Hwelte: The Mustang

By Roy McShane

"The Old West collides with World War II."

In Roy McShane's second installment of his trilogy, HWELTE, bomber pilot First Lieutenant Chuck Hewitt returns home wounded from Stalingrad, in 1943, to his parent's ranch at Flagstaff, Arizona. He's a broken man looking for answers-ultimately finding those answers in the extraordinary history of his white grandfather's and Navajo grandmother's struggle to forge a life together against all odds in the 1880s.

Inspired by his grandparent's hardships, Chuck decides to get back in the war and transfers into fighters. He eventually winds up in England, in 1944, with the 354th Fighter Group-the first group to fly and fight over Europe in the new, revolutionary P-51 Mustang. Whereupon, after his initial mission escorting B-17s over Germany, Chuck makes a startling discovery about the common denominator fighter pilots and bomber pilots share: They are all condemned men living on death row.

"...McShane's descriptions of the American West, and the air war in Europe during World War II, are the best I've ever read." -San Francisco Bay Guardian

"The Old West collides with World War II. Strap in and hold on for the ride of your life..." -Los Angeles New Times

"...a western, a war story, a flying story and a love story, McShane pulls them all together with exciting realism." -St. Louis Post-Dispatch

HWELTE (whell-`tay) n. Navajo: meaning fortress or place of refuge.

Author's Websites: www.thaiwave.com/hwelte
www.phuketdir.com/hwelte

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 6, 2004
• ISBN: 9780595754076

Book preview

All Rights Reserved © 2003 by Roy McShane

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any

means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

iUniverse, Inc.

For information address:

iUniverse, Inc.

2021 Pine Lake Road, Suite 100

Lincoln, NE 68512

www.iuniverse.com

ISBN: 0-595-30575-X

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

chapter 1

chapter 2

chapter 3

chapter 4

chapter 5

chapter 6

chapter 7

chapter 8

chapter 9

chapter 10

chapter 11

chapter 12

EPILOGUE

For the men who served with the 4th and 354th Fighter Groups

during World War II.

You were the Class of’45—you were legends in your own time.

Pronunciation and Definition

HWELTE (whell-’tay) n. Navajo: meaning fortress or place of refuge.

Acknowledgments

I wish to extend a special thanks to my editor, Regine Schumacher, whose experiences in wartime Germany greatly influenced the historical accuracy of this novel.

Contact Information

To contact the author, please use: www.thaiwave.com/hwelte

Be assured all e-mails will be answered.

For those readers interested in illustrations of the aircraft mentioned in this

novel, please use the Aircraft Index at:

www.phuketdir.com/hwelte

chapter 1 

BOXTED, Station 150,

LANGHAM, ESSEX, ENGLAND

March 7th, 1944

First Lieutenant Charles Benjamin Hewitt shivered in the damp cold and F found himself wanting to urinate, but knew it was mostly just from nerves and having to wait. He was standing with two other American pilots also decked out in their flight gear. A Dodge weapons carrier had recently brought them from the squadron’s ready-hut and dropped them off at the edge of the hardstands. They were trying to use the side of a small shack, built by the crew chiefs out of packing cases, as a wind break with little success. Despite the additional clothing they had donned in the equipment room, they were discovering that the wet English wind sliced right through it.

Four clammy, wet fighters waited for them on their individual hardstands. With engines running, they glistened sleek and dark in the dull, gray light of morning, as water ran off their trailing edges. Chuck Hewitt watched the four crew chiefs run the fighters up and complete their checks of the engines. He paid particular attention to them that morning and couldn’t help appreciating the care these men took in preparing the aircraft for them.

Then, as the engines were silenced one by one, Chuck began to notice something else about these fighters. Their appearance seemed to be tougher and crustier than the Stateside versions and, as he really began to study them to determine why, Chuck found their olive-drab paint and the white paint of their recognition stripes on wings and tail plane had peeled back from leading edges and rivet heads, exposing the bare aluminum underneath. There was also the stubborn residue of previous engine exhaust and oil stains down the sides of the fuselage, plus the beginnings of gray-faded ribbons that started at the gun ports in the wings. These were the stains left by gun dust, the exhaust signatures of the Browning M2 .50 caliber machine guns being fired in anger, the muzzles of which were now tape-sealed.

As he continued his scrutiny, Chuck began to discover the occasional metal patches which pockmarked the skin of these fighters from hits received on previous missions. Some were newly painted, while others were still in original bare metal. These were relatively new fighters from the factory, but combat had its own unique way of aging them quickly.

Chuck swung his electric-blue eyes from the combat veteran aircraft to his companions...and immediately became a little ill. They could be classified as typical all American boys; athletic, clean-cut, baby-faced innocents. Combat virginity was written all over them. Chuck’s combat experience in Russia had given him an edge, a taste of what lay ahead. It had also physically aged him, making his handsome, rugged, dark features appear older than his twenty-four years. He knew these two kids had no concept of what lay ahead for them and wondered what their chances of survival would be. For that matter, he now wondered about his own.

Chuck knelt at the edge of the concrete hardstand, lowering his lean, athletic six-foot-two frame, and began to massage his souvenir from Russia. He wondered if his aching right calf was merely psychosomatic or if the old wound was just acting up from the cold and damp. As he kneaded the scar tissue and muscle where the 20-mm splinter had entered and exited, a gift from the German Luftwaffe, Chuck began to play his usual mental game.

It was his way of accepting the loss of Tamara, perhaps the only woman he would ever love. In his mind, he saw her standing just at the periphery of his vision, over his right shoulder. In reality, Chuck felt her presence more than he actually imagined he could see her. In any event, she was there wearing her leather helmet, goggles, greatcoat and boots with her Tokarev automatic strapped to her waist. Just as he had seen her so many times in December of ‘42, before she launched as a Free Hunter on a patrol mission over Stalingrad, in her Yak fighter.

She smiled at him, not only with that beautifully warm mouth, but with her soft-blue eyes. It was her way of letting Chuck know he was on the right track, that she was there for him. Gradually, the ache in his leg went away.

Chuck glanced over at his two companions. How could they possibly grasp what Tamara had been like? The most beautiful Russian woman Chuck had ever laid eyes on; patient, self-sacrificing, a deadly fighter ace and cunning hunter.

The thought brought a slight smile as he remembered the hours she had sat with him in that miserable, underground bunker, patiently sharing the secrets of her deadly trade. How could he possibly explain to these men the incredible luck he had experienced at stumbling across such an extraordinary woman? Quite literally only a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence.

Before Chuck left Russia, Tamara had not returned from her last mission and was listed as MIA (Missing In Action). Another present from the Luftwaffe. At first he had allowed it to almost destroy him, but now, Chuck used his loss to fill himself with a terrible resolve; revenge. It was time to face the demon in his lair and settle accounts. He was through hiding and licking his wounds. After a great deal of effort, and bucking the military system, Chuck had finally reached Europe. Now he was about to discover if Tamara’s patient tutelage was either a complete waste of time, or would actually give him a much-needed edge in air combat.

Regardless of the outcome, Chuck would still carry her in his heart as long as he could draw breath. So what harm was there in his little game? Feeling her presence, seeing her in the periphery of his vision standing behind his right shoulder, accepting the warmth of her smile and the support of her gentle spirit.

Upon his return to America, from Russia, Chuck could have easily nailed down a soft job Stateside as a B-25 instructor, playing it safe and staying out of the shooting war. But there was this large, personal score between himself and the German Luftwaffe that needed settling, which wouldn’t allow him to play it safe.

Still, the idea of sitting helplessly in a bomber’s cockpit and being shot to pieces again, as had occurred when he was delivering a lend-lease B-25 to the Soviet Air Force, held very little appeal to him. So, though it took time and hardheaded persistence, he eventually managed to pull some strings; getting out of bombers and into something a little more offensive like fighters.

He wangled a transfer to the 20th Pursuit Group at Paine Field in Everett, Washington, and checked out in the P-39D and in due course the new P-51B Mustang. Then, after a stint at the bombing and gunnery range at Tonopah, Nevada, Chuck was shipped overseas to England for reassignment with a fighter group.

Upon arrival in England, however, Chuck was first assigned to the 496th FTG (Fighter Training Group) for ETO indoctrination (European Theatre of Operations).

After getting a few more hours in the Mustang, he was then released for assignment with a fighter group. And that’s how it came to pass on that wet morning in March of 1944 that Chuck found himself, along with his two green colleagues, assigned as a replacement Sprogs to the 354th Fighter Group based at Boxted, three miles north of Colchester, in Essex.

Barely four months previously, the 354th itself had been shipped over from the States and issued the new, long-range North American P-51B Mustang.

However, the brainchild of North American Aviation’s Dutch Kindelberger, was new only to the U.S. Army Air Forces. It had been originally designed for the British Royal Air Force, proven by them in combat during the previous two years, and nicknamed by their Air Ministry as the Mustang. Only after the RAF began having incredible success with the P-51, did the USAAF finally tear itself away from the P-47 and P-38; taking another look at the new Rolls-Royce powered P-51B Mustang. Its unusual performance and long-range greatly excited them, developing high hopes for this new wonder fighter.

Somehow, the 354th was the first fighter group to be assigned the new Mustang. The reasoning behind this, other than the fact the group was the new kid on the block, baffled Chuck.

Which brings us to another anomaly concerning this fighter group. The 354th really had an odd setup, for it was administratively controlled by the 9th Air Force while, at the same time, being operationally controlled by the 8th Air Force, making it a legitimate child of neither. It smelled to Chuck like this was some huge USAAF experiment and, if the 354th failed with this new fighter, neither the 9th or the 8th Air Forces would take any heat as long as they maintained their distance from the crash.

On the plus side of the experiment, though, was the arrangement at Boxted. It appeared to Chuck to be really first rate, as far as airbases go. For starters, it had three concrete runways, two of which ran 4,200 feet in length, while the third ran 6,000 feet in length, plus forty-three dispersal loops, and six pans. Each of the fighter group’s three squadrons had its own maintenance hangar, engineering and operations building, plus separate living areas with numerous Nissen huts for both officers and enlisted men. The base was designed to accommodate 2,894 personnel, had its own group headquarters complex and hospital, plus two large mess halls, and separate officer’s and NCO’s clubs. And, all of this modern military convenience, was neatly nestled in the picturesque English countryside.

In all honesty though, despite his persistent feeling of being a guinea pig, Chuck genuinely liked this new fighter they called the Mustang. In most respects he found it to be far superior to the P-39 and was eager to get more time in the craft. He was also impatient to get this first orientation flight with the group out of the way, and get some missions under his belt, thus elevating his status from that ofSprog to Sport.

He and his fellow neophytes had been assigned to an Old Sport that morning, a combat veteran captain and substitute squadron leader, whose job it was to size them up. In other words, to determine how much additional training they’d need before taking them out on their first combat mission.

They had already placed their B-8 backpack parachutes inside their assigned fighters, along with the K-type one-man life rafts attached to the parachute’s harness with snap ring assemblies, and which served the additional role of seat cushion. Since they had also completed their respective pre-flight inspections, with their crew chiefs in tow, there was nothing else to do but wait for the captain to show and try vainly to keep out of the cutting wind. The captain had been held up by a last-minute phone call at the squadron’s ready-hut.

As his two companions chain-smoked and joked nervously in their heavy flight gear, replete with yellow B-3 Mae West life vests, Chuck found himself deliberately staying aloof. He sensed their apprehension.. .their fear, treating it like a contagious disease, wanting no part of it or them.

Finally, the captain arrived in a Dodge command car. As he climbed out, the captain ordered the non-com driver to stand by until he was airborne. As he approached Chuck and his companions, Chuck stood up. Then a crew chief ran over and relieved the captain of his parachute with attached dinghy pack, taking it to the captain’s fighter. After apologizing for holding up the show, the captain gave them a quick review on some of the important points from the morning’s briefing on their training exercise. The man was two years junior to Chuck but, as Chuck eyed him coldly, he at last figured out what it was about the captain he didn’t like. For a seasoned combat veteran the captain seemed to speak a little too fast, too loud, and laugh too quickly at his own bad jokes. Chuck began to sense the man was wrapped a bit too tight for this job. It made Chuck uneasy.

The date was March 7th, 1944, and, as the captain continued his spiel, Chuck watched a Mustang lift off into the English spring morning with its high overcast. A patch of dull, gray sunlight glinted off the fighter’s wet olive-drab back, as it climbed like a frisky colt to 2,500 feet, then banked sharply left. It was a routine maintenance test flight. The captain cracked another bad joke. All three men laughed like nervous schoolgirls. and Chuck watched the Mustang break in half! Its long nose, containing the engine, going in one direction while its engine-less fuselage, with wings and tail section attached, fell in the opposite direction.

Shit! Chuck exclaimed. I should have stayed in bombers!

His words stopped the young captain in mid-sentence. Startled, the captain first looked at Chuck, then over his shoulder in the direction Chuck was staring with his mouth agape.

All four men suddenly became like some monument to aviation, standing there in all their flight gear, frozen like statues. And, for the first time that morning, they became totally oblivious to the cold, unable to comprehend what their eyes were seeing since their stunned minds were refusing the image.

At first the engine-less Mustang tumbled, then flattened out, and spun like a ruptured, falling leaf. The G forces in the cockpit had to be unbelievable, like some unseen giant’s fist crushing the pilot into his bucket seat. There was no physical way the pilot could possibly extract himself.

So Chuck and his three companions simply stood there watching help-lessly.waiting for the man at the controls of that Mustang to die. He didn’t disappoint them.

The engine ran wildly for a moment, then fell silent shortly before it struck the ground with a dull, distant thump, burying itself from sight in shame within an erupting fountain of mud.

Then came the pilot trapped inside his broken, bizarre, spinning craft. It impacted roughly a couple of hundred yards from the engine, with a sickening snap and crunch from the rending aluminum skin and collapsing airframe. A plume of water and sod shot skyward as a wing and the tail section broke off. Then the water, sod and aircraft parts fell back to earth and it became very quiet. There was no fire, no explosion...nothing. All that remained was a half-submerged broken hulk with its camouflaged paint scheme blending neatly into the flat, wet landscape. Aside from a fragment of white here and there, the remnant of a star and bar or recognition stripe, there was little indication of any aircraft actually being out there, giving Chuck the impression that what he had just witnessed hadn’t really happened after all.

The captain looked back at Chuck; he was chalk white. Then he told the men to wait there, mumbled something about making another phone call, and left in the command car.

Now the airfield erupted with frantic activity as two British-made Fordson WOT1 fire-fighting tenders, an Austin K2/Y ambulance with clanging bell, several jeeps, a Dodge command car, plus a mob of people on bicycles and on foot, appeared from every direction. All dashed for the same objective; the fallen Mustang’s remains.

Chuck walked slowly away from the others. At length he came to the hard-stand containing his assigned P-51B Mustang. Walking up to its left side, he stopped and took a long, hard look at the fighter.

Fear rose inside him like vomit and choked in his throat, making him want to run. It was a new type of fighter and obviously had some very serious flaws still to be worked out. All new types had them at first, especially in wartime, when they were rushed, sometimes prematurely, into production. It took hundreds and, in some cases, thousands of flying hours to get out all the bugs. In time of war these risks came with the territory and a pilot had to accept them.

But to break in half like that., Chuck thought, to just fucking break in half! What kind of flying suicide coffin is this?

There was a name painted on the long, sleek nose of this particular Mustang which they had assigned to him. A name left by a previous owner, who had flown another Mustang on a mission while this one was being repaired, and who was now listed as KIA (Killed In Action). The name was scrawled in peeling, dirty-white letters and simply stated: SPARE PARTS. It had acquired this unusual name from the fact that it was actually the product of a compilation of parts from two different Mustangs. One had been shot up so badly on a mission it was damaged beyond all economical repair. And the other, upon arriving in England by ship, had been dropped dockside in its original crate.

Chuck had gotten the aircraft’s history from his crew chief, a story that didn’t exactly inspire a lot of confidence to begin with. But now, after seeing this other Mustang literally fall apart in midair, he wondered if perhaps the name on his fighter wasn’t trying to tell him something.

Then, what really began to disturb him was the fact that Tamara was no longer standing behind his right shoulder, in the periphery of his vision. All of a sudden, Chuck was very much alone. Doubt flooded into the pit of his stomach like ice water. And, once again, Chuck wanted to know what in the hell he thought he was doing here, thinking that he could possibly exact anything that would even remotely resemble revenge against Mr. Hitler’s mighty Luftwaffe? What on earth was he attempting to prove?

chapter 2 

CANYON DEL MUERTO, ARIZONA

January 18th, 1943

It was very cold. But Chuck found it to be a dry cold, which didn’t really 1. seem to bite through him, the way the cold had in Russia. Just the same, he had built a small fire in the center of the kiva and sat close to it. Its warmth felt good and it comforted him to hear the pinion wood pop and crackle. His wounded leg was healing rapidly now, but the cold still caused it to be stiff and ache miserably. Chuck had surrendered his crutch for a cane, because the leg, as yet, couldn’t support his full weight. He sat cross-legged before the fire, closed his eyes and made himself relax, just as his Navajo grandmother had taught him.

Chuck had arrived at his family’s ranch, outside Flagstaff, only four days ago. Russia was still a vivid reality and the cause of his bad dreams and restlessness.

Borrowing the family pickup truck yesterday, he had packed some camping supplies and drove most of the day to Canyon de Chelly, camping on the canyon’s floor last night. Rising at dawn, he had taken a cold breakfast and drove the ‘39 Ford pickup to Canyon del Muerto, the Canyon of the Dead. Taking the climb up the narrow path on the cliff’s face slowly with his weak leg, he didn’t reach the ancient Anasazi cliff dwellings until late in the morning.

Chuck found the same underground kiva his grandmother had brought him to last summer. He then descended into the blackness of its bowels on a new pine ladder, carrying firewood, a GI flashlight, and hope.

For Chuck Hewitt was a troubled young man hunting for answers, praying that he could somehow unlock secrets he knew lay hidden in this particular kiva. The secrets he was certain his full blood Navajo grandmother, Naashjeii Asdzaa (Spider Woman), had left for him to find. Her baptized Christian name had been Sarah.

Last November, almost two months ago, his grandmother had mysteriously disappeared with the family pickup truck and one of the Navajo ranch hands. Four days later the ranch hand returned alone with the pickup. He appeared to be badly shaken and, for a day and a half, the Navajo refused to communicate with anyone or leave his shack. Finally Chuck’s father, Matthew, took some whiskey to the ranch hand’s cabin and deliberately got him drunk. His name was Johnny Tall-Boy, he was a 40-year-old full blood Navajo from Gallup and, in time, when the liquor had loosened him up, the Indian told Matthew Hewitt a very strange story.

He had driven Chuck’s 77-year-old grandmother, Sarah Hewitt, to Canyon del Muerto, where they made camp at the base of the cliff in the stand of cot-tonwoods below the ancient cliff dwellings. An old singer, or Navajo medicine man, was waiting for them in the cottonwoods, whom Johnny Tall-Boy had never seen before. Later, that same afternoon, both Sarah Hewitt and the old singer made the climb up to the cliff dwellings. When night fell, they didn’t return.

On the morning of the next day, Johnny Tall-Boy saw smoke coming out of the ancient sweat lodge. Someone was undergoing purification. However, he detected no other movement in or around the cliff dwellings. All he saw was the rising smoke.

That night, still alone, Johnny Tall-Boy cooked his supper, ate it in silence, then crawled uneasily into his bedroll among the cottonwoods. He found it difficult to sleep, but at last gradually dozed off.

Later on, however, he abruptly awoke and checked the luminous dial on his watch: it was just after 1:00 AM. He laid there for a while as he tried to determine what had brought him out of sleep.

At length he realized what it was. There were none of the usual night sounds from birds, insects, or the wind. Nothing.only dead quiet. His campfire had also died out, but there was a half-moon and, in its cold light, he suddenly felt very frightened. Then, in the far distance, he heard the echo of a single beating drum, faintly drifting down from the cliff dwellings. And, after awhile, it was joined by an eerie, quavering voice, singing an unfamiliar chant.

For close to an hour the ranch hand lay in his bedroll, wishing the drum beat and chanting would stop. Because it meant the graves of the Anasazi, or the old ones, up in the cliff dwellings, were being disturbed by the living, making this a good place to encounter a ghost. Which additionally meant this was a very bad place for Johnny Tall-Boy to be. He then prayed that what he heard was in fact the old singer, and not a trick being played by the ghost of an old one. He also listened for whistling and looked for owls, coyotes, and indefinable black shapes; the usual indicators that ghosts were present.

Half of Johnny Tall-Boy wanted to vacate the premises immediately, while the other half was frightened of showing up at the Hewitt ranch without Sarah Hewitt. Against his better judgment, Johnny Tall-Boy chose to stay.

Then, as if the very breath of life were being sucked out of the canyon, a wind of great force came rushing up the canyon’s floor and, in the cold light of the moon, the Navajo saw a dust devil twist past his camp, the sight of which paralyzed him. For Johnny Tall-Boy was certain it was a ghost.

Angry cumulonimbus cloud boiled over the canyon’s rim as lightning exploded and spat from its bowels. Thunder rumbled through the canyon in long rolling echoes, bouncing back and forth off Canyon del Muerto’s sheer rock cliffs. The cottonwoods writhed and twisted about the ranch hand from the raging wind, as if they also desired to run away. But, like Johnny Tall-Boy, they appeared to remain rooted in place out of fear.

Violently the wind and lightning increased its intensity, stinging the Navajo’s eyes with bursting light and flying sand. Impatiently Johnny Tall-Boy cringed inside his bedroll, waiting for the storm to subside, as an eternity seemed to pass. Anxiously he looked at his watch, praying that dawn was near. To his amazement it was only 2:39 AM. But, as he checked the time, his campsite all at once seemed to reflect a very strange blue-white light.

Rolling over in his bedroll, he looked at the source of this peculiar light.. .which then practically stopped his heart. A huge, solitary bolt, of what appeared like lightning, was exploding from the center of the cliff dwellings, showering glowing shards of rocks and boulders out over the canyon like white-hot comets! The blue-white bolt snaked upward.higher and higher.. .until finally impaling the huge thundercloud squatting over the top of the canyon, like some darkly-brooding, great giant. For a fraction of a second, this hot, writhing ribbon of energy connected the heart of the cliff dwellings with the thunder-head. Then it severed itself from the center of the ancient apartments and rose.. .twisting its way up into the viscera of the cumulonimbus and vanishing. After which it seemed to detonate a series of electric explosions deep within the thundercloud, causing flashes of light and earsplitting thunder to slam over Johnny Tall-Boy’s body.

Ultimately more writhing white-hot veins of lightning issued from the bottom of the cumulonimbus. These bolts striking both the canyon’s rim and floor, exploding boulders and rocks into the air like bits of glowing phosphorous, and igniting dry vegetation into numerous, isolated fires.

Johnny Tall-Boy buried his body into the bedroll, convinced the deities were about to suck away his life. While thunder from this last spectacular display hammered him into the canyon floor, vibrating the trunk of his body like a hollow reed. He was certain the thunder would never end until every last spark of life had been pounded from his body.

But in time, by some miracle, it did begin to recede, leaving life in his body intact, as it rumbled down the canyon, causing several rock slides in its wake.

In the end Johnny Tall-Boy burrowed out of his bedroll and looked with terror about him, amazed at his survival. The wind was losing its force as the thundercloud moved beyond the canyon’s 900-foot vertical rim. It still angrily spat intermittent bolts of lightning, but with none of the rapidity or power of its previous display. Heavy rain now fell from its flat base, as it continued to recede in the distance.

With thunder still rumbling beyond the canyon’s rim, accompanied by the occasional distant flash of lightning, the Navajo then became aware of the great wind having spent its ferocity; his body at last being caressed by a mere icy breeze. Johnny Tall-Boy replaced his boots, buttoned up his heavy sheepskin coat, and pulled down his hat. He shivered, not from the cold, but from his close brush with the spirits of the night.

He also knew he wasn’t out of the woods yet. For he saw the isolated fires left by the lightning and was certain these were the residue of angry ghosts.. .who would be hunting him shortly.

Leaving everything behind, Johnny Tall-Boy had fled in the Hewitt pickup truck.

Matthew Hewitt patiently listened to the Navajo’s story. The ranch hand had worked on the Hewitt’s place, off and on, for the past ten years. In all that time he had proven himself fairly reliable and trustworthy. Aside from disappearing on a two or three-day drunk once in awhile, he had always been loyal to the Hewitt family. For him to abandon Sarah Hewitt like that, gave credence to his incredible story. Something unexplainable had definitely happened out there in the Canyon of the Dead.

The Navajo’s story filled Matt Hewitt with dread, making him wonder if he had lost Naashjeii Asdzaa, his mother, Sarah.

With a heavy heart, Matt drove into Flagstaff and paid a call on a man he had gone to school with as a boy: Dr. Thomas L. Gandee, MD. Everyone in town knew and respected this man and simply referred to him as Doc

Gandee. At fifty-one, he was a year older than Matt, but as kids he and Matt had shared many a bloody nose and black eye together. For whenever the white kids had ganged up on Matt, because he was a half-breed, Doc Gandee would throw himself into the fray, attempting to come to Matt’s rescue. Sometimes it had worked, sometimes it hadn’t, resulting in both of them getting stomped.

Since their days in school together, Doc Gandee and Matt Hewitt had remained the best of friends. He had been there for Matt the night Benjamin Hewitt, Matt’s father, died in 1919 of the Spanish influenza. And the following year Doc Gandee helped Irene, Matt’s wife, through the complicated birth of Matt’s only child, Chuck; after which Irene was never able to conceive again. Ten years later, Doc Gandee was there again for Matt when his grandfather, Hwelte, passed away. During birth, illness, or death, any time of the day or night, Doc Gandee had always been there for the Hewitt family.

Now Matt sat in Doc Gandee’s office about midday, and told his incredible story. When Matt had finished, Doc Gandee prescribed Old Crow, and poured the pair of them a stiff drink. Both old friends sat in an uneasy silence as they sipped their bourbon and digested Matt’s story.

Finally, Doc Gandee belted back the remainder of his libation, cleared his throat and said, Well, Christ-on-a-cracker, Matthew. Let me change my clothes, call my wife and cancel my appointments. Then we’d best hit the trail, we’re-a-burnin’ daylight.

And that was all that needed to be said. Matt had already packed camping provisions for two people in his pickup, because he knew he wouldn’t be going to Canyon del Muerto alone.

They camped at Chinle that first evening, then early the next morning made the descent into Canyon de Chelly. When they eventually reached the junction, where Black Rock Canyon forks to the right and Canyon del Muerto forks left, Matt and Doc Gandee found a group of roughly thirty Navajo waiting for them, along with horse-drawn wagons.

The crowd was largely made up of men, with a few women and children. Matt recognized some of their faces because they were from the Jemez clan, his mother’s clan.

One of the older Navajo males stepped forward and greeted Matt. He wore a cowboy hat over silver hair, a heavy red and black mackinaw coat, with Levis and boots, and he sported silver and turquoise earrings.

All the people in this crowd seemed solemn and a bit uneasy. No one spoke or smiled except this elder. Using the language of the Dine, or the People, as the Navajo refer to themselves, he conveyed that he was glad Matt had come, because none of the People would go up to Mummy Cave, which was their name for the cliff dwellings at Canyon del Muerto. He also told Matt that two young boys had seen the lightning four nights ago, as they tended their flock of sheep on the canyon floor. The People knew Naashjeii Asdzaa, or Spider Woman, was in Mummy Cave at the time, and were certain powerful medicine had occurred that night. That’s why they were afraid to go there. Then he asked if Matt was going there.

Matt nodded his head in the affirmative.

The old Navajo nodded in agreement, then turned and motioned to the others. The knot of people parted as two young men lifted something out of one of their wagons. Silently they walked over, placed it on Matt’s pickup and began to lash it to the roof and bed of the truck. It was a new, crudely-made pine ladder, close to eighteen feet long.

Matt and Doc Gandee looked at each other in bewilderment. Matt asked the old Navajo what the ladder was for.

Now the old man looked a bit uncomfortable. At last he said because there was no ladder inside the kiva.

Matt then asked him why not.

The old Navajo said, Because it has been turned into many pieces of charcoal, which the two boys found on the canyon floor. It fell on the boy’s sheep during the ‘night of the many lightnings’.

Matt translated what the old Navajo had told him to Doc Gandee, after which both men stood in an uncomfortable silence, each deeply lost in thought, as they watched the Navajos climb aboard their horse-drawn wagons and leave down Black Rock Canyon. At length, Matt and Doc Gandee got back into the pickup and, taking the left fork between sheer rock walls, entered Canyon del Muerto. Neither of them spoke throughout the rest of their journey.

There was a bite to the air and most of the trees they passed had already transformed their leaves into a rich gold or orange. They also passed the occasional six or eight-sided hogan with its log walls and earthen or adobe roof. Since the cultivated fields had already been harvested, most of the hogans were abandoned this time of the year. However, there were a few with families still in them, as signatures of telltale smoke, rising through the smoke holes in the roofs, indicated.

They reached the cliff dwellings at Canyon del Muerto a little before noon. Quickly setting up camp in the cottonwoods, they built a small fire, and had hot coffee and sandwiches. Studying the path up the face of the cliff, as they ate, they discussed how they would climb it to the cliff dwellings above.

Finishing their meal, they unlashed the ladder, and set out on foot for the base of the cliff. It was a difficult climb for both men, having to carry the ladder and pick their way along the worn switchback path, up the face of the cliff.

But, by taking it slowly, they in due course reached the massive cave’s floor, where the ancient-crumbling apartments of the Anasazi stood, without any serious mishap.

After resting from their climb, they located the kiva, then took the new ladder over to it. Laying the ladder down on the cave’s floor, they began to examine the kiva’s roof for structural integrity.

The roof of the underground kiva was a dome, rising about a foot off the cave’s floor, with a square entrance in the center where a ladder was normally positioned for entry. What caused Doc Gandee and Matt to examine the roof, were the large cracks that emanated from the edges of the entrance. As they inspected the entrance more closely, they discovered that it appeared to have been enlarged or, more accurately, blasted out. For portions of its adobe lip were missing, exposing whole sections of the log framework supporting it underneath. The adobe at the mouth of the entrance, that remained intact, also appeared to be melted like glass, while the log frames beneath were charred black. It gave them the impression that some great force, creating a tremendous amount of heat, had issued from the kiva through this solitary entrance.

Not completely trusting the roof, Matt eased himself down on his belly, and inched his way up to the entrance. He then stabbed the beam of his flashlight into the kiva’s black cavity. What met his light startled him.

His mother, Sarah, and his grandfather, Hwelte, had brought him to this kiva many times as a boy and young man. Over the years he had become familiar with its interior. What Matt had expected to see was the kiva’s smooth floor of white sand, or the charred remains of some terrible explosion.

Instead, the beam of his light revealed pictures of snakes, birds, horses, antelope and deer in bright shades of red, blue and green. There were other brightly painted creatures and objects also, which defied description. Such as Corn Bug on Moon, Arrow Snake People, Holy People Armed with Flint, Sky People, Cloud Houses, and Whirling Mountain. These, Matt could recognize, but still there were others which completely baffled him.

It was the most magnificent dry painting he had ever seen, if not the largest, for it seemed to cover every square inch of the kiva’s floor. Despite its size, the workmanship and detail were staggering, as were the materials used to construct it. Matt encountered brightly colored sands of every description, shells, real turquoise, feathers from different birds, various types of cornmeal, pollens, woods and sacred plants.

But there was something else about the dry painting.something which greatly disturbed Matt. He had never seen a dry painting laid out so strangely before. The idea of going down into the kiva suddenly became very unappealing to him. This dry painting frightened him. He could feel it had power.

The beam of Matt’s flashlight then touched something discordant at the dry painting’s center. It appeared to be a charred crater, as if some type of blast had occurred there. An object lay in the bottom of the crater. But it was impossible at this distance to make out any definition, other than it appeared to be just a dark lump.

Due to the questionable appearance of the kiva’s roof, both men decided not to be on it at the same time. Standing on the cave’s floor, Doc Gandee fed the ladder to Matt. Whereby, after resting it on the kiva’s roof for a moment, Matt carefully slid it down the black throat of the kiva’s entrance. It traveled twelve feet before bumping to a stop on the kiva’s floor.

Matt was about to descend into the kiva, when something his mother had taught him long ago slipped forward into his consciousness: To us the ashes of our ancestors are sacred and their resting place is hallowed ground. He didn’t know what exactly had made him think of that, but it caused him to step away from the ladder, and remove his boots. After which, he mounted the ladder in his white wool socks, stepped down a few rungs, and then looked up at Doc Gandee. Matt caught the puzzled expression on his friend’s face.

This is sacred ground, Doc, Matt said, then continued his descent.

Snapping on his flashlight again, and feeling for each rung, Matt eased himself down the ladder, occasionally stopping and checking the bottom of it with his light. Eventually he reached the last rung. The base of the ladder stood at the edge of the crater, requiring Matt to step off the ladder to one side. He did so gingerly and called out to Doc Gandee that he was off the ladder.

He hated to tread on the dry painting, for not only was it a remarkable thing of great beauty, but more importantly he was afraid of disturbing the power it possessed. It made him decidedly uncomfortable defiling it with his feet, causing him to restrict his movements.

Matt opened up his Levi jacket and rubbed his barrel chest. He took several deep breaths to calm himself down. He possessed a stocky build, standing a couple of inches shorter than the good doctor. His complexion was tanned and ruddy, with dark hair thinned out on top and graying at the temples. He hated dark places underground and was finding it a little difficult to breathe.

As Matt swung his flashlight across the dry painting, something caught the beam of his light, making him freeze. It was the design of a large, coiled white snake, surrounded by a circle of guardian sidewinders done in white, blue, yellow and black sand. Matt was shocked. He had heard about this design from his mother. She had warned him to beware of it, telling him the singers around Newcomb had ceased using this design, since one of their members had a very bad experience with it: Several years ago it had been used at a sing, where all the participants had died mysteriously.

Matt’s shock was compounded when he discovered three more of these designs, all four of which were surrounding and facing in towards the charred crater at the dry painting’s center. Why had his mother ignored her own warning? What was she doing with something so obviously dangerous as this? Matt Hewitt’s stomach turned to ice water.

It was deathly still inside the kiva and Matt now heard the ladder creak and groan as Doc Gandee placed his full weight on it. Turning around, Matt held the ladder for him and placed his light on each hand-whittled rung, so Doc Gandee could see where to put his feet. Matt was pleased to see his old friend had taken the time to remove his boots also. The Doc was a lanky individual, with a full head of curly-gray hair, and wore a battered leather jacket with faded Levis.

Reaching the bottom, Doc Gandee stepped gingerly off the ladder, snapped on his flashlight, and adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses.

Jesus, Joseph and Mary., he gasped in a rasping whisper, as if he were afraid his voice would disturb something or someone. Matt, look at this!

Doc Gandee held the beam of his light on the bottom of the kiva’s north wall. What appeared to be a small, Black boy lay sprawled on the floor, with his upper back and head resting against the base of the wall’s narrow stone bench. The body was a good twelve feet from the ladder and, because the angle was too great, it had prevented Matt’s beam of light from reaching the body, when he had previously shone his flashlight from the roof down through the Kiva’s entrance.

Both men stepped cautiously away from the ladder and carefully crossed the dry painting as they approached the prone figure. None of the dry painting around this small body appeared to have been disturbed. It gave Matt the eerie impression that this dark, little figure had been dropped there, right out of thin air. An involuntary shudder rippled up Matt’s spine.

The Dine, or Navajo, have an abhorrent fear of the dead. They always bury their dead right away, with elaborate precautions, which is done mainly to avoid the malignant part of the dead person; their ghost. For they believe this malignancy can return to avenge some neglect or offense. No matter how good the person was in life, their evil side has the ability to return. For the living, contact with such evil could bring about ghost sickness and death. That was mainly why Sarah Hewitt’s clan refused to come up to Mummy Cave and find her, coupled with their fear of the powerful medicine, which they knew had taken place inside the kiva. About now, Matt’s Navajo blood began wondering if he should have followed the clan’s example.

As the combined beams of their flashlights now converged, and they drew closer to the prone figure, more detail was revealed. Gradually, Matt realized the body wasn’t that of a boy after all. It was a small man...a very old, Black man.

Doc Gandee knelt next to the corpse and began to examine its left hand. The entire arm was very stiff and difficult to raise. Matt knelt on the other side of the small body. As Doc Gandee got the arm up and off the dry painting, Matt at once discovered this person wasn’t a Black man after all. To his amazement, it was a Navajo with the entire front portion of his flesh scorched black! The old man was naked except for the charred remnants of a buckskin breechclout.

Sweet Jesus wept.. .what happened to you? Doc Gandee whispered under his breath, as he began to examine the old Indian’s scorched face and charred hair.

Matt rose to a standing position but kept his light on the corpse. Numbly he began to deduce that this must be the old singer Johnny Tall-Boy had told him about. The Navajo medicine man that had met his mother at the cottonwoods and accompanied her up to the cliff dwellings. It was also most likely to be the same individual whom the ranch hand had heard chanting that night.

Matt.. .look at this, Doc Gandee whispered, as he pulled the old Navajo’s head forward, and illuminated the back of his skull. The head had an odd, flattened shape to it, and the silver hair back there wasn’t burnt, but contained a dark, dried stain; possibly blood. Doc Gandee spread the old man’s hair apart, revealing the scalp to be split open, with fragments of skull appearing along with dark globs of blood and brain. The back of his head.see here, it’s been crushed. How, in the name of heaven., Doc Gandee’s mystified whisper trailed off to nothing.

Doc.. .look up here, Matt said, as he shone his light a little above them on the kiva’s wall, directly above the body. There was a dark stain on the wall, as if someone had thrown a wet sponge against it, filled with dark-brown ink. The wall’s adobe plaster was freshly cracked by an impact at the center of the stain. From this point the stain ran down the wall in two long, thin streaks.

Allowing the corpse’s stiff torso to once again rest against the base of the wall’s narrow stone bench, Doc Gandee rose to his feet. Placing his light on the stain, he reached up and touched it. The stain consisted of dried blood, with tissue and bone fragments embedded in the wall’s crack. When Doc Gandee realized this, he immediately began sweeping the kiva’s floor with the light’s beam all around the corpse, as though he were desperately searching for something.

What is it, Doc? Matt whispered. What’re ya lookin’ for?

Signs of a struggle, came the doctor’s sharp-whispered reply.

Matt then assisted him with his own flashlight. Except for their own tracks, they found only the smooth undisturbed surface of the beautiful dry painting, and then the charred frame of a lightweight drum two yards from the body, towards the crater.

I want to look at the crater, Matt.

Okay, Doc.

Both men carefully approached the crater’s edge.

Look here, Doc.,Matt illuminated several moccasin imprints, and other indentations, in the dry painting’s surface. I think this is where the old singer was sitting when he sang his chant, Matt added.

My God, Matthew., Doc Gandee expelled under his breath, swinging his light from the crater to the old singer’s tracks, then beyond to the drum, and then where the body lay. These items were practically in a straight line back from the crater. The old Indian was blown back there from where he sat! Doc Gandee exclaimed. Then he shot the beam of his light up onto the stain on the kiva’s wall, and said, That’s how he crushed his head on that wall. The doctor dropped his flashlight’s beam from the stain to the corpse which lay directly under it, and added, Then he fell and bounced off the bench to the floor below. That’s why his flesh is so badly scorched, sweet Mother of God, there was some kind of explosion in here! I think we.

Matt interrupted him, his voice sounding strangled and pleading, as he cried, No! Oh please, dear God! No.no.

Doc Gandee turned around and looked at Matt, as his lanky frame shuddered a little and his light skin became a shade paler. For the good doctor found he hated the frigid darkness of the kiva and the mysteries it contained. Mysteries which grated on his Christian concepts. Basically, he was a man of science, who was being frightened by the things waiting for him here in the dark.. .and he hated being frightened worst of all.

Putting his light momentarily on Matt, Doc Gandee watched his stocky friend drop to his knees at the lip of the crater. Matt in turn held his flashlight’s beam on something inside the crater’s center.

What, Matt! Wh-what is it? Doc Gandee stammered, disturbed by his friend’s behavior. Moving next to Matt, he also swung the beam of his light onto the object in the crater that held Matt’s attention. At first it appeared to be some sort of darkly-burnt lump. But as he adjusted his glasses and really studied it, progressively the lump took on form and definition, causing Doc Gandee’s heart rate to shift into a much higher gear. It was the naked body of a small-boned person, sitting upright in the fetal position, with legs drawn up, arms around the legs, and the head down. It was impossible for the doctor to tell age or sex because the body was so badly charred.

Getting over his initial shock, the scientist in him went to work, as Doc Gandee attempted to analyze the situation. His efforts, though, only brought him more questions, frustration...and fear.

The crater was at the exact center of the dry painting. This is where the person, for whom the ceremony was being conducted, would sit naked. Judging by the depth of the crater, it had to have been one impressive blast. But why was the body still in the crater and only charred? Why hadn’t it been blown out of the crater and into a thousand pieces around the inside of the kiva? What the hell type of explosion had taken place here?

Totally mystified, Doc Gandee now knelt and, reaching below the crater’s lip, touched the crater’s surface. Straight away, the doctor wished he hadn’t, for it only increased his confusion and fear. The scorched-colored sand inside the crater had fused to glass.

Early in his career, Doc Gandee at one time had been a physician to a mining company. Having seen several accidents involving explosives, he possessed firsthand knowledge of their effect on rock, earth, sand, and the bodies of men. What he found here in the kiva, based on past experience, defied all reasonable explanation.

As Doc Gandee rose to his feet, he became aware that Matt was no longer at his side. Looking over his shoulder he found Matt moving about the kiva, frantically sweeping his light back and forth, apparently searching for something. Matt.what are you doing? Doc Gandee demanded in a harsh whisper, because his friend’s actions only added to his fear.

Totally absorbed in his desperate search, Matt didn’t answer. Moving around to the east wall, he abruptly froze. The beam of Matt’s light had caught something in one of the small alcoves. Slowly he reached inside and extracted a large, very old leather bag. Placing it on the kiva’s floor, he raised its flap and took out a man’s calico shirt, Levi jacket, pants, and heavy silver jewelry. Laying these articles down, Matt reached back into the alcove’s recess, and this time pulled out a faded-blue denim bag. Setting it down, Matt parted the drawstring, opened up the bag and removed a woman’s heavy, black velvet blouse and red skirt, silver and turquoise bracelets and squash-blossom necklace, plus a handwoven Navajo blanket.

Holding these last items to his chest, Matt dropped to his knees as he emitted a low, terrible moan. Then, burying his face in the clothing and blanket, he wept. For he had instantly recognized these meager possessions that belonged to his mother. There was no further doubt for him as to the identity of the small, charred body resting at the bottom of the crater.

Matthew Hewitt had been intimately familiar with his mother’s gifts and knew of her ability to tap into energy. But why had she chosen such a violent path out of this world? Had this been intentional? Or had something gone very wrong with the ceremony? These questions greatly disturbed him, making