Wait for Signs: Twelve Longmire Stories Read online

  Also by Craig Johnson

  The Cold Dish

  Death Without Company

  Kindness Goes Unpunished

  Another Man’s Moccasins

  The Dark Horse

  Junkyard Dogs

  Hell Is Empty

  As the Crow Flies

  A Serpent’s Tooth

  Spirit of Steamboat

  Any Other Name

  VIKING

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) LLC

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  New York, New York 10014

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  A Penguin Random House Company

  First published by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC, 2014

  Copyright © 2014 by Craig Johnson

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  “Old Indian Trick” appeared in Cowboys & Indians magazine. “Ministerial Aid,” “Slick-Tongued Devil,” “Unbalanced,” and “Toys for Tots” appeared in Craig Johnson’s Christmas in Absaroka County, published by Viking Penguin in digital format. “Thankstaking” appeared in Craig Johnson’s newsletter. “Firebug,” “Several Stations,” and “High Holidays” were published as individual volumes by A.S.A.P. Publishing. “Divorce Horse” and “Messenger” were published as individual volumes in digital format by Viking Penguin.

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Johnson, Craig.

  [Short stories. Selections]

  Wait for signs : twelve Longmire stories / Craig Johnson.

  pages cm

  ISBN 978-0-698-18182-3

  1. Longmire, Walt (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Sheriffs—Wyoming—Fiction. I. Johnson, Craig. Old Indian trick. II. Title.

  PS3610.O325A6 2014

  813' .6—dc23

  2014010100

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  Contents

  Also by Craig Johnson

  Title page

  Copyright page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  OLD INDIAN TRICK

  MINISTERIAL AID

  SLICK-TONGUED DEVIL

  FIRE BIRD

  UNBALANCED

  SEVERAL STATIONS

  HIGH HOLIDAYS

  TOYS FOR TOTS

  DIVORCE HORSE

  THANKSTAKING

  MESSENGER

  PETUNIA, BANDIT QUEEN OF THE BIGHORNS

  For Eric Boss, Westerner, gentleman, and book rep of the first order.

  “Too often I would hear men boast of the miles covered that day, rarely of what they had seen.”

  —LOUIS L’AMOUR

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  After I was fortunate enough to win the Cowboys & Indians Tony Hillerman Award with “Old Indian Trick,” the first story in this collection and the first short story I had ever written, I got the bright idea that I’d send it to the folks who subscribed to my newsletter as a free gift for the holidays. On Christmas Eve, about ten years ago, I fired the story off at 11:59 Mountain Standard Time. I didn’t really know what I was getting into until the following November when readers began asking me when I was planning on sending out this year’s holiday tale, and as the communications began piling up, I rapidly figured out that I’d created a monster.

  Knuckling down, I wrote another story and discovered that I actually enjoyed the process and the format, because it gave me the opportunity to address the small points in Walt’s life that were pivotal but not appropriate for an entire novel. They run from twelve to forty pages—some are mysteries, some have mysterious elements, and others are no mystery at all, just glimpses into Walt’s life.

  People have often asked me if I have any intentions of killing Walt off someday, and I have to admit that I’m somewhat taken aback by the question. Never say never, but the greatest insurance that I’ll not do that is the character of the man himself. Walt is kind, decent, caring—and I just like him and hope you will, too.

  There’s another group of people I’ll never kill off, starting with actor, director, writer, and friend extraordinaire, Lou Diamond Phillips, and actor and big-dog sheriff, Robert Taylor. The adventure of having my novels adapted into the A&E television series has been a joyful affair, mostly due to the newfound friendships with the cast, the producers, and the crew, and to you, the new readers, but especially due to Lou and Rob. As only one example of the kindness and generosity of the men, I was asked to deliver the commencement speech on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation, and wrote the words, but then discovered that I was going to be on a book tour and couldn’t attend. Lou jumped on a plane from Santa Fe where he was filming Longmire, flew to Montana, and delivered the speech for me, much to the thrill of the Lame Deer High School graduating class and the Northern Cheyenne Nation. The man is a scholar and a gentleman on horseback, and I thank him for his generosity of spirit.

  Gail Hochman, the agent above all agents and head ramrod to this wayward maverick, was instrumental in making the Longmire books and television series possible. Never without a kind or enthusiastic word, Gail was the only agent who would take on my first novel, The Cold Dish—little did I know, she was also the absolute best.

  Kathryn Court is my wagon boss, the cowgirl errant who stands between me and a harmful word. Her constant and personal attention has made me and the series what we are today.

  Ben Petrone has been a friend, confidant, and riding partner, along with Angela Messina, Scott Cohen, Maureen Donnelly, Lindsey Schwoeri, and Carolyn Coleburn.

  Marianne Merola has kept a hard eye on the manifest and loaded these twelve dogies to parts unknown and languages unspoken by yours truly.

  Here’s also to those two cattle barons past, Tony Hillerman and Robert B. Parker, for looking out the window of the dining car and giving a cowboy from a town of twenty-five a leg up in making the big time.

  And to Michael Crutchley and Chet Carlson, the railroad bulls who kept us on the level, and to Mike and Susie Terry, the original owners of the Divorce Horse. Thanks to Judy Slack and the Wyoming Room of the Sheridan Fulmer Library and the indomitable Vic Garber for all those marvelous stories that we listened to while those steel wheels rumbled on through the night. Thanks to the Teton Raptor Center for the phalanx of owls that flew along above us, and to Marcus Red Thunder for holding the flaming arrows at bay—except for Judy, the flaming arrow that gets through and pierces my heart every time.

  INTRODUCTION

  Tightrope. It’s not just a Clint Eastwood movie, or a circus performer’s next trick. It’s that thing upon which great mystery writers must boldly but carefully tread, precariously balancing the unwieldy burdens of plot, character, and setting, all the while enticing us to enjoy the jo
urney and marvel at the view. Each step is carefully placed so as to stay one chess move ahead of the savvy readers—who, try as they might, should not be able to see the ultimate destination until their literary guide is good and ready to show them—but never to lose them. One misstep and the entire entourage tumbles into the abyss. Now, try doing it in cowboy boots, and you’ll begin to comprehend the amazing feat that is each of Craig Johnson’s Longmire mysteries.

  I have the great honor of bringing one of his unforgettable characters, Henry Standing Bear, into the corporeal world—otherwise known as your TV—on A&E’s Longmire. Having read all of the Longmire books to date, I was understandably intimidated by the prospect. The Bear is so vividly drawn, both inside and out, that he virtually leaps from the page and into the reader’s imagination. Preparing for the part, I kept thinking of the actor Will Sampson from the classic film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and how beautifully he’d risen to the challenge of bringing Ken Kesey’s Chief Bromden to life. Fittingly, it was a Sampson-like struggle to immerse myself into the role. Standing Bear’s stature, both in height and philosophy, seemed so enormous that I quailed at the thought of filling his majestic moccasins—especially in the eyes of the man who had formed him from the Absaroka clay, whom I’d be meeting before shooting began. Trust me when I say it’s never easy to meet your creator.

  I’d had the opportunity to meet the author of a literary character I was attempting to portray only once before. The year was 1991. The film was The Dark Wind, and I was playing Jim Chee, the iconic Navajo tribal police sergeant created by the great Tony Hillerman. Mr. Hillerman was warm, gracious, and more than magnanimous. Stately, even. He said I resembled Jim Chee as he’d always imagined him. Since he didn’t comment on my acting, I took this comment as his tacit approval of my performance. Though my encounter with Mr. Hillerman was nothing but positive, it only made me more respectful of the genius it takes to create a character beloved by millions. So it was not without a little trepidation that I looked forward to meeting the rightful heir to Mr. Hillerman’s literary legacy.

  Fortunately for me, Craig Johnson not only inherited the mantle of literary genius from Tony Hillerman, but was also bequeathed his grace, warmth, and generosity. Now, sans the photo that graces the back flap of Craig’s books, many a gentle reader could be forgiven for imagining that Craig Johnson might look like the weathered but erudite offspring of Louis L’Amour and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Not so much. The unassuming and open-faced man whom I met while filming the Longmire pilot was more evocative of the helpful clerk at your local Feed-and-Tack store who would gladly throw in a truckload of alfalfa if you would just purchase that beautiful hand-tooled saddle. (Okay, I wrote that last bit just to make Craig and his wife, Judy, laugh.) Still, Craig Johnson is not what you might expect . . . and yet he is everything you might expect. He is a man of letters and a man of his word. A laureate with a lariat, if you will. In short, Craig is the spring that feeds the very deep well that is Walt Longmire.

  Not all of the short stories in this collection can be classified as mysteries, although there is a generous enough serving of plot thickeners to satisfy any attentive reader’s appetite. The stories, taken together, remind me of the stained-glass windows in church that become an adolescent Walt’s primary focus in “Slick-Tongued Devil.” Each story forms a small but integral part of the bigger picture, a piece of the mosaic that we, Craig’s faithful readers, have come to know as the world of Absaroka County and Walt Longmire. Each is imbued with its own unique color and illumination and can be considered a gem in its own right.

  It occurs to me, too—though I’ve never actually ridden a horse with him—that Craig Johnson knows how to pack a saddlebag. These stories are bulging with the western wit, warmth, and hard-won wisdom we’ve come to expect from his long-form fiction. He continues to make me laugh out loud at the most inopportune times. And yet it is Craig’s hand with humanity, his empathy and compassion, that leaves the most lasting impression. I have often found myself rereading his sentences simply to absorb a profound truth that he’s managed to convey with an economy and specificity Hemingway would admire. Craig paints the landscape of Absaroka County masterfully, inviting the reader to share his reverence for nature, and yet it is in his role as a guide to human nature where he is most intuitive. There is a resonant melancholy that blows in the breeze of Absaroka and occasionally ruffles Walt’s unkempt hair. It whispers in the ear of the reader. It makes us feel. It makes us think. It makes us reflect on our own place in this vast wilderness. This is what art, in any of its forms, is supposed to do.

  So as you read these newly collected entries into the Absaroka lore, and you find yourself on a lonely stretch of Wyoming highway or on a windswept, snow-covered plain, you might want to look up. The sky above Absaroka is often turbulent and indiscernible. But there are those times when it is clear. So crisp and blue and pristine that it might bring a tear to your eye. At those times, you might see Craig. Still up there on that tightrope. Still scanning the landscape like Henry Standing Bear’s owls. Still maintaining that delicate balance between plot and profundity as he makes his away across.

  And still wearing his cowboy boots.

  —LOU DIAMOND PHILLIPS

  OLD INDIAN TRICK

  It’s hard to argue with an old Indian or his tricks.

  I was driving Lonnie Little Bird up to Billings for an evening diabetes checkup at Deaconess Hospital when we pulled into the Blue Cow Café, on the Crow Reservation just off I-90, for some supper. The Blue Cow had been a restaurant longer than it’d been a casino; its MONTANA BREAKFAST! SERVED ALL DAY! AS FEATURED IN READER’S DIGEST! consisted of a half pound of bacon, four jumbo eggs, twelve pancakes, three-quarters of a pound of hash browns, a pint of orange juice, and endless coffee—a western epic, well known across the high plains.

  We had gotten a late start—the sun was already sinking over the rolling hills of the Little Big Horn country and was casting surrealistic shadows against the one-ton hay bales of the Indian ranchers. It was September and, with the sporadic rain of a cool August, it looked like everybody was going to get a third cutting.

  We rolled the windows half down and made Dog stay in the truck. I lifted Lonnie, placed the legless man in his wheelchair, and rolled him in. He smiled at the remains of the day and picked up a free Shoshone Shopper newspaper as we passed through the double glass doors into the restaurant. I wheeled the old Cheyenne Indian to a booth by the window where I could keep an eye on the truck and on Dog and where we could hear Montana Slim singing “Roundup in the Fall” through his nose on a radio in the kitchen.

  “Nineteen-forty-eight 8N tractor, only twelve hundred dollars.” He held his gray and black hair back with a suntanned, wrinkled hand. “Comes with a Dearborn front-end loader.”

  I tipped my hat back, pulled a menu from the napkin holder, and looked at the tiny rainbows at the corners of his thick glasses. “I don’t need a tractor, Lonnie.”

  “It is a good price. Um hmm, yes, it is so.”

  I nodded, tossed the menu on the table, and glanced around. “You think there’s anybody here?”

  He blinked and looked over my shoulder toward the cash register. My gaze followed his—two sets of eyes stared at us, just above the surface of the worn-out, wood-grained Formica counter.

  * * *

  “So, you weren’t here when it happened?”

  The Big Horn County deputy continued to take my statement; he was young, and I didn’t know him. “Nope, we just stopped in for a little dinner and noticed that everybody was hiding.”

  “And you’re headed to Billings?”

  I wondered what that had to do with anything. “Yep.”

  “And the old Indian is with you?”

  I had listened as he’d questioned Lonnie Little Bird and hadn’t liked his tone. “Lonnie.”

  He stopped scribbling. “Excuse me?”

  I looke
d at my friend, now parked at the corner booth and still studying the Shopper. “His name is Lonnie. Lonnie Little Bird. He’s an elder and a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribal Council.”

  The deputy gave me a long, tough-guy stare, or as much of one as he’d been able to cultivate in the six weeks he had spent at the Montana Law Enforcement Academy in Helena. He stabbed the still shiny black notepad with his pen for emphasis. “I’ve got that in my notes.”

  “Good.” He gave me more of the look, so I smiled at him. “Then it won’t be hard for you to remember his name.”

  “You didn’t see anybody when you pulled in?”

  “Nope.”

  “No Indian male, approximately twenty-five years of age with a . . .”

  “She didn’t say Indian. She said ‘dark hair with dark eyes.’”

  He didn’t like being interrupted, and he liked being corrected even less. “Look, Mister . . .”

  I made him look at the notebook for my name.

  A tall, heavyset man entered the café; he wore a large silver-belly hat, a .357 revolver, and a star. He waved at the two behind the counter as I turned back to the deputy. “Wanda’s Crow. If she thought he was Indian, she’d have said so.”

  I caught the eye of the woman with the hairnet. “Wanda, was the kid Indian?” After a brief conversation with the manager, they both shook their heads no. “You need to quit jerking us around, get a more detailed description of the suspect, and put a unit out to circle the vicinity.”

  “Is that what you’d do?” He studied the notebook again for my name—evidently he wasn’t a quick learner.

  I watched as the large man with the star stood behind his deputy. Wesley Burrell Best Bayles, the sheriff of Big Horn County, was a legend; hell, I’d seen him eat the MONTANA BREAKFAST! SERVED ALL DAY! AS FEATURED IN READER’S DIGEST!