The Lost Ark

by J. R. Rain

  I studied him. He disgusted me, and the woman didn’t help my feelings of repulsion. “I will hold you personally responsible for their safety, Daveed.”

  He said nothing. I decided there was nothing else to be gained here, and as I moved toward the front door, the woman hurled an Armenian insult, comparing me to a monkey’s ass. It loses some flavor with translation.

  Outside, in the rain behind the hotel, I found a foul-smelling dumpster. I removed the gun from my waist and shoved it deep between two white plastic bags.

  Chapter Five

  We were seated at the Sicak Patates. Hot Potatoes.

  The dining room was elegant by Dogubayazit standards, perhaps the nicest in town. Small glass tables. Slender red candles. Menus long and leather-bound. I wore Levis and a plaid flannel. Faye was dressed in black silk pants and a shimmery silver blouse that captured the candlelight and returned it a thousand fold. She seemed well-rested, and in a better disposition, although her lips were still pressed into a thin line, barely displaying the matted mauve lipstick she was wearing. A spot of wine shimmered on her lower lip. Her green eyes were the color of a tropical lagoon. Tonight, her hair was parted to the left, bangs curled just below her eyes. She was the prettiest woman in the room.

  I told her of my conversation with Daveed Hammid, leaving out the part about the ample breast. The waiter came by and I ordered sea bass for myself and lamb for her.

  When the waiter left, Faye leaned forward on her elbows, and said, “So there’s a chance my father may still be on the mountain,” she stated firmly. I was noticing that most things about Faye were firm.

  “Sure,” I said. “But whether or not he’s alive is the question.”

  She sat back, crossed her arms under her chest.

  “Ever the optimist,” she said.

  Although the rain had stopped hours ago, the big window next to us revealed a sodden street and dark skies beyond. I was drinking Turkish beer, and she the house Chablis. I lit a cigarette, offering her one. She shook her head, although her conviction was waning.

  “Would you offer an alcoholic a drink?” she countered.

  “I do every night.”

  “Never mind.”

  There were no laws in Turkey about smoking in public places. Turks love to smoke, and they do so everywhere. In fact, a haze of the gray stuff hovered just below the ceiling, roiling in a mini storm cloud.

  There was a lull in the conversation. I hate lulls.

  “So what is it that you do back home?” I asked, squinting through the smoke, realizing for the first time that this felt like a date.

  I swallowed and broke out in a sweat. She didn’t notice.

  Instead, she picked up her wine glass between her thumb and forefinger and swirled the contents, which came dangerously close to spilling over the edge, but didn’t. I studied her as she did so. She sat straight in her chair, chin forward. She looked up at me with clear unblinking eyes.

  “I teach archaeology at USC,” she said. “Or, more accurately, paleo-linguistics.”

  “Ah. The study of ancient languages,” I said. “Just like your father.”

  “Very good, Mr. Ward. However, unlike my father, who gave it all up, I’m still doing original research in the field of Mayan cryptology.”

  I thumbed through my mental image of her father’s book. “Your father gave up his tenure at USC to take a position at Southern California Christian to pursue Biblical archaeology, I believe.”

  “You could say I filled the void left by his vacancy. Father is a foolish man, and a dreamer. He seeks to add validity to his faith, which, I think, is an oxymoron.”

  When the waiter brought our food, Faye’s eyes widened with pleasure. I think she was ravenous. We both were, and ate quickly. The waiter took our plates and we ordered more drinks, another beer for me and a Turkish coffee for her. When he returned with our drinks, Faye picked up the tiny porcelain coffee cup and smiled.

  “Positively Lilliputian,” she said.

  “But with a Brobdingnagian kick,” I said.

  She nodded her linguistic approval. Somewhere, Jonathan Swift and maybe even Gulliver, were rolling in their graves. Faye tasted the strong coffee, and seemed to like it. The waiter came back and asked me if we would like desert. I said desert was against the young lady’s religion. He shrugged and left. Outside, people strolled by the window, watching us drink. I watched them watching us drink. Cars with broken headlights rolled one way. Cars with broken taillights rolled the other.

  Faye asked, “So why’s the mountain closed?”

  I shook my head. “Good question. No one knows for sure, and those who do aren’t talking.”

  “Camilla mentioned something about an Arab prince.”

  “Emir Omar Ali, a Saudi Arabian prince of tremendous wealth. He’s also a well-known adventurer. In fact, the National Geographic did an article on his attempt to cross Antarctica. The attempt failed, by the way, with three of his team members forever lost. Now his passion has turned to Noah’s Ark. He has ascended the mountain on three separate occasions, myself leading the way on the second attempt. Let me assure you, Miss Faye, he’s a royal pain-in-the-ass, although I got along well with his personal bodyguard. Must be the peasant blood in me.”

  “So what does the Arab prince have to do with the mountain being closed?”

  I sipped my beer, placing it directly in the center of the square white napkin. Bullseye.

  “That’s the rub. While the Turkish military patrols the base of Ararat, the Arab and his men ascend the mountain regularly in helicopters, bringing up a constant stream of supplies from a secured airbase just outside of Dogubayazit. Even the shepherds who live on the mountain with their herds of sheep are forced to stay away. All in all, it’s very detrimental to the guiding business.”

  “Is it common to close the entire mountain?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Depends. Kurdish terrorists often seek refuge on Ararat, or use it as a training ground. The Turkish military often perform sweeps, clearing the area of all illegal activity. But the military doesn’t generally remove the peaceful shepherds who have lived on the mountain for centuries.”

  “So what do you think is going on?” Faye Roberts asked.

  “Some in Dogubayazit speculate that Omar might have found Noah’s Ark, and is currently digging it free. Those who prescribe to conspiracy theories think he’s a spy or a terrorist. Either way, gossip is alive in well in Dogubayazit.”

  I signaled the waiter for another beer. Faye declined more coffee with the international shake of her head. I rubbed my full belly, vaguely considering undoing the top button of my jeans.

  “Could this Omar Ali have anything to do with my father’s disappearance?”

  “Anything’s possible. But more than likely—”

  “More than likely my father’s buried under an avalanche. I know,” she said bitterly. She had twisted her cloth napkin into a rope. Or noose.

  I said, “Let’s make one thing perfectly clear, Miss Faye. Mount Ararat is as dangerous as they come. In fact, it can be a deathtrap to those who don’t know what the hell they’re doing. Your father, according to Daveed, went off on his own. Mount Ararat without a guide is like sailing in rough seas without a rudder.”

  Her eyes narrowed. She set her coffee cup down. Loudly.

  “My father is an experienced climber.”

  Diners seated around us looked at us curiously. I recognized one, a big man with black hair greased straight back, olive skin shining in the candlelight. He was my banker. I waved; he nodded. He turned back to his slender wife, who completely ignored us.

  I was silent, watching Faye. My plan of dissuading her from climbing the mountain was rapidly crumbling to pieces.

  “I know the odds are slim of finding him, Sam, but I have to try. He’s my father, after all.”

  I took a big breath. It was time to end this nonsense.

  “I may be the only one who tells it to you straight, Faye, as there are others her
e in Dogubayazit who will surely take advantage of you. What you hope to accomplish is impossible and foolish. You’re father is dead, and so is his student. You are wasting your time and money. It would be best if you got on the next bus from Dogubayazit and left. There is much trouble to be had here.”

  She held my gaze without blinking, lips disappearing into a thin, bloodless line. Cheekbones crimson. It was a full minute later when she finally spoke, and she did so slowly and carefully.

  “I am under the impression, perhaps delusion, that it makes sense to look for those who are missing, no matter how improbable the odds.” She stood. “I thank you for your frankness, Mr. Ward. After the way you’ve put it, there’s nowhere to go but up.”

  I did something that surprised even me: I gripped her narrow wrist, and pulled her down to eye level. She made no move to break free.

  “You’re wrong,” I said. “You could die up there.”

  “I will take my chances, Mr. Ward. I owe my father that much.”

  She stared at me. I had expected to see tears in her eyes. There were none. Only firm determination. A look like that could conquer nations. Or mountains.

  I released my hold. She paused only briefly before leaving the restaurant. I watched her go. So did some of the other men. The waiter came by, glanced briefly at the empty chair. Then handed me the bill.

  “Well,” I whispered. “That went well.”

  Chapter Six

  I stepped out of the restaurant and into the cool night air. The rain had come and gone, leaving Dogubayazit in muddy ruins. I picked my way carefully over the broken cobblestone sidewalk, slipping once or twice in the slime that had washed up from the street. I was slightly drunk, having celebrated my failure to dissuade her attempt to climb the mountain with a few more beers.

  Faye Roberts was headstrong and reckless. And those were two characteristics that can get you killed on Ararat. Her father had probably been the same way.

  I turned my collar up and shoved my hands deep into my pockets.

  Faye Roberts wasn’t my concern. I had done my best to discourage her. And she hadn’t listened.

  “Stubborn broad,” I mumbled.

  The shops were closed. The streets empty. The cobblestone sidewalk morphed into a long swath of black mud. My hiking boots made sucking noises with each step. Water drip-dripped everywhere. In the far distance I saw a flash of headlights, heard the grind of a very old motor as the vehicle turned down a side street and disappeared. The air was crisp, and there was the sweet smell of rain on the wind, perhaps the promise of more to come.

  Faye Roberts had looked gorgeous tonight. The designer of that silver blouse should receive a fashion award. Or a handshake. It had shimmered in all the right places.

  I turned onto a larger street. There were more hotels here, all glowing invitingly at this late hour, foyers brightly lit. Ten minutes later, I stopped in front of my bar with its double doors wide open as dim yellow light issued across the sidewalk. I paused and lit a cigarette. Which turned the pause into something more than a pause.

  I leaned against the wooden door frame, smoking contentedly, staring out into the quiet night. Somewhere a dog barked, a deep-throated mean-sounding bark. Another dog responded. This one more of a yipe. This went on for some time until both pooches were suitably caught-up on the night’s gossip.

  The wooden sign above me creaked in the wind. A dirty spotlight illuminated the sign, revealing a single hand-painted word: Bira. Beer.

  I like to keep things simple.

  I took one last drag from the cigarette and flicked it away and stepped into the near-empty bar.

  * * *

  Like the name, the bar itself was simple. There were a half dozen of the requisite neon lights on the blond pine walls, and scattered here and there were posters of scantily clad women holding their favorite bottles of beer. Round tables scarred with cigarette burns, knife blades, fingernails and sharp elbows. Two ancient ceiling fans, powered by exposed leather belts, did little to disperse the pall of white smoke that hung suspended in the air. A typical bar, even in Eastern Turkey.

  Five customers remained at this late hour, sitting in wooden chairs of varying degrees of solidity, talking amongst themselves, some louder and more drunk than others.

  Pascal was behind the bar, cleaning glasses with a rag that could have used some cleaning itself. A good kid. Nineteen years old. Whip-thin. Always a smile on his face, which said a lot. Because he didn’t have much to smile about. Both his parents were killed by Kurdish guerrillas, a bomb left in a duffel bag on their bus, leaving Pascal to raise a kid sister in a small apartment on the east side of town. During the day he studied accounting, via a correspondence course from the university in Istanbul. The correspondence course had been my idea.

  He saw me and smiled from ear to ear. There was a shiner under his left eye, courtesy of the yuruk.

  “I was getting worried, Sam bey.” He used the word bey as a sign of respect, or if he wanted to borrow some money.

  “Anything exciting happen while I was gone?” I asked.

  He pointed to a broken chair in the corner of the room. Two of its legs were gone. “Just one fight, Sam bey. Nothing I couldn’t handle.”

  “How’s the eye?”

  “I’ve been hit harder.”

  I grinned. Although Pascal was small, he was tough. I motioned with my thumb. “Hit the road, kid.”

  Pascal pocketed his earnings and untied his apron and hung it on a hook over the sink. He flashed me another grin. “By the way, the American woman came by tonight and asked me to give you this.”

  Pascal held up two twenty dollar bills attached to a note. The note was short, with big flowing letters: ‘Sorry for sticking you with the bill. I hope this covers it. The lamb was excellent, by the way.’

  Pascal was grinning. “She is very pretty, Sam bey.”

  “I know.”

  When the kid left, I took up the position of honor behind the counter, staring at the note. I poured myself a splash of brandy. A short while later, I poured another.

  “At least she didn’t stick me with the bill,” I said to the splash of brandy. The brandy didn’t respond, of course. But if I had a few more shots, it just might.

  Later, an older woman came in through the open double doors. She was three sheets to the wind, weaving this way and that as if she were a detective on a crooked trail. As always, she was beautiful, elegant and stately. She was, of course, Camilla Constantine.

  Chapter Seven

  Camilla was my self-appointed spiritualist and oracle, reading much into my words and actions, coming up with some amazing prognostications. Most were ridiculous. Some were humorous. And a few were deadly accurate. Of course, those were the ones that made me nervous. Then again, even a blind harpoonist can hit the ocean.

  “You look good, Camilla,” I said. “Drunk, but good.”

  Camilla sat before me at the bar and shrugged out of a red silk business jacket with ivory buttons. She hung the jacket on the back of the barstool, its black silk inner lining shining under the dusty lightbulbs above.

  I placed a glass of raki, made from distilled raisins, before her, a favorite of Camilla’s. She promptly tilted it back and drained the glass dry and motioned for another.

  “Rough day?” I asked, pouring.

  “Sometimes I would like to kill all men,” she said in Turkish, her voice deep. Sort of sexy. “I would like to kill them all one at a time. And slowly.”

  I stepped back. She continued. “Men think they can cheat me. But not tonight. I sent two of them on their way. They will never do business with me again, and it is their loss. Men, Sam, are assholes.”

  “Don’t look now, Camilla, but you happened to be seated across from an asshole now.”

  “None of the above applies to you, Sam.” She reached out and patted my cheek with a warm palm. “Though I should grab your ear and shake some sense into you.”

  “Is that a Turkish form of foreplay?”

&n
bsp; She shook her head, irritated. When she was drunk, she didn’t find me as cute as usual. “I send a beautiful American young woman your way, and you turn her away as if she were diseased.”

  I raised my forefinger to counter that accusation, but Camilla had moved on. When Camilla speaks, one needs more than a forefinger to break in. “But that’s okay, Sam. You had your reasons. Yes, what she asks is stupid and foolish. But she is pretty and nice. I thought you two were right for each other. She was a good omen. After all, you are both Americans.”

  I shook my head. “There’s more to a relationship than nationality, Camilla.”

  “But I knew you would take care of that girl. I don’t trust the other guides.” Camilla sighed and took a breath, sitting back in the stool. “However, Faye Roberts is a big girl. Her own iron will got her here. And it is her own iron will that keeps her here now.”

  “So she didn’t leave?” I asked. I tried to sound casual, but the excitement was there in my voice. For now, the Academy Award was safe.

  “Of course she didn’t leave,” said Camilla. “She will not be denied, Sam. I have recommended she speak with Niksar.”

  “Niksar?” I leaned forward across the counter, frowning.

  Camilla shrugged and raised her eyebrows. “At least he will not take advantage of her. He is a decent man.”

  “But a horrible guide. You’ll get her killed. Has she spoken with Niksar yet?”

  “She has a meeting with him tomorrow morning at eight.”

  “What room is she in?”

  “Sam,” said Camilla. “Don’t you dare wake that child now. She has had a long day. If you want to speak with her, you will do so tomorrow morning.”

  I was breathing hard.

  “You seem upset, Sam,” said Camilla sweetly.

  “You know damn well why I’m upset. And you know what I think of Niksar. Twice he’s gotten himself lost on Ararat. The man is a horrible guide, which is probably why you suggested him.” I took a breath, seeing red. “I feel as if you’ve scripted my every move.”