Why had he not asked more pertinent questions when Kawasi was with him?
Judging by the few he had seen, they looked not too different from people on this side, yet what if that was not the case? What if the people he had seen had been deliberately chosen because of their resemblance to people on this side? Certainly their customs would be different, and he would be walking into a trap if he crossed over with no more knowledge than he now had.
Crossed over? Was he actually buying that story? Did he believe in such a thing?
Suppose it was an elaborate fraud? A kidnapping not for ransom but for what Erik knew? It had happened before, and Erik Hokart was a man of international reputation in his field.
So what could be done? He simply did not know. None of his tried investigative methods seemed to help in this situation. He would return to the mesa, camp there, and await developments. They might move against him, or Kawasi might return.
What of the Poison Woman, so-called? She had appeared suddenly on the mesa, miles from anywhere, and had, according to Erik, disappeared into the kiva. If there was not another side of the curtain, where had she been hiding in the desert?
He swore softly. “Raglan,” he said aloud, “you’re getting in over your head.”
The small town of Dove Creek lay just ahead. This was one of the places where Zane Grey had lived briefly and where the local citizens claimed much of Riders of the Purple Sage had been written. He slowed down, thinking of stopping for coffee, then decided to drive on. As he drove out of town he glanced back and saw a pickup carrying two men pull out on the highway.
He stepped on the gas. It was a long way to the next town, and the road was often empty. He dropped his hand to his pistol, shaking it free of its scabbard. He was a good driver and had qualified in a defensive-driving course given for the Secret Service. He knew something of evasive action. The trouble was that the highway offered almost no place to go except itself and a few roads turning off into the desert, any of which could turn into a trap.
The pickup was behind him, a good half mile back and maintaining its distance. He stepped up his speed but noticed that he did not pull away. Despite his suspicions it might be nothing at all. They were more than likely simply some ranchers heading home.
His thoughts returned to the problem. If there was another world parallel to this, in some other dimension, perhaps, what would it be like? How would it differ from this? He had read science fiction about such things but remembered none of it.
They would be what we call Indians, of course, but they must have progressed beyond what the cliff dwellers were when they abandoned their cliff houses and returned to that other world. Yet “progressed” in what way? What were they like now? Those he had seen, if not accomplished actors, seemed little different from the people on this side, yet that seemed was a large word. Actually, he knew nothing about them.
If he saw Kawasi again he must remember to ask these questions. Apparently, access to this world was strictly controlled and perhaps had been nonexistent for many years, perhaps even centuries. Kawasi had suggested they wanted much from this side but did not wish to make themselves known.
The car behind him was gaining. The road was empty now and they were closing in.
The highway dripped into a hollow, rose out of it, then dropped into another. To the right he suddenly saw a small turn off into the brush, apparently something used by highway work vehicles. Instantly he turned into it, pulled behind a couple of cedar trees, ready to drive back onto the pavement when he could. He took the gun from the seat and held it in his lap.
Only an instant, and their car went by, driving fast. Apparently they were not expecting evasive action and probably were not accustomed to car chases. He counted a slow ten, then pulled out onto the highway, letting them get well ahead. He was still in the hollow and out of sight if they looked back, so he climbed slowly, topping out on a rise to see them far ahead, driving fast.
He returned the gun to the seat beside him and slowed his pace. Evidently they believed he had increased his speed and they were doing likewise. Monticello was not far ahead, and if they did not realize what had happened before then, they would probably stop there to try and find him.
Long ago he’d had friends in Monticello but he doubted if any remained whom he knew. Entering the town, he turned off and, avoiding the main street, drove down back streets until he emerged on the highway headed south.
It was after midnight when he finally got to sleep in a motel room, and he awakened as usual in the cold light of dawn. For a moment he lay still, listening. Down the street somebody started a car. Somebody else passed his room, walking along the parkway. A moment of silence and then a door opened and closed, and he heard boots walking across gravel.
He lay perfectly still, listening. Seven hundred years ago all this country around, but mostly to the south, had been inhabited by those whom the Navajo called the Anasazi. This had been their land, its true length and breadth not yet established, nor the limits of its culture. Yet much was known of them.
Father Escalante had come this way seeking a route from Santa Fe to Monterey, California, in 1776. Father Garces, that intrepid adventurer in a cassock, had come up from the south, exploring a wild and lonely land, only to turn back. Who first had seen the cliff dwellings was without doubt one of those unknown hunters or prospectors who found almost everything before the official discoverers came on the scene.
W. H. Jackson, photographer for the U.S. Geological and Geographical Survey, was guided into the area by John Moss, who told him of the ruins and, when asked, indicated where they were to be found. Moss is sometimes represented as a mere miner. He was much more than that. He was a man who, leading a party of prospectors into Indian country, had no trouble with Indians. He met them, smoked with them, ate with them, and established a relationship that endured. No matter that others had trouble with the Utes, Moss did not. He had welded a friendship that was to last. In subsequent years he founded Parrott City and operated mines in several states, including Colorado and Arizona. Undoubtedly the Utes had told him of ghost cities high in the cliffs, and he was a man who would have been interested. Jackson, following the directions of Moss, visited at least one of the ruins. At the time no one had any appreciation of their size or extent. It remained for the explorations of the Wetherills to demonstrate that.
Jackson had gone into the ruins in 1874, and others followed, guided by the Wetherills. The cliff dwellings had been strongholds, but the people were vulnerable when working in their fields. Invading Indians from the North, perhaps the Ute and the Navajo, had stolen their grain and killed many of their people. Nor had the cliff dwellings themselves been secure. The first white men to visit found the bones of the dead scattered about, pitiful evidence of what had taken place.
It is often forgotten that the Indian the white man encountered had himself been an invader, sometimes preceding the white man by but a few years. The Anasazi themselves had come to the country from elsewhere and settled first on the mesa tops, where the ruins still remained, many of them hidden, however, by brush, trees, and grass. No matter what other reasons have been given, it seems obvious they would not have abandoned their mesa-top homes for the great caves without reason. Only a few of the cliff dwellings had springs, and water as well as food and fuel had to be carried into the cliff dwellings at great expenditure of labor.
Mike Raglan swung his feet to the floor. For a moment longer, he listened to movements from outside. A traveler was loading a car, and there were voices of children, then a woman’s admonishing them to be quiet, that people were still sleeping.
He shaved and showered, thinking of what he must do. Gallagher would be around, and would have questions for which Raglan had no answers. Yet he might have information too.
Two men were looking at his car when he emerged. They were, he was sure, those who had followed him the previous day. “Something I can do for you?” he demanded. “You lost something?”