Free Hillerman, Tony - [Leaphorn & Chee 04] by jpg] People Of Darkness (v1) [html Page A

humans. In the auditorium, perhaps a hundred potential buyers were wandering among the stacks of rugs on the display tables, inspecting the offerings and noting item numbers. At this hour, most of the crowd would be in the cafeteria, eating the traditional auction dinner of Navajo tacos—tortillas topped with a lethal combination of stewed mutton and chili. Chee stood just inside the auditorium entrance, methodically examining its inhabitants. He had little idea what Charley would look like—just Becenti's sketchy description. His inspection was simply a matter of habit.
    "Looking for someone?"
    The voice came from beside him, from a young woman in a blue turtleneck sweater. The woman was small, the sweater large, and the face atop the folds of bulky cloth was unsmiling.
    "Trying to find a man named Tomas Charley," Chee said. "But I don't know what he looks like."
    The woman's face was oval, framed by soft blond hair. Her eyes were large, and blue, and intent on Chee. A pretty lady, and Chee recognized the look. He had seen it often at the University of New Mexico—and most often among Anglo coeds enrolled in Native American Studies courses. The courses attracted Anglo students, largely female, enjoying racial/ethnic guilt trips. Chee had concluded early that their interest was more in Indian males than in Indian mythology. Their eyes asked if you were really any different from the blond boys they had grown up with. Chee looked now into the eyes of the woman in the bulky blue turtleneck and detected the same question. Or thought he did. There was also something else. He smiled at her. "Not knowing what he looks like makes it tougher to find him."
    "Why not just go away and leave him alone?" she asked. "What are you hunting him for?"
    Chee's smile evaporated. "I have a message from his nephew," he said. "Somebody wants to buy his old car and…"
    "Oh," the young woman said. She looked embarrassed. "I guess I shouldn't jump to conclusions. I'm sorry. I don't know him."
    "I'll just ask around," Chee said. Her distaste for police was another standard reaction Chee had learned to expect from the young Anglos the reservation seemed to attract. He suspected there was a federal agency somewhere assigned to teach social workers that all police were Cossacks and that Navajo police were the worst of all. "Are you with the Bureau of Indian Affairs?" he asked.
    "No," she said. "I'm helping the weavers' cooperative." She gestured vaguely toward the check-in table, where two Navajo women were sorting through papers. "But I teach school here. Fifth grade. English and social studies." The hostility was gone from her eyes now. The curiosity remained.
    "I'm Jim Chee." He extended his hand. "I've been assigned to the police station here. Fairly new here."
    "I noticed your uniform," she said. She took his extended hand. "Mary Landon," she said. "I'm new, too. From Wisconsin, but I taught last spring at Laguna Pueblo school."
    "How do you do," Chee said. Her hand was small and cool in his, and very quickly withdrawn.
    "I have to get back to work," Mary Landon said, and she was gone.
    It took Chee about thirty minutes to establish that Tomas Charley was present at the auction and to get a description of the man. He might have done it faster had there been any sense of urgency. There wasn't. Chee was more involved in getting acquainted with the occupants of his territory. Then Mary Landon was at his elbow again.
    "That's him," she said. "Right over there. The red-and-black mackinaw and the black felt hat."
    "Thanks," Chee said. Mary Landon still wasn't smiling.
    Tomas Charley was leaning against the wall alone. He seemed to be watching someone in the crowd. Mary Landon said something else, but Chee didn't hear it. He was studying Charley. He was a small man—not over five and a half feet—and skinny. His face was bony, with small, deep-set eyes and a narrow forehead under the brim of his tipped-back hat. There was an alertness about him, a