by Angela Hunt
“Bah! I know nothing!” Baklanov sent Alexandra a look of bewildered incredulity. “Accept this man’s help, my stubborn friend. Leave me to my phages; we will not get in your way.”
Michael stole a brief look at Alexandra—the woman’s cheeks had flushed crimson, yet she continued to look out over the water as if she hadn’t heard a word of the conversation.
Granting her mercy, Michael answered the Russian doctor’s first question. “Unfortunately, Dr. Baklanov, I know about prions from firsthand experience. Still, I can understand your reluctance to accept them.”
“Their structure makes no sense to me.” The Russian knocked the glowing ashes of his cigarette into the river. “Every known living organism uses molecules of nucleic acid to carry information it needs to reproduce, yet these proteins do not contain nucleic acid. How can they reproduce at all?”
Caitlyn screwed her face into a question mark. “Remind me about nucleic acid, please?”
“DNA or RNA.” Grinning, Michael lifted his eyes to meet her mother’s. “How much do you know about how life begins?”
“She knows the truth.” Alexandra waved in a deliberately casual movement. “We don’t talk about birds and bees, for instance. She knows the proper terms.”
“Right.” Deciding to test the woman’s assertion, Michael bent to Caitlyn’s level. “Long ago, biologists used to think tiny little men lived inside human sperm. Using crude microscopes, they actually claimed to have seen these little fellows, or homunculi, as they called them. Supposedly, these little men settled in a female egg cell, ate the yolk, and grew big within the woman’s womb.”
Caitlyn giggled. “That’s crazy. Everybody knows about chromosomes and the double helix.”
Michael looked at her mother again. “How old is this child?”
“Ten,” Alexandra answered, “going on thirty.”
“Quite.” Returning to Caitlyn’s level, Michael continued his explanation. “In time, of course, biologists wised up and began setting things to rights. They finally figured out that cells—and chromosomes— contained DNA, the building blocks that could create a person. Obviously, you know about the double helix that separates when a cell divides.”
Caitlyn shrugged. “I studied all that two years ago.”
Baklanov gazed at the girl in rapt admiration. “Amazing.”
“Well,” Michael continued, “not every part of your body needs the entire DNA sequence—you are also composed of proteins, hundreds of different varieties. These proteins do the mechanical and chemical work of the body, and they are formed from RNA, which comes from DNA. These proteins do not contain nucleic acid, but they do have a proper structure. Imagine, if you will, one of those toy necklaces made of beads that snap together. The pattern in which they are joined affects how they perform in the body.”
He had thought he’d lose her in the complicated explanation, but the girl nodded, thought working in her eyes.
Michael took a deep breath. “A protein, you see, doesn’t reproduce like a virus or bacteria because it’s nothing but bare beads, so to speak. Most of the time proteins are mass-produced by the body, and all of them are normal, snapped together in just the right formation. But occasionally the body will absorb a different protein—one composed of exactly the same materials, but snapped together in a different pattern. From that moment on, all the body’s newly manufactured proteins begin to model themselves after the mutated one. We call the one that causes all the trouble a prion.”
He squinted at Caitlyn. “I’m assuming you know what mutated means.”
“Altered, transformed, transmuted.” She frowned up at him. “But what caused it to be different?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea.”
“No one knows what triggers the mutation.” Shooting Michael a glance of grudging respect, Alexandra entered the conversation. “Some have theorized that the process has something to do with crystals—like ice.”
Baklanov’s forehead crinkled. “Would you mind explaining that one?”
Caitlyn clapped her hands. “I get it! It’s like water—two molecules of hydrogen, one of oxygen. At room temperature, H2O is liquid. Above boiling, it becomes steam. Below freezing, it’s ice. Three different forms of the same molecular composition.”
“That’s close, honey.” Alexandra gave her daughter a smile. “But prions are a little more complicated. The process of crystallization occurs in our bodies all the time. It’s through crystallization that our bodies turn the calcium in milk into teeth and bones. Because the process has been fine-tuned through evolution, our bodies know that teeth require one organic structure while bones need another. There’s an atomic pattern, sort of like a blueprint, that these proteins follow in order to reproduce.”
When Caitlyn blinked, Michael suspected that for the first time in a long time the girl had been handed information she couldn’t instantly absorb.
He bent to peer into Caitlyn’s eyes. “I wouldn’t place much stock in that talk about evolution. I happen to believe it’s blarney.”
“Ignore him, dear.” Leaning forward, Alexandra curved her upturned palm into a cup. “If you had a handful of marbles and you dropped them in my palm, how would they stack up?”
As Caitlyn stared at her mother’s hand, Michael could almost see her mental computations—three marbles across the fingers, perhaps four across the palm, the next row would stack in the concave spaces, a third row might fit before they began to spill over the edge of her mother’s thumb. . .
Caitlyn made a face at the imaginary marbles. “I figure you could stack thirty-three before they would begin to fall out of your hand.”
Alexandra laughed. “That’s good, honey, but I asked you how they would stack up. In order to figure the amount, you had to visualize how they would lie in my palm, right? So the answer is more oblique— the arrangement of the stack would depend upon the layout of the bottom layer.”
Confusion clouded Caitlyn’s eyes for a moment, then her face brightened. “Of course!”
Alexandra turned to Baklanov. “Crystals reproduce according to an atomic template. If that template is mutated, the resulting structures will pattern themselves after the mutation. We think that’s how prions reproduce. One foreign template enters the body—probably from the ingestion or insertion of foreign prions—and every protein the brain produces from that point is also mutated. These proteins do not function properly, so brain cells begin to die. In time, the death of these cells creates holes in the brain. And without a brain. . .” Her eyes darkened as her voice faded away.
Michael snapped his fingers as a thought occurred. “It’s like Cat’s Cradle!”
Three perplexed faces swiveled toward him.
“A Kurt Vonnegut novel—I read it during my adolescent science fiction phase. In the story, a scientist creates a new variety of ice that melts at 114.4 degrees Fahrenheit. Trouble is, whenever the stuff—he called it ice-nine—touched anything liquid, it turned the liquid into ice-nine.”
Caitlyn grinned. “Cool.”
Michael shook his head. “Not really. One character touched the ice-nine to his tongue, and his body—composed mainly of water, as all our bodies are—immediately froze solid. When the ice-nine encountered the ocean, all the seas and everything in them froze. Every river that ran to the ocean, every raindrop that touched the damp soil turned to ice-nine. That scientist’s little invention spelled the end of life on earth.”
Alexandra gave him a brief, distracted glance. “I haven’t read that book, but I can appreciate the metaphor. Yes, prions might operate in the same way. Depending upon the pattern, they can clog the heart or the brain, and in time the living organism is . . . well, it’s too diseased to function.”
Two deep worry lines appeared between Caitlyn’s brows, but she didn’t look up at her mother. Instead she turned and studied the riverbank, signaling through body language that she had grown bored with the conversation.
Alexandra’s eyes swept over her daughter’s
form, and for an instant Michael thought he saw a flicker of pain in those expressive depths. But then she looked toward the shore, too, her hand rising to adjust the brim on her straw hat.
Taking his cue from the women, Michael stared at the floor and surrendered to the silence that had settled over the boat. He couldn’t help but wonder, though, why a woman as bright and competitive as Alexandra Pace would delve into a frantic study of diseases that until recently had struck fewer than one person in a million.
7 APRIL 2003
11:30 A.M.
As the boat drew near the village of Libertad, Alex realized that the settlement had little in common with San Miguel, a village that had profited by its proximity to Yarupapa Lodge and a steady influx of tourists. While community buildings populated the outskirts of San Miguel, Libertad had no visible school, church, medical clinic, or jailhouse.
From her perspective, the community consisted of little more than a scattered collection of thatched structures on stilts. From the halfwalls framing the fronts of the buildings, dark-eyed children peered at the approaching visitors and ducked shyly away when spotted.
The drivers from Yarupapa cut the engines as they entered the village, then propelled the boats through the flooded development with oars. The river did not recede here, Tito explained, until late May or early June. Until dry land appeared, people traveled from house to house by canoe.
Alex’s stomach shriveled when she realized they cleaned their floors, scrubbed their clothes, and fed their families with fish from the same river that served as their sewer.
As they drifted through the village, she saw a toddler playing at the edge of a floating dock, unsupervised except for a little girl who couldn’t have been more than three or four.
She turned to face the young man handling the engine. “What if the baby falls in, Tito?”
Something in her must have expected him to reply that children were taught to swim during infancy, for his answer surprised her. “The girl will call for help,” he said, his brown eyes sweeping the scene, “but many babies die.”
What sort of mothers were these women? Alex drew a breath, about to ask where the child’s mother was, then abruptly shut her mouth. After a week in this place, she knew where the mother was—in the house, cooking over an open fire banked on a mud-baked slab, caring for other children, or working feverishly to string grass seed beads into some little ornament a tourist might want to buy. No one could accuse the women of these villages of wasting time on the telephone or in front of a television.
Tito called out to a young girl who had stepped out to the front porch; the girl replied in Spanish and pointed toward another structure at the edge of the settlement. After stopping at this house and asking more questions, Tito and Hector cranked the engines and reentered the main stream of the river, pointing the two boats to a lone building about half a mile away on the riverbank. This home, Tito told them, belonged to Julio and Maria, who had chosen to live outside the village.
The elevated building looked like all the others, except perhaps a bit larger. Bare spots yawned through the thatched roof and the half-wall along the front of the home, but dry grass covered the land between the supporting stilts. Squawking chickens raced under the floorboards, entertaining a quartet of children who squatted on the grass.
“So many children,” Baklanov observed, smoothing his beard.
Tito shrugged. “Unlike you, our people have nothing to do after dark but make babies.”
Rolling her eyes, Alex propped her chin on her fist and scanned the area for signs of an adult. These men would think twice about making babies if they had to carry them, nurse them, and bend over a bulging stomach to harvest meager crops.
As the boats pulled up to the muddy shoreline, she noticed that this family appeared to have a bounty of crops. A stand of banana trees grew at the side of the house, and another tree she didn’t recognize sagged with heavy green fruit.
“Papaya,” Tito said, following her gaze.
Of course.
They disembarked. As Duke Bancroft, Tito, and Alejandro Delmar went in search of the man who had first encountered Kenway’s patient, Alex slipped her backpack over her shoulder, then helped Caitlyn with her bundle. They stepped onto the ground and walked along the shoreline, enjoying the opportunity to stretch their legs.
“Now begins the adventure,” she whispered in her daughter’s ear. “Are you ready?”
Caitlyn grinned, her bright brown eyes narrowing to slits above a sea of freckles. “You bet!”
The other boat’s passengers disembarked as well. While most of the passengers paced in the grass, Kenneth Carlton and Raul Chavez hurried to the house. Alex watched them go with a wry smile—Julio and Maria might have to repeat the story for both sets of passengers. Men like Kenneth Carlton always wanted to hear things for themselves.
As the pair of men climbed the ladderlike steps into the house, Lauren stood quietly on the shore, her head lowered and her arms crossed over her chest. Alex noticed that the young woman wore suitable clothing for travel in the tropics—khaki trousers and a longsleeved cotton shirt much like Alex’s. Instead of a wide-brimmed hat, however, a Braves baseball cap hid most of her hair, leaving the sides of her face and neck vulnerable to mosquitoes.
Alex looked away, resisting the temptation to roll her eyes. Poor Lauren probably thought the baseball cap was cute—or maybe Carlton had given it to her. Either way, she’d be suffering from mosquito bites soon enough.
Several moments passed before the landing parties came out of the house. They exchanged polite farewells with Julio and his wife, both of whom kept looking toward the boats with wary eyes. Alex knew they’d be relieved to see the researchers go away.
Carlton assembled his team on the shore. “Our jungle man,” he began, and for a fleeting instant Alex wondered when Ya-ree had become their jungle man, “exited the forest about twenty yards to the south. Julio says the fellow promptly passed out, so I’m afraid we will learn nothing new from these people. But that’s okay. We have our starting position.” He looked around, then winked at Lauren. “As they say, friends, it’s time to make tracks. Let’s move out.”
“I suggest we walk two abreast,” Duke Bancroft added, taking control as he appraised their group with a narrowed gaze. “Let Delmar and I take the point, while Chavez guards the rear. We’ll be looking for tracks in the grass, and we don’t want to risk anything being trampled until we’ve had time for a good look.”
As the members of her group gathered their belongings, Alex paused to thank Tito and Hector for the ride to Libertad, then slipped an arm about Caitlyn’s shoulder. Amazing, how exhaustion could make her arm feel as though it had become as heavy as lead.
“It’s just like the Wild West, isn’t it, Mom?” Caitlyn asked, grinning. “Indian tracks in the dust and all that?”
“Not quite the same, I don’t think,” Alex answered. “For one thing, nearly a week has passed since that poor man appeared. Things grow quickly here, and you’ve already seen how active the animals are. I’ll be surprised if they find any tracks at all.”
Struggling to stand upright against a tide of weariness, Alex followed Bancroft and Delmar into the jungle. With no visible breaks in the foliage, the men used machetes to cut a trail, the crack and rustle of their efforts disturbing the steady insect hum of the woods. The team would have made slow progress even if they had not had to clear a path, for a hiker had to be mindful of protruding roots, tangling vines, and threatening wildlife. In this edge habitat, where the river permitted abundant light, they would travel slowly through the thick and varied plant growth, a fact for which Alex felt deep and extreme gratitude. Once they left the river and entered areas crowned by dense canopy, hiking would become easier because only herbs, ferns, seedlings, and fungi grew in the shadows.
Moving slowly, however, proved as tiring as walking at a brisk pace. Once Alex stumbled and made the mistake of grasping an overhanging vine for support. Though she clung to the vi
ne for only a moment, a line of ants filed onto her hand. She yelped as one of them stung her, then frantically swatted them away. “Ouch! Ants!”
A step ahead, Caitlyn turned to cast her mother a reproachful glance. “Lazaro warned us. There are all kinds of ants in the jungle, and most of them bite. Carnivore ants can strip a body down to the bone in a matter of hours.”
“Thank you, Caitlyn, for the biology lesson.” Holding her injured hand close to her side, Alex lowered her head and moved forward, deciding to walk closer to the leaders.
At the front of the line, Delmar and Bancroft pushed slowly and steadily forward, looking for openings that might indicate a trail. Alex realized Ya-ree would have looked for openings, too, especially if he were in danger. Though plants grew with amazing speed in the tropical environment, people and animals still managed to establish paths and canoe trails through the rainforest.
“Mom? You mind if I go talk to Mr. Fortier?”
Alex glanced up at the perfumer, who walked immediately behind Bancroft and Delmar. The little Frenchman had proven himself plucky and clever, yet his decision to shadow two men armed with machetes also attested to his common sense.
Alex nodded her permission. Better that Caitlyn should walk with Louis than notice her mother’s increasing weariness. “Go ahead, kiddo.”
Jogging ahead, Caitlyn caught up with Louis, who began to regal her with stories of where and when he had discovered famous fragrances. Their double lines shifted and relaxed, and a few moments later Alex found herself walking beside Deborah Simons.
She glanced down at Alex’s arm. “I heard you got bit. You okay?”
“I think so.” Alex held up her hand for Deborah’s inspection. “Stung like the dickens, though.”
Deborah caught Alex’s wrist and studied the red welt. “Some ants can really pack a wallop. The bite of the tocandira, a giant about an inch long, results in twenty-four hours of pain and fever. But that ant is native to Venezuela, not Peru.”
