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“Know? Know what, Callista?”
“You can cut out the innocent act, Logan. I figured it out last night in my hotel room. Although I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. Now tell me, when did you first find out about my traveling back to the old west?”
Logan attempted one last look of confusion before he finally let down his mask and cracked a sheepish smile. “I was in high school when the journal was first given to me.”
I gaped at this news. “Way back then, huh? Let’s see it.”
Logan went to his desk and opened his top drawer, lifting out an old leatherbound journal. A different diary than the one now in custody by the Bryant Wolf Pack military.
“Your great-great-grandfather’s then,” I stated, taking it from him.
I pulled out the old sepia photograph of me sitting stoic and still with my hands primly folded in my lap.
“Yes,” Logan answered, watching me with fascination. “My mother entrusted me with on my sixteenth birthday. Incredible reading. Henry Bautista was a very famous photographer and artist of his time, and he made a killing after investing in the Eastman Kodak corporation. That’s where my mother’s family made their original fortune, which of course led to others.”
“Is that right?”
“Yes, Grandfather Henry was a brilliant entrepreneur, but he would have been a great novelist too,” Logan added. “He wrote about all sorts of wild things in his journal, including how a person could fly in the air or under the ocean inside metal contraptions, and even travel across time itself.”
“Hmm. Sounds like just another Jules Verne story to me,” I remarked.
“Indeed.”
He blushed slightly, adding, “His success was due in great part to a very special teacher of his, the one in this photo. She inspired an eager, curious, imaginative young boy to think outside the box, to reach for possibilities. Her wisdom, advice and encouragement helped him become the accomplished man who in turn inspired millions of others throughout the years. Myself, included.”
“Did he? I’m glad then. That she helped him in some small measure,” I added.
“She did, indeed,” Logan continued. “She also taught Henry Bautista the value of other cultures. This legacy was passed down through the generations to myself. I think that’s why I’m truly motivated to build the casino to help the Snoqualmie people become financially self-sufficient.”
I frowned, biting my bottom lip. “I see. However, a casino on indigenous lands comes with its own problems, Logan.”
“Do you have a different proposal, Callista?”
I walked over to the desk where the land map and casino blueprints were spread out on the long meeting table.
“You know, I do,” I said. “How about instead of a casino, you build a cultural center attached to a family oriented hotel.”
“A hotel?”
“With shops and restaurants and other resort amenities,” I added. “Like horseback riding and archery and crafts and activities that will provide jobs to the tribe locals and an outlet to express their culture in a way that will help teach outsiders about their people.”
Logan turned to study the map considering my suggestion, then pulled out a set of wire-rimmed eyeglasses to focus harder on the plans. Slowly he grinned wide.
* * *
Her headlamp shining onto the rock wall, Maggie reached up and gently touched the sunburst and sickle symbols and the ancient lettering below them, all showing a faint streak of dried blood.
Lowering her hand, she turned back to me, saying, “Pretty hard to swallow, McEwan. Especially for a logically minded scientist like myself.”
“I believe the perfect person to believe my story would be a scientist,” I countered. “That’s the first rule of science after all—to challenge the commonly held beliefs and reach for the possibilities. If we didn’t, then we wouldn’t have electricity for your headlamp or the plastic for your fake fingernails.”
“Funny. Who else have you told this...theory of yours?”
I couldn’t tell her that Logan knew, or the reasons why.
Nor could I explain about the Bryant werewolf pack one mountain away from where we were standing who might believe it.
Or the fact that an evil organization three thousand years old were hunting people like them, and me, and maybe anyone else that challenged their twisted belief systems.
