Bone Walker: Book III of the Anasazi Mysteries (52 page)

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Authors: Kathleen O'Neal Gear,W. Michael Gear

BOOK: Bone Walker: Book III of the Anasazi Mysteries
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Keen anticipation lit Pigeontail’s eyes. Where did that come from? What did it mean? What was he waiting for?
Browser turned to Stone Ghost.
Perspiration had glued his uncle’s thin white hair to his wrinkled forehead, but his black eyes blazed. Stone Ghost said, “Catkin is right. This is certainly a trap. Which means you must make certain, Nephew, that you are smarter than Two Hearts, and few have ever been. That’s why he’s still alive, though we’ve tried to hunt him down many times.” Stone Ghost stepped toward Browser and looked up. “You must also make certain that anyone who chooses to accompany you on this raid knows he is going there for one reason, to kill
the most dangerous witch in the land. There is a good chance that all of you will die at Owl House.”
Blue Corn added, “There is one more small thing to consider.”
Browser turned to face her. She looked suddenly frightened. “Yes, Matron?”
“Two Hearts is a very powerful witch. If there is any chance that Obsidian’s heart can extend Two Hearts’s wicked life—”
Browser spun around. “Catkin, find Straighthorn and Jackrabbit! The time has come to end this.”
 
 
“CAREFUL!” DUSTY CRIED as he leapt the yellow tape and ran. “Stay back! The whole roof can go at any second!”
No one questioned his unexpected authority as he shouldered through the gaping FBI agents to get to Michall and shouted, “Give me your flashlight!”
She pulled it from the sheath on her belt and thrust it into his hand. Dusty dropped to his hands and knees and crawled forward until his head cleared the hole. “Sylvia? Do you hear me?”
“I’m okay!” she called up.
Flipping on the flashlight, he shot the beam around the interior and saw her, sitting about four feet below. Dust covered her from head to toe.
Sylvia coughed and shielded her eyes against the light while she looked around the interior of the kiva. “Oh, Dusty, you’re not going to believe this.” She
lifted a long tan object and pointed to the floor in front of her. They were everywhere.
“What does she see?” Michall asked.
Through the swirling dust, he made .out the bones, and a portion of the curving kiva bench that buttressed the north wall. Plaster still clung to the stone in places. Dusty swiveled to look at Maureen. “Sylvia is sitting in the middle of a bone bed.”
Maureen hurried toward him, and Dusty slid backward, gave her the flashlight, and said, “Be careful not to collapse the rest of the roof.”
“I’ll be careful.” She took the light, got down on her belly, and slid forward to look. Her long black braid snaked through the dirt at her side.
Yvette and the FBI guys looked wary and uncertain, obviously expectant, but without the feeling of pure ecstasy that shone in Michall’s wide eyes.
“It’s intact,” Dusty said to her unasked question. “The roof hasn’t completely collapsed onto the living floor on the north side.”
“Dusty?” Maureen twisted her head around to peer at him. “We have … let’s see … one, two, three, at least three femora that I can see. From the looks, it’s probably two individuals. Well …” She paused, as though confused. “This is strange. You can’t have three different sized lefts, and that fourth femur is smaller.”
“What does she mean?” Rick asked Dusty as he wiped his brow with his coat sleeve.
“She means there are probably more than two individuals.”
Michall said, “Okay, how do you want me to do this? I’m not a physical anthropologist.”
Dusty studied the slanting pit floor, and for the first time since Dale’s death, he felt whole, excited, happy to be alive. “If we can get Sylvia out without bringing the whole thing down, I think you should drop back. The smart way is to trowel this down to the burned beam.” He cocked his head, reading the pit floor, seeing
through the soil. “The best entry is right there in the middle of the pot hunter’s hole. We have to assume that he fell through, too, just like Sylvia did. And both of them have destroyed the context. Which means we can—”
“Huh?” Rick asked as he photographed Maureen’s butt where it hovered over the hole.
“The pot hunter and Sylvia had to put their feet somewhere,” Dusty said. “That means that they either crushed or kicked the bones aside.”
“That’s bad.” Bill was holding a tape recorder where he’d been dictating notes. “Sylvia just destroyed evidence.”
Dusty said, “But we also have about a third of this kiva floor intact! The pollen, the phytoliths, the artifacts, everything’s there.”
“Except what the pot hunter took,” Michall corrected. “It’s not like it’s pristine.”
“Yeah, but this isn’t the thirties, almost-a-doctor Michall. For now, this is pretty spectacular.”
“What the
hell
is going on here?” Nichols’s unexpected voice demanded harshly. “Stewart! You consider yourself under arrest for interfering with an investigation!” Sam Nichols stood at the edge of the kiva in his brown canvas coat, breathing hard. His thick black hair was sticking out at angles from under his gray knit cap. “Is that Dr. Cole in that hole?”
Dusty smacked dirt from his hands. “Agent Nichols, we’ve hit the mother lode.”
“I hope that means you have a damn good explanation, Stewart!”
Dusty helped Maureen out of the kiva as she crawled back, a glow in her eyes. “I could see two adult skulls, a male and a female.”
“Uh, Sam,” Bill said, his tape recorder held out in Maureen’s direction. “We’ve had some interesting developments. I wouldn’t file charges on Stewart or Dr. Cole yet. We’d probably better take Stewart’s advice
and excavate as he recommends or we’ll collapse the rest of it. Stewart says that—”
“Hey!”
Sylvia yelled, her arms extended from the hole. “Somebody get me out of here! This is spooky!”
Michall said, “Give me my flashlight, I want to go look.”
Dusty handed it to her, and watched Michall slide forward on her belly until she could shine her flashlight down into the hole.
“Hey, swamp rat,” Michall greeted. “You look picturesque squatting there amid the bones.”
Sylvia replied, “Come on. Get me out. There’s something really strange about these bones. It’s as though I can feel them crawling all over me.”
Michall panned the beam around for a while, then asked, “Is that a wall crypt over there?”
Sylvia answered but Dusty couldn’t make out the words.
“All right.” Nichols fixed his good eye on Dusty. “Assuming that I’m not dragging you off to Albuquerque and one hell of a stiff fine, what’s going on here?”
“We don’t know for sure yet,” Bill said from behind. “Sam, there’s a kiva full of dead people here. You just missed the collapse of the hole in the roof.”
Dusty caught movement from the edge of his vision and spun around. “Yvette? Where are you going?”
She was headed downhill, her black coat flapping.
“I’m cold!” she called over her shoulder. “See you later.”
“Yvette?” Nichols asked. His horn-rimmed glasses flashed as he whirled to take another look at the woman.
“Yvette Hawsworth,” Dusty said. “She just showed up at my trailer last night—”
“And you didn’t call me immediately!” Nichols roared. He waved an arm. “Rick, would you kindly run down and detain Ms. Hawsworth. Stewart, Cole, get in my car! Let’s find a place to talk.”
 
 
BROWSER STOOD IN the windswept plaza, the ruins of Kettle Town rising around them. The long-abandoned town felt oddly remote, as if the place watched through the dark windows and doorways, waiting for some great event to unfold.
Rubbing a hand down the back of his neck, Browser could feel the eyes of the old ones—his ancestors—upon him. He addressed his small party: “First, I need two volunteers to make sure that Matron Blue Corn gets safely to Flowing Waters Town.”
Two of the Mogollon warriors trotted forward, expressions grim. “Yes, War Chief. Upon our lives, the Matron will be delivered safely.”
“You need not do this,” Blue Corn said, a grudging respect in her eyes. “Just get me back to Center Place. I left three wounded warriors there. They will be wondering what has happened. They can get me home. Or, rather, we can get each other home.”
“See to them, too, if you will,” Browser charged the warriors.
“Yes, War Chief.”
“I do not think this is smart,” White Cone said from the side. “It is not the time to divide our forces.”
Browser cast a sidelong glance at Pigeontail, aware that the old Trader seemed to soak up each word like a wadded fabric shirt in a rain puddle. “We must move rapidly, Elder. If not, Shadow’s reinforcements will arrive from Starburst Town before we can rescue Obsidian and be on our way south.”
Stone Ghost added, “Time, my friend, is the one thing we do not have.”
“Those who jump too quickly fall into fires or
floods,” White Cone countered. “But, very well, what of Elder Horned Ram? He is failing.”
“We’ll take him with us.” Browser took in Catkin’s stunned expression, then turned to Blue Corn. “He wanted us dead, didn’t he?”
“He did,” a gravelly voice called.
Browser turned to see Rain Crow propped in the doorway, a war club hanging from his hand. He squinted against the daylight, and his expression reflected the terrible agony inside his head. He took a step forward, wobbling, and had to use his war club like a cane to brace himself.
Blue Corn asked, “War Chief? Are you fit to travel? Are you ready to start home?”
Rain Crow swallowed, his negation the faintest shake of the head, as if any more would have split his skull. “No, Matron. I wish to remain here for a time. Browser is going after Two Hearts, correct?”
“I am.” Browser nodded.
“Then I am going with you.” Rain Crow lifted his ruined face and glared at Browser.
“I need you at home,” Blue Corn said shortly. “And beyond that, you’re not fit to fight a mouse, let alone White Moccasins. You look like a passing butterfly could blow you over.”
Rain Crow smiled. “Matron, while I have been sick, tongues have been loose. The talk is that the White Moccasins were responsible for Gray Thunder’s death. None here has let slip, or even hinted, that my guard was killed in retaliation.” He almost toppled, jamming his war club down to keep his balance. “I would know who caused my guard’s death.” He shot a veiled look at Browser. “You, War Chief?”
“No,” Browser insisted. “And I doubt that any of the Mogollon did, either. My suspicion is that Shadow did it.”
“I share your thoughts.” Rain Crow took another step. “And I think you are right to keep Horned Ram
close. He is the sort of serpent you are better off keeping in a cage. At least when you can see him you have an idea of what he’s up to.”
“Why would I want you with me? You look like you’re about to fall over dead yourself,” Browser said.
The grim smile played about Rain Crow’s pain-wracked lips. “I relieve you of any obligation for me, War Chief. I will make my own way. Should I fall behind, you have my leave to abandon me. I have sworn an oath to find and kill the culprit who murdered my guard. It is something I must do, that is all.”
Browser nodded, remembering how disoriented he had recently been when Two Hearts had cracked him in the head. The pain had to be like watery fire running through Rain Crow’s brain. “Very well, but you are on your own if you come with us, Rain Crow.”
“I understand that,” the War Chief replied.
Catkin stepped in front of Browser, her back to the others in the room, and whispered, “We can’t take an old man and a wounded warrior with us! Are you trying to get us all killed?”
He gazed into her dark panicked eyes and said, “I have reasons. Please—”
“What reasons? They will slow us down to a crawl, and if Horned Ram has the chance, he will scream out our location to our enemies! Have you lost your wits?”
Browser put a hand on her shoulder and felt the bunched muscles. “Not at all. My wits are the only thing I have left. I can’t explain right now. You must trust me.”
She didn’t wish to. He could see it in her expression. The cant of her jaw, the way her nostrils flared. But she nodded and stepped back.
Browser called, “Red Dog? Fire Lark? Please find a ladder and lay Horned Ram on it. I want to be out of here in one half-hand of time.”
“What will Straighthorn and I do?” Jackrabbit asked.
“Come with me.”
Browser turned toward Old Pigeontail. “Tell me one last thing, Trader? Are you certain Carved Splinter is dead?”
Pigeontail gave Browser a sympathetic look. “Only bones remain of the young warrior. And most of them have been boiled and splintered, if you understand my meaning.”
Jackrabbit’s throat worked.
Browser looked at the young warrior. “I have special duties for the two of you. Gather your things and meet me at the front entrance of Kettle Town. We will discuss it there.”
“Yes, War Chief.”
 
 
THE CONFERENCE ROOM at the Visitors Center spread about sixteen by twenty feet and had artsy photographs of Chaco Canyon on the pale green walls.
Nichols leaned back in the chair at the head of the long rectangular table and glared at Dusty and Maureen, who sat side by side to his left. Stewart appeared a little insecure, but Cole stared right back at Nichols, as though she’d endured a thousand such interrogations and wasn’t intimidated by him at all. Nichols took out his notebook and slapped it on the table.
“This is a criminal investigation, for God’s sake. Are you two particularly dense?” He loosened his tie and reached for the cup of weak coffee Rupert Brown had provided; it steamed on the battered government tabletop.
“Not at all, Nichols.” Maureen crossed her arms. “And neither are your agents. Both of your men are conscientious. They wouldn’t allow anyone to compromise evidence.”
Nichols squinted at her. “They’ve assured me of that,
but your involvement
appears
to be a conflict of interest, Dr. Cole. Do you understand that?”

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