The God Gene: A Novel

by F. Paul Wilson

  But research? Wanting to study the little profit centers and not pocket any cash? That he would not understand. And what he couldn’t understand ignited suspicion.

  Which was why Marten had dropped that idiotic “missing link” remark on the first trip. He had seen the dollar signs flash in Laffite’s eyes, just as he knew they would. This strange Afrikaner became an asset then, rather than a liability, but an asset he did not understand and therefore could not fully trust.

  So Marten had to be extra circumspect this first day on the island, had to play it close to the vest.

  He ground his teeth in frustration. This whole boat trip would have been unnecessary if only he had been able to do what needed doing on Saturday. If only the caldera weren’t so deep, if only that pilot’s winch cable had been longer, if only the helicopter had had a big enough fuel tank to allow Marten the time he needed, if only the pilot hadn’t seen the VX on the scraped canister …

  If only, if only, if only …

  He began unpacking his gear.

  “I need a place to set up my tent,” he called to Laffite. “Where do you suggest?”

  “I am thinking right here,” he said, waving an arm at the underbrush around him. “Grab a machete and start clearing.”

  A machete? Start clearing? Was he insane?

  But no, he didn’t want to challenge Laffite’s authority again. That had been poor judgment. He wanted no confrontations. Laffite was welcome to his captaincy. It wouldn’t last long. If things went according to plan, by tonight Marten would be the only living human on the island.

  He grabbed one of the three machetes, pulled the crude black eighteen-inch steel blade from its sheath, and went to work on the underbrush. In minutes his palms were burning. His hands weren’t used to this kind of work. He’d have blisters soon. He’d have brought work gloves had he known.

  “Olha!” Razi said in Portuguese. “They watch.”

  Marten straightened and looked around. Sure enough, the subcanopy was teeming with dapis, clinging to branches or leaping from tree to tree, their tails stretched out behind them—leaps of ten to a dozen times their body length.

  “They’re always watching,” Marten said.

  Laffite gave him a quizzical look. “I thought you didn’t speak Portuguese?”

  Uh-oh.

  Marten hadn’t told anyone he knew Portuguese—some Portuguese. As Keith he had taken the Rosetta Stone course on his trips back and forth to Mozambique. But as Marten he’d decided it better to let people like Laffite think he didn’t know the language. Laffite’s English was far better than Marten’s Portuguese anyway.

  Besides, people tended to speak frankly about you when they thought you couldn’t understand them.

  “I don’t,” he replied in English. “But you can’t spend time around here without picking up a few words. I certainly can’t hold a conversation.”

  Laffite gave a slow nod along with a calculating stare.

  More suspicion. Not good.

  Bakari jabbed his machete into the dirt and strode toward the traps. “We catch one.”

  The live traps collapsed flat. Laffite had brought along a dozen, and two larger holding cages, which did not collapse.

  “How do you plan to work this?” Marten asked, eager to get off the subject of languages.

  The Frenchman’s stare lasted a few more heartbeats, then he said, “I am figuring on heading back with two dozen males. That should allow me to test the market. If things go as I predict, the first group will create a buzz among exotics enthusiasts. Once they sell out and word gets around that there aren’t any more, demand will soar.”

  “As will prices.”

  A big grin. “Exactly! So, when we have a dozen in this cage, we will take it back to the Sorcière and bring over the second. When that is full, we head back to Maputo.”

  Bakari was walking their way with a fully expanded live trap big enough to hold a raccoon. It would certainly hold a dapi. Even two.

  Marten caught himself about to say, We call those have-a-heart traps back in the States. No, no, no! Marten was a South African.

  Instead, he said, “I’m not familiar with this model.”

  A total lie, but Laffite didn’t need to know that.

  “They’re quite ingenious,” Laffite said. “Bakari, give our friend a demonstration.”

  Bakari set the trap down and knelt beside it. It ran about thirty inches long and maybe a foot high and wide. Five sides were quarter-inch steel mesh. A handle protruded from the center of the top, and a galvanized steel plate blocked the entrance.

  “This is a one-door trap,” Laffite said. “It is very strong. Once in there, a dapi will not be able to get out.”

  “But how does it get in?”

  Bakari unlatched the slanted front panel and retracted it until it was positioned flat against the top of the trap. He latched it there.

  “The door is spring-loaded,” Laffite said, “with the trigger in that little plate on the floor of the trap. When the dapi takes the bait … watch.”

  Bakari stuck a slim twig through the top of the cage and poked the trigger plate. In an eye blink the steel panel snapped off the top and into the open end, blocking it.

  “The door can’t be opened from the inside, only the outside. The dapi is unharmed and safe from predators until we collect it.” He smiled. “It even has a snack to munch on.” He looked at Bakari. “Speaking of which, what will you use for bait?”

  Bakari lifted a protein bar. “This. They like.” He pulled a hunting knife from a sheath on his belt and cut off a piece.

  “On Madagascar we bring sliced bamboo shoots for lemurs,” Laffite told Marten. “They of course can forage for their own, but we’ve found that soft, moist, sliced shoots fresh from the tin are a delicacy for them. We brought a case of those.”

  Marten looked up and around and saw dozens of dapis watching them intently.

  Just then the sunlight dimmed. Marten checked the sky, expecting a cloud, but no. The sun was starting to dip behind the rim—not setting yet, just slipping out of sight.

  Suddenly the dapis started howling, heads raised, lips pursed, filling the air with discordant, high-pitched ululations. Bakari and Razi pressed their hands over their ears, but Laffite was smiling, his expression fascinated. Marten imagined his own expression mirrored the Frenchman’s.

  But the discordance gradually diminished as the disparate tones found each other and blended into a single note echoing through the canopies, filling the caldera. They held that note for a long, long time. And then, as abruptly as it had begun, it stopped.

  “Mon dieu!” Laffite said, eyes wide. “I am … I have never … what was that?”

  Marten was equally amazed. The indri lemurs of Madagascar sang, but their “songs” were more like prolonged hoots and howls. They did not sing in unison.

  And now that the dapis had finished their song, they resumed watching the human interlopers.

  “We must catch,” Bakari said in Portuguese as he resumed resetting the trap. “We must!”

  Marten glanced again at the audience of dapis, then turned to Laffite. “You might want to hide how the mechanism works when you unlatch the door.”

  “Why?”

  Marten gestured about. “They’re watching.”

  “So?”

  “So they learn very quickly. They’re highly intelligent.”

  “But they are also very little. You said yours weighed less than a kilo. These weigh no more, from the look of them.”

  “I’d say you’re right.”

  “Well, then, that means their skinny little arms will be unable to overcome the power of the door spring. It is quite strong.”

  He was probably right, but Marten had felt obligated to say something, just to show the Frenchman that he was on his side and wanted to help him succeed.

  But Marten had no intention of allowing Laffite to succeed.

  He watched Bakari reset the trap, then carry it deeper into the caldera
. Marten had just resumed hacking at the undergrowth with the machete when Bakari returned not five minutes later.

  “That didn’t take long,” he said.

  Bakari grinned. “This is test. We see if—”

  He was interrupted by sudden screeching from back the way he had come, entirely different from the singing of a few moments ago. This had a terrified edge to it.

  “Ha!” Bakari cried, pumping a fist in the air.

  He ran back through the brush, Marten, Laffite, and his brother close behind. In a small clearing, maybe one hundred yards from the camp, they found a crowd of dapis, all clustered around something. They scattered at the humans’ approach, revealing Bakari’s trap. And inside, a very frantic, frustrated-looking male dapi, hurling itself against the sides, pulling at the door that wouldn’t budge.

  Same brown fur as Mozi, same white belly as Mozi …

  Marten’s throat tightened. Keith trying to surface again. Down, Keith. No thoughts of Mozi allowed. Mozi is dead and gone and good riddance!

  As the four humans surrounded the trap, the dapi quieted, shrinking into a wary, cringing crouch.

  Above and all around, his fellow dapis clung to the surrounding branches and trunks, chattering as they watched.

  “Always they watch,” Razi said.

  Yes, always watching, Marten thought. Watching and learning.

  Laffite knelt beside the trap and studied the captive.

  “Do not be afraid, little fellow,” he cooed in Portuguese. “We are not going to hurt you. We are going to feed you and keep you safe and find you a good home.”

  He signaled to Bakari who lifted the trap by its top handle. This elicited a frightened scream from its occupant that was immediately echoed by the surrounding dapis.

  “I not like dapis,” Razi said. “They not scared like should be.”

  Though he knew exactly what he’d said, Marten asked Razi to repeat it in English, then responded: “Don’t forget, this is their island. They’ve ruled here for millions of years. We are newcomers. They don’t know us yet.”

  Laffite nodded. “But they will learn to fear humans soon enough.”

  Don’t count on it, Marten thought.

  As Bakari moved off with the trap, the dapis followed, seeming to fly as they leaped from branch to branch. Marten stayed behind. He’d noticed dapis clambering up the smooth baobab trunks and clinging there to watch. With no branches, how did they manage that?

  He moved to the base of one of the cylindrical trunks, a good six feet across, so thick it would take three or four grown men to stretch their arms around it. He inspected the reddish-gray bark.

  “Looking for something?” Laffite said behind him.

  Apparently the Frenchman wasn’t going to let him out of his sight.

  “I’m trying to figure how they climb these trunks.” He ran his hand over the smooth surface. “With nothing to grab on to, how do they—?”

  He felt an indentation under his palm and took a closer look. A small notch, an inch wide and perhaps half an inch deep, had been cut into the thick bark about five feet off the ground.

  Laffite moved closer. “What is it?”

  “Not sure … give me a second…”

  He felt around some more, higher this time, and found another notch, identical to the first, maybe two feet above it.

  “Handholds,” Marten said as wonder filled him. “They’ve cut handholds and footholds in the bark.”

  “‘They’? Who? The monkeys? The dapis?” Laffite’s expression was a study in skepticism. “That is crazy.”

  “Is it?” Marten said. “Who else is around to do it?”

  “But why? They have all these other trees that are easy to climb.”

  “Right. But these baobabs produce a tasty fruit, and if you don’t want to wait for it to fall, then you have to go up and get it.”

  Marten backed up for a better look. Yes … a third notch had been cut above the second.

  “How did they do it?” Laffite said, his tone still incredulous. “What did they use? Teeth? Bite the bark?”

  “These trees are amazingly resilient,” Marten said, moving closer again, “and their bark is thick and tough.” He inspected the notch at the five-foot level more closely, poking the tip of his little finger into it. “I don’t see any teeth marks here. This looks like it was cut into the bark.”

  “Cut? With what?” Laffite barked a laugh. “Don’t try to tell me they have little axes!”

  Marten glanced at him. “In a way, they might. A sharp-edged piece of lava stone might do the job very nicely. It’s hardly in short supply on a volcanic island like this. In fact, from the looks of these notches, I’ll bet that’s exactly what they used.”

  “But that would mean…”

  “Yes. They use tools.”

  Marten continued to stare at the notch. This was a whole other level of intelligence. Mozi had been able to open a three-number combination lock, but that had been imitative behavior—she’d watched the attendants dial in the combination and simply mimicked their actions. These cut notches were a number of steps ahead of that. This meant not only confronting a problem—how to scale a smooth, branchless baobab trunk—and formulating a solution, it meant devising the means to implement that solution.

  “I am very impressed,” Laffite said. “This will make them even more valuable. Imagine what my customers can teach their new pets.”

  “Yes … imagine.”

  Grinning, the Frenchman put his hands on his hips and did a slow turn. “Look at this place. Pure. Clean. Untouched. It is very possible we are the first humans here, ever. It is a paradise. We must keep this secret.”

  “We’ve already agreed on that.”

  “But I was thinking of money then … only money. This is more important than money. We must keep this place…” He snapped his fingers. “What is your word for ‘without dirt’?”

  “Pristine? Unsullied?”

  “Yes! Unsullied.”

  “Does this mean you won’t be bringing dapis back to the mainland to sell?”

  Laffite laughed. “Now you are making the joke, yes? Of course I will. But I will work extra hard at keeping others of my kind away from this little piece of paradise. I feel as if we have discovered the Garden of Eden.”

  The remark jolted Marten. The Frenchman didn’t know it, but he was very close to the truth.

  Even if they’d forgotten the way back to the makeshift camp, all they had to do was follow the noise. The trees around the camp were alive with chattering dapis. The cacophony was terrific.

  They found Bakari standing over the trap as he pulled on a pair of yellow-and-black heavy-duty firefighter gloves. Razi, also gloved, stood nearby gripping the open door to the holding cage. In a single swift, smooth, practiced motion, Bakari slipped back the spring-loaded door with one hand and, like a snake striking, jabbed the other into the trap. The dapi screeched as the glove closed around his chest and he was eased out, kicking and struggling all the way.

  Marten wasn’t sure what happened next. The dapi’s screech was replaced by a howl from Bakari, followed by a curse as he hurled the little primate to the ground. It landed hard and screeched again, but this time obviously in pain.

  Razi scooped it up and deposited it in the holding cage, closing the door after it. Bakari was shaking his right arm and muttering a few more curses in Ronga or Tsonga—Marten couldn’t tell them apart. His forearm was bleeding where the dapi had bitten him.

  “How did that happen?” Laffite said, looking furious. “You’ve done a thousand transfers without a bite.”

  Bakari said only, “First aid,” and went looking for the kit.

  Marten and the others turned their attention to the cage where the captured dapi was clinging to the three-quarter-inch mesh of the side wall, whimpering. It tried to lower itself to the floor but yelped when its right leg touched down. It couldn’t bear any weight on it.

  “Damn it, Bakari!” Laffite shouted. “You broke its leg!�
��

  Marten looked up. The dapis filling the trees around them had gone silent. They clung to their trunks and branches, staring. He felt a chill. They were more intelligent than he had imagined, and they’d seen everything.

  The only sound was Laffite continuing his tirade against Bakari.

  “You’ve ruined it! I can’t sell it with a broken leg!”

  None of that mattered, of course. Marten had no intention of allowing a single dapi to leave this island.

  4

  MAPUTO, MOZAMBIQUE

  After checking into the Hotel Cardoso, Laura had settled in her room and called home to touch base with Marissa before she left for school. Someone knocked on her door just as she finished.

  Rick.

  “Time to make a few decisions,” he said, waving a map.

  She had her suitcase opened on her bed so he unfolded the Madagascar map on the tile floor. He pointed to a thick dot made with a Sharpie.

  “Here’s my best approximation of the coordinates Mugabe gave us—a hundred miles or so off Madagascar’s west coast. If there’s an island, that’s where it is.”

  Laura sat on the edge of the bed, looking over his shoulder.

  “But how do we get there?”

  “We do what Keith did. We take a chopper, only we take it from Madagascar instead of Mozambique.” He pointed to an area labeled Morondava, east-southeast from the coordinates. “That’s the closest town big enough to have its name on the map.”

  “Fine,” she said. “But how do we get there? And do they even have an airport? And if they have an airport, does it have a helicopter we can rent?”

  Rick sighed. “Good questions. We need a travel agent, someone who knows this stuff.”

  “How about the concierge?”

  “Now there’s a thought. You take a nap while I go down and check this out.”

  “No, no,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m on my second wind.” Or was it her third? Either way, she couldn’t sleep right now. “We’ll go together.”

  The concierge was young and beautiful, with mocha skin and short black hair, straightened and shiny and close to her scalp. The brass nameplate on her desk read simply BIANCA.