The Visitant: A Native American Historical Mystery Series (The Anasazi Mysteries Book 1) by W. Michael Gear & Kathleen O’Neal Gear

Author:W. Michael Gear & Kathleen O’Neal Gear [Gear, W. Michael]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781639778324
Publisher: Wolfpack Publishing
Published: 2023-10-10T00:00:00+00:00

11

“I don’t see anyone, Aunt Hail.” Maggie Walking Hawk Taylor guided her great-aunt away from her old black Dodge pickup and into the archaeological field camp. To her left, five canvas tents stood in a circle around a fire pit. Tools, ice chests, and lanterns scattered the area in front of the tent flaps. Over at the site she could see conical piles of back dirt from the excavation.

“Where do you think they went?” Hail Walking Hawk asked in a frail voice. Her blue dress shone in the late afternoon sunlight.

“They have four-day breaks, but they’re supposed to be back today. I told them we were coming. Maybe something delayed them.”

Maggie scanned the excavation units directly in front of her. Screens, for sifting the dirt, lay beside three of the rectangular holes. The other holes had been covered with black plastic. Rocks, shovels, and picks weighted down the edges of the plastic.

Maggie wiped damp strands of short black hair from her forehead and sighed. Ordinarily she’d be here dressed in her green ranger’s uniform, driving a National Park Service truck, but she’d taken a few days off work to pick up her aunt and drive her out here. She felt oddly out of place in her white T-shirt, tan shorts, and black tennis shoes.

She looked around. “Well, there’s a stack of folded lawn chairs over there beside the fire pit. Let’s go sit down.”

As they started walking, Hail held tight to Maggie’s arm, breathing hard. Soft pained sounds escaped her lips.

Maggie frowned. Her great-aunt claimed to be in excellent health, but she bit her lip as she shuffled along, her eyes squinted, as though against pain.

At the age of eighty, her aunt had a face like a James Bama painting, rusty and wrinkled, wise in a way beyond the comprehension of most whites. Age-spotted skin hung off her arms and throat. Arthritis had crippled her hands, leaving them claw-like, but she still worked around the pueblo, cooking bread and fashioning cornhusk dolls for the children.

“Just a little farther, Aunt Hail,” Maggie said, “then you can rest.”

“I’m all right, girl.” Hail smiled and affectionately squeezed Maggie’s arm.

They walked into the shade of the tents, and the temperature dropped ten degrees.

“Hey now, that’s better,” Maggie said. “Why don’t you wait here, Aunt Hail? I’ll unfold chairs for us.”

“Sure, I’ll listen to the quiet.”

Maggie walked away. As she set the chairs up, she maintained her vigil on her aunt.

Maybe bringing her out here wasn’t such a good idea. When her aunt first heard the details of the site, she had insisted, demanded, in fact, that she be the one to monitor the archaeologists. She had waved off protests of conflict of interest, the factional politics in the pueblo, and every other objection.

Hail looked around through white-filmed eyes. Maggie had explained to her once that doctors these days could remove cataracts quickly and painlessly, but Hail had chuckled. “I see better with them,” she’d replied, and Maggie had dropped the subject. The Walking Hawk sisters had a variety of names.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.