return.
As they set off across the valley toward the dark slot canyon, Nora looked up. The northern sky had grown lumpy with thunderheads. She frowned; normally, the summer rains weren’t due for another couple of weeks. But with a sky like this, the rains could be upon them as early as that very afternoon.
She urged her horse into a trot toward the slot canyon.
It was the work of a long, wet, weary hour to toil through the slot canyon, the gear dead weight on their backs. At last, Nora parted the hanging weeds and began walking down toward the camp. Smithback fell in step beside her, breathing hard and shaking mud and quicksand from his legs.
Suddenly, Nora stopped short. Something was wrong. The camp was deserted, the fire untended and smoking. Instinctively, she looked up the cliff face toward Quivira. Although the city itself was hidden, she could hear the faint sounds of loud, hurried conversation.
Despite her weariness, she shrugged the pack from her back, jogged toward the base of the rope ladder, and climbed to the city. As she clambered onto the bench, she saw Sloane and Black near the city’s central plaza, talking animatedly. On the far side of the plaza sat Bonarotti, legs crossed, watching them.
Sloane saw her approaching and broke away from Black. “Nora,” she said. “We’ve been vandalized.”
Exhausted, Nora sank onto the retaining wall. “Tell me about it,” she said.
“It must have happened during the night,” Sloane went on, taking a seat beside her. “At breakfast, Peter said he wanted to go up and check his equipment before getting to work. I was going to tell him to take the day off, actually—he didn’t look that well. But he insisted. Said he’d heard something during the night. Anyway, next thing I know he was calling down from the top of the cliff. So I went up after him.” She paused. “Our communications equipment, Nora . . . it’s all been smashed to pieces.”
Nora looked over at her. Sloane was uncharacteristically unkempt; her eyes were red, her dark hair tousled.
“Everything?” Nora asked.
Sloane nodded. “The transmitter, the paging network—everything but the weather receiver. Guess they didn’t think to look up in that tree.”
“Did anybody else see or hear anything?”
Black glanced at Sloane, then turned back to Nora. “Nothing,” he said.
“I’ve kept a sharp eye out all day,” Sloane said. “I haven’t seen anybody, or anything.”
“What about Swire?”
“He went out to the horses before we learned about it. I haven’t had a chance to ask him.”
Nora sighed deeply. “I want to talk to Peter about this. Where is he now?”
“I don’t know,” Sloane said. “He went down the ladder from the summit before I did. I figured he’d gone back to his tent to lie down. He was pretty upset and . . . well, frankly, he wasn’t making much sense. He was sobbing. I guess that equipment really meant a lot to him.”
Nora stood up and walked to the rope ladder. “Bill!” she shouted down into the valley.
“Ma’am?” the writer’s voice floated up.
“Check the tents. See if you can find Holroyd.”
She waited, scanning the tops of the canyon walls. “Nobody home,” Smithback called up a few minutes later.
Nora returned to the retaining wall, shivering now. She realized she was still wet from the trip through the canyon. “Then he must be in the ruin somewhere,” she said.
“That’s possible,” Sloane replied. “He said something yesterday about calibrating the magnetometer. Guess we lost track of him in all the confusion.”
“What about the horse killers?” Black interrupted.
Nora hesitated a moment. She decided there was no point in alarming everybody with Beiyoodzin and his story of witches. “There was only one set of prints on the ridge, and they led to the camp of an old Indian. He clearly wasn’t the killer. Since our equipment was smashed last night, that probably means the horse killers are still around here somewhere.”
Black licked his lips. “That’s great,” he said. “Now we’re going to have to post a guard.”
Nora looked at her watch. “Let’s find Peter. We’re going to need his help setting up some kind of emergency transmitter.”
“I’ll check the roomblock where he stashed the magnetometer.” Sloane walked away, Black following in her wake. Bonarotti came over to Nora and drew out a cigarette. Nora opened her mouth to remind him that smoking wasn’t allowed in the ruin, but decided she couldn’t summon up the energy.
There was a scuffling noise, then Smithback’s shaggy head appeared at the top of the rope ladder. “What’s up?” he said, coming over to the retaining wall.
“Somebody snuck into the valley last night,” Nora replied. “Our communications gear was smashed.” She was interrupted by an urgent shout from within the city. Sloane had emerged from one of the roomblocks on the far side of the plaza, waving an arm.
“It’s Peter!” her voice echoed across the ghostly city. “Something’s wrong! He’s sick!”
Immediately Nora was on her feet. “Find Aragon,” she said to Bonarotti. “Have him bring his emergency medical kit.” Then she was running across the plaza, Smithback at her side.
They ducked inside a second-story roomblock complex near the site of the burial cyst. As Nora’s eyes grew accustomed to the dim light, she could see Sloane on her knees beside Holroyd’s prone form. Black was standing well back, a look of horror on his face. Beside Holroyd lay the magnetometer, its case open, components scattered across the floor.
Nora gasped and knelt down. Holroyd’s mouth was wide open, his jaw locked solid. His tongue, black and swollen, protruded from puffy, glaucous lips. His eyes were bulging, and a foul graveyard stench washed up from each shallow breath. A slight, thready gasp escaped his lungs.
There was movement in the doorway, then Aragon was beside her. “Hold my light, please,” he said calmly, laying two canvas duffels on the floor, opening one of them, and removing a light. “Dr. Goddard, could you please bring the fluorescent lantern? And the rest of you, please step outside.”
Nora trained the light on Holroyd, his eyes glassy, pupils narrowed to pinpoints. “Peter, Enrique’s here to help you,” she murmured, taking his hand in hers. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
Aragon pressed his hands beneath Holroyd’s jaw, probed his chest and abdomen, then pulled a stethoscope and blood pressure cuff from the duffel and began to check his vital signs. As the doctor opened Holroyd’s shirt and pressed the stethoscope to his chest, Nora saw to her horror a scattering of dark lesions across the pale skin.
“What is it?” Nora said.
Aragon just shook his head and shouted for Black. “I want the rest of you to get a tarp, ropes, poles, anything we can use for a stretcher—and tell Bonarotti to get some water boiling.”
Aragon peered intently back into Holroyd’s face, then examined the man’s fingertips. “He’s cyanotic,” he murmured, fishing in one of the duffels and pulling out a slender oxygen tank and a pair of nasal cannula. “I’ll set the flow at two liters,” he said, handing the tank to Nora and fixing the cannula into Holroyd’s nostrils.
There was the sound of feet, then Sloane returned with the lantern. Suddenly, the room was bathed in chill greenish light. Aragon pulled the stethoscope from his ears and looked up.
“We’ve got to get him down into camp,” he said. “This man needs to go to a hospital immediately.”
Sloane shook her head. “The communications gear is completely trashed. The only thing still functioning is the weather receiver.”
“Can we cobble something together?” Nora asked.
“Only Peter could answer that question,” Sloane replied.
“What about the cell phone?” Aragon asked. “How far to the nearest area of coverage?”
“Up around Escalante,” said Sloane. “Or back at Wahweap Marina.”
“Then get Swire on a horse, give him the phone, and tell him to get going. Tell him to call for a helicopter.”
There was silence. “There’s no place to land a helicopter,” Nora said slowly. “The canyons are too narrow, the updrafts on the clifftops too precarious. I looked into that very thoroughly when I was planning the
