A Thief of Time by Tony Hillerman

of those sites himself. And he knew what attracted the Anasazi. A cliff faced to catch the winter sun and shaded in the summer, enough floodplain to grow something, and a source of water. That, particularly the water, narrowed it a lot.
    He scouted Canyon Largo first, and Blanco Canyon, and Jasis Canyon. He found two sites that had been dug into fairly recently. But nothing new and no sign of the tire tread pattern he was looking for. He moved north then and checked Gobernador Canyon and La Jara and the Vaqueros Wash eastward in the Carson National Forest. He found nothing. He skipped westward, driving far faster than the speed limit down New Mexico Highway 44. The light was dying now—a cloudless autumn evening with the western sky a dull copper glow. He checked out a couple of canyons near Ojo Encino, restricting himself always to the access roads gouged out to reach the gas wells and pump stations Nails had been serving.
    By midnight he finished checking the roads leading from the Star Lake Pump Station, driving slowly, using his flashlight to check for tracks at every possible turnoff. He circled back past the sleeping trading post the maps called White Horse Lake. He crossed the Continental Divide, and dropped into the network of arroyos that drain Chaco Mesa. Again he found nothing. He circled back across Chaco Wash and picked up the gravel road that leads northwestward toward Nageezi Trading Post.
    Beyond Betonnie Tsosie Wash he stopped the pickup in the middle of the road. He climbed out wearily, stretched, and turned on the flash to check the turnoff of an access trail. He stood in the light of the half-moon, yawning, his flash reflecting from the chalky dust. It showed, clear and fresh, the dual tracks of an almost new Dayton tire tread.
    Chee’s watch showed 2:04 A.M . At 2:56 he found the place where, maybe a thousand years ago, a little band of Anasazi families had lived, and built their cluster of small stone shelters and living spaces, and died. Chee had been walking for more than a mile. He had left his pickup by a pump site and followed the twin tracks on foot. The pump marked the dead end of this branch of the service road—if two ruts wandering through the sage and juniper could be called that. From here, the dual tires had made their own road. Away from the hard-packed ruts, they were easy to follow now—crushed tumbleweeds, broken brush, the sharp smell of bruised sage.
    They led up a long slope, and Chee guessed they wouldn’t lead far. He walked carefully and quietly, moon over his shoulder, flash off. The slow huffing of the pump motor diminished behind him. He stopped, listening for the sound the backhoe motor would be making. He heard a coyote, and then its partner. One behind him, one on the ridge to his left. It was work time for predators, with all the little nocturnal rodents out braving death to find a meal.
    He didn’t see the truck until he was within fifty feet of it. Nails had nosed it into a cluster of juniper just over the crest of the hill. The doors of its van box stood open, a square black shape with the ramp used to unload the backhoe still in place. Chee stared, listening, feeling a mixture of excitement, exultation, and uneasiness. He put his hand on the pistol in his jacket pocket. Chee did not like pistols in general, and the one he had carried since being sworn into the force was no exception. But now the heavy hard metal was reassuring. He walked to the truck, placing each step carefully, stopping to listen. The cab was empty, the doors unlocked. The wire cable from the winch spool extended down the steep slope, slack. If the backhoe was down there, as it must be, the engine wasn’t running. The silence was almost total. From far behind him, he could hear the faint sound of the walking beam pump. No coyote sounds now. The air was moving up the slope past his face, a faint coolness.
    Chee held the cable in his left hand and started down the slope,