The Orchid Hunter

by Sandra K. Moore

  They stopped at a pink oleander-shaded menu stand and stood with their hands in their pockets, browsing. A gang of teenagers migrated past, jostling the Brain, who glanced up in annoyance. Then his attention went back to the menu.

  Better to approach them one at a time. The Brain walked on. The Whiner lingered over the appetizers. I strode forward, turned my head to look at Boudro’s Texas Bistro, and gave the Whiner a full-frontal press.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I spewed, smiling my sweetest smile as I pawed his trousers as though trying to cop a feel while maneuvering my shoulder bag. Nothing in his pockets. The map had to be on the Brain.

  “That’s all right.” The poor guy looked almost grateful to have been groped.

  Then the Brain turned to look for his buddy and stared me in the face. His eyes widened. He clearly recognized me from somewhere, but I had no idea where. His face—innocuous, bland, shocked—meant nothing to me. In a split second, he pivoted and sprinted away, one hand reaching for his left windbreaker pocket.

  Eureka.

  “Hey! Wait!” the Whiner yelled behind us.

  The Brain didn’t slow. He dodged through the walking crowd alongside the river like a freshman running back. I got hung up around a waiter carrying a tray of steaming seafood, slid underneath his arm, and took off again. The Brain’s distinctive bobbing head kept me posted amid the sun visors, suits and golf shirts.

  He abruptly turned up a steep stone staircase to Commerce Street. I took the steps two at a time, jostling a bevy of well-dressed tourists and earning a chorus of “Hey!” A guy wearing a navy sports jacket and a power tie with green accents—not a good combo—grabbed my arm but I twisted free. The interference slowed me down enough to let the Brain make the street without me and lose himself in the shopping crowd spilling onto the sidewalk.

  Damn.

  I jogged further south, thinking he wouldn’t be so stupid as to double back to pick up the Whiner. At the Market and Alamo intersection, I came upon another set of steps leading down to the River Walk. From the Market Street bridge, I could see a good bit of the river and the people walking along both sides of it. On the north side, not much happening except for a maintenance barge puttering south and a bright pink river barge loading up with dinner passengers. On the south side, the terraced Arneson River Theater seats had filled up with spectators for whatever was going on onstage across the river, which was loud salsa….

  Bingo.

  Thinning hair, beige windbreaker, and a furtive look over one shoulder. Had he not looked, I’d have had to think twice. I swung down the stairs, jumping the rail on the last five steps to land next to a startled restaurant hostess with flaming red hair and a Clinique-ly perfect face.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled.

  I was nearly on him when the Brain caught sight of me and bolted toward the stage. On it, several brilliantly costumed Mexican dancers wheeled in some traditional hoedown. Mariachis jammed on a little platform behind the dancers. Across the river, spectators sprawled on the terraced seats leading up a steep hillside. A tourist barge moseyed in our direction, the driver giving the usual historical spiel as he steered his boat between the stage and the seating area.

  Perfect place for a takedown.

  The Brain jumped a barricade blocking off any pedestrians who might wander onto the stage and caught his trailing foot on the wood. He nearly fell, taking the barricade with him. Great. He was tiring. I sprinted over the downed barricade. He catapulted onto the stage. The crowd gasped. I jumped up after him. Dancers scattered like gorgeous tropical birds spooked by a cat. A running leap and I tackled him, shoving him down face first onto the wooden flooring.

  “Gotcha!” I shouted over the mariachis. The Brain wriggled like a worm on a hook. “Hold still a minute, will ya?” I reached for his map pocket.

  I caught a glimpse of dark green uniform in my peripheral vision as the Brain wrenched himself loose, throwing a much lighter me to one side. I scrambled to my feet. Dark green uniform meant the Parks and Wildlife cops. The dancers faded back when I lit out after the Brain again, chasing him up the walk toward Presa Street.

  The Brain threw a frightened glance back at me and then did something I’ll never forget: he jumped from the sidewalk onto the oncoming river barge, skidded behind the driver, hopped from there onto a maintenance scow headed the other direction, and then finished with a mad leap to the other sidewalk. A second later and the boats had passed each other, leaving me looking at twelve feet of water between us.

  Nice trick. And there wasn’t a footpath close enough to cut him off. I watched him scramble up a retaining wall. He disappeared.

  The dark green uniforms pounded my way, so I took a page from the Brain’s book and skedaddled up an ivy-covered wall. On the other side, I sprinted over Market Street to the River Bend parking garage and my first floor Rent-A-Wreck. Thirty seconds later I motored sedately out into evening traffic.

  Only after I knew I wasn’t being followed did I pull over so I could study the paper the Brain had so graciously given up, unbeknownst to him, in our scuffle amid the gorgeous dancers.

  Harrison’s proprietary code covered the page. I scanned through the gibberish, finding nothing but lots of notes to self about insects, repellants and allergies. The poor Brain had got himself bamboozled. Then a set of letters and numbers caught my attention. I translated, tried not to get too excited.

  Oh, yes, Harrison had been in the field. That little encoded phrase at the bottom of the sheet told me exactly where he’d been.

  Roraima, Brazil, here I come.

  Chapter 3

  The Hotel Imperial in Boa Vista crouched at the city’s edge, its clapboard sides weathered and unpainted for most of a decade. Chico, the Brazilian contact I’d inherited from Daley when he got dumped from von Brutten’s payroll, had set up both my flight from Boa Vista into the jungle and my guide. He’d also booked the Imperial for me. Doing me a favor, he probably thought. I could tell it was usually a brothel but, for the sake of the International Conference on Environmental Protection and Sustainable Living being held that week, it had temporarily become a true hotel. Just grungy, sleazy and cheap.

  Thanks for nothin’, Chico.

  The conference was being held in one of the legitimate hotels in the city’s heart. Strange city to have a conference, I thought as I collected the old-fashioned church key to my no doubt dingy and bug-ridden room. Why not Manaus, which at least had a cosmopolitan air? The greasy hotel landlord smiled a greasy smile and wished me a good stay. At least I’m pretty sure that’s what he said; my Portuguese isn’t what it should be.

  As I trudged up the narrow stairs, I heaved my canvas duffel bag over one shoulder. The pain about doing what I do isn’t the scraping around in the jungle. It’s having to buy all your supplies at the local open-air market—rice, beans, a cooking pot, matches, mosquito netting, a hammock, tins of cooked meat, bottled water (which is incredibly heavy after you’ve carried it around for a while), and rum or whiskey for trading with the Indians. Bickering prices with wily natives whose language I imperfectly speak and hear is no fun. I walk away suspecting I’ve been robbed.

  I usually bring with me the real basics: my day pack, two sixty-meter climbing ropes and assorted climbing hardware, a collection of Hefty OneZip bags in various sizes, a first-aid kit complete with snakebite antivenin and antimalarial prophylactic, several cans of mosquito repellant, three changes of cotton underwear, tincture of iodine, tampons and garlic. I know. Garlic. But I swear, the jungle grows fungus better than any place on earth with the possible exception of a woman’s vagina. One clove used as a suppository can kill the beginnings of a yeast infection. Cross my heart. Garlic is a natural antibiotic.

  Life in the jungle doesn’t get really hairy until about the second or third day. You count on being able to wash out your undies in a stream at least once a day; when you can’t, you turn them inside out or go grungy until you can find a stream. When the bottled water runs out, you boil enough local wat
er to fill a canteen, doctor it with the iodine and hope for the best. You try not to get bitten by snakes, and Brazil has plenty. You also learn real fast how to tie mosquito netting around your hammock so the little bastards don’t eat you alive in the night. The mosquito netting also keeps the vampire bats off you. And no, the garlic won’t help in that situation.

  Normally all this stuff would get carried around by lackeys I’d hired. But Daley decided this time last year his best bet to finding good plants was to track me rather than the plants. Besides, an orchid stolen from me wouldn’t make it into von Brutten’s hands. During his first attempt, I’d had two “interns,” a gun-toting guide and a burly carrier for the heavy stuff. As a result of having too many people to worry about when Daley and his little band of Merry Men struck, I nearly let him make off with a delicious Phragmipedium. Never again, I vowed, and have traveled with only a guide since.

  I humped all my stuff down the long, dark corridor to my room. The church key went into the heavy stained-door’s lock and turned. The lock clicked and thunked. I shoved. The door creaked but didn’t budge. Brilliant. The damn door was stuck in its frame.

  I dropped my stuff on the dirty floor and backed across the corridor—a whole step. Not much room to build up a head of steam. And in my colorful cotton turista dress disguise, I couldn’t just pound the door down without getting the neighbors’ attention. I certainly didn’t want that in case Daley managed to track me this far, which he was probably working on. So I set my back against the corridor and put the heel of my flat sandal near the rickety handle. I gave a quick, sharp, satisfying kick.

  The door exploded open. It swung hard and bounced off a wooden chest placed too close to the doorway. Inside, the room echoed the same gloom as the corridor. I stepped in to review the scene. Rickety iron bed, cracked mirror, dirty walls, light eeking from a bare bulb in the middle of the ceiling. Hotel California it ain’t.

  “I beg your pardon.”

  I spun. Behind the partially open door and battered bureau sat an iron claw-footed tub filled with soapy water and a handsome man. Dark hair, dark eyes, lightly flared nose, a flurry of black hair on his well-muscled chest.

  “I told the manager I wasn’t interested in any entertainment,” he said in what I suspected was perfect Portuguese. He looked me up and down, pausing in interesting places. “But you may have changed my mind.”

  He stood, revealing the most splendid specimen I’d ever seen either in the hothouse or in the field. Water glistened over his dark skin, accentuating every angular muscle and darkening the dense thatch beneath his navel. An admirable addition to any garden, I thought. He reached for a towel and casually dried his back, still standing knee-deep in water and letting me enjoy the view.

  Part of my brain scrambled for the proper phraseology for I’m not a whore, you chauvinistic ass, while another part searched for, Take me now and be quick about it. The sane part—the very small part with the synapses still firing—screamed to get out of there.

  I struggled with my Portuguese. “You must have the wrong room.”

  “Inglês?”

  “Yes.”

  He continued to study me while he lifted one powerful leg from the tub, then the other. Even the undersides of his thighs were dark. The towel made another circuit of his broad shoulders and traveled down his chest, but not far enough to obstruct my line of sight. The scientist in me took over, pondering dimensions, speed, staying power.

  “I rather think you have the wrong room.” His English was as perfect as his Portuguese. And his deep voice stung right where a girl needs it most. “Too bad.”

  I managed not to stutter. “I was told this room.”

  “Then maybe that’s correct.” He looked pointedly at the laughable excuse for a double bed provided by the establishment. “Do you hog the covers?”

  “On that thing I wouldn’t have to.”

  “It is narrow.” His gaze lingered on the open neckline of my dress.

  I resisted the urge to tuck my arms in and artificially produce more cleavage than I legitimately have.

  “I’ll straighten this out with the manager,” he said.

  He dressed as leisurely as he toweled. First he pulled on a pair of cotton trousers. I guessed underwear wasn’t his thing. He shrugged into a loose shirt, then buttoned it from the bottom up, leaving me a nice swath of bulging chest to admire for as long as possible.

  Evil man.

  I followed his broad shoulders downstairs where he engaged in a lively debate with the greasy landlord in speed Portuguese, most of which I didn’t catch. When they were done, the landlord smiled apologetically.

  “What just happened?” I asked.

  “The international conference has every room in this place taken. We will have to share.”

  “Then we should each get half our money back.” It was miserly of me—half would be all of eight dollars—but it was the principle of the thing. I didn’t appreciate being taken advantage of.

  “He’s agreed to have dinner sent up.” He steered me back toward the stairs.

  “Sent up? We’re not honeymooning.” I mentally cursed as slightly pornographic images starring my handsome roommate naturally coursed through my head.

  His deep laugh sent a thrill down my spine. “Perhaps not, but I believe we may be together for some time.”

  “What do you mean?” I stopped on the landing, leaving him a couple of steps behind and still at eye level. Nice and tall.

  “Our generous landlord told me your name. Dr. Robards?”

  “Yes,” I admitted warily, reluctant to give up even my stage name to this guy.

  “I am Carlos Gutierrez, your pilot. Chico hired me to take you into the jungle.” He smiled, and his black eyes glinted many, many promises at me.

  Thank you, Chico.

  I slid out of bed well before dawn and silently dressed. Force of habit. I always check all my gear before heading out. At first light Carlos and I would be at the airstrip, taking off for the deep interior. I twisted the bare bulb in its socket to turn it on, then pulled out the number-coded paper I’d lifted from the Brain in San Antonio, memorized it and burned it in a metal ashtray. When the ashes cooled, I broke them up with a ballpoint pen.

  Despite the crackling and the smoke, Carlos still slept soundly, as well he should after the heroically athletic sex he’d treated me to. He lay with one strong arm thrown over his bare stomach and the other tucked under my pillow.

  I tipped the ashes into the waste can on top of the used condoms. Story of my sex life, I thought, looking into the can. I always get hot for somebody and go into it thinking, The sex is going to be great so maybe this guy is The Guy, and the next day have a helluva casual sex hangover. Maybe it was time to stop making this mistake. The ashes cast up a question mark of smoke. I went to check my gear.

  All the essentials went into my day pack, and everything else would go into the canvas duffel bag, leaving me plenty of room for the orchids. Ordinarily I’d bring a newspaper with me for drying and pressing specimens. But von Brutten needed the Death Orchid alive, so I’d brought several cardboard tubes for storing and shipping. He’d also given me a handful of forged CITES certificates to help me get the orchid back into the States. I’d have to pass off the Death Orchid, if I found it, as a different orchid altogether.

  That’s another irony of CITES. You can’t transport a specimen across international boundaries unless it can be identified as a known species. So if you’re like me, hunting down brand-new species, you’re outta luck. Or else you become a criminal, as I have. What a woman will do in the name of botany.

  I settled in the chair and by the dim light took another look at Harrison’s notebook page Photostat. Marcus would probably figure out pretty fast what the blood on the original page really was, but my guess was I’d be in the jungle by then, out of reach of anything remotely resembling phone service. I’d just have to check messages next time I hit a city. Most of Harrison’s handwriting, shorthand and abbrevia
tions I could decipher from three years’ practice working as his graduate lab assistant. The page took issue with Rudall’s suggestion of a close morphological relationship between Hypoxidaceae and Orchidaceae. Hypoxidaceae are bulb plants, like lilies and amaryllis. Put simply, in order for a plant to be chemically active, it needed, among other things, to have alkaloids, and Hypoxidaceae don’t. If orchids were like lilies, in other words, they’d be useless for any pharmaceutical company to pursue.

  Harrison’s notes, calculations and research were all designed to determine whether his Death Orchid specimen could indeed be used by a pharmaceutical company. In layman’s terms, the answer was a whopping great yes.

  A scribble near the margin, barely readable and in shorthand, caught my eye. Something about the orchid’s distinctively long column. That probably meant its pollinator, whatever it was, had a distinctively long proboscis. Rain forest relationships are ancient. Sometimes, more often than you might think, a single insect and a single plant have coevolved so that one can’t exist without the other. The bug drinks only the nectar provided by the plant and the plant can accept as pollinator only that bug. Or, like Scooter’s Phalaenopsis, the flower disguises itself as the bug’s mate so the males will be attracted to it. Darwin himself, after finding an orchid with a twelve-inch column, had hypothesized the existence of an insect with a twelve-inch proboscis. Turns out, years after Darwin’s death, someone found that very insect.

  But the idea of saying “Open wide” and shoving a microscopic tongue depressor down a bug’s throat didn’t appeal to me.

  Then another scribble: the Death Moth.

  “Up already?” Carlos’s carelessly deep voice should have raised a shiver, but it merely annoyed me. I liked to work alone, in silence.