by Tony Peluso
“Good, they’re in the refrigerator, bring me one too.” Eddie directed.
Life with Eddie Grimes proved to be a hoot. His hospitality was both generous and genuine. His home became our base of operations. Lt. Col. Grimes had many talents and a dry sense of humor. In less than a day, I knew I’d made a friend for life.
After we did our research, Eddie would make terrific meals. I’d wash dishes and clean up. At Casa Grimes, light colonels were on the K.P. roster.
Eddie did exhaustive research on the Christus sculptor. His name was Keith Monroe. His base of operations had been San Francisco. Mr. Monroe had a captivating, eclectic style, producing statues, sculptures, and fine art of all types.
In addition to the Christus, he had a signature work. It’s a larger than life reproduction featuring Marilyn Monroe—no relation—in that scene from The Seven Year Itch where she stands over a sidewalk exhaust and her dress blows up provocatively. Thanks to Keith, the good people of Chicago get to admire a huge version of Marilyn’s butt in their public spaces. Otherwise, Eddie could establish no connection between Mr. Monroe and the disappearance of the Christus. It turned out to be a dry hole.
On Tuesday, my first full day at Eddie’s house, I found three Ostergaards in the Phoenix area. For a fee, a website provided a number for a Claire Ostergaard in Scottsdale.
I showed my discovery to Eddie. He’d arrived at a stopping point on his project. We discussed my approach. He agreed to listen to the conversation. I made the call in the afternoon. I got voice mail on the fourth ring.
“Hi, Ms. Ostergaard,” I began. “I’m Tony Giordano. I used to know Dan Ostergaard. I wonder if you’re related to him and if you have time to speak to me.”
I left my cell number and hung up. Two hours later my cell rang. I recognized the number. It was Claire Ostergaard. I pushed the button for the speaker function.
“Hello, this is Tony Giordano,” I began.
“Hello Tony, this is Claire.”
“Thanks for calling back. I hope I haven’t troubled you. I was …” I began before Claire interrupted.
“Tony, you don’t recognize me. I used to be Claire Weston. We attended Saint Francis together. I went on to Xavier while you were at Brophy.”
“Claire! Of course, I remember you. You were the prettiest girl in our class and the smartest.”
This development surprised me. I’d known Claire Weston since first grade. She’d been the best student in our class. She blossomed in puberty. All of the Brophy Boys thought that Claire was the hottest girl at Xavier High.
She seemed to be attracted to older guys. By sophomore year, she’d begun dating frat boys from ASU. By the time I met Dan Ostergaard, Claire wouldn’t have given either of us the time of day.
“What a surprise. You’re part of Dan’s family?
“I’m Dan’s widow.”
“Claire, I’m so sorry. I had no idea that you even knew Dan. In high school, you traveled in better social circles than Dan and I.”
“I was Dan’s second wife. We were married for fifteen years before he disappeared. We hooked up in the ’80s, after our first marriages hit the rocks. Dan worked in Scottsdale, but he had a home near the Biltmore. Saint Francis was close enough for him to participate in our charitable programs. We interacted on projects, started dating, fell in love, got annulments, and got married.”
“Again, I’m so sorry for your loss,” I said.
“I wondered if you would contact me. I’ve been expecting a call for a dozen years,” Claire said.
“Why would you say that,” I asked. I looked at Eddie who had a surprised expression.
“You were with Dan at the chapel in Sedona, right? You were with him when you both had the encounter with the object?”
I paused. I had a hundred questions. I looked at Eddie. He waved his hand in a furious circle, indicating that I should get on with it.
“Yes, I was with Dan at the chapel. When did Dan tell you about that?”
“A week before he disappeared. He read about the chapel and a missing Christ figure. He had an emotional reaction. I tried to comfort him. He was so melancholy.”
“Why did you think that I’d contact you after all these years?” I asked.
“The last time Dan and I spoke, he called me from his hotel. He told me that he’d knocked over a hornet’s nest. He wouldn’t explain what he meant over the phone. He told me that he’d lay the whole thing out when he came home. He said that he’d contact you. What he learned would affect you. He made me swear not to call you, unless he was there. He said that if something happened to him, I was not to contact you at all.”
“Holy fucking shit!” Eddie whispered.
“So Dan didn’t want you to contact me?” I said.
“The last thing he said was that, if you called me and inquired about him, I was to tell you that if you valued your immortal soul, you should abandon any thought of following him. I’ve been waiting to see if you would make contact. This is a relief. For the longest time, I thought Dan had a breakdown and wasn’t rational.”
Eddie and I looked at each other, like two stupid kids caught in an inexcusable act of vandalism. We wondered what world of shit we’d fallen into.
“So how is everything in Tampa?” Claire asked.
“How do you know that I live in Tampa, Claire?”
“The area code on your cell phone number. Besides, after that call from Dan, I found out where you lived, just in case. I’ve followed your career. You did big cases for the Department of Justice. You work for a Sheriff now. You’ve written a novel. I have it.”
“You read my book?” I asked. “How’d you like it?”
At this point Eddie gave me the finger, then did the circular hand gesture again. He was impatient with my interest in Claire’s evaluation of my literary work.
“I liked it a lot. It’s a neat story. Dan would have liked it too. He loved historical fiction. But tell me, are you retired?”
“Can’t retire. I have an expensive mistress named Gretchen. I’ll work until I drop. Then she’ll run off with a much younger man.”
Eddie gave me the hand job sign. He pretended to wipe away a phony tear to mock the plight of a man with a trophy wife.
“Well, I wish you the best.”
“Claire, I’m calling from Sedona.”
“Tony, leave there immediately! It’s beyond dangerous for you. Nothing good can come from you being there. Dan was right. Your life and your very soul are in jeopardy.”
“I’ll be all right, Claire. Don’t worry.”
“Those were the exact words Dan used when he ended our final conversation. I’ll go to Saint Francis tonight and light candles. God bless you.”
“Thanks, Claire,” I said, but she’d already hung up the phone.
“What the fuck is going on?” Eddie asked.
I had a flashback to September 2, 1966. Dan stood at the door of the chapel. I shook the door. He complained that he was a religious supplicant, whose soul was in peril. The priest had locked us out. He couldn’t get “no satisfaction.” I smiled remembering his bad impression of Mick Jagger.
“What are you smiling about?” Eddie asked. “This is serious shit. We’re behind the curve by fifteen years. Ostergaard stumbled over some heavy stuff. We have to avoid falling into the trap that got him. It’ll be harder since you’ve been so careless and broadcasted your intentions all over town,” Eddie said.
“OK, Colonel. I’ll go make calls to local law enforcement. How about you continue the research on Hansen?”
“How about you make the calls and I fix us some chow? We’ll eat, have a beer, and work through the afternoon?”
I agreed. We did have to eat.
I felt shaken by the conversation with Claire Weston-Ostergaard. I worried that a terrible fate awaited Eddie and me. I won’t deny that I was scared. I was glad that Eddie was around—I wouldn’t succumb to fear in the presence of another s
oldier.
After lunch, I made calls to the Coconino and Yavapai Sheriff’s Offices. I got nowhere. I had the same bad luck with the Sedona Police.
Internet queries provided me with the names of veterinarians practicing in the area. I called three that seemed promising. I got one call back from a female vet. She’d purchased her practice five years earlier from an old timer who’d worked the SR 89A corridor of Jerome, Cottonwood, Clarkdale, Page Springs, Sedona, and Oak Creek in the 1960s.
Though I’d made up a convincing lie about looking for the couple because they were heirs to a modest bequest from an aunt in Florida, she declined to give me more data about the retired veterinarian. She promised to reach out to him. I gave her my cell number and asked her to have him call it.
I got nowhere with Bishop McMannes at St. Luke’s. I figured that I’d drive over to the church and see if I could make some headway with a personal visit. I’d try later in the week.
Eddie had more luck looking into Don Hansen. Over the last decade Hansen had earned a reputation as a shady character. He had many fans and several serious detractors. Despite leaving several messages, he didn’t return our calls.
Later in the evening, Eddie prepared a gourmet grilled flounder. We polished it off with a superb bottle of Viogner from the Burning Tree Cellars in Cottonwood. After I cleaned up the mess, we held a status conference in his study.
“OK,” Eddie began. “The sculptor of the Christus is irrelevant. The veterinarian angle is on indefinite hold, right?”
“That’s about the size of it,” I said.
“No luck with the bishop?”
“Correct, we’ll have to drive over there in a day or so.”
“Don Hansen is ducking us,” Eddie said. “There’s no reason that he couldn’t have returned the calls. Nobody is that busy.”
“I agree.”
“Your buddy’s widow threw gasoline on this fire.”
“I’ll say. She scared the shit out of me.”
“You must leave immediately. Your soul is in jeopardy!” Eddie said, using a ghoulish accent and emphasizing the last five words.
“If I hadn’t heard the actual fear in her voice, I’d think the whole thing was pathetic and melodramatic,” I said. “My immortal soul.”
“Tony, her fear is based on the fact that her husband disappeared fifteen years ago. She might not be right about the soul in peril, but she’s not paranoid. Something bad is operating around here,” Eddie said.
“We should find out where Hansen lives and pay him a little visit,” I suggested.
“That’s not a bad idea, we …” Eddie began when my cell phone started to play the first 24 bars of the 82nd Airborne All American Anthem.
I pulled the phone out of my pocket and saw the number. It was local.
“It might be Hansen,” I said. “Hello, Tony Giordano.”
“Tony, it’s Don Hansen.”
“Hey Don, thanks for calling.”
“No problem. Got your messages. Sorry, but I’m all booked up this week. I don’t have time to take you up to Schnebly Tank. It’s too far.”
“Look, Don. I’ll make it worth your while. I’ll pay you triple your normal fee.”
“Sorry, can’t. As a consolation, I have a colleague who’s a retired Coconino County detective. He’s been guiding people for a few years. He agreed to take you up there.”
“I’m disappointed. I’d hoped that you would take us.”
“Who’s the us? Is the beautiful Gretchen still here?”
“No, I have an Army buddy that I ran into. He’s up for a long hike.”
“Dave will have no problem guiding two old soldiers. He was in the Army too.”
“What’s his full name and number, I’ll reach out to him.”
“Dave Fleet. Don’t worry. He’ll call you tonight and arrange the trek. He’s very good. He’s lived around here for thirty years. He’ll take good care of you. Sorry, got to go. Bye.”
“What’s the deal?” Eddie asked, as I looked over at him.
“Hansen can’t go. We have a replacement. He’s a former detective, named Fleet.”
“Are you sure that he said Fleet?” Eddie asked.
“Yes. What’s wrong with Dave Fleet?”
“The papers say that Fleet was one step ahead of termination from the Coconino County Sheriff’s Office. Last few of years he’s stood accused of using excessive force on two drug dealers in a bust that he made in Flagstaff. It was a very big deal.”
“Eddie, I hear that shit all of the time. I have cases pending in Tampa. The claimant’s story often breaks down with experienced cross-examination.”
“Might be hard to cross-examine these drug dealers,” Eddie said.
“Why?”
“Cause Fleet shot them both in the head. The Coconino Sheriff’s Internal Affairs folks exonerated him. The County never filed criminal charges. There’s speculation that the families of the dealers might initiate one of those suits that you were talking about.”
“Colonel, a man who can shoot that well might come in handy if we have to defend our immortal fucking souls,” I joked.
“Unless he venerates evil, inter-dimensional demons,” Eddie said.
Chapter Ten
August 28, 2013, 10:00 a.m.
Paleo-Indian Ruins at Schnebly Tank
Coconino National Forest, Arizona
The Paleo-Indian ruins at Schnebly Tank didn’t resemble any of the other impressive Native American sites on the Mogollon Rim or in the Verde Valley. They were ancient—ten times as old as Palatki, Tuzigoot, and Montezuma’s Castle. The inhabitants of this site hunted and gathered along the rim for more than 3,000 years before the Egyptians designed the Pyramids at Giza.
The Paleo-Indians didn’t engage in recognizable agriculture. They didn’t leave remnants of their dwellings, other than shallow trenches dug out of the limestone that they used as foundations for tents made from animal skins, tree bark, or brush. They did provide posterity with a rich tapestry of complex and detailed petroglyphs.
As I walked alongside the rock wall that served as their primitive canvas, I marveled at the effort that the Paleo-Indians had invested in the intricate work. The glyphs depicted all manner of predators, game animals, human beings, geometric designs, and strange figures that I couldn’t recognize. A huge sandstone overhang, at least 25 feet in depth, had protected the ancient etchings over the last ten millennia.
I tried to imagine what it must have been like to live up here 10,000 years ago in an area swarming with deadly predators, never knowing what threat or bounty the hunt would bring. They must have been a hardy band, surviving on guts, wits, and limited natural resources in this small box canyon. The Paleo-Indians propagated and prospered in a difficult environment, and still had time for artistic expression.
The prehistoric artists found a bountiful source of water at the site. In the desert, high plains, and arid scrub forests of central and northern Arizona, a tank is anything natural or manmade that catches rainwater. In the limestone and sandstone formations that form the Mogollon Rim and its foothills, natural bowls, depressions, and tanks are common. Due to the paucity of rain, they’re dry most of the time.
Schnebly Tank is the exception that proves the rule. It’s large for a tank, with a water surface area roughly two-thirds of an acre. After a heavy rain it can double in surface size and depth. It’s never dry because a small, cold, and reliable spring feeds it year-round. The tank sits in a narrow draw off the main canyon at 6,600 feet above sea level, along one of the tree-lined promontories on the Mogollon Rim.
Other springs feed a little creek that local wags have named the Conaqua—Spanish for “with water.” The presence of the tank, the other natural springs, and the small creek made it possible for the ancient rock artists to survive for several generations before they disappeared.
I felt giddy from my major discovery, now an hour old. After arriving at the site, w
e located the etchings that Hansen claimed resembled the Christus.
These petroglyphs depicted a spot-on reproduction of the Christ figure from the chapel. After close examination, the Christus etchings seemed more detailed, proportional, and life-like than any of the other glyphs at Schnebly Tank.
The detail of the rock carvings alone might have swayed the most committed skeptic, but the background—or more precisely the context—in which the ancient artist had placed his figures, ended all rational debate. Above and to the left of the largest Christus-like figure, a pre-historic scribe had etched an accurate replication of the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper star systems, complete with the Big Dipper ladle edge and the Little Dipper handle pointing at the North Star. Looking at these petroglyphs made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
When I embarked on the trip to see the rock art, I had no idea what advantage I would gain. I felt that if the Stone Age Indians had recorded the presence of inter-dimensional beings in rock carvings, I might not be as daft as Gretchen feared. Now I knew that I wasn’t crazy. I had made a connection of galactic proportions. As I stared at our find, I thought back to how the trek had started.
True to Hansen’s promise, Dave Fleet called later on Tuesday evening to set up our trip. We’d leave Wednesday morning at five. Fleet was brusque and all business.
“So, it’s you and your Army buddy?” Fleet asked, after we’d dispensed with 30 seconds of preliminaries.
“Yep. We have our own equipment. Hansen said it was a five hour hike each way, but we could do it in a day if we got motivated.”
“He did, did he? I’ve never heard of anyone getting in and out of Schnebly Tank in ten hours travel time, especially in August. It’s closer to sixteen hours, added to the dicking around that most tourists do once they get in there. In the heat, it’s a two day hike from the trail head that Hansen uses.”
“We didn’t count on an overnighter,” I said.
“Been awhile since you’ve been in the field, Colonel?”
“No, I hiked West Fork and Broken Arrow last week. We’ll have to pack more gear.”
“Nope, ’cause we ain’t going the way Hansen would. Look, Colonel…”
