Page 18 of It Takes a Thief

Moss Empire must’ve heard me, my tires mushy in the sand, and came out. An older fellow, a bilagáana and quite probably an adláanii, his dopey, puffy eyes gave him a deeply sad look, like that old cartoon dog Droopy. I’d be sad too if I had to live in this remote trailer. White hair ringed his bald head like a pillow with arms. Moss Empire was white but just as full of loudmouth soup, not even bothering to put down his flask. When he got up close, I could tell it was whiskey.

“Miss Illuminati! Nice to meet a fellow Italian out here in the middle of nowhere.”

“It’s Mrs.,” I corrected him, right off the bat. To avoid explaining that one, I barreled ahead. I reminded him, “Ogden said you could show me where Galileo might be herding some sheep in the canyon?”

“I know exactly where he is!” he said heartily. He lifted his flask, and I was afraid he was going to offer me some. “Just let me get a refill and we can be on our way.”

To my relief, he had his own motorcycle, a derelict Fat Boy like our Turk used to ride. I wouldn’t have to drive him back to this dilapidated trailer. Unfortunately, I had to pee, so I had to go inside that hunk of junk. I became even more uncomfortable when I saw computer printouts taped to the wall of that mother from The Family Guy getting boned by several eager guys. What the fuck? I’d never heard of such a perversion, and I’d seen a lot in my ER days. Crystals of meth were scattered on the table. Moss Empire didn’t have the bad facial scarring or dental rotting associated with heavy meth use, so maybe he was only selling it. One could only hope.

Before we took off, I gave him a twenty “for gas” so I wouldn’t feel beholden to him. The overjoyed way he whipped his wallet from his back pocket told me he wasn’t used to cash. He brandished the wallet at me.

“This here wallet,” he said importantly, “is made from human skin.”

I smiled weakly, unsure how to respond. “Oh yeah? How do you know that?”

He wriggled his eyebrows. “Because I’m the tailor.”

Oh, boy. This Rez needed me like a prisoner needed a key.

I still needed Moss Empire, so I nodded happily at him, and we were on our way.

This is apropos. I come here to find one drugged-out alcoholic help me find another. If I can’t fix Ford, maybe I can fix these people who’ve had so much strife thrust upon them by an outer world rigged in their favor.

I could’ve just gone directly to the clinic located in Chinle at the mouth of the Canyon de Chelly, met the doctor who ran the place, offered my services. The Navajo Area Indian Health Services, a federal branch, administered the clinics. The inpatient clinic in Chinle itself had 60 beds, and I was kind of angling for that job posting because, well, let’s face it. Canyon de Chelly. And I wanted to meet Galileo Taliwood.

June or Sax would know how to describe the striations we drove through. Me, I just used food descriptors. One massive outcrop was layered like a tilted cake—red velvet on the bottom—granite and quartzsite, I knew—topped by mango, then caramel, capped by white icing. Course, you couldn’t drive around on the white, so there was another layer of protective milk chocolate on top of that. That was the canyon rim where all the “non” tourists were allowed to go to various overlooks.

We were coming upon a giant mesa of multi-hued clay and dark chocolate ledges. Moss Empire caned it as though he planned to plunge into the mouth of that canyon. But I stopped my car when he did at a ranger’s station where the sign proclaimed that the Canyon de Chelly was owned by the Navajo Tribal Trust. Tourists could only enter with a Navajo guide.

Moss put down his kickstand and went to greet a ranger while I stretched my legs. There was a campground here, and you better believe in October it was milling with “nons.” While the overlook trails were no doubt stupendous with views of Spider Rock, caves, ruins, and the rivers carving around enormous spires, our goal was the valley floor. Unescorted.

Moss Empire somehow finagled this with the ranger. The Droopy dog was finally grinning, jamming his lid on his head, looking like a WWI combatant. “We’re on our own, Miss Illuminati. We’ll be going out Canyon Road past some ruins of people’s homes. Ranger told me where he last saw Galileo and I know where his hogan is.”

That sounded like a deal to me. The only concession was, I had to ride two up behind this repulsive drunk man, but I didn’t see any alternative. He didn’t offer me a helmet.

We started out sedately, and the views were so extreme I didn’t notice I was being forced to basically bear hug this odd man.

“About forty families live on the canyon floor,” Moss explained to me as we passed some bedraggled folks milling about a much-patched hogan. I was surprised to see the man did wear a head scarf, the woman in a skirt tending a fire. I imagined it was just as it would be five hundred years ago.

For a while, to my right I could see the distinctive spire of Spider Rock. It looked familiar from television commercials. Moss said, “Traditional Diné believe the taller of the two spires is where Spider Grandmother lives.”

They did have charming beliefs, and I had always wished Ford would do more to delve into his heritage. Lytton had been forced to embrace it, having been adopted by an Apache elder down south in Fort Apache. He’d grown up on the Rez, obtaining a scholarship for his PhD in chemistry—he really was Dr. Riding Hawk. I’d always seen Ford sort of scoff at his half-brother for owning it like that. Ford’s large ink piece was a skull on his shoulder, the Bare Bones. Lytton’s was a stylized eagle, like something you’d find on a totem pole. That was the difference between the two brothers.

June could have told me about the geology and Lytton could have interpreted and explained everything Yazzie to me. Instead, because I had a husband who barely paid attention to me, as usual I was on an adventure alone.

“There’s Galileo’s hogan,” said Moss, but he didn’t slow down. “He’s not there because his horse isn’t there.”

It was actually a round hogan made of clay bricks. Two glass windows punctured the mud, and the roof was held up by round beams. A windcatcher hung from a pathetic well. I’d always thought only nons liked those things, that they were somehow bogus or inauthentic. There was an empty corral. Not far away, petroglyphs on the red canyon wall depicted men walking horses, frogs, handprints, and… aliens?

Yes, no doubt about it, those men with lightbulb-shaped heads and snakes for fingers had to be depictions of alien life!

This was the strangest place! Would Galileo Taliwood be as lubricated and possibly on meth as this guy, my guide? Galileo’s brother Ogden had had a rough life, in and out of prison on trivial charges mostly, I thought. Looked like it might’ve scared Galileo out of ever leaving the Rez.

Around a few more bright sandstone corners, we found him. His tall, gangly frame was perched atop a small spire, and he even held something that resembled a shepherd’s crook. His worn pants were rolled up to his knees, cuffs rolled to his elbows, and he looked out almost cross-eyed at his little herd. He, too, wore a headscarf, and when he turned to view us, I could see he looked more “non” than Diné. His skin was nearly sunburned, and he had that white paste on his nose. But he smiled widely, genuinely, to see us.

Without introducing myself, I hopped off the bike and ran to hug Galileo Taliwood. His arms sort of hovered about my back, as though he didn’t know where to place them. And his accent was almost Southern California.

“Well, now. Who have you brought me on this gay day in May?”