Diablo Mesa(4)

“The point is,” said Tappan, “that something happened here totally inconsistent with a balloon or nuclear monitoring device crash. And then you can see where topsoil, here and here, was moved to bury the target area and cover up all these tracks—and smoothed over. Why would they have gone to so much trouble to cover up a balloon crash? That’s a lot of earthmoving.”

She scrutinized the survey more closely in the confines of the car. There were signs of a lot of old activity extending from the target area.

Tappan smiled. He took out another chart and unrolled it. This was obviously a magnetometer survey, a tool archaeologists used to record the magnetic properties of soil for mapping subsurface terrain. There were various anomalies and dark spots in and around the target area. The disturbed area with its faint furrow was also vaguely delineated.

“All those dark spots and smudges are what we laymen would call ‘buried stuff,’” said Tappan. “Stuff that your excavation will unearth.”

“It could be anything,” Nora said. “Rocks, tin cans, trash.”

Tappan tapped the charts with a finger. “Maybe so, but this proves one thing: The government lied. There was no weather balloon or secret nuclear surveillance device. Why would they lie?”

He stared at her with gray, searching eyes. It was a fair question.

“And the lying goes on,” Tappan said. “A few years ago, the government allegedly declassified its files on UFOs. There was some startling stuff in there, as you probably know—videos of objects taken by fighter pilots and so forth. But even earlier they had released documents indicating the Roswell crash was not a weather balloon, but a classified government device, developed at Los Alamos for detecting aboveground nuclear blasts. It was being tested but got away in high winds and crashed at the Roswell site. The ‘disk’ that witnesses described was actually a radar reflector, used for tracking purposes.”

“Sounds reasonable,” she said. “That might explain the furrow—the thing getting dragged along the ground, perhaps.”

“The furrow is at least fifteen feet deep. No—the nuclear device with a radar detector attached was also misinformation: a second layer of it. First a weather balloon, then a secret surveillance device. All disinformation. Nothing to see here, folks! The real Roswell files—and the artifacts and debris they found at the site—remain secret.”

She shook her head. “And the alien bodies?” she asked sarcastically.

He smiled. “Look, the point is, there’s more to be found at the crash site. You can see it in these two surveys. A professional archaeological excavation would reveal what, exactly: not only a ground disturbance, but something more…perhaps much more.” He rolled up the maps. “What do you say, Nora?”

“Um, are these charts all you’ve got?”

“All? I think it’s quite a lot. Look, I didn’t want the Institute. I wanted you. I thought you’d probably quit when you heard the proposal, and I was right.”

“You were wrong. I was fired.”

He chuckled. “Now that I’ve met you, I can see how that might have happened. Digby, that poor homunculus…” He shook his head sadly. “Have you really been reporting to him these last six months?”

Nora deflected the question. “Why me?” she asked. “There’s plenty of archaeologists out there.”

“I followed the Victorio Peak treasure story with great interest. And then I acquainted myself with the work you did at Donner Pass and, before that, the Quivira site. I don’t want some slope-shouldered academic. You’ve got all the qualities I need: courage, ability, perseverance, judgment. I built my business by finding the right people.”

She watched almost with regret as he snapped rubber bands back on the charts and put them away.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I can’t do this. I just can’t.”

“I’m not asking you to make a decision now. All I’m asking is that you come and see the site for yourself. Meet the team, look at the evidence. The site is on Bureau of Land Management property. I’ve got all the federal permits, equipment, engineers, a couple of semidomesticated postdocs—everything necessary for a first-class excavation. All I need is a credentialed archaeologist. I’m offering a good salary.”

She shook her head.

“My chopper is waiting at Sunport Aviation. We can be at the site in just over an hour, and you’ll be home by six. Or if you decide to stay, you’ll have a custom Airstream to yourself for the night.”

She sighed. The “good salary” part, at least, was tempting. She and Skip shared a house, and they were always scrambling to pay the mortgage. Santa Fe was an expensive town, and the Institute was not exactly generous.

“I’m very sorry,” she said, opening the door and getting out. She turned to see Tappan looking back at her with surprise and dismay. He clearly wasn’t used to having people turn him down. “Thank you for the offer, but I’m afraid I have to decline.”

She closed the door and went back to her car, wondering as she did so if she’d just made the worst mistake of her life.





3



NORA ARRIVED HOME at their small house on the south side of town. She dropped her box of stuff on the kitchen counter, tossed the backpack in the corner, put the pot on for coffee, and flopped down in a chair. Mitty, their golden retriever rescue, came rushing over, wagging his tail so hard his entire back end was swaying. He pushed his nose into her hand. She petted him absentmindedly, wondering what the hell she was going to do now. It was one o’clock and the day stretched ahead endlessly. Maybe she should start sending out CVs.