Scotty put a hand on his shoulder. "Why wouldn't he be alive? Who would gain anything by his death? We have to remember that the gimmick in this whole business is a golden skull. Nast wants it, Nangolat wants it, Lazada wants it, and we want it. No one has it."
Rick gained altitude steadily, keeping an eye on the twisting road below. "All right. I'll go along with your reasoning. Whoever wants the golden skull has to go to Banaue to find it. It can't be found—unless by a lucky accident—without the earth scanner. And who has the scanner?"
"Nangolat."
"Can he use it?"
"No."
Rick shrugged. "Tony can use the scanner, though. We suspect that Nast has Tony. The question is what is the relationship between Nangolat and Nast?"
Below the Sky Wagon the high green mountains marched in a series of ridges from horizon to horizon. This was the divide between Igorot and Ifugao country. Rick let the conversation lag as he searched below and ahead for a landmark. There was a little cloud cover around him, as Santos had predicted.
Then the cloud was past and the three looked down into the great valley of Banaue.
Rick and Scotty gasped. It was incredible! As far as they could see, the mountains on either side of the valley were sculptured into irregular green steps, or terraces. The smallest terrace was perhaps only a few feet square, while the larger ones were the size of a football field. They rose in an irregular triangle right to the base of the clouds. There was no particular pattern. The Ifugao farmers had simply used every possible inch of space to make terraces for the growing of rice. In some places the step from one terrace to the next was only a foot or two. In other places the step up to the terrace above was forty feet.
The retaining walls of the terraces were native stone, irregular pieces laid together by expert Ifugao masons without benefit of mortar or concrete. The same method had been used to make the great wall of China.