\u201cWhat is that man going to do?\u201d asked Mabel, as she and her father made toast in the kitchen of the little brick house. \u201cAre you sure the Halfslips aren\u2019t in trouble?\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tIt was Friday morning, the start of a weekend trip Mabel had very much been looking forward to, but concern about the previous night\u2019s events was clouding her enthusiasm. Mr. Crockett poured coffee into a stainless steel travel mug and shook his head.
\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t know what kind of report the DIS might have gotten,\u201d he said, \u201cbut I\u2019m certain it was a mistake. The Halfslips aren\u2019t growing anything illegal. This kind of thing is a nuisance, but it\u2019ll get straightened out.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel stepped out the front door and winced as a raindrop splashed onto her nose. \u201cI hope the weather is better at Cochiti Spring,\u201d she said, zipping her jacket a little higher.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cDepends on what you mean by \u2018better,\u2019\u201d responded Mr. Crockett. \u201cIf you want hot and dry, you\u2019ll be in luck.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThey took the alley around the press office to River Street and met Mrs. Crockett who had loaded the Jeep with the necessary duffel bags.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWell look at that,\u201d said Mrs. Crockett, gazing across the street. \u201cBoris Fairweather must have decided he didn\u2019t like that tin roof.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tThrough the partially constructed front wall of the Fairweathers\u2019 house, Mabel could see a collection of colorful umbrellas. Mrs. Fairweather was reading the comics under a blue one. Ricky and Amanda sat under green and yellow ones as they ate cereal. In the living room, Mikey and Lulu Fairweather were swinging red umbrellas at each other and ignoring the cartoon on television. Mr. Fairweather was on the mostly skeletal roof installing terra-cotta tile on a single sheet of plywood.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cGood morning, Boris!\u201d called Mrs. Crockett. Mr. Fairweather waved his hammer in reply.<\/p>\n
\n\tRocky Creek Road was a bumpy ride under the best conditions and on a rainy day mud splashed the Jeep\u2019s windows with each jolt. Mrs. Crockett parked alongside the Shooting Star, and got out to toss duffels up to Mr. Crockett who had climbed onto the wing.<\/p>\n
\n\tInside the airplane\u2019s hold, two passenger seats had been fitted side by side behind the cockpit. Mabel climbed in beside her mother, and buckled up as Mr. Crockett taxied across the airfield. As the Star ascended Mabel watched the rain fall on Logjam, but low clouds quickly obscured her view. The last object she could positively identify was a green van, parked behind Franklin\u2019s Guest House, its windshield crudely patched with duct tape.<\/p>\n
\n\tThirty minutes west of Logjam the dense clouds began to thin. Patches of blue appeared in the white fluff outside Mabel\u2019s window, and soon, if she looked down, she could see a green and beige patchwork quilt of farms. Mabel heard a click, followed by the familiar hum of the computer which had replaced Clemmy on the Shooting Star. <\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cGood morning, Peter,\u201d said a voice more patient than Clemmy\u2019s. \u201cMay I help you navigate?\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cHi Bailey,\u201d responded Mr. Crockett. \u201cYes, thanks. We\u2019re about ninety miles west of Logjam, heading for a private airport south of Artesia, New Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tBailey\u00b8 hummed for a few seconds and responded. \u201cPeter, orient yourself three degrees north and set the autopilot.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe green areas of landscape had nearly disappeared when the Star began to descend. The surface they approached appeared to be little more than rough rocky cliffs set in sandy soil, with an occasional patch of green scrub. The Star whined and whirred, descending slowly until its wheels connected with the ground, bumping and rattling the plane and its passengers. Mr. Crockett taxied, and slowed to a stop alongside a cluster of several small planes.<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel could feel the intense change in climate even before her father raised the hatch. There was something stimulating about the dry heat which helped Mabel shake off the drowsiness she often felt after a lengthy flight. Mr. Crockett secured the Star\u2019s hatch after they\u2019d all climbed out.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThere\u2019s our ride,\u201d said Mrs. Crockett, motioning toward a silver Land Rover approaching from across the airfield. The old but well-maintained vehicle stopped alongside the Crocketts.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cClara and Peter Crockett?\u201d asked a voice, as the Rover\u2019s door opened. Mabel had an inexplicable sensation that pure sunlight was pouring out of the car as a woman stepped out. Short and slightly round, she appeared to be about fifty years old. Her hair, half gray and half sandy-brown, was pulled into a thick, loose braid, and she wore a light-blue India-print cotton dress.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cYes,\u201d said Mrs. Crockett, \u201cand this is our daughter Mabel.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe woman smiled at Mabel. Mabel liked her more instantly than almost anyone she\u2019d met before.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI\u2019m Margie Haycraft,\u201d said the woman, as she opened the rear hatch of the Rover for their duffels. \u201cYou\u2019ll find that most of us at Cochiti are jack or jill-of-all-trades, but my special niche is herbs. And sometimes, like today, shuttling guests.\u201d Margie opened the Land Rover\u2019s side door and flashed a deeply lined smile that illumined her face like a star. \u201cIt\u2019s about forty minutes to the Spring.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe terrain between the airfield and their destination became, if anything, increasingly more barren. The emptiness was broken by an occasional lonely homestead, but signs of life were few. The hills around them became steeper, and the cliffs sharper.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s not as dead as it looks here,\u201d said Margie. \u201cYou have to look closely for signs of life in the desert.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cA lizard,\u201d called Mrs. Crockett, pointing out her window.<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel looked, and also spotted the dark silhouette of a bird of prey overhead.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cCochiti Spring,\u201d explained Margie, \u201cwas inhabited by native Americans one to two-thousand years ago. We use the cliffside dwellings they abandoned, and enjoy the healing properties of the original mineral spring.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cSounds great,\u201d said Mr. Crockett. \u201cI think a nice soak might be the first thing on my to-do list.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tA lengthy drive later, the Land Rover approached what appeared to be the driest, and most desolate bit of landscape they\u2019d seen yet. The road narrowed, and became almost indistinguishable from the desert sand. Ahead, on the left, a cliff jutted out toward the road, obscuring what lay beyond it.<\/p>\n
\tJust at the cliff, Margie threw on her left turn signal, and Mabel could see that the road, as they turned, threaded through a narrow passage between the first cliff and a second outcropping behind it. Except for a crevice above them, where the two rock walls didn\u2019t quite touch, it was like driving under a bridge, in momentary darkness.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWelcome to Cochiti Spring,\u201d said Margie, as the Rover emerged from under the rocks.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe change in scenery was startling. Mabel felt as if she had entered a salad bowl, where desert cliffs formed a ring around groves of trees, and lush gardens. Most striking were the cliff walls to their right. The face of the cliff was mostly rough rock displaying layered bands of varying color. Several stairways, carved directly into the cliffside, rose from the canyon floor to a series of apartments, also carved out of cliffside rock. The apartments bore the same colorful striations of the cliff around them, but were distinguished by the smoothness of their walls, and their multi-level pattern, as if a child had created them by stacking building blocks.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cPretty cool, isn\u2019t it?\u201d asked Margie, as she pulled the Land Rover to a stop in front of a large, more recently constructed wooden building at the base of the cliff. \u201cThere\u2019s a site-map at the stairway. Look for \u2018Zuni.\u2019 That\u2019s the name of your room. If you\u2019d like to leave your bags here on the porch, someone will bring them up.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tMargie smiled at Mabel, who was gazing at the cliff face and shielding her eyes from the bright desert sun. \u201cDinner is at 6:30, right here in the dining room, and on the other side of this building you\u2019ll find a walkway to the spring. My office is up the far stairway. I\u2019d be thrilled if you come up and see me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cLet\u2019s just haul\u2019em up,\u201d said Mrs. Crockett, slinging a duffel over her shoulder and heading toward the site-map at the foot of the nearest stairway. Mabel and her father followed Mrs. Crockett\u2019s lead and grabbed the remaining two duffels.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThere\u2019s Zuni!\u201d said Mabel pointing out a square on the diagram, indicating a cliffside chamber near the top left of the dwelling cluster. <\/p>\n
\n\tThe hike up might have been arduous given the desert heat and bright sun, but the Crocketts found that being in the direct shade of the cool cliff made it tolerable. After climbing what amounted to five flights of stairs, Mabel ran ahead onto a small terrace with a door labeled \u201cZuni.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tOpening the door, she entered a room which was rather dark, having only one window onto the terrace. But it was immediately apparent that the limited sunlight paid off in comfort. In an environment where daytime temperatures often reached 100 degrees, the room they stood in was naturally cool. The room was furnished simply, with a wood-framed double bed and two matching twins, all of which were outfitted with colorful quilts. A wardrobe, a dresser, two chairs, and a mirror completed the room\u2019s furnishings, and adjacent to the bedroom was a basic, but cheerful bathroom. <\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cYou know, Clara,\u201d said Mr. Crockett, plopping himself onto the larger bed. \u201cI\u2019ve changed my to-do list. Item one is a short nap.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cHow surprising,\u201d said Mrs. Crockett, seeming not at all surprised. \u201cTell you what, you do that, and I\u2019ll go get some history from the folks in the lodge. Why don\u2019t we meet at the spring in an hour? Mabel do you want to come with me?\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI think,\u201d said Mabel walking onto the terrace, where the view of the complex below reinforced her salad-bowl sensation, \u201cthat I will take a walk around the gardens and meet you at the spring.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel quickly changed into shorts and grabbed a denim baseball cap. Running back down the steps seemed to take no time at all, and she quickly skirted the lodge\u2019s porch and found a path toward an especially dense and fruity gardened area. In the moister air of the garden, fragrances became stronger and more tantalizing. A gravel path snaked in seemingly random fashion through clusters of colorful blossoms, set among green plants with leaves the size of dinner plates. Ahead, Mabel heard a trickle of water, and the scent of orange blossoms wafted from a stand of taller trees at the center of the garden. The gravel path widened, then opened at the edge of a small grassy clearing. Mabel paused for only seconds before running across the grass to the opposite side of the clearing.<\/p>\n
\n\t A marble fountain, set on a pedestal, gurgled next to the unusually tall and woody orange trees which surrounded the clearing. The heat made the urge to take a drink irresistible, and it was only after drinking from the water jetting up at the center of the fountain that Mabel noticed a small brass plate on the edge of the fountain\u2019s bowl which said \u201csafe to drink.\u201d Feeling simultaneously foolish and relieved, she leaned toward the water to drink some more, then turned to see who else had entered the clearing.<\/p>\n
\n\tThere was no-one, but Mabel felt as if she were no longer alone. She scanned the trees at the edge of the clearing, but saw only a yellow and brown bird. After quaffing another sizable portion of water from the fountain, Mabel headed out of the garden on a path across from where she\u2019d entered the clearing.<\/p>\n
\n\t Wooden benches waited at intervals along the path, which meandered right and left. At each turn Mabel hesitated, feeling that she would encounter someone around the bend. Several more yellow and brown birds cocked their heads at her, and she rounded the next corner smiling at a particularly beguiling blue bird, when she was startled to see that the next bench was occupied. Her second fleeting thought was that she\u2019d been mistaken, it was a tree shaped remarkably like a person. No, that was silly. How could she have mistaken a person for a tree? The person on the bench looked at Mabel expectantly, but with an air of timidity, and still the thought that she was perceiving a tree, not a person, flickered in Mabel\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI\u2019m Dun,\u201d said the person, in a sweet tenor voice.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cExcuse me?\u201d asked Mabel, regarding the person on the bench. She first supposed it was a boyish woman, then revised her guess to girlish young man. But maybe he wasn\u2019t so young. Finely textured, golden-brown hair, just the color of the dried up leaves falling off the orange trees, grew to his shoulders. His tan skin almost matched his hair, and he wore simple khaki shorts and a safari jacket. \u201cDone with what?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n
\n\tHis giggling laughter sounded like jingle-bells. \u201cMy name is Dun,\u201d he said. \u201cDun is my name.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel giggled too, and the apprehension in Dun\u2019s expression temporarily melted. What a peculiar but sort of delightful looking individual, Mabel thought. He appeared both fine-boned and sturdy, with high cheek-bones, a sloping, pointed nose, and eyes that seemed almost canine, like Sparkle\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI\u2019m Mabel,\u201d said Mabel.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cYes,\u201d replied Dun, as if he already knew that.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cAre you a guest?\u201d asked Mabel.<\/p>\n
\n\tDun burst into a fit of laughter, that caused a pendant around his neck to swing. \u201cNo, no, I\u2019m not the guest here. Everyone else is the guest.\u201d Noticing Mabel\u2019s gaze he fingered the pendant which hung from a leather cord. \u201cI made it,\u201d he said, looking fondly at the object which appeared to be a crescent moon made from tree bark. \u201cAnd it\u2019s a good one.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tMabel had the strong feeling that Dun wouldn\u2019t take kindly to a straightforward question like, who are you and what are you doing here, so she thought carefully for a minute about what she would say next. Finally, she settled on, \u201cYou must live here, then.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cAlways,\u201d he replied. \u201cOver there is my…\u201d Suddenly Dun stopped and tilted his head as if listening. Then Mabel heard the crunch of gravel coming toward them from the center of the garden. She glanced behind her, and in her peripheral vision Dun again looked tree-like. A young couple, probably honeymooners, strolled hand-in-hand from the direction of the fountain. She looked back at Dun, but saw neither Dun nor a tree. Just an empty bench.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cWhat is that man going to do?\u201d asked Mabel, as she and her father made toast in the kitchen of the little brick house. \u201cAre you sure the Halfslips aren\u2019t in trouble?\u201d It was Friday morning, the start of a weekend trip Mabel had very much been looking forward to, but concern about the previous […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=275"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":276,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275\/revisions\/276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.emilygillespieclement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}