identifying the victim: Henry Roan, a forty-year-old Osage Indian
who was married with two children. He’d once worn his hair in
two long braids before being forced to cut them off at boarding
school, just as he’d been made to change his name from Roan
Horse. Even without the braids—even entombed in the car—his
long, handsome face and tall, lean body evoked those of an Osage
warrior.
The lawmen returned to Fairfax, where they notified the justice
of the peace. They also made sure that Hale was informed; as the
mayor of Fairfax recalled, “Roan considered W. K. Hale his best
friend.” Roan was one of the full-bloods whose financial allowance
had been officially curtailed, and he had often asked Hale to
advance him cash. “We were good friends and he sought my aid
when in trouble,” Hale later recalled, adding that he’d given his
friend so many loans that Roan had listed him as the beneficiary
on his $25,000 life-insurance policy.