The Sirens of Oak Creek

by Robert Louis DeMayo

  Mattie, now twenty-seven, and her husband, Stephen. And the boys—Emory, Jess and Albert—aged nine, six and four.

  The assurance that the boys would know their grandfather coursed through his being, reviving him, and at the same time washing away some of the pains of the past.

  And his own boy was here, too. Jesse. Grown, but still alone. With pride, he felt he could be a good influence on the young man.

  He heard a shout, and looked over to see Mattie leading her youngest, Albert, around on Shadow. The older boys were wrestling with their dad on a blanket where a picnic had been set out. Howard slowly began to sit up.

  A few feet away, an agave had just finished its parabolic stretch upward, climbing to almost twice the height of a man, where it shot out tubular flowers of yellow and burnt red. A multitude of hummingbirds circled it, and Howard remembered Margaret’s story of how she told Jim she was pregnant.

  He glanced downstream and as if on cue saw the Thompsons heading his way.

  They were expected.

  Margaret was now twenty-one, and her kids were sprouting up, too. Frank was four, leaping ahead of them from rock to rock, while Jim chased after him. And she cradled Lizzie, who had just turned one and still didn’t sleep through the night.

  Howard was relieved to see that Richard Wilson was not with them. Wilson lived alone at Indian Gardens now, tending the crops in exchange for his rent. A few times Thompson had asked Howard if he’d seen him around, possibly up on the rim or inside the West Fork.

  He got the feeling Wilson was slacking on his responsibilities.

  Howard climbed to his feet and slowly walked over to the blanket, where he plopped down next to Stephen and the boys.

  “Hey grandpa!” they yelled and crawled over him and pushed and tugged until he lay on his back and surrendered.

  Mattie cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention.

  “I want to thank my Pa for making all this possible,” I said, when the Thompsons had greeted everyone, and we were all seated. “I still can’t believe we’re all together.”

  A small feast was laid out before us: venison, rabbit stew, potatoes, greens from the garden, and corn on the cob with butter.

  “Hear, hear!” shouted Jim Thompson.

  I could tell our arrival in the canyon was the best thing that had happened that year as far as the Thompsons were concerned. Now there was another woman for Margaret to talk with, and other boys that Frank could play with—and hopefully burn off some energy.

  Margaret stood and walked to a soaproot yucca. She picked a dozen of the pure-white blossoms and returned to kneel by me.

  “These are great mixed with a salad,” she said. “Here, try one.”

  I nibbled on a petal and smiled. There was a slight tart aftertaste, but I thought they would make a great addition to a salad. “Delicious,” I said.

  Margaret giggled. “If you want delicious, wait until you taste Jim’s rhubarb-brown sugar pie!”

  We were celebrating the completion of a small cabin that would house us until we could build a larger, more permanent structure. My brother, Jesse, would need his own place soon, too.

  But for now, we were so glad to have a roof over our heads after the long journey from California. Everyone had worked on the construction, even the Thompsons.

  Pa had picked the location, about a mile downstream from his place at the mouth of the West Fork. It was, by no coincidence I’m sure, located at the base of his trail up onto the plateau.

  A place I’d yet to see.

  Might as well have family watching my back, he had said.

  Jim Thompson said, “I can’t believe there are close to a dozen people living in Oak Creek Canyon—we’re almost a town!”

  Howard grabbed a piece of corn and pointed it at him, “I’m so happy to have everyone here, but let’s not get carried away. You start calling it a town, and more people will come.”

  When the last corn cobs had been picked clean, Margaret uncovered her heated rhubarb pie, and Pa ate two slices. It had a soporific effect on him, and he slid into a second nap of the day.

  The sun was hovering by the canyon’s rim when Howard took his leave and walked the mile up the creek to his cabin. Mattie had asked him to stay overnight, but with three adults and three kids, the quarters were tight.

  He suspected Stephen and Jesse might sneak off for a drink, and he knew he was welcome, but he was ready for a little break.

  The five children were so full of energy that just watching them exhausted the older man. Their screams—especially once they retired indoors—set him on edge. It had been a great day, but he was happy when he reached his lonesome cabin, just before darkness set in.

  He lit a kerosene lantern, walked into the bedroom and opened a wooden chest. In the bottom, wrapped in cloth, was Cristóbal’s leather-bound journal. A hundred and eighty years had stiffened and yellowed its pages.

  Howard dragged a chair under the puddle of light cast by the lantern, sat down heavily, and opened the book.

  His Spanish was a bit rusty, and the script was difficult to read, but slowly Howard followed along with the account of two Spanish brothers as they landed in the New World and made their way to the Verde Valley.

  The entries were sparse, mostly logistical, until they reached Oak Creek Canyon. Then they became barely legible, seemingly written by a shaking hand.

  He held the book up to the light and translated the last line, written in a neat hand: Today, we separate.

  After that entry, the writing became altered. Frantic. It took Howard some time to decipher the spidery text.

  And the ink was somehow different, too.

  Howard examined the page closely, then held the book away from his face with a puzzled expression. Had the Spaniard put down his last thoughts in his own blood?

  I believe a bear protects this canyon—or the treasure, I am

  not sure which, but I see his tracks in the morning.

  Chapter Fifty

  I turned in a dream while Stephen snored next to me, sated from the food and drink. In my dream, an old woman in buckskins sat on a rock in the creek and sang a wordless melody.

  The woman had grey hair and a serene, wrinkled face. She moved slowly, and I realized she was very tired as she sat there, feet in the water, singing.

  The forest appeared to respond to her song. The trees and grass were swaying and breathing with her. And in my soft bed, by my husband, I also swayed, my whole body recalling the melody I had once heard on my father’s lips.

  And then the old woman sighed and slumped to her side.

  She lay there, unmoving, and I didn’t realize she was dead until the forest around her began to change.

  Slowly, the leaves turned from green to brown and dropped, and then a wind came through and blew them over the woman’s body, all but covering it.

  By the time the bear showed up her body had turned to bones.

  The bear—an old brown grizzly—sniffed her bones and nudged them before ambling away.

  And then they were covered with snow. First a dusting, but soon several feet of it, while the creek froze solid.

  When the snow and ice melted, the water rose, and as I watched the old woman´s bones were washed into the creek where they sank down into the depths below the rock she had sat upon.

  I floated in her dream, watching it all.

  Eventually I woke. I lay there, still; the world outside my window lit brilliantly by a pale full moon.

  And then the hair on my arms began to rise as I heard the melody again.

  I didn’t think about what I did next, my body moving by its own volition. But soon I found myself outside the cabin, following the beautiful melody upstream.

  I recognized it, of course.

  But the song I knew had been my father’s rendition of it from years ago. What I was hearing now was all so much more.

  The song made me feel that I was connected to the land.

  Not a thought entered my mind ab
out the hidden dangers in the canyon´s night.

  The song seemed to float over the water.

  I reached the confluence with the West Fork and realized that Pa’s cabin was just a short walk away.

  I thought of sitting on his porch but stopped in my tracks when I saw a woman crouched on the side of the creek.

  My first thought was I’d come across a ghost, but when I peered at her longer I realized it was no spirit, but Margaret.

  “What’re you doing here?” I asked.

  She laughed. “I would guess the same thing as you.”

  I didn’t understand. I asked, “Where did you learn that song?”

  Again, she giggled. “That wasn’t me singing.”

  I stared at her for a long moment. She was a few years younger than me, but no child. I believed her.

  “Then who?” I asked.

  Margaret slid down the bank to stand by me. She paused there and let her eyes drift over the silver forest. “I came here tonight because I knew you would, too,” she said. “Since we arrived here a few years ago, I hear that singing nearly every full moon.”

  I peered deeper into the West Fork, where it had seemed to come from. “You ever follow it further?” I asked.

  Margaret nodded, and then she began to tell me about the night of the silver bear, and the lagoon. It seemed so farfetched, that at first, I didn’t believe a word, but the more she talked, the more I sensed in my heart that she was relating what she believed to be true. At least most of it.

  Eventually, I asked, “You expect me to believe that a necklace turned you into a bear?”

  She looked at me defiantly. “Believe what you want—I’m just warning you to never go there. You ever hear that singing, just stay in bed.”

  “Okay,” I said, awkwardly, and we walked downstream together. Aside from the trickling of the creek, the night was quiet as the moon hung over us. After a few minutes I could hear the singing again, softer now, but we both pretended not to take notice.

  * * *

  The next day, late in the afternoon, Howard ascended Itzel Canyon. He was moving fast. A last-minute visit by his daughter had delayed his departure from his cabin on the West Fork, and he wanted to reach the hidden canyon before dark.

  He crawled up the chute into the box canyon, his small backpack occasionally brushing the roof of the tunnel. It felt strange to scramble up what had been an obsession for the last few years—but now the chute was simply a way to get into the canyon.

  The box canyon felt timeless. Like a clock wouldn’t work here, even if you wound it every day.

  He glanced at the old ruin, half-expecting someone to walk out of it. A ring of stones that was surrounding a firepit could have been placed there last week; in fact, ash was still present from the last fire that had been lit here who knows how long ago. Discarded pots, arrow shafts and baskets lined a shaded section of the wall.

  But an uneasy feeling in his gut told him it had been a hundred years or more since anyone had been here.

  Since he had read the Spanish journal, a strange new fear accompanied him when he came here. He slowly walked the perimeter of the small canyon, observing the high walls for another way in or out.

  He cursed himself for not having gotten here earlier. In just a few minutes the canyon would be cast in shadow. Already, the only direct sunlight was creeping up the eastern wall, soon to be a memory.

  Suddenly he stopped dead.

  Before him, in a patch of damp earth, he saw tracks.

  Boot tracks. A large man. Recent.

  He knew instantly they were Wilson’s. It didn’t surprise him that he had finally discovered his secret.

  Howard walked back to the ruins and sat in the retreating sunlight. He opened his pack and took out the leather-bound journal, then flipped to the back and examined the last few entries.

  He struggled with a word at the end of a sentence, but after repeating it several times, it came to him: Cave.

  He translated the sentence: She warns me not to enter the cave.

  What cave? He asked himself. He glanced toward the back of the canyon, and a pile of debris against the wall. A shadowy darkness stared back at him from the base of the cliff, and he realized he had missed something when he’d stumbled around earlier.

  He knew he would have to explore the cave. But he would do it tomorrow, with the sun on his back.

  The sun had now passed beyond the high walls and he was cast in shadow.

  Before closing the journal, he focused on the last entry.

  “Bruja!” Witch!

  Chapter Fifty-one

  Jim and Margaret Thompson were sitting on the porch of their Camp Kitchen cabin and watched Wilson approach, his rifle clutched in his hand. Normally, he would have come from the north, following the creek downstream, but today he came from the west, skirting Capital Butte.

  Margaret glanced up from a pair of pants she was mending and said, “Here comes a bad penny.”

  Indeed, Wilson looked like the type of company nobody really wanted. His face was red and puffy, and his eyes darted all over the property as he approached, taking stock.

  When he was a few paces away, Thompson said, “I had hoped you would be closer to Indian Gardens this time of year. The corn is just coming in, and unattended, the deer will gobble it all up.”

  Wilson stifled a grin. “Well, if’n it’s so important to you, Jim, why don’t you stay there for a while?”

  Thompson stared back coldly. “Because that wasn’t our arrangement.”

  Now Wilson let loose his grin, enjoying himself. “I’m thinking—maybe we needs a new deal. Maybe you should just sell that place to me. Why not do that?”

  Margaret glanced up. “You don’t have a pot to piss in, Mr. Wilson, how you aiming to buy Indian Gardens?”

  He laughed. “Oh, I’m just messin’—but I do plan on having money, someday.”

  Frank exited the cabin, slamming the screen door behind him.

  “Hush, Frankie,” said Margaret. “The baby is sleeping.”

  Thompson sat quietly for a moment, realizing he needed the old bear hunter. In a friendlier tone he said, “Mr. Wilson, I have to go to Prescott for a week, leaving in about an hour, and I could really use a hand—both here and at Indian Gardens.”

  A wily mien crept over Wilson´s face, and Margaret tried to cut Jim off. “I’m sure I’ll be fine, Jim.”

  But Wilson said, “Oh, I’d be happy to help out.”

  Thompson sighed in relief. “Thanks, Mr. Wilson, I’ll sleep easier knowing somebody is nearby in case Margaret and the kids need help.”

  Wilson smiled benevolently at Margaret.

  “I’ll check on ‘em every few days.”

  Margaret was stewing mad as she prepared a lunch for her husband before he set off. She didn’t like Mr. Wilson and saw no benefit of his watchful eye. Being neighborly, she still made an extra plate for Wilson. But she really wished the man would just leave. For some reason he lingered.

  His Sharps rifle was leaning against the cabin, by the door.

  Thompson glanced at it, “I see you got your bear gun out.”

  “Yes sir,” he nodded. “I do—and I’m plannin’ on using it.”

  Margaret whispered, “On what?”

  Wilson rose up, lifted his rifle and peered through the sites. “On that silver grizz.”

  Both Thompsons gave him a blank stare and he guffawed. “Oh, how I love that expression! Everybody around here got secrets—if that ain’t the truth. You got secrets, and old Bear Howard, he got secrets too!”

  He looked directly at his hosts and added, “and I suppose if’n I’m being honest, I’d have to say I got a few secrets, too.”

  “You seen that bear again?” asked Thompson, his voice trembling.

  Wilson shrugged. “No, but I seen his tracks.”

  “How can you tell it’s the silver grizz?” asked Margaret.

  Wilson laughed. “Well, I suppose I can’t say what color he is—but it’s t
he only bear of that size I’ve seen since I first came here. Got to be him.”

  “Where’d you see the tracks?” asked Thompson.

  Wilson eyed them both for a long moment before answering, “Deep into the West Fork, that’s where.”

  Thompson turned pale and walked to the shed, and Margaret collected a few plates and disappeared into the kitchen.

  Wilson stood up and brushed the crumbs out of his beard. He stepped off the porch and shouted, “I’m gonna use the outhouse before I hit the trail!”

  When he was gone, Margaret came back out on the porch.

  She stared at Wilson’s gun, leaning against the cabin wall, then glanced at the outhouse.

  She grabbed the gun and knocked its sight sharply against a rock in the cabin´s foundation.

  Then she quickly leaned it against the cabin again, but at a wider angle. When she entered the cabin she slammed the door, and outside, the gun fell to the ground with a clatter.

  Wilson’s shouts brought both Jim and Margaret to the porch. There they found Wilson staring at his gun in dismay. With an angry expression, he was examining the bent sight.

  “How did this happen?” he growled.

  Thompson looked around. Frank ran by again. “Seems like it fell over… but maybe young Frank knocked it over by accident.”

  “Or it might have been me when I shut the door,” added Margaret.

  “Well, my bear gun is wrecked!” shouted Wilson.

  Thompson nodded, thinking. He finally said, “Listen, I’ll take it to Prescott with me and get it repaired—and I’ll throw in a box of shells. Will that work?”

  Wilson’s face was beet red. “I guess it’ll have to be.”

  Thompson went into the cabin, and returned with a small, lever-action Winchester rifle in hand. “Take this while I’m gone,” he said. “It’s only a 32-30 caliber, but it’s a good gun for birds and rabbits.”

  Wilson took the rifle but scoffed at it.

  “This thing won’t kill a squirrel.”