by Farris, John
I didn't know if Greg had killed Lagerfeld and ransacked his files, or merely suggested that it be done. It wasn't important how it had happened, his motive was clear. Now I was the only one in the neighborhood who could connect Greg Walker to Bonnie Sullivan, presumed missing and probably long dead by her father's hand.
I inspected three hotels in and near Cobían before deciding on the Petén Grande, three blocks from the zócalo and the Colonial-style basilica to which I had invited Greg Walker at nine o'clock. It was the feast day of some locally prominent saint, the church bells were ringing hourly, and the trees in the plaza in front of the basilica were decorated with strings of lights and paper bunting.
The entrance to the Petén Grande was off an unpaved street, through double wooden doors of a size you might expect to find in a German castle. The doors were set within a thick masonry wall twelve feet high. There was a pleasant courtyard with a fountain behind the wall, with the usual bird and monkey cages. A good breeze came off the lake and through the lobby of the hotel. There was an elevator that went as high as the third floor. I was on the fourth and top floor, overlooking the lake. Double room with telephone, balcony, private bath, a ceiling fan and an electric fan on the lacquered rattan dresser, twenty dollars a day in season. There were two good locks on the door, but still I didn't want to leave anything valuable behind when I went out again.
I had the number of Gùzman's clinic on a card he'd given me. I got a woman who didn't speak English and then, after a lengthy delay, Gùzman himself.
"'Nica's as good as could be expected. Give me a week and I may be cautiously optimistic. She's asleep now, but maybe you could see her for a few minutes this afternoon. Want to make it three o'clock?"
After talking to Gùzman, I went for a walk, stopping at the photo store in town, which, like most of the other shops, was open. Apparently the minor-league Saint's Day wasn't significant enough to interfere with business. I picked up the pictures I'd shot of Achille, the bell captain of the Itzá Maya, and some of the other people who worked there. I had intended to mail them to Achille, but the post office was closed for the day, so I added them to the collection of stuff I was carrying around with me and crossed the zócalo to the steps of the modified basilica: Spanish-Colonial style, four towers instead of two. The steps were crowded with people. Kids and old women were hawking religious souvenirs and bunches of flowers, paintings of the honored saint on everything from paper fans to china plates. There was a lot of activity inside the basilica as well, although no mass was in progress.
The size of the sanctuary surprised me. I was interested in finding a location where I could watch, without being conspicuous, the main entrance to the basilica. There were side doors as well, but no one was using them. They might have been locked. On each side of the high altar, where offerings of flowers rose to the nailed and bloodied feet of Christ, there were tower chapels, or grottoes; one of them included a stone tomb. The altar was well lighted, but the nave was not. Very little daylight passed through the high, narrow, stained-glass windows. Votive candles burned in pyramidal rows in two locations, in holders of smoked ruby glass. There were four confessionals, and vividly enameled statues in Easter-egg colors at each Station of the Cross.
I sat near the left-side aisle while I looked around. Several penitents went past me down the rough stone aisle on their knees, praying or weeping aloud. Our concerns were different, but I felt a pained affinity. The voices of other worshippers scattered in pews down by the altar added to the echoing din.
After a few minutes the dust and aromatic smoke had me coughing. I left without having made up my mind about anything that related to my meeting with Greg. If he showed up. But I didn't see how he could afford not to.
A little before three I found my way back to the village of Las Figuras, where Dr. Gùzman had his clinic. By daylight it wasn't a bad-looking place, with a central park and basketball court shaded by old Ceiba trees, a couple of modest hotels and some ruins nearby, on a small bluff above a shallow bay that looked like a waterfowl refuge. There were a lot of boats in the muddy water below the village. It was a good afternoon for boating, breezy, not too humid. On a day like this I could understand why Gùzman had been persuaded to stay.
His own home was on the walled grounds of the clinic, in a grove of trees a couple of hundred feet away from the larger building. There were gardeners with machetes on the grounds. Two teenage boys and a blond girl were working with tools under the hood of a 4WD Suzuki in the driveway beside the stucco house, arguing like siblings about the nature of the problem. Gùzman supervised, a bottle of beer in one hand. When he saw me pull up he sauntered over, wearing threadbare jean shorts and a Lakers jersey.
"Kids are home from school for a week," he said. "No emergencies until the feast-day boozing gets out of hand later tonight, so I took the afternoon off. 'Nica had a couple of visitors from the hotel. Don't look so worried, I vetted them before I let them in." He made a gesture with the beer bottle, directing my attention to a couple of compact young men, bare to the waist, pruning a sprawling purple bougainvillea next to the clinic.
"These are my guys. Very deft with their big knives. I took your note seriously."
"How did anyone know she was here?"
"Veronica asked me to call a friend, have her bring some clothes and personal stuff. Said she could be trusted."
The blonde girl was dancing around on bare feet, fists up, offering to punch out one of her brothers.
"Don't hit him in the nose, 'Cesca!" Gùzman yelled. "I can't do any more with it if it gets broken again!" He beamed at me. "Just like her mother," he said. "Barb taught them all how to box. I'm the nonviolent type. So what's going to happen, Butterbaugh? You mixing into something local?"
"With luck I'll be out of here in less than two days. I don't think I've stirred up anything yet. I'm taking Greg Walker's daughter with me. I have every reason to believe she's in real danger if I don't get her out of Guatemala."
"Sounds a lot like kidnapping," he said edgily.
"No. Sharissa knows me well, and I think she trusts me. I'm doing this with the full knowledge and cooperation of her grandmother."
"What kind of danger?"
"Veronica thinks Greg Walker may be planning to offer his daughter as a ritual sacrifice to some old god or other. He may have done this in the past." I opened one of the envelopes I had with me, slid out the photo of Frederick and Bonnie Sullivan. "This was the daughter he had with him when he visited Cobían nineteen years ago. By the way, speaking of lucky gene selection, he looks today just like he did in this photo."
"Only now he goes by the name of Walker. Why did he beat up 'Nica?"
"She tried to warn Sharissa. She believes there've been cases of human sacrifice in this area, in recent times. It's a local mania, drenched in superstition, who knows how it ever got started: a few people who claim to be descended from the elite Maya have been fortunate to live well past the average life span, and they attribute it to something supernatural like bathing in the blood of a virgin. The Hotel Itzá Maya and its owners apparently have figured into the cult bloodletting, going back to the hotel's beginnings."
"How come I never heard anything about this?"
"It wouldn't be a public spectacle. The people who are participating in these ritual acts are delusional, but still they must recognize the fact that they're committing murder."
"Assuming there's some truth in what you're talking about, could 'Nica be mixed up in it?"
"I don't even know Veronica. We didn't have the chance to talk much last night. What do you think?"
"What I know about Veronica is that she has suffered. Her husband was killed, two years ago. She loved him very much. There are people who handle tragedy or crisis better than others. It has to do with one or two enzymes in the brain. Barb has been a friend to 'Nica, but Barb's been away at med school. I don't know who her other close friends are, or if she has any. Maybe she stays to herself too much, and broods. Goes without sle
ep. The need for sleep is more psychological that physiological. Deprive susceptible individuals of sleep for a few days, it's amazing how quickly they become delusional, even psychotic."
"How has she been acting today? Depressed?"
"I wouldn't say depressed. Subdued. That's from trauma, and the medication. She hasn't had much to say about what happened to her."
"Could I see her now?"
"Yeah, I guess so. But only for a few minutes, and I'll be there too. It looks as if I have a small stake in this business. I've worked in the Petén for twenty-three years. I give one day a week to the public hospital in Cobían, and three days a month I do the flying-doctor bit. I suppose you'd say I've established a certain rapport with the departmental bureaucracy, but if I cross the wrong people, like Francisco Colon, I'd be deported in a day. So far I haven't done anything but treat an injured woman. Beating up women isn't considered to be a crime in Third World countries, so I'm not looking to be interrogated. As long as I'm treating 'Nica, she's protected. Once she leaves, I can't help her. I have no interest in you, one way or another. You understand? Good. Let's go in."
One visitor from the Itzá Maya was an older woman who worked in the business office. She wore thick glasses and had bleached her hair to a rusty orange shade. Her name was Encarnación. Veronica's other visitor was the night bell captain, Achille, who greeted me enthusiastically outside the private room where Veronica was recuperating. Off duty he wore primary colors and gold chains.
"Boss!" Achille had never made much of an attempt to get my name straight. "What a terrible ting! But you de one who finding she, yes?"
I nodded. Encarnación said anxiously, "Did you see them? These terrible robbers who beat her?"
"I didn't see a thing."
"Poor Veronica. All her life, she is so unlocky."
"But she not killed," Achille said. "We must be thankful."
I had his photographs with me, and took them out of the envelope. While they were exclaiming over Achille's likeness, I wound my watch. Gùzman let himself into Veronica's room, closing the door behind him.
"Boss, for what I owe you dese wonderful peeksures?"
"They're a gift, Achille."
"I must do something for you! Very fine old watch you have, for sure, but need winding, always. I get you a wonderful Rolex, mon, de greatest watch in de whole wurl. Never need to wind. It not exactly a Rolex, you understand, but even de Rolex people have difficulty to tell. Two hundred fifty quetzales."
"Thanks, Achille. But this one has sentimental value."
"You like dese gold chain? Stupendous value! I have a place to buy."
"Maybe later, Achile. I need to talk to Veronica now." He shook my hand and Encarnación kissed my cheek, and they left.
I heard Veronica's voice when I knocked. She was more or less sitting up in the hospital bed, at an angle of thirty degrees. Apparently Encarnación had brought her a nightgown and a satin bed jacket with a Mandarin collar. Her hair was brushed. Her dark eyes had a high shine to them, and the tracery of scars, like part of the skeleton of a leaf, was prominent on her right cheekbone. She still had IVs taped to one wrist.
"Hello," she said. "You are the one who save my life. I doan remember your name."
"Butterbaugh."
"For sure. Buzzerball. Now . . . it comes back to me. How are you today, Buzzerball?"
"Okay."
"Tell me, Buzzerball. What were you doing at my house last night?"
Guzman leaned against the wall next to the single small window in the room, arms folded, taking us both in.
"I'm a detective," I said. "From Greg and Sharissa Walker's home town. Remember? We talked about him on the way over here."
She closed her eyes. "Oh, yes. And you—you are trying to protect Sharissa?"
"At her grandmother's request. I don't have any official status. Greg Walker isn't a suspect in a criminal case. If we were in Georgia, I could lock him up for assault. It might be possible to do that here, in spite of what Dr. Gùzman thinks. Which would make my job a little easier."
Veronica was silent for a while. Then she looked at me as if from the end of a tunnel and said, "Nobody hit me. It was raining. The floor was slippery. I was doing the laundry, Oops. I fall and hurt myself."
I looked at Gùzman and said, "You two have time to fix this up before I came in here?"
He shook his head, looking speculatively at Veronica. Then he spoke to her in Spanish, softly. She smiled a bitter smile and didn't reply. He seemed concerned, glancing at me as if I were getting on his nerves just by existing.
I said, my tone angrier than it should have been, "You're lucky Walker didn't put a bullet in your head. He's probably done worse, to others." I couldn't tell from her unwinking eyes if she was depressed, hostile, or merely indifferent. Then I realized Greg must have let her live out of deference to Francisco, who he would trust to keep her in line from now on.
"I'm going to take Sharissa home," I said to Veronica. "It's all I can do, but I think I can accomplish that much."
"Good for you, Buzzerball."
"Can you tell me why you think Walker planned to kill his own daughter in a ritual sacrifice?"
Veronica turned her head on the pillow, grimacing.
"I have always . . . heard things. About the sacred beings, and . . . their sacrifice of virgins. Then this man Walker come with his daughter, before the eclipse. He is . . . he seem to be . . . especial friend of Francisco. Who is all but on his knees to Greg Walker. This is not like Francisco. But it was the way of his father, too, when . . . others came to the hotel, from around the wurl. Always with an adolescente, who they treat like a prize calf. You understand? Is it superstition, my imagination, is it that I am crazy for a long time? Maybe. What do you think, Arturo?"
He didn't say what he thought.
I said, "A man named Nils Lagerfeld, a Swedish archeologist, remembered Walker from the time he was here before. Made notes of their conversations. Walker, or Sullivan as he was calling himself then, had an encyclopedic knowledge of Maya lore. He could read glyphs. He bragged about living many lifetimes. I saw the notes myself, but they're probably missing now. Lagerfeld was killed in his office, last night or early this morning."
Gùzman made a dismal whistling sound through his teeth.
"I don't have evidence that Walker murdered Lagerfeld, or had it done. But his circumstances make him the logical suspect. If he is guilty, I should know soon."
"How?" Veronica said.
"I'm meeting him tonight."
She frowned. "Alone?"
"No, in a very public place. The Basilica of the Iluminata."
"You must be careful anyhow. Very careful."
"Don't doubt it for a minute."
Gùzman came unstuck from the wall. "You have firsthand knowledge of a motive for Lagerfeld's murder," he said to me. "What are you planning to do with that information?"
"Once I have Sharissa out of the country, I'll send my notes and some photographs to the Swedish embassy in Guatemala City and let them approach the local authorities. They'll push it a lot farther than I ever could."
"Meanwhile," Veronica said, "Greg Walker will leave the country."
"He might get away," I admitted. "I've said before, Sharissa—"
"Is your only concern. Claro. But it seems a shame. One can only hope he will suffer the fate of the Marquise."
"Who?" Gùzman asked her.
She smiled wearily. "That is a story for another day, 'Turo. But now . . . I am finding it hard to talk and breathe at the same time. ¿Permiso?"
She seemed to have fallen asleep even as we were going out the door. We walked toward the clinic's foyer. In a treatment room Gùzman's med-tech assistant was taking care of the split bloody knee of a kid from the orphanage. Gùzman detoured to give the tearful boy a pat on the head, and rejoined me on the veranda.
"Let's say we arranged for you to call me after midnight tonight, but that call doesn't come. In fact, nobody hears from you again. Wh
ich would be a shame, naturally, but those things happen when you play detective."
"I am a detective," I reminded him.
"You're a fish out of water in this country. A big shiny carp."
"I'll be taking very good care of myself."
"But—"
"I thought you didn't want to be involved."
"I could manage a few things anonymously."
His kids were playing keep-away with a garden hose on the lawn near his house; they seemed to be having a hell of a good time while they got soaking wet. The spray from the hose created brief effervescent rainbows in the summery air. I felt some interior tremors, a sense of remorse, as if I had been persuaded that I'd failed already. I had set up this confrontation with Greg Walker as deliberately as I knew how. But I wasn't at all convinced I was good enough to win my own game. Gùzman had reminded me: there were only two kinds of fish in the sea. Sharks, and food for the sharks.
"One A.M.," I told him. "If I don't call you by then, all the information for the embassy will be in an envelope taped to the back of the first confessional on your left in the basilica."
I was an hour early for my appointment. A Mass was in progress, and the nave was nearly full, with standees in the small atrium. I felt comfortable and not too conspicuous in the crowd of worshipers. The amplified voice of one of the three priests on the altar created a sepulchral echo above the murmuring sea of responses. The confessionals were doing good business while the Mass was said. Small flames of candles flickered in shadowy places. Pockmarked plaster saints with rosy cheeks stared at one another across the bent backs of the dutiful and the penitent.
Unable to stand in one place for the duration of the Mass, I maneuvered slowly through the doorway to the nave and toward the left-side aisle. For the second time in forty-eight hours, I almost ran right into Greg Walker.
He was standing, flanked by but a head taller than a family group of dark-faced local people, near the aisle, with his face turned away from the altar and toward another family group: Joseph, Mary, and the infant Jesus. The Virgin's feet were bare, bone-white and nearly toeless, probably from repeated fondlings and kisses.
