Chapter 6: Night of the Fox
Clunk! Clunk! Clunk! Clunk!
Alice sat straight up in bed. Listening in the dark, she heard the sound of someone opening and closing the bathroom door repeatedly, then realized it wasn't the bathroom door at all but Wolf and Cora's bedroom door. Reaching over to Uncas who was curled up on his side, she shook his shoulder to wake him. Getting no response, she got up and slowly opened their door a crack to peek outside. Wolf and Cora's door was closed and no one was in the livingroom or the kitchen. Shutting the door, she hurried back into bed as a shiver went down her spine.
"Uncas, wake up! Wake up!" she said, shaking his shoulder again. Still unable to rouse him, she tapped his face several times while calling his name. When he still continued sleeping, Alice started to get worried. Why couldn't she wake him? Even in a deep sleep, this would have woken him up by now. When violently shaking his shoulder again and again did nothing, she slapped his face hard, then again and again, and again. The forth slap produced a result.
"Wha…..What?" he said, sitting up with a start. Disoriented and breathing hard, he blinked his eyes while trying to focus on his surroundings. Looking at Alice, he saw she was upset. "What's the matter?"
"I couldn't wake you!" she said in a shaky voice. "I kept trying and you wouldn't wake up! You've never done that before!"
"Well I'm awake now!" mumbled Uncas as he rubbed his eyes, still feeling a bit groggy. "What did you get me up for anyway?"
"I heard a noise. Someone keeps slamming Wolf and Cora's bedroom door! I looked but I didn't see anyone out there."
"It's probably just 'Blanket Woman" making her nightly rounds again." Uncas said with a sigh as he threw himself back down onto the bed. "If that ghost wakes up Wolf I'd hate to be her. Go back to sleep. It's nothing to worry about."
Clunk! Clunk! Clunk! Clunk! BANG!
This time Uncas shot straight up in the bed as not only the door to the next bedroom repeatedly slammed shut, but their bedroom door banged as well as though someone had kicked it hard from the other side.
"What the hell?" said Uncas. "What's gotten into her tonight? She never makes this much noise?"
"It sounds like she's very upset about something." said Alice.
Getting out of bed, Uncas cautiously went out into the livingroom with a trembling Alice close behind him. Looking around, he was just about to check the bathroom when a long, slow creaking sound came from behind them. Turning around, they saw the door to Wolf and Cora's room slowly opening by itself. Looking through the doorway, Uncas saw the room was empty.
"Looks like 'Blanket Women' is trying to tell us Wolf and Cora are gone. Did you hear them get up?" he asked Alice, who shook her head no.
After looking out on the front deck and then out the back door toward the ramada, the two sat down on the livingroom sofa.
"Where are they?" she asked him.
"I don't know. There's no sign of them anywhere and both vehicles are outside so wherever they went, they went on foot. Normally they'd leave a note if they took off somewhere, but I can't find one." said Uncas.
"I was going to try calling them on my cell but there's no signal. Have you tried 'calling out' to Wolf?" Alice asked.
"Yeah, he's not answering. And that's strange after the way he chewed me out the other day when I didn't answer him. We both promised we would from now on no matter what. Unless he's asleep. That's the only time we can't hear each other. But that doesn't make any sense. If he wanted to sleep outside he'd sack out on the deck or under the ramada. He wouldn't leave the camp at night to do that."
"Do you think something happened to him? Maybe he's unconscious." said Alice, feeling a wave of worry joining the fear already building inside her.
"No. If he was I'd have somehow been knocked out too. And we'd both regain consciousness at the same time, which means he'd be able to answer me now. No, if something happened to him, it would have happened to me too and I'm fine."
"Well you weren't a few minutes ago when I couldn't wake you up."
"I was asleep and sleeping at the same time isn't something he and I do. There's no reason why I wouldn't wake up on my own without him. Unless….wait….you really couldn't wake me up just now?"
"No, I couldn't. I had to shake and slap the hell out of you first. Uncas, you were frightening me!"
"Shit!" he said as he jumped up off the sofa and looked at the log book on the table. Not finding any entries listed, he went into Cora and Wolf's room. After a quick search, he turned to Alice who had followed him in.
"Cora's nightgown is on the bed and Wolf's watch, his gun and both their cell phones are gone. So is their backpack and the blankets from our hike. I'll bet he saw something out by the ruins and went to check it out and Cora went with him. Come on Pretty One, get dressed, we gotta go. Hurry!"
Using a flashlight, Uncas shined the light on the ground around the bottom step of the deck. It didn't take him long to locate Cora and Wolf's tracks and the direction they had gone confirmed his suspicions. Returning to the house, he strapped on his holster and made sure his handgun was fully loaded. He also put several extra clips in the ammunition pouches on the holster and grabbed a box of cartridges for Annie's rifle which was slung over his shoulder. Tucking the box of cartridges into his jacket pocket, he was soon joined by Alice who had made sure their backpack still had the first aid and snake bite kits in it before putting in several bottles of fresh water and the blanket Wolf had left on the deck. Following behind her husband, the two headed toward Jackrabbit Mesa.
"Do you really think that's where they went?" she asked.
"That's the direction their tracks are heading. Stay right behind me. I'm only going to turn on the flashlight every so often to check the trail, so we're going to be walking in the dark. I don't want to take a chance on someone seeing the light."
"Back at the house, it seemed like you remembered something. What was it?" she asked him.
"I was thinking of the time Wolf and I had those bad head colds and I took some of that nighttime cold medicine that makes you sleep. That stuff knocked me out for a good twelve hours and even though he didn't take any, it knocked Wolf out for a while too. The same thing happened again the next time we got sick. That's the only time that one of us being asleep will have somewhat of an affect on the other, when there's some kind of medication involved." said Uncas.
"But Wolf hates to take any kind of medicine unless he absolutely has to. And he certainly wouldn't take any drugs to make him sleep if he went out into the desert with Cora."
"Not on his own he wouldn't."
The waning light of the moon provided just enough light for Uncas to make out a lone pinion tree up ahead. Something on the ground near the tree caught his attention and he headed over to see what it was. As they got closer to the tree, he could see a distinctly rectangular shape on the ground. Reaching down, he felt the dark shape and realized it was a blanket. Using his jacket to shield the beam of the flashlight, he turned it on and recognized the blankets as the ones from the hike.
"Looks like they made a bed here, but it doesn't seem like anyone laid on it." he told Alice.
"Why would they make a bed if they saw somebody at the ruins and came to check it out? And if Wolf did see something out here why didn't he log it in before they left?"
"I don't know, maybe he….." Uncas stopped in mid sentence as he pulled Alice down onto the blanket with him. Putting his finger to his lips, he nodded his head toward the mesa.
Listening closely, they both heard faint voices coming from the direction of the ruins. When the voices faded, Uncas removed the rifle from his shoulder and held it ready while he whispered to Alice to take the blankets and follow him. Intending to use the base of the mesa as cover by following it over to the ruins, they made a run for the cliff base.
Just before they reached it, Uncas saw the black pickup with the camper. Carefully approaching the vehicle, he took a quick peek inside of the cab before trying the back door on the camper. Finding it locked, he and Alice slowly crept over to the ruins, keeping as close to the mesa as they could.
At the ruins, they once again heard the voices of two men up ahead and cautiously made their way toward the sound. Seeing the glow of a light, the couple ducked into one of the rooms in the ruins. Looking through what had once been a small window, they saw a man on the other side filling up a box with an assortment of bubble wrapped bundles.
A second man walked out of one of the enclosed rooms in the ruins carrying another box and suggested they bring the pickup over so they could load the rest directly into it from the cavern. Taking the boxes and the lantern with them, the men left together to get the truck.
Waiting until the men were out of sight, Uncas signaled Alice to follow him and, crouching, they sprinted into the enclosed room the second man had come out of. Another lantern illuminated the room and they saw a large opening had been busted through the back wall leading to another passage into the caverns. This passage was much larger than the one they'd discovered on their previous outing and it, too, was lined with lanterns. Shouldering the rifle again and drawing his handgun, Uncas led Alice through the passage, stopping when they reached the point where it dropped off down another steep slope into the cavern.
"Look at this! They built stairs over the slope." whispered Uncas.
"Whoever those men are, between the stairs and the lanterns, they went to a lot of trouble to make this place assessable." Alice whispered back.
"I'd like to know what's in those boxes they're taking out of here. Come on!" Taking Alice's hand, Uncas led her down the stairs into a small chamber. It was here that the trail of lanterns ended and the two darted out through an opening into the darkness of the main chamber of the caverns.
Crouched down just to the left of the opening, they listened for more voices. When he was sure there was no one else in the cavern, Uncas turned on the flashlight. Shining the light on the floor outside the opening, he saw a partial trail of boot tracks left by the red dirt from around the ruins that had fallen off the boots of the men as they walked. Giving a general indication of the direction the men were going, he was tempted to try and follow the tracks, but he knew they would not lead him far and the men would soon be returning.
Deciding to wait in the next chamber over, as this would give him a clear view of where the men were going, Uncas silently gestured for Alice to follow him. Shining the flashlight through the entrance, they had just started to enter when Uncas heard the faint but familiar click of a safety lock being released on a gun.
"Get down!" he said to Alice in a sharp whisper. As they threw themselves to the floor, Uncas pointed the flashlight and his gun toward the direction he'd heard the click and was surprised to see Cora pointing a gun back at him.
"Cora, its Uncas! Put the gun down!" he said, holding the flashlight in a way that illuminated the area for her to see them.
"Uncas?" Cora replied, looking visibly shaken. "Uncas! Alice!" she cried, putting down the gun and throwing herself on them as they got up off the floor.
"Where's Wolf" asked Uncas before spotting his brother lying on the floor behind Cora.
"What happened?" he asked as he went over and knelt down next to him.
"It's all my fault!" said Cora as Alice held her trembling sister. "I left our backpack on the ground where we couldn't see it and one of those men put tranquilizers in our water bottles. He told the other man he'd put enough in there to kill whoever drank from them….and Wolf did!"
"Oh my god!" said Alice.
"How much did he drink?" asked Uncas.
"He only took a little sip. But he passed out almost immediately after that." said Cora.
"How long has he been out?" Uncas asked as he checked his brother's pulse and breathing.
"Um, abou…about an hour….m…maybe two? I remember when we got here Wolf said it was 12:30. He drank the water not long after that."
"Well it's almost 2:30 now. That's about two hours give or take." said Uncas as Alice and Cora knelt down beside Wolf.
"We have to get Wolf out of here and get him to a hospital! After he passed out his breathing became shallower and his heartbeat seemed different." said Cora as she stroked her husband's hair.
"That's because he went into a deep drug induced sleep. He'll be alright. His pulse is strong and his breathing is steady. Don't worry Cora, he gonna be fine." said Uncas, putting a reassuring hand on her back. "If he was in any danger at all, I'd be in bad shape right now too and I'm not. The drug's already had all of the effect on him that it's going to. He just needs to sleep it off."
"You were right about why I had so much trouble waking you up." Alice said to Uncas as she covered Wolf with two of the blankets and made a pillow for his head out of the third.
"Yeah. I guess he and I are both damn lucky he didn't take a bigger drink. If he had, it would have killed him and he'd have taken me with him."
Hearing the two men returning to the caverns, Uncas and Cora quickly turned off the flashlights. As they walked through the main chamber, Uncas heard one of the men say to the other they needed to bring two more loads after this one up to the surface and then they'd be finished for the night. Hearing their plans, Uncas came up with one of his own. Once he was sure the men were out of ear shot, he informed the sisters of his intentions.
"Sounds like their using this cavern as a storage area. When they come down here again I'm going to follow them. I want to see what their smuggling out of here and where they're keeping it."
"No Uncas, it's too dangerous!" said Alice.
"Please don't! I agree with Alice." said Cora. "It's too dangerous. Let's just stay here until they're finished and then we can leave. We'll tell Dave Yazzie all we know and let him deal with it."
"That's just it. Dave said he needs solid proof of what's going on out here before he can do anything. I'm going to get him some." said Uncas as he gave Alice the rifle and box of cartridges. "Here, take this. If those two men come in here, use it!"
"How will I know it's not you?" asked Alice.
"I'll say something in Mohican to let you know it's me. You're pretty fluent now. If you don't hear me say anything and someone just walks in here, shine the flashlight in their eyes. It'll blind them and you'll be able to see who it is."
"What if they catch you?"
"They won't catch me. I'm a fox, remember? We're pretty wily critters! We can even outsmart a wolf….. just don't tell him I said that." Uncas said with a smile and a nod toward his brother.
Returning for another load, the two men walked across the main chamber, guided by the light from the headlamps they were wearing. Uncas was waiting for them behind a nearby stalagmite. He watched as the men made their way across the cavern and entered another chamber on the opposite side. Following the light from their headlamps, he kept enough of a distance from them so they would not see the muted beam from his flashlight. Cora had tied a bandana around it to dim the light and he was glad she remembered Wolf had put the bandana into their backpack.
Standing at the entrance to the chamber the men had entered, Uncas saw the glow of lanterns coming from yet another chamber attached to this one. The shadows of the men could be seen moving about on the wall and he could hear the sound of boxes being shifted around. Not wanting to risk being seen, he decided to remain where he was until the men left. This time hiding behind a rock formation, Uncas waited and his patience was soon rewarded when the men reentered the main cavern and headed toward the small chamber with the staircase.
After they were out of sight, Uncas darted into the storage area. The light from the lanterns illuminated the chamber and he saw numerous boxes filled with plastic bags and bubble wrapped items. Looking through several boxes, he found they contained a variety of Anasazi pottery and various other artifacts, along with items that were clearly of a more recent period including silver and turquoise jewelry.
Taking a couple of small bags from the bottom of one of the boxes and tucking them into the pocket of his jacket, he was about to leave when he heard the voices of the men returning. Ducking into a fissure in the wall, he found it led to yet another chamber.
As he looked around with the flashlight, he heard a scraping sound as his shoulder bumped against something on top of a ledge in the rock and he barely managed to catch a small rectangular object before it fell to the floor. Standing motionless until he was sure the men hadn't heard anything, he looked at the object and saw it was a tape recorder.
Moving to the far side of the chamber, Uncas turned the volume to its lowest setting and played the recorder, holding it to his ear and slowly increasing the volume until he could hear it. Turning off the devise, he gave a slight smile as he looked toward the direction of the men in the storage chamber and back to the recorder.
"Looks like I just found the source of the 'ghost voices'." he thought to himself. Tucking the tape recorder into the other jacket pocket, he began to look for another way out of the chamber when he heard the sound of a gunshot echoing through the caverns.