man on the Rosebud?”
    “The same. She’s a true Winyan Wakan, perhaps one of the last of the sacred women here. My aunt Elizabeth studied the holy ways with Margaret. She had to give it up when her finance officer position got to be too many hours. Aunt Elizabeth is the only reason Margaret agreed to take me under her wing and teach me the old ways.”
    The old ways. Uncle Marion had taught Manny the old ways once, taught him the four Lakota virtues of bravery, fortitude, wisdom, and generosity, and breathed them daily. Unc believed that Lakota children chose their parents, not the other way