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accompanied by a fetid odor that made Richard gag and turn his face away.
    When he looked back, the gap and the corridor had vanished and the stench was fading. The man was still standing there, though, regarding him with curiosity. Richard recognized him. There weren’t many black professors at Cal Hills, and this guy towered over them all.
    “P-professor?” he stammered.
    “How do you do? I’m Dr. Todd, from the religion department. I see I’m not the only one who’s curious about the dig.”
    “No, sir.” He stared. Maybe he was just tired—imagining things. He looked around. The night was scented by nothing stronger than dust and sage. “Did you, uh, walk up here, too?”
    “I thought this seemed like the best vantage point.” Todd stepped forward and stood next to him. Richard glanced down at the professor’s expensive leather shoes. There wasn’t much dust on them; not as much as he’d gotten on his own sneakers hiking up the narrow back trail. But the professor’s soles did look muddy, as though he’d stepped on something wet, and several small feathers clung to them. “Has anything interesting happened?”
    “Not much.” Richard turned his attention back to the lights. “They put up those barriers and dug up a bunch more bones. They’re being really slow and careful, like CSI . They must be human bones. They wouldn’t make a fuss over animal bones, would they?”
    “I expect not.”
    Richard was pleased to have his guess confirmed. He’d definitely be able to sell his photos to the county paper.
    “Is that a telephoto lens?” Todd asked.
    “Yeah. I’ve been taking photos for the Clarion . Go ahead and look, but don’t mess up the focus.”
    “Of course not.” Todd leaned over the camera, looking through the viewer. “Oh, yes, those are definitely human.”
    “Do you think it’s, like, an old Indian burial ground?”
    Todd laughed, a rich, baritone sound.
    “You’ve been watching too many horror movies. If that’s a graveyard at all, it’s probably one of the old Scandinavian settlers’ plots.”
    “Wouldn’t there be coffins?”
    “Perhaps. The wood may have fallen apart, however, between the winter storms, the summer heat, and the odd earthquake or two.” The professor spoke absently as he moved the camera to look at another part of the dig. “I don’t know. They might have been buried naked, amen.”
    Richard looked at him curiously. Amen? “Is being buried naked some kind of religious thing?”
    “I would say it’s more likely to indicate an absence of religion,” Todd replied, moving the camera back to its original position and standing. “Even in the most primitive cultures, corpses are usually interred with some sort of covering.”
    “Maybe the shrouds rotted?”
    “It’s possible.”
    “So, what are you thinking? If it’s not a graveyard, is it like a serial killer’s hiding place or something?” Richard made the suggestion half-seriously, half-jokingly, expecting the professor to brush it off. Instead, the tall man cocked his head, regarding the scene below them with a faint air of puzzlement.
    “It’s possible,” he repeated.
    “Whoa.” Richard jumped to his feet, checked the viewfinder, and snapped another photograph, just to do something with his hands. “So this could be a real mystery.”
    “It’s definitely a mystery.” Todd was silent a moment. “Yes, I see them, amen.”
    “See who?” Richard looked around for someone new on the scene.
    “Watchers.” Todd’s voice suddenly went strange on the last syllable of the word. “Watchers....”
    “Like us?”
    “Be careful up here.” Todd made an abrupt turn and began to stride away. “There’s blood in the air.”
    That was creepy. Richard yanked his jacket more closely around his shoulders.
    “Uh, okay. I’ll be careful. You, too, professor.”
    The big man was already lost in the night.
    Richard looked down at where the professor been standing and picked up one of the