A policeman, Benny Kinsman, is investigating a tip he received that a man known for poaching is back at it again. So Officer Kinsman heads out into the wilds of northern Arizona to catch the poacher, Robert Jano, in the act of capturing an eagle, a protected species.
Acting Lieutenant Jim Chee of the Navajo Tribal Police is expecting Kinsman in his office for a meeting and when Kinsman doesn't show up, Chee goes looking for him. He finds the poacher, Jano, standing over Kinsman's body and immediately arrests Jano.
Meanwhile retired policeman Joe Leaphorn has been hired by a woman to find her missing niece, Catherine Pollard. Pollard went missing the same day as Officer Kinsman was attacked. Leaphorn doesn't believe in coincidences and agrees to try to find the missing woman. He seeks out Officer Chee, seeking to speak to Jano to find out if he noticed Pollard when he was in the area or if he had seen the jeep she was driving. Leaphorn finds out that a jeep was seen by a local not too far from the area where Kinsman was killed. And Chee finds out that Jano also saw a jeep while he was out poaching eagles. Using this information, the jeep is located and there is blood on the driver's seat. It begins to look like Kinsman's murder is possibly connected to Pollard's disappearance. And that Jano is not the killer.
This was an OK read. There is some rather technical stuff about scientists investigating diseases carried by animals that can spread to humans, namely bubonic plague and hantavirus. Of course this figures into the plot and it is not a red herring. But the killer's motive came as a complete surprise to me and made sense in a sad way. One can only hope that the killer's conclusion about the fate of humankind doesn't happen.
Here is a review by Kirkus Reviews.
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