He let out a sigh; he'd survived. But the instant he'd relaxed, the rock he was holding pulled loose and he skidded toward the cliff. This was it. He was going over. But at the last moment the crook of his elbow caught a clump of sagebrush. He didn't move, didn't dare. When the dust settled, he still clung to the dry bush, but his legs hung over the side of the cliff.
"Indy, hang on! Hang on!" Smitty yelled somewhere above him.
"Sure," he said between gritted teeth. "Why not?"
But then the roots of the sagebrush started to give way. Inch by inch it lost its hold on the dry earth, and Indy moved closer and closer to falling over the edge of the cliff. He looked around for something else to grab. There was nothing but dirt and loose rocks. He couldn't last but a few seconds longer.
"Catch!"
A rope dangled a few feet to his right. Smitty snapped it, attempting to flip it over to him, but the rope only snaked in place. Indy groped for it, but the roots of the shrub pulled loose. He lunged for the rope... and missed by inches.
When Walcott heard the pounding on the door of his hotel room, he knew it was either the law or Calderone. He wasn't sure which one was worse. The cops would arrest him, but if the Sicilian's impatience had turned to anger, Walcott knew Calderone would kill him without a moment's hesitation. A day and a half had passed since he'd been shot in the skirmish below Mesa Verde, and he was still in pain, and he was feverish.
He climbed out of bed, hobbled over to the door, and opened it a couple of inches. "Who is it?"
Calderone pushed his cane through the opening. "Why are you still here?" He walked into the room, followed by his two hulking bodyguards.
"I have a fever. I need some medicine."
"This is not the time to lie in bed. You need to find Mara and the staff."
Walcott watched Calderone's mole twitch. "All right. I'll find her, and if she's got the staff, I'll get it. First, I've got to find my car. I left it at the hospital."
Calderone smiled. "It's parked in the back of the hotel waiting for you."
"Thank you. I appreciate it. The police might have gotten it, and—"
"Do you still have the money I gave you, or did you drink it all up?"
"No, I have it. Most of it, I mean. I'll get it for you."
The Sicilian held his cane out in front of Walcott. "Keep it. I'm leaving today. My people need me." He nodded to one of his bodyguards, who passed him a long and slender polished teakwood box. Calderone opened it, revealing a red velvet lining. "You will place the staff here and bring it to Rome."
He walked to the door, and the bodyguards followed. "If I don't hear from you, I'll send someone to finish the job for me."
The door slammed. Walcott had a good idea what Calderone meant by finishing the job, and he didn't like it. He couldn't wait any longer. He had to find Mara, and the way to her now was through Jones.
12
The Three Circles
Mara stoked the fire in the stone shelter high on a canyon wall as she warmed up leftover rabbit stew from the night before. She had escaped with the three surviving Utes after Walcott had been wounded, and had convinced them to take her to this remote canyon. She felt safe here, safer than if she had gone to Cortez or Bluff.
Walcott, she was convinced, was not the only one involved. Someone had been feeding him information, and until she found out who it was, she was in danger. But now she had to leave. The solstice, the day of promise, was just a sunrise away, and she knew she must go in search of Aguila. She'd leave as soon as she finished eating.
At the thought of the solstice, a fragment of a recurring dream came to mind. She bent over, and picked up a stick. Somehow, she knew that it was a dream that had recurred over and over and she had been repeatedly forgetting it. This time she'd remember. She scratched three circular symbols in the dirt. The one in the center was different from the other two. It was a series of circles within circles, what she considered to be an Anasazi sun symbol. The other two were spirals. She'd seen them too, but had heard varying interpretations of their meaning. The most common was that they meant a journey of some sort. The three symbols were somehow related to her quest for the unicorn's horn. That much she knew.
Ben, the grandson of Sam, the Ute guide who had been killed by Walcott's thugs, sat across the fire watching her. She pointed at her drawing. "Have you ever seen these three symbols together?" Ben stared at the drawing, then shook his head. "What do you think it means?" she asked. "I saw them in a dream."
"Then your dreams have been invaded by a wolf," he answered.
She knew the kind of wolf he meant, not the animal, but a witch, an Indian who could transform himself into the shapes of wolves or other animals and even fly. Many Indians feared them, and believed they would cause illness or even death through evil magic. It surprised her that Ben had made the observation. Aguila was considered by many to be a wolf.
Ben suddenly stirred as if he'd heard something. A moment later, the two other men rushed into the stone shelter. They spoke excitedly in Shoshoni as Ben scrambled to his feet.
"What's going on?" she asked.
"Someone's coming."
"Who?" She pushed past them, stepping out of the shelter for a better view. To her surprise, Aguila was walking along a path leading directly toward their hidden shelter. He was a small, wiry man, barely over five feet tall, with graying hair that fell to his shoulders. Even though he was at least seventy, he was fit and never seemed to tire. He walked among the rocks with a baffling gracefulness, as if he knew exacdy where to take every step without ever having to look down.
"It's okay," she called out. "I know him." But the Utes were already darting away among the boulders as they headed toward the top of the canyon wall. She shrugged and moved down the path. "I was going to look for you today," she said. She knew from experience that looking for Aguila and finding him were two different matters. "How did you know I was here?"
His peculiar green eyes seemed to literally glow. Those eyes alone were enough to convince anyone who suspected that the elfin old man might be a witch. "Your father and a young man are looking for you. I knew this is where you would be."
"Then they got my message."
"So your father said."
Indy dropped straight down over the cliff, and before he had time to even think about what was going to happen next, his boots struck a flat surface, and he found himself seated on a narrow switchback in the trail. He'd only fallen about fifteen feet, but just a yard away the cliff fell another two hundred feet.
He wiped a hand over his face, and tried to catch his breath. His body was still locked in an emergency survival mode, the sort that allowed him to take considerable punishment without feeling immediate pain. But now, as he realized he'd survived the fall, he mentally checked over his body. No shots of pain, signaling serious injury, responded to his call. He was scraped and bruised, but had suffered no broken bones.
His fedora rested atop some sagebrush growing from the side of the cliff just below the trail. He crawled forward, carefully reached out, and snatched the hat. He pressed it firmly over his head, and as he did, his gaze turned upward. For an instant, he thought he'd spotted an eagle circling high above him. Then he realized it was a vulture, actually several of them. "Sony, guys. No cleanup crew needed today."
"My God, Indy, you're alive!"
He looked up to see Smitty on his horse, careening around a bend at a dangerously fast trot. The two other horses trailed after him. Indy used the wall to brace himself as he stood up. "I took the shortcut down."
Smitty stared in amazement. "I thought you were a goner for sure."
"I don't go away that easily." Indy mounted his horse and grimaced as the back of his shirt rubbed against a patch of raw skin.
The path soon narrowed even further. Now the girth of the horses was actually wider than the trail. But to Indy's surprise Smitty stayed in the saddle. He was about to suggest they walk when Smitty's horse reared up and then tap-danced on the tig
htrope-like ledge.
"You slimy devil!" Smitty growled. But the horse wasn't the object of his anger. Smitty pulled out his revolver and fired twice at the ground.
The horses pranced nervously and Indy thought they were all about to hurtle into the abyss. He reined in Chico as best he could. "Whoa! Whoa, boy!"
"Got him!" Smitty shouted, and he urged his horse forward. The beast hesitated, then moved ahead.
Indy felt Chico's wariness as the animal spotted a six-foot rattler laying lifeless in the center of the trail. "It's okay, boy. Go on." But nothing that Indy said could persuade the horse to step over the dead snake. He finally unhitched his whip and with one swipe knocked the rattler over the ledge. "There, that suit you?"
The horse snorted and they moved on.
In spite of the treacherous terrain and lurking vipers, the remainder of the journey to the ruins came off without incident. As they arrived at the junction of Kane Gulch and Grand Gulch near midday, Indy glimpsed the ancient Anasazi pueblo, their destination. Like the cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde, the stone structures had been built under an overhang.
"Mara!" Smitty yelled. His voice echoed in the canyon, and seemed to violate the sanctity of the ruins. "Mara!"
No answer.
The overhang was nearly ten yards deep and curved so that they couldn't see all the buildings. The ones closest to them faced east, while those at the other end looked south.
"Well, if there's anyone here, they certainly know we've arrived," Indy said, not exactly pleased by Smitty's shouting.
"It's deserted. Just as I thought."
Indy got down from his horse. "Let's not give up so quickly. Maybe she's out getting water. Or maybe she's gone and left us a message."
Smitty didn't answer, but Indy could tell that he was disappointed. The old prospector didn't have much to say about Mara, but his concern was etched in his dark expression.
As they climbed into the ruins, Indy was immediately enchanted by the silent village. He imagined what it had been like when the village was alive and thriving. He closed his eyes a moment, and could literally hear the sound of children playing, of women grinding corn, of men gathering for a hunt. But he forced himself to focus on his search for Mara. He noticed markings on the rear wall, not rock art, but the message Mara had passed to Shannon: No. 73 AMNH 1920 N.C.N, and B.T.B.H.
Seeing it now made Indy even more intent on finding out why Mara had wanted him to come here. Maybe she'd intended to meet him here, but hadn't made it. Or hadn't made it yet. The only other alternative was that this was the hiding place of the staff. But where would he look? It could literally take weeks for him to scour these ruins to find a buried artifact, even one that was only recently hidden.
"I'll go down to the other end and work my way back," Smitty said, and he disappeared around a wall.
Indy moved from room to room, making a quick inspection of each one. He passed an open-topped kiva. Its log ceiling had vanished long ago, and its interior had been filled with rubble. When he came upon another desecrated kiva, he bent down and picked out a pottery shard from the rubble. He brushed the dirt from its exterior, revealing a network of dark lines that had been painted over the original pale orange hue. He dropped it back into the kiva and continued on.
He stopped to examine a handprint left behind in the mortar of a wall. When he placed his own hand over it, his fingers measured nearly an inch longer than the person who had made the impression. It gave him an odd feeling to think that the person who had made the impression had been dead for at least six hundred years. In spite of his experience in ruins much older than this one, the handprint made the place utterly human. It told him and everyone who would ever see it that people had lived and died here, and that they were not so different from anyone else. Even though the village had been excavated by Wetherill and others, Indy knew that if he spent the summer here he would no doubt learn much more about the people who had lived here. Maybe some other time.
As he walked on without finding any indication that Mara, or anyone else for that matter, had been here recently, he became more and more frustrated. If the point was for him to find the staff, then why hadn't she been more specific? He wished Shannon were here now so he could question him about Mara's exact words. She must have given some hint about where she had expected him to look. But maybe it was obvious.
He asked himself where he would hide something in these ruins if he wanted an archaeologist to find it. He thought about his question as he examined a small storage room that gave no hint of any hidden secrets. He couldn't think of a single place. He wracked his mind. There was something else that Mara had said to Shannon: "It's ironic that we're in a kiva and so close to the underworld."
The underworld. What better place to hide the staff? Shannon had thought she was changing the subject, but Mara actually was giving him another clue. The Anasazis' connection to the underworld was the sipapu, the small hole in the floor of a kiva. Maybe that was what she'd done with it. But the kivas he'd seen so far had been littered with rubble nearly to their rim.
"Any luck?" Smitty called out as he ambled toward Indy.
Indy shook his head. "How about you?"
"I didn't find Mara, if that's what you mean, or any sign that she's been here."
"Did you see any kivas?" Indy asked.
"A couple."
"Full of rubble?"
Smitty motioned with his hand. "One of them was. The other one way back was fairly clean."
"Show me where it is."
The kiva in question wasn't exactly uncluttered, but it would be possible to clear away the rubble without much trouble. Indy lowered himself over the side. The early morning sunlight would reach back here, but by late afternoon the kiva was shrouded in shadow. "I've got a feeling about this kiva, Smitty. I want to find the sipapu."
"The hole to the underworld," Smitty said, chuckling. "You think that's where the answers are?"
"We'll see."
"Tell you what, I'm gonna get the lantern. It's dark back here, and my eyes aren't so good anymore. Then I'll give you a hand."
By the time Smitty returned, a pile of rocks was growing outside of the kiva as Indy tossed one after another over his shoulder. "Watch where you're throwing," Smitty groused. "You almost hit me."
He lit the lantern and passed it down to Indy, who held it up to see if there were any signs of the sipapu. Most of the rocks he'd removed had come from the center of the kiva and now an indention in the floor was visible. But the depression was too large for the sipapu. "This must be the firepit." He held the lantern up to the wall and circled the kiva until he found another indention. "Okay, here we go."
"In the wall? I thought the hole to the underworld was in the floor."
"It is in the floor," Indy said as he paced across the kiva. "That was the ventilator shaft." He dropped to one knee and reached for a rock. "Right about here is where we should find the—"
"What is it?" Smitty asked.
Indy's thoughts had flown back to his eagle dream. "It's a feather, Smitty, an eagle feather," he said. "Ain't that something."
"So what?"
"It just reminded me of something. Doesn't matter now." Indy quickly removed rocks, sifting through the loose dirt beneath the rocks. His anticipation grew with each stone he pulled away. Then he felt something. "It looks like a piece of canvas, Smitty. Can't tell yet, but it might be a bag."
13
Departures
From her perch atop a boulder, Mara had an excellent view of Sipapu Bridge, one of three natural sandstone formations that arced gracefully over White Canyon. The bridge and the entire canyon were bathed in a pale yellow light as the sun hovered over the canyon wall in its slow, orderly descent. She imagined Indian priests patiently watching the sun day after day, year after year, noting where the sun rose and set, calculating the hours and minutes and seconds, and precisely marking the change of seasons.
It wasn't the first time Mara had been here, but the view of t
he bridge still enchanted her, left her with a sense of eternity. The bridge connected the distant past with the present and the future. The events of her life, which seemed so overwhelming right now, would take place in a minuscule speck of time in the geological sense of things. The thought was at once comforting and frightening. Comforting in that her trials would be over before she knew it, but frightening because she sensed the immensity of time and space and her relative insignificance. She was like a moth, with a life span measured in hours instead of years. She'd bat her wings a few times, then vanish from the world.
Mara looked around, wondering what had happened to Aguila. She'd wanted to leave right away to meet Indy and her father at Junction Ruin, which was only a few miles away. But Aguila had told her that was unnecessary. Everything was unfolding as was intended, and there was no reason to rush.
Her gaze shifted to the valley floor where three men on horseback moved single file at a fast trot. She raised a hand and waved. The Utes had remained out of sight ever since Aguila had arrived, and she'd assumed they feared him because they thought he might be a scout for the law. But when she found Ben filling his skins with water, he told her that they couldn't stay here with the Navajo witch and were leaving. They feared him even more than the law officers who were searching for them.
Mara had never felt the slightest apprehension around Aguila. Maybe it was because she'd grown up in a culture where witches were a superstition from the past, while her Ute friends saw them as real and dreadful. She had met Aguila after she'd begun her search for the staff. Rosie had steered her on the right path, but she'd warned Mara that Aguila was a strange man. She'd said that he'd hidden the staff and would never sell it to her.
So Mara had visited him under a pretext. She'd made a couple of dozen drawings of rock art, and her plan was to ask him to help her understand the meaning of the drawings for a book she planned to write. But just making contact with Aguila had been an unusually difficult task. Even though Rosie had told her where he lived, finding the exact site was nearly impossible since no one she asked would admit that they had ever heard of him. Finally, Mara had found the hogan, just as Rosie had described it, near a stream and a row of Ponderosa trees that served as a windbreak.
Indiana Jones and the Unicorn's Legacy Page 12