by Kate Thornton
Nightwatch created by Jeff Williams
It was pleasant in Georgetown in the early fall. The leaves were just beginning to turn from green to light yellow, and the evenings had turned cool, with just a hint of the nip that would herald the reds and oranges of real autumn.
Tom Weldon looked like a priest hurrying through the cobbled streets of the old part of town, past antique stores and little restaurants. His black suit and black tee shirt gave him the look of a well-fed vicar until you saw the Wild Turkey belt buckle, not a part of any known ecclesiastical outfit, not even Episcopal, not even in Georgetown. Tom was solidly built, with a weightlifter's stocky grace, and was a psychologist, not a priest, although the parallels between the two professions occurred to him every time he passed Christ Church.
He looked at his watch and turned to hail a cab. He would be late for his dinner with Simon if he didn't get a move on. The Cannon Moon Cafe was too far on foot and he had spent more time than he wished at the University Library. His practice in Arlington, Arlington Counseling Group, was now moderately successful and this success allowed him the time and finance to pursue more arcane endeavors. This one involved investigating the origins of auditory delusions and had been suggested to him by a patient who insisted on making sense of the background noise in elevators.
His other arcane endeavors all involved Dr. Simon Litchfield.
Simon Litchfield was nowhere to be seen in the Cannon Moon. Tom was disappointed until he remembered the little private room in the back. He headed back toward the storage area and knocked hesitantly on an old wooden door.
"Come in, Tom," Simon's voice was almost a whisper. "Close and latch the door behind you."
Simon was seated at the single table, and the candlelight threw strange shadows on the rough-hewn walls. The back room of the Cannon Moon was reserved for storage, spiders, gunpowder plots and Simon whenever he asked for it. His khaki pants were still pressed and his tan safari jacket was open to reveal a glimpse of an old silk shirt, frayed a bit at the cuffs, but soft with time and care. The glint of gold on his wrist was an expensive watch, but he didn't check it. He seldom kept track of the exact time anymore.
Another knock sounded. Simon unlatched the door for Gillian Eckelberry, the Cannon Moon's proprietress.
Gillian was a woman of a certain age, meaning that time could not dim the sparkle in her eyes, even if she needed a little help to keep the highlights in her hair.
"Here's your favorite wine," she said, holding out a bottle of Andreas Montepulciano d'Abruzzo. She deftly opened the bottle and poured half a glassful into the tall balloon on the table. Simon took his eyes off her long enough to savor the color, sniff at it and swirl it around a few times. Not the best idea with the Cannon's superb lobster bisque, but ideal with a steak. It would be perfect in about twenty minutes, changing subtly throughout the meal.
Gillian, however, was perfect now always had been, always would be. Simon could smell her scent, an intoxicating mix of Norell cologne and lobster bisque. She left the bottle and disappeared toward the kitchen.
Tom latched the door again. Simon looked at his friend, Tom Weldon. He had counted on Tom's help in the past, but this was different. Simon's work at the Nightwatch Institute for Strategic and Economic Studies had taken him to some very unusual places, and in spite of his rather mundane-seeming profession of civil engineer, it hadn't been all dams, irrigation and power stations. Well, officially maybe it had, but on a politically grand scale.
The Institute was privately funded, and provided the kinds of services the government could not. In addition to extensive global analyses and situation assessments, the Institute also provided hands-on recovery for war-torn areas, agricultural technology, and other engineering projects. But there was another side to the Institute a less public side. The covert side of the Institute the Lower Echelon - had sent Simon on more dirty, dangerous and fascinating assignments than he cared to remember. Okay, some of them were best forgotten anyway, but all of them were important and used his unique skills. It wasn't exaggerating to say he had saved the world once or twice, and not just by surveying dirt and building pipelines.
"Simon," Tom Weldon smiled. They had been through a lot together. "What's with the secret room?"
"Tom," Simon smiled back but didn't answer. "Have a seat and a glass of wine and tell me everything you know about Shakespeare."
"English poet, 1600's, plays and sonnets."
Simon laughed. "Okay, now tell me what you know about Pico da Neblina."
"Brazilian mountain, Argentine and Colombian border, tallest in Brazil."
"Very good." Simon happened to know that Tom had once been on Jeopardy and had paid off a student loan with his winnings. "Anything else?"
"About Brazil?
Yeah, a few things. I know
Nightwatch has some interests there.
The rainforest is a hot topic all over, especially with the big
pharmaceutical companies. Pico da Neblina National Park is in the northwestern
corner of Amazonas, along the banks of the Negro River. It's a mature,
undisturbed evergreen forest in one of the wettest parts of Amazonia. NASA and LBA-Eco both have extensive field
research projects in the area. NASA you
know, LBA is the Large Scale
Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia, an international research
initiative led by Brazil to understand the climatological, ecological,
biogeochemical, and hydrological functioning of Amazonia, the impact of land
use change on these functions, and the interactions between Amazonia and
the Earth system, to use their own words. You know, how destroying the
rainforest causes irreversible damage to the planet."
"Sounds like
you know more about the rainforest than you do about Shakespeare," Simon
said dryly, impressed with Tom's understanding of the Amazonas region. Tom was right about Nightwatch's interests
in the area, too. Nightwatch had legitimate
research projects in the area, some under contract to NASA.
"Hey, I know a lot
about Shakespeare, too," Tom protested. "But something tells me
Brazil is more on your mind this evening. So what's the big deal at Pico da
Neblina? Got some wells to dig or
pipeline to lay out there?"
"Not
exactly," Simon replied as he sipped the Montepulciano d'Abruzzo
appreciatively. "Nightwatch was
assisting at a village in the Pico da Neblina National Park. Not really a village, more of an assembly of
huts and sheds around a partially completed research tower. The LBA turned most
of the data collection operation there over to Nightwatch some time ago. The two fellows responsible for the major
studies in that area were quite busy, so the Institute sent out a couple of
data analysts and kept the local help.
Some of the Brazilian researchers from other field sites and the
occasional NASA field worker dropped by up from time to time, but mostly it was
just data collection and recording."
"So what
happened?" Tom asked.
"The research
station, village, whatever, disappeared three days ago."
"What do you
mean, disappeared?"
"I mean it
can't be found. One of our data
analysts, a woman, was at the site manager's station about a mile away when it
happened. She said one minute it was there, visible from the window, and the
next minute it was gone. She called the
site manager, a guy named Luis Camacho.
He was out at a different collection site at the time and drove straight
back.
"He picked her
up in his vehicle and they drove to where they thought the tower should
be. Only no matter which road they
took, they couldn't seem to get close to where it had been. They drove around for about an hour, and
finally returned to his station.
Camacho called Nightwatch for a satellite reading and the fun started
when Nightwatch couldn't find it either. But it was nothing compared to the
fireworks when NASA called --- even with their resources, they couldn't find
it."
"What about the
people I assume there were people there? What happened to them?"
"We don't
know," Simon admitted. "There
were two Nightwatch analysts, a Brazilian researcher and at least four or five
indigenous people. They disappeared
along with the structures."
"Well stuff
doesn't just disappear, Dr. Litchfield it must go somewhere. I guess we're
going to find out where?" Tom
leaned forward and grinned.
Simon smiled
back. "I was hoping you might join
me. I hope Stephanie can come along,
too. We're going to need her expertise. And speaking of expertise, I want you there
to interview the young lady who saw it all. Find out what makes her tick, and
more important exactly what she saw."
For once, Dr. Simon
Litchfield was going to take the initiative ask his boss for permission to
mount a covert study. The prospect both amused and dismayed him. Callow was an annoying twit, but Simon needed
the Nightwatch's Lower Echelon's sanction for an operation like this. And no one could know just why he was so
interested yet not even Tom.
Callow had that particularly irritating look on his face when Simon and Tom took their seats at the library's big table. The Popular Culture section of the Institute's library was Callow's usual meeting place. While little could destroy Tom's good humor, Simon felt his stomach grab at the sight of his boss.
"How do you do, Mr. Weldon," Callow said, as he failed to extend his hand. "I have heard quite a bit about you." He wrinkled his nose as if he had heard only unsavory bits of gossip about Tom. He knew very well how useful Tom had been on the last Institute assignment Simon had taken.
"And you, Litchfield I still don't see why you think this Brazil business has anything to do with you or Weldon, here."
"Oh, come now," Simon retorted. "You know you need someone to go look at this thing. Sooner or later you're going to call for me so you can have the pleasure of sending me to one more Godforsaken piece of undeveloped dirt somewhere."
Simon looked cooler than he felt. His khaki jacket sported a crisp military press and the creases in the matching pants were sharp enough to cut. His hat occupied the chair to his left while Tom occupied the chair to his right. Callow stood, or rather paced back and forth like a frustrated cat, keeping his position of power.
"All right, Dr. Litchfield," Callow leaned with both hands on the table, his face too close to Simon's for comfort. "You'll get your wish." Callow allowed himself a smirk, "but you'll have to take the assignment on the Echelon's terms, not yours."
Simon held still, waiting for the bad news. The Echelon's or rather, Callow's terms wouldn't be easy.
"You can't take your friend to the middle of the damned rain forest, Litchfield. But you can go. And I want answers within a week." Callow straightened and turned his back to Simon, but the drama of the moment was ruined by Callow's cell phone.
"Callow. Yes, sir," Callow said into it. "Yes, yes I understand. No, sir, not at all. Yes, yes, that can be arranged." He was scowling when he hung up. "Here," he said abruptly, pushing a small envelope toward Simon. "Take anyone you need. Leave tonight."
Simon accepted the envelope and Callow strode to the doorway. He turned back for a moment. "I still want answers within a week, Dr. Litchfield. A week."
Tom sighed. "If I never work for anyone like that for the rest of my life, I'll be delighted." He smiled and his blue eyes lit up. "At least he doesn't like me, there's a plus."
Simon laughed. "He was a bit touchy today, more so than usual. There must be something about this Brazil thing that bothers him personally."
"Well, it sounds like someone higher up the food chain just gave you the assignment for real."
"Yes, a good thing in the short term, but it may be a long term regret." Tom said nothing, and Simon's expression told him little. All of their assignments had been regrettable in one way or another.
Stephanie Keel wasn't looking for trouble, not that she would duck it if it came sailing toward her. She was looking for an embedded code in the Institute's public website. Hackers had become such a problem lately that she had recommended closing it down, but the brass on high was right without its legitimate public face, the Institute could never operate below the radar in covert actions. So the public website had to be maintained and she was next on the rotating roster. Overqualified, yes but all the Institute computer whizzes shared the small duties, too.
She pulled her athletic frame out of the ergo chair and stretched. Her usual outfit of khaki cargo pants and vest was brightened with an electric blue cashmere sweater underneath and a blue and white bandanna holding back her black hair. It almost qualified as formal wear for her. The pants pockets were stuffed with miscellaneous gear: tape, wire, pliers, CDs, paper, electronic gadgets and other bits and pieces of collected stuff. She was too young to have been a MacGyver fan, but she was an unconscious daughter of the character, ready in a pinch to construct anything of out virtually nothing but pocket fluff.
As an integral member of Simon Litchfield's informal team, Stephanie had seen action in nearly every part of the world, setting up communications, breaking into electronic locks, downloading the secrets of madmen all in a day's work.
She worked hard and played a mean game of racquetball, but her social life was non-existent. If you asked her why that was, she was likely to give a flippant answer about the men she knew being either married or intellectually challenged.
It wasn't true about the twice-married but currently divorced Dr. Litchfield, but that didn't matter because it was just a convenient excuse. The truth was much more complicated.
Her cell phone rang. "Hello?"
"Stephanie, pack for the Amazon, we're leaving tonight." Simon Litchfield's voice had its usual slightly arrogant tone, but it was also harried. "Nightbird," he said before she could ask. "I'll brief you in the air."
She closed her phone. The Amazon okay cargo pants, khaki vest and a supply of tee shirts should do it. And a poncho. Nightbird was the Institute's jet reserved for urgent use. She wondered where it would land the Amazon wasn't known for its high-tech airports. She hurried off to pack.
Stephanie kept a small but brightly-lit apartment just blocks from the Nightwatch Institute.
The living room looked more like the console room of a security company, with eight monitors in a rack, several processors and drives and a plethora of high tech gadgetry. A neat workbench sported several expensive pieces of test equipment, a micro-soldering station, pegboard storage for dozens of small tools and a power strip labeled in different voltages. A curved desk with three keyboards, several telephone jacks and a television set completed the equipment. The only adornment on the walls was a pair of racquets hung next to the door, ready for the next game.
Across the small room were a battered loveseat, coffee table and floor to ceiling bookcases filled with books. A handsome telescope on a polished wooden tripod was aimed out the small window toward the night skyline.
The kitchen was just a cooktop, microwave and minifridge occupying the wall in the living room right next to the front door. An alcove led to the bedroom, small, tidy and completely antiseptic, with less style and personalization than a mid-range hotel room. The old dresser was bare on top, with drawers of plain lingerie, thermal socks, and a couple of racquetball outfits. The closet held a collection of cargo pants, tee shirts, sweaters and boots. A lone and aging black cocktail dress hung like an outcast at one end, dusty matching pumps camouflaged by darkness in the corner.
The bathroom was just as utilitarian no perfume, makeup or bath oil - just plain soap, shampoo and a comb. It could have been a shared latrine in an Army BOQ.
Anyone breaking in to Stephanie Keel's apartment would have guessed it was the lair of a post-adolescent geekboy with spare change.
Anyone breaking in while she was there would have been seriously injured, thoroughly interrogated and filled with extreme regret.
Stephanie was better at technology - computers and gadgets, as Simon said - than anyone else at Nightwatch. Her natural intelligence, inquisitive mind and excellent training kept her in demand for all sorts of projects. She could take her pick, and it was no secret that she loved the high-stakes, dangerous jobs with Dr. Litchfield.
If anyone bothered to investigate her private life, they might have discovered that Stephanie Keel didn't have a private life, and hadn't had one for almost five years. But they probably wouldn't have discovered why.
****
The drone of the Nightbird was reduced to a pleasant hum in the passenger cabin. Simon, Tom and Stephanie sat at one of the cherry veneered work tables, belted into the plush swivel seats but otherwise as comfortable as in any office. Stephanie had her high power laptop out and was pulling up information on LBA-Eco.
"So what's so important about this disappearing village that you begged Callow for a chance at it?" she asked as her fingers flew over the keyboard.
"I never beg," Simon replied with a sniff. "I merely requested."
"I was there," Tom reminded him. "You begged."
Stephanie grinned. "So, come on what is it?"
"I have to start at the beginning," Simon said uneasily, "and there are a few, uh, details, I may skip. But please hear me out." He looked down at the envelope in his hands. There was the slightest tremble.
Stephanie stopped typing. This wasn't the confident and sometimes even arrogant Dr. Litchfield she knew. Tom looked at his friend with keen interest.
"A long time ago, in 1605, to be more precise, a Spanish writer who had lost the use of his left hand fighting in a war wrote a magnificent account of the futility of war. This account had many stories woven through it, including one about a man who overthrows a king in order to woo the king's lady. The lady chooses death over the tyrant, and he ends up wooing her corpse.
"Later, so legend has it, another man wrote a play based on this rather gruesome tale. Or maybe he didn't there's some dispute. Maybe someone else wrote the play, if the play was written at all. Or maybe it was a different story altogether, the story of a man who tries to prove his wife's lack of fidelity by having his best friend try to seduce her."
"Like Cosi Fan Tutti?" Tom inquired, then reddened. He wasn't prone to blurting out his knowledge of opera. Must be the altitude, he thought.
Simon nodded, still looking down at the envelope. "Yes, similar stories abound in art everywhere, including opera mistaken identity, tragic circumstances, death to all in the end."
"What's this have to do with a missing village in Brazil?" Stephanie asked.
"The play was lost, with several other works by the same gentleman, but enough of his work survived to make him immortal in the literary sense. So scholars have searched for centuries for the lost works. Some of them were probably destroyed by the author as inferior," Simon continued, "some were probably used to wrap fish or light fires. But at least one was probably hidden because of the information it contained."
Simon opened the envelope and pulled out a few pages from it. The handwriting was small, birdlike scratchings written with a real fountain pen. The paper was yellowed and cracked, the edges crumpled and torn. "The lady in Cervantes' tale was called Celinde Gryphius and in this envelope is a letter faxed to Nightwatch from Celinde Gryphius."
Stephanie sat very still, the color draining out of her face.
Tom leaned in closer. "No kidding? Well, it looks old, but not that old."
"Too right," Simon agreed. "This Celinde Gryphius is the Nightwatch data analyst who survived the village disappearance. When I saw her name on the report, I knew I had to investigate this one. You see, Gryphius is not a common name. In fact, I have only known one other Gryphius, and it was he who caused me to research the name in the first place.
"Stephanie, my dear," Simon said gently. "I know it is your story to tell or not as you see fit. If you don't wish to discuss it, I can give Tom a general outline and we can still pursue our mission. If you wish to back out, it is a little late, and I credit you with more courage and determination than that, but Nightbird can take you back on the return trip if need be. I am determined to see this thing through for my own reasons."
Stephanie shook her head and Tom was shocked to see the glint of tears in her eyes.
"No. It's time I got over it anyway, don't you think?" she asked. "I mean, I know I'm not the only girl in the world to get taken by a smooth talker." She blinked and put on a rueful smile. "Besides, it's just us." She hesitated.
"Look, Steph, " Tom began but Stephanie cut him off with a scowl.
"No I said I'd talk. Look, I've spent five years getting over it, okay?" She took a deep breath. "Five years ago a man named William Gryphius wormed his way into my life and promised me the moon. Well, I was young and stupid and believed him. One thing led to another and "
Tom braced himself for the sad but common tale.
" he ended up keeping me a prisoner in an underground vault for nearly four months. I had my first contact with the Nightwatch Institute when a team was sent in to destroy his vault and I got rescued along the way. Simon was on the team, it was our first meeting, although I don't remember too much of it. I spent the next two months in a hospital and several months after that in therapy. When I recovered, Nightwatch offered me a job and here I am."
Simon looked away. He knew the parts Stephanie had left out of her brief narrative. He knew what the monster Gryphius had done to her, both to her body and to her mind.
"I'm sorry, Steph," Tom said gently. He was horrified. He hadn't expected anything so violent or destructive. "What happened to him?"
"I killed him," Simon said simply.
Stephanie, who had never killed anyone, winced. She carried Simon's guilt as her own.
"But our mission here is with Celinde Gryphius," Simon reminded them. "Stephanie, there is no one more skilled in identity searches than you, but I hesitated to ask you to perform this one. On the other hand, we really need to know if this Gryphius is, as I suspect, related to that one."
Stephanie fought an involuntary urge to vomit. She suspected there were other prisoners in the underground vaults, but after her recovery, she put the past firmly behind her and never once looked back into the darkness. She threw herself into her work and never again felt truly comfortable with anyone but her teammates. And she had tried hard to forget the monster Gryphius.
"Okay, Simon," she said. But it wasn't okay, not really.
Tom leaned over and put a meaty paw on her strong hand. "I'll help, Steph in any way I can."
She smiled weakly and withdrew her hand. "What's in the letter?" she asked crisply.
Simon smoothed the sheets. "There are two items in the envelope," he said. He didn't mention the full printout on Celinde Gryphius that Nightwatch had provided. "This appears to be a fragment of a poem copied, perhaps, or hastily jotted down from memory."
"Virtue and cunning were endowments greater
May the two latter darken and expend;
But immortality attends the former,
Making a man a god. 'Tis known I ever
Have studied physic, through which secret art
By turning o'er authorities, I have,
Together with my practice, made familiar
To me and to my aid the blest infusions
That dwell in vegetatives, in metals, stones;
And I can speak of the disturbances
That nature works, and of her cures; which doth give me
A more content in course of true delight
Than to be thirsty after tottering honor,
Or tie my treasure up in silken bags,
To please the fool and death."
"Well, it sounds old," Stephanie said. "But I don't know what it means. Should be easy to find, though."
Simon pulled another piece of paper out of the envelope. "This is Celinde Gryphius' initial statement in her own words." He passed the statement to Tom.
Simon removed the final piece of paper from the envelope. "We have one more problem out in Pico da Neblina," he said. "In addition to the entire village vanishing, a Dr. Finley St. John was sighted in the vicinity a week before. Apparently he is of interest to the Institute and we are to find him and bring him back."
"Who is he?" Tom asked.
"I'm not sure," Simon admitted. "I was rather hoping Stephanie would help us out on that one, too."
"You got it, Boss," she said, pulling her laptop toward her. "Anything else?" Some of the old spark came back into her face as she began typing on the keyboard, and the ghost of a smile played around her lips.
"No, Stephanie," Simon said, "that should do
it for now. By the way, we'll be
landing in Sγo Gabriel da Cachoeira,
in the Pico da Neblina National Park.
There's a good-sized airport there.
Our NASA contact and someone from the LBA will meet us. I understand it's about 78 degrees
Fahrenheit and raining."
The smell of
Amazonia hit them the moment they stepped out onto the tarmac, an aromatic
mixture of vegetation, mildew, flowers, jet fuel and moisture.
The airport was a
simple affair: a landing strip and runway big enough to accommodate a heavy
jet, a large tin-roofed cinder block building with open windows and a control
tower with blinking lights. A Land
Rover careened right up to them and a pale man in a Seattle sombrero waved.
"Hey! Dr. Litchfield? Hi! I'm Kevin Brady,
NASA." A tall, thin young man
jumped out of the vehicle and opened the tailgate. "Here, you guys can store your stuff in the back." It was pouring.
Tom and Stephanie climbed
quickly into the backseat and out of the rain, which beat down heavily. This was not a "soft" day, as
Simon had heard a misty, drizzly day in London described once. This was real rain, coming down in streams.
He held his hat on with one hand as his cape whipped around him and hoisted
himself up into the front passenger's seat.
Kevin started the engine and splashed through a large puddle. "Carlos Vieira from LBA was supposed to come with me, but he got held up at one of the sites he'll meet us up at Luis Camacho's place. Get comfy, it's a long drive." Camacho was a Nightwatch contract employee, site supervisor for the area.
There wasn't much to see out the rain-streaked windows, and they all knew they would get a chance to become acquainted with Amazonia soon enough. Tom Weldon tried to meditate to the sound of the rain and Stephanie had her eyes closed, recovering from the emotional trauma she had just put herself through. It was good to have the comfort of solid Tom Weldon close by, although she didn't want any of his professional poking around in her psyche.
"Tell me about your work here, Mr. Brady," Simon prompted.
"It's Dr. Brady, but call me Kevin. Everyone here's a Ph.D. of some sort, so we don't stand on ceremony. In a nutshell, I monitor several sites in the Pico da Neblina area to make sure NASA's interests are represented and the money is being spent properly. Carlos, the LBA guy, actually runs the research end of things, manages the research teams, monitors the data, does the transmissions and things."
"So where were you when the village, um, disappeared?"
"Well, we can pinpoint the time pretty well through satellite photos you know, one minute we saw it, the next minute we didn't so I know exactly where I was. I was up at Luis Camacho's place. It's the only place for miles where you can feel like you're actually in a real house instead of a research hut." Simon knew from her statement that Celinde Gryphius had been in the same place at the same time.
"What was going on at the site?"
"Just the usual recording rainfall chemistry, measuring rates of smoke transfer from the understory to the upper troposphere, measuring carbon dioxide fluxes, looking at remote sensor readings, defining aerosol properties, all interesting stuff related to the importance of Amazonia to the planet's chemistry as a whole."
Simon Litchfield could see beyond the ecological importance of such information. There were plenty of strategic applications as well. "And LBA's role? " he asked.
"Well they own the place," he answered. "Without Brazil's cooperation, the scientific community goes nowhere here. But it's more than that. Brazil is unique, the site of the world's oxygen replenisher, pharmaceutical storehouse, everything. This research is Brazil's ticket into the major players in the world's economic and political markets. And it really might end up saving the planet from global warming and ultimate annihilation."
"What about Pico da Neblina in particular anything different about that site?"
Brady shook his head.
"No, just another research site with a few huts and a tower. There
are sixteen districts with research sites dotting them. Some of them contain urban areas, like the
sites around Manaus, Belem, and Sγo
Paulo. A couple, like Fortaleza and Natal, are coastal. But most of them cover a lot of rain forest
territory, undeveloped and wild. Pico da Neblina is in the Sγo Gabriel da Cachoeira district. Other wild districts are Rio Branca,
Ji-Paranα and across the border in Colombia, Yapu. It's a big project, with lots of public and private funding from
all over the world, hundreds of participants and mountains of data. No one ever
hears about it, but it's not a secret or anything. There just isn't a lot of public interest in the slog work of
statistics. We get grad students from
everywhere, though. It is the ideal
place for research and publication."
No wonder
Nightwatch had a big, but quiet, stake in the area, Simon thought. It was right up their proverbial alley.
During the two-hour drive to Luis Camacho's house near the Pico da Neblina site, the rain stopped, the sun was brilliant, the rain started again and then it cleared up again. The highway became a road that became a dirt road cleared by bulldozer. The vegetation was lush, with trees and shrubs, all manner of flowers and vines, and the team caught an occasional glimpse of a small animal or very large insect. The cries of birds could be heard in the distance. At one point, the grand sight of Peak 21 or Pico da Neblina rose before them, knobby on top and swathed in a halo of clouds and fog.
The damp sweat everyone had developed in the rain was a nuisance in the humid air. Tom realized his socks would never dry out and resolved to wear his mountain trekking sandals. Even Dr. Simon Litchfield's khakis were a bit rumpled, but he had packed his Canadian set, so he had something comfortable to anticipate.
At the house Luis Camacho greeted them jovially. He was a big, rawboned man, too pale for the Amazon, perpetually sunburned. His watery blue eyes beamed out of a round face and under his decrepit boonie hat a few strands of straw-colored hair escaped. He was dressed in a sweat-stained khaki shirt and faded blue shorts. Scuffed boots and a .45 automatic on a belt holster completed his ensemble.
"Come in out of the heat," he directed, with just a hint of a Portuguese lilt to his voice. "Welcome to the Fog Peak. Pico da Neblina, Fog Peak," he explained. "The most beautiful place in the world."
The house was certainly beautiful. It was large, long and low with a full verandah. Inside, ceiling fans kept the air moving and cool through the well-appointed rooms. Rattan furniture with brightly-colored cushions gave the sitting room the feeling of an excellent hotel. Tea and sandwiches were brought and Camacho offered drinks as well. Kevin Brady poured himself a scotch.
"I am delighted to have Institute visitors," he said. "Please consider this your home during your stay with us."
Simon smiled. Since there was nowhere else to stay, and since they had already made arrangements to stay there, and since the Institute technically owned the house, the offer was unnecessary.
"We often play host to visitors," Camacho explained. "NASA, LBA, Nightwatch, university researchers, government emissaries and just recently a scholar out from Cambridge, England."
"Cambridge!" Simon exclaimed. "Why what a coincidence. I spent time there myself. Who, may I ask, was this visitor?"
"Oh, an interesting old professor some sort of poetry expert. He was only here a couple of days, then talked about returning to Manaus. St. John something. He went out with Brady there," Camacho gestured toward the NASA representative, "he could tell you more."
Brady seemed puzzled. "He didn't go out with me," he said. "Must have been someone else."
"Well, whatever. Didn't see him again." Camacho turned away abruptly.
He was saved from interrogation on the subject by a man in the field researcher's standard uniform of stained cotton shirt and shorts. His black hair formed a kinky nimbus around his head, and a short black beard looked in need of a trim.
"Hey, Carlos!" Camacho gave the newcomer a bear hug.
Carlos Vieira grinned and shook hands with everyone. "The Nightwatch sends their fashionable team, I see." His glance took in Simon Litchfield's khaki ensemble, Tom Weldon's all-black outfit and Stephanie Keel's cargoes. His glance lingered on Stephanie, and not because of her fashion statement. Nothing could disguise her natural good looks, though she did nothing at all to enhance them.
Simon took the compliment. "Thank you, Mr. Vieira, or should I say Dr. Vieira?"
Carlos grinned and shook his head, "No, no we are all doctors, here, Dr. Litchfield. The LBA and the Brazilian government send you their welcome and hope you will be able to help solve this little, um, dilemma of the missing research site."
"How soon can we tour the area?" Tom was anxious to have a closer look.
"Right now," Kevin Brady offered. "We still have a couple of hours of daylight left."
"Excellent!" Camacho said. "I'll have someone put your things in your rooms perhaps you'd like to freshen up a bit before going out? My housekeeper, Maria, will help you." He gestured to a small woman in a print dress. She led them down a large corridor and showed them to their rooms
Minutes later they were all piling once again into the Land Rover. Kevin hit the gas and for a few moments the sky cleared to reveal the breathtaking sight of Pico da Neblina the second tallest peak in the country in all its fog-encircled glory.
"Over there," Kevin pointed. "That's where the site was. See where those two outcroppings on the side of that hill come together? There was a clearing just below there." He aimed the vehicle in the direction of the hill. "But watch this."
No matter how carefully or recklessly Kevin drove, the road went right past the area. At one point, it dwindled down to a track, then a trail, then what must have been merely a capybara run. "This road used to go right through the site."
"It's even weirder on foot," he explained. "There aren't any of the old landmarks or anything. It's just more vegetation."
Kevin maneuvered the vehicle in as close as possible to the coordinates on the NASA map he carried, then everyone got out and walked around. It was warm, humid and lush the real rain forest they all had read about. It smelled of flowers, rotting vegetation, smoke and water.
Tom was grateful for his cool, dry sandals until he noticed Kevin's boots. Snakes he hadn't thought about snakes.
"You can get pretty close to the outcroppings," Kevin said, pointing. "But you can't actually find the clearing where the village was. I mean, there is no clearing anymore. It's as if the whole landscape just shifted and that part of the world - the universe, even just doesn't exist."
Stephanie was busy with a hand-held instrument. She pointed it toward the outcroppings, then in the opposite direction. She made some notes in her PDA and switched instruments. Her second instrument was a digital camera, and she took lots of pictures, including a few of the Land Rover, Kevin Brady, and Simon Litchfield.
"Tom," she said, "stand over there and let me get a picture, okay?" Tom obliged, smiling for the camera, squinting into the last rays of the sun.
The sunset was a spectacular red gold, but midway into it, the sky clouded up and it started to rain again.
"Let's get back," Kevin suggested. "I don't like being out much after dark."
****
Luis Camacho's house was welcoming as it grew dark and rained heavily. The air was still quite warm, and Simon felt sticky.
Camacho was out, but the housekeeper, Maria, brought food and drinks into the great room. Sitting companionably around a low table by candlelight, Simon brought up the subject of Dr. Finley St. John, the poetry expert from Cambridge.
"So, Kevin, Luis Camacho said Dr. St. John left with you?"
"No," Kevin replied. "I mean, yes, Luis said that, but no, the old guy didn't go anywhere with me. I just saw him here that one time, although I know he's been to several of the sites and spent a lot of time in town."
"Town?" Tom asked.
"Sγo Gabriel
da Cachoeira, where you landed. The
airport's a bit out of town, so you didn't see it properly. It's a pretty good-sized town, right on the
Rio Negro. Gabriel of the Waterfall,
but not the Gabriel you might think.
This Gabriel was a soldier. Anyway, it's the biggest town in the
area. It's been there since the old
missionary days, when the Franciscans invaded in the 1700's." Kevin paused. "The Salesians in the
early part of the 20th Century weren't much better. It's a wonder
any indigenous people survive at all, but you'll find at least six different
peoples around here. Anyway, it's a two
hour drive, as you know."
"And St.
John?" Simon prompted.
"Oh, yeah, St.
John. I heard from one of the guys over
at Atmospheric Chemistry that he spent a lot of time in church. Go figure. But no one has seen him for at
least a week. Why, what's the
interest?"
"I think I may
know him from Cambridge," Simon lied with ease. "Now, what about the
people who disappeared with the site? Has anyone seen or heard from them?"
"Not that I've
heard of," Kevin said. "But you might want to ask Celinde. She's staying here, and she was technically
with the site, although she was here when it disappeared."
"She's
here?" Stephanie asked sharply.
"Here in this house?"
Kevin looked up in
surprise. "Yeah, well, she's out right now with Carlos, but she'll be back
in the morning. I think they went up to
the tower site near Cucui, up right next to the border. They should be back by
mid-morning."
"Kevin, we're going to need a vehicle of our own," Simon said. "Where can we get one?"
"Oh, that's easy. Both NASA and the Institute have vehicles here. Just check one out from Luis, but make sure you have plenty of fuel and you know where you're going. It can get pretty dangerous around here. The roads are all really just trails and the weather is unpredictable. Not to mention the wildlife."
Tom thought about snakes again and shuddered.
"Hey, I'd be glad to take you anywhere you want to go, though," Kevin offered. "NASA made it pretty clear that I'm to give you anything you need." He grinned engagingly toward Stephanie, but she was busy with her handheld computer.
Tom felt an uneasy and unusual stab of protective jealousy. There was nothing at all wrong with the NASA kid, he told himself. And Stephanie could use a little distraction. But not now, not on this trip.
"Thank you, Kevin," Simon said, "and I think we'll need to split up anyway, so your generous offer is most welcome."
"Okay, whatever you say. Listen, I got a ton of stuff to do. Why don't I meet you here in the morning and we can go anywhere you want. Oh, and don't be alarmed if you wake in the night local legend says this place is haunted."
Kevin got up and after a last glance at the oblivious Stephanie, disappeared down the hallway to his room.
The candles had burned low and the three Nightwatchers were silent except for the click-click of Stephanie's keyboard.
"All right, Stephanie," Simon said softly. "Give us what you've got."
Stephanie looked up from her computer. "What do you want first, Simon?" she asked.
"Celinde Gryphius?"
"You could have had the official bio from Nightwatch, Dr. Litchfield," Stephanie said stiffly, not meeting his eyes.
"I know, Stephanie," Simon replied. "As a matter of fact, I do have the official bio. But I want to know what you came up with."
Stephanie stared at him for a moment, then dropped her eyes to her laptop.
"Celinde Gryphius.
Born Emily Jane Kingsford twenty-nine years ago outside of Manaus,
Brazil. Parents noted as David and
Emily Kingsford. One sibling, an older
sister, Laura. Emily Kingsford, the mother, was a physician and
died in an accident in the Amazon when the children were little. David
Kingsford, an historian and sociologist, then moved to Canada with his two
daughters.
"Kingsford was
involved in a complex project of his own when he met William Gryphius in
Canada. They set up shop together and
the older daughter joined them. Emily was an odd duck, and grew up around the
research laboratories. She married
Gryphius after an explosion killed her father.
The older daughter took over the father's work, but didn't get along
well with her sister or with Gryphius.
Gryphius and Emily moved to England for a couple of years. Emily began calling herself Celinde during
this time.
"I couldn't
find out exactly where the money came from," Stephanie admitted, "but
I think Kingsford left them pretty well off.
Kingsford, as you both know, was working on some sort of temporal displacement
theory, and his older daughter damned near got us all killed.
Simon
grimaced. He remembered Max Cory,
remembered with guilt that he had been responsible for his death.
"Yeah, same Kingsford. Anyway," Stephanie continued, "Gryphius dabbled in the temporal displacement stuff in England for a while, but then got interested pharmaceuticals. Celinde had some of Emily Kingsford's papers from her work in the Amazon and Gryphius thought he could find the fountain of youth or eternal life or something. But things apparently got hot for him and he surfaced later in the States, setting up a series of underground labs for his research
"That's what he was working on when you found me. His experimentation involved human subjects, mostly young women. Twelve women were identified, including myself and Celinde Gryphius. Of the twelve, only four survived. The other two also work for Nightwatch, one as a fitness instructor and one as a pilot.
"Celinde Gryphius has been working as a data researcher here in the Amazon. She speaks Portuguese and one of the indigenous dialects, and requested an assignment in Amazonia, which she considers her home."
Stephanie paused. "There is nothing on Gryphius before his association with Kingsford in Canada. Nothing."
Dr. Litchfield's eyebrows went up. "That usually means a very careful backstory by a very sophisticated intelligence agency," he mused. "Stephanie, if you can't find it, it's not there. What else?"
Stephanie took a breath. "Well, the fragment of verse is a passage from Shakespeare, but from an obscure play. It's from "Pericles, Prince of Tyre" and appears to refer to natural medicine. But it's a disputed speech from a character who is sometimes omitted from stage productions."
"Odd. And Dr. St. John?" Simon prompted.
"Oh, lots and lots on the good doctor," Stephanie said with a satisfied grin.
"Finley Robert Swithin St. John, - pronounced 'Sin Jin,' by the way - born 74 years ago in Bantwick, Kent, England. His parents were Christopher Colin St. John, Queen's Counsel that's a lawyer and Viscountess Carolyn Finley de Brettville, minor aristocracy. Upper middle class upbringing, public school education that's private schools to us graduate work at Oxford, specialties in history, languages, drama and poetry. Unmarried, no family. Professor at Cambridge teaching Shakespeare, currently on sabbatical. Has published extensively on Shakespeare's so-called "lost" plays, and is said to be obsessed with a particular play, Cardenio. He has spent time in Italy, France, Canada and America, and most recently has traveled to Brazil."
Stephanie looked up from her laptop. "And no one has seen him or heard anything from him for several days."
"Well, where was he seen last?" Tom asked.
"Here," Stephanie replied. "Last recorded contact was with his publishers via telephone call from this very house four days ago. Something about the Franciscan invasions."
"Very well," Simon said, "Tomorrow, Tom, you take Celinde Gryphius. Give her a thorough debriefing and find out everything you can." Simon felt another pang of regret over Max Cory. His arrogance had caused his death, and it would always haunt him.
"Stephanie, I'd like you to stay here and see what you can find out about this area take some readings, see if anything shows up. Maybe the village is still there and we just can't see it." Simon gave her an encouraging smile. "I am going out with Kevin Brady I have a feeling I know where to look for Dr. St. John. Get some sleep, team we are going to need all our wits tomorrow."
Tom Weldon slept late. By the time he awoke Simon and Stephanie were already gone and the house was quiet. Maria, the housekeeper, left a tray of tea and sweet rolls by his bedroom door, and he took it out to the great room with him. He had given up his hope of sandals and was dressed in his usual black garb, this time with sturdy boots.
Carlos Vieira dropped Celinde Gryphius at the front door about an hour later and Tom greeted her. He introduced himself and they went out onto the back veranda to talk. The view was spectacular.
Stephanie rose early, packed some equipment and supplies into her rucksack, and set out with her handheld GPS. They had all abandoned their cell phones there were no signals in that part of Amazonia. She was slathered in bug repellant and carried what looked like a ski pole. It was actually a telescoping antenna which doubled nicely as a hiking stick.
She walked slowly and deliberately toward the area where the village had disappeared, listening to the sounds of the Amazon and watching for any movement.
Simon Litchfield and Kevin Brady drove the two hours to Sγo Gabriel da Cachoeira to the Catholic
church. It was a simple structure with
a tall steepled belltower, overlooking the wide Rio Negro River. A Salesian father in the colors of a Bishop
greeted them inside. Simon was startled
to note the man was Asian by his features.
"Gentlemen,
you are early for Mass," he said. "But you are welcome to meditate
here for the next hour or so."
Simon gave a small
bow. "Thank you Father, but we are
here on different business. May we talk
to you for a few moments?"
The priest returned
the small bow. "Yes, as you wish. Please follow me." He led them through a side entrance and down
a short flight of stone steps to a spacious and remarkably cool room. The stone walls were unadorned except for a
rather large and startlingly realistic crucifix. A simple wooden table with chairs and a large, battered old desk
completed the furniture.
"I am Jose
Wei-Song," the priest said, seating himself at the desk. Simon and Kevin pulled up chairs and Simon
did the introductions.
"I want to ask you about a colleague of mine, Dr. Finley St. John. I understand he has been spending some time in your church."
"Yes, that is so."
"Is he here now?"
"No, I am sorry. I have not seen him here for four days. He was most interested in our historical collections, and spent many hours looking at our records. A scholarly man, well read in many languages."
"What was he looking for?" Simon asked.
"Ah, I don't know that he was looking for anything in particular," the priest said. "He was most interested in the early records of the Franciscans, and wanted to look at everything. Of course, many of the records are in Rome, where the climate can be controlled. The Amazon is not conducive to the preservation of old records."
"May we see what he as looking at? He seems to have disappeared and I was hoping his work might shed some light on his whereabouts."
The priest nodded. "Of course. But I can tell you where he went when he left here. The young lady picked him up, and he was most excited to be visiting a village."
"Young lady?" Simon asked.
"Yes, from the research team. Celinde, he called her. I'll get the papers, if you will wait here." The priest left them.
"What would Celinde be doing with the Cambridge guy?" Kevin asked. "I didn't even know she knew him."
"Weren't they staying at Camacho's at the same time?" Simon asked.
"Well, yeah, but lots of people stay there and he didn't really seem like her, uh, type." Kevin blushed. "No offense, Dr. Litchfield, but he was, well, you know, old."
Simon winced. He was a far cry from the Cambridge doctor's seventy-nine, but he doubtless seemed old to this pup.
The priest returned with a sheaf of yellowing documents. "These are copies made of the originals. They are primarily Franciscan records of the first schools for indigenous peoples from the end of the 1700's through the early 1800's. The records of our order, the Salesians, begin in the 1920's."
Kevin and Simon studied them for about an hour. Although Simon could not read Portuguese, Kevin's was passable, and between them they could read Spanish quite well. They found the small marks Dr. St. John had made on the copied texts.
"I think I know what the good doctor was after," Simon finally said. "The Franciscans practically destroyed the indigenous peoples through forced and systematic cultural indoctrination. They took the young from their tribes and families and forced them into Christian schools. They took their language, religion and customs, and substituted their own on pain of death. It was that substitution particularly of Shakespeare that caught Dr. St. John's curiosity. The Franciscans bore no particular love for the secular poet, yet a reference to the Shakespeare studies repeatedly pops up in the school records. I'll bet the doctor thought he was hot on the trail of his missing play."
"How would it get here?" Kevin asked.
"South America was a trade destination in the late 1600's," Simon explained, "and the Franciscans colonized here in the late 1700's. The folio could have traveled through any number of routes and ended up here. The question really, though, is why. Why would it end up here?"
"I guess only Dr. St. John can answer that," Kevin said. What he didn't know about Shakespeare could fill volumes.
"No, wait. These are records of the schools costs, headcount, curriculum, that sort of thing, but not what was actually taught. I find it hard to believe the Franciscans taught Shakespeare to the indigenous peoples her, when they were primarily concerned with forced conversions. What we really need to see are the actual texts. If any of those are still around, they would have the key to this, I think." Simon's excited voice carried in the stone chamber.
He hurried to find the priest, but he had to wait for the conclusion of the Mass before he could ask Bishop Wei-Song about any educational materials used in the late 1700's and early 1800's.
"Yes, of course," the Bishop smiled when the Mass was concluded and Simon approached him in the sanctuary. He left and returned with an ornate silver and glass casket which he carried back to the stone walled chamber where Kevin was pacing impatiently. He set it down on the polished wood table and opened the top. Inside were several hand-written copies of the Holy Bible and several parchment documents.
"The Franciscan fathers were of the third order regular," the Bishop explained, "and included a number of Italian friars. Some of the texts were annotated in Italian, but for the most part everything taught was from the Latin Vulgate Bible, although the common language of the fathers here was Portuguese. There were a few items written in Spanish, I think, but it is difficult to elucidate the differences between the Portuguese and Spanish of that time."
He placed a large leather-bound bible on the table and opened it to display a color illustration, not as detailed or beautiful as a real illumination, but handsome nonetheless. "I am afraid these items are very fragile, Dr. Litchfield," he cautioned. "Please take care in handling them."
Simon began to turn the pages slowly. The Spanish inscription became apparent only if you were looking for it. There was a word on nearly every page, made to look as if it were an annotation of some sort. Simon wrote them down in order as Kevin translated them.
When he came to the end of the annotations, he read it all back:
"virtue and cunning were endowments greater than
nobleness and riches careless heirs may the two latter darken and expend but
immortality attends the former making a man a god it is known I ever have
studied physic through which secret art by turning over authorities I have
together with my practice made familiar to me and to my aid the blest infusions
that dwell in vegetatives in metals stones and I can speak of the disturbances
that nature works and of her cures which doth give me a more content in course of true delight than to be thirsty after tottering honor or tie my treasure up in silken bags to please the fool and death"
"What's it mean?" Kevin asked. "Sounds like nonsense to me."
"It sounds like Shakespeare to me, my boy," Simon replied. "Or maybe Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. I think it's what the good Doctor St. John was after, only I don't think he knew it. And there must be more to it. It is the account of some sort of potion, maybe something from a plant extract. But there must be another piece to it, a missing piece which would give more details, maybe a recipe or location."
"Recipe for what?"
"I don't know yet." Simon reached for the next bible and they leafed through it page by page, but found no similar annotations. The parchment documents were hundreds of hand written hymns and poems, most referring to St. Francis of Assisi, the order's founder. They too were written in Latin, except for one, which appeared to be written in doggerel Spanish.
"Translate this one, Kevin," Simon said as he read the words and wrote the translated version on the same page as the other annotations.
"to my aid the best infusions drawn from natures own flower which doth halt the course of years and impart fair youth to all who live her secret found and kept but to the church's own destruct and in the fires burn to dust the resurrection gone"
Simon re-read the words, his face a serious study. Then he folded up the piece of paper with the two mysterious sets of words and put it in his pocket.
"What's it mean?" Kevin asked again.
But Simon just shook his head. "We need to find the good doctor, Kevin." He called out for the Bishop who appeared instantly.
"Did you find what you were looking for?" Bishop Wei-song asked, gathering the documents back into the glass casket.
"I don't know," Simon confessed. "I rather think not. Did you say you had seen Dr, St. John recently? I think he might hold the key to our little mysteries, not the dusty papers of past centuries, although we are grateful to have seen them. Do you know, Your Grace," Simon used the formal address for the first time, "if Dr. St. John looked at these items?""
Bishop Wei-song smiled. "No, I am sure he did not. He did not ask for them. But I do remember his last conversation here. He was most interested in the indigenous peoples, especially the Parumami, who had been schooled here in the early 1800's. They were less enlightened times, I am sure you will agree."
Simon did agree. Forced religious conversion was indeed an unenlightened practice, barbaric even. There must have been a powerful reason for such a thing, something he did not yet understand. "And Dr. St. John left here in the company of the young lady researcher you say?"
The Bishop nodded. "They were going to one of the villages to a shabono or Parumami house," he said. "The Doctor was very excited."
Simon thanked the bishop for his hospitality and ushered Kevin out into the warm humid air. "So what do you think of the Shakespeare?" he asked in the intermittent sunlight as they got into the vehicle.
"Shakespeare was never my best subject," Kevin admitted. "But I know one thing: if the doctor left here with Celinde, why don't we ask her where he is."
"Excellent suggestion, my boy," Simon agreed.
Stephanie's instruments indicated nothing more than lush vegetation. Whatever had been at the research site's coordinates was simply no longer there. The site itself, the ground itself, still existed. But roads leading in and out, all structures, and people were just not there. It was as if that little piece of Paradise had never existed.
The tumblers in her mind clattered into a different configuration maybe because she was still fighting the images of Gryphius. Could it be that she was looking at a former version of the site one from before human habitation? Had the Kingsford legacy of unstable time travel somehow marbled into this?
She shook her head to clear it. Discount nothing, she told herself, but don't be too hasty to believe the improbable.
She continued her slow trek to the center of the area where the site had been. Faint underground rumblings might have been just her imagination, but the difference in vegetation and the beginnings of a headache were not. Under the forest canopy, the plants growing in the site area seemed different. She photographed a couple of the low shrubs, unusual in their almost blue color.
She pulled up some botany information on her hand-held and let out a low whistle. There was something odd about the blue plants, but there was no record of them in her online Encyclopedia Botanica. Not a problem, she told herself. They just haven't been catalogued yet. There must be thousands of 'undiscovered' plants in the Amazon. Pharmaceutical companies from all over the world spent lots of time and money researching the Amazonian flora. It was odd, she thought, that the Nightwatch crew hadn't run into any of them.
A rustling noise caused her to duck behind the substantial trunk of an ancient tree. She pulled out her pistol and half expected to see a giant snake. Snakes weren't high on her favorites list.
A tall, beautiful blonde woman dressed in a tight cotton blouse and form-fitting shorts dragged a large duffle bag through the undergrowth. The bag looked full and heavy, and the woman's well-toned muscles strained at the load. She had a semi-automatic rifle slung across her body and a long knife strapped to one tanned thigh. When she shook her head to toss her hair out of her eyes, Stephanie recognized Celinde Gryphius from her Institute photo.
A groan issued from the duffle. "Shut up," Celinde said in a clipped accent, "or I'll give you something cry about." She dragged it deeper into the blue bushes. "You'll go to sleep here, Mr. Weldon, and never wake up."
Stephanie tightened the grip on her pistol. If she fired now she could take the Gryphius woman down, but she wanted no, needed to know what was going on. There was no doubt that Tom Weldon was in the bag, but what was Gryphius doing with him?
Gryphius dragged the bag a bit further, then let the end fall hard to the ground. The bag was still. Gryphius looked around suspiciously, listening for any unusual noise. Then she got down on her hands and knees and began feeling around on the rich rainforest floor. She found what she was looking for and pulled a length of heavy rope out of the decaying foliage. She used it to open a large trapdoor.
As Gryphius started disappearing down into the earth, Stephanie holstered her pistol and threw herself onto the woman from behind, grabbing a handful of hair and jerking the surprised face back sharply while yanking an arm up behind the woman's back.
Gryphius let out an enraged scream and twisted to claw at Stephanie. Stephanie tried to haul the woman out of the hole in the ground, but Gryphius went for her knife with her free hand and slashed out at Stephanie. The blade caught Steph across her upper arm in a shallow red line of blood. She let go for a second, then lunged at the semi automatic rifle slung around the woman's body. She knocked the knife away with the woman's own rifle, then tightened the sling around Gryphius' neck, turning the weapon on its strap until it dug into her throat and stifled the screams.
Gryphius clawed at her throat helplessly as Stephanie dragged her out of the hole by both ends of the rifle attached to the asphyxiating sling. Gryphius began to lose consciousness. Stephanie pulled her out onto the ground and rolled her roughly onto her face. Then she pulled a length of thin wire from her pocket and fastened the woman's hands tightly behind her back. Only when Gryphius was securely tied did Stephanie loosen the rifle sling and disengage the weapon from the near-comatose woman.
Using her own knife, Stephanie cut open the duffle bag to release Tom Weldon. Weldon's shallow breathing had a peculiar wheeze to it, and a purple bruise above one eye looked serious. He was out cold, his eyelids fluttering and his arms trussed in front of him with what looked like clothesline. Stephanie cut the line and massaged his wrists for a moment, then sprinkled a little water over his face from her canteen.
"Hey, buddy," she said softly, "come on, it's okay, everything's gonna be fine."
Tom groaned and twitched, then gasped and started to come around. Stephanie saturated a scarf with more water and placed it over the swollen bruise. He opened his eyes and tried to speak, but spluttered and coughed , then heaved himself up on one side facing away from Stephanie to retch in the foliage.
"Sorry," he muttered, embarrassed.
"What's going on?" Stephanie asked. "I thought she was on our side."
"I did, too," Tom admitted. "But I never got much of a chance to find out. We met out on the back terrace and when I started to ask her a few questions, she slugged me in the face and tied me up. Look, I'm no lightweight, Stephanie, but that woman is strong. She tied me up and put me a bag. No explanations, nothing. And did I mention how strong she is?"
Stephanie nodded. Gryphius had been uncommonly strong and only the leverage of the automatic rifle on its sling had given Stephanie any advantage at all.
Tom sat up and took a few breaths. "Phew!" he said, "what stinks?"
"I think it's those bluish plants." Stephanie replied. "We seem to have bruised a few in the scuffle." She tossed the automatic rifle to Tom. "Keep an eye on Sleeping Beauty I want to check out that hole in the ground."
****
Kevin Brady drove back to the house with a reckless abandon that caused Simon to grab the frame of the vehicle more than once. The scenery, which was enough to elicit gasps even without the speed, flashed by in a brilliant panorama of green, blue and the scarlet of birds in flight. Simon could well understand how people became enchanted with the Brazilian forests and refused to leave. He hoped the beauty of the rainforest and nothing more sinister had captured Dr. St. John.
They met Carlos Vieira about six miles from the house. He pulled his Land Rover right up next to theirs and rolled the window down.
"Hey, how's it going?" He asked with a grin. "Any luck finding our missing site?"
"We're still working on it," Simon assured him. "Right now, I need to find Miss Gryphius and ask her about the Cambridge professor who was out here last week."
"I dropped her off at the house this morning," Carlos said. "But I was going back to leave some LBA taskings for Luis. I don't know where he is, I think he's still up near the border."
"Cucui?" Kevin asked. "Weren't you guys up there too?"
Carlos' grin faded. "Uh, yeah, Celinde and I were there last night. I thought I saw Luis there too, but I, uh, I'm not sure." Carlos seemed hesitant and his manner changed. "Look, I'll catch up to you guys later, okay? Will you just leave these folders for Luis?" He handed a small stack of bright blue folders through the open window, then turned his Land Rover around in the muddy track and sped off.