The Highwayman: A Longmire Story (Walt Longmire #11.5)(27)

We finally gave up and headed north, coming to rest at the Cee Nokuu Café at the Wind River Casino, where we filled our stomachs with Indian tacos and iced tea. “She’s probably dead.”

The Cheyenne Nation shrugged, taking the last sip of his tea and standing. “I have one more secret weapon that I am about to employ. Stay here.”

“Okay.” I finished my meal and waited, getting a free refill from the machine and sitting back down in time for Henry to reenter. “She is in the next room.”

“Who?”

“Theona Womack.” He gestured to the wall to our left. “They have Blue-Hair-Charity-Slots for Tots in the event room on Thursday mornings here at the casino. They are almost done, but I will warn you that she is not alone.”

? ? ?

“How are you, Bucket?”

“I’m fine, you old bat, how are you?” She snickered, and I was starting to get a feel for how you dealt with Kimama Bellefeuille. Pulling a chair out for Theona, I was careful pushing it back in, afraid I would break the seemingly mummified woman if I wasn’t careful. Theona made Kimama look like a spring chicken.

The Bear sat beside her, holding her hand and speaking low in Arapaho, which left me out of the equation. I turned and looked at Kimama as she sipped a Dr Pepper from a can with a straw. “How much did you win?”

She flapped a hand in dismissal. “I lost seventeen dollars.”

“I thought you could see the future?”

“I can, and I saw myself losing eighteen dollars, so I made out all right. Besides, it’s all for charity.” She sipped her soda some more, and her dark eyes glistened. “I heard the flat-hat went swimming.”

“She did.”

“I heard you did, too.”

“Yep.”

“Did it cool you off?”

“Yep.”

“Did he try and warm you back up?”

I stared at her. “What?”

“Heeci’ecihit, when you met him, did he try to warm you?”

I thought about the delusions I’d had last night, having convinced myself that that was what they were. “What are you talking about?”

Without a moment of hesitation, she reached an arthritic finger out and tapped the coin in my shirt pocket with a fingertip that felt like wood. “You saw him.”

I was astonished that not only did she know I had the coin, but she knew exactly where it was. I stumbled for a response. “I . . . I’m not sure what I saw.”

She nodded her head and smiled at the surface of the table. “You are not the first to see him, Bucket.”

“Have you seen him?”

She ignored me and began listening to the conversation going on at the other side of the table. After a while she readjusted herself on her chair and looked out toward the center of the casino, where all the amputee bandits clanged and beeped, clamoring for attention. “The machines, they don’t take quarters like they used to, very dissatisfying for those of us who like the noise.” She turned back to look at me. “My husband and I were coming back from a sweat one summer some years ago, headed for Thermopolis, when we overheated in the canyon. We were just sitting there waiting for the automobile to cool itself when one of the flat-hats pulled in behind us. We had been having an argument, and we’d been drinking a little. The flat-hat came up and asked my husband for his license. He kept shining his flashlight in on us, making it hard to see him, but his voice sounded strange and familiar.”

I glanced over and could see Henry and Theona watching Kimama as she told the story.

“He stood there with my husband’s license for a long time, but then he handed it back to him and told him that his license only had a year left on it. My husband was glad to get it back without having to do anything else and assured the flat-hat that he would get another one in a year.” She sipped her soda. “I’ll never forget what the flat-hat said next.”

Duly prompted, I asked, “What did he say?”

“He said he wouldn’t have to.” She sat the can back on the table. “Eleven months later my husband died.” A long moment passed as Henry and Theona regrouped their conversation, and then Kimama spoke again in a low voice. “You know how he died?”

“Your husband?”

She made a long, exasperated noise through her clenched teeth. “No, Heeci’ecihit, the Highwayman.”

“Well . . .”

Her head slipped to the side, and she eyed me at an angle. “He died in fire. It is a bad way to go.”

“I don’t know if there are any good ones.”

She flapped the hand at me again. “There are many, but fire is bad. The terrible thing about fire is that you become one with the wind, your ashes carried around the world over and over again seeking peace but finding none. Every time Heeci’ecihit attempts to come to rest, the winds pick him up, blowing on the embers of his soul and carrying him further.”

I cleared my throat and leaned in. “So, if we were so inclined, how could we find peace for him?”

I sat there looking at her, and the noises from the casino seemed to fade away and we might’ve been sitting in the canyon with only the sound of the water and the wind around us. “The dead only want the same as the living.”

“Which is?”