Zuni Stew: A Novel (12 page)

They all climbed out of the truck to face the cliff. Louis Paul stepped in front of Jack and placed both hands on his shoulders. He looked inside Jack, concentrating his thoughts, aligning him with life spirit. He did not speak, but silently called upon everything in the universe—natural forces such as lightning, wind, great droughts, to physical entities like rocks, animals, rivers, and humans—to permeate the man before him with the universal spirit
Isa-ha-i.
He intended to link Jack with the entirety of nature and the cosmos, the life force in all beings.

He said out loud, “This is far as I go. Special cave up there. Hide. Snake god will protect. I pray for you. Tito will go between. Go.”

Jack knew the man was going to take care of him.

Tito led. Up, down red arroyos. Daylight was failing. Jack finally could make out the entrance to the cave, thirty feet from the top. They stopped.

The cliff. Sheets of pure granite. Crevices. Precipitous cleavages. Eons of exposure to wind, ice.

“Do not let negative thoughts bother you.” Tito handed Jack a small leather pouch. “Snake fetish, keep it. Always.”

With a basket strapped to his back, Tito slunk up like a lizard. Fast. Like a blur. He disappeared into the rock.

Jack hesitated. A giant cast shadow swallowed the canyon. A single sheet of darkness engulfed him. Suddenly, he was sitting cross-legged at the cave entrance. Sitting on a finely woven Indian horse blanket.

“I must go. The light,” said Tito softly.

“What about water?”

“A spring, back of cave.”

“What time will you be back? What’s the schedule?”

“No schedule. There is no time in Zuni,” Tito said.

21

A
t his desk, speaking to Admiral Zeller, Bill said, “Yes, sir, he’s taken care of.” He hung up and covered his mouth and a big yawn.

“Doctor Newman,” said the head nurse. “Mr. Jahata is here to see you.”

“Good, send him in right away.”

Louis Paul said only, “The doctor is safe. You may use your powers to keep him that way,” and left.

Bill touched the fetish he always kept in his pocket. He had been secretly honored by the Zunis. He had been inducted into the rattlesnake fraternity.

The extremely surreal experience began in a kiva, a big round gathering house, painted floor-to-ceiling with god figures, winged monsters, mythical animals with grotesque masks. All the images in the murals were winding in and out of giant corn plants in iconographic chaos. Men were singing. Loud and harmonious. Overwhelming.

He was escorted to an altar at the distant side of the acrid-smelling room. The attendants at the altar, all smoking cigarettes, sat around a blazing fire nearby. All the men were nude, their painted bodies covered entirely with symbols Bill didn’t understand. Hands, heads and feet were striped red, yellow and white.

At first glance, he thought the men were wearing skin-tight garments, until he was stripped, and at each stage of the ceremony, painted with another symbolic image. At one point --– he couldn’t recall when because he was so disoriented—someone handed him a crude cigarette. With one draw, he became nauseated, but the sensation quickly faded. A strong sense of calm settled within.

He didn’t mind the rattlesnakes draped around his neck, their exposed fangs inches from his face and bare chest. All he felt was the intense chill of the subterranean chamber and the pounding of his heart. He was given a snake fetish and asked to close it in his hand. During the chants that followed, he didn’t even notice that the snakes had slithered
off his body.

At the conclusion, he was told of the power and protection he now possessed, courtesy of his fellow brethren, the rattlesnake. Furthermore, he was told at his will he could use his power to protect others.

They were believers. Expression of belief astonishing. What did they believe in? Bears? Nature? He was knocked out by it all. He believed it, too. He did not have to know.



Bill asked Stan to take a look at the battered Scout. Lori grabbed a duffle from the back seat and fell into step with Bill. They crossed the street to his house where they were greeted by Flipper.

“I have two guestrooms—take your pick. Got to check on my very p.g. dog first. This big guy is the father.”

Lori dropped her bag on the floor and followed Bill to the garage, shutting the door behind her. Bill squatted beside a very tired new mother. Flapper had delivered by herself, five new puppies. Eyes still closed, they were sleeping beside her, snuggling against her side, burrowed in the blankets.

Bill soothed the Newfoundland, praising her work and smiled up at Lori. “Delivering babies is my specialty and she didn’t need me at all. Oh, I almost forgot to ask you. How’s your pregnancy going?”

Lori laughed. “You believed me.”

“A woman’s prerogative,” Bill chuckled. He left to get a batch of clean towels, fresh water and kibble.

Later Lori took a shower while Bill fixed ham and cheese sandwiches, and opened two beers. When she didn’t appear, he knocked quietly on her door. She was dressed in an oversized white T-shirt, with a towel wrapped around her head, in deep sleep on the single bed. He ate both sandwiches, drank both beers and crashed.



“What are you doing up so early? Did you sleep okay?” asked Bill, exhausted from a night dealing with an accident at the junction of Route 4 and NM-602. A semi-truck trailer T-boned a van loaded with hippies. “They called me at two AM—hope it didn’t wake you. I can hardly think.”

“Nothing could have awakened me. I raided your frig for breakfast and took care of Mom and the pups.”

“Thank you.” He poured two cups of coffee from a pot in the corner.

“What do you know about Jack?”

“He’s in Jahata’s hands, who’s a very powerful man in the tribe, a shiwani. That’s all I know.”

“You mean you don’t actually know where he is?”

“No. If someone like me, his colleague, knew where he was, I suppose I’d pretty soon be dead meat.”

Lori sat down at Jack’s desk and told him that the mauled corpse was in Albuquerque for autopsy. The case had somehow been shifted to the jurisdiction of the FBI.

She tapped the desktop with her fingertips, finally saying, only because she needed his help, “I found the pistol the man was carrying. I had ballistics check it out, they sent it on to Chicago. I had the strange feeling from the start that I had seen the guy before, maybe a mug shot, but I wasn’t sure. He turns out to be a known contract killer. Based in Chicago. Associated with big shots. I’m surmising the latter because the DC office has suddenly taken an interest in the case. If Washington is interested, this is a big deal, and I need to know where Jack is, right now.”

Bill, whose fatigue had temporarily vanished, replied, “I don’t know where he is. But if Washington is interested, I may know why. I’m going to tell you something super-secret. You probably won’t believe me.”

“Try me. Since I got to New Mexico, damn little surprises me anymore.” She walked to the one window in the office, and with her back to Bill, said, “Shoot.”

With a sense of anxiety in his voice, Bill told her that a number of years before arriving in Zuni, there had been an epidemic of lung cancer. “Also a pot full of tragic genetic defects in newborns.”

Most of the victims were from the north and west portions of the reservation, areas adjoining the Navajo reservation. The federal government sent investigators, but no official report was ever distributed to the on-site doctors. Rumors around the rez said it originated with the mining of large uranium deposits on leased reservation land.

“I had a good friend, a physics wiz at Los Alamos labs, look into it. He sent me as much info as he could relating to radiation. In short, wherever you find uranium, you’ll also find decay products, one of which is radium. In turn, that radium gradually disintegrates into radon gas. Actually, a group of radon progeny. The bottom line, Lori, is that all these products are dangerously radioactive, and are breathed in by the people working the mines.”

Lori turned to look at him. “Didn’t the Fed do something about it?”

“Only after one helluva battle. I testified before Congress. I supplied a lot of the patient data—got my butt whacked good by Area Office for doing it.” He told her that in the early 1950’s, under the protective umbrella of the Department of Labor, and the Small Business Administration, Mom-and-Pop uranium shaft miner outfits were encouraged to operate on Indian land. With the blessing of the Atomic Energy Commission, the Bureau of Indian Affairs not only participated, but encouraged the leases. At least two-hundred loans were made by the SBA to uranium exploration companies in the name of economic development.

“Nothing—
nada
—was ever said about the risks of uranium-bearing ore, though I know full well there were written reports documenting the dangers buried somewhere in Washington.

With an edge to his voice, Bill continued, his outrage obvious. “The Indians lost a huge amount of land to contracts made between the government and several big industrial outfits who wanted to mine on reservation land. There was overt confiscation of herds of Indian-owned sheep and cattle, leaving the Native Americans destitute. They shipped them to Gallup for sale, but some of the animals were herded into corrals and just left to starve to death. Poor devils,” Bill said. “Thank God that’s all stopped. It’s one reason I’ve stayed in Zuni.”

He refilled both their cups. “There’s something else I want to tell you that is still a mystery to me. I’ve never told anyone. As thanks for my testimony, I was inducted into one of the kiva fraternities—the Rattlesnake.”

“I suppose that’s quite an honor,” she said, a trace of skepticism in her voice.

“It carries a great personal power. I was told I can transfer this power to someone in need. For what it’s worth, at dawn, I prayed that the powers of the rattlesnake be with Jack.”

“Okay, I’ll buy into your story, despite the fact I don’t trust anything without shoulders.” But what did that have to do with Jack? Uranium? Radium poisoning in New Mexico. Mass murder in Chicago. “I’ve got to get to Jack.”

“Jahata was just here, I’ll take you to him. If he chooses to tell you, then you’re in.”



Jack awoke to complete silence. He had curled into a tight ball, holding his ankles tightly to keep from falling off the ledge. Pale light filtered through low clouds, the new moon resonated high above. He scooted b
ack, stretched his stiff legs, his hand touching the basket Tito had left. He picked up the smell of smoke; smoke unique to Tito’s mother’s cookstove.

Three jars of stew. Three apples. A bag of some sort of seeds. Dried corn. Flashlight. Cup, spoon. A mirror.

He was thirsty. Knowing he had to conserve the batteries, he flashed the light briefly, then allowed his eyes to adjust to the darkness. An off-shoot to the right. Stay in the main gallery. Tito warned of sink holes. Rock tore his knees. The ceiling was too low to stand. Suddenly a loud rattling sound came from ahead. He turned on the flashlight. The corridor appeared to widen. He slowly moved forward. Stopped abruptly by a very active rattle. He turned off the light, afraid the snake would attack. Staying absolutely still, the only sound he could hear was his own heart beating. The rattling stopped, and he could hear a slithering sound which (thank God) slowly disappeared further into the darkness.

He was sweating despite the coolness in the dank channel. Flashlight on. No snake in sight. He edged forward, inch by inch, but stopped when his lead hand felt no rock, only space. Directing the flashlight downward, he realized he was at the edge of a chasm. Sheer sides of a black bottomless pit plunged downward, with no floor in sight. His breathing was shallow, his palms wet. He noticed a narrow natural bridge to his right. He carefully crossed the six-foot gap, and in the narrow field of the flashlight, he saw something shining.

“Water—it’s the pool.” He was shocked to hear his voice. Cupping his hand, he tasted the water. Fresh spring water. Sweet, icy cold. He sat back on his haunches and splashed the freezing water on his face, realizing the snake had warned him, saving him from certain death. He fingered the fetish Tito had given him, then pressed it to his wet lips.



Bill preceded her up the ladder. Left her at the screen door. Louis Paul rose to greet her, his head silhouetted against a small square window. The room smelled old. Not musty. Old. Austere. Very austere. Only essentials. A kiva fireplace in the northeast corner. Neatly stacked piñon wood. A broom. Rocking chair. One goatskin. A profound stillness.

She noted surface electrical wiring, a bulky metal switch box—not recessed. Connected to a single overhead fixture. A naked light bulb. The black, wall-mounted telephone looked out of place. The sound of a radio
commentator speaking in Zuni filtered into the room, followed by static. Someone turned it off.

Silence again. She had been in seamy, sleazy bars, filthy ghettos, third-world diarrhea-ridden barrios, surrounded by men from the dregs of the earth, but walking into Louis Paul’s primitive home unsettled her more than any place she had ever been. He seemed polite, yet a certain invisible unknown, an unseen power touched the very core of her being.

She felt as if she had lost control. Not physically, but mentally. She was not uncomfortable. A strange feeling, something she had never experienced, even when enduring a mind-altering drug exercise during training. She was prepared to deal with capture and truth serums, brainwashing and torture.