17
Over the next twenty-four hours, Erin conducted ten interviews, managed to track down the six surviving Navajo Beauty quilts, and captured photos of each. A compulsion to find the cave paintings Susie had spoken of—even if she had to find it on her own—began to build until by Thursday morning, she awoke to realize she could repress the urge no longer. Her internship ended on Friday. She had only this one last chance to find Olivia.
Returning posthaste at the reports of Debra’s less-than-savory conduct, Director Benallie had assumed the helm of the Cultural Center once more. An elderly docent discovered a priceless black and white piece of ancient Anasazi pottery missing from a display case in the Prehistory section. Another casualty of Debra Bartelli. Tulley and the Bureau put out feelers to contacts in the underground world that trafficked in stolen artifacts. But so far, no luck.
Several additional pieces of late nineteenth century Navajo silversmithing—not currently on display—had also been taken from the storage room. The discrepancies had turned up during Erin’s detailed inventory and cataloguing. Maybe another reason for Debra’s hostility toward her?
Tulley believed those pieces were long gone and probably financed the oh-so-conveniently-timed sweepstakes win that had sent the Director away from the Center and the Rez in those last critical weeks of the meth lab operation. Still no luck in finding the lab, either.
First thing Thursday morning, Erin walked the director from the parking lot into his office. The director had been more than understanding with her request to take the day off.
“Petroglyphs.” Benallie leaned back in his leather desk chair, adjusting the waistband of his navy wool slacks. “At the mouth of the canyon. The cave’s halfway up the rock face. A sheer drop to the floor of the canyon.”
He laughed. “No place for anything except mountain goats.” He’d been a great supporter of Erin’s extracurricular quest from the beginning of her internship.
“Be sure and take lots of water. Quite a hike. Only been once when I was a boy. Didn’t bother to make the climb myself. Lonely place.”
His eyes took on a faraway look. “Not much visited by those among the People who are superstitious.” He patted his round belly.
“Or by those of us who were pudgy even as children. I understand the drawings give a rough account of the history of the Cedar Canyon people since the bilágaana first set foot on our land.”
She nodded.
“Take some pictures for the Center, if you don’t mind. And we’ll call it a working holiday. Don’t know anyone’s ever documented those paintings. Be interesting to create a display to include with our Arts and Crafts section.” Benallie pushed his reading glasses farther up his nose and reached for a paper on his desk.
She backed away from his office, his attention already drawn to the multitude of tasks he faced on a daily basis.
“And Erin?”
She paused to find him peering over the top of the report in his hand. “It goes without saying you need to secure a competent local guide before venturing into such a wild, desolate place. Who will be—?”
They both jolted as the phone at his right hand rang. As he reached for it, she melted into the hallway.
Least said, soonest mended.
With Tulley on duty, she was glad she hadn’t had to lie to the kindly director.
Had to lie?
She frowned.
This Olivia thing had turned into an obsession Erin suddenly couldn’t wait to purge herself from.
Erin pulled the car as far into the arroyo as she dared and set the parking brake. Stepping out of the car, she shivered. A chill wind blew downward from the rim of the surrounding cliff walls. Shielding her eyes with her hand, her gaze drifted to the tops of the tallest peaks where drifts of snow still pockmarked the ground. Perhaps winter had decided not to yield its iron grip upon the land just yet.
She reached, as an afterthought, for her jacket and stuffed it with the other articles she’d packed in the backpack. Her ‘kit’ as Dad called it. She’d included four bottles of water, a first aid kit, a flashlight, extra batteries, a cell phone more than likely useless in this backcountry location, and a couple of granola and chocolate bars thrown in for good measure. Her camera and sketch pad, too.
As she hoisted the strap onto her shoulders, a sharp bulge at the bottom of the pack jabbed into her thigh. A little extra precaution. When facing the unknown, it was best, Daddy had taught her, to pray and hope for the best but to be prepared for the worst. She had no intention of becoming a tasty meal for any predator—animal or human.
The wind whistled among the forested ridge at the top of the rocky slope she had to climb. She took a deep breath. Other than the wind, silence.
No other human for miles. She, out of habit, locked her car.Smiling at her own foolishness, she stuck one booted foot into a crevice, her fingers searching the rough basalt surface for a handhold.
Halfway up the mule deer path that emerged once she’d cleared the first five—or ten—truck-size boulders, she realized this would’ve been easier with an experienced guide. Unless you happened to be part mountain goat. Once she cleared the topmost ledge, she leaned into the shadow of an overhang and unscrewed the cap of her water bottle. Drinking deeply, she flexed her legs, stretching her calf muscles in the vain hope of working out the kinks. She’d be in for a world of hurt, sore muscles tomorrow.
From her perch high atop the ridge, it was all downhill—literally—from here. Boulders lay strewn across the length of the canyon, like a giant’s abandoned playthings. Across the dry canyon floor that opened up below her, she spotted an unusual sandstone formation with chalk white lines—man-made—undulating over the surface of the monolith, resembling the Nazca lines of Peru.
Giant spiraling wheels, stick figures of men, species of animals that no longer roamed the earth. Carved by the Ancient Ones who preceded the Anasazi. And above that rock face, she’d been instructed, lay the cave paintings. The canyon wall itself pockmarked with caves both large and small.
Picking her way down was almost as hard as the uphill climb. As her boots slid and pebbles skidded and clattered to the bottom of the gulch, she concluded downhill was indeed scarier than going up. She blinked rapidly, trying to free her eyes from the grit of the red sandstone.
At the bottom, she paused to catch her breath—and regain control of her tattered nerves. She savored each morsel of one of her chocolate bars as she pondered the best approach to the cave, situated halfway up the rocky face of Petroglyph Canyon. A musky aroma of sage tickled her nose.
Her boots left a track of dusty heel prints in the canyon floor. Clusters of the Apache plume stretched their pinkish feather-like plumes toward the sun arced high overhead. Her forehead prickling with beads of sweat, she glanced at the watch on her wrist and rolled the sleeves of her khaki safari shirt up to her elbows. It’d taken her longer than she’d expected to get to this point.
No more breaks. Time to get moving. Or she and the coyotes would be out here together tonight cavorting their way through the moonlight. After climbing another hour, she reached her destination.
Panting as she stepped into the mouth of the cave, she ground to a halt. The arid sunshine warmed her back. Before her lay . . . inky darkness.
She’d always had a particular aversion to the dark. Erin wrestled with an irrational, primal fear of being buried alive. Of suffocating. She forced herself to inhale deeply and exhale slowly. Erin stood frozen, watching and listening.
No doubt slimy, icky creatures dwelled here under the earth. Maybe a hibernating bear or two. Or had they already awoken from their long winter naps and were now ready to eat?
Fine time, she kicked the ground sending up a clod of dirt, to wish she’d spent more time studying the animals and their behavior before venturing into their habitat and less time with her nose in a book on basket-weaving among the Navajo. “Get a grip, Dawson.”
She flinched at the sound of her voice reverberating off the cave walls. And another thought . . .
Could bats actually get entangled in your hair as she’d always heard?
Out of reflex, she ducked and clamped the wide-brimmed felt hat more securely about the crown of her head. She shuddered. How badly did she want to see these cave paintings? Other than thinking to bring a flashlight, she’d deliberately kept her mind from examining too closely the ramifications of what cave exploration would entail, knowing if she did, she’d never force herself to get this far.
Light. That’s what she needed. Light always dispelled the darkness.
Unzipping the pack, she fumbled around until her fingers encountered the cold aluminum of the flashlight canister. One flick of the switch and the darkness yielded to the torchlight in her hand. Ahead, a tunnel curved out of sight. She shone the light upward until the light disappeared into the darkness.
Good. The vaulted ceiling high enough so as to be out of sight. She wouldn’t have to fight claustrophobia at least. At her feet, the light revealed the ubiquitous red dust of the Dinétah. And the walls were dry.
Maybe no slimy, icky creatures around.
Squaring her shoulders, she tiptoed a few steps forward until she came to the bend in the cave wall. She pressed her back against the stone, the flashlight drawn against her chest and pointed upward below her chin.
For a moment as her face glowed in the light, she was reminded of bonfires at summer camp and ghost stories told when the counselors stepped away. She shook herself. Defi-nitely not the place to think of ghost stories, though this long-forgotten place echoed with atmosphere.
Regretting every supernatural tale she’d ever heard, as she’d seen Adam do when he’d entered her vandalized home, she summoned her courage and whipped around to the other side of the bend. The light bounced off the wall. But not before she caught a glimpse of blue.
Holding her breath, she drew closer, the flashlight scanning every inch of the wall. She advanced step-by-step, awestruck at the still-crisp colors, the delicacy of the lines, feeling like Howard Carter must have when he uncovered the treasure of Tutankhamen.
At the far left, the pictographs began, different from the petroglyphs carved in the canyon below. These drawings were painted onto the surface of the wall with a mixture of crushed mineral substances the artist would’ve had at hand. Applying the paint first to his fingers, he’d then rub it onto his drawings.
The first drawing, done in white clay and charcoal, depicted the octagonal, dome-shape of the hogan, a few sheep, and the figures of men. The second revealed other men with conical helmets on horseback with lances aimed at a group of hogans. Red and white pigments illustrated this scene.
Spaniards—she wondered—who’d failed so utterly to dominate and control the Navajo unlike their easy conquest of the neighboring Pueblo peoples?
The third panel displayed a fierce battle between many horse soldiers and proud, feather-draped Navajo warriors. The combatants grappled in a life and death struggle against each other. In the background, the square frame of a large building. A figure in a bell-shaped skirt stood beside the building, an interesting blue shape in the place of the head.
A woman? A white woman with a bonnet?
One lone warrior on horseback rode straight for her position. An eagle circled. The Cedar Canyon Massacre?
Erin held her breath and moved to the right along the wall until she came to the next painting. A bonneted woman—that same woman?—in front of a hogan, sheep once again milling about the backdrop of the painting. The eagle flew above the home. Flecks of silver mica reflected in the light Erin held in her trembling hand.
“Silver Eagle,” she whispered.
Farther down, jagged streaks of painted lightning sizzled up and down the wall. She gasped, stepping back in alarm. Anger radiated from the wall. And pain?
She was almost afraid to examine the next painting. Was there another painting? Or was this the end of Olivia Thornton’s time with Silver Eagle and the People?
Closing her eyes and gripping the light, her feet obeyed her brain and moved sideways a foot. Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes.
A blue-bonneted woman and a silver-flecked man stood in the doorway of a hogan. Above the hogan, the eagle no longer circled but instead, the sign of the cross hovered above the roof. And the dome-shaped roof?
Tears rolled down her cheeks.
A square had been etched and subdivided into alternating green and blue squares forming triangles and feathered star points.
The Navajo Beauty.
“Olivia,” she breathed. She touched a fingertip to the square.
And though she’d never be able to prove it conclusively, in her heart she knew, Olivia had made it home to Silver Eagle and the People of Cedar Canyon.