Page 10 of Dead Mountain

“How did the petroglyphs in the back of the cave come to be damaged?”

The two young men looked at each other. “No idea,” said Kottke.

“Did you throw rocks at them?”

“I don’t remember.”

Corrie let a beat pass while they did some more fidgeting. Then she said, “I told you we’re not going to charge you with possession. But keep in mind, it’s a felony to lie to the FBI. That includes claiming you don’t remember something when in fact you do. Now: Would you care to strain a little harder to remember?”

They stared back with pale, frightened faces. If it hadn’t been for the damage she’d seen in the cave, she might have felt sorry for them.

“Maybe we did throw some rocks,” Kottke said. “We got pretty messed up by the end of the night.”

“Did you trigger a cave-in?”

“No cave-in, not at all, it was . . . just some rocks that fell from the ceiling.”

Corrie paused briefly. “You found the cave, got drunk, got stoned, then began throwing rocks at the petroglyphs.”

“I guess,” said Purdue. “But I didn’t know they were anything important—I just thought they were graffiti someone had left in the cave.”

“How far back into the cave did you go?”

“Not beyond that point where the rocks fell. It didn’t look safe.”

“How did you discover the burial?”

At this question, both young men grimaced involuntarily.

“That was Brandon,” said Kottke. “I was sleeping.”

She turned. “Brandon?”

“I was trying to go to sleep and this thing was poking me in the back. I looked, and it was the skull.”

“And then?”

“I freaked out. I moved to the side of the cave and . . . well, I guess I must have passed out. Next thing it was morning.”

“So you didn’t try to dig it up?”

“No. No, I didn’t. I didn’t want anything to do with it.”

“And your friend? He didn’t disturb it?”

“He was passed out, too.”

“Was he the one who vomited?”

Brandon looked at his friend. “Yeah.”

Corrie nodded. She was glad it was going to be up to the sheriff whether to charge these kids. She believed what they said about not intentionally disturbing the burial, which would have been a class C felony. Vandalizing the petroglyphs—she wasn’t sure what the statute on that was. It probably fell under ARPA, the Archaeological Resources Protection Act.

She turned. “Agent Sharp, any questions?”

“Thank you, Agent Swanson.” He glanced over at the two and let a silence settle in before speaking. “Mr. Kottke, why did you deface those petroglyphs?”

“I don’t know. Like Brandon said, I didn’t know what they were. You’ve got to understand, we were pretty drunk.”

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