Tale of the Broken Spoke: A Sedona Chi Mystery

Chapter One

Three Years Later – Sedona Chi

The blond with the pink, plastic, daisy-adorned, flip flops and lavender, strapless, spandex, tube top squealed, These rocks are hot! They burn my booty! She struggled stretching her leopard leotards back over her silicon injected gluts. I’m not taking anything off out here unless it’s in a tent!

Skip Rhodes groaned in shame, running his hands through his shaggy dirt-blond hair to push back the headache his clients were giving him. Never in his forty-two years…

He looked at the blonde’s companion, the man with the aviator sunglasses, white golf shorts, and soft-soled loafers and shook his head. You can film at night, he shrugged, not really caring.

Skip regretted having taken their online reservation. But they were from L.A. and with those bookings he always added an extra twenty percent to cover the inevitable pain in his butt.

Aviator was a producer and Flip Flop was his starlet. On the reservation form he’d indicated he was scouting locations for a film. He hadn’t indicated it was actually for a sci-fi western mature audience cable series called Debbie Galaxy Does Westworld. It was obvious from her lack of inhibition why Flip Flops Debbie was along for the weekend with her boss. Not Skip’s kind of people, but hey, the tour business in Sedona was competitive; somebody had to take their money.

There’s no service. I can’t post on Instagram! cried Flip Flops, aiming a sequin decorated cell phone. She was on her knees, mouth open and studded tongue suggestively positioned over a stack of spirit rocks. Skip decided then and there to up the California premium another fifteen percent.

Skip Rhodes was the owner, driver and sole guide for Sedona Chi Tours. His girlfriend at the time he wrote his business plan had come up with the name. They were still friendly, but he missed seeing her red hair cascading down her back while she relaxed on his couch. She had a swimmer’s body, long and flat with wide shoulders. Until she educated him, hit him over the head as he recalled it, Skip hadn’t known what Chi meant other than some tortured memory of a cartel drug lieutenant’s inamorata threatening him with a machete. Che’ll cut you bad, the mule had jeered. Not all his memories were good.

Before they’d broken up, Lilac had tried teaching him about Sedona’s magnetic dynamism and the philosophy of Chi. Both important to almost everyone living in or visiting the quirky town of Sedona, Arizona. She’d threatened to shoot him and send him to his spiritual afterlife after he’d cracked half-a-dozen jokes. A discharged Tucson detective, Yoga and guns were her real loves. All he remembered now was Chi had something to do with the life force of the universe, energies that flowed around your body, and that you could manipulate it with martial arts. That’s how he explained it if clients asked.

The lighting’s fantastic. I’m just not sure about getting the cameras and a futon this far out. The union will want a fortune, Aviator said, ignoring Debbie’s demand for a tent.

This part of Boynton Canyon trail is pretty remote. But Enchantment Resort would be popular with your cast. They have a glamorous pool, Skip countered, not sure why, the producer was staying there and had surely seen it. He was proud of coming up with glamorous though, it sounded Hollywood.

You think they’d let us shoot in the Jacuzzi?

"Why not? Glen Ford did scenes for The Rounders there." The Rounders had been filmed in 1965; Enchantment Resort opened in the late 80s. But Aviator didn’t strike Skip as the kind to be into cinematic history. John Payne...not the Duke...did a few B westerns out here too, along with Tyrone Power, Burt Lancaster, and Bob Mitchum. You’d be in good company.

John Payne…any relation to Long John Pain? He’s a legend.

Skip ignored the question and kept hiking. His outgoing friend Kuul Baltazar had volunteered to join the tour and tote the lunches and wine packs. He wanted to meet the motion picture people. Kuul called them Segway tours; his segue to lucrative movie adviser contracts. He was big for an Indian, a few inches taller than Skip’s 5’11, and while Skip was solid, his friend dwarfed him in bulk. The wine was an Elite Tour upgrade. Big spending Aviator had ordered Riesling, specifying no more than $8.99 a bottle.

Sedona Chi offered personalized tours and hikes in and around the artsy quirky town of Sedona, Arizona. He’d initially pictured the business as a sort of Hop-On Hop-Off trailhead tour, but didn’t like the idea of driving all day. Wine tours were popular, but merlot went straight to his head and if you couldn’t drink what was the point. He’d toyed with a sunset tour, but decided it’d interfere too much with tequila hour. Ambition for himself had never been Skip’s Chi; he was more a Give him an assignment and he’ll get it done kind of guy.

After a few months of trial and error, he’d settled on personally guided vortex mystery and ancient monument tours, and the always popular red rock vista hikes. Pretty generic, but generic sold. He also offered a weekly Skip’s Crack Tour to the south rim of the Grand Canyon. His friend Kuul had come up with the name, ever the quick wit. Most local tour companies offered hurried Oooh-Aaah half-day trips to gape into the mouth of time and visit the gift shops. Skip felt at home there and he respected the Canyon, his trips stayed overnight and delved deeper into the geology and the Park’s human history.

He’d picked Sedona because he valued the anonymity of a transient tourist town. No one cared who he’d been or where he’d come from. In fact, he’d yet to meet anyone who actually came from Sedona. He set his own hours and business was good, as good as he needed anyway. Good enough to attract sketchy Hollywood characters...

It’s still not working, Debbie Galaxy whined, now straddling a twelve-inch juniper stump, holding her phone low and out front for the money shot.

Give it a break, baby, said the polarized producer.

Flip Flops pouted, playfully wagging her tongue at the Aviator. Skip was surprised the tongue fit through her puffy augmented lips. The only gear in her head seized on another idea, Hey Navajo man, how’d you like to do a shoot?

Navajos don’t take photographs, said Kuul. They steal the inner spirit of all living things. Kuul crossed his arms and looked to the sky. The Great Spirit forbids it. Kuul was wearing a knockoff Yei blanket vest made by the China tribe and knee high buckskin moccasins despite it being in the high 80s. He knew how to play a part.

Kukulkan Bonifacio Baltazar was Skip’s closest friend; his only friend since Lilac Williams had dumped him. Depending on how the wind blew, Baltazar slipped into and out of the stereotypical roles of backward noble savage or Native sage. It looked like he was going with the shaman today. Kuul wasn’t even Navajo, except when it was commercially viable. One night, under a Cuervo haze and Skip’s poking at the origin of his unusual name, he had admitted he was half Mayan with a few parts Yaqui and a German great grandfather. Kukulkan was the Mayan name of their War Serpent God.

But for you, pretty white women, you can use my iPhone. You have to have the right setting out here to access data. We are near a sacred vortex, the Chamber of Commerce has it turned off to ensure the transcendental tranquility of our sacred mountains.

Skip thought he picked up a slight Bavarian bullshit accent. You didn’t need data to take or send a picture. His pitch was coming.

Well, how does yours work then? Flip Flops asked. I’ve seen you taking my picture." Kuul had been keeping a pictorial record of Debbie’s interactions with the desert.

I perform a Telephonic Receiver Blessing, Kuul said straight-faced.

Get ready.

Can you bless me? Flip Flops asked. This is so cool; you’re like a real life medicine man aren’t you?

Kuul winked at Skip and raised his arms over his head. Aviator was checking his phone to see if he needed a Blessing too.

I can tell you know a lot about our customs, Kuul said. Here it comes. "Dinetah, the mother Earth, and First Woman allow me to bless human electronic possessions under certain conditions. You must make an offering to appease the Hero Twin gods."

Take the faux Navajo shtick; add in gullible tourists, a few mystic stories about the Hero Twins and Spider Woman, and the tips rolled in. Kuul usually topped his blessings off with selling authentic bear and moose fetishes (Arizona never had moose) that he molded from coyote scat.

Kuul’s real job was running a plumbing service, AAA Plumber to the Stars. He marketed to the liberal Hollywood crowd with second homes in Sedona. They ate the mystic aboriginal stuff up. That’s why Kuul had jumped at the chance to tag along. Just last week he’d roto-rooted a kitchen drain for Diane Ladd. He’d pulled out a serving of yellow asparagus still wrapped in a plastic baggie.

What kind of offering? Flip Flops guardedly asked. Smooth talkers, always angling for a freebie, always wanting the same thing. Sure, the Navajo had mysterious black eyes and a great tan, and she had to admit the grizzly sad-eyed guide was attractive in a younger Jeff Bridges kind of way. But Debbie Galaxy wasn’t stupid, she’d been around the universe a time or two. She wasn’t about to give it for free, at least not with this hot sun beating down. Young looking skin was her trade.

Kuul bowed, spreading both arms wide, forefingers pointing to the ground, Mother Earth asks for ten dollars per photo and post, he said cheekily. No checks or plastic.

Boom, payday! Skip hid his grin as best he could.

That’s all? Aviator said, opening up his wallet.

Skip knew he and Baltazar made an odd couple. They couldn’t have been more different. But if the chips were down, Kuul was there to turn them over. Despite the fake façade, he was level-headed and a good thinker when he wasn’t hustling. The big Mayan might take a more cautious roundabout path to solving a problem, but they always seemed to end up at the same solution. Skip had learned to trust him. That was big in Skip’s book. And it wasn’t a bad thing to know a good plumber.

After Kuul pocketed a Benjamin for the pictures and an owl fetish, Debbie and Aviator were done. Skip would get his cut later. It was mid-morning and the temperature was already ninety. With the photo shoot finished, they hiked another quarter-mile to a grove of desert willows where they ate lunch, and Debbie auditioned for her role with the Riesling bottle. Getting even that far on the trail hadn’t been easy. The producer had dried his bare feet twice complaining about blisters, he hadn’t worn socks, and Debbie tore a thong on a flip flop that Kuul repaired with a yucca stem. But Skip had quoted three hours and he didn’t want any L.A. negotiating when they got back.

You ever sell anything more than these owl figures, like arrowheads or necklaces or other old Indian stuff? Aviator asked Kuul. I know some people in L.A. that pay big for authentic items, painted pots, shields, pre-Colombian goods, you know.

Kuul’s tone changed from his Navajo foolishness, It’s illegal, he said seriously. You should tell your friends they’re subsidizing the desecration of our ancestors. We wouldn’t steal a gold cross from your church; you shouldn’t steal from our holy sites. Kuul walked away before Aviator could respond.

It was just a question, he said to Skip.

Aviator was his client, but he’d had about all of the couple he could take. It’s a sensitive issue that carries more baggage than you could imagine. Best leave it alone.

After they ate the leftover chicken tenders that Skip had made into gourmet chicken salad he looped back to Enchantment Resort, dropping DeMille and Bankhead at Mii’amo Spa for expensive margaritas and Teddy Bear Cholla flour foot massages. Cecil B. didn’t tip, but Debbie had winked and slipped him her phone number.

How about a cold Snake Charmer at the patio? Kuul asked as they were riding back into town. He was thumbing his gratuities and whistled, We did good Kemo. Aviator had tipped him another fifty. I’m buying. The patio meant Oak Creek Brewery, the locals spot off Coffee Pot Road where the vats were located, not their tourist packed grill in Sedona’s outdoor Tlaquepaque Mall. Snake Charmer was a dark I.P.A. with a tangy hint of grapefruit, no relationship to the amiable Mayan war god.

Deal. I could sure use a couple. Skip said.

Chapter Two

Dogie Style

Big Bob Baker was sweating like a three-legged jack rabbit chased by a mountain lion. Keeping up with the feisty Maggie Kempdinger, Vice President of the Sedona Westerners, wasn’t what he’d signed up for. The Westerners were a local hiking club. Big Bob had just graduated into the Dogie group from the less active Amblers. Even their easier, less stressful hikes went deep into Sedona’s surrounding wilderness. The Dogies were headed out Jacks Canyon Trail. On a weekday it was safer, there were far fewer mountain bikers zooming around blind curves.

As lead Dogie it was his responsibility to keep everyone together, make sure they had enough water, write a short article for the Red Rock News, and lead the hike. Thanks to Steel-Calves Kempdinger he’d already lost the latter honor. The woman was a maniac. Big Bob knew he couldn’t trust her the minute he saw her two L.L. Bean diamond tipped trekking poles. No Dogie needed two poles. And her military issued Camel Back hydration pack was way beyond the pale for the easier Dogie hikes. She belonged in the more advanced Rough Rider group if she wanted to punish herself. The whole group was struggling to keep up her pace. He sure as hell wasn’t carrying her ass back if she pulled a quad.

Steel-Calves had picked the hike too. She knew Big Bob would sweat a couple of five-gallon buckets on Jacks Canyon trail. All the Westerners knew Kempdinger was a sadist; that’s probably why the Rough Riders hadn’t promoted her. The sign at the trailhead warned them to beware of the heat because there was no shade.

Kempdinger, slow the heck down, it’s a pleasure hike not a race, Big Bob gasped. Mustang Timmy’s about to pass out.

Mustang Timmy was Big Bob’s drinking buddy and they were hungover from the VFW award dinner last night. Mustang had landed at Inchon, which put him well into his eighties. Big Bob knew for a fact that if Timmy upchucked out here they’d clinked their last Coronas.

The group had hiked a couple miles and hadn’t yet found their groove. Jacks Canyon trail was wide open in this part. It ran below Lee Mountain, but not close enough to be in the shade. Sedona wasn’t scorching like Phoenix, but still plenty hot for Bob’s 275 pound package and Mustang’s high blood pressure. Not a whole lot of recreational hikers used Jacks Canyon. The views were Okay, but not as good as those around Courthouse and Bell Rock. The Dogie’s had only seen one backpacker and he’d been out for two days. Steel-Calves wasn’t even breaking to take pictures, which was pissing him off because he needed them for the newspaper.

Mercifully, Kempdinger finally stopped. She turned to face the other panting Dogies with a look that said, You weak kneed, cry baby motherless calves, time to grow a pair and lace up your Magellans. We’ve haven’t even gone three miles, she said instead.

Big Bob tried standing in the spindly shade of an ocotillo to catch his breath. Mustang Timmy sat on a red boulder and promptly fell over backwards. His blood pressure was probably impacting his equilibrium. You killed him! Big Bob yelled.

I’m Okay, Mustang whinnied, rolling over on all fours trying to get up. Two liters of Makers Mark is too much weight for my backpack. I think it broke.

The other Dogies, Crazy Eddie, Mel the Butcher, Gladys ‘without a Pip’ Knight, and Puddles Waylon, all panicked at the loss of refreshment and started trying to help Mustang upright. Big Bob, exercising excellent leadership skills, instructed them to not move him in case he’d hit his head. Hold on, we need to check his pupils.

For the love of Kit Carson! Kempdinger said disgustedly. Get him up and dust him off. We’ve got another four miles to go. You’re all going back to the Amblers if I have anything to say about it. Kempdinger had a reputation in the Westerners as being a hard ass wagon master. She’d been a P.E. teacher and girls’ basketball coach in Nebraska.

Good lord, we smell like the basement of a frat house on a Sunday morning! sang Gladys ‘without a Pip’ Knight, lifting Mustang’s elbow while Crazy Eddie was pulling a leg the other way. Gladys got her nickname from singing once a week at Eddie’s Yavapai Bar and Grille. In her seventies, her range wasn’t what it was when she had performed at the Hilton. Puddles Waylon had salvaged the Makers Mark and was wringing his bandana over his water bottle.

Leave me alone! I’m a veteran, screamed Mustang Timmy.

"Everybody settle down. Let’s just rest here awhile and we’ll see how Mustang feels. Then I’ll decide if we’re going on, not Kempdinger," Big Bob said in exasperation, reasserting his charge as lead Dogie.

A little later Big Bob gathered his troops, except for Kempdinger who’d marched ahead. Mustang was feeling better after a few hits of the Makers Mark. I never quit on MacArthur, he said to no one in particular. Puddles and Butcher were raring to go. Gladys and Crazy Eddie decided to head back, "We’ll be at Red Rock Café enjoying some blue corn huevos if you all change your mind." Big Bob, Mustang, Puddles, and Butcher waved goodbye and sauntered on to find Kempdinger. They’d all agreed when they started the goal was four miles out and four miles back. A few clouds had moved in cooling things off a bit. Big Bob thought they could make it, maybe even another mile or two to keep Kempdinger from filing a complaint.

A mile farther they found Steel-Calves finishing an all-natural Quest Bar. The damn things had twenty grams of protein, Big Bob thought; she’ll run the rest of the way. So, Big Bob, we going on or turning tail?

You stay behind, I’m taking scout. Unless you want to go back alone and then we’ll see you at next month’s meeting, Big Bob ordered.

With Big Bob scouting they leisurely hiked another mile. When the others came up, Big Bob was taking panoramic pictures of the red walls. The clouds were making a dramatic shadowy effect against Lee Mountain. Hopefully the Red Rock News would print his shots in color.

The trail looks like it splits, Bob said. One path went straight ahead and another turned off to the left toward a box canyon.

Ain’t either one of them look too good, Mustang noted. Don’t see no cairn, Butcher added, the double negative going unchallenged.

"Make a choice Big Man. You’re the leader, Kempdinger chided. Big Bob had his foot on a boulder double-knotting a shoestring that had come loose. He was looking in both directions and thinking. Make sure you don’t tie them together," Steel-Calves said. Finishing with the lace, he headed left down what looked like little more than a deer path. Kempdinger shook her head in mock disgust at Bob’s directional acuity, but followed.

A quarter mile in the path got better, more sand than rocks, easier on Mustang’s knobby knees. It roughly followed an arroyo into a canyon. The farther they walked the narrower the canyon became. Red rock walls on both sides tightened around the Dogies. Back in the day it would have been a good place for an ambush. Today the scenery was gorgeous, not threatening. Big Bob welcomed the heavy shade from the side walls.

Pretty clear nobody’s been in here for a while, Mustang said. Looks like we’ll run out of trail not too much farther.

Mustang had got his second wind. The flask he’d transferred the Makers Mark into was dry, so Big Bob knew he’d be gassed going back. Mustang didn’t care much for water, or, Chinese weak tea, as he called it.

They arrived at the end of the trail, not counting the mountain goat switchbacks heading up through a rock slide to a ridgeline above. Big Bob put his boot on a low pinon branch to retie the annoying lace; time to turn around he thought.

Went the wrong way, didn’t you Big Bob, Kempdinger sneered.

I don’t think Mustang can make it up there, Big Bob said, studying the terrain for show. We’ll turn around here.

Mustang whacked his pole on the ground, Hell I can’t. He was about to charge the hill when…

Hey! Over here! Jesus H. Christ! Puddles yelled and was motioning them over to a clump of acacias away from the trail. I found something.

Big Bob, Kempdinger, and Butcher headed that way. Mustang had found a nicely grooved seat in a boulder and stayed put. Jesus H. Christ, Puddles repeated. They hadn’t seen him this excited since New Year’s Eve at the Lions Club when Lucy Chiselbottom got drunk and grabbed his hinky.

He was staring at a pile of bleached bones half covered with blown red dirt and years of debris. A few bones had been pulled away and spread around by scavengers. The rest of the Dogies were trying to make sense of what they’d found.

"It’s human," Butcher pronounced with some certainty. He’d been a butcher back in Chicago before retiring. There was half an elk in his garage freezer. Big Bob had been with him when he bagged it over by Show Low.

How can you tell, they’re only a few and they’re scattered all over? Big Bob questioned.

I carved a lot of beef and pork ribs. This is nothing like those, they’ve gotta be human, Butcher said, turning over a curved broken piece of deteriorated bone.

Let me see it, Big Bob said, grabbing the bone and inspecting it closer. The idea of it being human made him nervous. The Forest Service would be all over him and the Westerners for disturbing a burial site; he’d probably get kicked out of the club. I think it’s black bear. I read in National Geographic they’re genetically ninety-eight percent our match.

Puddles had wandered farther along the rockslide to take another pee. His prostate had been pressing his bladder like General Crook had pushed the Chiricahua after they jumped the reservation. With hinky in hand, he spied a rusty wheel as his drip drip drip made an unnatural sounding ping ping ping. I found a bike! Hauling it out of a clump of manzanita and fumbling with his zipper he held it up for show – the bike. It’s beat to hell.

Maybe the bear got it, Mustang yelled, having followed what his fellow Dogies were finding from his rocky perch.

Makes sense, Big Bob said.

Kempdinger had been quiet through the whole exchange. She’d been scratching around and found a few more bones. Looking up forty feet she got an idea of what probably happened. Big Bob, you’re a moron. Butcher’s right, those are human remains. Obviously a crazy biker tried riding up those switchbacks and fell. Whoever it is has been out here a while.

I agree with Bob, it’s a bear, Mustang yelled from his seat twenty yards away. He’d follow his Captain through hell and back.

Kempdinger yelled back at Mustang. Daniel Boone here couldn’t even follow the main trail. We’ve got bones and we’ve got a bike. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out.

Maybe it was a circus, Puddles suggested, having shook and tucked everything away. He hated to disagree with Big Bob and Mustang. They were always good for a couple of free beers at the VFW.

Kempdinger threw up her hands, I’m never doing Dogies again!

Chapter Three

Lazy SOB

Sands Desert Retreat was outside the city limits on Red Rock Loop Road. The sweeping vistas of Cathedral Rock and older homesteads stood in contrast to the concrete and smaller lots in town. The retreat was owned by Zula Ballsy who had been married to a Vegas mob boss. According to local legend, Tony Two Balls Ballsy had been axed by his New Jersey family for skimming off the top. Whether or not Zula had anything to do with the axing and got the money to buy the retreat as a reward was another part of the rumor.

The Sands had originally been a ranch. In honorarium Zula Ballsy named the bar/gathering hole the Lazy SOB after Sonny O’Bryan, a famous old-time foreman who