Free Dry Bones: A Walt Longmire Mystery by Craig Johnson Page B

but it slipped out when I first got to the hospital.” Her expression didn’t change, and I continued. “I didn’t know if you knew that I knew, but I didn’t want this to become something between us, something bad.”
    There was a sudden banging somewhere in the building, and as Dog vaulted from the floor beside the crate and began barking, we both looked around; I found my voice first. “Did something fall over in here?”
    The banging started again, and this time I could tell that someone was hammering on the front door of the museum. It was just after midnight, and I’d locked the door, which was a good thing in that it gave me time to climb off the crate and get my clothes on.
    “Walt!” It was a man’s voice, muffled by the heavy glass.
    “Who the hell is it?” Vic pulled the blanket over her shoulders as I hurriedly tried to straighten my hat and my back and started after Dog for the door.
    “It sounds like Saizarbitoria.”
    Dodging through the gift shop, I made my way past the front desk and wrapped my fingers around the keys dangling from the lock on the inside. I yanked the door open and caught Dog by his collar so that he wouldn’t mistake the Basquo for an intruder. “What’s the matter, Sancho?”
    He looked as panicked as I’d ever seen him. “It’s Lucian—I think he’s having a stroke or something.”
    “What?” I stood there looking at him and realized I was asking the wrong question. “Where?”
    “The home for assisted living; he won’t go to the hospital.”
    I yelled over my shoulder. “Vic, stay with the dinosaur!” I looked down and shoved Dog back inside. “And Dog!”
    I ran with Sancho and dove into the passenger side of his sedan. “Give me the lowdown.”
    “Classic, non-movie-style stroke.” Sancho backed the cruiser out, spun the wheel, and flew through the abandoned town with its blinking yellow lights. “The housekeeper found him sitting in his chair complaining of pain and discomfort.” He turned to look at me as we flat tracked it onto Fort Street and hit the afterburners again. “He had his leg shot off, for Christ’s sake—you would think they would’ve taken that kind of thing seriously coming from him.”
    I immediately remembered Danny Lone Elk’s flask. “Yep, you would.”
    “Anyway, somebody else came in a few hours later—he was still in that chair, but he’d thrown up on himself and was saying he was fine, but this time he was having a migraine-like headache, tremors, and slurred speech. Well, they dialed 911, and we got there at the same time. The EMTs got him cleaned up, and he told Cathi and Chris that he was feeling better and they should beat it. Well, he
was
the sheriff, so they did.” Santiago made the next turn, and we were almost there. “I didn’t think that was the right decision, so I bullshitted with him, but then he started messing up his words and said he was feeling sick again.” He slid to a stop at the entrance of the center behind the EMT van, and we leapt out, running for the door, me trying to keep up. “I tried to sit him in his chair, but one of his arms wouldn’t work and I knew right then that I had to get the EMTs back there quick.”
    We blew past the empty registration desk and down the hall. “And then?”
    “He was still arguing with them, and you know how he is—he can argue with a stump. So that’s when I came after you.”
    When we got close to room 32, I could see a small crowd of attendees, including the director, Mary Jo Johnson, standing in the hall. “Oh, thank God, Walt . . . He won’t listen to any of us, and now he’s got a gun.”
    Sancho and I slid through the group, Cathi and Chris sitting impatiently on the sofa with their equipment, and looked at the man in the high-back, steer-hide-covered chair with the.38 Smith & Wesson service revolver resting on his knee.
    “Lucian?”
    He didn’t look at me, but when I kneeled down in front of him, he raised the pistol up and pointed it