The Curse of the Lost White City

by James Gray

When I awoke early the next morning, I was disoriented. But the brick walls, wooden beams, and familiar furniture and devices quickly snapped me back in place. Here were my books, my photos on the wall, a disconnected telephone on a wooden table, an ancient-looking PC and printer in another corner.

  I made coffee and toast, dressed as warmly as possible, and went out for a short walk. It must have been at least –25° Celsius and strong gusts of ice-cold Arctic air blew in off the river. It was the kind of wind that would make any normal soul drop to their knees in desperation. I went back to my apartment, turned up the heat to the max and went back to bed.

  Over the next few days, I spent most of my time looking out the window waiting for some kind of sign of life from Valeska. The painkillers took away most of my initiative. I tried her cellphone a few times: nothing. So I tried reading but couldn’t concentrate, my cooking needed inspiration, and watching television was as boring as always. I felt that I was slowly drifting away until one day, around noon, my phone rang.

  “Jack?”

  The connection was crystal clear, as if she were speaking to me from next door. “Valeska. Where are you?”

  “I just got back to Tegucigalpa.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, I’m fine, but I had to hide in the mountains for a long time. There is no cellphone service up there.”

  “I was worried.”

  “Don’t be. I’m safe. And what about you? Did they fix your arm?”

  “Yeah, but it took two weeks in the hospital and three operations. Now I’m back in my apartment for now. And Barker? Any news?”

  “He’s disappeared with Esmeralda. Hijo de puta! (Son of a bitch!) And according to my uncle’s accountant, Barker took most of Uncle Igor’s money from the company’s account and moved it to an offshore bank in the Cayman Islands. The only thing left is the house.”

  “You uncle’s house?”

  “Yes, that’s it. My uncle was too trusting, and the more I learn, the worse it gets. It seems Dog even bought off the notary and forged legal documents in the name of Zarkin Negocio making himself sole owner of the company. We should have gotten rid of that bastard when we had a chance.” Her voice turned vicious.

  “Valeska.”

  “I’ll kill him.”

  “Please, Valeska, stay away from him for now. I don’t want to lose you.”

  “I’ll be okay, Jack, believe me.” She was quiet for a moment. “Okay, enough with my problems. What about you?”

  “I’m just taking it easy, trying to get back to normal.”

  “Have you seen any friends?” She seemed concerned.

  “Not really, and I have a hard time concentrating. The doctors say that’s to be expected because of the quantity of morphine that I’ve received. But I’ll recover.”

  There was another silence. Then she said, “Jack, there is good news too. I’ve been spending time in the archives here at the university. I found lots of information about Ciudad Blanca — of course, much of it is legend. It’s fascinating. I’m also doing research on the Internet. I’m learning a lot.”

  It was exactly what I needed to hear.

  “We’ll sail to the Mosquito Coast when I return.”

  “With your boat?”

  “You bet. I still want to write about that area and maybe do something about the trafficking of stolen artifacts. Maybe we could even go into the jungle and try to find Ciudad Blanca. It will blow Barker away. Are you interested?”

  “Of course, but if Dog and his gang are there …”

  “Do you really think that he would stick around after what he’s done?”

  “Maybe you’re right. He’s probably gone to Colombia to make new contacts. But we don’t know where Ciudad Blanca is.”

  “But you were there, you must have an idea.”

  “All I know is that it’s in the mountains and that Dog landed the plane on a river not too far from the ruins. But that was more than five years ago.”

  “Your uncle must have had a map?”

  “I’m planning to go back there now that I’m home and spend more time looking next week. There has to be some kind of information somewhere.”

  “Just be careful.”

  “Don’t worry, there’s a guard there full-time.”

  “Wait for me before you do anything drastic.” But the line went dead.

  NO PLACE LIKE …

  The comforts of home were sweet: a good bed, a hot shower and lots of books. Ever so slowly, my bones started to mend, as did my memory, my capacity to concentrate and my ego. I had Internet put in my flat and started to read up about La Mosquitia and the Ciudad Blanca. However, it was slow going, and working the PC keyboard and taking notes with my left hand felt awkward. Three times a week, I would take a city bus and visit a therapist who would work on my right arm, wrist and hand. Every so slowly, they were beginning to function but they would never be back to normal. Even with these new activities, I just couldn’t keep my thoughts off Valeska. The more I thought about her, the more I felt she was luring me into a maze of trouble. She wanted vengeance. When I called her a week later, she sounded really wound up.

  “I’m working with a lawyer. I’m going to sue Dog Barker and then send him to jail.”

  She was getting involved in a story without an end. When she’d gone to Zarkin’s house to search for more information, she found that the guard had disappeared and the house had been ransacked. Hidden away in a drawer she discovered an external hard drive containing copies of the correspondence between Zarkin and Barker. But there was absolutely nothing about the location of Ciudad Blanca.

  “Valeska, please back off,” was all I could say. I felt helpless. I wanted to get back to Honduras as fast as possible and make sure that she didn’t end up somewhere in a shallow grave.

  During the deep freeze of January and February, life inside the walls of this frozen white city seemed to stand still. It snowed and it snowed. It was always magical when the footprints and tire tracks disappeared again. Sometimes a horse-drawn calèche passed me.

  In Central America, the streets were loud and chaotic. I knew I had to go back and finish what I had started with that amazing woman. But my right arm was still immobilized from my shoulder to my fingertips and my neck still felt twisted; however, my brain was healing. I started to frequent Belley’s Pub and mingle with the small crowd who usually gathered there after work. It was a friendly place with brick walls and a fireplace, a good haunt for anybody looking for a conversation.

  One day, a long-lost friend walked in. It was Eddy, a documentary film producer. Together we had spent months in Northern Québec filming dozens of documentaries — mostly about a nomadic First Nations tribe called the Innu. Our trips up to Northern Québec were always worthwhile. We had good chemistry. As I filled Eddy in about what I had been through in Honduras, I could imagine him coming along. Clearly he was thinking the same thing.

  “It’s a subject people love: ruins in the jungle, Maya history, illegal trafficking in artifacts. You’re in the middle of the story.” Eddy pondered, “A film shot in a foreign country is hard to finance, but what an incredible chance! We just have to sell the idea.” Then he laughed. “What about this Dog Barker guy? By the way, I love the name.”

  “Yeah, me too. But I don’t love the man. He’s disappeared with most of Zarkin’s money and his yacht.”

  “Or maybe he’s hiding somewhere, waiting for this to blow over,” said Eddy.

  “Anything’s possible. Another beer?”

  “Sure.”

  I called for two more.

  “This could make a great documentary,” he said. “I’m almost sure that if we write up a good synopsis, I can get financing.”

  “You think so?”

  “Sure, people eat up this kind of adventure. But it sounds dangerous as hell.”

  “Not if we can find the right people to take us there,” I said.

  “Yeah, but the problem is: Where is there? You said yourself that the D
og is the only swinging dick alive at the moment who knows exactly where these ruins are.”

  “Yeah, and there was also Zarkin, but he’s dead.”

  “But he must have left something behind, some information, a map …”

  “I know. Valeska’s working on it but she hasn’t had any luck.”

  “Ah yes, the girl. Every time you say her name, you drift away into another zone.” With a wide grin on his face, Eddy sat back and nursed his beer. “It must be love.”

  “Maybe it is, but these days it’s long-distance love. But hey, let’s talk about the next step.”

  “I agree. I know of a few distributors who could pick up a project like this. We could get an advance sale from one of the TV networks. You know, we’ve done a lot of crazy projects together and they have always worked out. But be prepared; I may have to pitch you as the guy on camera. You have a reputation, and a fairly good one at that.”

  “Eddy, those days are long gone. I’d do anything else, even record the sound.”

  “You may have to do that as well.”

  Two days later, I spoke with Valeska and we went through all the new developments in each of our lives. On her end, there hadn’t been any changes. No sign of Barker or Esmeralda and no more information about the location of Ciudad Blanca. It looked as if he and his gang had really sailed away. Valeska seemed more focused on legal issues. She was basically staying out of sight and working with lawyers, trying to find a way to get her hands on her uncles’ money that had been transferred by Barker to the Cayman Island account. But it looked more and more like a lost cause. As for me, it was a bit more positive. I brought her up to date concerning my project with Eddy. My health was improving, and sooner or later I would be able to join her in Honduras. We reminisced about making love on the beach, under the falls, and how that all seemed so far away. Were we drifting apart? Perhaps.

  As weeks went by, the midwinter sun shining through my loft’s large skylight, I began to feel better. My strength gradually returned. Every afternoon, I would put on my heavy coat, slip into my snow boots and hike up the Rue des Remparts to the boardwalk next to the Château Frontenac. It was ideal exercise, but the view overlooking the frozen Saint Lawrence River made me colder. Its beauty was vast and desolate. It always amazed me to watch the ferryboats cross from the shore opposite the Old City, carefully pushing their way through thick, swirling ice floes to bump up against the pier just below where I stood. It all seemed like an endless struggle — the ice, the cold, the wind and especially the lack of the sweet tropical fragrance that I had become so used to. However, there was still something poetic about the place. It was a town made out of stone cut out of the rocky cliffs that lined the river. It had witnessed war, revolution, epidemics of typhoid fever and cholera. Québec wasn’t just a pretty town; it had depth and a story that went way back, long before recorded history. Maybe that’s why I was attracted to its narrow streets and stony walls.

  At times I watched teams of rowers pull their long oars in unison through the thick river pack ice below: centipedes, with oars for feet. Off in the distance to the north, the rolling Laurentian hills stretched for hundreds of miles up the tundra where caribou roamed by the thousands. The oldest fortified city in North America had the luxury of still being surrounded by forests and farmland. In every direction, there was a horizon to contemplate, to observe and to dream about. The favorite part of my walk was when the seemingly endless sunset turned the cloudless sky a vivid orange, melting into deep blue before a lone Venus appeared in the northwest. I wondered if the same planet was looking down on Valeska.

  One evening, after one of my long walks, I went down to Chez Belley to meet up again with Eddy. But this time he wasn’t in such a good mood. He had just been rejected by two governmental film-funding agencies. Since the last election, there had been budget cutbacks, and several of his valuable connections had been replaced with a breed of by-the-book bureaucrats with their own priorities and their own friends. After looking over our proposal, they refused to put a dime on the table, insisting that the project needed further research, detailed description and a better presentation.

  Despite everything, Eddy tried to stay optimistic, but it wasn’t easy. In his experience, the investing network usually refused most documentary film projects at least once, so Eddie was still confident that we would eventually get things moving in the right direction. It would just take time and more hard work. Eddy was part Innu and had been producing documentary films about First Nations people for years. But to the conservative investors, a film about people looting artifacts from lost Maya ruins near the Mosquito Coast was perhaps too exotic.

  “Canadian content, that’s the problem. They said the project doesn’t have enough Canadian content.”

  “But they’re wrong, Eddy. Dog Barker is from Alberta, and he’s the one who got me going in the first place. You can’t get more Canadian than that, can you?”

  Eddy leaned forward and thought a little.

  “The problem is that your Dog friend is definitely not going to cooperate with us. He may be a central figure in our story, but we’ll have a hard time getting him on camera.” Eddy leaned back in the chair and ran his fingers through his long silver hair. He meditated for a while, staring into his beer mug. “You know, Canadians have a reputation as world leaders in the purchase of all kinds of illegal objects. They’re much easier to smuggle into our country than into the US.”

  “That’s an interesting start,” I said.

  “It’s more than interesting, it’s hot. Smuggling pilfered Mayan artifacts is in the same category as drug trafficking, dealing blood diamonds or pushing stolen weapons.” Eddy rose from the chair, stretched, went over to the window and looked out onto the narrow street. “But we need something else … another angle. Ah, shit!”

  “Ah, shit what?” I was sure he was onto something.

  “I completely forgot about the parking meter. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  I ordered more beer, and when Eddy came back, the brainstorming continued.

  “Eddy, I just had a flash. Remember what the Innu say up in Natashquan?”

  “Sure! Nushuit ishe pukenanu wapush,” Eddy said in Innu. (There are two ways to skin a hare.)

  “Exactly. I was going to say the same thing. Did you know that there are theories that the Maya are distantly related to Canada’s northern aboriginal peoples? And that some of their mythology can prove it? These are elements we can build on. What we need is for an Innu to join our expedition and team up with some locals on the Mosquito Coast.”

  “You’re onto something. We’ll put a Canadian Indian in front of the camera, not a Jacques Legris like you.”

  “Eddy, you’ve finally seen the light. So let’s go hunting.”

  After a few more beers, our meeting was over. I wove my way up the hill and then up the wooden stairs that led to Rue Hamel. Once back at my flat, I flopped down on the sofa and fell asleep with my coat still on. A few hours later, the shrill ring of my cell phone brought me out of my dreamless stupor.

  “Jacques, guess what? I think I’ve found it.” Her voice was fresh, full of positive energy.

  I was still in a daze.

  “Valeska? Found what? Where?”

  “At the university, the archaeology faculty wants to help.”

  “Go slow, I just woke up. Who wants to help?”

  “I met with the archaeology department directors yesterday and explained to them some details about our project. They want to help out! They have given me access to all the information about Ciudad Blanca that they have.”

  “How about the Ciudad’s location? Do they have any leads?”

  “Not yet, but close. They support our project completely and will give us as much information as possible. They believe a film would be a valuable tool, since they have neither the money nor the manpower to protect or explore all the nation’s ancient sites. Their new museum could use all you can give them: photos, films, charts, everything.”r />
  For the rest of that night, I just couldn’t sleep; there were just too many wild ideas spinning in my head. With the exception of the car accident, all I’d asked for had come about. Once more, the trail was beckoning to me and there would be no turning back.

  A few days later, they x-rayed my arm at the hospital. It seemed to be healing perfectly. The titanium plates holding the bones in place were doing their job. A few more weeks of physiotherapy would be all I would need to get my arm working properly.

  More good news, spring had finally arrived. It was about time. Rue Saint-Jean was effervescent with pale-faced pedestrians emerging from winter hibernation. Street conversations always lasted longer when the weather warmed up and people seemed in much better spirits. I sat on a bench in the old Protestant cemetery, watching the squirrels playing between the trees and the tombstones. They seemed underfed, but a summer of acorns and lunchtime leftovers would fatten them up for sure.

  The next day there was one of those early spring snowstorms and about thirty centimeters of heavy white stuff was dumped on the city. But that didn’t stop Eddy. He was able to plow through the drifts with his 4x4 and meet me at my flat on Rue Hamel. It was time to put our heads together and do some real research. Hours later, papers and notebooks were stacked up on the table. Despite the mess, we had a method: Eddy concentrated on the physical aspects while I worked on the human side. In mid-afternoon, we began comparing notes.

  “Okay, listen to this,” said Eddy. “Most of the Mosquito Coast area south of the shoreline is the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve. It includes half the Paulaya Valley and part of the lower Sico Valley to the west, Wampu Valley to the south and part of the lower Sigre Valley to the Patuca River further to the east. Take a look.” He had printed up four pages and Scotch-taped them together to make a good-sized map.

  “That’s a hell of a lot of land to cover. I hope Valeska can find the exact position. If not, we’ll be looking for the rest of our lives.”

  “Which will be pretty short if we stay in that jungle too long. Along the coast, it’s probably swampy. The rivers that flow from the mountains have been used for centuries for navigation into the interior.”