“This could be farmed,” he mused aloud. “I could grow corn here.” He searched the manganese violet-colored twilight shadows. Zoan’s long night-eyes could easily see the distant herd, which had dramatically stampeded—for about half a mile. “Nothing for you, Horses. You can’t eat fish,” he murmured. “But you could eat corn if we could grow some.”
As he approached the massive lift of sandstone that was swallowing the sun, his mind was on farming. He knew farming—how to plow, how to plant, how to take care of crops, and how to harvest. That had been the good part of his life on the surface above the laboratory. But here there were problems for there were no neatly humming electric tractors with plows and disks and sodbust attachments. He stared blankly, concentrating. No water. How could I get water here? Maybe—what’s that word?—irrigate. Bring a ditch down from the creek from where it rises in the hills. But he had no shovels, and besides, it would take a single man a long, long time to dig a ditch like that.
Now Zoan considered his new home—the great stone edifice that was so integrated with the rising cliffs that it seemed to have been carved out of them. A huge D-shaped structure, it covered nearly three acres and reached as high as five stories in places. When Zoan had left the lab, his trek had seemed aimless at first. But somehow he had ridden the grisly old stallion right into this canyon, to this ancient place. As soon as he had seen it, he knew this was where he was supposed to stay.
And now, as he had so many times, he studied it again, marveling anew at it. Two large plazas dominated the center of the lower level, with great dark echoing openings yawning in them. Zoan had a dreadful fascination for the circular holes. He knew that they had been underground chambers at one time, but time and weather had stripped away the roofs.
Behind and to one side of the plazas rose the ruins that had once been the homes of an ancient people. Now only stubby brown grass and tough mesquite shrubs lived there.
As Zoan often did, whether through effort or gift, he had a vison so vivid it was like living and walking and breathing the reality of the once-thriving civilization. He saw the fields, not exactly lush, but they did thrive with orderly rows of corn and beans and squash. He heard the muted splash of streams running down from the hills and cliffs, cutting deep into the stone that still bore the trail but not the life-giving water. People were there, people Zoan could see and hear clearly, as they moved across the community plazas, calling out greetings and pausing to visit neighbors in the doorways. High cries of children, running and playing, sounded in the golden air. From the windows high above, faces peered out. It was a live place, of color and light and sound and heart.
Suddenly Zoan expelled his breath, realizing he had been holding it. He knew little about the people who had built this magnificent place so long ago. In the way of odd connections Zoan had, he recalled Dr. Kesteven talking to Alia Silverthorne about “the children of light,” and a place called Chaco Canyon, and the Anasazi. The word meant, Dr. Kesteven had said, “Enemy ancestors.” At the time the conversation had been nothing to Zoan but another indelible, and unfathomable, imprint on the map of his memories. But when Zoan had found this place, he had, in his peculiar way, recognized it, and had recalled Dr. Kesteven’s explanation. About the Anasazi, Dr. Kesteven had known but a little. They were wanderers, the Anasazi, he had told the woman. They learned to plant corn and had built fine communities here and in Arizona and Colorado. They were a peaceful people, good at making exquisite pottery. Niklas had frowned, then muttered, “No one knows what happened to them. They just left their homes, and then they disappeared into the mists of time . . .”
It was almost fully dark, so Zoan entered one of the apartments on the first floor that he had made into a home for himself. It was a spartan place. A sleeping bag lay against one wall. On a shelf carved out of stone were a razor, two bars of soap, which he hoarded carefully, a toothbrush, and a brush and a comb, which pretty well summed up the total of his toilet articles. He had also brought a small store of supplies: some basic cooking utensils, needle and thread, small tools, two electric lanterns, a few packets of dried beef and vegetables, two five-pound bags of rice. But the only personal things Zoan had brought were two books that he had found, lost and forgotten, in the well-stocked lab library. One was a Bible and the other a book of poetry by a man named George Herbert. Sometimes at night he would sprawl belly-down by the fire and read from the two books.
Zoan understood little of the Bible and even less of the poetry, but he had read it so often that it had become imprinted in his mind, and had somehow soaked into his understanding. During the days when he roamed the barren plateaus, bits and portions of his books would come to him. In his solitude, his books had come to form a great deal of his thinking. One conscious analysis that Zoan had was that he liked the poetry; even just the sounds and rhythms gave him light pleasure. But the Bible he loved deeply, an emotion that Zoan hadn’t known he was capable of. Especially he loved the last book, even though sometimes it made him feel a little bit of dread, much like the times he mystically knew of Bad Things to come. Slowly, however, Zoan was coming to understand that the book told of terrible happenings, yes—but also of victory.
Efficiently, Zoan made a fire using the old flint-and-steel method. He had one piece of steel and flints were abundant. He kept punk from dead trees and shrubs so that when he struck a spark it caught eagerly; a tiny lick of flame and a thin wisp of smoke wavered in the cold desert night. Patiently he blew on it, adding more of the punk until finally a small blaze kindled. Nourishing it with small twigs, gradually adding larger ones, he soon had a cheerful fire snapping and crackling, a homey sound that gave Zoan a feeling of peace and security. Outside Zoan cleaned the fish. He fed one to the jaguar, one to the old dingo, and one to two twin brindled cats that had mysteriously appeared out of nowhere to adopt Zoan and the dog. Even the jaguar put up with the two cats, who were only half grown. It would seem that some confusion would have resulted from their joining the community, for Zoan called both of them “Cat,” too. Happily, Zoan wasn’t confused because he knew who he was talking to, and neither the big cat nor the two little ones cared because they only paid attention to humans—even special ones like Zoan—when they wanted to anyway, regardless of what they were named.
Moving back inside, he pushed a green stick through the white meat of the other fish and held it over the fire. When it was cooked he ate hungrily, singeing his fingers pulling the meat off. It was white and flaky and delicious. “Could use some salt. I’ll have to see if I can find salt somewhere,” he spoke aloud.
He took a drink out of the ola that he had discovered down in the circular caverns. He had gone down into them—steps were carved out of the walls—a few times, but only in the daytime. The ola was a small but beautifully designed clay jar with geometrical designs painted in reds, yellows, and blues. The water was tepid, but Zoan was accustomed to that. He picked up the smaller book and turned the page to one of his favorite poems:
A broken Altar, Lord,Thy servant reares,
Made of a heart, and cemented with teares,
Whose parts are as Thy hand did frame;
No workman’s tool hath touch’d the same.
A heart alone
Is such a stone
As nothing but
Thy power doth cut.
Wherefore each part
Of my hard heart
Meets in this frame,
To praise Thy name:
That, if I chance to hold my peace,
These stones to praise Thee may not cease.
O, let Thy blessed Sacrifice be mine,
And sanctify this Altar to be Thine!
He read the words aloud, pleased with the way they appeared on the page, more pleased by the mere sounds. He murmured the line, “A heart alone is such a stone as nothing but Thy power doth cut,” many times, not understanding it in his brain but stamping the sentiment deep in his spirit.
Going back outside, Zoan stood for a long time, just
watching the millions of stars and marveling at the silence of the desert at night. His mind went back to the time when the Voice had come to him in the laboratory, in a dream and in music. The Voice had told him to leave the lab, to go out alone, and he had been afraid . . . but the Voice had spoken truth.
So he had been obedient to the Voice, and since he had been isolated, alone with his thoughts and meditations, in this quiet place, Zoan had learned two things with absolute certainty.
One was that the Voice he had heard, and knew so well, was God.
The other thing that Zoan was sure of was that he had been brought to this place for a purpose. Zoan still wasn’t clear exactly what his purpose was; that is, it was not a formal plan laid down in neat compartments in his mind. It was something of an inner surety, a visceral comprehension, and the beginnings of a vision. But Zoan was not the kind of man to be bothered with hurry. He would know, and see, at the right time.
Finally he went back into his home of old stone and snuggled down in the sleeping bag. The nights were cold, and his sleeping bag kept him wonderfully warm. His acute hearing caught the sound of heavy pads. Without looking up, he knew that the jaguar had come inside the ruins of the house to stretch out in the doorway. “Good night, Cat,” he whispered. He got no answer but he could hear the animal’s deep breaths as he dropped off to sleep.
Dawn came—and with it a sense of urgency. Zoan scrambled to his feet, slipped on his boots, and hurried outside, still unsure of what he was sensing but knowing it to be a true instinct. The jaguar was gone. The old stallion, Zoan’s sometime friend and sometime mount, was outside, stamping impatiently and tossing his head. His eyes rolled, showing white.
“What’s wrong, Horse?” Zoan murmured. He watched the agitated animal for a moment, then suddenly he knew that some-one was coming. Without hesitation he broke into a lope and left the ruins. He ran to a distant cliff, a great fault break where the floor of the mesa ended in a jagged drop down to a scrub valley below. Standing at the edge of a precipitous undercut cliff, his sharp eyes picked up a group of people, far away but moving toward him. Some of them were mounted, some walked. They had several pack animals. He studied them, his eyes narrowed but his unusual pupils rounded into full black disks, even in the brightness of the morning. Finally he lay down on his stomach so that they could not see his outline against the sky.
As the band came steadily forward, Zoan turned his full attention on the man who was obviously their leader. The young Indian sat his horse easily, in the timeless natural manner of his people. His dark eyes were deep and glinted like obsidian stones set in the copper glint of his skin. His mouth was wide, but not full, and was now closed into a thin line of determination. A tall man, he was lean, wiry, sinewy. Long gleaming black hair hung down his back in a thick braid tied with a leather thong and a single tan feather. He was dressed in a pair of old, loose buckskin trousers, and wore a leather vest with no shirt.
Something about the Indian fascinated Zoan, drew him. Of the few people Zoan had known in his life, Dr. Kesteven had been the only one with whom Zoan had had a human relationship— and it was a rather shallow and one-sided one at that. Now, as he studied the face of the man who rode the bay stallion, Zoan suddenly felt a kinship. It was inexplicable and beyond reason, but Zoan was not a man who moved and lived according to reason.
Now, Zoan thought, I’m not going to be so alone anymore. He knew, somehow, that this young Indian, whoever he was, would be inextricably entwined with Zoan’s life. Silent and unmoving, he watched the group as they came plodding forward. His eyes moved from point to point, noting individuals, but always his eyes returned to the lithe form of the leader. “I don’t know your name,” he whispered, “but I’ll come to know you well.”
Ever since the death of her grandfather, Little Bird had been unhappy and lost. Perhaps if the Mitchells had stayed in the West she might have found some sort of place for herself, or some sort of peace in herself, but they had left. For weeks she had restlessly prowled the countryside, unhappy and aimless.
More grief came when she blew the engine of her Harley Davidson. The motorcycle had been a means of escape for her, but now it was past fixing. Little Bird had no money. It didn’t matter, anyway, for there were no parts available for such an ancient machine, and no one who knew how to make them work anymore.
Now as Little Bird pulled her horse up close to the leader of her bedraggled little community, she reflected on how she had heard a rumor of a man in the desert who was turning back to the old ways of his fathers, the Apache. Little Bird had always been impulsive, but since the death of her grandfather and the loss of her only close friends she had become thoughtless and reckless. Blind and uncaring she set out to wander, telling herself she wanted to know what truth lay in the rumors. As she had roamed the southwestern mountains and plains, she had encountered other Indians, lost and uncertain as she was. Finally a small group of them had found the elusive Cody Bent Knife, as he called himself. She had watched him daily for weeks. She was drawn to him, and at the same time disdainful of his beliefs and the hope for the future that he offered.
Abruptly Little Bird taunted, “You’ve gotten us lost, Cody.”
Cody turned his deep gaze on the young woman. As he studied her, he saw the strength in the firm body, the determination in the dark brown eyes, marked the pure Apache blood that was revealed in her burnt coral skin and the jutting planes of her cheek-bones, high and prominent. “What makes you think I’m lost?” he asked.
“Because we’ve wandered all over this desert for weeks now, and all your fine talk about going in circles is just that—going in endless and useless circles. We don’t have anything to eat and everyone’s sick of it.”
Cody pulled his horse to a stop and let him lower his head. There was weariness in the animal, he felt, as there was in his own body. He looked back over the small group that was strung out behind him and saw that the hard traveling had planed away all excess flesh. His eyes went from person to person, for he had learned to know them and see them as he had never known people before. His gaze rested on the oldest of the party, the seventy-year-old Benewah Two Color. Here was the one man whom Cody trusted, and the one who had caught the vision that had driven Cody himself to the desert. “Two Color, Little Bird says I’m lost.”
The old man’s hair was still black except for the white streak at the left temple. He had been born with that odd white mark, which was the reason for his name. There was something of the prophet in him, this old man. He had spent his life watching his people fade away and die off and turn away from their history until now, he saw with profound grief, there was almost nothing of the American Indian left.
Yet still there was, behind his jet-black eyes, the hope of things not seen. He was a man who knew what it was to have visions, for he had both welcomed them and cursed them at different times in his life. Now time had pared him down in body, but in strength of heart he was as determined as his young friend Cody Bent Knife to learn of the truth of these terrible times.
Now Benewah Two Color’s jet-black eyes settled disapprovingly on the young woman, but his rebuke was gentle. “You are too forward, Little Bird. Your grandfather would not have approved.”
Little Bird flushed. She was wearing a pair of faded jeans and a thin, cheap white man’s shirt. Her feet were shod with worn half boots and her black hair was tied carelessly behind her back. She wore a floppy brown hat with a wide brim. Rather sulkily she retorted, “My grandfather would never have come on a wild-goose chase like this.”
“I think he would have,” Two Color said mildly. “It’s just the sort of thing we talked about when we were young men.”
Actually Little Bird knew that the old man was right. She had grown up listening to her grandfather’s stories of the old days, and he had always insisted that there would come a time when the tribes would return to the old ways of living in closeness with their lands. Of course, after he had become a Christian he had modified his visions, hopes,
and dreams somewhat.
Now Little Bird looked around at the dusty, travel-weary crowd and felt the same old impatience she’d had time and time again with her grandfather. “I’ve heard enough Messiah talk for a lifetime. What I want to know is when are we going to stop somewhere and set up a real camp where we can get some rest?”
“And something to eat.” The speaker was a man in his early forties with the name of Bluestone Yacolt. His father was Apache, his mother Blackfoot. He had been born with bright blue eyes, which was inexplicable to both his parents. They had never changed, and from them he had been given his name. Pulling his horse up beside Little Bird, he wondered, again, what exactly he was doing out with the bunch of dusty visionaries. He couldn’t explain it. Now his eyes were flashing the color of turquoise. He had been a gambler and a drunk and had learned to hate all connection with anything Indian. He had married a Nez Percé woman and she had borne him a child that Bluestone had named Sunstone, but Sunstone and his wife had died in the plague.
Bluestone had wandered aimlessly, always weary but never stopping. For some reason that was unfathomable to him, he was out in the desert with what he considered a bunch of deluded, and possibly dangerous, weirdos. But part of Bluestone Yacolt’s rebellion was to stay far away from the grave dignity that was evidenced by the Old Ones such as Benewah Two Color, so now he said in a lazy voice, “I’m starving to death, Cody. Hey, could you maybe do a rain dance, get us some nice cold water? And while you’re at it, do us a T-bone steak dance, with maybe a potato chant on the side?”
Cody Bent Knife was accustomed to this sort of outburst from Bluestone, and he never let it bother him. “We’re not lost, Bluestone, and we’ll eat. With that little paunch you’ve got going there, you’ll live for a while longer.”
The Beginning of Sorrows Page 13
