CHAPTER FOUR
Ruth's house looked exactly as Kari had left it that morning—herbs drying on the porch railing, baskets of freshly gathered plants arranged in order, the old pickup truck parked at its customary angle beneath the juniper tree.
Only the absence of Ruth herself on the porch suggested any change in routine.
Kari parked beside the pickup, gathering the folder containing the case files and photographs she'd brought from the station.
As she approached the house, the familiar scents of herbs and smoke drifted through the open windows—Ruth continuing the ceremonial preparations they'd begun together earlier.
She knocked lightly on the door frame before entering, a courtesy Ruth had instilled in her since childhood. "Shimásání? It's Kari."
"In here," Ruth called from the back room she used exclusively for medicine preparation. Her tone carried neither surprise nor particular welcome—simply acknowledgment of Kari's presence.
Kari found her grandmother seated on a low stool, grinding dried plants in a stone mortar. The rhythmic scraping of pestle against stone paused as Ruth looked up, her dark eyes immediately noting the folder tucked under Kari's arm.
"You bring work to a medicine day," Ruth observed. Not a question, not quite an accusation.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your preparations," Kari said, setting the folder on a small table near the door. "Something's come up that I need to ask you about."
Ruth resumed her grinding, the steady motion almost hypnotic. "Sit," she said, nodding toward another stool. "You look tired. Did you eat after the crime scene?"
The question surprised Kari—Ruth rarely expressed such direct concern for her physical wellbeing. "No. There wasn't time."
Without comment, Ruth set aside her mortar and pestle, moving to the small kitchen where she removed cornbread and mutton stew from the warming oven. She placed both before Kari along with a mug of cedar tea that had been steeping on the counter.
"Eat first," Ruth said. "Questions can wait until the body is nourished."
The simple meal tasted better than anything Kari could remember from recent days—perhaps because she was genuinely hungry, or perhaps because Ruth's cooking carried elements of memory and belonging that transcended mere flavor.
They sat in comfortable silence as Kari ate, Ruth returning to her medicine preparation.
Only after Kari had finished and helped clear away the dishes did Ruth settle on her stool again, folding her weathered hands in her lap. "Now. What questions bring you back so soon?"
Kari considered her approach carefully. Ruth responded poorly to direct interrogation about traditional practices, particularly when they intersected with police matters.
Years of historical trauma had instilled deep wariness about sharing cultural knowledge with institutional authorities, even when that authority wore her granddaughter's face.
"I've been thinking about my grandfather today," Kari began, choosing a path that felt both honest and strategic. "His police work, I mean. I realized how little I actually know about him."
Something shifted in Ruth's expression—a softening around the eyes, perhaps, or a slight relaxation of the perpetual vigilance she maintained. "Joseph was a complicated man," she said. "Strong in his beliefs but gentle in his heart. Much like you, in some ways."
The comparison startled Kari. "Really? I always thought I took after Dad's side more—the analytical thinking, the focus on evidence."
Ruth's mouth curved in what might have been a smile. "Different paths to the same destination. Joseph also looked for patterns, for truth beneath appearances. He simply used different words to describe the process."
Encouraged by this unexpected openness, Kari continued. "What was he like as a police officer? As a detective?"
Ruth was quiet for a moment, her hands absently sorting herbs as she collected her thoughts.
"He believed in justice more than rules.
Sometimes this created problems with his superiors.
He saw connections others missed and trusted his instincts when evidence seemed insufficient.
" She glanced at Kari. "He kept many cases in his heart long after the department declared them closed. "
"Cold cases," Kari said. "I do the same thing. There are investigations from Phoenix I still think about, still see patterns I can't quite complete."
Ruth nodded. "This is the Chee way. To hold questions until answers reveal themselves, even if the revealing takes many seasons."
Kari leaned forward. "Did he talk about his cases with you?"
"Some. Not all." Ruth's fingers moved methodically among the dried plants, separating stems from leaves. "He understood that certain knowledge belongs in certain places. Police work in the station house. Family matters at home. Sacred concerns with those who maintain traditions."
"But sometimes those worlds overlapped," Kari suggested gently.
Ruth's hands stilled momentarily. "Yes. Sometimes the boundaries are blurred, especially in cases touching on traditional matters. Those were the heaviest for him to carry."
Kari sensed an opening. "Did he ever talk to you about his cases?"
A shadow passed across Ruth's features. "As I just said, he understood that certain knowledge belongs in certain places—and not in others."
The warning was subtle but clear—proceed carefully. Kari reached for her folder but didn't open it yet. "What about coworkers? Is there anyone he was close with?"
"He had several partners over the years. Remy Silver was his partner the longest, before their falling out."
"Falling out?"
Ruth waved a dismissive hand. "Ancient history. Besides, your grandfather never told me what it was about."
Kari made a mental note of the name. Silver might be able to tell Kari crucial details about the cold case—assuming he was still alive.
"Did he ever mention cases involving ceremonial aspects?" Kari continued. "Crimes where traditional elements were misused or involved somehow?"
Ruth's gaze sharpened, her earlier openness receding like water absorbed by desert sand. "Why do you ask these specific questions, Asdz?′?′ K'os?"
"I told you, I want to know more about my grandfather."
Ruth smiled thinly. "You want to know about his work. Do not lie to me, granddaughter."
The moment of truth had arrived. Kari opened the folder, removing the crime scene photographs—not of the body itself, which would be disrespectful to show, but close-up images of the herb bundle found in Martin Reynolds' mouth. She placed these on the small table between them.
"A professor was killed at Cold Water Canyon yesterday," she said simply. "These were placed in his mouth after death."
Ruth didn't immediately reach for the photographs. Instead, she studied Kari's face with an intensity that seemed to search for something beyond words. Finally, she looked down at the images.
The change was instantaneous and alarming.
Ruth's composure—the steady presence that had weathered decades of hardship without visible strain—cracked like parched earth during drought.
Her hands, always so steady even in her advanced years, trembled visibly as she touched the edge of one photograph with a single fingertip.
"Where did you find these?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
"The killer placed them in the victim's mouth," Kari explained. "Dr. Hatathli identified most of the components—sage, cedar, juniper—but wasn't certain about the white flowers. I thought you might recognize the specific combination."
Ruth stood abruptly, moving with uncharacteristic urgency to a cedar chest in the corner of the room. Her hands shook as she opened it, removing a small bundle wrapped in red cloth.
"Shimásání?" Kari asked, concerned. "What's wrong?"
Ruth didn't answer immediately. Instead she unwrapped the cloth, revealing a smudge bundle composed of the same plants visible in the photographs, bound with similar red thread.
Without explanation, she lit the bundle from a candle that had been burning throughout their conversation, waiting until the herbs began to smolder and release fragrant smoke.
"Stand," she instructed Kari, her tone brooking no argument.
Confused but compliant, Kari rose as Ruth began moving the smoking bundle around her in specific patterns—up and down her body, in circles around her head, across her shoulders.
The older woman murmured in Navajo, words too low and rapid for Kari to follow completely, though she recognized phrases invoking protection and purification.
"Shimásání, please," Kari said when Ruth finally stepped back. "Tell me what this means. What are you protecting me from?"
Ruth extinguished the smoldering bundle in a shell containing sand. Then she sank down on her stool again, looking every bit her age.
"Fifty years," she murmured, seeming to speak more to herself than to Kari. "It returns after fifty years, as the old ones said it would."
Gooseflesh sprang along Kari's arms. "What returns? What are you talking about?"
Ruth gazed off into space, saying nothing.
Kari tried a different tack. "We found cases from 1973—exactly fifty years ago. Three professors killed the same way, with the same herb combination placed in their mouths. Grandfather investigated those murders."
Ruth closed her eyes, pain etching new lines into her weathered face. "Joseph never solved those cases. Not officially. But he knew." She looked directly at Kari. "He knew, and the knowing nearly destroyed him."
"Knew what? What did he discover?"
Ruth shook her head, sudden resolve hardening her features. "No. This case is not for you, Asdz?′?′ K'os. You must give it to someone else—Ben, or your FBI friend Daniels. Someone without Chee blood."
Kari thought of pointing out that Agent Paul Daniels, her father's former partner, wasn't her 'friend.
' But that was neither here nor there. In all the months since returning to the reservation, through all the cases she'd investigated including those with ceremonial aspects, Ruth had never once attempted to interfere with Kari's police work.
This unprecedented intervention struck Kari with the force of physical impact.
"I can't just walk away from a murder investigation because of some—"
"Some what?" Ruth interrupted, her voice sharp. "Some superstition? Some old woman's fear? Is that what you were going to say?"
Kari exhaled slowly, reining in her frustration. "I didn't mean it that way. But I need to understand why you're asking this of me. What connection does our family have to these cases? What did my grandfather discover that was so dangerous?"
"Some knowledge is like poison," Ruth said, gathering the photographs and returning them to the folder with hands that seemed to have steadied through effort of will alone.
"It changes those who consume it. Joseph was never the same after those murders.
The searching hollowed him from inside, year by year. "
"He died of heart failure," Kari said, confusion clouding her thoughts. "That's what Mom always told me."
"His heart failed because his spirit had already begun to fade," Ruth countered. "The knowledge he gained during that case… it took pieces of him each time he returned to those places."
Kari's training rebelled against such mystical explanations, but recent experiences had taught her that Ruth's warnings often contained truth, however metaphorically expressed. "I need more than this, Shimásání. What was he investigating beyond the murders themselves?"
Ruth gathered herself, seeming to make a difficult decision. "I cannot tell you what I do not fully understand myself, and I will not try. I must do my best to protect you, as your grandfather did his best to protect me."
The conversation was clearly over. Ruth had retreated into the focused silence she maintained when performing ceremonial work, her body language conveying a boundary as tangible as any physical barrier. Kari knew from long experience that no further information would be forthcoming today.
"Thank you for the meal," she said, moving toward the door. "And for your guidance."
Ruth didn't respond, her hands moving ceaselessly among the herbs, as if the methodical work might ward off whatever fear their conversation had awakened.
Outside, the afternoon sun beat down with indifferent intensity, the mundane reality of heat and dust a jarring contrast to the unsettling conversation within. Kari stood beside her Jeep for a moment, trying to process what had just transpired.
She thought about Ruth's words: I must do my best to protect you, as your grandfather did his best to protect me. She thought of the instantaneous change that had come over her grandmother at the sight of the herbs.
The fear.
Whatever Joseph had protected Ruth from, it was clear to Kari that it hadn't completely left her grandmother untouched.