He turned away and put a tea ball filled with coffee into the steaming water. Something about his tone of voice made me think he was testing me, trying to check out whether I was who I claimed.
“Where is Charlene?” I asked.
He pointed a finger toward the east. “In the Forest. I’ve never met your friend, but I overheard her being introduced in the restaurant one night, and I’ve seen her a few times since. Several days ago I saw her again; she was hiking into the valley alone, and judging from the way she was packed, I’d say she’s probably still out there.”
I looked in that direction. From this perspective, the valley looked enormous, stretching.forever into the distance.
“Where do you think she was going?” I asked.
He stared at me for a moment. “Probably toward the Sipsey Canyon. That’s where one of the openings is found.” He was studying my reaction.
“The openings?”
He smiled cryptically. “That’s right, the dimensional openings.”
I leaned over toward him, remembering my experience at the Celestine Ruins. “Who knows about all this?”
“Very few people. So far it’s all rumor, bits and pieces of information, intuition. Not a soul has seen a manuscript. Most of the people who come here looking for the Tenth feel they’re being synchronistically led, and they’re genuinely trying to live the Nine Insights, even though they complain that the coincidences guide them along for a while and then just stop.” He chuckled lightly. “But that’s where we all are, right? The Tenth Insight is about understanding this whole awareness—the perception of mysterious coincidences, the growing spiritual consciousness on Earth, the Ninth Insight disappearances—all from the higher perspective of the other dimension, so that we can understand why this transformation is happening and participate more fully.”
“How do you know that?” I asked.
He looked at me with piercing eyes, suddenly angry. “I know!”
For another moment his face remained serious, then his expression warmed again. He reached over and poured the coffee into two cups and handed one to me.
“My ancestors have lived near this valley for thousands of years,” he continued. “They believed this forest was a sacred site midway between the upper world and the middle world here on Earth. My people would fast and enter the valley on their vision quests, looking for their specific gifts, their medicine, the path they should walk in this life.
“My grandfather told me about a shaman who came from a faraway tribe and taught our people to search for what he called a state of purification. The shaman taught them to leave from this very spot, bearing only a knife, and to walk until the animals provided a sign, and then to follow until they reached, what they called the sacred opening into the upper world. If they were worthy, if they had cleared the lower emotions, he told them, they might even be allowed to enter the opening, and to meet directly with the ancestors, where they could remember not just their own vision but the vision of the whole world.
“Of course, all that ended when the white man came. My grandfather couldn’t remember how to do it, and neither can I. We’re having to figure it out, like everyone else.”
“You’re here looking for the Tenth, aren’t you?” I asked.
“Of course… of course! But all I seem to be doing is this penance of forgiveness.” His voice became sharp again, and he suddenly seemed to be talking more to himself than to me. “Every time I try to move forward, a part of me can’t get past the resentment, the rage, at what happened to my people. And it’s not getting any better. How could it happen that our land was stolen, our way of life overrun, destroyed? Why would that be allowed?”
“I wish it hadn’t happened,” I said.
He looked at the ground and chuckled lowly again. “I believe that. But still, there is a rage that comes when I think of this valley being misused.
“You see this scar,” he added, pointing to his face. “I could have avoided the fight where this happened. Texas cowboys with too much to drink. I could have walked away but for this anger burning within me.”
“Isn’t most of this valley now protected in the National Forest?” I asked.
“Only about half of it, north of the stream, but the politicians always threaten to sell it or allow development.”
“What about the other half? Who owns that?”
“For a long time, this area was owned mostly by individuals, but now there’s a foreign-registered corporation trying to buy it up. We don’t know who is behind it, but some of the owners have been offered huge amounts to sell.”
He looked away momentarily, then said, “My problem is that I want the past three centuries to have happened differently. I resent the fact that Europeans began to settle on this continent with no regard for the people who were already here. It was criminal. I want it to have happened differently, as though I could somehow change the past. Our way of life was important. We were learning the value of remembering. This was the great message the Europeans could have received from my people if they had stopped to listen.”
As he talked, my mind drifted into another daydream. Two people—another Native American and the same white woman— were talking on the banks of a small stream. Behind them was a thick forest. After a while, other Native Americans crowded around to hear their conversation.
“We can heal this!” the woman was saying.
“I’m afraid we don’t know enough yet,” the Native American replied, his face expressing great regard for the woman. “Most of the other chiefs have already left.”
“Why not? Think of the discussions we’ve had. You yourself said if there was enough faith, we could heal this.”
“Yes,” he replied. “But faith is a certainty that comes from knowing how things should be. The ancestors know, but not enough of us here have reached that knowing.”
“But maybe we can reach this knowledge now,” the woman pleaded. “We have to try!”
My thoughts were interrupted by the sight of several young Forest Service officers, who were approaching an older man on the bridge. He had neatly cut gray hair and wore dress slacks and a starched shirt. As he moved, he seemed to limp slightly.
“Do you see the man with the officers?” David asked.
“Yeah,” I replied. “What about him?”
“I’ve seen him around here for the past two weeks. His first name is Feyman, I think. I don’t know his last name.” David leaned toward me, sounding for the first time as if he trusted me completely. “Listen, something very strange is going on. For several weeks the Forest Service seems to have been counting the hikers who go into the forest. They’ve never done that before, and yesterday someone told me they have completely closed off the far eastern end of the wilderness. There are places in that area that are ten miles from the nearest highway. Do you know how few people ever venture out that far? Some of us have begun to hear strange noises in that direction.”
“What kind of noises?”
“A dissonance of some kind. Most people can’t hear it.”
Suddenly he was up on his feet, quickly taking down his tent.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I can’t stay here,” he replied. “I’ve got to get into the valley.”
After a moment he interrupted his work and looked at me again. “Listen,” he said. “There’s something you have to know. That man Feyman. I saw your friend with him several times.”
“What were they doing?”
“Just talking, but I’m telling you there’s something wrong here.” He began packing again.
I watched him in silence for a moment. I had no idea what to think about this situation, but I sensed that he was right about Charlene being somewhere out in the valley. “Let me get my equipment,” I said. “I’d like to go with you.”
“No,” he said quickly. “Each person must experience the valley alone. I can’t help you now. It’s my own vision I must find.” His face looked pained.
&nbs
p; “Can you tell me exactly where this canyon is?”
“Just follow the stream for about two miles. You’ll come to another small creek that enters the stream from the north. Follow this creek for another mile. It will lead you right through the mouth of the Sipsey Canyon.”
I nodded and turned to walk away, but he grabbed my arm.
“Look,” he said. “You can find your friend if you raise your energy to another level. There are specific locations in the valley that can help you.”
“The dimensional openings?” I asked.
“Yes. There you can discover the perspective of the Tenth Insight, but to find these places you must understand the true nature of your intuitions, and how to maintain these mental images. Also watch the animals and you’ll begin to remember what you are doing here in this valley… why we’re all here together. But be very careful. Don’t let them see you enter the forest.” He thought for a moment. “There’s someone else out there, a friend of mine, Curtis Webber. If you see Curtis, tell him that you’ve talked to me and that I will find him.”
He smiled faintly and returned to folding his tent.
I wanted to ask what he meant about intuition and watching the animals, but he avoided eye contact and stayed focused on his work.
“Thanks,” I said.
He waved slightly with one hand.
I quietly shut the motel door and eased out into the moonlight. The cool air and the tension sent a shiver through my body. Why, I thought, was I doing this? There was no proof that Charlene was still out in this valley or that David’s suspicions were correct. Yet my gut told me that indeed something was wrong. For several hours I had mulled over calling the local sheriff. But what would I have said? That my friend was missing and she had been seen entering the forest of her own free will, but was perhaps in trouble, all based on a vague note found hundreds of miles away? Searching this wilderness would take hundreds of people, and I knew they would never mount such an effort without something more substantial.
I paused and looked at the three-quarters moon rising above the trees. My plan was to cross the stream well east of the rangers’ station and then to proceed along the main path into the valley. I was counting on the moon to light my way, but not to be this bright. Visibility was at least a hundred yards.
I made my way past the edge of the pub to the area where David had camped. The site was completely clean. He had even spread leaves and pine straw to remove any sign of his presence. To cross where I had planned, I would have to walk about forty yards in plain sight of the rangers’ station, which I could now see clearly. Through the station’s side window, two officers were busy in conversation. One rose from his seat and picked up a telephone.
Crouching low, I pulled my pack up on my shoulders and walked out onto the sandy flood wash that bordered the stream, and finally into the water itself, sloshing through mounds of smooth river stone and stepping over several decayed logs. A symphony of tree frogs and crickets erupted around me. I glanced at the rangers again: both were still talking, oblivious to my stealth. At its deepest point, the moderately swift water reached my upper thigh, but in seconds I had moved across the thirty feet of current and into a stand of small pines.
I carefully moved forward until I found the hiking path leading into the valley. Toward the east, the path disappeared into the darkness, and as I stared in that direction, more doubts entered my mind. What was this mysterious noise that so worried David? What might I stumble upon in the darkness out there?
I shook off the fear. I knew I had to go on, but as a compromise, I walked only a half mile into the forest before making my way well off the path into a heavily wooded area to raise the tent and spend the rest of the night, glad to take off my wet boots and let them dry. It would be smarter to proceed in the daylight.
The next morning I awoke at dawn thinking about David’s cryptic remark about maintaining my intuitions, and as I lay in my sleeping bag, I reviewed my own understanding of the Seventh Insight, particularly the awareness that the experience of synchronicity follows a certain structure. According to this Insight, each of us, once we work to clear our past dramas, can identify certain questions that define our particular life situation, questions related to our careers, relationships, where we should live, how we should proceed on our path. Then, if we remain aware, gut feelings, hunches, and intuitions will provide impressions of where to go, what to do, with whom we should speak, in order to pursue an answer.
After that, of course, a coincidence was supposed to occur, revealing the reason we were urged to follow such a course and providing new information that pertained in some way to our question, leading us forward in our lives. How would maintaining the intuition help?
Easing out of my sleeping bag, I pulled the tent flaps apart and checked outside. Sensing nothing unusual, I climbed out into the crisp fall air and walked back to the stream, where I washed my face in the cool water. Afterward I packed up and headed east again, nibbling on a granola bar and keeping myself hidden as much as possible in the tall trees that bordered the stream. After traveling perhaps three miles, a perceptible wave of fear and nervousness passed through my body and I immediately felt fatigued, so I sat down and leaned against a tree, attempting to focus on my surroundings and gain inner energy. The sky was cloudless and the morning sun danced through the trees and along the ground around me. I noticed a small green plant with yellow blossoms about ten feet away and focused on its beauty. Already draped in full sunlight, it seemed brighter suddenly, its leaves a richer green. A rush of fragrance reached my awareness, along with the musty smell of leaves and black soil.
Simultaneously, from the trees far toward the north, I heard the call of several crows. The richness of the sound amazed me, but surprisingly I couldn’t distinguish their exact location. As I concentrated on listening, I became fully aware of dozens of individual sounds that made up the morning chorus: songbirds in the trees above me, a bumblebee among the wild daisies at the edge of the stream, the water gurgling around the rocks and fallen branches… and then something else, barely perceptible, a low, dissonant hum. I stood up and looked around. What was this noise?
I picked up my pack and proceeded east. Because of the crunching sound created by my footsteps on the fallen leaves, I had to stop and listen very intensely to still hear the hum. But it was there. Ahead the woods ended, and I entered a large meadow, colorful with wildflowers and thick, two-foot-tall sage grass that seemed to go on for half a mile. The breeze brushed the tops of the sage in currents. When I had almost reached the edge of the meadow, I noticed a patch of blackberry brambles growing beside a fallen tree. The bushes struck me as exceedingly beautiful, and I walked over to look at them more closely, imagining that they were full of berries.
As I did this, I experienced an acute feeling of déjà vu. The surroundings suddenly seemed very familiar, as though I had been here in this valley before, eaten berries before. How was that possible? I sat down on the trunk of the fallen tree. Presently, in the back of my mind rose a picture of a crystal-clear pool of water and several tiers of waterfalls in the background, a location that, as I imaged it, seemed equally familiar. Again I felt anxious.
Without warning, an animal of some kind ran noisily from the berry patch, startling me, and headed north for about twenty feet and then abruptly stopped. The creature was hidden in the tall sage, and I had no idea what it was, but I could follow its wake in the grass. After a few minutes it darted back a few feet to the south, remained motionless again for several seconds, then darted ten or twenty feet back again toward the north, only to stop again. I guessed it was a rabbit, although its movements seemed especially peculiar.
For five or six minutes I watched the area where the animal had last moved, then slowly walked that way. As I closed to about five feet, it suddenly sped away again toward the north. At one point, before it disappeared into the distance, I glimpsed the white tail and hind legs of a large rabbit.
I smiled and proceeded east agai
n along the trail, coming finally to the end of the meadow, where I entered an area of thick woods. There I spotted a small creek, perhaps four feet wide, that entered the stream from the left. I knew this must be the landmark David had mentioned. I was to turn northward. Unfortunately there was no trail in that direction, and worse, the woods along the creek were a snarl of thick saplings and prickly briers. I couldn’t get through; I would have to backtrack into the meadow behind me until I could find a way around.
I made my way back into the grass and walked along the edge of the woods looking for a break in the dense undergrowth. To my surprise, I ran into the trail the rabbit had made in the sage and followed its path until I caught sight of the small creek again. Here the dense undergrowth receded partially, allowing me to push my way through into an area of larger, old-growth trees, where I could follow the creek due north.
After proceeding for what I judged to be about another mile, I could see a range of foothills rising in the distance on both sides of the creek. Walking farther, I realized that these hills were forming steep canyon walls and that up ahead was what looked to be the only entrance.
When I arrived, I sat down beside a large hickory and surveyed the scene. A hundred yards on both sides of the creek, the hills butted off in fifty-foot-high limestone bluffs, then bent outward into the distance, forming a huge bowl-like canyon perhaps two miles wide and at least four long. The first half mile was thinly wooded and covered with more sage. I thought about the hum and listened carefully for five or ten minutes, but it seemed to have ceased.
Finally I reached into my pack and pulled out a small butane stove and lit the burner, then filled a small pan with water from my canteen, emptied the contents of a package of freeze-dried vegetable stew into the water, and set the pan on the flame. For a few moments I watched as strands of steam twisted upward and disappeared into the breeze. In my reverie I again saw the pool and the waterfall in my mind’s eye, only this time I seemed to be there, walking up, as if to greet someone. I shook the picture from my head. What was happening? These images were growing more vivid. First David in another time; now these falls.