by Steve Cash
The Baron’s estate was intact and the place became a safe haven for him and Ray during the early stages of the Great War, as it was fought in East Africa. The Baron confessed to Ray that he had a son and grandson who were both fighting for the German army, somewhere in France. He tried to persuade his friend, General von Lettow-Vorbeck, to arrange for their transfer to Africa. It never happened. When Dar es Salaam was under siege and then bombarded, the old man’s estate was destroyed. Baron Ernst Rudiger von Steichen was hit and killed by flying debris during one of the explosions. Ray said his own leg, arm, and five of his ribs were broken in the blast and it took him nearly a week to heal. Once he did, he contacted the Baron’s family in Salzburg. The Baroness Matilde, granddaughter-in-law to the Baron, sent a long letter in return, thanking Ray and giving him the sad news that the Baron’s son and grandson had both been killed in the war. In a postscript she asked Ray if he could somehow bring the Baron’s body back to Salzburg. She wanted to bury them all among their own family and ancestors.
War makes pirates and strange bedfellows out of almost everybody. With his abundance of street skills and plenty of money, Ray was able to smuggle himself and the Baron’s coffin by ship to the Black Sea, then up the Danube all the way to Linz, where he made connections to Salzburg. The trip was a difficult and dangerous journey, but Ray made it in less than four months.
In Salzburg, he was met and welcomed by the Baroness Matilde. Ray said he could tell instantly that she knew he was Meq and in thirty minutes they were driving through the gates of the von Steichen “family spread,” as Ray called it. Nestled between a lakefront and the sheer rock face of a mountain, and connected across an entire hillside, stood a series of castlelike stone structures. This had been the home of the von Steichens since the Middle Ages.
The Baroness showed Ray to his quarters deep within the complex. Ray said there were so many buildings, most with additions and additions to the additions, it felt more like its own village than a family home. The master bedroom of his suite was covered in three-hundred-year-old rugs from Isfahan and even older Venetian tapestries hanging on the walls and over an enormous fireplace with a mantel well above Ray’s head. The Baroness asked him to stay for the funeral and Ray accepted. She was alone now in the great home. Her mother-in-law had suffered a stroke during the war, as had the last Baroness, the Baron’s own wife of fifty years. She died without ever knowing his fate and Matilde guessed it had been the same for the Baron. Ray told her the Baron always referred to his wife as a living person. That was comforting news to the Baroness Matilde. She then asked Ray to stay for as long as he liked, for the duration of the war if he wished. Ray told her it might be a good idea to “sit out the squabble,” as he referred to waiting for World War I to end. She also hinted that she had a special place to show him, saying it was the source of the Baron’s mad quest.
Ray stayed in Salzburg with the Baroness for almost a year, becoming her closest friend and acquiring in the process his newfound interest in Mozart and modern painting. At war’s end, he decided to return to the city of his birth, Veracruz. The Baroness understood and they said their farewells in Salzburg at the train station. Ray then headed for Switzerland to pick up the gold the Baron had insisted on paying him. After a brief stop in Munich, where he met and talked with a character named Hess that Ray described as “a real piece of work,” he found the bank and the gold waiting for him in Zurich. He traveled south to Marseille and boarded a ship sailing for Panama. From Panama, he made his way to Mexico and eventually St. Louis, in order to “save my ass,” as he reminded me.
Ray stopped his tale and looked out the window. The train was slowing down and the sun was just rising in the east. We were approaching the outskirts of Cleveland. Ray smiled to himself and reached into his vest, pulling out a packet of photographs and staring down at them.
“Well?” I asked. “Did she ever show you the special place?”
“That’s the part you ain’t gonna believe, Z. But I want you to look at something first. The Baroness let me take some photographs before I left.”
“Photographs of what?”
“Paintings—portraits painted by Vermeer and Botticelli.”
“Are they rare?”
“Yeah, you could say that, only I think the word ‘rare’ ain’t nearly enough. These are portraits of the same girl.” Ray stopped talking and looked at me for a reaction, then he said, “Vermeer lived almost two centuries later than Botticelli.”
“Then…how is that possible?”
“You mean I’ve gotta explain it to you, Z? You can’t figure that out?”
“She’s Meq?”
“You got it.” Ray handed me the photographs. “Look at her, Z. The Baroness told me her name is Susheela the Ninth. She’s Meq, all right, but she ain’t Egipurdiko or Egizahar.”
The photographs were sharp and clear, but they were not in color. Ray described the colors for me, mentioning especially the green of the girl’s eyes in the portrait by Vermeer. “If you’ve ever seen Vermeer’s blues, then you’ll know what I mean,” Ray said. “Her eyes are the greenest damn green I’ve ever looked on, Z.”
I studied the portraits closely, amazed and bewildered by what I saw. The girl was Meq without a doubt; her individual features, specifically her lips, were even similar to Opari’s. However, there was one very obvious and unexplainable difference, a difference unlike any other difference between us. The Meq girl in both portraits was black.
“So the Baron was telling the truth,” I said. “She was real.”
“She sure was, and is, as far as anybody knows.”
Just then, our train changed tracks for the approach into the rail yard. The jolt woke Mitch and he leaned out of his sleeping berth, trying to see out the window. “Where are we, Z?”
“Cleveland,” I answered. “New York by tonight.”
Ray winked and said, “There’s something else I want you to see, Z, but let’s wait until we’re on our way to Spain, what do you say?”
I gave the photographs one last glance, then handed them back to him. “Those portraits are nothing short of amazing, Ray.”
Ray winked again. “Ain’t life grand, Z? You never know, do you?”
New York City is not a city for the faint of heart. It is the biggest, toughest, meanest city in America, and arguably the greatest. Anything and everything has or will happen in New York. Until you have experienced for yourself the size, sounds, smells, the pace of life, you cannot imagine how overwhelming it can be. As we were pulling into Pennsylvania Station, Ray said it best: “I love this place, but it can kick your ass.”
It was well past working hours on a working day, yet there were still thousands of people coming and going through the huge terminal. Arrosa was there to greet us, however, and helped with the transfer of Unai and Usoa from Pennsylvania Station to our ship, the Iona. I saw a trace of sadness in her eyes, but she was efficient and the whole process took less than an hour. Ray was also a little sad. After I had introduced him to Arrosa, he immediately asked about Nova. Neither she nor Geaxi were present and the disappointment was evident on his face and in his eyes. Arrosa informed him that both of them were in Ithaca, New York, having left only two days earlier.
“Ithaca? What’s in Ithaca?” I asked.
“You will have to ask Nova, señor. I only have the names of the men she was to meet—Theodore and Leopold Wharton. Geaxi accompanied her and also gave no explanation.” Arrosa paused, then added, “I am thinking she might have seen something, señor, in a dream or vision. She was not herself.”
Ray and I exchanged puzzled glances. I knew Geaxi had gone for one reason—to watch over Nova—but I had no idea what Nova might have seen. Her visions were powerful, private enigmas that came without warning.
Suddenly Mitch spoke out. “My daddy, if he’s still alive, might be livin’ in Ithaca. On my way back to St. Louis, I could spend a little time there, find out what’s goin’ on with Nova, and maybe pay him a visit. I never have
before and this is as good a time as any.”
“What?” I asked, completely surprised. “I have never heard you even mention him.”
“It never came up, Z. Where do you think I got my middle name? My mama wanted me to never forget where he was from, so she gave me the name Ithaca.” He paused. “I might have a sister somewhere, too.”
I didn’t know what to say. None of this was expected. I looked at Ray and he grinned, then adjusted his bowler and said, “Let’s get somethin’ to eat, what do you say?”
“Good idea,” Mitch said.
“This way,” Arrosa said to all of us, adjusting her own black beret. Minutes later we were in a taxi, weaving our way down Fifth Avenue to Arrosa’s loft apartment, three blocks from Washington Square in Greenwich Village. We were due to set sail for Barcelona in twenty-four hours. That is a blink of the eye in New York City. I had hoped for the chance of seeing a ball game at the Polo Grounds, but that would have to wait for another time. Soon, I told myself. Soon.
The next day passed even quicker than I imagined and Mitch saw us off in the evening, looking resplendent in a black tuxedo and white silk scarf. He had an appointment later to meet a man in Harlem about investing in a nightclub, saying, “I can’t resist it, Z. This town is poppin’.” I told him I would cable him as soon as we reached Barcelona. I also wondered why no one was there to say farewell to Arrosa and I asked if any of her friends knew she was leaving. She answered, “No, and this is not a problem, señor. I knew this might happen. It is better this way.”
The Iona eased her way into a crowded and busy New York harbor, then steamed out to open seas. By midnight she had set a course east and south, bound for the Canary Islands, our only scheduled port of call before Barcelona.
I turned to Ray just before we said good night. “Any strange weather ahead, Weatherman?”
Ray grinned. “Nothin’ I can see, Z.”
There were few women on board the Iona. Most of the crew were Greek and spoke a dialect none of us had heard before. However, I needed no translation to understand what they meant when Arrosa was around. She did nothing to provoke them. Her clothes were simple and she wore no makeup or jewelry. None of their words or leering glances seemed to affect her, but I was uncomfortable with it and so was Ray.
The weather held across the mid-Atlantic and even though I was already missing Opari and the others, it felt good to be at sea again. The three of us spent much of our time on deck, walking or sitting in deck chairs. The passengers generally left us alone, and for the few who inquired, Ray and I were posing as brothers and Arrosa was our aunt. We never quite explained the reason for our trip and kept every conversation confined to the trivial. On the night before we reached the Canary Islands, Ray and I found ourselves alone, leaning on the railing near the stern, staring up at the great sweep of stars from horizon to horizon. My eyes drifted up and across, then focused on the constellation Pleiades, the Seven Sisters. The more I stared, the more they seemed to be whispering, sharing their secrets with each other at the very top of the sky.
I turned to Ray. “When are you going to show me the ‘something else’ concerning the Meq girl?”
“Tomorrow, Z. I got it hid away in a special place in my suitcase. I’ll get it out when we dock. It’s kind of fragile.”
The next morning we made port in the beautiful deepwater harbor of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, a place Captain Woodget and I had visited several times for several reasons as smugglers. The Canary Islands were a haven and an oasis for us, as they had been for sailors and merchants for centuries. I learned later the Meq have known and passed through the islands for millennia. Unai himself told many tales involving the Guanche, a mysterious, tall, blond, bearded tribe who inhabited the islands two thousand years before Columbus sailed anywhere.
The harbor was busy with merchant ships and container ships of all sizes, most filled with bananas or tomatoes. There were some passenger ships and private vessels, but not many. The Iona steered a clear path through traffic and we docked safely about midmorning. We would only be in port for the day and nearly every passenger was on deck and planning on going ashore. Ray had his white shirtsleeves rolled up and Arrosa wore a red flower print sundress and sandals. The air was hot and dry and the sky was a sharp, bright blue.
Arrosa smiled. “Are we going ashore? I have never been to this place.”
“Of course,” I said. “But, Arrosa, there is something I must ask you and I hope you aren’t offended.”
“I will not be offended. What do you ask, Zianno?”
“Only that you wait ashore for Ray and me. He has…he has something to show me in private.”
She laughed slightly. “That is not a problem, señor.” She turned and pointed toward an area on the dock that was a hundred yards from the Iona, away from the stream of passengers and cargo handlers and close to a tangled stack of banana crates. “I will wait for you there,” she said, adjusting her black beret to the proper angle.
“We won’t be long, Arrosa. I promise.”
“It shouldn’t take but a few minutes,” Ray said.
She laughed again. “It is not a problem, believe me. I will be waiting.”
She turned to leave and Ray and I watched her until she was walking down the gangway, then we went directly to his cabin. He pulled out his battered suitcase and opened it on top of the small bed. There was a false bottom in the suitcase and Ray dismantled it carefully. Underneath, hidden in a padded compartment, lay a papyrus scroll, weighted at both ends with long pieces of carved ivory and rolled into a coil. Ray lifted the scroll gently and spread it across the bed. Once he had it completely secured, he shook his head and looked over at me.
“Can’t make heads or tails out of what it says, Z, but I thought you ought to see it. Especially when I found out who had it and who it was for!”
I stared down at the stained, ancient paper. At first, I saw nothing on it except a group of red dots in the upper left section, possibly made with ocher. Then, below a fold and crack in the center of the papyrus, I saw a few blurry, faint scratches in black. I leaned over, looked closer, and was astounded.
“Who had this, Ray? Where did you get it?”
“In the ‘special place’ the Baroness Matilde talked about. It was a room, Z, a huge room in the oldest part of the castle, right up against the mountain. It used to be the entrance to a salt mine. One of the first von Steichens sealed it off, then converted it into an enormous space attached directly to the castle. Susheela the Ninth used it as her home for a thousand years. The papyrus was hers, Z. When she left without a word, she left this behind.”
A few seconds passed in silence. I was dumbfounded. “How old was, or is, Susheela the Ninth?”
“I don’t know, but the Baroness said the girl always referred to herself as ‘the last of her kind.’”
“You said you thought I ought to see this because you found out who had it and who it was for. What did you mean?”
“I mean there was another piece of paper with the papyrus. It was written by Susheela the Ninth and gave instructions, in German, as to exactly who was supposed to see the papyrus. The Baroness had to translate the instructions for me, but not the name.”
“What was the name?”
Ray grinned and picked up his bowler, spinning and twirling it on his finger. He opened his mouth to answer and just before he spoke, I stopped him. “Wait! Hush! Do you hear that?”
Ray was startled at first, then understood immediately that I was using my “ability.” “I can’t hear nothin’, Z,” he said.
I listened again to make sure the sound was what I thought. Then it came again, this time in panic, and I realized who it was. “No! No!” the voice shouted. “Get off me, you pig!”
“Come on,” I said to Ray and took off running for the gangway, dodging several people and pushing others to the side. Ray had no difficulty keeping pace. He was right on my heels and once we were down the gangway, I could hear the shouts and curses behind us of the
people who had been knocked out of the way. I paid no attention and was in a full running stride.
“Where are we going?” Ray asked casually.
“Arrosa is in trouble!” I shouted back.
Ray caught up with me. “Did you ever get that Stone back?” he asked with a wink.
“Sure did,” I said, tapping my pocket and slowing down to a trot. We were getting close. Even Ray could hear the struggle now. Ahead of us a jumble of crates filled with bananas were stacked one on top of the other in front of an open warehouse. On the opposite side of the crates Arrosa was being dragged into the warehouse. She was screaming in Spanish and fighting back.
Ray grabbed my sleeve. “Let me go first,” he said. “If there’s more than one, then they’ll all go for me, and you can do your little trick with the rock. What do you say?”
“Go,” I said without hesitation, then reached in my pocket and found the Stone.
Ray ran around the stacks of bananas, which were piled twenty feet high. Within seconds there were shouts and loud curses in Greek. There seemed to be at least three men attacking Arrosa. They were screaming back and forth and Ray was shouting in English to let the girl go. Arrosa was shouting, too, asking Ray in Spanish if I was with him.
I came around the last stack of bananas and as I reached my arm out to use the Stone, two thick, bare arms encircled me from behind and held me in a viselike grip. The man who grabbed me was heavyset and stank of sweat and stale rum. He held me in the air like a doll. My arms went numb and the Stone dropped out of my hand and rolled on the ground.
“Damn,” Ray said. Someone even bigger was holding him in the same manner. I thought I had seen the man on board the Iona.
“Are you all right?” I shouted to Arrosa. She had quit struggling and was almost out of sight, being dragged inside the warehouse by a third man. The man had a knife pressed against her throat. His undershirt had been torn to shreds by her teeth and fingernails.
