“Naw. Just long enough for some college guys to get in there and dig the stuff up, like on TV.” He scratched his head, meditatively. “But that was like, some old fort or something. I dunno what they’d do about somethin’ like this.”

Neither did anyone else, it appeared. The foreman was deep in conversation on his phone, and the rest of them were at something of a loss. Not for the first time, Larry regretted that he hadn’t popped for the cost of one of those phones. He’d have liked to put in a couple of calls—to the Osage Principal Chief for one, and to old man Talldeer for another. But he didn’t dare leave the site, because right now, from the dirty looks he was getting, it looked like the foreman would be willing to use any excuse to fire him.

The foreman shoved the phone back into his car and stalked back, the look on his face boding no good for anyone who got in his way.

“The boss says that he wants us to dig the stuff up and trash it—burn it or throw it in the river or bury it or something,” he said shortly. “Otherwise the Feds are gonna get in here, drag in the college people, and start holding things up while they screw around.”

That was when Larry decided that no amount of money was worth violating a burial site. He got on his dozer, with a silent apology to those buried there, and backed up. Carefully. Doing his best not to disturb things any more than he already had.

The dozer was a cranky old bitch, and he used his long familiarity with her to kill her and flood her carburetor. She coughed and died; he made some elaborate “attempts” to restart her, then held up his hands.

“Sorry,” he said, face carefully blank. “I guess she needs some work.”

The foreman’s face turned tomato-red, but there wasn’t anything he could do if the dozer had stalled, no matter what the cause. The way he was glaring at Larry boded no good for the future, but he had no choice but to order a second piece of equipment forward.

He chose one of the dozers leased directly to the construction company. Unfortunately for discipline, he chose the machine normally driven by Bobby Whitehorse. Bobby was young—but Bobby lived at home with his parents. He was single. His car was paid for.

In short, Bobby could afford to get fired.

“No effin’ way, man,” Bobby said, putting the machine in idle, and sitting back on the seat, arms folded over his chest. “I’m not diggin’ up nobody’s ancestors.”