Tyrannosaur Canyon

by Douglas Preston

  Hernandez beat a hasty retreat, only too eager to get away from the makeshift grave. Willer moved upwind, smoking furiously, inhaling a lungful of smoke with each breath as if to scour his lungs free of the odor of death. He looked around. The dogs were at their rock, whining and eager. For what? A meal?

  "Where's Wheatley?" asked Hernandez, looking around.

  "Hell if I know." He saw Wheatley's fresh footprints going farther up-canyon. "Find out what he's doing, will you?"

  Hernandez hiked up the canyon and soon disappeared around the corner. He returned a moment later, a smirk on his face. "He's puking."

  Chapter 6

  FRIDAY MORNING DAWNED a flawless blue, with flocks of jays squawking and fighting in the piñons, the cottonwoods casting long cool shadows across the meadow. Tom had fed the horses that morning, given them an hour to eat, and now he led his favorite horse, Knock, over to the rail to be saddled. Sally joined him with her buckskin gelding, Sierra, and together they worked in silence, brushing out their coats, picking the hooves, saddling and tacking up.

  By the time they set off, there was only a memory of coolness in the green cottonwood shadows along the creek. The flanks of Pedernal Peak rose on their right, the steep slopes ending in the chopped-off summit made so famous by the paintings of Georgia O'Keeffe. They rode in their usual silence, preferring not to talk when on horseback – the pleasure of being together was enough. They reached the ford, the horses splashing across the shallow stream, still icy from melting snow in the mountains.

  "Where to, cowboy?" Sally asked.

  "Barrancones Spring."

  "Perfect."

  "Shane's got everything under control," Tom said. "I don't have to get back at all this afternoon."

  He felt a twinge of guilt. He'd been relying on Shane far too much this past week.

  They reached the bluffs and began climbing the narrow trail to the top. A hawk circled above them, whistling. The air smelled of cottonwood trees and dust.

  "Damn, I love this country," Sally said.

  The trail wound up the side of the mesa into the cool ponderosa pines. In half an hour they reached the top and Tom turned his horse to look at the view. He never got tired of it. To his left was the steep flank of Pedernal, and to his right the sheer orange cliffs of Pueblo Mesa. Below lay the irregular alfalfa fields along Cañones Creek, which opened to the vast Piedra Lumbre Valley, one hundred thousand acres broad. On the far side rose up the stupendous outline of the Mesa of the Ancients, notched by canyons – the beginning of the high mesa country. Somewhere, out there, lay the fossil of a fabulous Tyrannosaurus Rex – and a half-crazy monk looking for it. He glanced over at Sally. The wind was blowing her honey hair and her face was turned into the light, her lips slightly parted in pleasure and awe.

  "Not a bad view," she said with a laugh.

  They continued on, the wind rustling through the sideoats grama grass that edged the trail. He let Sally ride ahead and watched her on her horse. They continued to ride in silence, the only sound the rhythmic creaking of their saddles.

  As the country opened up to high grasslands of Mesa Escoba, she touched her heels to Sierra's flank and moved into a trot. Tom followed suit. They abandoned the trail, riding across the windblown grass, dotted with Indian paintbrush and lupines.

  "Let's go a little faster," Sally said, giving her horse another nudge with her heel. He broke into an easy lope.

  Tom kept pace. At the far end of the meadow Tom could see the cluster of cottonwoods marking Barrancones Spring, at the base of a red cliff.

  "All right," cried Sally. "Last one to the spring is a rotten egg! Giddyap!" She gave Sierra one final touch of heel. The horse shot forward, stretching out into a dead run while Sally gave a whoop.

  Knock, who always wanted to be in the lead, needed little urging to follow suit, and soon they were tearing across the meadow, neck and neck. Sally began to pull ahead, her hair streaming behind like a golden flame. Tom watched her fly, and he had to admit she was one hell of a rider. The two horses whipped over the grass and into the sudden cool of the trees surrounding the spring. At the last minute, Sally reined in and Tom followed; the horses leaned back and dug in like the well-trained reining horses they were, sliding to a stop. When he looked over, he saw Sally sitting on her horse, her hair wild, her white shirt partly open, having popped a couple of buttons, her face in high color.

  "That was fun."

  She hopped off the horse.

  They were in a small grove of cottonwoods, with an old fire ring in the center and a couple of logs for seats. Genizaro cowboys from days gone by had built a line camp here, with tables shaped from rough-hewn logs of ponderosa, a wooden box nailed to a trunk, a broken piece of mirror wedged into the fork of a tree, and a chipped enamel washbowl hung from a nail. The spring itself lay at the bottom of the cliffs, a deep pool hidden behind a screen of desert willows.

  Tom collected the two horses, unsaddled them, watered them at the spring, and staked them out to graze. When he returned, Sally had spread out lunch on a thin blanket. In the middle of the table was a bottle of red wine, freshly opened.

  "Now that's class," said Tom, picking it up. "Castello di Verrazzano, '97 Riserva."

  "I snuck it in my saddlebags. I hope you don't mind."

  "It's been dreadfully shaken up, I fear," said Tom in mock disapproval. "Are you sure we should be drinking at lunch? It's against the rules to drink and ride."

  "Well now," Sally drawled in imitation of him, "we're just going to have to bend the rules, aren't we?" She tucked into her sandwich, taking two great bites, and then poured some wine into a plastic glass. "Here."

  He took it, swirled it around, and sipped, aping a connoisseur. "Berries, vanilla, hints of chocolate."

  Sally poured herself a glass and took a good slug. Tom took a bite from his own sandwich and watched her eat. A green light filtered through the foliage, and every time a breeze blew the trees rustled. When he finished his lunch, he lounged back on the blanket they had thrown down over the soft grass. In the distance, through the cottonwoods, he could see the horses grazing out on the flats, dappled in sunlight. Suddenly he felt a cool hand on his temple. He turned and found Sally was bending over him, her blond hair falling like a curtain.

  "What are you doing?"

  She smiled. "What does it look like?"

  She laid her hands on either side of his face.

  Tom tried to sit up, but the hands gently pushed him back down into the grass.

  "Hey..." he said.

  "Hey yourself."

  One of her hands slid inside his shirt, caressing his chest. She bent down and put her lips to his. Her mouth tasted of peppermint and wine. She leaned over him and her hair fell heavily across his chest.

  He reached up to touch her hair, then stroked it and ran his hand down to the strong hollow of her back, where he could feel her back muscles moving. As he drew her down, he felt her slender body and soft breasts glide up against his.

  AFTERWARD, THEY LAY next to each other on the blanket. Tom's arm was thrown over her shoulder and he was looking into her amazing turquoise eyes.

  "Doesn't get much better than this, does it?" he said.

  "No," she murmured. "It's so good it almost makes me afraid."

  Chapter 7

  MADDOX STROLLED UP Canyon Road

  and rounded the corner at Camino del Monte Sol. A forest of hand-carved signs greeted his gaze, festooning both sides of the narrow lane, each trying to outdo the other in hand-crafted cuteness. The sidewalks were crowded with tourists decked out as if for a trip across the Sahara Desert, with floppy sun hats, water bottles strapped to their waists, and big-lugged hiking shoes. Most of them looked pale-faced and confused, as if they'd just emerged like grubs from the rain-rotten cities of the East. Maddox himself was going for the rich Texan look today, and he figured he'd gotten it down pretty good with his Resistol, boots, and a bolo tie sporting a manly, golfball-sized chunk of turquoise.

  The r
oad passed some old Victorian houses, converted like everything else into gallery space, windows gleaming with Indian jewelry and pots. He checked his watch. Noon. He still had a little more time to kill.

  He wandered in and out of the galleries, amazed at the sheer quantity of silver, turquoise, and pottery there was in the world – not to mention paintings. Art, Maddox felt, was basically a scam, as his eye took in one more window full of Day-Glo-colored canyons, coyotes howling at the moon, and Indians draped in blankets. Another easy way to make money, and all perfectly legal. Why hadn't he seen the opportunities before? He'd wasted half his life trying to make money the hard, illegal way, not realizing that the best moneymaking scams were all legal. When he was finished with this last job, he'd go one hundred percent legit, plow some money back into Hard Time, and maybe even look for investors. He could be the next dot-com millionaire.

  One gallery packed with enormous sculptures in bronze and stone caught his eye. The stuff looked expensive – just moving it would cost a fortune. The door chimed as he entered and a young woman came clicking up on high heels, giving him a bright lipsticked smile.

  "Can I help you, sir?"

  "Sure thing," he said, already hearing a drawl in his voice. "This sculpture here" – he nodded at the biggest one he could see in the store, a life-sized group of Indians carved out of a single piece of stone that weighed three tons if it weighed an ounce. "If you don't mind me asking, how much is it?"

  "Blessingway. That's one seventy-five."

  Maddox stopped himself just in time from asking, Thousand? "Do you accept credit cards?"

  If she was surprised she didn't show it. "We just have to verify the credit limit, that's all. Most people don't have that kind of credit limit."

  "I'm not most people."

  Another bright smile. He noticed she had freckles on her chest where her silk shirt was unbuttoned.

  "I like to charge things whenever possible and get the frequent flyer miles."

  "You could go to China with the miles on that one," she said.

  "I'd rather go to Thailand."

  "There, too."

  He looked at her more closely. She was one good-looking woman, as she'd have to be, working in a place like this. He wondered if she was going to get a commission.

  "Well..." He smiled, winked. "How about the price on that one?" He pointed to a bronze of an Indian holding an eagle.

  "Freeing the Eagle. That's one-ten."

  "I just bought a ranch out of town and I've got to furnish the damn place. Ten thousand square feet, and that's just the main house."

  "I can imagine."

  "Name's Maddox. Jim Maddox." He held out his hand.

  "Clarissa Provender."

  "Good to meet you, Clarissa."

  "The artist is Willy Atcitty, an authentic, registered member of the Navajo tribe, one of our foremost Native American sculptors. That first one you were looking at is carved out of a solid block of native New Mexico alabaster from the San Andres Mountains."

  "Beautiful. What's it about?"

  "It represents a three-day Blessingway sing."

  "A what?"

  "The Blessingway is a traditional Navajo ceremony which is meant to restore balance and harmony in one's life."

  "I need one of those." He was close enough to her now to smell the creme rinse she had used that morning in her glossy black hair.

  "Don't we all," said Clarissa Provender, with a laugh, her sly brown eyes looking at him sideways.

  "Clarissa, you must get asked this all the time, and if I'm out of line tell me – but how about dinner tonight?"

  A bright, phony smile. "I'm not supposed to date potential customers."

  Maddox took that as a yes. "I'll be at the Pink Adobe at seven. If you just happen to run into me there, I'd be happy to treat you to a martini and a Steak Dunigan."

  She didn't say no, and that encouraged him. He waved a hand at the sculptures. "I think I'm going to take the one in alabaster. Thing is, I have to measure the space first, make sure it fits. If not that one, the other one for sure."

  "I have all the specs in the back: dimensions, weights, delivery routine."

  She clicked back and he watched her behind twitching in its little black dress. She came back with a sheet, a card, and a brochure about the artist, handing them to him with a smile. He could see a streak of lipstick on her left canine. He slipped them into his inside jacket pocket.

  "Mind if I use the phone to make a quick local call?"

  "No."

  She led him to her desk in the rear of the gallery, punched a line, and handed him the phone. "This'll just be a second. Hello? Dr. Broadbent?"

  The voice on the other end said, "No, this is Shane McBride, his associate."

  "I just moved to Santa Fe, bought a ranch south of town. I've been looking to buy a reining horse. It's a paint, a beautiful animal, and I need a vet check. Is Dr. Broadbent available?"

  "When?"

  "Today or Saturday"

  "Dr. Broadbent's not here right now, but he can do it Monday."

  "Not Saturday?"

  "I'm on call Saturday, and let's see... I've got a slot at two."

  "Sorry, Shane, nothing personal, but Dr. Broadbent came highly recommended and I'd be more comfortable with him."

  "If you want him, you'll have to wait 'til Monday."

  "I need it done Saturday. If it's a matter of his day off, I'm willing to pay extra."

  "He's going to be out of town that day. Sorry. As I said, I'd be happy to do it."

  "Nothing personal, Shane, but like I said..." He let his voice trail off in disappointment. "Thank you anyway. I'll call on Monday, reschedule."

  He replaced the receiver, gave Clarissa a wink.

  She looked back at him, her face unreadable.

  "See you at the Pink, Clarissa."

  For a moment she didn't respond. Then she leaned forward, and with another sly smile said in a low voice, "I've been in this job for five years and I'm very, very good at it. You know why?"

  "Why?"

  "I know bullshit when it walks in the door. And you're so full of it you're leaving tracks."

  Chapter 8

  THE HELICOPTER TRANSPORTING the forensic team had to land almost half a mile down the canyon, and the team was forced to hike their equipment up the wash. They arrived in a ferocious mood, but Calhoun, head of forensics and always the wit, had turned it around with jokes, stories, slaps on the back, and the promise of cold beer all around when it was over.

  Calhoun had run it just like an archaeological dig, the site mapped out with a grid, his men troweling down layer by layer, the photographer documenting every step. They ran all the sand through one-millimeter wire mesh and then again through a flotation tank to recover every hair, thread, and foreign object. It was brutal work and they'd been at it since eight that morning. Now it was three o'clock and the temperature had to be close to a hundred. The flies had arrived in force, and their droning sound filled the confined space.

  Pretty soon, Willer thought, it would be time for the "scoop" – that moment when a ripe corpse is rolled into a body bag, ideally without falling apart like an overcooked chicken. A lot happened to a body in five days in the heat of summer. Feininger, the police pathologist, stood nearby, supervising this particular operation. She seemed to be the only one who managed to remain cool and elegant in the heat, her gray hair done up in a scarf, not a bead of sweat appearing on her lined but still handsome face.

  "I want all three of you on the right side, please," she said, gesturing to the SOC team. "You know how it works, slip your hands under, make sure you've got a good grip, and then, at the count of three, roll it over and onto the plastic sheet, nice and easy. All got on protective covering? Check for tears and holes?" She looked around, her voice ironic, perhaps even half amused. "Are we ready? This is a challenging one, for sure. Let's get it right, fellows. Count of three."

  A few grunts as the men got in place. Feininger had long ago banned th
e SOC boys from smoking cigars, and instead each one had a big smear of Vicks VapoRub under the nose.

  "Ready? One . . . two . . . three . . . roll."

  With a single economical motion they rolled the body onto the open body bag. Willer noted it as a successful operation, in that nothing came off or was left behind in the process.

  "Good work, boys."

  One of the SOC team members zipped it up. The body bag had been prepositioned on a stretcher, and all they had to do was pick it up and carry it down to the chopper.

  "Put the animal head in that one," directed Feininger.

  They duly placed the burro's head in a wet-evidence bag and zipped it shut. At least, thought Willer, they had agreed to leave most of the burro behind, just taking the head with the gaping hole made by a 10mm round fired into the animal at point-blank range. The round had been found imbedded in the soft sandstone of the canyon wall, an excellent piece of evidence. They had uncovered the prospector's equipment, and the only thing they hadn't found, it seemed, was any indication of his identity. But that would come in time.

  All in all a good haul of evidence.

  He checked his watch. Three-thirty. He wiped his brow, pulled an iced Coke out of the cooler, rolled it against his forehead, his cheek, and the back of his neck.

  Hernandez came up beside him, nursing his own Coke. "You think the killer expected us to find the stiff?"

  "He sure went to a lot of trouble to hide it. We're, what, two miles from the killing? He had to strap the body on the burro, lug it up here, dig a hole big enough for the burro, the man, and all his shit... No, I don't think he figured we'd find it."

  "Any theories, Lieutenant?"

  "The killer was looking for something on the prospector."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "Look at the prospector's shit." Willer gestured to the plastic tarp on which all the prospector's gear and supplies had been laid out. One of the SOC boys was lifting each piece of evidence in turn, wrapping it in acid-free paper, labeling it, and packing it away in plastic evidence lockers. "You see how the sheepskin padding on the packsaddles is torn off, the other stuff ripped or slit open? And you see how the guy's pockets were turned inside out? Not only was our man looking for something, but he was pissed that he wasn't finding it." Willer took a last noisy sip, chucked the empty Coke can back into the cooler.