Black Sun Descending (8 page)

ON THE WALK FROM MACY'S
to Jane Vaughn's office, Silas had time to think about Dallas Vaughn's response to his wife's death. He knew from experience that the waiting was hell, but he hadn't expected the husband to show quite so much contempt so soon after learning of his wife's murder. What had he said? It had been a relief when she had disappeared? It occurred to Silas that if he was looking for a suspect in Jane Vaughn's murder, and not merely a connection between this woman and his own wife, Dallas Vaughn would be at the top of the list. He was lost in these thoughts as he walked onto the campus of the university, near the Drury Hotel. The university was in the final days of the spring semester before exams started. Walking through the sounds and sights of the campus, Silas was drawn to an empty bench near the museum. He sat down heavily. He didn't like the way he was thinking: if Dallas Vaughn had been responsible in some way for his wife's death, then the chance that Jane's murder was related to Penelope's disappearance was faint. That meant that this trip down memory lane was for nothing; there would be nothing to find. It also meant that Penelope might still be found alive; if Vaughn had killed his wife as a result of a domestic quarrel, there would be no reason Penelope would be involved. Maybe the deaths of the three friends from Flagstaff were unrelated.

What had Vaughn meant by having “a little extra now to cover the bills?” It dawned on Silas that there might be a life insurance policy that would now pay out a handsome sum to her widower. He'd have to ask Katie if the
FBI
had looked into that angle.

Silas was lost in these thoughts when he heard his name spoken as if it was a question. He turned and looked.

“My God, it is you. Silas Pearson.”

Silas stood up. “Hi, Sarah.”

Sarah Jamison was around forty years old; she wore a light fleece jacket and had her long red hair tied up in a bun on the back of her head. She smiled and when Silas reached out a hand, she laughed and pulled him into an awkward embrace. Then she stood back.

“That bad?” Silas asked.

“Well, you don't look much like a professor of English anymore, that's for sure.”

“I'm not.”

“I know. I'm on faculty now. I'm teaching in the
MS
program in the School of Earth Sciences.”

“Let me guess.” Silas put a finger to the side of his head and closed his eyes. “Environmental Sciences and Policy.”

She hit him on the arm. Silas smiled. “That's good to hear. You always were my best student. I thought maybe they'd give you
my
old job.”

“Who says they didn't offer it?”

“I should have banned you from volunteering for those fish-kissers at the Wilderness Society when you were in my program.”

“I would have liked to see you try.”

“You probably would have arranged a protest.”

Sarah pointed to the bench and Silas sat. She sat next to him and they regarded the quad a moment. “So, what are you doing here? You look like you're dressed to climb Humphrey's Peak, not stroll around campus.”

He looked down at this boots and canvas pants and his rough and knotted hands. He seemed unaware of how he had dressed that morning. “I've been spending a lot of time outside,” he said by way of explanation.

“I know, Silas. I've been following what's going on up in Moab.”

“Following?”

“Well, you were in the papers a lot last year. When was that, July?”

“August and September.”

“It was in the papers. The bodies you found and the fact that you were searching for Penelope.” Silas nodded and Sarah continued. “You still haven't found anything?”

“I've found a lot, but I haven't found Penny.”

“Has that search brought you back to Flag? Can I help?”

Silas exhaled. “In a way. I don't know. I found . . . I found another body. A woman. She lived here in Flag. Worked just off campus. Did you know Jane Vaughn?”

“
You
found her? God, Silas, it was front-page news. The paper said some workers at the Atlas Mill site found her.”

“It was me. The cops and
FBI
kept my name out of it. Did you know her?”

“Not very well, but I do read the papers. She was in them a lot.”

“I hear that. She was an activist. Worked on Grand Canyon stuff.”

“She was a firebrand. I saw her speak on campus last fall at the start of the semester. She was very passionate about the Grand Canyon and the surrounding area. She called it the Greater Grand Canyon ecosystem. Said that we couldn't just protect the canyon and leave the rest of it open to mining, drilling, and dirty energy. If we did, the Grand Canyon would become an island. Plants and animals would suffer from isolation. It's a common principle: island biogeography.”

“When was this?”

“I'd have to check my calendar. It was sometime in late September, maybe early October. Why?”

“Jane Vaughn disappeared in November.”

“You think it was related?”

“I don't know, Sarah. It could be. What I'm trying to figure out is if her . . . death . . . had anything to do with Penelope's disappearance. What else did she say in this talk?”

“She talked about air pollution from the Navajo Generating Station in Page creating smog that was making it hard to see the canyon on a summer day, the new uranium mining ban north of the canyon, how we had to fight to keep that in place, and about Wilderness designation for the river corridor. I think there were other things, but it was a while ago. You might be able to find the talk on YouTube. I know someone from the university's Environmental Club filmed it.”

Silas had never watched a video on YouTube in his life. Sarah watched him as he mulled this information over. “Silas, do you know what you're doing?”

He slowly shook his head. “I have no idea.”

SILAS LEFT CAMPUS.
There weren't many proponents of industry or motorized tourism that Jane Vaughn hadn't managed to piss off in her work to protect the Grand Canyon. This too reminded him of Penelope's activism; both of these women seemed hell-bent on making as many enemies as they could, and for what? Silas soon arrived at the small two-story building where Jane Vaughn had her office. He stopped across the street from the building and surveyed the scene. There was a sign advertising the Grand Canyon Preservation Society; the curtains of the second-floor offices were drawn. The sun was slipping down on the horizon and the streetlights were flickering to life; soon darkness would fall. Silas scanned the quiet road, wondering if anybody else was watching the office, but all he could see were parked cars. He felt a peculiar—and strangely familiar—sense of paranoia as he stood observing the quiet street. His hands were sweating as he fumbled for the key in his pocket, nearly dropping it as he unlocked the door. He turned on the office lights.

There were three desks in the room. One was positioned by the door like a reception counter. The others were pushed against the far wall. Two filing cabinets separated them. The reception desk and one of the other desks were bare; the third desk was cluttered with papers, a telephone, newspapers, and a lamp. There was an empty place where Silas guessed a laptop computer would normally reside. He figured that the
FBI
had been here and taken it to examine its hard drive, likely after Jane had gone missing. He went to that desk and slowly sifted through the papers. There were piles of correspondence between Vaughn and various elected officials, mining executives, local land owners, the superintendent of Grand Canyon National Park, and Chas Hinkley from Glen Canyon. There were bills and affidavits, and a wide range of clippings from various magazines.

Silas sat down at the desk and started to read through the papers. There was such a mass of material, and any of it could have led Vaughn into a conflict with one interest or another. Silas simply didn't know what to make of it. He heard a noise outside the door. His breath caught like a chock stone in a narrow slot. Someone was walking up the back steps. He quickly looked around to find a place to hide. If this was the
FBI
returning to search the room again, he was going to have a lot of explaining to do.

He stood, flipped off the lights, felt his way through the dark to the washroom, and stepped inside. He heard a key slip easily into the lock and the door to the outside stairwell opened. Silas stepped back farther into the lavatory. He smelled something strong and familiar when the outside door opened. It was musty, like a campfire. Silas inched forward to try to see who was at the door to the office.

The door to the washroom swung open and a rough hand flipped on the switch. Silas shouted and the bull of a man in the doorway paused and then did the same. A heavy hand quickly reached out for Silas, who stumbled back and tripped over the toilet, crashing against the wall. Several rolls of toilet paper fell from an overhead shelf and landed on his head.

“Holy sweet Jesus!” It was Hayduke. “What the fuck are you doing hiding in the shitter?”

“What are you doing here?” Silas demanded, straightening himself.

“Likely the same thing you are.”

Silas, angry now at being startled, pushed past the young man. Hayduke smelled like body odor and campfire; the familiar scent. “Dallas Vaughn gave me a key. How did you get in?”

“There was a key under the mat.”

“How did you know?”

“I been here before. I told you, Jane and I did a little work together. I came to see what might have got her whacked.” Silas stared at him in disbelief.

Hayduke seemed to compose himself quickly. “You done in there? I gotta take a leak.”

THEY GOT DOWN TO WORK.
Hayduke, who had visited the offices of the Grand Canyon Preservation Society on several occasions, told Silas that he had a pretty good idea what they should be looking for.

“
I'm
looking for a connection to my wife,” Silas told him.

“You find out why Jane Vaughn was killed and you may find out where Penelope is.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Those two were close, man. They worked on a lot of issues together. Didn't you ever talk with Pen about this stuff? We find out what got Jane killed and we might find a clue as to where Penny is.” It shocked Silas to hear Hayduke refer to Penelope with such a familiar tone. Hayduke opened a filing cabinet and started to thumb through the files.

“You really think that Jane Vaughn kept her killer's name on file?”

“Next best thing, man. She kept a file of correspondence from everybody who hated her.”

“Listen, Hayduke, I appreciate what you're trying to do, but I doubt very much her killer sent her a letter.”

“What else you got?” Hayduke handed him a thick file.

Silas opened it. It was mostly printed pages of emails Vaughn had received. He watched as Hayduke sat down at Jane's desk with a second file and started to leaf through it. Silas sat at the reception desk and began his search. An hour passed; when he looked up Hayduke was looking at him. “What did you find?” Silas asked. The young man seemed excited.

“A lot of people didn't like Jane Vaughn, that's for sure. She got a lot of random emails condemning her stand on just about everything, including Wilderness along the river corridor in the canyon. Those motorized raft companies would get their clients to email politicians, and copy Jane, telling them that motorized rafting was their God-given right.”

Silas agreed. “There's a pattern in here. It looks like there were a few folks who really didn't like what she was up to and told her that as often as they could.”

“Who's that?” Hayduke got up and crossed the floor to where Silas sat.

Silas pointed to a few stacks of paper he'd arranged. “Well, Chas Hinkley. I've been hearing his name again and again. Jane and he had very long email exchanges, and let's just say that Superintendent Hinkley didn't feel the need to exercise restraint. Here, look.” Silas pointed to one page where Hinkley and Jane went back and forth. “He basically tells Vaughn that if she keeps up her antics, she'll find herself at the bottom of Lake Powell. Not in so many words, but the implication is clear.”