CHAPTER 8
Five minutes later they rounded a bend in the canyon and Moody saw that which he had been anticipating.
The multisided domed structure was much smaller than the average motor home. It was built of mud or adobe, with a roof that came to a slight point. To the detective it most nearly resembled a Mongolian yurt, which he was familiar with only because he’d seen one on an International Geographic special on the Divit channel one night when the game he’d planned to watch had been pre-empted.
A dog of indeterminate breed lay in a path of sunshine in front of the building.
“Doesn’t look like anybody’s home.”
“Maybe because that is not the home.” Ooljee leaned forward, resting both hands on the wheel. “That’s an old hogan. You would be surprised how warm it is in winter and how cool in the summer. There is something about sleeping on packed earth that puts you in touch with a whole range of feelings you miss while sleeping on water or foam or air-suspension. You should try it sometime.”
“Not in Florida,” Moody countered. “Too many creepy-crawlies.”
Ooljee drove past the hogan and the indifferent dog,
crossed the lazy stream that looked far too feeble to have cut the mighty canyon. It flowed quiet and unhurried, in no rush to find the next inch nearer sea level.
The second hogan looked much like the first except that it was considerably larger, two stories tall, and constructed of prefab plastic walls filled and insulated with blownfoam. Copper-tinted polarized windows regarded their surroundings, while from the central peak of the roof a large satellite dish pointed southward. Even though the canyon ran north-south, Moody knew that reception had to be limited.
Much of the roof was lined with tracking, hi-dope solar panels. A large rectangular building with few windows dominated the yard behind the hogan. A twinge of recognition went through Moody when he noted that the entrances to both buildings faced east. He was beginning to feel a little less like an intruder.
Next to the creek stood a large abstract sculpture that on closer inspection turned out to have a practical function. Brightly hued metal poles supported a roof of artificial tree limbs. They varied in color from deep raw purple to intense blue to a light rose, shifting subtly within the metal itself. The poles looked too thin to support their sculpted burden.
“That’s a summer shelter,” Ooljee explained, “or rather a modem interpretation of a traditional one whose boughs would have to be replaced every year. This one is more practical, but I miss the wood.”
He didn’t know what the remarkable metal was, though. They were to find out later that it was anodized titanium.
As Ooljee parked in front of the building two more mutts materialized to greet them. One might have had some honest shepherd in him, but Moody wasn’t sure. Both were curious and friendly.
He hung back and let Ooljee ring the bell, hunting in vain for some visible security device like a scanner or heat sensor. It was either expensively concealed or nonexistent. Probably not needed here. This wasn’t Metropolitan Tampa. Besides, anyone trying to steal from a home in this canyon would find himself with but one avenue of escape, easily closed off.
Not that the man who opened the door looked like he’d need any help subduing an intruder. He was taller than Moody and just as heavy, though his weight was far more aesthetically distributed on his bones. He looked like one of the Bucs’ better linebackers. In point of fact he had played football, though only on the college level.
He chatted with Ooljee for a bit, then stepped out and favored Moody with the kind of big, down-home country smile the detective hadn’t encountered much since leaving Mississippi. He felt immediately at home.
“Yinishye Bill Laughter.” He looked to be in his early or mid-thirties. His handshake was as solid as the rest of him, though Moody was quick to note that unusual pressure of the index finger along the back of the hand.
“Vernon Moody. I’m—”
“Paul has told me.” He beckoned for them to follow. “Come on around back. I’d take you through the house, but Marilee’s shopping and my dad’s watching the game.”
They walked around the building, with its views of creek and towering canyon walls. All three dogs accompanied them, one sniffing at the detective’s heels, the other two scouting ahead.
The big, bamlike structure behind the house turned out to be an industrial workshop. Moody had expected cars or trucks, perhaps even a gyrocopter, maybe farm equipment; not an artistic assembly-line. Acrylic bins overflowing with colored sand lined one wall. Long benches and tables occupied the middle of the floor, flanked by stacks of flat boards cut from high-quality hardwood, sheets of metal, rolls of flexifan.
There was a section set aside for welding, with its own scrapmetal yard and anodizing equipment, as well as a potter’s comer with clay, electronically controlled wheel, and flash kiln. A big commercial-grade laser cutter dominated a back table like a lost piece of army ordnance.
Finished sandpaintings were stacked neatly in sorting racks, next to framing equipment. Laughter even had his own seal-wrapping machine and shipping materials. The paintings themselves varied considerably in size, from miniatures a few inches square to a pair of eight-by-ten foot monsters leaning against the near wall. Ooljee asked about them before Moody could.
“They are for the new terminal going in at Casa Grande International Airport.” Laughter was obviously proud of his work. “They’ll be viewed from a distance, hence the outlandish proportions. As you can see, all the designs and yeis are rendered oversized.”
“What’s a yei?” Moody inquired.
“A spirit. A god. A person. It depends. Yei-bei-chei. Yei for short.”
The two young men working near the back of the shop paid little attention to the newly arrived visitors.
“Apprentices. My assistants,” Laughter explained.
Moody watched as one of them prepared to apply an adhesive base to a foot-square piece of thin metal. His companion finished adjusting a protective mask, then turned to his left and picked up a hose-and-nozzle arrangement. It hissed like a snake giving warning as he sprayed transparent fixative over a quartet of finished sandpaintings.
“They do a lot of the drudge work.” Laughter studied the pieces with a critical eye. “It frees me to concentrate on painting and design.”
Moody was still a bit taken aback by the sheer scale and mass production aspects of the operation. To him it didn’t look much like art. But then what did he know?
“You don’t paint. You use sand.”
“Paint is just a medium. Sand is another.” Laughter indicated a custom industrial easel that held a half-finished sandpainting.
“In the old days you had to lay sand fast because your adhesive would set up. That made for some sloppy work. This is much better. I use a debondable elastomeric transparent adhesive. You can cover a whole board with it and work on any section you want without worrying about the rest drying out in the meantime. The next day you just spray the area you want to work on with the debonder and it becomes malleable again. None of it sets up hard until you apply the fixative. As for a paintbrush—” He reached behind a nearby workbench.
Moody flinched instinctively when Laughter emerged holding what looked like a gun. In an industrial sense, it was. Instead of emitting a high-powered stream of fine grit to scour away old paint and varnish, Laughter’s sandblaster had been modified to apply sand. The width and impact of the stream could both be manipulated electronically. A built-in switch allowed the attached vacuum hose to select from any of the nearby bins of colored sand. The whole contraption was no bigger than an automatic pistol. One hose connected it to its air supply, a second to the sand distributor. The custom device was a compact cross between a sandblaster and an airbrush.