Mysteries In Our National Parks: Ghost Horses: A Mystery in Zion National Park. Gloria Skurzynski

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СКАЧАТЬ up at the kids and smiling, probably thinking how sweet it was that the four of them were doing a little circle dance together. Probably figuring that everything was all right now. But was it?

      His attention was jerked back to the dance, because Ethan had stopped his chant and Summer began to speak. Her voice soft, her eyes half shut, she murmured, “Grandmother’s grandmother saw the big fire on the mountaintop. Our people were dancing the Ghost Dance. They danced. They danced. The fire burned higher.” Summer spoke in a monotone, her voice neither rising nor falling, but for some reason it made Jack’s scalp prickle.

      “Grandmother’s grandmother saw the smoke. It rolled down the mountain. It covered the earth and the people and the animals. No one could see, but they kept dancing. The smoke got thicker. It hid the sky. It hid the earth. It hid the horses, and turned them into ghosts.”

      Now Summer spoke in a singsong. “After two days the smoke was gone. After two days the horses were gone. They became ghost horses. But sometimes, when the people danced, the ghost horses returned.”

      While she told the tale, Summer’s eyelids drooped lower and lower, while Ashley’s eyes widened until the whites showed. As for Jack, he caught the smell of—no, that was crazy. He couldn’t be smelling smoke—there wasn’t a wisp of it showing anywhere, nothing rising into the perfect blue sky, and from that high on the hill he could see all around. Then Ethan began to sing once more, louder than before,

      I’yehe’ Uhi’yeye’heye’

      I’yehe’ ha’dawu’hana’ Eye’de’yuhe’yu!

      Ni’athu’-a-u’ a’haka’nith’ii

      Ahe’yuhe’yu!

      By that time, Steven and Olivia had climbed closer to where the kids danced around the little cedar tree. They were still 20 feet away when Ethan stopped abruptly and pulled his hands away from Ashley’s and Summer’s.

      “Oh, don’t stop,” Olivia begged. “That was just—charming.”

      Ethan turned into stone man again. He didn’t say a word.

      “I loved it!” Ashley exclaimed. “Can we do it again? Maybe when we get to Zion National Park? Ethan says we need a cedar tree; I bet there’s lots of cedars in Zion. You’ll do it again, too, won’t you, Jack?”

      Jack didn’t know whether he wanted to dance the Ghost Dance again. It made him feel off balance, and not just because of the strange rhythmic words that he couldn’t understand. It was something more, something he couldn’t quite wrap his thoughts around.

      But the dance could be a way to keep things smooth between himself and Ethan, and for that reason alone he should agree to do it once more. What did it matter, anyway, if he shuffled around in a circle while Ethan sang, or chanted, or whatever you called it—Jack didn’t know whether the words had any meaning at all.

      That part about the horses, though, that Summer told—that part was different. Ghost horses. Ghost horses moving across the empty plains in search of—what? He shivered a little, even though the mid-September sun felt warm on his arms.

      “Won’t you, Jack?” Ashley’s voice broke into his thoughts.

      “Sure, I’ll dance again,” Jack answered softly. He wasn’t agreeing to make Ashley happy, or to connect with Ethan and Summer or to make the trip to Zion run more smoothly. He would dance to see if in a different setting, under a different sky miles and miles from here, he would still smell that hint of invisible cedar smoke.

      CHAPTER THREE

      Here we are, riding in an SUV made in Korea, Jack thought. Look at us: two Shoshone kids; my mom, whose four grandparents came from Italy; my dad, with a Norwegian mother and a father who could have been from anywhere, whoever he was—my dad never knew him—and us, Ashley and me. I guess this mixed-up carload is about as American as you can get.

      “Hey, what are you thinking about?” Ashley asked him.

      “Nothing. Just where things came from.” Stretching his arms, Jack asked, “Hey, Ashley, do you know what they first named this park, before they changed it to Zion?”

      “I don’t know,” Ashley shrugged. “What?”

      “It was Mukuntuweap National Monument, in 1909. It didn’t get named ‘Zion’ until 1919.”

      Wrinkling her nose, she said, “Mukuntuweap? Did I say it right? What a weird name.”

      “It’s Indian,” Ethan told her. He pulled his eyes away from the window long enough to say, “This used to be Paiute land. They hunted here. This land was taken from them, just like Yellowstone was taken from us. But their spirits are still here.”

      “Oh,” Ashley answered, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. “Well, anyway, it sure is pretty around here, no matter what the name is.” Ethan grunted and looked back out his window, pressing his forehead into the glass.

      They’d rented the sport utility vehicle at the airport in St. George, Utah. Now, as they approached Zion, the flat, sandy earth changed into spires of red rock that brushed the sky like enormous statues. Eons of upheaval and erosion had molded the Navajo sandstone into strange rock formations, here rounded from wind and rain, there transformed into snaggletoothed summits that seemed to bite the clouds. As they neared the park, red rock monoliths rose up into the sky, so tall that even when he craned his neck, Jack couldn’t see their tops.

      “OK, stay on this road until we come to Zion Lodge, which is right in the canyon,” Olivia told Steven as she peered at the map. “The park has booked us into three connecting rooms. Isn’t that great? We get to stay in the same building where I’m giving my lecture!”

      “I never knew marrying a wildlife veterinarian would buy me a ticket into so many wonderful places,” Steven told her. “I just hope you won’t be giving your talk in a room with a big window. I mean, who would want to listen to a speech on animal pinkeye when there’s this kind of beauty all around?”

      “Excuse me?” Olivia cocked her head toward her husband. “Are you saying you don’t find my topic fascinating?”

      “Hmmm. Pinkeye in the deer population. I couldn’t sleep all last night just thinking about it.” Steven, who had a large, lopsided grin on his face, stole a quick glance at Olivia.

      “Steven Landon, you know my lecture isn’t on pinkeye—pinkeye is just one example I’m using to show how the different branches of the government handle their animal problems. For instance, Zion won’t treat the pinkeye in their deer, since it’s national park policy not to interfere with a naturally occurring disease. The Bureau of Land Management, on the other hand, treats pinkeye with antibiotics…”

      “My mom is a wildlife veterinarian,” Ashley whispered to Summer, who was sitting beside her in the very back of the SUV. “She helps rangers if there’s a problem about park animals. Lots of times we get to go with her to national parks all over the country. We’ve seen wolves and manatees and grizzlies and cougars and all kinds of stuff. It’s really cool.”

      Summer nodded quietly, her eyes wide. “Are they fighting?”

      Ashley answered, “Fighting? You mean my mom and dad? No!”

      Jack СКАЧАТЬ