The Mayan Conspiracy (16 page)

Hawker again shouted to him but didn’t slow, and Verhoven couldn’t make out the words. He heard the natives ahead, crashing through the branches. He caught sight of Hawker for a second. And then he was gone.

Before he could stop, Verhoven met the same fate; the ground suddenly gone from underneath his feet, he fell through the darkness. He slammed into a musty wall of earth and then crashed backward with a splash, landing in three feet of mud and water.

He looked around but could see nothing; the blackness was complete. The only light he saw came from thirty feet above, a thin veil of a lighter black in the shape of a rectangle.

He’d fallen into a pit of some kind: a trap. He stood awkwardly, the mud squishing under his feet, the cold muck dripping off him. The fetid water stank, but it had probably saved his life.

“Hawk!” he shouted. “Are you down here?”

Sounding as if he was in a certain amount of pain, Hawker replied, “Unfortunately.”

Verhoven turned toward the sound of Hawker’s voice, the water swirling just above knees. “Better hope it stays dark, mate. Because if I see you I’m gonna kill you.”

“For what?”

“For bringing me down here.”

He heard the sound of water sloshing as Hawker moved around in the darkness. “If you hadn’t tried to shoot the son of bitch, we might have been able to talk to him.”

“A bloke charges you like that, you shoot first, ask questions later.”

“He wasn’t charging,” Hawker replied. “He was looking up in the trees, hunting something. He just found us by accident.”

Verhoven paused, realizing that Hawker was right. He moved to his right, bumping against something. He touched it with his hand, and realized it was the carcass of a dead animal. He pulled back. “Looks like we’re not the only ones to fall in this …”

The words died on Verhoven’s lips and he went still.
He thought he’d heard something moving around in the pit, in the opposite direction from where Hawker’s voice came. He turned slightly, stirring the water.

“Don’t move,” he whispered. “There’s something else down here.”

Verhoven crouched, his nose close to the stinking muck, straining to see. The pit was clearly designed as a trap, and any animal that might have fallen down there with them could be dangerous. He moved slowly to one side, feeling for the wall of the pit, bumping against it.

A low, almost inaudible growl reached toward him, drifting out of the darkness, like the guttural rumble that comes from the back of a crocodile’s throat. The sound was labored, a deep heavy groan, a warning almost below the range of human hearing.

What made that sound? A caiman, a large snake, maybe—pythons were rumored to make low rumbles in their guts—or even a jaguar, wounded and weak in the bottom of a pit, it could still kill with a single claw.

Verhoven backed away from the sound, moving along the length of the trench.

“I have a flare,” Hawker said, his voice a whisper.

Verhoven paused, making sure his hands were ready. “Light it.”

Behind him the flare snapped and with the sizzle of the phosphorous it lit, flashing in the darkness. For an instant, Verhoven went blind. When his eyes adjusted, he saw nothing in front of him except filthy water and the muddy walls at the closed end of the rectangular pit. Something moved on his left, clinging to the wall. It lunged toward his face, hissing, with its jaws open.

Verhoven jumped backward, firing. He crashed into
Hawker, knocking the flare into the muck. The light vanished as murky water swallowed the burning stick.

Scampering sounds came toward him. Verhoven fired from his fallen position.

Something clawed him and then pushed off, using him as a stepping stone to launch itself up the wall. The flare bobbed to the surface and Verhoven caught a glimpse of a shape clambering up the side of the pit. He fired as it went over the top, blasting it forward as its momentum carried it out into the jungle night. The thing shrieked in agony.

As Hawker plucked the flare from the water, the light improved. Verhoven dropped his gaze, checking the rest of the pit, side to side, up and down.

They were alone.

Hawker fell back, racked with laughter.

“What’s so damn funny?”

“Keystone Cops,” Hawker said, barely able to get the words out.

“You’re the chief, then.”

Hawker couldn’t stop chuckling. “And you’re having monkey for dinner.”

Verhoven hadn’t gotten a good enough look at the scrambling thing to know what it was, but the size was about right—thirty to forty pounds—and there was little else he could think of that could climb like that. For a moment he was almost embarrassed, blasting a little monkey with an AK-47. Then again, a starving, cornered monkey could have made a mess of them, even if it wasn’t a life-threatening situation.

“Better than him having us,” he replied.

As Hawker continued laughing, Verhoven fished out
his radio. Fortunately, like everything else electronic they had brought along, it was waterproof. He clicked the switch, told one of his men what had happened and ordered him to bring a rescue party and some rope.

As Verhoven finished the conversation, Hawker tapped him on the shoulder and pointed to one of the walls, holding the flare up to give him more light.

The central part of the left wall appeared to be made of stone. It was covered in lumpy chunks of mud, but even in the flickering light, a large face could be seen beneath that mud. A face carved in the stone. Around it were other marks, hieroglyphics that looked remarkably similar to those Danielle had showed him.

As they studied it, the rescue party arrived and dropped down a rope. Hawker and Verhoven climbed out and the group shined their lights into the pit. Danielle nodded her approval. “We’ll show McCarter in the morning,” she said.

Weary and covered in muck, Verhoven began his walk back to the camp, ignoring the questions about what had happened and glad that the ridiculous situation was over.

Before he’d gone ten paces Hawker spoke, stopping him in his tracks.

“Where is it?” Hawker asked.

“Where’s what?” Danielle replied.

Hawker’s voice rang with suspicion. “Verhoven’s monkey.”

Danielle, and the men who’d helped with the rescue, only seemed more confused, but Verhoven understood. He looked around. There was no monkey carcass, no blood on the ground or a trail to indicate that something
else had dragged it off into the woods. No sign of the thing he’d blasted.

“There was a monkey in the pit,” Verhoven explained. “I shot at the bugger as he went over the top of the wall. Looks like I missed.”

The others seemed to accept that and appeared unworried, but Hawker’s stare was unrelenting, his suspicious nature locked on to the latest small thing that seemed out of order. Verhoven met his eyes and then scanned the forest around them again.

Both of them knew he didn’t miss.

RICHARD KAUFMAN GLANCED AROUND
the confines of the small hospital room. The walls were covered in a muted green. A pair of ancient beds, complete with rusting iron frames and tall IV stands, sat opposite and parallel each other, while a wilting, forgotten plant spread its thin arms in a corner near the window.

He waited there as a nurse helped the room’s sole patient return from a trip to the communal rest room. The man entered, struggling with a crutch under each arm.

Stooped but still over six feet tall, the man was broad-shouldered, thin and bony, appearing almost emaciated. A ragged nest of tangled dark hair sat on his head, while dark circles hung from his eyes and his skin looked a sickly color. He reminded Kaufman of a house that had caught fire but remained standing: hollowed out, discolored and lifeless.

A look of surprise appeared on his face as he studied Kaufman. “You’re not a doctor,” he guessed.

“I would have thought you’d seen enough of doctors.” Kaufman replied.

The man nodded slowly, then hobbled to a new position with a smile covering his ragged face. “Yeah, I have,” he said. “Which means you must be Helios.”

“That’s right,” Kaufman replied, sarcastically. “I’m the Greek god of the sun, and I spend my time visiting patients in small hospital rooms.” He stood. “The real question is who you are and how you came to know about Helios, considering that you can’t remember your own name.”

The man tried to smile, but it seemed to cause him pain and he quickly gave up. “Give me a second. I’ll explain.”

He crossed the room, struggling with the crutches in the narrow space. He reached one of the beds and leaned the crutches against the wall. When they started to slide, he grabbed them and slammed them back into place. Anger and bitterness, Kaufman thought. Here was a man who hated his current predicament. Then again, who wouldn’t?

The patient looked up at Kaufman, his legs sticking out beyond the hem of the gown; one leg was white, the other a dark tan color.

Noticing Kaufman’s gaze, the man explained. “They took it off,” he said. “Didn’t even ask me. Just took it off and gave me this one to replace it.” He glanced down at the dark prosthetic. “I guess there aren’t too many light-skinned Caucasians in these parts, so the legs all look like this, and in the end, they just give you what fits.”

“You were going to explain some things,” Kaufman said. “Let’s start with Helios.”

“Right,” the man replied. “But first I have something
you might want to see.” With great effort he retrieved a small backpack from beside the bed, rummaged through it and then tossed something to Kaufman.

Kaufman studied it: a hexagonal crystal resembling those the NRI had been examining; the erstwhile Martin’s crystals. The meeting’s importance grew.

“Interested in talking?” the patient asked.

Kaufman closed the door. “Who are you?”

“I’m Jack Dixon,” the man replied.

Kaufman had seen photos of the NRI’s team, including Dixon, and he now recognized the man, a shell of his former self, perhaps fifty pounds lighter, not including the leg.

“The NRI is looking for you,” Kaufman noted. “Not interested in getting in touch with them, for some reason?”

“Not particularly,” Dixon said. “Not if I can do better.”

“What makes you think I can help you with that?” Kaufman asked.

“Because a two-faced son of a bitch stole something from me,” Dixon said. “Stole what we were fucking dying for out there.” The burst of anger seemed to come from nowhere. “My guess is he did it for you.”

As Dixon paused to calm himself, Kaufman considered what he’d said. Futrex had two moles within the NRI. Out of prudence, he’d tried to split them up, and as luck had taken its course, one had ended up on the current field team while the other had joined Dixon on the first effort.

When the NRI had stopped receiving reports from Dixon’s field team, Kaufman had taken it as a good sign,
thinking his man had made some type of move. From Dixon’s comment, it was apparent that he’d done so, only something had gone wrong. There had been no radio call requesting extraction, no communication of any kind, and for several weeks no sign of either Kaufman’s mole or the NRI team.

“You caught him,” Kaufman guessed.

“No,” Dixon said bluntly. “But something else did. The natives skewered that son of a bitch and then let some animal feed on him. When I found him he was missing half his body, but he still had his pack. He had that crystal and some other items. He also had a piece of paper tucked into his ID packet with a list of frequencies on it, and the word ‘Helios’ circled a few times.”

Dixon paused to scratch carefully at one of the sores on his face. “The thing is, no one in my unit touched the radio except me. And Helios … not our code word. Sounded more like a buyer or a corporation. Some big shot waiting for delivery. Maybe a Greek god among men.” He nodded toward Kaufman. “So what do you think, big shot? You still want to buy?”

Kaufman listened to the man’s words, their abrasive quality seemed false, a forced effort as the man’s voice wavered ever so slightly. Kaufman wondered what he was hiding.

“Maybe,” Kaufman said. “First I need to know a few things, beginning with what happened out there.”

Dixon went quiet for a moment. He gazed at the floor before looking back at Kaufman. “I took eight men out into the jungle,” he said finally. “And I left all eight of them behind, dead,” he said. “Most of them ripped to shreds by some animal we never saw.”

“What are you talking about?”

“We were the rover party, our job was to cover a lot of ground, talk to the locals and categorize what we found. Sinkholes, caves, anything that might have once been a stone structure. For the first three months we didn’t find anything that wasn’t just shit. But then we hired on these two native guides, and after jerking us around for a week, they got all liquored up and told us about this place no one was supposed to go. To go there was death, they said, but for enough whiskey and the promise of a couple of rifles, they told us how to find it. And so we did. A big-ass temple, just sitting there out in the middle of nowhere. We cracked it open and I found that crystal in there, along with some metallic-looking stones, the kind that set off a Geiger counter, if you get my drift. And just then everything started going straight to hell.”