He said he’d look, promised to fax the photos to Holbrook Eason and then said, “How’d that dude from the embassy work out?”
“What dude?”
“Armand, Anthony…”
“Alan?”
“Alan, yeah. Vicki said he was gonna take you to a big do at the Spanish Embassy.”
“Are you saying Vicki arranged to have him as my escort?”
“You didn’t know?”
”Just tell me, Niro.”
“All I know is she didn’t want you running around Nicaragua by yourself, so she called somebody at State.”
The story went on, but I’d heard enough. Alan a planned package? A male frigging babysitter to keep me company. Getting laid as his reward? He’d never mentioned it as a requirement of his job. Stupid me, and I’d thought he was seeing me because he cared, because he was smitten.
“Jen, you still there?”
“I’m still here. I’ll be back by the weekend. Don’t forget to tell Vicki.”
I hung up, called room service for the European breakfast, and paced around trying to decide if I should cry, throw something against the wall, or call the airport and schedule a flight to Tampa. No, not until I talked to Holbrook Easton.
I picked at my breakfast, then showered, dressed, and went downstairs for a newspaper. The headline read—ARMY AND SQUATTERS IN PEACE TALKS. Oh, great, I thought. Just my luck. Peace could come to the islands now that Alan was gone.
At eleven, Nicaraguan time, I called Alan’s Colorado number.
“Department of Economics,” said the woman who answered.
“I’m calling Professor Alan Page. I thought this was his home number.”
“No, this is the university. Dr. Page is on sabbatical in Nicaragua.”
“Can you please give me his home number?”
“I’m sorry, Miss. We’re not allowed to give out home numbers.”
“Look, Miss, I’m his assistant at the embassy. This is the only number we have.”
She apologized and gave me the number, which I called, using the international AT&T operator. The phone rang four times before the answering service kicked in with a woman’s voice, a Latina accent. You have reached the home of Maritza and Alan. We’re not able to come to the phone at this time, but please leave a message at the…
Maritza and Alan? Hadn’t he told me they were divorced? Why hadn’t he told me the truth?
Probably the same reason Stan never talked about the doctor’s wife.
I slammed down the phone, yanked the little guardian witch off my wrist and tossed it against the wall. In the following minutes, I cried until my stomach hurt, blasted Alan with the Beretta that was still in my pack, and plunged off the balcony to my death.
Not until a news alert came over the room radio did I return to my senses.
We interrupt this program to bring you the latest about the unrest on Lake Nicaragua. According to sources at the Ministry of Information in Managua, a cessation of hostilities has been declared by the squatters and the army…
Unbelievable. Peace on Zapateras at last.
I changed into hiking clothes, grabbed my pack, and was in the lobby when a desk clerk rushed over with a fax from Victoria.
Jen: Niro and I checked your photos. There’s no old couple in native dress. Sorry.
A chill came over me. How could they not show up in my photos when they were clearly there, but show up in an artist’s sketch when they weren’t? It made no sense.
But neither did what I was about to do.
I strolled down to the market, purchased items I might need, caught a taxi to the landing, and found Nelson at his boat, all muscles, greasy dreadlocks and torn T-shirt.
“Where is Mr. Alan?” he asked in the musical cadence of the Caribbean.
“He’s meeting me on Ana Maria. Can you take me?”
Chapter 35
Ana Maria Island
By the time we landed and tied up, the shadows beneath the coconut trees stretched to the horizon. Only a few days ago, this island was a happy place. Now it looked as sad and empty as my heart. Worse, from the way Nelson kept glancing at me, I was pretty sure he saw right through my lies. He unloaded my gear anyway and handed me an AK-47.
“I have a pistol,” I said.
“Pistol no good on lake.”
He propped the AK at the front door along with an extra clip.
“You keep door locked, Miss Jennifer. Not good to be out here alone.”
I trudged to the mango tree and scooped out the coffee can that contained the keys. Nelson said he’d stop back tomorrow, then hopped back into his boat and roared into the redness of the western sky. I unlocked the front door and headed straight to the boathouse.
It was still there—a small outboard powered by a 115-horse Evinrude, perfect for island hopping. Alan had removed the ignition wire to deter thieves, but I found it under an oil can. I attached it to the coil, checked the fuel tank and oil, and hit the starter to test the motor. It sputtered to life. Now I had everything I needed—opportunity, motive and means.
Back in the cabin, I sat down with the AK-47. Nothing to do but chamber a round, click off the safety and pull the trigger. I aimed at the painting of a nude.
Probably Maritza, poor thing.
The thought caused my face to burn, and before long I was throwing cushions against the wall. Even contemplating property damage. I knocked over a chair, smashed a vase, and was searching for something else to break when I remembered the love toys.
A stab of pain shot through me. Had he lied about those too? Used them with other women?
I threw them into a pillowcase and was gathering the porn videos when I found a cassette marked L.M. What was this? Luz Maria? I popped it into the TV set.
Damn it. No power.
I went back to the boathouse, got the generator going, and sat down to watch.
A salsa came on. The first scene was at a noisy party: Alan as tall and handsome in a tuxedo as 007, a woman behind him with her arms about his waist. She stepped into the open and smiled—bright red lips, dark frizzy hair, and breasts about to pop out of her gown.
Luz Maria.
A nasty feeling came over me, the same as when I’d first learned about Stan and Annie. I fast-forwarded until it showed them in a boat approaching an island—Ana Maria Island.
This island. Our little tropical love shack.
Alan had changed into Bermudas and short-sleeved shirt; Luz Maria in jeans and tank top.
She hopped out of the boat, looked back at Alan, and licked her lips.
My stomach twisted. I wanted to scream. To cry. To hurt someone.
The next scene was in the same bedroom where I now sat. Luz Maria smiling like a vamp, removing her earrings to the tune of a salsa.
Slowly.
The tank top and jeans came off. Now she was down to bra and black bikini panties.
Even more infuriating was her perfect body.
Slut!
She rolled around on the same bed where Alan and I had made love a hundred times.
The beat of salsa grew louder. So did the pounding in my head. Off came her bra and she was stripping off panties when I raised the Beretta and fired a round into the TV.
I pumped more rounds into the nudes on the wall, and kept firing until the clip was empty.
If Holbrook Easton had been there, complaining about me discharging a firearm, I’d probably have shot him too. Then, with my ears ringing, I hauled all the goods outside and built a bonfire.
The alarm clock jangled me awake at three. The nasty odor of burnt plastic permeated the cabin. By then, my enthusiasm had all but evaporated. Lake Nicaragua was vast, larger than Rhode Island, Delaware and Washington, D.C. combined. As large as Puerto Rico.
And I couldn’t even find my way around Georgetown.
I rolled out of bed, lit candles, and turned on the radio, hoping to get the latest news about the peace talks. Instead, I got Ana Gabriel crooning about lost love. The las
t thing I needed.
At 0345 hours, tanked up on coffee and dressed like a Special Forces commando in black pullover and baggy dungarees, I threw my gear into the boat, opened the double gates, unhooked the tether from the winch, and eased the boat into the lake.
The stars were as sharp as the dawn of creation. No breeze and no waves, nothing but a glassy smooth surface and open lake. I checked the compass, got a bearing and twisted my cap backward on my head. “Do it,” I said, and hit the throttle.
Chapter 36
Isla Zapateras
Maybe it was my imagination, or the spirits of my ancestors, but after about ten minutes on that lake, with nothing but stars above and water below, the drone of the outboard seemed to be speaking to me, saying to turn back, to rethink what I was doing. It grew so intrusive that I stopped. Twice. And just sat there. Yes, I could turn back, but then I’d hate myself.
Just have a look, I told myself. Plenty of time to turn back.
In time, the dark outline of hills and forests rose in the distance. When I reckoned I was within a mile, I throttled down to half-speed, to idle, to stop.
Through the binoculars, I saw campfires. Gunboats as well, some of them flashing messages, but none on the north side where I wanted to go.
Nothing but a low-hanging moon that silvered the chrome on my windshield.
On I went, slowly, ready to about-face and run. The ebb tide was flowing south into the Rio San Juan and downstream into the Caribbean, pulling me into its flow. I drove the boat to the north side, passed around a boulder island, killed the motor and let the drift carry me.
Little by little, I came close enough to smell the decay of swamp and forest. A wall of brush loomed up in front—dense, loud. Could this be the place, with a lagoon beyond?
Then I found what I wanted, a small opening beneath limbs and trailing vines.
Turn back, said my inner demons. It’s not too late.
No, I was here now, and women who didn’t take chances never accomplished a thing.
The chorus of chirping of insects grew louder. I laid the AK-47 within easy reach, made a final sweep with my binoculars and, seeing nothing but lake and stars, idled into the passage.
Spider webs got in my face. Birds fluttered out of the thicket. The inlet widened into the lagoon I’d seen on the map—if that was the right word for such a dismal place.
I killed the motor. Patches of fog drifted around me, cool, damp and alive. Things croaked and hooted. Bloodsucking insects buzzed. A hideous shriek told me some poor creature had fallen prey to a stalker, and I imagined if I listened closely, I could hear the voices of the old women of my village, begging me to flee this evil place.
I sprayed on insect repellent, pulled a blanket over me, and waited.
The sky began to glow. Blurry objects around me grew clearer. The nearest took on the form of great waterside trees, with tentacles and vines trailing into the water. The lagoon was about the size of a football field, bordered by vertical inclines to the left, jungle to the right and a marsh of reeds straight ahead. But where was the cave? The old man had said it was in a cliff about a hundred paces to the right, beyond a marsh.
I paddled into the reeds and kept paddling until I was in knee-deep water only a few feet from dry ground. A final check for alligators and snakes and I stepped out of the boat.
The light was poor, a pale imitation of dawn shrouded in fog. Fish jumped. Frogs croaked. Brightly colored birds fluttered along the shore, squawking like an angry flock of predators.
But no sign of squatters.
Even then, with the boat only feet away, I knew I could still back out, go home and return with a team. But if I went into that jungle, it would be like stepping into eternity with no guarantee I’d ever come back.
I slung the AK around my neck like a jungle fighter, hitched up my pack, lifted the machete, and waded into a glade of saw-toothed palmettos.
My first swing sent a rabbit dashing into the brush, and every few heartbeats a monkey or some other creature protested above me—howling, screeching, squawking.
Dry ground turned to swamp. Trees loomed up like monsters, covered with vines and creepers. Snakes slithered away, and I waded through stagnant water that reached my knees, through oozing mud that gummed my boots.
A dark object that might be an alligator lay in front. I took a wide berth around it, but when I shoved a branch out of my face, I realized too late it was chichicaste, a name that meant either fire-plant in some ancient Indian language or sting-the-hell-out-of-you.
My face seemed to catch fire. I screamed. I cursed. I fell to my knees and splashed water over my face and neck. Damn it, someone should have warned me about this plant.
I chopped it to pieces and stumbled on, more vigilant than ever, and by the time I reached dry ground, my shirt was drenched and sticking to my skin. My face and neck burned. I was covered with bites and plant debris, but at least I was out of that damn swamp.
A cool breeze blew off the lake. Buzzards circled overhead. I rested a minute on a boulder, doctored my face and neck with cortisone ointment, and pushed on, following an animal path until I came to a vertical cliff that loomed forty or fifty feet above me.
Could this be it—this Niagara Falls of jungle growth, covered with vines and creepers, punctuated here and there with bright red flowers? Was there a cave beneath that foliage?
I waited to catch my breath, drank some water, and was about to begin poking and prodding with my machete when a sudden gust of breeze shook the entire cliff.
This wasn’t a cliff. More like a wall of vines clinging to an overhead protrusion, which meant a sheltered, cave-like hollow behind it, the perfect place for glyphs or cave drawings.
I hacked a small opening and tossed in an insect bomb.
Out dashed a rabbit, followed by a flurry of bats.
I chopped. I slashed. I pulled and tore to make the opening larger. Insects buzzed. Foliage flew. The aromatic smell of broken vegetation filled the air. I was Carter at Tutankhamen’s tomb, Bingham at Machu Picchu. Jennifer on the threshold of fame.
Then I switched on the flashlight and stuck in my head.
Carter saw wonderful treasures. Bingham saw a magnificent city in the clouds. All I saw was a cave-like hollow that was thirty or so feet high by about fifty wide.
It took another ten or fifteen minutes to make an opening large enough to pass. By then I was exhausted, sweating, breathing hard. Don’t go in yet, said my archaeological mind. Beware of snakes, trap doors, witches and other hidden dangers.
If you go, you must protect yourself with a blood offering.
No, thank you, old woman. I wasn’t going to open a vein in this place. So I waited to catch my breath, said, “God, give me courage,” and squeezed through the opening.
Chapter 37
Father Antonio’s cave
Water dripped. Bat droppings covered the ground, and it had the nasty stench of a leaky barn. I lit candles, pushed them into the muck and took a few steps, holding the machete in my right hand, half expecting a nest of vipers to fall on my head. My feet squished. I lit more candles and glanced around like a cop looking for the bad guys.
Something shrieked and fluttered away.
I screamed, flung out my arms, and dropped the flashlight.
Damn. Probably just a harmless bird. I waited to settle down, then scooped up the light, took a few more steps and realized too late that I’d stepped on a human skull.
My mom would have run out of the place, screaming. I should have run too, but not until I was sure this was Father Antonio’s cave.
A protrusion on the right wall took on the form of a hideous creature—half-human, half-crocodilian, at least twelve feet high and as ugly as the gargoyles of Notre Dame.
Yes, this was the place. Father Antonio had mentioned stone sentinels.
I trudged on, watching my step, until I reached the rear wall.
It was perfectly vertical, no doubt the work of humans, and covered with liche
n and dead creepers. I took off my pack, opened my Swiss Army knife to the long blade and cut carefully, my archaeological soul committed to doing no damage.
A patch came loose. I pulled it away. The surface beneath was smooth as marble.
I pulled away more lichen. Yes, there it was, a wall of glyphs. Not primitive glyphs carved into stone. Not rock drawings either, but a fired ceramic plate in the most breathtaking colors. Anthropomorphic creatures here, zoomorphic there, celestial bodies, spirals, abstract symbols.
Heart racing, I moved over a few paces and cut away another swatch. Glyph Girl appeared in miniature—the same girl as in the Place of the Speaking Rocks. Or someone who looked like her. Another image showed an angry volcano hurling out fire and debris, and a woman in flowing robe—Moses?—standing before an assembled crowd.
I could hardly wait to report my findings. Come back with a team from the Smithsonian. There’d be interviews, articles, TV shows, scholars debating the meaning.
At last I’d be a real archaeologist.
The drone of an approaching boat came to my ears.
I hurried to the opening and peered out. A patrol boat was speeding over the lake toward the island, slicing the water. It stopped near the inlet, its engine giving off a throaty pulse. The flag of Nicaragua billowed atop the mast. An officer stepped out of the cabin and scanned the place with binoculars. I held my breath.
Please, dear God, don’t send anyone into the lagoon.
The officer barked an order I couldn’t hear. The engine roared. The boat pulled away, leaving a foamy wake, the stench of diesel, and my pounding heart.
Back to work I went in a fury, stripping off lichen, taking photos, moving over a few steps and repeating the process. I came to the end of my roll of film and was loading another when birds outside the cave began squawking.
Again I dashed to the opening, this time with the pistol.
Birds fluttered out of the brush. The snap of twigs set my heart to thumping. Something moved in the shadows. I thumbed off the safety and waited. Every bush and every tree took on the shape of a man. Every sound became the voice of a stalker. I became conscious of my own breathing. Then I caught a whiff of cigarette smoke. Oh, God, why hadn’t I brought the AK inside? It was still leaning against the boulder, next to my pack.
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