Flight of the Serpent

by R. R. Irvine writing as Val Davis

  Elliot had a faraway look in his eyes. “We’re too far south for the Anasazi,” he muttered.

  “Hohokam?” Nick prompted, picking up his train of thought.

  “Could be Salado. The Hohokam were mostly a riverine people.” He paused, pursing his lips. “Of course there was Ventana Cave. That was Hohokam. But the only way we’re going to find out is to take a look.”

  He turned to Moyle. “We might find something in that cave to make you famous after all.”

  “Sorry. I have other plans for Ophir.”

  Dobbs snorted. “Sure, you do. You sold out to the Feds, didn’t you? I saw you huddling with the bastards before they took off.”

  Moyle glared at the prospector. “Wasn’t there something else you were going to mention to our guests here?”

  Dobbs looked blank.

  “You know,” Moyle prompted, “the drawings.”

  “Oh, yeah. Now I remember. There used to be Indian drawings all over the place. That was way back, of course, before they started mining around here. But old-timers have told me that the whole cliff was covered with them scratchings.”

  “Where exactly?” Elliot asked.

  Dobbs waved toward the door. “Where the old mine shafts are now. Above boot hill mostly, between there and the entrance to Sulphur Canyon.”

  “Not a quarter of a mile from where we’re standing,” Moyle added.

  Elliot glowered at Nick. “Did you know about this?”

  She shook her head. “I did not, and I haven’t seen any sign of them.”

  “You can still spot them,” Moyle said, “but only if the light’s just right. What’s left of them anyway, cut right into the sandstone.”

  “Petroglyphs,” Elliot said excitedly. “Show us.”

  So much for Elliot’s trench, Nick thought.

  Dobbs led the way outside and pointed at the cliff face that loomed over boot hill.

  “You’ve got to be standing right underneath to see them,” Moyle said. “And like I said, the light has to be just right.”

  “Lead the way,” Elliot told him.

  Dobbs started to step off the porch but Moyle held him back. “Me and Dobbs have beer to drink. We’ll leave the Indians to you.”

  Dobbs looked at Elliot uncertainly.

  “It’s okay,” Elliot said, stuffing a ten-dollar bill in the prospector’s pocket. “We can find our own way. Why don’t you have another beer on me.”

  Donning her Cubs cap, Nick stepped off the Emporium’s shallow porch and into the dazzling sun. For a brief moment she imagined that a shadow had passed overhead, and she thought she could detect a rhythmic, almost dreamlike thump. The powakus, she thought, the Hopi trickster. She shivered.

  “Can you hear that?” she asked her father, uncertain herself that she’d heard or seen anything at all.

  Elliot looked around and shrugged his shoulders. “All I can hear is the call of an unexplored site. Quit dawdling.”

  Nick tried to shake off the feeling of unease. The sky was bright and clear, but the heat from the blazing sun had lost some of its warmth.

  Chapter 15

  Wiley looked down at the desert floor thirty thousand feet below him and regretted that they had to leave before things got really interesting. But as it was, they’d barely made the plane after planting the explosive. What a sight it would be when the Director pushed the button.

  Wiley sighed. As usual, he kept his seat in the upright position, as was his habit on flights long or short. Sit straight, don’t move unnecessarily, and you didn’t get off the plane looking wrinkled and disheveled. Next to him Voss slouched and kicked off his shoes.

  They were flying first class, such as it was on the commuter airline that flew out of Tucson, with stopovers in Flagstaff and Las Vegas on its way to Salt Lake City.

  “We could have made better time driving,” Voss said, yawning.

  Wiley said nothing. Cooped up in a car with Voss crossing that much desert didn’t bear thinking about. Even with air-conditioning, it would have smelled like a gymnasium.

  From his aisle seat, Voss leaned across him to peer out the window. Voss, whatever his drawbacks, was good at his work. Better a reliable slob covering your back, than someone who might get you killed.

  “Look where they’ve sent us,” Voss said, pointing at the window.

  Below, the Utah landscape looked as bleak and uninhabitable as Ophir.

  “I hear Brigham Young called this state the promised land,” Wiley said.

  “A man with all those wives,” Voss answered, “probably never had time to look out the window.”

  Wiley only grunted.

  “What do you think of that lady archaeologist?” Voss asked.

  “I think we should keep our minds on the job.”

  Voss leaned close and whispered, “Please, let her turn out to be the job.”

  Wiley sighed.

  Voss continued, “You know what I’d like to do with her, don’t you, where I’d like to put my .357?”

  “Don’t get your hopes up. We may have to walk away from this one.”

  “What about your .22? How would you use it on her?”

  Wiley shook his head. Rather than risk metal detectors and X-ray machines, they were traveling without weapons. Once on the ground, their contact at the airport would resupply them.

  Maybe then Wiley could talk Voss into something more civilized. On second thought, why tempt fate? The man was a master with a .357. Put something else in his hand and he might hesitate at the wrong time, or maybe even miss when he was guarding Wiley’s back.

  Thirty minutes later, the outskirts of Salt Lake City came into view.

  “That’s what I like to see,” Voss said. “A city in the wilderness. A ten-minute drive outside of town and you’re in the middle of nowhere. You could bury an army in that desert and nobody would be the wiser.”

  Chapter 16

  Nick and Elliot, armed with canteens, trowels, and hand picks, walked along the base of the cliff, peering up at the overhanging rock.

  “I thought I trained you better,” Elliot said as they reached the base of boot hill. “An archaeologist should always examine the local landscape carefully for possible sites.”

  “Look up there,” Nick retorted. “Do you see anything?”

  Squinting, Elliot shook his head. “You told me you’d spent a lot of time out here.”

  “And I never saw anything to pique my curiosity.”

  “If you were one of my students, I’d flunk you for lack of interest.”

  “You said yourself, this isn’t Anasazi country. So what’s so exciting all of a sudden about this site?”

  “If it’s Salado, possibly nothing, except we are outside their generally accepted territory. If it’s Hohokam, you realize, no remnants of the above-ground structures have ever been found.”

  He lowered his gaze from the cliff. “Let’s try the canyon. I don’t see anything here.”

  Nick shaded her eyes to stare up at the red-rock escarpment above them. Halfway up the hundred-foot face, two abandoned mine shafts reminded her of empty eye sockets in a skull. From those two openings had poured the tailings that created boot hill. Some part of her, that place in her brain where education and logic gave way to superstition, felt as if the eyes were watching her. The eyes of the powakus.

  “Look at this place,” Elliot said. “It just goes to show you that the white man will live anywhere when there’s gold to be had.”

  “Archaeologists will do the same,” Nick shot back, “and they don’t have gold for an excuse. Why—” She blinked and rubbed her eyes. “There, just below the mine shaft on the left.” She moved sideways to get a better angle. Elliot stayed right beside her.

  “I can see a stick figure,” he said suddenly. “Its head is gone but the rest is okay.”

  Nick said, “I see it, but I don’t believe it. It looks like Basketmaker Two.”

  “It can’t be, not this far south.”

  “What do you t
hink it is, then?”

  “I don’t know yet, but it’s a major find if we can place the Anasazi in this part of Arizona.”

  “How the hell did they get up there to carve it?” Nick wondered out loud. The Basketmaker II period of Anasazi culture, she remembered, ran all the way from 1200 B.C. to 500 A.D, with the great rock art tending to be early rather than late.

  Elliot began pacing back and forth along the base of the cliff. “There has to be a way.” He stopped dead. “Here, the handholds begin here.”

  Centuries of erosion had shallowed the handholds that had been cut into the rock by the ancient cliff dwellers. Here and there, bullet holes pockmarked the sandstone wall.

  “The Anasazi were great climbers,” Elliot said, studying the boulder-strewn area at the foot of the cliff. “But we tenderfeet had better clear a drop zone in case we lose our footing.”

  Nick shook her head. “That’s a fifty-foot climb. We need a ladder.”

  “I’m going up there, Nick. You know that. Besides, there’s a rock shelf just below the figure. I can stand on that.”

  “I see it,” Nick said, sighing. The shelf couldn’t have been more than six inches deep, but few obstacles would stop Elliot. To be the first archaeologist onto a site, to touch a piece of history forgotten for centuries, was electrifying. Better than sex, her father often preached. Sometimes she agreed with him.

  “I’ll go first,” Nick said.

  “Like hell.”

  “I’m a hundred pounds lighter than you are, Elliot, and a hell of a lot younger. If the rock’s too brittle, I’ll have a better chance.”

  Once most of the sharp boulders were removed from the area directly below the handholds, Nick started climbing while her father stayed on the ground, grumbling under his breath. She enlarged each handhold as she went. About ten feet up, the holes weren’t as shallow. After twenty feet, they were deep enough to make the climb possible without constant pick work, though it was still a tricky ascent. And there was no guarantee the rock ledge would hold once they got there. The heat wasn’t helping any. Her sweatband was already leaking badly enough to half-blind her.

  “I’m coming down,” she called, then cautiously groped her way back down the cliff.

  “The handholds aren’t as bad as I thought,” she told her father. “But I’d be a lot happier if we had a ladder.”

  “I don’t think the Emporium runs to fifty-footers, do you?”

  Nick shook her head.

  “Now that you’ve tested the handholds, Nick, I assume you’ll let me go up.”

  Nick knew better than to argue at this point. “Just take it slow, Dad. That’s all I ask.”

  She admired his technique, which was precise and cautious despite the adrenaline that had to be surging through him. Her own adrenaline rush was enough to make her fingers tremble. And he was a big man, linebacker-size he liked to say, though that was stretching it.

  She gave him a ten-foot lead before starting up the cliff after him. By the time she was fifteen feet off the ground, Elliot was just above her, feeling for a fresh handhold. In that instant, a tremor moved through the sandstone.

  Tightening her grip, she looked up to see a black shadow filling the sky. It hovered there, above the canyon rim. At first, Nick couldn’t understand what she was looking at, then the shadow slowly resolved itself into a helicopter, its rotors kicking up dust and debris. Small rocks began raining down.

  “Don’t they see us?” Nick shouted.

  Her father’s answer was lost in the rotor roar as the chopper descended even lower. The increased downdraft beat at her. A dust devil swirled to life on boot hill, sandblasting Nick from head to foot.

  “Get down!” she shouted at her father.

  Panicked, she lowered one foot, searching for a hold.

  The downdraft intensified. She clawed at the sandstone. Her loose foot scrabbled, unable to lock onto a hold. Then suddenly the gale dislodged her other foot. For an instant, she hung there by her hands, until finally the wind became too much. It sucked her from the cliff face. At the same time Elliot yelled, “Look out!”

  Nick landed flat on her back. Elliot hit so close beside her that his elbow rammed into her stomach. The impact knocked the wind out of her. By the time she caught her breath, the helicopter was gone and the dust was settling.

  She sat up and realized her father wasn’t moving, wasn’t conscious.

  Just then the ground shook beneath her, a sharp jolt, followed by a muffled thump.

  Nick searched the sky, expecting to see the helicopter returning.

  There was another thump, louder this time. She could feel it through her entire body.

  Above them, the entire cliff face shimmied, then suddenly disintegrated in a deafening roar.

  She grabbed Elliot’s ankles and began frantically dragging him away from the base of the cliff.

  An instant later, Nick was hurled flat by flying debris. Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around her head and curled into a ball.

  Pain blossomed everywhere, her arms, her legs, her head. Dirt filled her eyes, blinding her. Dust choked her. She couldn’t breathe. She was being buried alive.

  Abruptly the roaring stopped. She kicked out. Thank God. Her legs were free. She squirmed frantically with her legs. Her hands tore at the rock around her head and face. She broke free before her air ran out.

  She had to find Elliot. She wiped the grit from her eyes and blinked painfully. There was nothing to be seen but rubble.

  “Elliot!” she screamed.

  Nothing.

  Then she saw it, his foot protruding from among the red-rock debris.

  Chapter 17

  In a frenzy, Nick tore at the rocks covering Elliot. Her nails broke. Her flesh tore, but she didn’t care. The pain only spurred her on.

  Over and over, she called his name. But the only response was the ringing in her own ears. Probably she had a concussion. To hell with that. To hell with anything but her father. By God, somebody was going to pay.

  She found his other foot. The sight of it gave her hope. Only a few seconds had gone by. At least, she hoped that was all, that she was thinking straight.

  She hugged his ankles and pulled. For an instant, she thought Elliot’s weight, plus that of the rubble still covering him, was too much for her. Christ, digging him out completely would take too long. Even now, maybe she was too late. Maybe . . .

  Screaming through clenched teeth, she strained to pull him free. By now, her breath was coming in ragged gasps and her lungs were on fire. She was about to go back to digging, when suddenly his body moved. Straining until she shook, she tugged at him. Rocks fell away, and he was free. She dropped to her knees beside him. Dear God. He wasn’t breathing.

  Fighting to stay calm, she cleared his mouth and began CPR.

  Goddammit, Elliot, don’t leave me alone, she screamed silently.

  He coughed.

  “Talk to me,” she shouted.

  “You’re kneeling on my broken arm.”

  “Sorry.” She moved. “Can you feel your legs?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. They hurt like hell.”

  “Pain’s a good sign,” she said, too brightly.

  “That’s comforting. Now, help me up.”

  Once he was sitting, he blurted, “My God, there’s nothing left of the cliff.” Or Ophir either.

  Until that moment, Nick hadn’t noticed. Where they had just been climbing, there was only a gigantic rockfall. If she and Elliot had been higher or lower, they’d both be dead.

  “There was an explosion after we fell,” Nick said. “Somebody tried to kill us.”

  “Don’t start imagining things, Nick. Maybe all that noise from the chopper caused a mine shaft to collapse.”

  “I don’t buy it, Elliot. And why was the chopper there anyway?”

  “Coincidence?”

  “You don’t like that answer any more than I do.”

  Elliot shrugged. “Maybe we ought to look for Moyle and Dobbs.”


  “They’re under twenty feet of rock.” As soon as Nick stood up, her ankle buckled. It was twice normal size and throbbing painfully now that her adrenaline was starting to ebb.

  “It’s not broken,” she said, accepting Elliot’s help. “It just surprised me. I can walk.”

  They helped one another to the pickup.

  Elliot took one look inside and said, “I see you did listen in class. You kept your artifacts out of harm’s way. But those wall drawings are gone forever. We’ll never know if the Basketmakers got this far.”

  “You have a one-track mind,” Nick said. But then so did she. The box containing the results of her dig was safely stowed behind the seat. At least something of the Benson sisters would survive. She’d still be able to finish her research.

  But first, she had to get Elliot to a doctor.

  Chapter 18

  Nick’s hands were still shaking as she punched Gault’s number into the telephone outside the emergency room in Mescalero, where she’d stopped to get her father’s broken arm set. She needed to talk to someone and John Gault was already on her mind.

  “I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon,” he said the moment he heard her voice.

  “I’m calling from Mescalero,” Nick said breathlessly, then hesitated, wondering how to explain the situation. Finally, she just blurted out, “I think someone tried to kill us.”

  “What? Are you all right?”

  “A few cuts and bruises, that’s all, but my father’s arm is broken. We were lucky to walk away.”

  “Jesus,” he muttered. “Tell me what happened.”

  She took a deep breath. “Zeke Moyle put us onto some Indian drawings on the cliff near Ophir. My father and I were climbing up to get a close look when one of those black helicopters appeared overhead. The damned thing blew us right off the side of the cliff. Funny when you think about it. That saved our lives, because a moment later half the mountain came down on us.”

  “My God. How the hell did it happen?”

  “My father thinks one of the old mine shafts collapsed, but it sounded like an explosion to me. But I don’t know how the hell I’m going to prove it. Any evidence is probably gone completely, buried under the rockfall.”