Day 27

Chapter 43

[Problems in the recent chapters: No gun for Bonanza, corpse isn’t faceless. That’s nice and dramatic, but it really isn’t part of the story]
By the time Bonanza, Olaf, and Hugo arrived at Skeleton Cave, darkness had fallen in full. The clouds had thickened and a light snow still fell. In the parking area, they found no vehicles. Hugo got out and turned on a flashlight. He looked for tire tracks and found theirs from the previous night, and one other set, but he could not tell how old they might be, only that they were made on this day.
He looked at Bonanza, who looked up the trail. They walked out the trail toward the sinkholes for Skeleton Cave.
At the first sinkhole, they shined their lights into the pit. Nothing could be seen but the bare rocks whitened by a skiff of snow. A few trees grew there and a scattering of bushes, but nothing unusual. The second pit looked the same. Hugo started to walk around the edge of the pit toward the entry trail when he heard a scream. It came from far away; he couldn’t be sure from which way. Wildly, he looked around. Up the hill, toward Torture Rock he saw a flash of light.
He ran back around the sinkhole and pointed up the hill. “Someone’s up there.” He said. He started off cross country making his way through the boulders and round trees and sagebrush as best as he could. He slowed trying to remember if there were any sinkholes in the area. He remembered none from his previous travels in the area, but it had been a long time since he had been here in the daylight.
Bonanza and Olaf ran back to the truck as Hugo ran up the hill. He heard the engine gun, then the tires throw gravel as it sped off. Three miles by road, less than half a mile by foot, Hugo thought. Who will get there first?
Almost immediately, he felt winded. His exhaustion from being in the cave for most of the day returned. He regretted having to work so hard and now have to run up this hill. His mind tried to tell him that only some kids were playing a twisted game up at the rock, but his instincts told him to keep on, because it could be, would be Mandy.
His breathing became labored as sweat poured off his forehead into his eyes. He wiped at it madly, but to no avail. He thought about using the light sparingly so that he would have some kind of surprise advantage when he arrived, but the darkness so swallowed up the landscape that he feared running into a tree, or worse a hole, large or small: with the light off, he could see nothing. When he tried, it felt like being in the depths of a cave, no light.
The hill steepened and he slowed to a walk. He could hear soft chanting up at the top, and a steady faint glow came over the side.
From his right flashed a figure, a shape. He looked but couldn’t see anything. He shined his light in the direction in which he thought it had been, but only saw junipers and sagebrush. He though he heard something behind him. It is only my imagination playing trick, he thought. I have to get up this hill. Just then, he stumbled onto the trail that connects Torture Rock and Skeleton Cave. He picked up speed again confident of not running into anything.
He heard a scrabbling behind him and then the beast flashed to his left and knocked him down. A sickening odor of death and decay filled the air, gagging him as he hit the ground. He flashed his light be could see no sign of it. He heard a step to his left, again and raised the club just as the beast jumped toward him. It cave out a cry of terror and tumbled to its side, scrambling to get away from the object. Hugo stood, pointing the flashlight this way and that, trying to find the attacker. It had gone.
He knew that whoever was on top of the hill, must know that he had arrived because of the noise. The slope became more gradual. He rounded a slight bend and saw through the trees a horrible scene. Two people dressed in masks with long, pointed snouts, and grotesque protuberant eyes chanted softly beside and around Torture Rock. A still figure lay on the rock, tied somehow, and unmoving. Hugo turned off his light and began to run toward the rock. When he passed the last tree, he heard his name. He turned. Kneeling on the ground, hands tied behind her back sat Mandy. She looked at him pleadingly, and then at the rock.
“They have Mrs. McGregor.”
Hugo’s mind swam. What is Mrs. McGregor doing here? He thought. He looked from the rock to Mandy. “Are you all right?” He asked.
She nodded. He felt in his pockets for a knife to cut the ropes around her wrists. He found nothing. A key, anything to undo the knots! He thought. He dropped to his knees behind her and started to work at the knots with his bare hands. The stayed tied as tight as ever. “I can’t get them undone,” he said.
“You have to stop them,” said Mandy.
Hugo looked to Mrs. McGregor and the two figures chanting. He knew that she must be right but felt reluctant to leave here. “Go,” she said.
Hugo jumped to his feet, brandishing the flashlight with his right hand and the club with the other. He walked, then ran at the pair. Before he reached them, he heard the beast approaching from behind. He turned and held up the club. He made the symbol of the upright stick with the feather by its side in the air. The creature stopped, as though an invisible barrier had been erected between them.
Hugo looked at the beast in horror. He noticed the teeth. He noticed the size. He noticed the muscle and the sheer killing strength, but he couldn’t tear his mind from the eyes. I am looking into Hell, he thought. Blackness swallowing utter blackness into infinity. He felt that he should lay down and surrender his body to the evil that would overcome and kill him.
As he held the club aloft, however, he resisted. He felt a power flow down his arm and strengthen his resolve. He chanced a glance behind himself as the two chanters. They stood and stared at Hugo and the creature. He could feel their terror: it felt like tendrils of visceral madness encircling his body, reaching for the creature. The creature prowled in front of him pacing, looking for a way in.
“Get away from her,” he heard himself say.
“You will not stop us,” said a man’s voice.
Hugo turned to face them and the beast found the weakness. It leapt, but Hugo anticipated. As the creature rolled to its side to avoid the club, Hugo stood his ground. Instead of retreating, however, the creature used its momentum to make its way to the rock. It leapt onto the rock, digging its claws into the person on it, into Mrs. McGregor. Hugo heard a groan. The creature leapt once again and pounced on the farthest of the people in masks. A woman’s scream of terror and pain rent the air. Hugo felt his hair raise on end as the creature tore at her.
Hugo ran at the other dancer, jumping on him, striking with the flashlight. He fell limp under Hugo’s blows. Hugo brandished the club once again and forced the creature away. It looked at Hugo, the bloody muzzle twisted into a sort of grin, then bounded off into the night.


Chapter 44

Hugo cautiously made his way to Mrs. McGregor, tied to the rock. He feared the worst. Blood ran off the sides of the rock and pooled on the ground below. She had been clothed in a black robe, her hair pulled back tight against her neck. Ropes held her hands out to the sides, anchored to rocks a few feet away. He reached out and felt her wrist: he felt a pulse and had hope.
“Mrs. McGregor,” he said. “Esmeralda.”
She opened an eye. Her breathing came in faint gasps. “Hugo,” she said. She smiled just a little. “Hugo,” she said again. She opened her eyes wide. “Hugo,” she almost shouted. “You are the key.”
He looked at her as she fell silent again. Her eyes closed again. “Mrs. McGregor!” he shouted, shaking her shoulder. “Mrs. McGregor!” he shouted again. He could hear the growl of the pick-up coming up the road, but ignored it.
Her eyes snapped open again, “You are the key, Hugo. You told these [heretic/blasphemers] how to awaken the creature in your book, don’t you see?” She raised her head as to get up, but fell back when she felt the restraints on her. “You are the key, Hugo.” Her eyes snapped shut again.
Hugo thought for a moment. But what good does that do us now, he thought. “Mrs. McGregor,” he said again. “What do you mean, I am the key?”
She lay with her head on the rock, eyes closed. She whispered: “By your knowledge was the creature released, and so too, by your knowledge, shall the creature be returned to the ground.”
He heard footsteps behind him. He jumped up brandishing the club. Dr. Bonanza put up his hands. “It’s us, Hugo,” he said. He walked up and looked at Mrs. McGregor. He knelt and began to cut the bonds. Olaf tended to her wounds.
“She said that I am the key,” said Hugo.
Dr. Bonanza knelt, working for a moment. “And so you are,” he said. “I refused to believe it, but she insisted that you come with me while I investigated. She was right, Hugo. You are the key.”
Hugo remembered Mandy and went toward her. “Only you, Hugo, can put away this terror from McLoughlin Valley once and for all.”
As he walked to Mandy, he thought about all that had happened, and what he might have said in his book, that would give such an opening…what possible instructions. He remembered a legend, recounted in Haiti, that told of a snake charmer who had turned to necromancy:
…with the blood of the one and the power of a death, he made the creature whole and brought it back to life, wrenching it from the bowls of the earth and releasing its terror on the land. With the sign of he broken tree broken, it walked with impunity…

My god, he thought. Would someone try to do that here? He shook his head. They had done it. They must have combined it with some other ritual, because this creature was of flesh and blood, and not dead. But how? How can I be the key?


Chapter 45

[To be continued in one week. I promise! I am at 50,140 words and am going to finish up after the Christmas Bazaar so that I can concentrate on wood projects. I may write during the day and if I do, I will post that as well.]

Day 26

Chapter 38

Mrs. McGregor looked down into the sinkhole, her hand on Mandy’s arm. She shook her head. “Things are happening very quickly now,” she said.
Mandy looked at her. “What the hell are you talking about?” Mandy felt the anger, bred of fear, rise in her throat. She had become instantly tired of Mrs. McGregor’s riddles and half utterances. “What things? What is going on? Why are we here? What does Hugo and Dr. Bonanza have to do with all this?”
Instead of answering, Mrs. McGregor began to climb down into the sinkhole, picking her way around boulders, using cracks to lower herself down. When she reached the bottom, she could no longer see the body; it lay over a small rise from where she had descended. As she walked closer, she could smell the rotting flesh, but she smelled something else as well. She had only smelled it once before, many years ago, and many miles from here. Her father had initiated her, on their land, back in North Dakota. She had been the only girl in that [Brotherhood of Good]. She had shown particular talent for finding the good, and evil in men and her father recognized this. She had fought with evil, hand to hand one day, and she had prevailed.
The memory lent solace, but still, she feared what would come next.
She walked to the rise and crested it. Just below her lay the body, shirtless. She couldn’t see the face, the head was behind a rock. She feared what she might see next, expecting the gruesomeness of a missing brain. As she stepped around the body and looked at the head, she gasped as she looked at it: the head seemed intact. The ground looked like it didn’t even have blood on it. She quickly looked over the rest of the body. All seemed to be in order. She looked around for footprints, but found none on the basalt breakdown littering the floor of the sinkhole.
Mandy joined her. Martin peered over the rim of the sinkhole. “It’s Jimmy,” he said.
Mrs. McGregor looked sharply up at him. “Get down here,” she said. Anger tinged her voice.
Martin began to scramble down.
When he reached the two women, Mrs. McGregor said, “Turn him over.”
Reluctantly, Martin knelt down beside the body and placed a hand on its shoulder and hip. He leaned back and pulled the body onto its back. As it rolled towards him, he let out a little scream and jumped back. Mandy put her hand to her mouth and looked away.
Mrs. McGregor stared at the faceless corpse. She could feel the fear from the memory of what must have happened. Grimly, resolutely, she turned to the other two. “We haven’t much time, I fear,” she said. “But we don’t know where to look.” She looked to the rim of the sinkhole. Mandy followed her gaze half expecting to see someone, something peering back at them. “We must find Mario,” said Mrs. McGregor. “We have to get out of here.”


Chapter 39

As Hugo finished his meal, Dr. Bonanza and Olaf stood. Hugo stood as well and waited for what must come next. He picked up his club and wondered about it.
“These are not weapons,” Olaf said.
“They a protective device,” said Bonanza. “You will know what do with it when the time comes.”
Hugo looked at his club dubiously. He wondered when the time would come, both anticipating and dreading it. “What do we do next?” he asked.
Bonanza began to climb up a well worn wooden ladder, out of the hole, followed by Olaf.
“We might as well start at Skeleton Cave,” said Bonanza. “Right now, that is our only lead.”
As Hugo began to climb the ladder a thought returned to him. “I saw Maya,” he said as he exited the hole.
Bonanza looked at him. “She was at a window in the cave,” continued Hugo.
“Where was this?” asked Olaf.
Hugo began to point, but really had no idea where he had been when he saw her. “I’m not sure. She tried to help me out, but only had a climbing rope. I couldn’t get up it. I think that someone else was with her, though she denied it.”
Dr. Bonanza thought for a moment, then said told him to get in the pickup. He said that he had an idea where the window might be.
They drove in silence, bumping over the dirt track. Hugo thought that they must be on the refuge, judging by the plants and rocks, but had never been here before. The turned a corner and crested a rise. At the bottom of the hill, sat a car. Bonanza stopped and looked at it, trying to determine if anyone was still there. When he saw no movement, he put the truck in low and slowly inched the truck down the steep, steep hill.
“Be on your guard,” said Olaf. Hugo wondered if that meant that he would need to use his club, but saw that neither Bonanza nor Olaf had theirs out.
Bonanza pulled the truck up in front of the car, blocking its escape. He opened the door and slid out, pulling a hand gun from under the seat. Cautiously he walked toward the car, as the other two exited the passenger door. Hugo instinctively began to scan for footprints: many and jumbled, the told him no ready stories. He did find tire tracks leading away from the way that they had come.
Bonanza peered in the car, front seats, then the rear. “Nothing here,” he said.
Olaf felt the hood of the car. “Cold,” he said.
A trail led from the back of the car into the sagebrush. They followed it to a fire pit. It gave off no smoke, but was still warm. The continued on to find the window about twent yards on, at the base of a small rise. Hugo looked down into the hole. From this side, it looked completely different, but he felt sure that this must be the same window. He found markings in the soil that indicated a rope had been laid across a ten foot expanse. The rope had been tied to a large sage bush; he could see where it had rubbed the bark off.
“This is it,” he said touching the bush at its base. “What does it all mean?”
“It means that out Maya wasn’t alone.”
[earlier scene: Frank, Jimmy, and Martin performing a ritual, without us knowing who they are, not seeing any faces; also earlier scene where Maya and Frank are doing a different ritual/talking together. Maybe in the bar.]
“They have been staying here, at least one of them has,” said Bonanza. “But they left quite some time ago.”
“I agree,” said Hugo. “I think that we should follow those tire tracks. And see where they went.”


Chapter 40

Mrs. McGregor and Mandy had resolved to send Martin out to find help on his bicycle. That had been over an hour and a half ago. They sat in the car.
“I don’t think he’s coming back,” said Mandy. The sky had grown dark and clouds had moved in to cover the valley. Light snow had begun to fall. Huddled under blankets, she peered out the fogged side window.
Mrs. McGregor opened the door. She thought about making a fire. She thought about trying to walk to the main road, for all the good that would do. It was after four now, and getting dark. Ranger Tom would be closing up the visitor center and walking over to his cabin. They hadn’t seen anyone else all day, and could presume that no one else had visited the refuge on such an uninviting Sunday afternoon.
As she looked down the road, she saw headlights, still a long way off. She knocked on the trunk of Mandy’s car to get her attention. Mandy opened the door. When she looked at Mrs. McGregor she pointed. Mandy looked.
“We’re saved,” said Mandy.
Mrs. McGregor felt uneasy about the approaching car, though she couldn’t say why. As it approached, it slowed and stopped behind the car. The window rolled down. A woman leaned her head out. “Are you having trouble?” She asked.
Many looked at her car. “A coyote ran us off the road,” she said with a slight smile.
The woman nodded. “We’ll give you a lift,” she said. “Get in.”
Mandy opened the back door and got in. A man sat in the passenger seat. He looked to be about twenty one or two. Mandy nodded to him. “Thanks,” she said.
Mrs. McGregor climbed in beside Mandy.
The woman turned looked at them in the rearview mirror. “I’m Maya,” she said.


Chapter 41

Deep in the belly of the cave the beast felt the darkness of the day ebb. Night flowed into the valley as the blood flowed through the beasts veins. Again it stretched. Strength returned to its muscles and bones much more quickly now. It was stronger, more whole with each passing night. After each feeding, it could feel the power surge through its body.
Atavistic rage welled in its belly. The urge to kill nearly split its skull as it leapt and raced from the cave.
A deer, unlucky in its choice of bedding places, sat not far from the cave entrance. It had bedded down early as the light snow began to fall. It sat on the upward slope of a glen, surrounded by junipers and sagebrush. The wind changed directions, and the smell of evil, of impending death filled its nostrils.
Terrified, it jumped up and scrambled up the slope. From behind, it felt the hot breath of death on its flanks. Then ripping, tearing pain, and then oblivion.
The creature drank down the warm life blood and carved out the brain with swiftness and precision. Sated, it walked to the top of the rise and gazed out at the approaching night.


Chapter 42

Night began to fall on the three men as they bounced along the rutted track. They had followed the tire tracks from the encampment to a four way junction. The road, at that pointed had turned to hardpan, and they no longer could make out which way the other vehicle must be traveling. Hugo got out and looked for any sign, but in the gathering dusk, and on the hardpan, he couldn’t tell which way they should follow.
When he got back in the pick-up, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “We lost ‘em.”
Bonanza chose a way and drove on. “We’ll head down to Skeleton Cave,” he said. “I brought flashlights that work this time,” he grinned at Hugo.
As they joined up with the highway, Hugo estimated that they had about five miles before they reached the turnoff for the cave. He wondered if Bonanza had brought any beer, but more out of habit, than a genuine desire for one. He had a drink of water instead. He thought that maybe he would like to be clear headed for the trip into Skeleton Cave.
By the time they reached the turnoff, light from the sun had left the valley black. Snow spitted on them as the slowly drove up the dirt road. They drove in silence, until the saw Mandy’s car stuck in the ditch.
Hugo pointed. “Stop,” he said. Bonanza stopped the pick-up behind the car and they all got out. “This is Mandy’s car,” said Hugo as he looked in the back windows. He felt the hood. The cold from it bit his hand. “They haven’t been here for quite some time.”
Olaf indicated the tracks in the road. “I think that we found our mystery car.”
Hugo came to have a look. He looked up the road toward the cave. He wondered who had been this way, and if they had taken Mandy with them.

Day 25

Chapter 37

Hugo thought about Maya and Mandy as he walked down what could now be described as a corridor. The walls Had been bricked and torch brackets lined them. He wondered about Mandy, and where she might be today. He thought of her hair, and how then held hands on the previous day. He felt stupid thinking such thoughts, but continued to think them anyway. He enjoyed the sappy romance of it, and wanted her to like him like he liked her. My god, he thought. Am I still in junior high?
And what about Maya? He had gotten a strange feeling from her when she tried to help him out of the hole. Dr. Bonanza had said that she might be trouble. What about Dr. Bonanza? I suppose that I will be meeting him --and Olaf, I guess-- shortly. He felt sure that the underground part of his initiation --it certainly felt like an initiation-- must be about over, though the passageway seemed to be sloping downward again, not a good sign if you want to get back to the surface. At least, he thought, I must be going the right way, with all the bricks.
He looked at his wrist before he remembered that he had not put on his watch before leaving the house. He estimated that he had been in the cave for well over three hours, and probably more than four. It should be about two by now. He wondered about the weather, the glimpse that he had gotten out of the hole had been wispy clouds, but that could mean anything. He thought again about Mandy, and also about the Duck. He had always wondered why people called him the Duck. Hugo conjured many images, each more ghastly than the last, but couldn’t decide on a single reason. Probably something he picked up in high school or college.
As he thought and walked, the corridor opened gradually until it terminated in a round room with three doors in it. How congruous, Hugo thought. This must be the end, but which door to choose. Then he wondered if he even had to make a choice. Maybe they all lead to the same place. He thought this unlikely. His day hadn’t been going like that. Then he remembered the other two passageways and wondered where they must lead. They certainly didn’t connect up with his chosen passageway. It might be that one of them came down the chimney, but he thought that unlikely. That would still leave the other one. He would ask Bonanza, he decided, assuming that he would know. It must have been he or Olaf who set up the initiation. One of them crawled down there? He thought. He couldn’t imagine either of them being strong enough to go and do it. Though the way they had been talking, they must have set it up long ago.
He stared at the doors again.
“I chose the left one to get in,” he said aloud. “I suppose that I should choose the left one to get out.
He reached out and grasped the copper knob, long greened by the dampness, turned it and pulled. The door swung open. On the other side, Hugo saw more blackness. The passageway ahead stood unlined of bricks or other adornment. He stepped through. The door swung shut behind him of its own accord. He turned, startled at the noise. He tried the handle, but it wouldn’t budge. It was locked.
Hugo let the fatalism take over and walked ahead into the darkness. He picked up his lantern and wondered that it could still be lit after all this time. He sloshed it about: plenty of oil still filled the metal reservoir. He held it up and walked on.
Here the passageway sloped upwards. It gave Hugo hope that now, he must really be nearing the end. Suddenly he came to a crossroads, branches in front of him and to the right and left. He shone the lantern down each of the passageways, but the looked exactly alike. He walked a little way down the right and left branches, but found that they both sloped slightly upwards.
He chose the straight path.
The air became warmer, more fecund. I must be nearing the exit, he thought. He walked a little more quickly holding the lantern more loosely and to his side. He trusted in the path being clear and so didn’t see that the tunnel suddenly narrowed, and the ceiling dropped. He hit his head on the polished rock. He fell to his knees, holding his head. He felt for blood, but found none. He opened his eyes and felt lucky to not have knocked himself unconscious.
As he tried to regain his bearings, and for the pain to subside a bit, he glanced at one of the walls and found one of the symbols that had been marked on the two trees that he had found on the previous day. The symbol had been partially covered with another symbol. The over-symbol seemed to be an upright stick, with a feather laying beside it. Hugo recognized it immediately as one from the Southwest. He had actually gone to New Mexico to take a look at the original. He knew that it meant that goodness had prevailed over evil. On a whim, he searched the symbols on the club, that he still held in his left hand. He found many that he recognized, but the stick and feather was not among them. He wondered about that thoroughly expecting to find one. [previously when we described the club, we need to add a feather to it.]
He shrugged again and looked up at the ceiling that the had just ran his head into, and the way ahead. He dreaded the thought that he might have to crawl on his belly again. Here, at least, he could stoop to walk: he wouldn’t have to resort to crawling just yet.
The floor had a groove worn in it from many feet. The polished ceiling and walls reflected the light from the lantern back at him, almost blindingly. He stopped and checked the lantern for some kind of hood, but it had none. He squinted and continued on.
The passageway opened up and he could walk without stooping. The reflections from the wall, seemed to remain just as bright.
Finally, after another hundred yards of straight walking, Hugo came to a set of stairs. The metal clanged under his feet as he ascended. Above, still was darkness.
After ascending only a short while, maybe thirty steps, Hugo came to an overhead door. He wondered what must lay on the other side. He turned the knob and gave it a push. The door swung open and light flooded into the stairway. Hugo put up his arm to shield his eyes from the glare, much brighter than what the lantern had been in the polished corridor.
Hugo felt hands under his arms, hauling him up. He struggled, afraid after being alone so long, but a soothing voice said, “It’s okay now. Calm yourself down.” Hugo looked into Dr. Bonanza’s face. He stopped struggling at once. The hands placed him on the floor. He sat down with a thump, exhausted from all the time in the cave.
A bottle of water was thrust into his hands. He drank it greedily.
Hugo looked around. He sat in an adobe style round room. The light came in through open windows above them. He could see bushes reaching above them, and knew that he must still be underground. In the room a fire burned, smoking little, and not giving out much heat, the flames had died low. Bonanza stood near the fire, and Olaf had backed toward one of the walls.
Hugo felt disappointed. He had expected to be initiated into some kind of brotherhood with many members, but here only stood Olaf and Bonanza. He thought about the possibility of fighting evil with only these two. How can it be done? He looked at the club, then the lantern. He turned the wick down and let the flame wink out, then set the lantern of the floor beside himself.
“Stand and hold the club,” said Olaf. Hugo did as he had been told. A similar club and appeared in Olaf’s hands. Hugo looked to Bonanza and saw that he also had one.
“Hugo de Naranhas,” Olaf continued. “You have traveled a great distance underground, farther than you know. You have been to the place of the dead, and the underworld from whence evil springs. You have crawled through the very vein the beast to retrieve this club, that will help to overcome the evil that has been unleashed on the earth, on McLoughlin this day. You, Hugo, have allowed this evil to come into the world. You have brought it with your research and your book. You showed the way to two who should not know of such things. Knowledge is power, and power in the wrong hands can be very dangerous indeed.”
[excerpts from Hugo’s books sprinkled throughout the whole story, though we are not told exactly where they are from.]
Hugo stared at Olaf trying to make out all of what he said. He wondered about his book, how he had given the key, and had no idea. He slowly came back to Olaf’s words…
“…Do you, Hugo, accept this task put before you? We alone cannot vanquish the evil alone,” he indicated himself and Bonanza, but also many who were not present. “You, who have the knowledge to bring such things into the world, also have the knowledge to banish them.” Hugo wracked his brains trying to remember anything about unleashing an evil on the world from his book, but could think of nothing. And I am supposed to vanquish it as well? What am I getting myself into, he thought.
“Do you, Hugo, agree to become a part of this Brotherhood of Good [think of a better name]?”
Hugo nodded his head, looking Olaf in the eye. “Yes,” he said.
Olaf held his club aloft, then bent to the ground and drew the upright stick and feather symbol on the floor, though it made no marks. He nodded to Hugo as he stood up again. Hugo bent and did the same. He imagined that he saw a glow on the floor where he had traced, but put it out of his head.
Bonanza likewise drew the symbol, then looked around the room, as though here were watching other people do the same. Again he imagined glowing lines on the floor where people might have stood, one time, long ago.
“Good,” said Olaf.
Bonanza put another stick on the fire and flames sprang to life. “You must be hungry after such a long journey,” he said to Hugo. He thought that the ceremony must be over.
“Yes. I am hungry,” he said. He sat down near the fire, joining Olaf on the floor.
Bonanza rummaged through he satchel and came out with some dried meat and a piece of bread. Hugo ate them hungrily. Bonanza said, “You probably have many questions, hey? We only have time for a few. The sun has already began to set and we need to be far from here when that happens. You need to eat, and then we need to leave.”
Hugo thought of all the questions that he had while he at the bread --a scone, he thought-- and drank the water. “What is the evil?”
Bonanza looked at the fire and thought for a moment. “We can never tell when or where the evil will show itself, only that it is strongest at night. And each time, it is different. This time, we think that it is a creature has taken animal form. Sometimes is will take on human form, or a even a piece of land: it will turn the ground sterile and nothing will grow. It can get into anything that is alive…” he trailed off, not sure of how much to say. “No one has seen it, as far as we know.”
Hugo thought back to seeing the animal --the thing-- that had run out in front of the truck when they drove home from Skeleton Cave. “Did it come from Skeleton Cave?”
Olaf stirred the fire and replied, “We don’t know where it came from.”
Bonanza handed Hugo another scone. Hugo ate in silence for some time, then asked one final question. “Who else is with us?’ he dreaded the answer that must be coming. No one else sat around the fire.
“In the old days…” Bonanza began. “In the old days, everything seems better to us. Many have died, some have left us. It has been a long time since we last saw evil in McLoughlin Valley. We have grown lazy and complacent,” here he looked at Olaf, “and we haven’t initiated a new member for more than twenty years.” He hung his head and looked a the fire. Hugo felt that he had not gotten an answer to his question and started to pursue it further when Bonanza said: “We are three: Olaf, myself, and Esmerelda.” Hugo recalled the name…
“Mrs. McGregor?” he asked almost incredulously. But that would explain quite a lot, he thought.
“She is the one who initiated me. She is our strongest member.”

Day 24

Chapter 33

Hugo sat on the pile of breakdown, six feet below the hole that led to freedom and a reunion with Maya. What a strange coincidence, Hugo thought.
Maya reappeared at the hole. “I have some rope. I’ll tie it off up here and you can climb up,” she said. She showed him the rope, then went to tie it. She found a juniper, smaller than she felt secure with, but the lower slope didn’t give her much choice. She tied it off with a degree of skill, then walked it back to the hole, and the waiting Hugo.
“Here we go,” she said.
Hugo stepped out of the way as best as he could, and let the rope fall. He pulled the rope tight and tried to climb up it. She had thrown him a rope meant for climbing, but not like this, hand over hand. It slipped through his hands: he couldn’t grip it. He tried again, and shifted his hands a bit. He could pull his feet off the ground, but then he couldn’t move up the rope. He tried wrapping it around his legs, and around his torso, but nothing worked.
“It’s not working,” he said to Maya. She put her hands on her hips and looked down at him. “Isn’t there some one else up there with you?” he asked. “I thought I heard voices as I climbed up the breakdown.”
She shook her head slowly. He couldn’t see her expression, just her hair brushing her shoulders, back and forth. “No,” she said.
Hugo felt so tired of being in the cave. He wanted to get out and walk around among the plants and see the sky again. Frustrated, he bit at his lip. “Don’t you have a car or something up there?” He asked.
“I walked out here. My care is about two miles back [somehow in the earlier chapter, we should see here that she is lying to him]. I don’t know what to tell you. Can’t you pull yourself up?”
He felt that she knew that he couldn’t. What was she doing with a climbing rope out on a hike anyway? He thought. Reluctantly, he began to look around for another passageway that might lead to another exit. He looked up at Maya, still standing over the hole. “Are there anymore holes nearby?” he asked not very enthusiastically.
Her head disappeared from the hole for a second, then reappeared. “I don’t see anything,” she said. She shrugged her shoulders. “Is there any other ways that you might be able to go down there.
He had spotted another tunnel; he would be able to stand and walk easily. He pointed in the direction of the new passageway. “I will try that way, I guess.”
“I’ll see if I can find another exit over that way, and try to meet you there.” She started to pull up the rope.
Hugo felt suspicious, as though Maya had been hiding something, had not been helpful on purpose. As he walked into the darkness of the new tunnel, the wondered why she would have a rope out on a hike, again. And, he had been sure that he had heard someone else talking up there: he had been surprised when it had been a woman who peered over the edge and not a man. He felt sure that he had heard a man. He tried to shrug it off, but the suspicion lingered. Then he thought, I am just tired. What more could she have done. She couldn’t have pulled me up, that would be impossible…except that if she had a rope and had intended to do some climbing, then why hadn’t she had more gear, ascenders, pulleys or the like. I don’t even know of any climbing areas near here. Then he thought that he really had no idea where here might be. He had been in the cave for well over three hours, he was sure, and had gone in many different directions. He had assumed that he had stayed on or near Olaf’s property, but now he didn’t know for sure.
As he walked he didn’t pay much attention to where he walked. It seemed that the tunnely led in one general direction. He didn’t have to do a lot of work, mentally or physically. The passageway turned an the outside wall of the turn lowered and he bumped his head. It hut, but not too bad as the ceiling had been smooth. He walked with more care and tried to pay attention to what the passageway did, and if there were any branches off of it.


Chapter 34

“That was a strange coincidence,” said Maya.
The man nodded, thinking.
“I think that it was a god idea to leave him down there,” she continued when he said nothing. “Today is a crucial day for us.”
The man nodded again, but she could tell that maybe he thought otherwise.


Chapter 35

Mandy poured the last of the bottle into Mrs. McGregor’s cup. “I suppose that we should try to walk to the main road,” she said. “It doesn’t look like anyone is going to come out here and rescue us.”
Martin had fallen asleep in the back seat of the car. He snored quietly. Maya remembered something about not letting a head injury victim fall asleep, but he seemed fine, as he snored along peacefully.
“Why don’t you ride the bike,” said Mrs. McGregor. She hadn’t had this much to drink in a long time. Usually a nip during the holiday season tided her over for the rest of the year.
Mandy hopped down off the hood of the car and made her way to the other side of the road. It looked much the same as the side of the road that the car sat imbedded in. For the first time since they had gotten stuck, she thought about the coyote. She though it strange that it had been running across the road. Usually when you saw a coyote, it walked or loped. Hardly ever did you see it run. She shrugged and began looking for the bicycle. She walked straight out into the sage bushes, but found no sign of it. Then she walked parallel to the road for fifty or sixty yards in both directions, but found nothing.
The sky began to grow dark as the clouds moved in, more quickly now. Rain began to fall on the hills on the west side of the valley. She could see it moving down slope in sheets. Thoughts of being soaked to the bone entered her head. She looked up toward where she thought that the car should be, but couldn’t see it as she stood behind a clump of rather tall sagebrush. She walked toward where she though the road must be, but couldn’t fine it right away. She looked for the bicycle some more, then tried again to find the road. “It should be right over there,” she said aloud pointing. She stumbled onto another sinkhole; this one didn’t seem to have any cave entrances in it. A smell reached her nose. She shivered as the terrible realization reached her. A body lay at the bottom of the sinkhole.

Day 23

Chapter 32

Mrs. McGregor picked up one of the knives and handed it to Mandy. “Find a place to hide,” she whispered. Mrs. McGregor sat down on one of the waterproof boxes and took on an air of exhaustion and confusion, an older person’s greatest ruse. She turned off her flashlight.
Mandy scanned the room, finally deciding on a crack near the entry tunnel, fronted by a pile of breakdown. It wasn’t the best hiding place, but, hopefully, attention would fall on Mrs. McGregor. She also turned off her flashlight. The darkness startled Mandy: she hadn’t expected it to be so black.
From the tunnel that they had come down, Mrs. McGregor could see flashes of light. She could hear someone carefully walking toward the room, knowing that someone might be in the room. The footsteps stopped just outside entrance. The light scanned the room, slowly taking in everything. When it landed on Mrs. McGregor, head bowed, breathing heavily, it jumped as its owner jumped. Mandy heard a small noise of surprise. She almost jumped herself. She could feel the fear prickling the back of her neck. she hadn’t had time to think about what they had found. Two and two. The image of the dead deer flashed through her mind. She had to control a terrible gasp in her throat. she felt the metallic taste of adrenaline in the back of her throat, and felt it course through her heart making it flutter. She gripped the knife, not knowing what she would do with it.
Mrs. McGregor heaved a sigh and the light jumped again.
“Who’s there?” A man’s voice said shakily.
“Oh,” Mrs. McGregor said, as though she had not reaized that anyone else were there. She looked into the light. She had removed her hat; her hair lay disheveled and flattened against her head. A whisp stuck out on the side. In the light, her face seemed ghostly pale. She looked down again, saying nothing more.
“Who are you?” The voice asked. Trying to bolster confidence, the voice had a gruffness to it. “What are you doing here?”
Mrs. McGregor stood up and the man with the light advanced. “Don’t move,” he said. Mrs. McGregor looked at the man again, exhausted resignation on her face. Mandy could feel his confusion. Her hiding place stood five feet from the man, directly to his left. She couldn’t see him well. He stood about five feet tall. She could see that in his right hand he held the flashlight pointed at Mrs. McGregor. In the left he held his hand in front of himself, palm facing her. He was unarmed, as far as Mandy could see. She grabbed a rock from the floor. She prepared herself, gripping the rock, testing its weight. She decided that as he took the next step, she would jump out and strike him from behind. She couldn’t see the floor, but thought that she had a good idea where most of the loose rocks lay.
Mrs. McGregor collapsed. Mandy didn’t have time to worry that she might not be faking the fall. The man took a step toward Mrs. McGregor and Manyd jumped out as silently as she could. The flashlight swung around toward her, but not before she landed a blow to the back of his head. The man fell to the floor with a soft thud.The feeling of rock hitting bone and hair left Mandy nauseous.
“That was great,” cried Mrs. McGregor.
Mandy stood over the man unable to say anything. She flicked on her light and shown it at his face. He couldn’t have been over twenty. “I’ve killed a college student,” she said.
“No. He’s not dead at all. Look at his chest.” Mrs. McGregor pointed. “He’s just having a little rest. Did you like my acting?”
Mandy looked up at her. She felt disgusted and exlierated at the same time. She smiled a little and felt guilty for it. “I konked him good, didn’t I?” She said. “What shall we do with him?”
Mrs. McGregor shined her light around the room. “I suppose that we should move him out of the way. And we ought to cover him up so he doesn’t go into shock or something like that.”
They tried to move the unconscious young man, but found the going difficult: for being only five feet tall, he seemed inordinately heavy. After a minute of struggle and not much headway, Mandy suggested that they leave him were he lay. She took two of the robes and covered him up, using them as blankets. She suddenly felt hungry. She went to the boxes of food and rifled through them looking for something that looked appetizing. She settled on a bag of chips.
“Do you think that this is our livestock killer?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” replied Mrs. McGregor. “We’ll have to ask him when he wakes up. And hopefully that is soon because he isn’t the only one in the gang.” She nodded to the robes. “It looks like two more.”
Mandy nodded as she ate the chips. She examined the remaing robe. The cuffs definitely had blood stains on them. Whose, or what kind of blood, she could not tell.
By the time the young man began to stir, both women had become chilled. Mandy felt tired after using so much adrenaline. When she heard a moan from his direction, however, she stood up, ready to go again.
Mrs. McGregor shined a light on the man’s face. He grimaced in the bright light. Slowly, he drew his hand across his eyes to block out the light. “What happened?” he asked.
Mrs. McGregor moved the light out of his face so that he could uncover his eyes. “You snuck up on us, and we got the drop on you,” she said. “What are you three doing down here?”
The young man groaned. “Why did I let Frank talk me into this?’
Mrs. McGregor remained silent, perfering to let him talk. “It was fun at first,” he said. “We came down here and drank some wine that we had stolen from our parents, maybe had few chips [make them more high school age]. Then Frank started talking about sacrificing. I thought that he was just kidding, but then one night he showed up late and had this animal. I couldn’t even tell what it was. He had torn it apart; there was blood everywhere.” He moaned again and sat up. “Who are you? Are you the cops?”
“Did Frank make you kill those deer?” Mrs. McGregor asked.
The boy looked terrified. He slowly shook his head.
“Did Frank kill them himself?”
The boy put his head in his hands. “I haven’t been down here for about a week, not since those deer were killed. That scared us pretty bad. We were over at Torture Rock. Frank and Jimmy wanted to do a sacrifce under the moon. It was pretty late and we were pretty drunk. We were all gathered around the rock and Frank was leading the ceremony, when there was a terrible noise from up on the ridge.” He stopped and Mandy could see him physically shiver. “I never heard anyting so terrible. It made me sick to my stomach. It was like somebody pulled the guts out of dying cat. I thought that I was going to throw up, but I didn’t.”
Mandy glanced at Mrs. McGregor, tearing her eyes from the boy. She didn’t know what to say. She could clearly see, however, that he told the truth: he was terrified of the memory of that night.
“What’s your name, dear?” Mrs. McGregor asked. She sounded motherly.
The boy looked up at her. “Martin, ma’am,” he said.
“Then did you go up and have a look to see what had made that noise?”
“No ma’am,” he shook his head. “We ran back to Frank’s car and drove right back here. I came back into the store room and hid. I’m not ashamed to say that I was as scared as a baby. The next morning, Frank convinced us that we should go have a look up on the ridge. I didn’t want to go, but I didn’t want to be left behind either. So I went with them. We hiked up there and found where that deer was killed. I was scared when I saw that it didn’t have a brain anymore.” He looked at Mrs. McGregor, his eyes pleaded to her across the darkness. “Who would do that to a deer?” He asked.
“Did you carve those symbols on the tree?” Mandy asked. She cringed at the sound of her own voice, she had listened to the other two for so long.
“Frank said that we should mark the place so that as to ward off the evil that had been done there. He says those symbols are a sign of protection. I think that learned them from his father.”
“Do you know what they mean?” she asked.
Martin shook his head. “I guess they just mean stay away from here because evil was here.”
Mandy had a hard time reconciling the fact that these boys had practiced animal sacrifice, but felt that they needed to ward themselves from evil.
“Where are Frank and Jimmy now?” Asked Mrs. McGregor.
Martin shrugged his shoulders. “I haven’t talked with them since Friday at school.” He hugged his arms around his chest. “Please, ma’am. I’m getting cold and my head sure hurts.
“Do you have a car?” Mandy asked.
“I rode my bike. Usually Frank drives us down here.”
Mrs. McGregor helped Martin to his feet. She draped one of the robes around his shoulders. She rummaged through the food box and brought out a candy bar, handing it to him. He opened it and greedily stuffed it in his mouth. Mandy felt compassion and revulsion in equal measures for this boy. He seemed lost and scared and stupid all at once. On the way out, she grabbed a bottle of wine and put it in her backpack.
They carefully climbed out of the cave. Mrs. McGregor led the way, followed by Martin, and then Mandy. Mandy felt that Martin told the truth, and she hoped that he did. She didn’t envy Mrs. McGregor leading the way out when anyone could be waiting around a corner, or at the entrance. They came to the crawl and worked their way down the slope to the floor of the main tunnel. Martin stumbled every now and then, and Mandy worried that they would have to carry him out, which she knew that they could not do.
They reached the entrance and broke out into the daylight. It hurt her eyes at first, but she quickly adapted. She looked around the sinkhole carefully searching for an accomplice. The hole stood empty. They climbed to the rim and walked to the care, stills stuck in the ditch. Martin’s bicycle was not in sight. “Where’s your bicycle?” She asked.
Martin pointed to the other side of the road. “I hid it over behind some brush. No one looks over there. How did you find the cave?” He looked at the car and said, “Oh.”
“Do you think that you can ride out of here and get help?”
He shook his head. “I’m not feeling too good,” he said.
“The question is why doesn’t anyone else find the cave?” Mrs. McGregor asked.
“It’s not on the refuge maps. I don’t think that they want to develop it because there are bats that live back down the main tunnel.” Bat conservation had been a hot topic in McLoughlin for many years.
“How did you find it,” Mrs. McGregor asked.
They all sat down on the hood of the car. “We were biking out here and Jimmy had to go to the bathroom. We stopped and he walked out into the sagebrush and just found it.”
Mandy opened the car door and found a bottle of water and a corkscrew. She handed the water to Mrs. McGregor and got to work on the wine bottle. Mrs. McGregor took a long swig of the water and handed it to Martin. He gratefully took a drink also. Mandy poured a plastic cup half full of wine and handed it to Mrs. McGregor, then one for herself. Martin looked like he thought that he should have one also. Mandy held the bottle away and asked, “How old are you?”
He smiled. “Twenty-one, ma’am,” he said.
“You’re not over eighteen if you’re a day,” said Mrs. McGregor.
“And besides,” said Mandy, “you’re not supposed to drink alcohol after being hit on the head with a rock.” She shrugged. “Sorry about that.”
She put the bottle on the roof of the car and they sat to wait for someone to come by.

Day 22

[Only 9298 words to go!]

Chapter 29

[This needs to be earlier in the book, possibly right after Hugo wakes up]
“Did you take care of it?” The man asked.
Maya looked at him, “Of course I did. It was no trouble at all.”
“Does he know that he is the key to the whole thing?”
“He has no idea.”
“What about Bonanza. He could ruin everything.”
Maya considered. She didn’t know what to say for sure. “I think that he is not as bumbling as he looks, but more bumbling than he thinks.”
The man nodded. He took a sip of his coffee. His hands were cold in the morning chill. Maya pulled the collar of her jacket up around her ears, and looked around the countryside. They sat on a small hill at the north end of the refuge, looking south. So far, they had been so successful. Hugo had unwittingly shown them the way. The only thing that could go wrong now, would be if he realized it.


Chapter 30


They crawled over the breakdown for about ten yards. The rocks scraped their knees, but not too badly. As the cave opened up, they paused to let their eyes adjust to the darkness. Mandy’s headlamp shown in the darkness, but until her eyes adjusted, she could not see into the corner. Mrs. McGregor’s flashlight lit up the whole place. They sat and listened.
As their eyes became accustomed to the dark, they began to look around. Mandy could make out many foot prints in the wet soil that had blown in to the cave over the centuries. The caves in the refuge are young, they knew, relative to others like them. The last lava flow had occured within the last two centuries. The native people’s oral history told of vast flows appearing over the winter season. None of the caves, however, were in those flows, only in those older than two thousand years.
The cave had a main passage leading out of this room. Directly above it, ran a smaller tunnel, not tall enough to walk in, but one could crawl. Mandy chose to take the walking tunnel, when she noticed something like one of the symbols that they had seen on the trees carved in the rock. She looked at the upper passageway dubiously. She thought how much easier it would be to just take the lower passage and, when they didn’t find anything, turn around and head back out. Mrs. McGregor, saw the symbol also, and without a word, began climb up the gradual incline to the right of the main passageway, toward the smaller of the two.
Mandy thought that she should say something, or at least go first, but as Mrs. McGregor scrambled up to the ledge outside the upper passageway, she realized that it was she, not Mrs. McGregor who had less experience in such things. Mrs. McGregor looked down on Mandy. “It’s a bit of a reach right there.” She pointed her flashlight at a handhold so that Mandy saw it.
Mandy climbed up. At the top, they found another symbol carved in the rock this one looked similar to the one that Mandy had recognized as meaning heaven in Japanese. After looking at the photographs in the visitor center, however, she realized that they could be from anywhere. Mandy led the way into the upper passage way. The smooth floor made for easy passage; they didn’t have to struggle to crawl under the ceiling. They didn’t have to crawl more than about thirty feet when the passageway turned to the right and opened up enough that they could walk almost upright. They took care not to bump their heads. Mandy wished that she had atleast brought a hat to warn her when she was about to hit something. Mrs. McGregor had put on a stocking cap just before they had entered.
The passageway straightened out and led them gradually downward for another forty yards or so, when it split again, this time horizontally. Both passageways looked exactly the same to Mandy. She looked at the ground, hunting for footprints or any sign of which way the should go. She found a small bead of wax on the floor, but it sat right in front of the Y. She shrugged. Mrs. McGregor, meanwhile looked along the walls. “Here we are.” She pointed to a third symbol carved just inside the righthand passageway. “I think that we are getting close.”
They walked for forty more yards, then came to a blind corner. As they rounded the corner, the passageway opened up into a room ten feet hight and twenty five across. It smelled well used. All around, they could see signs of habitation. Or at least occupation. That wasn’t really it, though. It seemed more like a storeroom of sorts. In one corner, they found a pile of what looked like robes. On the cuffs, they found dark stains. Near the robes, sitting on a rock shelf, that had been brought in, sat three knives. Wine bottles, empty and full, sat in piles around the room. Two lanterns sat beside a pile of candles.
Mandy walked toward some waterproof looking boxes. She carefully opened one and found foodstuffs, mostly junkfood. She looked at Mrs. McGregor and shrugged. Someone had been here recently, but they could not tell how recently. Mandy carefully closed the lid of the box and opened her mouth to say something when Mrs. McGregor raised her hand to silence her. She put her finger to her lip and then pointed to the way that they had come. Someone was coming down the passageway after them.


Chapter 31

Hugo looked at the lanteren. He tried to see how far away the floor must be, but the light from the lantern blinded him. He thought about trying to free his other hand, but thought that he would probably fall out of the hole if he did.
Well, he thought, I guess I have to make a choice here. I can’t go back. I either have to drop the lantern and hope for the best, or I can squirm out of here and try to protect it. He felt the heat coming up his arm past the bail and decided what he must do. He looked at the underside of the hole, hoping to find someplace to hand the lantern, or grab on to so hat he could swind down. The smooth ceiling offered nothing.
He held the lantern up as high and as far from himself as he could. All was blackness. “Here goes,” he said, and slowly pitched the lantern back under his legs. He opened his eyes wide, trying to see everthing that he could before the lanteren fell, crashed to the ground, and went out.
All he could see were shadows dancing around in front of his eyes before the lanteren stopped in mid flight. It clanged against the wall. And then hung there. Hugo stared at it. He couldn’t understand what had happened: his mind refused to acknwledge that the lanteren still lit the room. The room! He quickly looked around the room expecting at any moment for the light to go out. The floor lay about six feet below the hole. He thought that probably he could wriggle free of the hole and swing down flopping his legs on the floor before having to let go. He had so feard that he would have to dive head first into the blackness, now knowing when he would hit.
And the club! It lay directly under the hole, thought it had rolled a little to the right. He felt such relief. He still couldn’t understand why he could still see. Why hadn’t the lantern gone out? He looked at it, still hanging from the hole. I should just get down and go take a look, he thought. He carefull found a handhold with his free hand under his waist and wriggled his torso until he could free his other hand. He found a hold for it as well and somersaulted free. His feet hit the floor with a thud and he fell to sitting but he was free!. He picked up the club and cradled it against his chest. I’m free! he thought.
I’m so tired, he thought. He breathed in and out, his breath coming quickly. He still sweated, though the longer he sat, the more chilled he felt. Reluctantly, he stood up and walked to the lantern. It had caught on an artificial protrusion, as though it had been put there just for that purpose. It probably has, he thought. He took the lantern from the hook and looked around the room. He didn’t see an exit. The flat floor extended to the edge of the lantern light. The walls were smooth. The only exit that he could see went through the ceiling, back the way he had come. He hung his head. He felt like crying. No, he thought. He walked around the room searching the walls for an exit. Opposite the lantern hook, he found a crack in the wall, just large enough to admit a full grown person. It had been cleverly obscured by a rock and the angle of the crack itself. He had to step down into a hole just before the crack, the angle his body and slide in sideways. He held the club in his leading hand and the lantern in the other. He had only to move this way, hugging the rock, for about ten feet before the passageway opened up and he could walk upright.
He turned a corner, and could see light ahead. The passageway opened into a huge entry room. Breakdown blocked his way, so he scrambled over the top toward the hole. He climbed a pile of breakdown thrity feet toward the hole. When he reached the top of the pile, they hole still stood out of his grasp. Ten feet above him, he could see that the sun shone and that whispy clouds had begun to form in the late morning sky. He looked around for a ladder, a way to pile the rocks higher, a stick, anything. He found nothing.
“Hey,” He called. “Hey!” He felt frantic. “Is anyone up there?”
He thought that he heard voices. “Hey! Can anyone hear me up there? I’m stuck down here.”
A face appeared over the rim of the hole. “Hugo?” a voice said. “Is that you?”
Hugo stared at the face. “Maya?” He asked.

Day 21

Chapter 26

Mandy looked at her watch. 10:45. They drove back to the turnoff for Skeleton Cave and Torture rock. Mandy couldn’t make out any new tire tracks, but she couldn’t be sure. Mrs. McGregor looked out the window, humming quietly to herself. She thought about the times that she had spent here, in her youth, and into middle age. She started to think about her age, but banished the thoughts, just as she always did when they cropped up. “It’s not how old you are, it’s how old you feel.” She would say. She noted the infrequent juniper, and the ever present sage brush. She had the urge to go up and see the mountain mahogany, but she knew that they would have to go far out of their way, down south and then to the very edge of the refuge before they climbed high enough to find any. As a girl, her father would make them toys out of mountain mahogany. It was so hard that they could write their names in other wood, but it was brittle too, and if they dropped a doll in just the wrong way, it would break into ten pieces. She smiled just a bit.
A raven flew at them, following the road. Mrs. McGregor scowled at it and it veered off, choosing to turn south rather than test her ire. She nodded her head approvingly, feeling in fine form. She turned to Mandy, “What do you expect to find up at the cave, dear?”
Mandy considered for a moment. Why had they come to the refuge today? “I really don’t know,” she said. “I suppose that I just wanted to prove to myself that there really wasn’t anything in the sinkhole last night. At least nothing like what I pictured.”
“What did you picture?”
Mandy drove in silence for a moment, trying to put into words the images that she had conjured in the dark. She didn’t want to sound melodramatic or juvenile. “Really,” she began, but didn’t have time to finish. A coyote ran out in front of the car at speed. It came at an angle, from their right. Mandy slammed on the brakes, and the car swerved off the road to the left. They came to a stop with one wheel in the ditch beside the road. The front bumper sat buried in red-orange dirt.
Mandy sat up, shaken. Mrs. McGregor sat slumped in her seat, the belt holding her up, for a moment. Mandy turned to put a hand on her shoulder, expecting the worst. Before Mandy touched her, Mrs. McGregor shook for half a second, and then lifted her head.
“My,” she said. “That was a close one, wasn’t it?”
Mandy breathed a sigh of relief. Her mind had flashed what she would have to do with a dead Mrs. McGregor. She felt guilty for thinking so selfishly, and so said, “Are you alright?”
Mrs. McGregor touched her head and felt her neck. She looked down at the seat belt, sticking a thumb under it to loosten it. She wiggled her toes. “Yes,” she said. “I think that I am fine.” She looked up at Mandy. “You, however, are bleeding.” She touched her own forehead where the blood on Mandy’s stood ready to drip.
Mandy felt her head, then turned the rear view mirror to have a look. “It’s not too bad,” she said. The place felt tender, and she knew that it would get worse before it got better, but all in all, not to bad.
“A good thing we were wearing our seatbelts,” said Mrs. McGregor [Hemingway would never have written such a line].
Mandy started the car again, and put it in reverse. The tires spun. Dust flew up in the rear, but the car didn’t even budge. She tried forward, hoping to rock the car free, like she had been taught when she became stuck in snow. The car lurched forward a few feet and stalled again. Mandy lay her head on the steering wheel. Immediately her head snapped back as pain shot through her head. She wiped the blood off the wheel, and on to her jeans.
“Maybe we should get out and have a look,” Mrs. McGregor suggested.
They opened the doors. Mandy had to jump down into the ditch, her door stood about a two feet higher than usual. Mrs. McGregor walked to the back and took a look. Mandy walked to the front. The wondered at how they had gotten into such a mess. She regretted that she had come, and that she had brought Mrs. McGregor. She really didn’t want to take care of an old woman out in the middle of the refuge. She calculated how far away the visitor center must be. Then she thought about how far they were from the road.
She sunk into the soft soil about an inch with each step while she surveyed the damage. Both tires had left the road. The left one, resting across the ditch half buried in the soil. She couldn’t seem most of the bumper. The right wheel hung over the ditch, slowly spinning to a stop. She turned and kicked a rock. It disapeard over a ledge. Mandy walked to the ledge. She had found a small sinkhole. She started to climb carefully down. She thought about Mrs. McGregor, but left her behind all the same.
The path she chose had been frequented by someone in the recent past. A single juniper grew near the bottom of the hole. The fallen roof lay jumbled at her fee. It would have been hard to travel if not for the well worn path. It almost looked as though someone had moved some dirt to make the path through the broken down basalt. She could see ahead a cave entrance. It opened its mouth, but only a little, barely a crack. She moved closer and peered in the crack. It looked like it went, but it grew dark very quickly; she couldn’t see far.
She turned and saw Mrs. McGregor staning on the rim of the sinkhole. “Does it go?” She called.
Mandy considered, “Yes. I think so.” Mrs. McGregor turned and disappeared. Mandy walked back out the path and climbed back to the rim. As she reached the top, Mrs. McGregor returned with Mandy’s backpack, and their flashlights.
“We really should try to get help,” said Mandy, taking her pack.
“Somehow, I think that we should have a look at the cave. But first, we should have something to eat and a little water. Mrs. McGregor wanted to climb down and have their lunch in the sinkhole but Mandy convinced them that they should sit on the rim just in case anyone happened by and could help them out with their stuck car.
As they sat, they chatted a little, but not about anything important. Mandy worried about her car, and not getting to Skeleton Cave, but resigned herself to having a look in this new cave. She tried to adopt Mrs. McGregor’s fatalist attitude. Maybe they were meant to find this cave and have an explore.
The food tasted good and Mandy seemed particularly thirsty. As they ate, she noticed the clouds starting to move in from the west. They gathered around the foothills to the east as well. When she said what strange weather they seemed to be having, Mrs. McGregor frowned at the clouds and replied with only a brooding “yes”. They said little else for the rest of the meal.
No one came up the road or passed them on the way out, so the packed up and walked back to the cave entrance. Mandy tried to note any footprints near the mouth of the cave. She found some, but couldn’t tell how old they might be. She wished that Hugo were there with them, as he could do a good job of estimating. She hadn’t seen any on the rim of the sinkhole, at any rate, and no cars could be seen nearby. She retrieved a flashlight from her back, turned it on and shone it into the darkness. Much breakdown littered the floor. So much, in fact, that they would have to crawl over it for quite a ways, it looked like, before they might be able to stand up.
“Are you sure that you are up to this?” She asked Mrs. McGregor.
“I’m not the one who is injured,” said Mrs. McGregor, rather tartly.
Mandy turned and crawled into the cave.


Chapter 27

[Need to have more passages like this earlier in the book so that we can see a development]
Somewhere deep in the earth, something stirred. The creature stirred. He had heard the voices, calling, calling to it. It had responded by breaking free of its bonds, the frozen crust of rock that had entombed it for these many years. It had heard the voices and came looking for a meal.
Slowly, languidly, it had stretched its atrophied muscles. As blood pumped once again through its veins, filling the muscles with that life giving fluid, it opened its eyes, to pure and utter darkness. It looked around, but could see nothing, nor did anything make a sound. It cocked its head and tentatively moved forward, as a new born deer might after birth. It bumped into a wall, and sniffed it. Then it caught a scent and followed it, followed it toward the surface. Its mind, razor sharp, thought of only one thing, something to eat. Something to eat. Something to eat. Hunger pulsed with each heartbeat.
Long idle claws scrabbled on the loose rock on the floor as it climbed toward darkness, through darkness, from darkness. With each step it became stronger. With each heartbeat more awake, more alive. More hungry.
Still, it followed the scent of the surface, a scent full of possibilities of choices, of creeping and crawling things. Of slithering things. Of running things. Its pace quickened. Saliva began to drip from its mouth. The scent of the surface became stronger, closer. Toward darkness it almost ran, now remembering the way. Sensing the twists and turns, sensing the loose rocks and the boulders that had to be skirted. Again the voices called and again its pace quickened.
The voices became more urgent. It resented the voices, wanted to kill the voices. A meal. Hunger burned in its belly. Faster now, almost a run, it came toward the surface. Faster toward the darkness, toward the voices. Toward the prey.


Chapter 28

Hugo felt sweat run into the scrapes on his arms and kneed. He felt soaked to the bone. Any sense of well being that the club had given him earlier, had evaporated. He thought that maybe he had made a mistake continuing on. Maybe I should have gone back, he thought. Maybe I was only supposed to retrieve the club. But no. Bonanza had implied that he should continue on, he was almost sure of it.
The passageway had opened up slightly to the left and right. Now, instead of being just large enough for him to fit through, it allowed him to put both arms forward and scoot along an his belly and elbows. The floor of the passageway, however, had become rougher: the compacted mud previous to the chimney, had vanished. He clawed his way along, determined and fatalistic at the same time. What else can I do but continue on? He thought. It has to come out somewhere, right? Bonanza wouldn’t have sent me down here to retrieve a club, then crawl on my belly until I died, right?
Twice, openings tempted him to his left, but he could not squeeze into them, they simply had been too small. He shined his lantern through them, but could only see blackness. He continued on doggedly. He continuted to check for chimneys overhead, but the ceiling had turned smooth as the floor had turned rough: he did not see even so much as a crack.
The passage becan to decline slightly. It began to close in again, as well. Hugo felt an anger toward the passage way rise in he mind, but tried to shut it out. It turned into anger toward Bonanza, and resentmet toward Mandy. A flood of emotions overwhelmed him as he crawled along. “What the hell is up with Mandy,” he said aloud. He was statled by the sound of his voice. How long have I been down here? He thought. He estimated two or two and a half hours, but he couldn’t be sure. And where is this damn tunnel going? “I’m tired of crawling on my belly,” he said.
As he moved along, his progress again slowed as the tunnel closed in tightly. He had to wriggle with one hand in front again, pushing the club and lantern ahead. He had to stop many times. He was becoming tired.
After the fourth or fifth rest, he had almost lost hope. Be began to think about trying to go backwards, but knew that that was hopless. With the floor as rough as it was, his pant leg cuffs would catch everytime he moved. He felt himself breathe against the rock. It pressed in on him. He tried to take a deep breath, but the rock sat against his back and chest. He felt the panic, but instead pushed through, making himself move forward again. He pushed the club ahead again, and it disappeared into space. He felt with his hand. He had found a hole in the floor of the passageway! He grabbed the bail of the lantern so that it would not fall. He lamented losing the club, but hopfully it would only be a short ways from the hole that he swung the lantern through.
He looked around, the lantern dangling in space followed by his head, his right arm still pressed against his side, pinned in the hole.

Day 20

Mandy looked at the caption. It said nothing about what they symbols meant, only where they were located: Southwest Colorado. “Well, that’s not very helpful,” said Mandy.
“This one,” Mrs. McGregor pointed at a different symbol, “is in Hugo’s book.”
Mandy stared at the photo, then Mrs. McGregor. “You read Hugo’s book?” She asked. She started to wonder why Mrs. McGregor surprised her still: it seemed that everyt ime she said something new, it was like a revelation to her.
“Of course I did, dear,” said Mrs. McGregor. “Didn’t you?”
“Well, I…I looked through it, of course,” said Mandy. “But that isn’t my sort of thing. He seemed to do his research well, though.”
“Most of it is pure hogwash, but don’t tell Hugo that I said so. Some, though, showed that he really does have the stuff. Possibly.” Mrs. McGregor made her way back down the row of exhibits. She stopped at the geology explanations. Mandy watched her for a moment, then turned back to the symbols and tried to make sense of any of them. One looked like water, or possibly a snake. Another looked like the moon, that made sense. Some parts seemed to be tick marks, as though someone were counting something. One looked like a club.
Mandy moved on. She thought about Hugo and wondered where he and Dr. Bonanza had gone off to. And why Mrs. McGregor wouldn’t tell her. She made a mental commitment to pick up Hugo’s book and try to read it again. She glanced at the rest of the dioramas and then walked to the gift area. The door opened and the ranger with whom they had spoken earlier came in.
He smiled and nodded to Mandy as he stepped behind the counter. “Now,” he said. “My name’s Tom; what can I do for you ladies this fine Sunday morning?”
Mrs. McGregor bristled at the term “lady”, but the ranger took no notice. Mandy, however had been called lady many times in her profession and no longer took notice of it.
“Well, Tom,” Mandy began, “I was one of the people who stumbled upon the deer up on Black Rock Ridge.”
“Yes, that was quite a thing, was it not?”
“Well,” Mandy continued, “I was wondering if you could give me --us-- any more information about that?”
“I’m really not allowed to say,” said Tom. “For some reason, the head ranger has wanted this kept quiet. At least until we know more. But, seeing as you are one of the people who found the carcass, I suppose that you have some right to know.” He glanced at Mrs. McGregor, then continued. “The ODFG came right in, we are under their jurisdiction, as I understand it, and hauled the carcass off the forensics lab. They haven’t released any official word yet, but the gossip is that it, the deer, was killed by an animal.” He let the statement hang. Mandy didn’t grasp the implication right away.
“Who took out the brain?” asked Mrs. McGregor.
“That’s the sticky part, is it not,” said Tom.
“You mean, that either someone --some person-- removed the brain after this animal killed it,” said Mrs. McGregor, “or else the animal removed it.”
Tom nodded.
“And the ‘sticky’ point,” she continued, “is how precisely it was removed.”
Tom nodded again, turning slightly green.
“What’s out there, Tom,” asked Mrs. McGregor. “What killed that deer and that horse, and quite a few other animals that no one is saying much about?”
Tom looked to Mandy for help, but she stared at Mrs. McGregor…again. “Um,” she said. “Thank you for your help, Tom.” Mandy took Mrs. McGregor by the elbow and escorted her to the door.
As Mandy pulled open the door Mrs. McGregor turned back. Tom stared after them. “Lock your doors tonight, Tom,” she said.
Tom nodded and whispered, “Don’t worry, I will.”
When the door had closed behind them, Mandy turned to Mrs. McGregor and stood akimbo, blocking the way forward. “What was that all about?” she asked.
Mrs. McGregor smiled an innocent smile. “I just wanted him to be careful tonight, there are strange things afoot,” she said.
Mandy couldn’t help but to think that maybe one of the strangest stood right in front of her. She shook her head and walked to the car. They got in. Mandy said, “What do you know about all of this Eseme?”
They sat silent for a few seconds. Mrs. McGregor said, “Things have been set in motion, evil tidings have reached my ear: I just hope that we are choosing the right path.”


Chapter 25

Hugo held the lantern up as high as he could and looked down the tunnel ahead of him. He tried not to look back the way he had come, but he couldn’t help himself. He turned and held the lantern up to light the passageway through which he had just walked. At the other end: only blackness. He wondered that he had gone so far so quickly.
He steeled himself once again, and continued on. The floor had gone from solid rock to compacted dirt and back again. The walls had darkened to black basalt, and had become eer rougher. Every now and then he could hear dripping as from a long ways away. Never, however, did he see where the drip might be coming from. In all his days of spelunking, he had never encountered a cave such as this. It must be man made, he thought. Though in so many ways it feels natural. Unnaturally natural.
He rounded a corner and the ceiling lowered until he had to squat down to see ahead. He crawled for twenty feet. The floor of the cave became merciless jagged bumps under his hands and knees. He wished that he had knee pads and gloves. He mentally shrugged and thought, I tried to pack for everything that we might encounter today, but, as usual, failed miserably. He laughed a bit and continued on. The ceiling lowered more and he had to crawl on his belly, scooting with his toes and elbows. At the same time, he could see that the walls narrowed. He wondered at his choice of tunnels. The floor became filled in with compacted mud, and started to incline. This cave has its own logic, he thought. He pushed the lantern ahead of himself; the rocky drips from when the ceiling melted under the heat of the magma river flowing underneath it caught at this shirt, and pants.
He looked ahead as best he could. He sweated, though the rock was cool to the touch. The stood still. He felt that he had been crawling for hours, when the sides abruptly closed in on him, becoming smooth. He felt a sudden rush of panic. He pictured the ceiling closing as well. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. He thought of how hard it would be to crawl backward out of the tight tunnel and the panic started again. He whimpered, and the sound of his voice startled him into a sort of calm limbo: he felt resigned that the rock would crush him to death, and that he would survive just the same.
The space became so tight that he had to put one arm up above his head, and drag the other at his side. He pushed the lantern an inch, then wriggled his body an inch. He pushed the lantern ahead two inches, then wriggled two inches. He had to stop often to catch his breath. Sweat poured off his brow and stun his eyes, but he could do nothing about it. Once he caught the pocket of his jeans on an unseen nubbin on the ceiling. He started to panic again when he couldn’t move, but calmed himself, more quickly this time, and inched his way back to unhook himself. He carefully resumed forward motion, picturing where the nubbin hung down so that he could carefully avoid it this time.
He squirmed his way to a tiny room. The tunnel in which he had been crawling, continued in the same direction that it had been going. The room, barely wide enough to stand up in, reached up into the rock farther than he could reach: a smooth chimney.
The lantern lay at his feet. He could see about three feet above his hands. He tried to pick up the lantern, but he couldn’t get it past his knees. He wriggled, changing position, pressing himself against the rock, but only succeeded in burning a line in his thigh where the hood of the lantern touched it. He felt fortunate when he held on to the bail, even though he jumped from the shock of the pain and bumped his head on the rock wall. He set the lantern back down and felt around as high as he could reach. He tried to shimmy up the chimney, but couldn’t get any purchase on the walls because he couldn’t bend his knee far enough to engage his feet.
By this time he had decided that he needed to go back to the lower tunnel and continue crawling. That seemed to him to be the proper way. He reached up one more time as high as he could, turning all the way around this time. He felt a crack, then a small shelf. The shelf angled up and he had to stretch to even stay in contact with it.
He touched something, and it clattered back away from the wall, into a hollow. He couldn’t reach any higher and the thing, whatever it was, was out of reach now. He dropped his hands and silently cursed himself. He squatted down, a wave of exhaustion overwhelming him. He hungered for a beer. Even a glass of water sounded good. He put his hands on the rock in front of himself as he squatted and rested his head against the rock. His forehead fit into a tiny depression. He looked up, but couldn’t actually see the depression. He felt it with his hands, and had an idea.
He stood up carefully and blindly searched the wall for more depressions. He found a very small ledge above the tunnel from which he had come. He reached up to the crack above his head, and at the same time twisted his torso and lower body so that his foot could reach the ledge. He pressed his back and side against the wall and slowly, painfully pulled up. His calf tightened almost immediately so he pulled harder with his fingertips. He straightened out his leg with his head just below the ledge. He started to reach up onto the ledge, but stopped as he feared not being able to see where he put his hand. He laughed at himself, for even if his head had been level with the ledge he wouldn’t have been able to see anything in the darkness.
He reached up and felt for the object. He located it, and put his hand around a thin cylinder of what felt like wood.
Quickly he pulled his hand back. As he drew his closed fist away, he felt a shard of rock slice the backs of his fingers below the second knuckles. He lost his footing and fell two feet to the floor.
Clutching his bleeding hand to his chest, he bent down and looked at the object. The cylinder --a shaft about two inches in diameter-- that he held had a small disk on one end, and ball on the other, glowed yellow in the lamplight. On the equator of the ball, many symbols had been carved. They had been painted blue. On the top of the ball, opposite the shaft a series of red dots formed a larger circle with a dot in the middle. Hugo peered at the symbols, unable to recognize any.
He saw the blood on his knuckles and realized that they needed attention. He pulled a bandana from his pocket and wrapped it around his hand to stop the bleeding.
Hugo looked at the object, he thought of it as a club, though a rather short one, and felt an overwhelming sense of wellbeing and awe. I’ve accomplished my task, he thought. He looked at the tunnel from which he had come, and the one that extended from where he squatted and sighed, the sense of wellbeing gone. He pushed his legs out behind him, and pushed the lantern and the club in front forward down the passage.

Day 19

She wound her way to the Southside Addition and found Hugo’s house at the end of Hugo’s street.
Hugo’s house wasn’t exactly at the end of the street. Next to him sat two other houses on his side, and then the abandoned house next to Mrs. McGregor’s was technically farther down that his. Of the neighbors next to him, he knew very little. The one closest was a rental: people always seemed to be moving in or moving out. In the last house on the street lived a man with even more peculiar habits than Hugo’s. He rarely went out, and when he did he always climbed up onto the canal bank, leaving the neighborhood by that route. Hugo had talked to him once, but not for very long.
When Mandy arrived, the neighborhood seemed deserted, except for Mrs. McGregor working in her yard. Mandy had met Mrs. McGregor twice before. She waved as she pulled up in front of Hugo’s house. Mandy got out and strode to Hugo’s door. She knocked on Hugo’s door and waited. A cat jumped into the front window and looked at her standing on the porch. Mandy waved at the cat, then wondered why she did. She knocked again. The cat cleaned itself.
She turned to go. When she reached her can, Mrs. McGregor called out: “He’s gone off with Bonanza.”
“Oh,” Mandy replied. She wondered what she should do next. “Do you know where they went?”
“I do.”
Mandy considered this. “Can you tell me?”
“I’m sorry, dear, I can’t,” said Mrs. McGregor setting her hoe against the fence and walking toward Mandy through the gate.
“Well, do you know when they will be back?”
Mrs. McGregor walked up to Mandy. She laid a hand on Mandy’s arm as Mandy held on to the door handle, waiting to see what would happen next. “Listen,” Mrs. McGregor said. “You want to go back down to the refuge, am I right?”
Mandy paused for a second, then said, “Yes. I thought that I might have a look at Skeleton Cave during the day light, instead of in the dark.”
Mrs. McGregor nodded. “I think that Hugo and Bonanza will be tied up most of the day. I’ll go get my coat and flashlight.”
Mandy considered this. She thought that she should say no, but then decided that the company would be nice on the ride down. By the time she looked up, Mrs. McGregor had already gone into the house. Mandy looked up the street toward the canal bank. She could see that the cottonwoods had almost lost their leaves; one looked especially bare, only a few yellow-orange leaves clinging to the middle branches. A hawk sat in that tree. It didn’t hunt, but only sat.
Mrs. McGregor returned. “Here we are, then,” she said as she walked to the passenger side door. She had a coat and flashlight, a large aluminum barreled one that took many large batteries. She also had a small satchel, though Mandy could tell right away that it was not a purse. Mrs. McGregor waited patiently for Mandy do get in the car and unlock her door. Mandy slid in, reached over to unlock the passenger door, then started up the car. Mrs. McGregor climbed in and made herself comfortable. “I haven’t been down to the refuge in years,” she said. “How exciting.”
Mandy smiled and buckled herself in. She drove to the end of the road and turned around. Mrs. McGregor looked at the last house and scowled a bit. Mandy didn’t notice as she straightened out the car and headed it toward the highway. She checked the gas gauge and decided that they had better fill up before they left town. She didn’t want to chance running out of gas miles from nowhere, and no one. She stopped at the same station that Dr. Bonanza frequented.
After she told the attendant what she wanted in the way of fuel, she asked Mrs. McGregor if she wanted anything from the convenience store. Mrs. McGregor said that she would like a candy bar, but that she didn’t know what kind that they had these days, “I haven’t had a candy bar for ages. Just get me something that you like.”
Mandy went in, thinking about what she should buy; rarely did Mandy have a candy bar these days either. She chose a bag of chips and a large orange juice for herself, then had a look at the candy display.
As she stood trying to decide another man walked into the store: “Hello, Joe,” he said. “Did you hear about the man hunt? They think that they might have a lead on who’s been killing those animals.” Mandy concentrated on the conversation.
“I did hear that,” said Joe. “Old McGillicuty, was in here this morning. He says that they are looking up around two rabbit lake. Maybe some kind of squatter.”
“Well, I hope they catch the sonofabitch,” said the man. He paid his bill and left the store.
Mandy quickly chose a candy bar and went to the cash register. She wondered if maybe there would be information in the morning paper. She paid for her gas and groceries. She asked for change for the paper box as well. As she exited the store, she looked for the man with the information, but the only car in sight was her own. She climbed in, almost breathless. She wanted to relay the information to Mrs. McGregor, anyone really, but she hesitated, wondering even why she had brought Mrs. McGregor along. She handed the candy bar to her, and started the car. As they pulled out of the gas station lot, she decided that she would tell Mrs. McGregor what she, Hugo, and Bonanza had been doing they day before.
“I have something to confess,” she started.
“I know all about it. I spoke with Dr. Bonanza last night,” said Mrs. McGregor.
Mandy looked at her and nearly swerved into a mailbox. She hadn’t thought that maybe Dr. Bonanza knew Mrs. McGregor. “So, you know that we were scared pretty good out at Skeleton Cave last night?” she asked.
“Oh, yes. Mario told me all about it.” Mrs. McGregor sat sweetly in the passenger seat placidly gazing out the windshield.
It dawned on Mandy that Mario, must be Dr. Bonanza’s first name. She had never really thought about it before. He had always been Dr. Bonanza. She had no idea what his degree had been in, but she had taken a class from him as an undergrad at Hedlund. Then it dawned on Mandy that Mrs. McGregor --now she wondered what her first name might be-- and Dr. Bonanza, Mario, knew each other. And possibly had for quite some time. Mandy thought about yesterday’s events, but chose to pursue more pressing matters.
“I’m sorry to be so forward, Mrs. McGregor, but how do you know Dr. Bonanza?” she asked.
“Please, dear, call me Eseme. Well, we go back a long ways. I knew him during the war.” She didn’t offer anything else. Mandy thought about pushing farther, but felt that it would be too impolite.
“Did Dr. Bonanza tell you about the symbols that we found?”
“Oh, yes,” replied Mrs. McGregor.
Mandy waited for more. She said, “What do you think about them?”
Mrs. McGregor tilted her head and smile faintly, “I think that he’s barking up the wrong tree.”
Mandy relayed the information that she had overheard at the gas station.
“Yes, well the police must try to do something,” responded Mrs. McGregor.
Mandy began to wonder about her passenger. The two previous times that they had met, Mrs. McGregor, Eseme, had been quite the chatter box. One time telling Hugo a story about some trip that she had taken as a girl. And the other time pontificating on the virtues of a well kept garden (that time the audience seemed to be the garden at large). They rode in silence for a time.
They passed Dr. Bonanza’s drive. Mrs. McGregor either didn’t notice or chose not to point it out. Mandy noted the name on the mailbox; neither did she, however, say anything about it. She looked down the drive, seeing two housed in the distance, but not knowing which Bonanza lived in. The sun began to warm the earth and the ponds and watering troughs began to steam. The air remained cold, however. Fall had settled into the McLoughlin valley and winter wouldn’t be far behind.
They entered the refuge and Mandy checked her watch: half past nine. She wondered what time the visitor center opened. It was located down the road about three miles from the turn off to Skeleton Cave.
“I’d like to go to the visitor center and see if we can talk with the ranger who hauled off the deer carcass, if you don’t mind,” she said.
“Oh, that would be lovely, dear,” said Mrs. McGregor. “Maybe we can spend some time looking at the exhibits”
“Sure.”
The drove through the refuge, and passed the turn for Skeleton Cave. Mandy tried to see if any new tracks had been left in the gravel road. She knew that Hugo could have done it, but just driving by, she had no chance at it. She shrugged and drove on. The road curved away to the west and down a small ravine; the visitor center stood on the south bank. The pulled into the parking lot, and into a parking place. It looked deserted. Mandy assumed the worst, that they were closed on Sundays. She turned off the car and got out to check the door anyway. Mrs. McGregor followed.
When they reached the door, it swung outward almost hitting them.
“Oh!” Mandy cried.
A tall, thin ranger in his mid fifties stepped out. “I’m terribly sorry,” he said, grabbing her arm to steady her. Mrs. McGregor stepped back, perfectly calm.
“We were just wondering if you are open today,” Mandy stammered.
“We are,” he said looking at his watch. “But not for another ten minutes.” He scratched his chin. “I’ll tell you what. I have to run a quick errand. Why don’t you two go on in. You can have a look at the exhibits, and the gift area. How does that sound?”
The two women thanked him and went in.
“He seemed nice,” said Mrs. McGregor when they were alone.
Mandy nodded and looked around. Directly in front of them stood a square counter. On it were spread maps of varying scale of the refuge and some of its caves. She glanced at them, but maps had never interested her. To the left and extending around to the back of the counter stood the gift area. She could see books on bats, geology, and birds. Other sundry items lined the shelves. She had never been that enamored with gift-shop gifts either. To the right and down a hallway Mrs. McGregor walked toward the exhibits. Mandy followed giving a cursory glance to each diorama depicting either cataclysmic eruptions eons ago, or native peoples engaged in the rituals of every day life: house building, weapon making, food gathering.
She stopped and looked more closely when she came to a series of photographs depicting pictograph and petroglyphs. She scanned each photo looking for the symbols that they had seen on the trees, but none of them looked familiar. In fact, she became less sure what the originals looked like, the more she looked at the photos. She scanned the captions and was surprised to find that many of the pictures were from far away, Arizona, Illinois, Japan, and Uganda. Beside the pictures of the petroglyphs in the refuge, she could discern many similarities.
She had almost given it up when something caught her eye. She had to turn her head to the left and kind of squint, but she felt sure that she saw the outline of the middle symbol, as she remembered it. This one, however, had been obscured by another symbol that looked something like a tree that had been broken, its top laying beside the trunk on the right side. Mrs. McGregor joined her, but didn’t say anything right away.

Day 18

Bonanza lit an oil lantern and Hugo could see around the interior of the barn.
A monster of a machine dominated the entryway. It was so large that Hugo wondered how it had been brought in through the doors, even though Hugo could see that the door that they had come through opened double-wide. Even so, Hugo wondered if it had been taken apart and put back together inside the barn.
Inside the door, along the earthen walls stood many implements of farming and ranching. Broken and whole tools lined the walls. Buckets lay piled near the machine, burlap sacks were stacked in five or six feet tall piles. Half a cord of wood stood back a bit. Hugo picked up one of the pieces; it weighed almost nothing, having sat so long; it had succumbed to the slow decay and would only warm a small hut for a very short time.
The lamps failed after only a short while, the darkness swallowing the light. Hugo tried to peer farther, but could not make out anything after twenty feet. Bonanza and Olaf stood close together, whispering quietly and animatedly together. Finally, Olaf turned and picked up a lamp of his own. He lit it and turned to Hugo expectantly. Hugo looked back at the two, blankly. He shrugged his shoulders, wishing that he had brought an extra beer. “What are we doing here?” He asked.
Hugo’s words set Bonanza and Olaf into motion. “We’re looking for something,” said Bonanza.
“Okay,” said Hugo. “Do we know what this something is?”
Bonanza pushed past Hugo, past the machine and the wood, into the darkness. Olaf gazed at Hugo for a second, then followed Bonanza. Hugo stood, wondering what was happening. I’ve been wondering that a lot lately, he thought. He turned and had to move quickly to catch up to Olaf and the light. He banged his shin twice before finally coming close enough to see in the light of the lamps. The earthen walls absorbed the light.
They passed wooden boxes that had stains on the outside from contents that had leaked out years ago, piles of rubbish, or what appeared to be rubbish, and mounds of dirt where the walls had slumped inward. The farther along they went, the more the walls seemed to have decayed. The roof, however, didn’t let in a peep of light. Hugo felt like they had been walking for much longer than the barn had appeared to be on the outside. He felt a question rising in his mind, but chose not to ask it. Bonanza hadn’t been in the mood for questions all morning.
The floor of the barn began to slope downward, imperceptivity at first, then more steeply. The floor changed from compacted soil to smooth rock. Eventually, they came to a set of stairs. They had been carved in the rock that underlay the soil. Bonanza stopped at the top of the stairs. A dubious hand rail had been sunk into the right hand wall. The ceiling had lowered. The potato barn began to look more like a tunnel under the earth. Hugo wondered about it, but kept his questions to himself, again.
Bonanza looked at Olaf. Olaf nodded slightly, and they began to descend the stairs. Hugo followed, filled with dread, fear, and curiosity. Here we go, he thought. Wherever that might be. Hugo wished that he had a lantern of his own. He immedeatly felt it childish, but the comfort of controlling fire comforted him. The closeness of the tunnel, and the glistening rock --the earth no longer absorbed, but reflected the light-- made the need for an extra lantern superfluous. Still the warmth would have been nice.
The stair descended for over two hundred steps. At their base, a small chamber opened onto three equal looking passageways. The rock looked less carved here, and more natural. As in the refuge, many lava tube caves dotted the McLoughlin valley, though Hugo knew of only three…four including this one. As a teenager, he and his friends had one much exploring of caves.
Bonanza handed a lantern to Hugo as though he had read his thoughts. Hugo felt reluctant to take it, however, the grasped the bail, warm from Bonanza’s hand, and lifted it up to look down one of the passageways.
Bonanza and Olaf looked at Hugo solemly.
“Hugo,” Bonanza began. “In this world, there are pockets of great evil. And always there have been men to fight and controll this evil. Some men were brave, others cowards, some of them brilliant thinkers, others no more than idiot stable hands. But they had one thing in common, when the time came, they defended their loved ones, their land, their way of life. If they passed these tests, then they knew that they could defend themselves from the evil, overcome it, overpower it. This, Hugo, is one of those tests.
“You can choose to not take this test. We will walk back up the stairs and I will drive you home and we will forget that any of this had ever happened. We will go on as though nothing had happened, though the evil will still be there, and it may be there between us. I will hold no quarter against you, but the evil will have stuck a knife in a chink in our armor. Will the evil overrun us? Will it spread throughout McLoughlin? Yes. That may happen regardless of what happens here today, or what good we can do tomorrow against the evil presence that has been growing in the south.
“This evil, we have kept it in check for many years. Not only Olaf and myself, but many others as well. We are part of a greater whole that has been working in the world since long before the birth of religions. We are a group that dates back to before the advent of farming. When our ancestors put down their clubs and picked up their planting sticks, the evil found a chink in the armor of the world. And since that time, some have been called to defend our chosen way of life. You, Hugo, have now been chosen.
“You will pass through one of these tunnels. Whichever you choose, all lead to the same place: a better understanding of our world, the evil and the good in it; and also a better understanding of yourself. You will become a part of a greater fellowship, a greater [German term for fellowship].
“Each of the tunnels has its own perils, and tests, and puzzles. You must chose one tunnel and pass through it, if you are to join us in the fight that you already have been fighting.”
Hugo stared at him, his mouth hanging open. “Why…why me?” He said.
“You have shown interest and knowledge in this affair of the last few days. You have been a good companion to me and have shown that you are willing to learn, listen, and most importantly to think. There are other reasons besides, but we will not discuss them now.
“Are you willing to do this, Hugo? Which tunnel do you choose?”
Hugo looked from Bonanza to Olaf and back to Bonanza. He couldn’t believe that the little man with bald pate who stood before him was the same man who drove him around, drinking beer, swearing about the government and what his sheep had recently gotten into. Images of the last three days flashed through his mind, and he wondered how they all fit together.
He turned and stared down the tunnels, one after the other. Then he looked back up the stairs. Somehow, not because he felt that it would be cowardly, the way up the stairs seemed the most difficlut way, the darkest path.
How strange, he thought, that the known way would seem the hardest.
Hugo nodded faintly at the lefthand tunnel. He tried to speak, but his words left him.
“Good,” said Bonanza.
“Good,” said Olaf.
Hugo nodded again, more to himself, then to either Olaf or Bonanza, and started walking.


Chapter 24

Mandy woke with the sun, ready to tackle the puzzle that was the refuge. She had thought about their time there, and specifically about being outside the entrance to Skeleton Cave. She felt certain that what they had heard had only been a rodent, or possibly a martin or badger. It hadn’t been some malevolent force. She had been tired; she had been ready to believe that something unknown and dangerous scuffled in the underbrush in the sink-hole of Skeleton Cave.
The new day washed all the fear from that encounter away. She felt ready to take a look in the daylight.
The Duck still lay asleep on the bed. His paintings scattered about the room, covered with the disarray of everyday life. Mandy smiled down at him, knowing full well that he would sleep for at least four more hours: he was not an early riser, and always required nine hours of sleep, no matter what time he went to bed, and last night had not returned particularlly early. After they had discussed the days event with two of the Duck’s friends at Astor’s, they had gone to a party at another lawyer’s house. There they had drank and talked, and played bawdy word games until early in the morning. When they arrived home, Mandy crashed in her clothes, barely kicking off her shoes before pulling up the covers.
After four hours of heavy sleep, though, she felt fine.
She made her way to the kitchen via the bathroom. She fixed coffee and a doughnut for breakfast. Felt guilty eating such a non-nutritious breakfast, but gobbled down the doughnut all the same. Then she had another while she though about what her plan of attack would be.
She decided that first she would go get Hugo, and see if Dr. Bonanza wanted to come. She wished that Hugo had a phone, but shrugged her shoulders: sometimes she wished that she didn’t have one. She would fix some sandwiches and some tea, and they could pick up some beer on the way.
She packed the lunch, two flashlights, and her coat in her backpack and headed out the door. She glanced in at the Duck. He lay sprawled across the bed at an angle, taking up her side as well as his own when Mandy had left. His right arm hung off the bed.
She picked up her keys from a handmade ceramic bowl on a table by the door and headed to her car. The car started right up, which was odd. Usually on frosty mornings she had to try at least twice before anything happened. She scraped he windows as the news blared out of the speakers and the defrost blew on high. She got in and drove through the downtown area, now deserted. She frowned at all the garbage on the streets and sidewalks. Saturday nights were always bad for littering, but this seemed particularly slovely. She noticed that two concrete trashcans had been knocked over, spilling their contents onto the street. High School hooligans. She mentally noted that she would try to pick up some of the garbage when she had time.
She wound her way to the Southside Addition and found Hugo’s house at the end of Hugo’s street.