ready to go.
Maddox strolled the length of the finished wall, caressing the beams. Then with a yell he seized a beam between two massive hands, jerked it back and forth as hard as he could, this way and that, stepped back and side-kicked the beams, shouted, screamed, swore, slammed his shoulders into the wall again and again. He spun, picked up the wooden table, and hurled it against the wall of beams, all the while shrieking, "Sons of bitches!
Bastards! I'll kill you all, I'll pull your guts
out
All at once he stopped, breathing heavily. From his knapsack he fished out a hand towel, dried the sweat off his chest and shoulders, patted his face, smoothed back his hair, then combed it back with his fingers. He picked up his shirt, slipped it on, flexed his back muscles.
Maddox allowed himself a grin. Nobody was going to bust out of his jail. Nobody.
3
WYMAN FORD SHOOK the dust out of the hem of his robes and sat down on the fallen, corkscrewed trunk of an ancient juniper. He had hiked almost twenty miles from the monastery and had reached the lofty heights of Navajo Rim, a great long mesa running for many miles along the southern boundary of the Echo Badlands. Far behind him lay the vermilion canyons of Ghost Ranch; and the view to the northwest was framed by the snowcapped peaks of the Canjilon Mountains.
Ford removed four 1:24,000 U.S.G.S. topographical maps from his backpack, unfolded them, and laid them side by side on the ground, weighing down the corners with stones.
He took a moment to orient himself, visually matching various landmarks to their corresponding outlines on the maps. With his binoculars he began searching the Echo Badlands, looking for a rock formation resembling the one on the computer plot.
Whenever he saw something promising, he marked its location on the map in red pencil.
After fifteen minutes he lowered the binoculars, encouraged by what he saw. He hadn't found a likely match, but the more he looked into the endless canyons crisscrossing the Echo Badlands, the more he was convinced that the formation containing the T. Rex would be found there. The domelike shape of the rock in the plot seemed to be typical of
the badland formations he could see from his vantage point. The problem was that much of his view was blocked by intervening mesas or canyon rims. Adding to his difficulties, the computer plot only showed a two-dimensional slice through the rock. There was no telling what the formation might look like from a different angle.
He raised the binoculars again to his eyes and continued searching, until he had covered all that he could see from that vantage point. It was time to move on to a point he had marked on the map as Vantage Point 2, a small butte at the far end of Navajo Rim that stuck up like an amputated thumb. It would be a long hike, but well worth the trouble. From there, he'd be able to see almost everything in the badlands.
He picked up his canteen, shook it, estimating that it was still more than half full- He had another, completely full, tucked away in his pack. As long as he was careful, he would have no problems with water.
He took a small sip and set off, following the edge of Navajo Rim.
As he hiked, he fell into a pleasant reverie brought on by the physical exertion. He'd told the abbot that he needed some spiritual time by himself in the desert, and he'd promised to be back by Terce the following day. That was now out of the question, and if he went into the badlands it might be two more days before he got back. The abbot wouldn't mind-he was used to Ford going off into the desert on spiritual retreats. Only this time Ford had the vague feeling that he was doing something wrong. He had misled the abbot as to the purpose of this trip; just because he prayed, fasted, and denied himself bodily comforts while in the desert did not mean he was on a spiritual quest. He realized he had allowed himself to become swept up in the intrigue of it, the mystery, the thrill of finding the dinosaur. The monastery had taught him the gift of self-reflection, something he'd never been too keen on before, and now he used that to reflect on his motives. Why was he doing this? It wasn't to recover the dinosaur for the American people, as much as he'd like to think he was acting from altruistic motives. It wasn't for money, and certainly not for fame.
He was doing this because of something deeper, a flaw in his character, a craving for excitement and adventure. Three years ago he had made a decision, impulsive at the time but by now well considered and confirmed by prayer, to retreat from the world and devote his life to serving God. Was this little expedition serving God?
Somehow, he didn't think so.
Despite these thoughts, as if in thrall to a power not his own, Brother Wyman Ford continued to hike along the windswept cliffs of Navajo Rim, his eye fixed on the distant
butte.
4
IAIN CORVU5, STANDING at the window, heard the phone-set chime on his desk
and the voice of his secretary announce, "Mr. Warmus from the Bureau of Land Management is on line one."
Corvus slipped quickly around behind his desk, picked up the phone, and assumed his friendliest voice.
"Mr. Warmus, how are you? I trust you received my permit application."
"Sure did, Professor. Got it right here in front of me." The western cracker accent grated across Corvus's ear. Professor. Where did they find these people?
"Any problems?"
"As a matter of fact there are. I'm sure it was just an oversight, but I don't see any locality data here."
"That wasn't an oversight, Mr. Warmus. I didn't include that information. This is an exceptionally valuable specimen, highly vulnerable to looting."
"I 'predate that, professor," came the long-distance drawl, "but the high mesas are a big place. We can't issue a museum paleontological collection permit without locality info."
"This specimen is worth millions on the black market. Giving out that information, even to the BLM, is a risk I'm reluctant to take."
"I understand that, sir, but here at the BLM we keep all our permit data under lock and key. It's very simple: no locality, no permit."
Corvus took a deep breath. "We could certainly give you a generalized location-"
"No, sir," the BLM man interrupted. "We specifically require township, range, section, and GPS coordinates. Otherwise we can't process it."
Corvus took a deep breath, tried to moderate his voice. "I'm concerned because, as you may recall, last year up in McCone County, Montana, a first-rate
diplodocus was nicked right after the permit was filed."
"Nicked?"
"Stolen."
The nasal voice went on tediously, "I'm not in the Montana district of the BLM, so I wouldn't know about a nicked diplodocus. Here in New Mexico we require locality coordinates to issue a collecting permit. If we don't know where the specimen is, how are we supposed to give you permission to collect it? Or to prevent someone else from collecting it? Should we put a moratorium on all nonprofit fossil collecting in the high mesas until you get your specimen? I don't
think so."
"I understand. I'll get you the locality data as soon as possible."
"See that you do. And another thing."
Corvus waited.
"There aren't any photos or a survey attached to the application. It's supposed to be in Appendix A. It's spelled out right there in the rules and regulations: 'Permittee must attach a scientific survey of the site, showing the fossil in situ, along with any remote-sensing surveys, if existing, as well as photographs of said specimen.' We've got to have some kind of proof that there's a fossil out there."
"The discovery is recent and the site is remote. We haven't been able to return for a survey. The point is, I wanted to be sure of establishing precedence, on the off-chance another application comes in for the same fossil."