Echoes of Worlds Past

by Nicholas Read

  Reaching into a shirt pocket Hills pulled out a piece of paper, unfolded it, and set it on the table between them. “Yesterday’s Financial Times. Syndicated, of course.”

  Chewing methodically, Eisman leaned forward to study the image on the paper. “I recognize the cartoonist. Always admired his line. Clean.”

  The cartoon showed a wide-eyed unshaven man clad in ragged shirt and shorts squatting on an island beach clutching a parasol fashioned from sticks and palm leaves. Behind him in the distance a ship was sinking stern-first. On the ship was the name Burroughs Labs. As the beachcomber was bald, writing in his name would have been superfluous. Everyone in the business world knew who was being depicted.

  Hills crumpled the paper, turned slightly, and arced it into a nearby basket. “It’s not funny, sir. When this sort of thing appears in the tabloids it can be ignored. When it starts showing up in The Times, The Economist, and so forth, it ceases to be amusing.”

  As always, Eisman was not in the least impressed. “And has it started to show up?”

  Hills pushed the remainder of his dinner aside, his appetite gone. “It’s been ‘showing up’ for weeks now, sir. I just haven’t shown any of it to you. I didn’t want to burden you with such nonsense.”

  This time Eisman’s smile was wide, and grateful. “That was good of you, William. What other kinds of nonsense?” When his assistant hesitated, Eisman pressed him. “Come on, Bill. I’m not about to fall to the floor in tears.”

  It was Hills’ turn to smile. “I know you’re not, sir.” The smile vanished as quickly as it had appeared. “Op-ed pieces that question your competence. Not just your competence to continue with Burroughs; articles that question your competence in general.” Raising his eyes, he met the unblinking gaze of his friend. “That question your . . . sanity.”

  Eisman forked in a piece of fish and chewed thoughtfully. For a long moment he was silent. “And what about you, Bill? Do you think I’m insane or competent?”

  Hills chose his words carefully as he stood for his customary evening constitutional walk along the beach. “I would say obsessed rather than mad, sir. They are different.”

  Eisman nodded. “Madly obsessed or obsessively mad? The Board is entitled to its own perspective.” He sank into thought.

  Hills let him be. Whatever response Raef Eisman concocted it was sure to be precisely thought out and to the point.

  As indeed it was. But it was not one that Hills would have anticipated.

  “Wire my resignation.” The fork dipped only momentarily before Eisman resumed eating as though he had just given instructions on how his laundry should be done.

  Hills gaped at him and sat down again with a heavy thud. “Sir? Resignation?”

  “Yes, that’s right.” Eisman was utterly composed. “If the boys and girls on the Board are worried about my mental capacity I am happy to relieve them of that concern. They can pick a new CEO. If they think it better for publicity they can promote me to CEO Emeritus. But as of this moment I am stepping down. I’m sure Burroughs Labs will do just fine without me.”

  “It won’t.” Hills spoke with conviction.

  “That’s very good of you to say so, Bill. I’ll be happy to consult, if they want me. But as of right now my life is my own.” His voice lowered. “Several billion ought to allow me to conclude my searching in a satisfactory fashion.”

  A sudden thought made him look up. “What about you? What will you do?”

  Hills took a moment to reflect. He had many years invested with Burroughs. There were stock options to consider, a vested retirement plan, the possibility of additional promotion within. There were friends he would miss. He watched the other man finish his meal. Other friends, yes, but he had never met another individual like Raef Eisman. There were times when the billionaire made no sense to anyone but himself. Yet somehow everything always turned out not only right, but interesting. Even exhilarating.

  He made his decision.

  “You have other things on your mind, sir. You’re going to need someone to manage your affairs. Look after your daily needs, finances, properties. I would like to apply for the job.”

  Eisman eyed him without a glimmer of a smile. “Got references?”

  “I can . . .” Hills began. Then he stopped. “Your sense of humor, sir, can oft be disconcerting.”

  “Yeah, shut up. You’re hired, Bill. Communicate my resignation to Burroughs, fire yourself, and write up your own contract.”

  “Is a contract necessary between us, sir?”

  Pushing back his chair, Eisman rose. “Probably not, but no deal is final till the paperwork is signed. Remember: without ink, deals sink.”

  The sun was going down, it was getting dark, and the resort’s solar-powered lights would not stay on past a certain hour. Eisman turned to leave. “I still have a couple of reports to review from the mountain crews. See you in the morning.”

  “Not in the morning, sir. I’ll head into town first thing to handle this admin. Once London reacts it might be like drinking from a fire hose.”

  “Oh, right. For my resignation be concise and be firm.” A last smile. “Be competent.”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  Hills followed his friend’s departure, glanced again at his wristwatch and made hurriedly for the beach.

  Eisman’s funk could not last forever, he knew. This clinging to a wish couched in desperation, this reluctance to accept reality and to let go. It might well linger until poor little Paige’s body or that of one of her friends was found.

  As a friend Hills was prepared to stick with her father until that moment came, or until Eisman finally surrendered all hope to the realization that his daughter was well and truly gone and that her fate might never be known.

  Eventually the distraught billionaire would return to the real world. At that time should he wish to resume his old position Burroughs would welcome him back. There was no question of that. He had made far too much money for them to refuse his return to the board, and in his morning wire he would remind them of that and suggest they both continue to serve in a consultative capacity rather than cut ties completely. Raef might snap out of it next month, it might be next week. It might even be tomorrow.

  Except that tomorrow was when Raef Eisman heard about Nan Madol.

  THAT HE HAD BEEN on Pohnpei as long as he had without having been told or learning about the ruins only reaffirmed how focused his attention had been on the search inland.

  A series of ninety-two artificial islets, the ancient Nan Madol complex5 had been constructed on the southeastern side of the island and was not visible from the resort. Having heard about the ruins in the course of making periodic runs into the single town of Kolonia, Hills innocently thought taking a day off to visit them would do his boss some good.

  Neither he nor Eisman anticipated what they found. Expecting a few crumbling structures formed of hand-gathered coral rubble, they were astonished to find themselves motoring softly along canals between walls of carefully worked and laid basalt that in places towered more than twenty-five feet high. Seabirds hunted the coral shallows while bolder frigates patrolled overhead. Sweat poured down their faces as their guide, wearing as little as possible, guided the open shallow-draft craft between the immense edifices.

  “Palaces for nobles, homes for priests, even dwellings for commoners. All built out of prismatic basalt. Construction began more than a thousand years ago.” The boatman turned down another artificial canal. “See that stone there? It is a single piece, twenty feet long and weighing more than fifty tons; carved and shaped like it was butter.”

  While Hills gaped in wonder at their surroundings, an initially distracted Eisman remembered snippets from having the late night History Channel playing in the background during countless nights working from home.

  “I know how the Egyptians moved such stones, including even larger ones than these, but how could people out here transport them? Across water, no less?”

  Hills eyed
him uncertainly. “You know how the Egyptians moved stones, sir?”

  Eisman blinked as he wiped his face and forehead. “Figure of speech, Bill. I meant to say that I know how the archeologists say it was done. With log rollers and pulleys and leverage.” He gestured at their decidedly un-Egyptian surroundings. “There’s no hard ground here to pull these stones across.” He turned back to their guide. “So how did they do it?”

  Turning down yet another canal, the guide smiled. “One legend says that a powerful sorcerer’s black magic was responsible. He flew the stones here from the quarries. Another legend says the Skypeople built a palace on Earth here to teach and rule from their ‘reef of heaven’. If you believe such tales, this city was once a gateway to the gods. The origin of such stories has been lost to us today.”

  Raef shifted in his seat. “A gateway you say? Here on the ground?”

  Their guide smiled wanly as he steered the boat. “On the ground, yes. And straight up through the air. A pillar of light, they said, right into the dark heart of heaven.”

  Hills grunted. “It’s the same story one hears for every megalith. Not just Egypt, but India, Africa, Mexico, and of course Britain. These sky people and magicians sure do get around.”

  Eisman nodded slowly. “But if we discount the legends and believe that tribal elders commissioned the work, all those sites you refer to, Bill, are located on soil capable of supporting log rollers and the weight of the great stones.” He gestured at their surroundings. “This is all water out here.” Already he was running calculations in his head. “Could local Micronesians of a thousand years ago build rafts capable of floating fifty-ton stones around an island subject to heavy wave action and daily tides?”

  “Well they certainly weren’t flown here,” Hills huffed. Immediately after he had voiced the objection he hastened to face the guide. “Meaning no disrespect to your traditions, of course.”

  The boatman grinned. “I watch television, I read the news. I am not an ignorant man, visitor William. I can guide tourists in German and Japanese as well as English. You will not catch me talking seriously about giant flying pillars of stone and doorways to heaven. But you must admit it makes a wonderful story.”

  Relieved that he had not offended, Hills smiled back. “So this was basically a center for politics and religion. Like most ancient cities. Given how isolated it is, there would have been little commerce with outsiders, I guess. Too far to trade with the next ‘civilization’, at Kosrae.”

  The guide nodded. “Some ruins there as well, but not like this.” Using the hand that was not manipulating the tiller he indicated their cyclopean surroundings. “There is nothing in all the world like Nan Madol. Yet few people have heard of it because it lies in Pohnpei, and Pohnpei lies in the middle of nowhere.”

  They cruised among the ruins in silence for a while before the guide spoke again. When he did, it was to address Eisman with genuine empathy in his voice.

  “I know about the search for your missing daughter, visitor Raef. Everyone on the island does. My brother and two of his cousins are part of your search parties.”

  “Thank you for your understanding,” Eisman told him quietly. “And for the hospitality that has been shown to us by your friends and families.”

  The guide turned wistful.

  “My aunt lost my nephew many years ago. He was fishing beyond the reef with two friends when a storm came around the island. It was a very strange storm, one of those where the clouds seem to hug the ocean instead of the sky and sneak up behind the mountain. It caught them and capsized their boat. The two friends were stronger swimmers and made it back safely, but not my nephew. He was with them until they crossed the reef using the surge; then they never saw him again. They think maybe he hit his head coming over the reef top, but no one knows. They never found his body . . .” He paused before finally adding, “. . . either.”

  It took Hills a moment to recognize that the guide was not being presumptuous. Micronesians were open and forthcoming. In his fashion, the man was only trying to show sympathy for Eisman’s position and understanding for his pain.

  “What will you do, visitor Raef, when the search teams reach the sea and there is no more island to search?”

  The billionaire responded immediately. “I’ve already thought of that. I’m going to hire every man or woman on the island with access to scuba gear and have them comb the reef system. If Paige and the other two girls ended up in the ocean they might have been swept inshore, their clothes pinned among the coral. But only their clothes . . .” Choking up, he broke off before he could finish the thought.

  “Very long, very expensive,” the guide murmured. With Eisman unable to reply, Hills filled in.

  “Mr. Eisman has hired people to search the land. He will hire people to search the sea.”

  “And then?” wondered the guide with disarming directness. He stared at Eisman. So did Hills, who had for many days put off asking exactly that question.

  Aware of their eyes on him, Eisman looked back from the front of the small boat. “Then? We’ll start over. Every year there are three hundred and sixty five fresh starts, new opportunities to do what you could not do the day before. The mountain search teams will begin again and take different routes downslope. It’s a big island, Bill. If the primitives of Nan Madol didn’t give up their quest to build a city on water with stone tools, we won’t give up our quest using modern ones.” Though determined as ever, there was a crack in Eisman’s voice. Hills nodded knowingly.

  “Of course we will, Raef. Of course we will.” Turning away from the other men, he once more turned his gaze and attention to their impossible, overawing surroundings, feeling their weight somehow pressing down on him as he realized the fleeting visit to this island might turn into fulltime residency.

  Forcibly he shifted his mindset. “There’s still plenty of daylight left and the day’s faxes won’t be in yet anyway. We may as well stay out here and finish the tour.” He eyed the guide. “What else can you tell us about Nan Madol?”

  Relieved that the conversation had turned back to familiar ground, the guide resumed his well-rehearsed narrative as they prepared to disembark at one of the artificial islands.

  “Though construction of Nan Madol probably began in the eighth or ninth century AD, the raising of these great stone walls and platforms is considered to have started around twelve hundred in the time of Columbus and the great Chinese fleets of the day.”

  With a muted crunching sound the boat grounded on solid, ancient stone.

  “Incidentally, the name Nan Madol means ‘the spaces between’ . . .”

  “Spaces between what?” asked Raef, wiping the sheen from his head. But all their guide gave him was a chin thrust to the sky and a knowing smile as he hauled them ashore.

  2 Ansett Airlines was placed into administration in 2001 and subsequently liquidated in 2002 due to what was called a ‘financial collapse’. Read more at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansett_Australia, or other media reports from the era.

  3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pohnpei

  4 Google “fallstreak cloud” and click Images or Video. Sightings that show the outlines of large geometric discs are candidates for cloudship signatures. These are not materially dense enough to materialize in our dimension, yet they possess an electrical wake that pierces the bosonic plane enough to make their silhouette visible. The phenomenon has increased as dimensional integrity deteriorates.

  5 Nan Madol is a ruined city that lies off the eastern shore of the island of Pohnpei. It consists of artificial islets—stone and coral fill platforms—bordered by a network of tidal canals. The original name was Soun Nan-leng (“Reef of Heaven”), according to Gene Ashby in his book “Pohnpei, An Island Argosy”. It is sometimes called the “Venice of the Pacific”. Google: “Nan Madol” for more information and maps.

  UNDERGROUND

  LONDON, ENGLAND

  AUGUST, 2007

  WITH ITS ERODED volcanic peaks, impossibly turqu
oise waters and singing waterfalls all now well in the past, Pohnpei was a dream of a tropical island. And if Pohnpei itself was a dream, then the brooding necropolis of Nan Madol was a dream within a dream. All subsumed in a romanticized mirage poking out of an ocean halfway around the world, another in a long line of the increasingly empty dead-end hopes Eisman had pursued for six highly controversial years.

  They said he was mad. No longer a speculation confined to the business pages or the realm of eager political cartoonists, Eisman’s passion to find his daughter or at least some minuscule indication of what had happened to her had entered the lexicon of common cultural currency.

  From actual news it had fallen over the years into cheap fodder for late-night comedians and former business competitors. By now even some of the latter had turned from laughter to pity.

  Raef Eisman? Oh yes—brilliant fellow, once. But ever since that strange incident involving his daughter, well—poor chap. Claims to see her talking to him in windows and mirrors—surprising he hasn’t tried to step through one of them, like Alice. The blood loss might bring him to his senses. He isn’t stupid, though. Just, you know—eccentric. After all, he’s rich.

  Oh, and remember the press when he bought an entire beach resort on the south coast of Brazil because some guests reported seeing the face of the Virgin Mary in some of the windows, and he’d rushed away from a conference to tear the place apart window by window, insisting it was his daughter they’d seen?

  Then he’d attacked a camera team from the local television network. The old fool had gotten himself deported over that! Oh dear, those photos of him wide-eyed and babbling on and on about wild conspiracies and his ‘North Pacific Anomaly’.

  What was it he had gone on about?

  Something about how the Van Allen belt came closest to the Earth’s surface at certain spots so the planet’s magnetic field is weaker there. Protons get trapped in between dimensions, so why not his daughter? How sad. Although that bit about not even the Hubble being able to take pictures in those zones made it all sound a bit mysterious.