Devil’s Claw

“Were you the one who suggested Lucy sign up for ballet?” Joa

Sister Celeste regarded her with a raised eyebrow. “Yes,” she said. “How did you know about that?”

“Jay Quick, the son of Lucy’s ballet instructor, remembered something about one of the nuns at school giving a book to her-a book about a Native American ballerina.”

“Maria Tallchief.” Sister Celeste nodded. “I knew when I gave Lucy the book that it made a big impression on her. It seemed to help-to give her hope that somehow things could get better for her. She was so desperately unhappy, I had to do something.”

“Why unhappy?” Joa

“Santa Theresa’s is a barrio school,” Sister Celeste answered. “We have lots of Hispanic students and quite a few Native Americans. Lucy was different.”

“Different how?” Joa

“She isn’t full-blooded Apache,” Sister Celeste replied. “And it shows. The other kids teased her and made her life miserable because she wasn’t Indian enough to suit them. And then, once she arrived at her grandmother’s place near Pearce, just the opposite must have been true. There she had too much Indian blood, and she was still an outsider.”

“Which is why her best friend turns out to be a red-tailed hawk?” Joa

“Who, the hawk?” Sister Celeste asked. “Big Red is at the monastery, too. At the time Lucy called me, she said she and the bird would be hiding out in the hills near Texas Canyon. I suggested that she come to Tucson. I offered to come get her right then, early Saturday morning. I even told her she could stay at the convent, although we aren’t really set up to accommodate boarders. Lucy refused. Said she couldn’t come because of the bird. She said since she couldn’t ride her bike on the freeway, she’d have to walk the whole way to Tucson because Big Red had never been in a car before and she didn’t think he’d go in one.

“When she was talking about her pet bird, I was more or less envisioning something like a parakeet or parrot. I had no idea what kind of bird Big Red was or how big. Someone came to where she was right then, and she had to get off the phone. She said she’d call me back. I stayed by the phone all day long, but I didn’t hear from her again until Sunday morning. When I talked to her that time, she was calling from a place called Walker Ranch. She told the people there that she had been hiking and gotten lost. She told me that someone bad had come looking for her Sunday morning, and she had run away, leaving everything behind-her bike, bedroll, water, and food. She said if it hadn’t been for her hawk calling a warning, she would have been trapped. She said Big Red was the only reason she got away.

“That was the first I really understood Big Red is a hawk. The woman who lived at the ranch gave me directions, and I told her I’d be right there as soon as I could to pick them up. Overnight I had been racking my brain to think of a place where a girl and a bird would be welcome. Sometime around midnight I remembered my friend, Father Mulligan.”

“At Holy Trinity in Saint David?” Joa

Sister Celeste nodded. “Since Lucy was clearly so frightened, it seemed like an altogether more sensible place for her, and Holy Trinity is a retreat center that is set up to handle overnight visitors. Once I understood Big Red was a hawk, Holy Trinity seemed like a good place for him, too. Much better than the grounds at Santa Theresa’s, which happen to be in the middle of Tucson. The only problem was getting them there.”

“Wait a minute,” Joa

“Lucy’s a very resourceful young woman, and I’m sure she could have walked that far,” Sister Celeste returned. “But right then, she was at the end of her rope. I remembered how in some of the old romance novels I used to read, falconers would keep hoods over their birds’ heads. So that’s what I did-got Big Red a hood.”

“Where?” Joa

“I didn’t have to. One of the sisters at the convent, Sister A

For several minutes the car moved through the bright desert afternoon sunlight with no further words being exchanged. When Sister Celeste spoke again, she took the conversation back several steps. “Back then, when I suggested Lucy take ballet, there was more to it than just the Indian situation.”

“Oh?” Joa

“When it was time for the first parent-teacher conferences that fall, Tom Ridder showed up by himself. I told him both parents needed to be involved in what was going on at school. I explained that things weren’t going well for Lucy-that she wasn’t fitting in and that she wasn’t working up to her potential, either. I asked him if there were problems at home. He admitted that yes, there were. He said he and his wife were having marital difficulties. That things were so bad they might end up in divorce court. He said Lucy was the only reason he was hanging on and trying to hold things together.”

“Lucy’s grandmother claimed Tom Ridder had behaved violently with his wife,” Joa

Sister Celeste shook her head. “No,” she said. “I agree there was violence in the home, but I don’t think Tom Ridder was the culprit. One day, Lucy came to school with a handprint-shaped bruise on her face. Remember, this happened back before there were state laws requiring school perso

“And you believed her?” Joa

“I had no reason not to,” Sister Celeste replied.

“Did you mention the possibility of Sandra Ridder’s own violent tendencies to any of the detectives investigating Tom Ridder’s death?”

Sister Celeste shook her head. “I kept waiting for someone to ask me about it, but no one ever did. I suppose I would have come forward eventually, but then, when Sandra Ridder pleaded guilty, it didn’t seem as though what I had to say would make any difference one way or the other. After all, Lucy wasn’t being left in the care of an abusive parent. Child Protective Services had shipped her off to live with her grandparents-a grandmother, I believe. The family situation was already in enough of a crisis. I didn’t see any reason to heap fuel on the flames.”

“Sheriff Brady?” The voice of Tica Romero came wafting into the car through the speaker in Joa

“I’m here, Tica. What is it?”

“We just had a call from Los Gatos PD out in California.”

“Los Gatos,” Joa

“They’re looking for Reba Singleton. Her husband, De

“Of course, I saw her,” Joa