Neil McMahon - Lone Creek

Madbird's place was up the McClellan Creek drainage, another isolated gravel road through thick woods. I started smelling the pine smoke from his stove as we got close. Unlike me, he had a real house, high-ceilinged and cedar-paneled, that he'd been smart enough to build with a VA loan when he came back from Vietnam. The windows glowed pleasantly, although as you came into their light you'd start to see the animal skulls mounted in the surrounding trees. There was a lot more that you didn't see but you had to be pretty dense not to feel. Strangers rarely got close.

I was sure that by now, Laurie was wishing with all her soul that she'd never heard of me. But she hadn't made a sound of complaint or even asked where we were going. She still didn't when I stopped the bike, but she stumbled a little getting off, staring nervously at the centerpiece of the fence gate-the bleached skull of a squirrel with its teeth still clamped in the piece of twelve-two electrical cable that was the last thing it had ever tasted. That one was kind of a joke.

All through the ride, I'd thought about how to handle this. I hated like hell to hit on Madbird again. But I knew he was willing, and he knew that if I got busted, I'd keep him out of it. The real problem was bringing Laurie in. There was no telling how things were finally going to shake down, or if she and I would even still be around. But if she did end up dealing with the authorities, I couldn't expect her to commit perjury to protect him. Any help he gave me would be abetting, and might also start them digging deeper into his other involvement. I'd thought about leaving her someplace while I talked to him, but that wouldn't be much of a hedge. I needed a vehicle, and if she described it to the cops, they'd quickly put together where it had come from.

I'd ended up deciding to go for the flip side-to keep her with me and cue Madbird. He'd pick up on it instantly and run with it. That way, she'd be a witness to his innocence. If she made him too uncomfortable, he'd let me know it and we'd move on. I wouldn't blame him a bit.

I took hold of Laurie's wrist and brought her around to face me.

"We can't put my friend at risk, so we've got to lie to him. And I've got to trust you."

She nodded, slowly but decisively. "Just tell me the lie."

"Not a word about John Doe or the cops or any of the rest of it. We got caught in an awkward situation and we need to get away for a day or two, where nobody will look for us."

Her head tipped a little to the side and her eyebrows rose.

"Caught in an awkward situation, like, by my husband?"

"That's what my friend will think, but he won't ask. OK?"

"OK," she said. Her tone was cooler, but that was understandable.

I kept hold of her wrist and led her toward the house. Without doubt, Madbird had heard the bike and was watching. By now, he'd have recognized me, and probably Laurie, too. He was going to be real interested in what this was about.

His two dogs were waiting inside the fence-half-feral Blue Heeler crosses, lying silent and flat to the ground. You wouldn't have guessed they were there if you didn't know. These weren't dogs that barked if another creature violated their space. They ripped its throat out. They were extremely smart and well behaved, they obeyed Madbird absolutely, and they tolerated other people as long as they sensed his approval. I'd gotten to be pretty good pals with them, and they usually came to greet me as soon as they caught my scent or the sound of my voice. But coming in at night, particularly with someone else they didn't know, might spook them.

I held my hands to the gate, palms first, beside my thighs.

"Soup. Ajax," I said. "How you guys doing?"

Soup, female, older, and the boss, rose cautiously and came over. I kept talking while Ajax did the same. After a little sniffing, they started wagging their stumpy tails.

Then an invisible Madbird said, "Looks like you check out OK with the bouncers."

Laurie's wrist jerked in my hand like she was going to break free and run. That was understandable, too-with that voice of his, he sounded like the captain of the guard on Judgment Day. The dogs lay back down.

"I'm sorry to bust in on you, Madbird," I said. "Laurie and me, uh, kind of had to go for a ride in a hurry, and we've got to keep going. I was wondering if you could lend us a rig."

I couldn't see his eyes, but I knew he was watching her, and I was sure that she knew it, too.

He stepped into sight from the house's shadowed doorway and walked forward to meet us. She tugged at me again. He was wearing jeans and an old vest made from an elk hide. Besides the Marine tattoos on his arms, he had a wine-colored birthmark across his bare chest the size and shape of a splayed hand, as if it had been burned there by fiery fingers reaching for his heart. His hair was a black mane and his face looked like a cliff side.

It was very clear that this was the force behind those skulls.

"Come on into my house," he said.

That invitation was a huge thing, and I hoped to Christ we wouldn't end up violating it.

The dogs fell in behind Laurie as soon as we got through the gate and followed at her heels, noses busy. They were too polite to be crotch sniffers, but they had a job to do. By the time we'd walked the twenty feet to the door, she was fixed forever in their memory banks.

As we stepped inside, I caught Madbird's eye and brushed my thumb across my lips. He lifted his chin an inch.

The walls were hung with tribal masks, some Native and some from Africa, where he'd traveled after the service. The coffee table was a vintage surfboard from the 1950s, handmade of wood and fiberglass. There was a rack of rifles and shotguns, and a pistol and a couple of hunting knives hanging from pegs. But potted plants spilling greenery suggested a feminine hand, and the furniture had enough hair on it to make it clear that he wasn't as tough on the dogs as he pretended to be. My earlier rush of sweat had long since chilled away, and the heat from the big iron stove felt fine.

"We ain't ever been introduced, but I seen you before," he said to Laurie. Then he nodded toward his girlfriend, who was sitting, relaxed but attentive, on the couch. "That's Hannah."

Hannah was also Blackfeet, and a thoroughgoing piece of work. You couldn't call her pretty, but she had a trim little figure and a tough sultriness that was magnetic. She was fiercely Indian-her teal-colored sweatshirt had a logo of four braves in full war regalia, and the caption homeland security: fighting terrorists since 1492-but she worked in management for the Forest Service and she knew her way around the white man's world real well. Maybe the most impressive thing about her was that she held her own with Madbird.

I could see that she was checking out Laurie like he'd done, although probably not entirely for the same reasons.

"This is all my fault," Laurie said abruptly. She put her face in her hands and shuddered, as if the reality was just hitting her. Maybe it was. I tensed, thinking she was going to start babbling, and then we'd have no choice but to leave.

"I wasn't careful," she said, still into her hands. "My husband followed me, without me knowing. It'll be OK, but I've got to let him cool down."

I exhaled quietly in relief.

Hannah hadn't yet moved or spoken. But now she stood, went to Laurie, and touched her auburn hair, feeling its texture between her fingers. Laurie raised her face, looking pale and scared. Whatever passed between the Virginia heiress and the smoky reservation girl in the next few seconds stayed silent.

"You're going to need some things," Hannah said. She turned away and left the room.

Madbird picked up a bottle of Napoleon brandy off the surfboard coffee table, twisted the cork out, and handed it to Laurie.