Star Gift

Chapter Twenty-Three

After Tuwa slid the discs out from inside her bra and entrusted them back to Michael, she left him and Blake at the hotel, as before.

"You don't want to join us for a bite to eat?" Michael asked the professor.

"Are you kidding, guys? This was one of the most stressful days in my life. I'm just going to drive home, shower, eat a cold spinach salad I left in the frig . . . and try to sleep . . . though I know that will be difficult. I'll phone you tomorrow, Michael."

"Keep your door locked!" he shouted as Tuwa sped away.

Back in the hotel, Blake realized his college classes at the university would be starting in one more day. But strangely, he had little guilt or interest in returning to Santa Cruz as he previously had. Was he being so affected by these revelations, he wondered? It was as if his focus on what was truly essential now in his life had morphed into something else. And that something centered around the incredible incidents, occurring like a dream, but mainly round his father. Still troubling him was the mystery of William's, and his apparent secret life work, so meticulous and unrecognized there in the southwestern desert.

"Now that we've got our room back for the night," Michael said, yawning, "I think we owe a few things to ourselves. Not just a good night's rest . . . but a damn good meal, Blake. What do you think? Are you as hungry as I am?"

"Yeah. I could use some food. But definitely sleep."

"Listen, it's my treat," Michael said. "I know a great Texas steakhouse in this town. Let's go there, have some T-bones, potato skins, and shake off those Feds with a couple of tall beers. Sound good, California?"

Blake smiled. "Yeah, it does. But I don't think I'll be shaking off those guys for a while, Michael. Can't say I've ever really seen the "men in black" before now. But that's definitely who they were, huh?"

"Most def, Blake. And pretty bad actors."

"Right. And for sure I've also never been buzzed by a combat helicopter. Yesterday was just as intense as today."

Michael laughed. "Well you might have to get used to that, my friend. You're in pretty deep now with all this."

Blake was temporarily speechless and deep in thought. He just watched as Michele took the discs out of his back pack and craftily hid them between the mattress and the support boards of the bed in their room.

"Of course, your father must have been pretty far into this too," Michael added.

Blake finally broke his silence, thinking about his father's collection of 'evidence.'

"Michael . . . you say you never knew my father, right?"

"That's right."

"So, you were just as surprised as I was with that storage shed full of . . ."

"Yeah. Pretty much. It was nothing I really hadn't seen before or have known about. But it's quite a compelling collection if he was planning on making a case."

"I see."

"But I have to tell you, Blake. Dan and Jasper told me they had known of someone . . . for years. An older guy. Non-Indian, who was constantly on a single-handed search out there. They knew he was interested in Native American culture. He was well-liked and respected. Even came to them for locations of rock paintings and legends about the Kachinas."

"Who?

"The dolls we found in the shed."

"Oh yeah. The messengers."