The morning sun's heat shimmered up from the desert floor in waves. The blackness of the lava flow at the northern end of the basin spread across the valley. The Malpais, the Spanish called it, bad country, where a horse could break a leg and a rider could break a neck. Behind the sharp coils of lava, snow still capped the twin peaks of Sierra Blanca, the centerpiece of the Mescalero Apache Reservation, and in the depressions where the basin dipped, shallow salt lakes held the residual water of winter, not yet evaporated by the furnace of a summer sun. They moved beneath the timberline in old-growth evergreens, breaking into the open only once to cross another knuckled canyon before the final push to Indian Wells.
Sara could see game trails converging at the base of a mountain. There were spoor and sign of coyote, deer, and rabbits along the trail, but no prints of man or domestic animals. The horses smelled water and picked up the pace, breaking into a gentle trot as the hill leveled out to form a saucer at the foot of the mountain. Kerney dismounted and Sara followed suit. He led her through a small grove of cedar trees and into a clearing against the mountainside. Indian Wells, a pool of water in a rock catchment basin at the base of the mountain, seemed to have no source. The water overflowed into a natural causeway and quickly disappeared into a rock crevice. They let the horses drink before tethering them. A search of the pool and surrounding area turned up nothing of interest. They ate a light lunch under the weak shade of a tree.
"How long would it have taken Sammy to hike in?" Sara asked. She had the open portfolio in her lap and was perusing the watercolors.
"Not long, if he drove partway up the last canyon we crossed," Kerney speculated.
"Two hours, maximum, on foot, I guess. The game trails make the hike reasonable."
"I didn't see any tire tracks in the canyon," Sara noted, as she rose and walked to the edge of the pool.
"Washed away," Kerney called after her, chewing on a cracker. "All the canyons carry water east into the basin. There's no other outlet. It's a closed system." He got to his feet gingerly and joined her at the pool. Squatting, Sara inspected the petroglyphs just above the water line.
"Here they are," she said, pointing at the rock face. She looked again, this time more closely, at some scratches in the stone next to the devil dancer.
"Are those your initials?" Kerney grimaced.
"I'm afraid so. I got my fanny warmed for that mischief. I thought this was a magical place when I was a kid."
"It still is," Sara replied. "The pictographs are wonderful. I'd love to know what they mean."
"I'm not real sure anyone knows, except the Apaches. I used to study them and try to figure out the symbolism. I think you have to know the story."
"I would love to," Sara reflected, getting to her feet. "So where's the cliff from here?"
"I have no idea," Kerney said. "Somewhere near Big Mesa, I think."
The clouds had turned the sky a solid gray.
"Time to go. There are two old mines close by at Sweet-water Canyon I want to check out. Sammy may have used those locations in several of his paintings. We'll cut up there and then come down to Big Mesa."
"And after that?" Sara inquired.
"It depends on the weather. We'll stop off at the 7Bar-K."
"What did the family brand stand for?"
"The seven was for luck and the K stood for Kerney. The lucky Kerneys. What a joke that turned out to be." He looked skyward again.
"We need to get moving. I don't want us caught in a gully washer."
Kerney pushed along at a faster pace; he could smell the faint tinge of salt in the air. Gray clouds were foaming into black tiers, building up to an angry squall, and canyon winds were whipping tree branches, whistling through the gullies. The storm could hit at any time or jump right over them.
They moved along the back side of stair-stepped mesas, through troughs that plunged into stands of virgin forest. Climbing again, they reached the first mine site only to be greeted by horizontal lightning in a thick sky, the cracking sound muffled in thunderheads. Kerney knew he was searching for Sammy's body, but it was hard to say so. He appreciated Sara's silence.
A light rain was falling as they finished searching the caved-in mine and moved downslope to the next shaft. The wind pushed the rain against their backs with enough force to soak through to the skin. They stopped briefly below a ridgeline to don rain slicks. The tunnel to the second mine, partially open and buttressed by large beams, had enough space beneath a rockfall for a person to crawl through. Sara dismounted, gave Kerney the reins to the gelding, got the flashlight from the packhorse, and wriggled cautiously into the cave before he could take the lead. She stopped, half in, half out, to sweep the blackness with light, looking for rattlesnakes and rats. A scurrying movement and the flash of red eyes at the edge of a vertical shaft made her freeze. It took all her self-control to keep from flinching while she waited for more movement.
She fanned the light slowly over the floor of the cave. There were no snakes that she could see and no evidence of any two-legged visitors. She wormed completely inside the tunnel, stopping at the sound of scampering beyond her line of sight. The noise ended and the beam other flashlight caught a pack rat frozen in the light. She sighed with relief and switched her attention to the shaft. It was filled in with rubble. Kerney scouted the outside area on foot as the rain came down harder and harder. He smiled when Sara emerged. There was dirt on her chin and the tip of her nose. She shook her head back and forth.
"Nothing?" he asked.
"Just a pack rat."
"Let's move on."
The wind roared up to gale force, pelting them with cold rain as they mounted their horses. Sara shouted over the gale, "We've got to get out of here." Lightning cracked above her. The gelding reared, ears back, rotated in a quick counterclockwise spin, and slammed into the packhorse. The roan back stepped and went down. Sara was out of her saddle, fighting to stay seated. The gelding spun in a tighter circle, whirling into a juniper tree at the fringe of the trail.
The branches whipped Sara's face, and she tumbled off the gelding, trying to take the fall on her shoulders and get away from the horse. She landed hard, the breath jarred out of her. The gelding, snorting with fright, reared above her. She could barely see through the sheet of rain as she rolled to avoid the hoofs. The impact never came. Kerney had the bay between her and the gelding, switching it with his reins. He got it settled down and hitched securely to a tree, tied off the bay and the roan, and ran to her. Sara struggled to sit up.
"Are you all right?" he demanded.
"I caught my foot in the stirrup and twisted my ankle." She held out her hand so he could help her to her feet. "That's all."
"Let me look at it," Kerney ordered, holding her firmly in place. There was a red welt on her forehead.
"It isn't broken."
"Which ankle?"
"The right one." She shook off Kerney's grip, tried to stand on her own, grimaced in pain, and sank back to the ground.
"Stay put. I'll tape it." He got the first-aid kit, took off her boot, and inspected the ankle. It was sprained but unbroken. He wrapped it tightly and got the boot back on before it would no longer fit over the swelling. He supported her as she stood up and took a few tentative, painful steps. Then he laughed.
"What's so damn funny?" Sara demanded.
"You and me," he said, still chuckling, as he walked her to the gelding.
"Now we're a matched pair."
They hurried across Sweetwater Canyon. There was no time to stop. The storm covered the range from north to south. Any runoff would catch them before they could reach the desert. Kerney led the small caravan to the side of a high mesa, into the stinging rain of a low cloud.
There was nothing above them but the blackness of the storm. Big Mesa curved between two canyons, encased in the cloud that spilled over into the basin and blocked the basin floor from view. Fog came at them from every direction and wrapped them up. It was gray and wind-lashed, with fleeting breaks
in the cover that brought a glimmer of creamy light into the haze. The horses, jaded from the ridge-running, needed rest. Kerney had pushed hard to leave the low ground. It was none too soon. They could hear the growing roar of the torrent below them, crashing through the rocks, sweeping toward the wide mouth of the canyon. He dismounted and dropped the reins over the head of the bay.
The horse stood still, legs quivering. Hunched over, eyes cast downward, he went looking for the footpath that would get them off the mesa. The trail started at a rock face along a narrow ledge, then made a series of sharp switchbacks. The old ranch road intercepted the trail on the first step up the mesa. They would have to walk the next two miles, leading the horses. Kerney found the trailhead and returned to give Sara the news. She groaned silently at the prospect and dismounted without comment. As she hobbled behind the packhorse she wondered if she would ever get dry and warm again. She assumed Kerney was taking them to shelter, but she had no idea where they were going or how long it would take to get there. She damn sure wasn't going to ask. There was no way Kerney would hear a whine or a whimper from her. The two of them trudged along on gimpy legs, waterlogged, leading miserable, tired animals. There was enough humor in it to make Sara smile every now and then, in spite of the pain shooting up her leg. The switchback trail was barely passable and in places only faintly discernible. Scattered rocks and saturated earth along the way made for tough going. The mud turned to thick slop as the intensity of the rain increased.
The cloud sank lower and the rain turned to hail. Sara's only reference points were the trail at her feet and the backside of the packhorse in front of her. She sighed with relief when Kerney signaled her to stop. He stood between two superficial ruts filled with water, intersecting the path.
It had to be the jeep trail. When he failed to move on she joined him and asked what was wrong. The hood of his rain slick dripped water down the brim of his hat as he bent to study the tire tracks in the mud.
"These are recent," he said.
"It looks like somebody's cut a new route."
"Going where?"
"As far as I know, nowhere. It dead-ends up at the rock face." He pointed up the trail. She might have missed it in the rain. "Drops straight off or goes straight up. There's no way out."
They were quiet for a moment, neither one of them enthusiastic about the obvious need to follow the tracks.
"The storm should break soon," Kerney suggested, wiping his nose with a damp hand.
"Let's go have a look," Sara said, with as much energy as she could muster. The tire tracks gave out in a circle of flattened grass where the vehicle had turned and backed up near two twisted, intertwined cedar trees close to a seamless cliff that cut off forward movement. At the base was a steep plummet to a smaller mesa below. On the canyon floor a bighorn browsed serenely within yards of a cascading flood of water rushing toward the mouth of Sweetwater. Kerney looked at the cliff. It matched perfectly with the bighorn watercolor. They tied the horses to the trees and took a closer look. The lower branches had been cut away to allow passage to the rock face.
A tent-shaped crevice in the granite had been care fully filled in with stones and small boulders. It took only a few minutes to remove the rocks. The air that wafted out of the darkness brought the smell of decaying flesh with it. Standing at the entrance, Sara used her flashlight to illuminate the cave. It was high enough for Kerney to stand upright and deep enough to hold two dozen or more people. The ground was smooth stone, except for a pile of loose shale at the back of the cave. They walked to the mound, and Sara held the flashlight while Kerney removed the shale. Under layers of rock the outline of a body emerged, wrapped in a tarp. Gagging on the stench, Kerney peeled back the sheath. Escaped gases from the decomposed body had blistered Sammy's face so that it looked burned. He was barely recognizable.
"Shit, shit, shit, shit," Kerney said, spitting the words out. He turned away, gasped for fresh air, and looked at Sammy's face again.
"Let me help," Sara said. Kerney brushed her hand away.
"I'll do it," he said hoarsely. He felt around Sammy's neck until his fingers touched the dog tags, undid the clasp, and carefully pulled loose the chain. The canvas beneath Sammy's head, crusted with dried blood, claimed tufts of hair as Kerney turned the rigid body on its side. The back of Sammy's head was crushed. Kerney's breath whistled out of him through his clenched teeth.
Underneath Sammy's torso was a sketch pad. He handed Sara the pad and the dog tags, fished Sammy's wallet out of his back pocket, and gave it to her.
With her mouth covered to fight off the stench, only Sara's angry eyes showed.
"This sucks," she said. Kerney said nothing. Slowly, he wrapped Sammy in the tarp, his hands tucking the material as though he were putting the boy to bed. Standing, he swallowed hard against the bile in his mouth and the piercing anger in his chest.
"Let's get out of here," he growled, pushing past her and into the moist, fresh air that smelled like earth, pine needles, and cedar.
Sara's flashlight beam caught a dull glitter in the fine dust near the feet of the corpse. She picked it up and held the light close to inspect it. It was an old military insignia, two crossed cavalry sabers with a company letter beneath the sheathed blades. She put it in her pocket and joined Kerney outside. Savagely, Kerney restacked the rocks to seal the entrance. The violence in his movements as he worked warned Sara that no help was wanted. Finished, he walked to the edge of the mesa. The high winds and rain were gone. Dreamlike on the skyline, the Sierra Blancas gathered the last of the clouds to their crowns. The basin, damp in wet tones of brown, green, and gray, glistened in the sunlight. *** Below him on a sprawling foothill, the shape of the 7-Bar-K ranch house jumped out at him. The living windbreak his grandfather had planted on the north side of the house was now a dead row of cottonwood trees. A pile of lumber was all that was left of the horse barn, and a few random fence posts marked the remains of the corral. The stock tank, almost covered by drifting sand, showed a rusted lip to the sky. A truck was parked in front of the log porch. East of the ranch, on the flats in the distance, sunlight bounced off a cluster of metal roofs. It had to be the test site. The sound of Sara's voice startled him.
"Are you all right?"
"Not by a long shot," he answered.
"Kerney… I'm sorry."
"I know." He refused to look at her.
"You'd think this old place had seen enough suffering over the years." He pulled himself together and forced a smile.
"I know it must hurt, but…" His interruption came before she could continue.
"It's okay." Tears made lines in the dirt on his face. He blinked more away.
"Let's dry out, clean up, and get some rest. I don't know about you, but I'm a complete wreck." They rode down toward the ranch in the unusually cool air the storm had left behind, Kerney in the lead. Sara prodded the gelding along until she was even with Kerney's shoulder. He would not look at her.
Chapter 7
The small desk, positioned with a view out the window, gave Eppi Gutierrez a clear line of sight to Big Mesa. He made his last entry in the daily log on the status of the bighorn herd, closed the book, and looked up. Coming down the old trail, two riders on jaded horses trailing a pack animal picked their way through the sandy bottom. His apprehension grew as he watched them come closer. In all his overnights at the 7-Bar-K he'd never seen anybody come down that trail-it went nowhere. He put his logbook in a metal box, found his holstered sidearm, and watched their approach through the front window, nervously snapping open the hammer flap. The riders dismounted at the tailgate of his truck and walked the horses to the porch. Both were limping, the man rather badly, the woman less so. They looked exhausted. He unholstered the pistol, hid the weapon behind his right leg, and stepped outside. The man spoke before he could challenge them.
"Are you Eppi Gutierrez?"
"Yes, I am. Who are you?"
"Lieutenant Kerney, Dona Ana County Sheriffs Department." He held ou
t his badge and gestured at Sara.
"This is Captain Brannon, Provost Marshal's Office. Do us a favor and put the gun away." Eppi blushed and stuck the pistol in the waistband of his trousers.
"Sorry about that," he said. "I didn't expect to see anybody riding out of the mountains, especially after the storm that just blew over. How did you know my name?" The two began unsaddling the horses. The woman, her face dirty and with a welt on her forehead, was still a looker, Eppi decided.
"The truck gave you away," Kerney replied.
"Did you come through Rhodes Pass?"
"More or less."
"Through the storm?"
Kerney nodded. "Had no choice. Do you think we can bunk here tonight?" He pitched his saddle onto the porch railing and Sara followed suit.
"Sure. No problem. Let me help you unload." Kerney nodded wearily.
"I'd appreciate it." They relieved the roan of its burden and bedded the horses under the dead windbreak trees after Kerney ran a string line. Eppi helped them carry water to the animals. Sara's butt was sore, her legs were cramped, and the twisted ankle throbbed. She finished watering the gelding, grabbed her sleeping bag and day pack, and walked toward the ranch house. It was a long, wide rectangle, easily sixty years old, with a shallow veranda, partially screened at one end. Sara couldn't resist the temptation to snoop around. The inside contained practical living spaces; an oversized living room and country kitchen on the front side, with a door opening to the partially screened porch, bedrooms and a single bath arranged in a row down a hallway at the rear of the house. She heard Kerney clomp across the oak floor of the front room and dump his gear in one of the empty bedrooms. She caught sight of him leaving. She decided it had to be his childhood room: a rusty horseshoe nailed above the door confirmed it.
Tularosa kk-1 Page 11