The Mescalero Project

CHAPTER ONE Moss wasn't more than thirty meters from the entrance but didn't realize it. He stood looking out from the shade of the red rock escarpment that breached the flat desert landscape, arching its spine toward the east. The only irregularity in the smooth sweep of terrain out in front of him was a sandy knoll to the southeast. He had walked a grid pattern back and forth through the sagebrush and mescal and ocotillo since noon without success. His clothes and the bandana tied about his head were soggy with sweat, and his eyes ached from the scorching sun despite the expensive sun shields he had bought for the trip. There had at least been spots along the access road in from the two lane visible now and then, where the wind had bared the shoulder enough to keep him from driving off into the soft sand. But right where his comsat compass confirmed the coordinates shown on the blueprints, there was no sign anything had ever existed here but sand drifts and mesquite, cholla and tumbleweed and saguaro. In the suffocating late afternoon heat, he busied himself setting up camp, determined to keep doubt from staining his hopes. He rigged a shade break with a tarp off the side of the pickup to two tent poles and set his camp chair and table under it. He had decided not to bother with the tent this first night. He would sleep in the open in his bivouac bag. The shadows cast by the saguaro stretched farther and farther as the sun slipped lower in the desert sky. He put a pot of water on the camp stove he’d set on the tailgate, and when it came to a boil emptied a pouch of dehydrated beef and vegetables into it. While it simmered and the water thickened to a more or less satisfying broth, he went looking for firewood. It was cold at night in the desert even in June. When he returned the stew was ready. With a small campfire under way just beyond the shade break, he opened a tube of saltine crackers and sat eating at the table under the tarp. The landscape was in deepening shadow, the sky turning from sanguine to purple as the sun dropped behind a butte off in the distance to the northwest. He threw a piece of mesquite on the fire now and then, watching the flames dance higher again, casting swirls of sparks up into the rapidly chilling night air. As he dipped saltines into the stew, he was aware of how odd the smell was, the aroma of stew mingled with the odor of a sweat-soaked man and the bone-bleached scent of the desert sand. This was the first time since starting out that he’d taken a break of any duration. All at once he realized how weary he was after a week long drive and merciless heat, then crisscrossing acres of spiny desert underbrush on foot and finding nothing. He wondered if he had come on a fool’s errand. He awoke before daylight. The cold desert air had settled on his face and on his ears exposed as they were to the night. Lying there in his bivouac bag, staring up at the glory of the heavens, he became aware of a weight on his hips, like when his cat, Charlemagne, slept on the covers. He started to get up, but the instant he moved he heard the unmistakable sound of a rattlesnake. Moss became as still as a stone, feeling the movement of the snake on top of him, as it wound itself into a new coil. His heart was pounding and he could hardly take a breath, terrified that the snake would strike his face or throat from where it was coiled over his groin. He waited, taking the shortest of breaths, trying not to move, though he was starving for air. He realized it probably crawled up there to stay warm during the night, as he tried to think what to do. Coming daylight began to reveal the shapes around him. Moss slowly lifted his head high enough to see down the length of the bivouac bag. The snake, with a girth as thick as his forearm, was coiled two feet away, staring at him. He slid his forearms slowly up to his shoulders. If he felt the snake move he froze and waited. Once he could reach the zippers he began undoing them, on one side, then the other, trying to keep his pelvis as level and still as possible. When they were undone enough to throw up a block with the upper half of the bivouac bag, he took a deep breath and made his move. The thump of the rattler striking at the thick insulated flap sounded like a fighter’s jab hitting a heavy bag. Moss scrambled up out of the jumble of material and sprinted a half-dozen meters away. He looked back and saw the big rattler slither off in the opposite direction, disappearing into the sagebrush. He rekindled the fire and stood warming himself, breathing in the sharp scent of mesquite, aware that his quivering stomach and the shaking in his hands had little to do with the cold.