Blasphemy

FROM THE BACK BEDROOM OF HIS bungalow, Ford saw the first of the protest riders appear on the rim behind Nakai Rock, silhouetted against the sunset. He raised his binoculars and identified Nelson Begay astride a paint horse, with a dozen other riders.

He turned his head and felt a throb from his fall the evening before. Since then, he and Kate had hardly been able to exchange a word, she had been so busy getting ready for the run.

The light on his satellite phone blinked, right on schedule. He picked it up.

“News?” Lockwood asked.

“Nothing specific. Everyone’s in the Bunker, starting another run of Isabella. I’m waiting to go meet the protest riders.”

“I wish you could have headed that off.”

“Trust me, it’s better this way. Did you look into this Joe Blitz thing?”

“There are hundreds of Joe Blitzes out there—people, companies, places, what have you. I culled a list of some that struck me as being possibilities. I thought I’d run a few past you.”

“Go ahead.”

“First of all, Joe Blitz is the name of a GI Joe action figure.”

“That could be an allusion to Wardlaw — Volkonsky hated him. What else?”

“Broadway producer of the forties who did Garbage Can Follies and Crater Lake Cut-up. Two musicals, one about tomcats, the other about a nudist colony. Both flops.”

“Keep going.”

“Joe Blitz, bankrupt Ford dealership in Ohio . . . Joe Blitz State Park, Medford, Oregon . . . Joe Blitz Memorial Hockey Rink, Ontario, Canada . . . Joe Blitz, sci-fi writer in the thirties and forties . . . Joe Blitz, developer who built the Mausleer Building in Chicago . . . Joe Blitz, cartoonist.”

“Tell me about the writer.”

“A Joe Blitz published science fiction potboilers in several pulp magazines in the early forties.”

“Titles?”

“A whole bunch of them. Let’s see . . . ‘Sea Fangs’ and ’Man-Killers of the Air,‘ among others.”

“Did he publish any novels?”

“As far as we could tell, just a lot of stories.”

“What about Joe Blitz the cartoonist?”

“Did a syndicated strip in the late fifties about a fat slob and a toy poodle. Sort of like Garfield. Never a big success. Let’s see . . . I’ve got about two hundred more, everything from the name of a funeral home to a recipe for smoking fish.”

Ford sighed. “This is like looking for a needle in a haystack when we don’t even know what the needle looks like. What about that Aunt Natasha?”

“Volkonsky had no Aunt Natasha. It might have been a kind of joke—you know, every Russian has an Aunt Natasha and an Uncle Boris.”

Ford glanced out the window at the riders entering the valley. “Looks like the note’s a dead end.”

“Seems so.”

“I’ve got to go—the riders are coming down into the valley.”

“Call me as soon as the run’s over,” said Lockwood.

Ford put away the satellite phone, locked up the briefcase, and went outside. He heard a distant engine, and a battered pickup appeared where the road entered the valley. It topped the rise and came down, followed by a white van with KREZ on the side and a satellite dish on top.

Ford walked over and stood in the trees at the edge of the fields, watching Begay and a dozen riders on lathered horses approach. The KREZ van stopped and a couple of television people got out and began setting up a shot of the riders. A large woman stepped out from the pickup—Maria Atcitty.

As the riders reached the fields, the cameraman started rolling tape. One rider broke away and galloped ahead, giving a whoop of triumph and whirling a bandanna in an upraised fist. Ford recognized Willy Becenti, the man who had lent him money. Some of the other riders urged their horses into a run, and Begay followed suit. They tore across the fields, whipping past the camera, and pulled up in the dirt parking lot outside the old trading post, not far from Ford.

When Begay dismounted, the reporter for KREZ came up, high-fived him, and started setting up the equipment for an interview.

Now the others were coming up. More high fives. The video lights went on, and the reporter began to interview Begay. The others stood around watching.

Ford strolled out from the trees and walked across the grass.

All eyes turned in his direction. The reporter approached him, holding out the mike.

“What is your name, sir?”

Ford could see the camera was rolling. “Wyman Ford.”

“Are you a scientist?”

“No, I’m the liaison between the Isabella project and the local communities.”

“You aren’t liaising very well,” said the reporter. “You got a big protest on your hands.”

“I know it.”

“So what do you think?”

“I think Mr. Begay here is right.”

There was a brief silence. “Right about what?”

“A lot of what he’s been saying—that Isabella is frightening local people, that its presence isn’t the economic boon it was supposed to be, that the scientists have been too aloof.”

Another brief, confounded silence. “So what are you going to do about it?”

“To start with, I’m going to listen. That’s why I’m here right now. Then I’m going to do what I can to make things right. We got off to a bad start with the community, but I promise you, things will change.”

“Bullshit!” came a cry—Willy Becenti, striding over from where he had staked out his horse in the field.

“Cut!” The reporter turned to Becenti. “Hey, Willy, I’m trying to do an interview here, do you mind?”

“He’s full of bullshit.”

“I can’t air anything you say if you use words like that.”

Becenti stopped short, staring at Ford. His face bloomed with recognition. “Hey—it’s you!”

“Hello, Willy,” said Ford, extending his hand.

Willy ignored it. “You’re one of them!”

“Yes.”

“You owe me twenty bucks, man.”

Ford reached for his wallet.

Becenti flushed triumphantly. “You keep your money. I don’t want it.”

“Willy, I’m hoping we can solve these problems working together.”

“Bullshit. You see up there?” Becenti pointed a skinny arm vaguely up the valley, exposing a tattoo. “There’s ruins up there in those bluffs. Graves. You’re desecrating our ancestors’ graves.”

The camera was rolling again. “Your response, Mr. Ford?” said the reporter, shoving the microphone back in his face.

Ford refrained from pointing out that they were Anasazi ruins. “If we could have some help identifying exactly where the graves are, we could protect—”

“They’re all over! Everywhere! And the spirits of the dead are unhappy and wandering around. Something bad’s going to happen. I can feel it. Can’t you feel it?” Becenti looked around. “Can’t you feel it?”

There were nods, murmurs.

“Chindii are all around, skinwalkers. Ever since Peabody Coal gouged out the soul of Red Mesa, it’s been a bad, bad place.”

“A bad place,” people repeated.

“This is just one more example of the white man coming in and taking Indian land. That’s what this is. Am I right?”