THE WAY OF THE BEAR
Still smarting from the rejection of her application for promotion to detective, Navajo police officer Bernadette Manuelito has accompanied her husband, Lt. Jim Chee, to Utah, where he plans to meet with Hosteen Desmond Grayhair and help persuade interested scientist Chapman Dulles to make a sizable donation to the Navajo Nation’s Fallen Officers Memorial Fund. On a solitary evening walk in the Valley of the Gods, Bernie is targeted by a truck that nearly runs her down shortly after she discovers that some of the valley’s ancient petroglyphs have been defaced. On top of all this, she’s called on to deliver the baby of Hannah Black, whose husband, Roper, has just tendered his resignation as Dulles’ security chief. Since Chee’s buddy Officer Ajax Becenti is away from his desk at the Bureau of Land Management, Bernie reports the damaged petroglyphs to Becenti’s partner, Ranger Cassidy Kingsley, a California import who seems indifferent. The tale picks up steam with the discovery of missing paleontologist Kyle Johnson’s body and the disappearance of Dulles, who leaves an unidentified corpse behind on his front porch. Hillerman ends up identifying a surprising number of suspects as perpetrators of diverse crimes and misdemeanors. But it’s clear from early on that the crux of them all is Mary, the fossilized skull that Dulles had found and made a beloved companion.
