Jo Ann Bender

Cries in the Desert: a Treasure Hunt Gone Wrong Jo Ann Bender

Alone and deathly afraid, Mara Ortega felt eyes watching her. A sense of the sublime rippled through the stones of the mountains-yet the seeming emptiness of the terrain northeast of Superstition Mountains exuded a presence that haunted Mara. Could it be the spirits of the long dead Apaches who once camped along this river? Or did Mara sense the presence of the Jesuit priest, Fr. Mauer, who with two of his flock were captured, first by the Spaniards and then the Apache? Mara, watching her husband Vance hike farther up the mountain to set another boundary marker for their claim, derived little comfort from his assurance that no one was following them. Her gut feelings and observations told her that the power of the vast desert had unleased spirits of the unknown. The Ortegas' search for lost Spanish gold in the mountainous desert country had all the ear marks of an exciting adventure but now Mara wondered what it could be turning into. It's treasure they found-but will it be worth its horrors?