“Yes, I can see this now,” stated DeNiza. “Family honor doesn’t mean anything to you.”
I stared at the ground.
DeNiza continued, “You have nothing to say? Why aren’t you telling me how proud you are of your people? Or your family? How about your tribe? No cute little stories about kin?”
I snapped back, “What’s so great about people, Carlos? Or family for that matter?”
DeNiza smiled and pointed at me with his knife. “That’s right, you don’t know them. You don’t know your ancestors, either.”
I got up and walked away. “Go to hell.”
He gave me an evil grin as he drove his point home. “That is why you do not know yourself.” He stuck the knife in a log and walked to the wall.
DeNiza placed one of his foot-long pegs in a hole and stood on it, testing its strength. Then he inserted another in the next hole.
In this manner he began to climb the cliff face.
The large raven returned, suddenly swooping in, and perching itself on top of a dried-out stalk of agave where it could watch the show.
“You see, it is so simple,” called DeNiza. He moved up a step and said, “Because you could not conceive it, you shall not share in my great discovery.”
I replied, “Why not let me worry about what I conceive.”
To this DeNiza laughed. It was a snort, really.
He said, “One like you is not worthy of my noble bloodline.”
I leaned against the wall to watch, “Keep climbing, Carlos. This is gonna be good.”
Soon he was thirty feet above the ground, but there seemed to be no end to the ascent. The rock face above remained vertical for another twenty feet before slanting back, out of sight.
As he moved to place another peg, a sudden “crack” echoed through the canyon. A nervous expression crossed his face. He tried to descend, but the peg he was standing on snapped and he began to fall.
Frantically he reached for the passing pegs and managed to grab one long enough to slow his momentum, but then it broke as well and sent him crashing through the remainder of the pegs.
He hit the ground hard.
I watched with a satisfied grin as he limped to the fire.
The raven cawed and flew off. As it ascended above the section the professor was climbing, it got a bird’s overview of everything. On the flat surface of the wall, out of sight from the box canyon, a huge Aztec glyph was carved into the rock.
And a light breeze blew over the image, tumbling grains of sand, and whispering, “Xibalba…”
Chapter Sixty-three
The distant sun crept over the rim of the West Fork, like a spider, shining yellow and black as it squeezed around the spires of rock. And its first intrepid rays shot into the box canyon, illuminating the entrance to a cave.
DeNiza leapt to his feet. He had hardly slept, and for the last few shivering hours he’d simply waited for the sunrise. But when it had instantly shown under a dead tree, and lit up the cave entrance, he was barely ready for it.
“Come on!” he shouted to me. Excited, like a boy.
I followed him to the back of the canyon, where he grabbed the old pine that had obscured the entrance, and with a lot of grunting and moaning he dragged it out of the way.
The pile of logs and debris that was left was rotted and covered with charcoal. Behind the rubble, I could see into a low cave.
DeNiza tore at the clutter that blocked the cave entrance, stirring fine powdered dust. In a few minutes a way was cleared.
He was covered with soot, and he was grinning.
He held up a charred stump and said, “Looks like there was a fire here once.” He stared up and saw how the overhanging cliff would have sheltered it from the rain.
As he moved one of the crumbling logs out of the way an odd man-made object was exposed. DeNiza grabbed it and brushed off the accumulated ash and soot and an ancient black-powder pistol was revealed. The wooden hand grip had been mostly burned away. He raised it reverently and mused, “Perhaps my ancestor died defending this treasure.”
I said, “More likely trying to steal it.”
DeNiza stared at me. “What makes you think my ancestor was such a bad person?”
We gazed at the dark entrance to the cave. It seemed the passing wind got sucked right into it. I asked, “What makes you think he was good? He carved up his chest, he scalped Indians, and he was ruthless.”
DeNiza nodded. “He was a man of power in a brutal world. I think you cannot fathom the sacrifices he made in the name of a greater good.”
“No, that’s not it,” I replied, “I’ve never had much money, but I can’t see how a treasure could drive you to do what he did to his body.”
DeNiza scoffed at me and shook his head.
We crouched as we entered the main chamber, which was lit up by the light from outside. Inside the cave the air was stale. It faintly smelled of death in here.
The sound of dripping water filled the silence.
I paused on a mound in the middle of several puddles, while DeNiza quickly walked the perimeter. Under several of the constant drips, the ancients had placed large clay vessels to catch the water. They were overflowing, and the dark water rippled with each drop.
DeNiza passed a dark recess by the entrance, and glanced in, but without a flashlight he could see nothing.
From my perch, I looked over the various pictographs that adorned the walls. Closer to me, on the mound, I noticed an assortment of offerings: several bowls containing different colored powders, a yellow drinking tube, some ancient dried seeds and a doll. There were also three river-rounded stones that were covered with an orange lichen, next to an old metate with a basalt mano.
The doll was made from a corn cob wrapped in a soft piece of leather. I held it up.
“Look at this,” I said. “It has to be hundreds of years old.”
DeNiza took it briefly, paused only long enough to confirm it wasn’t made of gold, then tossed it on the ground. He sniffed one of the containers of grey powder with disgust.
“I’m surprised that stuff has not decomposed,” he said.
He glanced at the dark recess again and said, “I’m going for a flashlight—don’t touch anything.”
I didn’t move. Not because DeNiza had commanded it, but because I sensed something special about the place. The water dripping down into the clear pools echoed throughout the cave.
I looked around, taking it all in.
Beyond the dripping I heard the voice of old Saan, saying, “She was scared, child, very scared. So, she ran to the cave where the water drips and hid there.”
I looked around with fresh eyes, my hands exploring the sand mound, feeling the soft impression on the top. It looked as if someone had once lain on this very spot.
I remembered Saan also said, “When the water hit her, that’s when she got pregnant.”
I ran my hands under the sand, letting it sift through my fingers. And then I heard Saan again, saying, “Your mother said she found that place once.”
I whispered, “What really happened here, Saan?”
Then my hand encountered an object; one that was solid and heavy.
I extracted an ancient leather bundle from the sand mound and gaped at it for a moment. A leather cord held it closed.
I was about to pull the cord when I heard DeNiza returning.
Quickly, I reburied it.
Over the next few hours, DeNiza scoured the cave. True to his word, he had brought everything he would need. He began by setting up a large, battery-powered floodlight, and then photographed the chamber and the various pictographs.
The dark recess by the entrance contained a partial bear skull, and he withdrew from it in disappointment.
But he was in his element, taking notes and doing field work. Without even asking me for help, he carried his equipment into the cave, storing it all in the small recess.
The cave had become an archaeological site, and he sectioned it off in a gri
d-like pattern, using a small collapsible shovel, string, a hammer and stakes. Every few minutes he scribbled something in a small notebook.
He stepped into a hazmat suit, apparently to test the various powders. It was a flimsy white outfit with a hood and a clear plastic face. “You look like an astronaut,” I said. He blushed a little at that, apparently enjoying the comparison.
“Go ahead,” he said, “laugh at me, but I will not have this expedition tainted because of contamination or incompetence.”
He had given me very specific instructions not to touch anything, and only observe from the mound. I sat there on my perch in the sand, almost next to him; no hazard suit for me.
“Well, I hope there’s nothing here that could mess me up,” I said.
He relaxed. “No, most likely not. I would guess the powders are a mix of pigment made from natural sources, plus pollen, and maybe a psychedelic.”
I lit up at that. I had done psychedelics—mushrooms in my case—at a Grateful Dead show in Oakland the year before.
He pointed at one of the bowls—the one filled with seeds.
“I believe these are seeds of the morning glory plant. The Aztecs called them ololiuqui, and they consumed them regularly because they contained a hallucinogen very much like LSD.”
“Really?” I asked. “Why would they do drugs like that?”
He sat back and stared at me.
“You really have no idea what this is all about, do you?”
I gazed back at him and had to admit to myself I really didn’t.
“Okay,” he began in his most patient voice. “In Mesoamerica, they held beliefs that the dead lived in the earth and mountains. Caves were sacred because they were a direct connection to that underworld.
“By going deep into caves, the Mayans and Aztecs supposed they could contact the dead. To them, a cave was basically a church, and by leaving offerings and conducting rituals they could petition their ancestors for favor and protection.”
“The underworld…” I teased. “That’s pretty heavy.”
He frowned at me. “It is my belief that the Aztecs thought this cave to be a door to the afterworld, and by leaving a sufficient offering, they might control who entered—and who returned.”
“The power of life over death?” I asked.
He shrugged and gave a weak smile. “Who knows?”
“What about the psychedelics?”
DeNiza nodded. “The Aztecs believed when you ingested these substances—hallucinatory mushrooms or seeds—you were transported directly into the spirit world.”
I fidgeted on the mound, pondering his words.
He continued, “Aztec warriors would take mushroom enemas before they went into battle.”
“What the fuck, Carlos?” I said, shocked. “That’s messed up.”
He gave me a rare smile. “Yes, it truly is. But they believed once the hallucinogens were in their system they were in the spirit world, amongst the gods—so any price was worth paying.”
I woke in the dead of night, just like the previous night. I quietly slipped out of my sleeping bag and exited the tent.
What was left of the waning moon had slid across the sky hours before, and it was very dark. After a moment my eyes adjusted, and I moved away from the campsite and the adobe ruin.
From the back of the canyon I could hear something that sounded like a chant. The further back in the box canyon I walked, the clearer the sound became.
This was not my mother’s song, and something about it terrified me, but I had to follow.
As soon as I entered the dark cave, the chanting stopped.
DeNiza had turned off his flood lights, and I squinted in the dark. Then I saw the far end of the cave had a slight glow to it. The basalt stones on the mound glowed softly, too. It was just enough for me to get my bearings in the dark and not trip on one of the survey strings.
I walked the perimeter of the cave.
And then, from the low end of the cave—where the glow was strongest—I could hear a voice.
It was very faint as it called out.
All the hair on my arms and neck stood on end. The voice was whispering my name. “Amber… Amber…”
This was not my mother’s voice. I shivered, and somehow found the nerve to crawl forward.
At the far end of the cave, I could see a small opening: air whistled through it. On the other side, I could dimly make out an open space. When I got closer, the whispering stopped.
I inched my head nearer to the opening, and suddenly the chanting started again—the same as the night before. But this time, it wasn’t faint and distant—this time, the voice was only a few feet away.
I jumped backwards, and the darkness smothered me, and my courage, and I fled the cave.
Not twenty feet from the entrance, I almost ran into DeNiza, who was standing there. I shrieked and jumped.
He hissed furiously, “What are you doing here?”
I still hadn’t caught my breath. “You bastard, you scared me.”
He didn’t care. “I asked you what you are doing here?”
“Will you relax?” I said. “I left my sweater on the mound, and I had to go to the bathroom. What’s wrong with you?”
He seemed charged, like a thunderstorm.
I gave him a stare. “Can’t I get a little privacy?”
DeNiza looked around suspiciously. He glanced at the entrance to the cave, only a few paces away.
He said, “I don’t trust you. You’re being deceitful—again.”
“Lighten up, Carlos,” I replied. “I just have to take a leak.”
He stood staring at me. “I will have this treasure.”
I unbuttoned my jeans. “Do you mind?” I asked.
He turned and walked away.
Chapter Sixty-four
The bruises on DeNiza’ chest and ribs had yellowed to almost the same color as the sandstone walls. He stood with his shirt off, leaning against the cliff wall, a short way from the fire. He was unshaven, hadn’t slept a wink, and his polished, professional veneer was fading away.
I was heating a pot of water over the fire and looked busy; but from the corner of my eyes I kept a close watch on him as he showed a tension that promised trouble.
He walked to his tent, grabbed a fresh shirt, and began to button it up. He was red-faced and twitchy. It was taking visible effort to look calm.
He caught my eye and chuckled to himself, then smiled broadly and said, “I can tell when you´re hiding something.”
He wagged his finger at me. “I’m not sure why you would not want me to find my treasure,” DeNiza continued. “I’m not even sure if you want to find it.”
He picked up the Spanish helmet and stared at it. “But you know something, and you don’t want to share.”
I took the pot off the fire and added one of my freeze-dried soups: mushroom. I ignored him while I stirred the soup.
DeNiza said, “You can trust me. I’m in this for good reasons: family honor. Plus, I’m a respected professor. I have tenure.”
I remained silent.
Exasperated, he turned his palms up and pleaded, “Please, where is my treasure? What are you hiding?”
I handed him a bowl of soup.
He took it, lifted the spoon to his mouth, and pretended to taste it. “Why won’t you just tell me?” he asked.
He was starting to twitch with frustration.
I stood directly in front of him and demanded, “Tell me what Cristóbal said to Alonso just before he died.”
DeNiza smashed the bowl of soup against the cliff wall. He seemed to grow in size as he stomped around and angrily yelled at me, “Why can’t you just answer a simple question? Are you really so afraid of trusting someone?”
I tried to speak but couldn’t find the words. Finally, I spat out, “Screw it. You want to know what I know?”
DeNiza said, “I do,” as he stepped forward in anticipation.
I met his eyes, “Once you find your treasure, wil
l you tell me everything?”
DeNiza hesitated, scratched his ear, and then smiled and said, “Of course.”
I pointed to the far end of the box canyon. I said, “On the other side of the chamber where the water drips, there’s another room.”
He pointed an accusing finger at me, “I knew you were hiding something!”
I shook my head. “You’re the one that’s hiding something.”
DeNiza crawled to the back of the cave and pointed his flood light directly into the small hole in the wall. I sat on the mound, watching him.
He said, “It seems like there’s a chamber or tunnel here, but it has been walled off. I left my flashlight in the tent.”
He paused at the entrance and warned me, “Stay where you are until I return.”
I replied, “Just relax, Carlos.”
At first there was only a gap of a few inches between the opening in the wall and the ceiling, but soon DeNiza began shoveling away the dirt piled in front of it. It was not a graceful thing to watch: the collapsible shovel was very small, and the professor clearly inexperienced in manual labor.
But he was ecstatic. Sweat poured off him.
He’d had the foresight to wiggle out of his hazard suit first, whose pure factory white was already tinted pink. He wasn’t so much afraid that he would get it dirty as that he might puncture the suit while digging.
After a few minutes the outline of a stone doorway became visible. DeNiza proudly pointed at his discovery, “You see this? These are not natural stones—this was built.”
The stones that filled in the entrance were a mismatched collection of sandstone, limestone and basalt.
“And these stones were added much later,” he said and began taking them out, one by one, and placing them to the side.
Some of the stones—the black basalt—had an orange lichen clinging to them which glowed slightly. But DeNiza barely noticed it when his eyes fell on what the wall concealed.
His jaw dropped, and he moved in slow motion as he removed the last few stones. His silence got my attention, and I crept closer, breaking his rule and moving off the mound.
The Sirens of Oak Creek Page 34