The Ghost Town of Cuthbert, Arizona

(CW, gore)

Two boys in the town of Waypoint, Arizona, went missing while playing near a canyon in early December. Searches were organized and executed for two weeks but to no avail, at which point the FBI then dispatched my partner and I to the small desert town. 

It was December 16th, salted snow piled up the sides of the roads, and the air was dry and assaulting. The town of Waypoint could barely be called a town. It had a singular motel, diner, church, school, courthouse, Sheriff’s department, and library, most of which were in the same building.

My partner and I checked into the motel, threw our belongings on the beds, then made our way to meet Sheriff Milton.

We shook hands with the Sheriff and he led us to the area where they believe the boys disappeared from. We walked a little ways towards a canyon before turning back as it was beginning to get dark. Searchers were still about on foot, some were down in the canyon. The leading theory was that they had run away or got lost, but there was no evidence as of yet to indicate anything about what had happened to them.

One moment they were there, the next they were gone, like they were never there at all, only footsteps in the dust.

After going to the station and planning the course of our investigation, we returned to the motel. My partner and I began to go through the case files and put together a list of people to interview the next day. After a full night of rest, and a cup of shitty coffee, we were on our way.

---

We started our day by interviewing the boys’ families. The eldest, Charlie Meyers, was thirteen years old when he went missing. We didn't manage to get ahold of the immediate family of Charlie as they were out searching. We spoke to his grandmother briefly but that didn't amount to much. So we then went to twelve year old Robert “Bobby” Koffe’s home. Robert’s parents were out searching as well, but we managed to speak with his eldest sister, Sharron.

“You can come inside if you want,” she invited.

We entered the trailer to find ourselves in a dimly lit, dank home. We sat down, a slight awkwardness in the air, before we began our questioning.

“Can you tell us about Robert and Charlie?”

“Like what?”

“What they were like, how their friendship was, and so on.”

“Oh.”

She looked down for a moment, turning up the corner of the rug with the tip of her shoe, a mindless task to sooth some ache.

“Charlie was older than Bobby. They were friends but I kind of noticed that Charlie picked on Bobby in the way a big brother would. Charlie would come over and he was always trying to get them to do some stupid stuff.”

“Like what?”

“Like jousting on bikes or sledding off the roof. Dumb boy stuff. But Charlie can be real excited about exploring. Charlie really wanted to go see the 'A Cave' but I told them never to go looking for it.”

“What this ‘A Cave’?”

“Just local legend sort of stuff.”

My partner and I looked to each other confused.

“What’s the local legend?” My partner asked.

“Well, so before Waypoint was a town there was a town called Cuthbert, they named a canyon after it. The ghost town is supposedly not far from here but I’ve never seen it. This was like, back in the old west or something, but one day the entire town just disappeared. Like they all just got up in the middle of the night and walked away, leaving everything behind. People only found out when others came to town after not hearing from anyone or something like that. It’s obviously just a local urban legend but I didn’t want the boys going out looking for it and getting hurt or lost, especially in that canyon. I tried to tell them not to go, I thought Bobby was smarter than this. So when they didn’t come home I assumed first thing that they went to go find it. I told the searchers but they were dismissive. They said there were no caves like that but that they would keep an eye out. I tried to find it myself, but I didn’t have any luck.”

She paused.

“I’m really scared. I want to be strong for my mom and all but it’s just…it’s been so long and…if I just made sure they didn’t go none of this would have happened…” 

She stopped and began to tear up. I couldn’t help but feel a sort of kinship with the young girl.

My younger brother had gone missing when I was a young teen. I had always felt that it was my fault in a way, as I was staying at a friend’s house when it happened. He was special needs, some guy pulls up in his car, he gets in, and just like that, gone, a ghost. Just like these boys, no goodbye, no body, just vanished, a memory, his bedroom left exactly like it always was, a room without its boy.

I assured her that it wasn’t her fault. But here I am, blaming myself for the same thing all these years later. Who am I to absolve her when I can’t even forgive myself?

I admit I didn't have high hopes for finding these boys, but seeing Sharron, I wanted to believe that we would. I had to find those boys.

---

We decided to head to the library to look for old maps to see if we could find any mention of the A Cave in Cuthbert Canyon. I approached the librarian, an older fellow with his glasses resting on the bridge of his nose, a moth eaten sweater and large dark pockets under his eyes. I told him who we were and if they had any maps that depicted the A Cave or a town called Cuthbert. He looked at me and chuckled slightly.

“Wow they sure are putting you boys to good use huh?”

Neither of us were amused. His grin faded quickly and he got rather timid.

“Well, you see I, I only say that because- well it’s just an old story.” He laughed nervously. “I’m not even sure if the place ever actually existed. I do have a good amount of local maps from land evaluations and purchases and what not if you’d like to look through those.”

“That would be just fine, thank you.”

“Of course, anything else I can do for you gentlemen?”

“What’s the story of the ‘A Cave’ and Cuthbert?”

“Well I’ll be, I didn’t think you two fellers for the type to care about old ghost stories but…anyway…”

He paused for a moment and removed his glasses, and sat more comfortably in his chair.

---

“So it goes, there was a town back in the 1800s called Cuthbert. It was built decently close to the canyon that would later get the same name. The town was somewhat prosperous, for a time, but as most towns like it out here in the West, they fell on some pretty hard times. On more than one occasion the men had to fend off roving gangs of headhunters, Indians and Mexicans alike. Anyway, there was a woman whose brother lived in Cuthbert with his wife and newly born child. She and he brother would write to each other very frequently. One day she begins to notice that he hasn’t written back in quite some time and she began to grow worried. So, she asked a friend of hers to take her to Cuthbert to go see if her brother and his family were alright.”

“They arrived at dusk, they could see the shadows of Cuthbert sticking out against the horizon before the setting sun. The woman began to grow anxious and perplexed, she looked to the whole town and not a single light, lantern, or fire was going, anywhere. Her mind ran to the worst, Indians, Mexicans, roving gangs. When they arrived in the town, however, what they saw was arguably more devastating; for at least had it been some gang of savages one would know what had happened. But not like this, not with what they found there in that town.”

“Which was?”

“Nothing. Not a single person. Nobody walking around, no dead bodies, no sign of a struggle, nothing stolen or broken. They checked every building, every room they thought of. Everything was right as it should be, just a town without its people in it. The woman was growing increasingly distraught. At least if it were Indians there would be something to bury, at least hope’s evil tendrils wouldn’t sink into her heart and tell her lies of the possibility that her family was alive out there somewhere. What she had been given was a grief that is even more ceaseless and cutting, as she isn’t even given the decency of knowing. Part of her will always wonder, and always ache."

"She cried for a moment. She rubbed her eyes and, when she looked up she was looking at the church. But something wasn’t quite right, she couldn’t make it out. She rubbed her eyes again, and behold, she could now see. Written on the doors of the church, in bloody, bold letters, was a name."

AURORA.

---

Map after map sparsely depicted the canyon, and if it did, it was usually on a larger map of the whole county and did not provide any mapping of caves or names. Perhaps this one was unmapped or undiscovered, or it really didn’t exist at all. After a few hours of lackluster results, we were soon to lose hope. However, by some miracle we found a map produced by a landowner some decades prior that pointed to a shoot-off section of the canyon with the name, A Cave scrawled in faint graphite.

The next day we called Sheriff Milton informing him of our discovery and organized a meeting at the canyon entrance. Due to the size and terrain of the canyon, Sheriff Milton believed it best to ride in on horseback. Since we were federal agents and not cowboys, Sheriff Milton called in a favor from the landowner whose property line butted up against the property that the canyon resided on so that we would have horses to ride in on as well. The parents pleaded with Sheriff Milton to let them come along but the Sheriff insisted that they could not. They relented begrudgingly. The Sheriff knew that the likelihood of finding these boys alive was not high, and no parent should have to discover their dead children in the way we possibly were about to. I saw Sharron before we rode in, we exchanged glances, though not much could be read in her expression. I nodded to her.

We descended into the canyon on our horses and made our way along, following the crude map to our destination. The warm sun contrasted against the bitter December chills and gusts of wind whisked up dust from the earth and into our eyes. The ride was long and quiet, not much said between anyone. The eeriness of our circumstances was not lost on us, though the deputies seemed much less bothered by the events unfolding than my partner did. As a father himself, he had a hard time with cases like these. Every now and again a deputy would spit out his chewing tobacco or one of them would light a cigarette, their hands trembling in the cold air. 

After around an hour, we arrived at the shoot-off. The early morning sun made it somewhat difficult to see the canyon walls. I kept looking at my map and back up again over and over trying to match what I saw to the area around me. Soon, we arrived at the location on the map where A Cave was written. I could tell as this section of the shoot-off faced the east, with a jagged cut in the rock-face. 

I called out that this should be the spot, to which we dismounted our horses and began a wide search for any sort of cave entrance. The boulders around us were massive, some the size of small trailer homes. They piled together in ways that formed strange mazes and catacombs, like long dark hallways that even the morning sun couldn’t penetrate. One particular entrance into a labyrinth of boulders caught my eye, waving to a couple of deputies to come with me. Sheriff Milton noticed, and wasn’t too far behind, along with my partner.

As we walked into the twists and turns of the boulders, it felt as if something was leading me exactly where it wanted me to go. I can’t explain it. These sorts of rock formations likely took millions of years to form, yet it felt like it was constructed for this very moment, that all those millions of years were leading up to this exact instance in time. As we walked, I somehow got too far ahead of the deputies. I called out, and their voices were muffled. I assumed they took a wrong turn, so I kept moving. It got darker and darker the further I went, so I drew my flashlight. I soon realized that the boulders were no longer boulders, but all around me was solid rock. Looking around, I realized it was a cave, the walls rose to the ceiling, forming a point. The “A” Cave. 

---

The cave seemed to descend a ways in and turn to the right. I called out to the deputies and heard no response. Something compelled me to push onward into the cave. As the edges of my flashlight faded into complete darkness, I held it tightly and continued to follow the bend to the right. Once I had completed the turn, what I saw puzzled me.

The cave narrowed where the walls, the floor, and the ceiling all converged together. Where they met was a jagged collection of rocks and gravel that surrounded some wooden planks. I got closer and realized that there was a small latch and a handle.

I tugged on the rusted handle, and it didn’t budge. Clearing some of the larger rocks, it moved a little more. After some decent work with my cold and numb hands, I cleared enough rock and gravel to give the handle another good tug. With all the strength I could muster, it finally gave way.

As soon as it opened, a gust of hot air washed and slapped me like a wave of ocean surf. This was pleasant in contrast with the meek 40 degree weather that I had been fighting against the whole day. I shined my flashlight into the opening and saw what looked to be a small wooden room.

The entrance didn’t make much sense, as when I peered in from the cave, I looked down into the room which appeared to be on its side in some sort of way. When I entered, I stood upright on the floor and saw that the entrance I had come out of was in the floor as well, just the same as the outside. I should have fallen inside, much like a cellar door to a tornado shelter or basement. It puzzled me for a moment, but I shook the confusion from me.

I took off my coat as the temperature here was much warmer than outside. I looked around, and it appeared to me that I was in a cellar of sorts, and there were stairs directly in front of me going up and to the left. With my gun and flashlight drawn, I made my way to the stairs and up towards the closed door.

Turning the brass knob gently, I opened the door and pushed it open with a groan. I was met with complete silence, a silence so deep I could hear my heartbeat and a near constant ringing in my ear. I shone my flashlight around, doors along the sides of two long hallways and a staircase going up, along with a front desk. The wood that comprised everything was dry, cracked, and old, whatever place this was had been here for a long time, yet everything looked to have been left yesterday. It appeared to be a hotel, or used to be. Approaching the front door I realized that the windows next to it were still intact as well. Shining my light yielded nothing, as only darkness lay beyond the windows. 

I opened the front door, and I walked out into what looked to be a street. I could feel the expanse of what I had just walked into before my flashlight could shine out and give me a bearing on my surroundings. I could faintly recognize the smell of smoke cutting through the musty wet air of the cave. I shined my flashlight around, in the darkness I could make out that there were other buildings all around me, all looking rotten and abandoned. I walked out into the dirt street and looked around some more. There seemed to be a turn in the road ahead to the left where more buildings lie. It looked like an old late 1800s boom town. The surreal nature of my discovery weighed heavy on me.

I couldn’t shake this feeling that I was being watched. I chalked it up to nerves. There should be people, yet there’s not any. So I shrugged it off and decided I would start by searching the buildings. I made my way towards the building across from the hotel. As I approached, I made out the sign reading, “CUTHBERT GENERAL STORE”. Goosebumps ran down my neck and spine.

I pushed the door open, with a creak and a muted ring from the old bell above the door, I made my way in. I called out the boys’ names in a loud whisper to silence in reply. As I looked around, I noticed that there were still items on the shelves, with hardly any dust on them. Other than the old dry and decrepit look of the exterior of the buildings, it looked like it had only been abandoned yesterday. I finished my sweep of the building, but with there being no signs of disturbances I made for my exit. As I made my way towards the door, I began to faintly hear other voices. I truly thought that it had to have been me hearing things that weren't there, as it was so faint I wasn’t even sure if I had actually heard it. As if to answer the doubt present in my mind, I began to make out the distinct sound of some rhythmic chanting, but just as quickly as I had heard it, the strange chanting stopped.

Once I was in the street again, I looked to the ground and saw what looked to be footprints of an entire group of people marching through the street. I followed the footsteps, past the hotel and Sheriff's Office. Passing the saloon, I noticed a slip of torn paper just posted up next to the door. It was a poster with a woman on it. It was faded and hard to make out, but I could tell that she was beautiful. A faint green glow haloed her, hail dark like out curled down to her shoulders. She wore a red dress with black patterns adorning it, it ruffled around the edges of her collarbone and her chest. Her eyes we are emerald green, and they seemed to cut right through me. Written above her was the name,

AURORA.

I shivered, stepped back and followed the footsteps further. I made the turn in the street, and pointed my flashlight towards the end of it.

My flashlight illuminated the steeple of an old church, the steeple pressed against the cave ceiling, where the cross should have been. The exterior of the church was covered in flaking white paint, contrasting against the dark rotten wood of the other buildings. I walked towards it, slowly, cautiously. As I did, my nervousness increased, but I shoved it away quick along with the sweat on my brow from the ever increasing heat and kept moving forward.

With a heave and a shove the doors let open, and in I walked into the chapel. It was so dark, and so much warmer than anywhere else down here. I looked to my feet and saw symbols written in red across the floor. I walked down the aisle, examining each of the unfamiliar symbols. They seemed biblical, but wrong, so wrong, like my soul knew the awful things they meant.

I pointed my flashlight up and towards the podium and altar. All across the floor, the steps, and most surfaces, were candles half burnt, with wax dripped and hardened all over. Golden chalices were littered about, along with other strange ceremonial articles. Looking up then to the altar, was a sight that, in all my years of being a federal agent, shook me to my core, and to this day still sticks with me.

Both boys lie there, on the altar, dead. Their eyes were empty sockets. Their wrists and throat had been slit and drained into a large bronze bowl with a ladle. The golden chalices were stained red and the bronze bowl was empty. Carved into the boys’ forehead was another symbol I did not recognize, circular and punishing. The boys were naked, their genitals were removed and their stomachs cut wide open. Their intestines were coiled around a staff that Tee’d off at the end with another odd symbol on the end of the scepter. The rest of their organs I did not see. When I looked at the younger boy’s face, Bobby, I couldn’t help but see my brother.

I looked behind the altar to see a cloaked figure lying on the ground, holding a chalice with the fresh blood staining the inside. I yelled and turned them over, whipping my handcuffs out, just  to see that they were nearly skeletal, appearing mummified. I looked at the boys one last time before collapsing to the ground. I felt sick, nauseous, I wanted to scream. I was hyperventilating, unable to calm myself. I managed pulled myself together as quickly as one can after witnessing something so primally evil, and turned to leave the church and find the others.

But when I shined my flashlight up again and into the pews, I saw dozens of figures, all in black hoods, sitting in the pews, motionless. A cold shiver consumed me in fear, I nearly fell backwards.

I stood there with my gun drawn, too terrified to move. The figures did not move, just the black hoods over their heads, still as stone. I approached the one nearest me, slowly, and reached out to life the hood. When my fingers made contact with the fabric and lifted, the head fell back limp with a crack. In it's lap rested in its cold grip was another golden chalice, stained with the fresh blood of the boys. It appeared mummified as well, dead for God only knows how long.

As I got closer to where I came in, I could hear the voices of the deputies. I made my way back to the cellar where I had entered and was met with a collage of voices asking different things that I couldn’t hear, all muffled noise. They soon began their dissent into this awful place. My partner and Sheriff Milton entered, the sheriff asked me what I had seen. I pointed and said, “Outside, to the left. The church.” The deputies made their way out, their flashlights in bound along with their voices. 

I looked to the floor in the dark basement, as I now stood in here alone. I thought of Frankie. I thought of Sharron.