of nowhere, we came to a stop sign and a 7-Eleven and a laundromat. Beyond the sign and rows of new prefab houses, we took a dirt road that opened on an empty field. Then I knew. I saw the ancient oak tree above the creek, and I saw the large craterlike indentation in the field. Nothing else was there. No barn or house. No shacks. It was drizzling, I remember, and Mabel stayed in the car and watched as I crawled through the barbed-wire fence, past the No Trespassing sign. I found junk—old mattress springs, clothes, a rusted refrigerator—people had dumped in the crater. There was no elderberry tree. Along the creek, I found one marked grave, a concrete block with the name Belle embossed on it.
But Mabel had no plans for going to Lolsel again. Not too far beyond the reservation, a good ways before the hills, she directed me off the highway. In a minute, we were on a dirt road, or rather a horse trail. Then, in my new car, we plunged down the rocky creek bank, crossed the water, and bounced up the other side. Dust swirled up, rocks thudded underneath. On a dry plateau beyond the creek, she said, “Stop, right here.”
She was gazing straight ahead to a wide smooth roll of packed dry earth. Something like the end of a rusted irrigation pipe stuck out of the ground. Piles of dried cow manure here and there marked the otherwise barren earth. “What?” I asked. “What is it?”
“There,” she said, nodding with her chin. “It’s where Grandma Sarah is buried. McKinley, too. Dewey, I think, too. The old graveyard.”
“But this is Wintun country,” I said.
“Yeah,” Mabel answered. “The old Wintun places was just down the creek there. . . After the white people pushed them up this far in the valley.”
I looked at the expanse of packed ground. “Well, where is Sarah’s grave? There’s no marker anywhere.”
“Hmm. I don’t remember. Somewhere in there, though.”
I jumped out and looked around. There wasn’t anything to see really. A warm breeze blew, and I could hear the low-running creek below. A lone cow bellowed in the distance.
“I can’t see anything,” I said, getting into the car.
“Oh,” Mabel said, as if I had just mentioned what I had eaten for breakfast.
I looked out at the empty ground. “So this is where it ended for Grandma Sarah Taylor,” I said.
Then all at once, Mabel burst into laughter. Not her light chuckle, but loud raucous laughing. She was looking at me sideways. I wondered what I had said or done that was so funny. How was she going to make fun of me this time? Then I heard it.
“No,” she said, barely able to contain her laughter. “Grandma didn’t end here. She didn’t die here. She’s just buried here. Who ever heard of a person dying in a cemetery? Well, I guess they could. It’s a good idea, anyway. Is that what you learn in the school?”
“No,” I answered. I felt angry. She knew what I meant. Then I looked down the creek, and over my shoulder to the highway. The old Wintun village. The dirt road where the highway is now. Grandma Sarah on the wagon with the sickly little girl. Grandma Sarah packing and washing clothes. The creek. The water that was still running clear from the hills above Lolsel to the big valley down below. Mabel. For the first time all day I thought I understood something she was trying to say. Of course, people didn’t die in cemeteries. They died when people forgot them.
I started the car and turned around. We thudded and bumped our way back to the highway. We drove on in silence. It was almost dark now.
After I pulled into the driveway of her new HUD home on the Rumsey Wintun Reservation, I jumped out of the car and turned on her porch light. I wanted to see what was left of my new car. Then I heard her passing on my side of the car. “Car done real good,” she said with a slight chuckle. I looked up from the dusty red fender, then took her arm and helped her up the porch step.
Carnivals, Madams, and Mixed-Up Indian Doctors
Then Mrs. Spencer she tried to put me in
school, but school didn’t put up with my
Dream work.
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