Uncertain Justice

Chapter 52

When Miles' weight came down on the floor near the corner, the old box buried below the surface had creaked a little. Even then, he'd almost not noticed ... until it occurred to him that a rock floor should never creak. It turned out that most of the stone floor under the table was a false covering that could be lifted away with concealed handles. There was a small fortune hidden there.

The gold had slipped Zeb's mind or he'd have shown it to Miles before, Zeb apologized. Afterwards the discovery in the stone house, he took Miles to several of the gravel bars on the river where gold nuggets were abundant. They'd dug shallow holes in a couple of the bars and picked up handfuls of nuggets of varying sizes with little difficulty. The heavy gold settled in the gravel; the deeper they dug, the more concentrated the gold became. In a deeper hole, the mud had literally sparkled in the sun from all the gold flecks lying at the bottom.

Zeb had remarked the mother lode for all this gold couldn't be too far upstream because the nuggets showed little wearing caused by long exposure to water and friction with other rocks. Zeb had looked at the needle pointed peak southeast of the valley and wondered aloud whether the source lay up there somewhere. He hadn't had the time to look, he said. He'd died before he got around to it, he said wryly.

Miles was taking only six dozen or so of the small but heavy leather sacks with him. Most of the bags Zeb secreted beneath the floor were still there. Gold, near as Miles could remember, had been selling for nearly fifteen hundred dollars an ounce when he'd fled into the mountains.

Nuggets, though ... particularly some of these big ones in Zeb's cache ... were worth a lot more as jewelry and souvenirs. He'd seen adds on the Internet selling smaller ones than his for several thousands of dollars. What he was taking out would keep him in fine style over the winter.

§

Even for as short a trip outside the valley as Miles planned, he needed to hike to the ancient city to say good-bye. Except for the Wolf Clan warriors who actively scouted distant regions for possible enemies, few of the People had been more than a few miles from the city where they'd been born. Even the Wolf brothers seldom traveled half the distance he intended to walk.

Almost everyone in the city was an old friend and the good-byes were strained and difficult. All the clans came out to wish him well on his journey. There was much feasting over several days. On his final day with them, the clans assembled at the front of the cavern to wish him a good journey. All of the warriors gripped forearms with him and it seemed one or two who had fought beside Miles against the invaders may have been developing respiratory problems in the cold cavern. They choked and coughed for much of the ceremony, their eyes watering frequently.

Old Zeb stepped forward to shake his hand in the way of the Europeans. Then he broke the handshake in favor of the forearm hold of the People and clapped Miles on the shoulder.

Many of the women scorned their more stoic men folk and wrapped as much of their arms as they could get around Miles. A couple of the younger women who had claimed many of his evening hours said good-bye to Miles with hearty kisses.

The People had not known of the touching of lips before he came but the practice was catching on like wildfire. Zeb had been disgusted. He didn't particularly liked kissin' and huggin' and such. He'd kept knowledge of that particular expression of affection to himself until Miles arrived.

At the Wall of Remembrance, the portal to the city, the elder who had greeted Miles when he first found his way there presented Miles with a pendant strung on a length of rawhide to go around his neck. He told Miles to always keep it close and the People would be with him wherever he roamed.

The symbol of the thunderbird was etched into the middle of the polished blue-green stone. Beside each clawed foot, delicate spirals generated outward in opposite directions. The wings were outstretched as if the hunter was ready to take to the sky at any moment. The strong beak was ready to defend or impale prey with equal expertise. The symbol for the sun was etched in the upper right corner where it would hang nearest the heart. A tiny representation of the moon stood out in the upper left. It was a beautiful, powerful talisman.

A hole had been drilled completely through the stone at the top and a length of rawhide threaded through the hole. When the elder placed it around Miles neck, the amulet lay warm against his skin, throbbing minutely with the beat of his heart.

The elder was caught by surprise when Miles pulled the heavy-bladed hunting knife and scabbard from his fanny pack and ceremoniously handed them to the old man. The old one blinked in the strong sunlight, saying the mighty weapon would be kept in a place of honor in the city. In this way, he said, Miles would be with the People also.

Miles bowed slightly and turned to leave. He marched away, perhaps a little too quickly for proper respect. He waved, but didn't look back. The sun was making his eyes water too.

§

He ate a cold meal of leftover cattail roots and smoked venison, not wanting to make another fire in the old rock hearth he'd just have to put out again. He pulled on the backpack with its load of gold nuggets, a little food, and most of the clothing he'd brought with him. The hiking boots were lashed to the outside of the pack in favor of the deer hide moccasins he'd grown accustomed to wearing. He had another set, plus materials to repair worn-out moccasins, inside the pack. The set of straight razors that had belonged to Zeb's father was on top of the pack's contents. They were the only things from the old stone house he was taking with him.

The spare combat boots he'd brought with him remained in a corner of the cabin with a covering of bear grease to protect them. Most of the survival tools and gear he'd thought necessary at the beginning of his journey had been discarded also, stored on shelves inside the little house. He didn't need them any more. When the jerky ran out, he would devise a snare to catch an unwary rabbit or bird for a meal.

Once outside, he closed the cabin door carefully, making sure the new latchstring hung outside should another traveler come by needing shelter while Miles was gone. He banged the butt of his spear/walking stick on the rock floor of the courtyard. He nodded at the solid, reliable thump. He was ready.

Crossing the river, he turned south and that afternoon, southeast, along the base of the high eastern mountain. A brisk stride put the miles behind him as he aimed at the low saddle between two mountains where Zeb said he'd crossed the mountain chain into the valley the first time he'd come here. The rising sun was warm on Miles' face as he tramped through tall grass made brittle with frozen dew.

§

The trek south and east was a quick one. At the end of the valley, he climbed the bare shoulder of another ridge projecting north from a range of mountains further south and then descended into a dry canyon that led northeast. When the canyon petered out, he found an old trail heading vaguely in the same direction that wound through the mountains along the steepest, roughest ridges.

A few weeks later, passage would have been impossible. The passes would be blocked by deep snowdrifts and scoured by frigid blasts of wind. As it was, he needed to seek out places protected from the wind to huddle inside his sleeping bag.

Eventually, he managed to work his way back down to lowland valleys for a while, then he found a high pass between two towering peaks and walked almost due east for most of six days. Fourteen days after leaving the valley, and after much hiking up one side of mountains and down the other, he struck the Continental Divide Trail.

A few more days walking north brought him to U.S 50 near where he'd first set foot on the trail in the early spring. The first time he heard a car's laboring motor he'd stopped dead in his tracks, wondering what it was. He hadn't heard an internal combustion engine for months.

He pressed on, marching north until he came to IH 70. The wide expanse of concrete ran west from Denver all the way to a rendezvous with Interstate 15 in southern Utah. It was a landmark he couldn't miss. Retreating into the trees away from the big highway, he made his way west and then north again through the higher mountains.

There were a number of small towns along the interstate. Surely he could find a place in one of them to sell some of the nuggets. He wanted a town that was large enough for him to not stand out, but small enough that news of a group of law enforcement people coming into town would spread quickly.

§

The tall, still-faced man sat quietly in the big waiting room. Spurning the magazines and newspapers spread neatly on the massive coffee table, he watched everyone who came and went without reacting visibly to any of them. His eyes flicked toward new arrivals and closely examined each one.

Once inspected and determined to be of no interest, he dismissed that man or woman and returned his gaze to the wall opposite his chair. There was no evidence he saw the wall though.

When the secretary came to tell him the Deputy Attorney General would see him now, the man looked in the young woman's eyes for a moment longer than was comfortable for her. Generally, people summoned by the second-ranking officer in the Department of Justice leaped to their feet in varying degrees of flustered excitement.

The intensity in this man's gray eyes disconcerted the woman. She wheeled and strode quickly to the door to the inner office and held it open for him. When she closed the heavy oak door, she let out a breath she hadn't realized she was holding.

She couldn't wait for the end of the workday when she would meet with her friends and tell of her encounter with Deputy United States Marshal David Owens.

§

The community of Santa Anita Springs sits at the junction of IH 70 and a state highway that wandered north and south through the mountains. If you drove north, it eventually connected with U.S. 40 to wind its way across northern Colorado. If you knew the way, one of the side roads leading off the state highway in that direction would take you northeast to U.S. 34 and eventually to the Rocky Mountain National Park. South, the state road struggled over high passes deep into the mountains to some prime hunting country.

In the spring and summer, Santa Anita Springs was a picturesque stop on the interstate for a fill up or a quick meal before heading down into Denver or a nice respite for travelers headed in the opposite direction after climbing up the long slope from the big city. Knowing tourists stopped overnight or several days to take advantage of the magnificent scenery. Small motels, restaurants, and some bed-and-breakfasts could be found a short distance away from the noisy Interstate.

In the fall, the motels were filled with hunters wanting a night between clean sheets and a hot meal or two at the beginning or end of a hunting trip. The winter season saw