When the Many Farms water tower appeared on the horizon, he ventured forward and made Ted Jernigan trade places with him. Taking the Ted-warmed seat, he asked Frances if she’d gotten any sleep.
She leaned away from him and gave him a cold look. “You mean, between hearing how Ted would have handled the Viet Cong and how much I overpaid for my house?”
Russ laughed. He couldn’t have been happier. “I kept waiting for you to come and join us.”
“One of us knows every single person on this bus. The other one doesn’t know anyone.”
He lost his smile. “Sorry.”
“When you told me you could be a jerk, I didn’t believe you.”
“Very sorry.”
She turned to her window and didn’t look at him again.
The sun had dropped behind the Black Mesa, beginning the long dusk in Many Farms, the somber illumination of its overwide roads, its identical BIA-sponsored houses, its utilitarian school buildings and dusty warehouses. Russ directed the driver to the council office and hopped out while the other two buses pulled up behind him. The air had a wintry bite, a thinness that his heart immediately registered. As he approached the office door, a sturdy young woman in a red wool jacket came out. “You must be Russ.”
“Yes. Wanda?”
“Russ, if I may say so, we were expecting you earlier.” In person, too, her voice was plangent. “I would like to discuss your plan with you.”
“The, ah—mandate?”
Wanda’s emphatic nodding matched her voice. “We have the mandate and you can help us. However, because you prefer to stay in Many Farms, we are willing to accommodate a second group here. I have spoken to the director and he is okay with it.”
“What is the mandate?”
“To conform with the mandate, we need handicapped access ramps at Kitsillie. A ramp for the front and a ramp for the fire exit. The toilet also must be handicapped-accessible. But may I be completely open and honest with you? I feel you would be more comfortable in Many Farms.”
Over the idling of three buses came the crunch of boots on gravel, the growling voice of Ambrose, a murmur from Kevin Anderson. If Russ’s group stayed in Many Farms, he would have to be with Perry, and Frances with Larry. Quickly, before Ambrose could interfere, he told Wanda that he’d rather stick to the original plan. Her emphatic nod said one thing, her troubled expression another.
“You may go to Kitsillie,” she said, “but I would ask you, in all re spect, to stay close to the school. No one should walk alone, and no one should be outside after dark.”
“That’s fine. We’ve had the same rule in the past.”
She stepped away to greet Ambrose and Kevin. Not for the first time, Russ was impressed by Ambrose’s way of forging a connection with a stranger, the compassionate scowl with which he conveyed that she was being seen as a person, taken seriously. Scowling as if nothing on earth mattered more to him, he asked Wanda how Keith Durochie was. It should have been Russ who’d asked the question.
“Keith is not good,” Wanda said, “but he is resting comfortably at home.”
“How bad is it?” Russ said.
“He is resting comfortably but I am told that he is very weak.”
Into Russ’s throat came the sadness of life’s brevity, the sadness of the sunless hour, the sadness of Easter. God was telling him very clearly what to do. He had to stay in Many Farms, where Keith had lived since 1960, so he could visit Keith and keep an eye on Perry. In light of Keith’s condition, his wish to enjoy sex with a person not Marion seemed even more trivial, and he’d been insane to imagine it happening in Arizona. He’d let himself forget how bleak the reservation was in late winter, how demanding it was to lead a work camp.
And yet, when he thought of doing God’s will, at the cost of his week with Frances on the mesa, he felt unbearably sorry for himself. It was strange that self-pity wasn’t on the list of deadly sins; none was deadlier.
The swing driver, a gaunt lung-cancer candidate named Ollie, had taken over the wheel of the Kitsillie bus. From the seat beside Frances, Russ directed him to Rough Rock and from there up the side of the mesa. The road was stony and narrow, and there was still enough light to see how close to the edge of it they were, how fatal a plunge would be. At a particularly harrowing bend, Frances gasped and said, “Oh Jesus, Jesus.” She clutched Russ’s hand, and, just like that, he was holding hers. She’d said it herself: jerks turned her on. Behind the bus, a horn began to honk.