A Leaphorn/Chee mystery.
Delbert Nez assured fellow office Jim Chee he didn't need help apprehending a vandal who was painting rocks in the desert. But when Nez failed to join Chee for coffee, Chee became concerned and went looking for him. He got to the location in time to pull Nez's body from Nez's burning patrol car, injuring himself in the process and to arrest a drunken Navajo man who was on scene and holding a gun. But Chee was too late to save Nez, who was already dead of a gunshot wound. And all the drunk man, Ashie Pinto, would say, when questioned, was, "I am ashamed."
Chee has to spend some time in the hospital due to the burns he suffered pulling Nez's body out of the car. Still recovering and facing more surgeries, Chee is off duty and feeling guilty. So he starts to investigate Nez's murder unofficially. He is helped by Nez's defense attorney, Janet Pete, who is also an ex-girlfriend of Chee's.
And of course there is Lieutenant Leaphorn, who, even though the murder did not occur in his area, is drawn into the investigation because it turns out Pinto is a relative of Leaphorn's recently deceased wife, Emma. Leaphorn feels like it is what his wife would have wanted, that he help prove Pinto's innocence.
This was an interesting story with a bit of a twist at the end. It all pins upon whether Butch Cassidy, the bank robber, didn't die in Bolivia, but came back to the States and continued to commit crimes and possibly died in the badlands of New Mexico on the run after a train robbery. And upon the antics of a shy teenage boy who wants to declare his love to his crush. But before the mystery of Officer Nez's death is fully solved, two more bodies will be found.
And here is a review by Publishers Weekly.
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