****
“What did he want?” asked Angela, who had been sitting quietly in the cabin, fussing with her makeup and snickering at Elizabeth. Elizabeth had run out of dirty dishes and was furiously dusting and sweeping to keep from going crazy. Simple had followed her example by cleaning and polishing woodcarvings, studying each piece carefully as he did so.
Abruptly a tribesman burst into the cabin, grabbed the two water buckets that Elizabeth was using for cleaning, and ran out of the cabin, splashing dirty water out of them as he went, the whole time shouting only one word by way of explanation, over and over again. It wasn’t so much what he said as his obvious urgency that had led Elizabeth to not hinder him in any way. It was obviously an emergency situation.
“Fire; the Indian word for fire, that’s what he was shouting,” explained Elizabeth, after a minute’s thought.
“Fire?” asked Simple. “What fire? Where?”
The three of them went outside to look, and were just in time to see additional tribesmen take four more buckets and three shovels from the barn and run towards the inner gate with them. More Tribe members by the dozen, men women and older children, were streaming out of the woods and through a breach that had been torn in the fence near the still locked gate. Many carried buckets, shovels, and blankets.
“Look,” said Professor Simple excitedly, pointing towards the Mountain. Above the tree line towards the Mountain, a cloud of black smoke was streaming into the clear blue sky. Something was burning in the Holly Forest.
“Johnny!” exclaimed Elizabeth, as she started down the path towards the gate, followed hesitantly by Simple and Angela. An armed guard turned the three of them back. Whatever was happening beyond the inner fence, only Tribe members were allowed to go to see it.
Now that they were outside, the unmistakable sounds of heavy machinery could be heard in the direction of the outer gate.
Elizabeth ran into the cabin and to the ancient telephone and quickly dialed her cell phone, expecting Mary, or even Johnny or Ann, to answer it. Instead a mechanical sounding recorded voice informed her that the number dialed was not in service. That didn’t make sense. She had turned it on herself and put it in the purse-like bag that Mary always carried. Then she realized that signal strength must be too low on the remote mountain to support cell phones.
She phoned Chief George’s office but nobody answered there either. She took a deep calming breath and settled down in an oversized chair. There was nothing she could do; she had to trust that Johnny and the Tribe were informed and handling everything.
Angela retreated to her rental car, but Simple returned to the cabin, where he picked up a wood carving of a unicorn and was studying it carefully. “I can hardly believe it. I’ve been researching myths and legends of the Northwest for years, and here’s evidence right in this cabin that I never even suspected. You must have seen the trees along the driveway, with faces grown into them. These carvings are Indian made, I’d swear it, and some aren’t very old. But this one looks like it may be hundreds of years old. How would Native Americans know about unicorns before being contacted by Europeans?”
Elizabeth suppressed a sudden impulse to tell Simple what she knew or suspected about Goth and shaman powers. It would probably blow his socks off. But no, that would only mean trouble for everyone. ”I think we should focus on Dooley now. Why don’t you phone the police or some friends in town? Maybe he’s shown up at home and we don’t even know it.” And maybe that would help us get our minds off the fire and the loggers, she didn't bother to add.
"Maybe I should phone some of Dooley's Artistic license friends in town," Doc Simple agreed.
Secrets of Goth Mountain Page 35