The Cortés Trilogy: Enigma Revenge Revelation

by John Paul Davis

  “Fernando’s grave had once been of great fascination to the great man.” Juan paused. “Unfortunately our fears proved correct. Another had beaten us to it.”

  Claude nodded. “And the others?”

  “The same.”

  “Ah.” He smiled gratefully as Miguel replaced the empty plate with a large bowl of piping hot chorizo served atop a generous selection of ready salted crisps.

  Claude began on the chorizo; he loved the way the perfectly cooked meats melted on to the crisps, creating a unique soft, crispy shell.

  “So, it seems we are a few years too late.”

  “Perhaps a few centuries too late.” Juan dipped his fork into the hot bowl and immediately approved of his uncle’s choice. “But all is not lost. Another stone has recently been found.”

  Claude dropped his fork. “Where?”

  “Within the old monastery in the Sierra de las Villuercas.”

  “You passed the sealed doors?”

  “Yes. It seems providence was with us. However, sadly not for Fernando and the others.”

  Juan told his uncle the news regarding the deaths of Pizarro, Busquets and Alvarez as well as the discoveries made in England and Spain.

  Claude nodded sombrely. “Alas. Such fortune turns ill. God rest their saintly souls.”

  Juan was far more reserved. “Only with the five stones together will the location of the lost city become known.”

  “As I have told you many times, the location has never been a problem. Its discovery was made known long ago.”

  “Even if the stories are true, there remains the problem of access.”

  “Access, access. You know, if I had my way, we would bulldoze our way through.” He gestured with his hands. “Why all the waiting?”

  Cortés jabbed his fork into the last piece of chorizo and rolled his eyes. “I am not willing to risk the loss of priceless artefacts just to satisfy old bloodlust. Besides, the possibility is not feasible. It would take equipment of far inferior size yet superior force to penetrate the forest, climb the pyramid and then enter the inner sanctum.”

  Claude adjusted his glasses and smiled. “Ah, so even in your own mind, the thought has come knocking.”

  “I am willing to consider any possibility should it help us discover what has for so long been lost. However, I am unwilling to take any great risks.”

  Claude pushed the empty bowl away, winked at the butcher and ordered two cold rolls with ham. “You must do what you think is best. You know you always have my support. After all, the treasure, it is not going anywhere.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure; we’ve had a complication.”

  “Oh?”

  “The American I mentioned is most learned; worse still, the archaeologist has been in the employ of the English royal family for longer than the American has lived.”

  “You are speaking of the negro?”

  “Yes.”

  “Ah. I remember meeting him myself, back when he was still the apprentice. His master was a good man. Shame about the choices he made.” He rolled his bottle, the remaining beer swilling from side to side.

  Cortés watched him like a hawk; he detected a backstory he was in no mood to hear at the present time. “The treasure was found on duchy property. It will only be a matter of time before a salvage mission begins.”

  “If what I hear is true, it already has.”

  Cortés cursed beneath his breath. “Those old ears hear much.”

  “Much, yes. Not always good. You did not have a chance to take any?”

  “Only two bag loads. The coins are not important; the statue was not authentic. All that mattered was the stone. That has outlived its purpose.”

  “How much gold was there?” Claude asked.

  “In England? Less than one galleon’s load. Less than ten per cent of what was brought to Spain. Less than a fraction of what still remains.”

  “I trust that what was found in the deserted mine remains in the same place?”

  “You think I would be so reckless as to let such things out of my sight?”

  “No. However, one cannot be too careful. Our family has always been cursed by watchers.” He bit into his bread roll and looked around silently. “Have you been followed?”

  “Not yet, but I am expecting it. The Americans would not be so reckless as to leave things to chance.”

  “What is in it for them? Besides academic credibility.”

  Cortés finished his beer. “Two stones have been found. Three remain. I need leads on those that are still missing. If they are moved, the book is useless. Where do I go from here?”

  “You are quite sure Velázquez is reliable?”

  “I trust his translations, yes.”

  “And you are also sure work on the tombs cannot be dated?”

  “One of the men speculated it was more recent.”

  “How recent?”

  “Last century, maybe a little longer. No work on the tomb of Fernando is officially recorded as having ever taken place at Seville.”

  The old man finished his roll and brushed his hands together. “Come. It is time we swallow our pride and pay a visit to an old friend.” He passed twenty euros to the butcher behind the counter. “Gracias, Miguel. Gracias.”

  12

  Valeria held her breath as she struggled through the exit of the hidden monastery. The nearby rocks were greasy on her fingertips, while the sky overhead had darkened angrily since her arrival, indicating that a second downpour was imminent. She smiled to herself as her mother’s other favourite rhyme, “the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain”, came to her mind, knowing it wasn’t entirely true.

  After pausing to catch her breath on the nearby rocks, she hurried through the castle ruins back down the pathway. As the seconds passed, she felt the wind pick up, the nearby trees rustling loudly, gutters vibrating against rooftops below. With Maria refusing to help, she knew she had only one way of getting to Medellín.

  Unfortunately, judging from the gathering blackness, she couldn’t have picked a worse time to make the journey.

  *

  Maria removed the tight plastic hard hat that had been pinching her head and searched for the button to activate the torch. With the second light shining, the walls and pathways took on a brighter yet somehow more ominous feel as though she had entered a vault beneath a church.

  Or worse yet, a lair inhabited by demons.

  “Valeria!” she called out, knowing the chamber of torches was impassable in such a short space of time. “Valeria!” she shouted again, louder, the sound dying somewhere within the vast emptiness. She waited nervously by the doorway, hoping Valeria would return.

  Again she heard no reply.

  She cursed her situation: being left alone in such an awful place, only days earlier the site of her greatest nightmare. Though she had not witnessed her grandmother’s murder, the memory of the gunshot continued to replay inside her mind like a song played back on an endless loop. At least with the extra light she no longer felt the walls were closing in on her; instead, the sight of the glow on the fountain created a beautiful illusion of warmth, the feeling heightened by the cascading effect of the water.

  Forgetting about Valeria, she returned to the previously concealed inner sanctum and explored the area beyond the fountain. The statue was great and mighty, reminding her of those often seen in a royal palace or in some of the nation’s more ornate plazas. The base was deeply set into paved stonework, giving it a solid artificial foundation that contrasted with the natural rocky surroundings.

  As in other parts of the cave, there was wall art.

  Moving to her right, she approached an area where the wall was smoother and covered by a heavy build-up of cobwebs. Rolling her sleeve around her hand, she rubbed it against the wall, watching the cobwebs come off and revealing a number of pictures. Instinctively, she took a step back as she feared the emergence of spiders, the very thought enough to bring her to a state of near panic.

 
Composing herself, she studied the new discoveries under the torchlight. The markings were easy to see, a series of strong yellow outlines that stood out prominently against the grey background. The first drawing was a two-dimensional outline of a cathedral, the style clearly Spanish gothic. The large bell tower was iconic and instantly recognisable.

  Brushing aside further cobwebs, she noticed a continuing trend. Left of the cathedral, she saw another religious building, its outline familiar but on this occasion less recognisable.

  Left of that was another similar building, joined on its right by a small green, rose-shaped object. On closer inspection, she realised that each of the three buildings had a green object close by, all of differing shapes.

  Further to the right of the first cathedral, the outlines depicted a scene of lush vegetation.

  Most likely a tropical island.

  She examined the pictures closely for several minutes, losing track of time. Though their meaning was unclear, it was obvious they were contemporary with other features of the temple.

  And that the strange objects radiated an emerald green glow.

  Taking a deep breath, she removed her iPhone from her bag and took a photograph on the camera. She checked the quality, satisfied.

  Leaving, she focused her torches on the pathway and set off quickly after her sister.

  13

  Away from the hustle and bustle of the neighbouring towns, the limousine with blacked-out windows made its way through the winding country roads to a quiet hamlet in the north of the county. On this occasion, the destination was no secret.

  Both passengers had visited it before.

  Ben’s attention drifted as he gazed through the tinted glass, intrigued by the way the dark colour had a defined effect on the appearance of the landscape, as though he were looking at a bygone time or watching an old film. He wanted to speak to Colts, but it was obvious that he was unwilling to talk. Even though the chauffeurs were chosen for their discretion, the man refused to take chances.

  After twenty minutes negotiating the minor roads, the limousine turned along a private road lined with immaculately trimmed hedging. As usual, there were few cars on the road; nobody seemed surprised or interested in their arrival. Continuing on further, they found themselves on a quiet country lane where all of the properties were gated. It was a journey the driver had made many times before, even earlier that week. On making the turn towards one especially high metallic gate, he punched in the security code and drove into a large cobbled forecourt that surrounded the familiar, large, five-bed Georgian mansion.

  “If I haven’t told you this already, it’s quite some place you have here,” Ben said.

  Colts grinned. “That reminds me, Ben. I’ll be needing my door key back.”

  They left the car and headed across the cobbles to an imposing front door surrounded by a stone archway. Ben stopped to admire the ivy-laden walls, the greenery partially covering some of the sash windows that were a feature at every level.

  Colts inserted the key, the heavy oak creaking as it moved. Once inside, he removed his leather shoes and put on a pair of slippers, relishing the comfort like a man who hadn’t been home in weeks.

  “My, oh my, that feels so much better!”

  *

  Colts made Ben a coffee and headed for the study on the first floor, inviting the chauffeur to entertain himself in the living room. Ben climbed the stairs with a familiar melancholic fascination as he reacquainted himself with the bizarre artwork.

  “I never knew you were a Picasso fan,” Ben said as they climbed.

  “And I never knew you were a Red Sox fan. See, we all have our little secrets.”

  Colts headed for the far end of the corridor and entered the study. Ben watched as Colts opened three sets of curtains, ending with those covering the largest bay windows that overlooked the hills beyond the hamlet.

  With sunlight entering, the various wall decorations instantly became visible.

  “You drew this?” Ben asked, again fascinated by the image of Colts alongside a moustachioed white man in what appeared to be a Mesoamerican temple. “Is that you or Morgan?”

  Colts laughed. “Back when I had talent, I used to do this sort of thing all the time. Check this one out.” He crossed to the other side of the room and brought back a near perfect copy of Monet’s Springtime. “Never believe it’s not an original, would you?”

  Ben was impressed. “Between you and me, I’d say your only mistake was signing it G. Colts.”

  Colts laughed louder.

  “So what exactly is this place?” Ben asked of the temple drawing. “More importantly, where is it?”

  “You ask me, no one of those things is more important than the other.” Colts replaced the copied masterpiece on the wall and headed back towards the drawing of himself in the temple. “The location is right here.” He pointed to the nearby map that covered the wall beyond an antique desk. As Ben remembered from a week earlier, several pins had been placed at various points, accompanied by small notes.

  Ben concentrated intensely, trying hard to make sense of everything. “It seems to be somewhere in the Olmec Heartland,” he began. “Looks like it’s somewhere just north of La Venta.”

  “You really are an expert, aren’t you?” Colts replied. “The river close to the island was thick with reeds. In the original language the translation of Tollan was . . .”

  “Among the reeds,” Ben interrupted, his eyes returning to the drawing. “What happened in the temple?”

  Colts took a seat and threw his hat across the desk. “I remember the first time I ever saw Arthur. He called me into his office at Imperial College and kept firing questions at me. Then he said I had precisely sixty seconds to prove my worth.”

  “I take it you succeeded?”

  “Not the first time, I didn’t. Arthur was never the type of man to suffer fools gladly; back then he thought I was just some yahoo with a big Jeep and an even bigger ego.”

  “Sounds to me he was a perceptive kind of guy.”

  “More than you’ll ever know. Wasn’t till two years later he finally let me into his confidence. See I’d made a huge breakthrough trying to locate the origin of the Santa Estella. Arthur was impressed and even saw to it that the university awarded me a doctorate.”

  “Presumably not for that work.”

  “You’re actually pretty perceptive yourself. Arthur decided to take me under his wing and let me in on studies even his wife didn’t fully know or understand.”

  “Like what?”

  “See, Arthur first became interested in the Noche Triste back in the ’30s when he was still an undergrad. Throughout the late ’40s and ’50s he spent months at a time trekking through the jungle.”

  “Looking for what exactly?”

  “Anything and everything. Be it evidence of Raleigh’s lost colony in Virginia to the seven cities of gold. It didn’t matter. Years later, he became far more selective, convinced the majority of legends were less worthy of note; however, back in the early ’80s we both had a stroke of luck.”

  “What was it?”

  “Poor Arthur got beat up outside a pub in Glasgow. Nothing a few stitches wouldn’t fix, but the injury changed him. Said he started looking at things all different.”

  Ben was intrigued. He had heard of similar reports, including from among his colleagues. “I guess trauma like that could cause one’s brain to rewire itself.”

  “Whatever the reason, Arthur became obsessed with the old sources and maps and discovered, be it by chance or fate, the exact location of the temple. Back then, I’d only been working on this for three years and was still to understand most of the problems we faced, but as time passed, I began to realise Arthur was just the kind of genius one only comes across once every blue moon. After locating the temple, in the place matching Raleigh’s descriptions, among the deepest parts of the jungle, we set foot in something that must have lain untouched since Sir Walter’s own visit. My, even now I can still fee
l the sweltering heat. The mercilessly heavy air. And the insects.”

  Ben folded his arms, unpleasant thoughts suddenly cleared from his mind. “What happened after that?”

  “The majority of the buildings were ruined, apart from the temple complex; even compared to Teotihuacán the condition of the temples was impressive. The inner sanctum of the main temple was unguarded aside from the final doors. That was where we came unstuck.”

  “There was no other way in? No passages, no hidden levers.” Ben removed his rucksack. “I’m pleased to hear neither of you decided to bring in a bulldozer.”

  Colts laughed. “Even if we wanted to, getting it through all the reeds and across the water would have been nigh on impossible; even for a helicopter it’s extremely difficult to land amongst the foliage.”

  “How did you get there?”

  “Once we made base at La Venta, we hired a Jeep and took it as far as we could. Over fifty miles that little beauty got us before we had to give in. Actually got us to within four miles of the island itself.”

  “I take it you walked the rest of the way?”

  “Only there; different story after that.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Original plan was to stay an entire weekend, set up camp at the structure, and at the very least sleep on the island. Was already mid-morning by the time we arrived. Time we left, not even three.”

  “What happened? The insects get too much for you?”

  “Weren’t too pleasant, Ben. Even worse were the natives.”

  Ben raised his coffee mug to his mouth and paused with it touching his lower lip. “Natives? You’ve gotta be kidding me?”

  “Hand to God.”

  Ben remained sceptical. “There. That far in the jungle?”

  “At the time, it was probably an even bigger surprise to us than you. Since that time, stories of rediscovered tribes have been far more common. About seven miles away, we made camp with another local tribe, who warned us not to proceed. Of course, back then we decided it was just superstition. Local nonsense.” Colts paused, noticeably long. “Leaving that place was the easiest decision I ever made. They came from nowhere and in their hundreds – thousands maybe – swarming like bees. Even today I still get the sweats thinking about how close we came to being stung.”