Dispensing with any sort of quackery I’d simply shouted, “Get out of here. This is my home. I am an Englishman and this is England!”
After all the noise had settled and Betty had ceased whimpering I winked at Jones. He was still holding the ceremonial dagger and chalk.
“You see my man…you have to tell these things off properly…don’t treat them like bloody royalty. We are higher than the angels…do you not recall…”
The towering bundle of nerves simply extend a thin white finger.
There it was. A perfect azure sphere sitting atop a cold carpet that itself sat atop a yet colder floor.
I promptly hauled it up. Jones leapt back.
“Ah! Careful Roderick…are you mad…”
I laughed. “Perfectly so my friend. Glad for it too seeing as to the effects sanity has upon you.”
“The house was shaking Rod…shaking and humming…” Betty muttered. “You should maybe be more…”
“Ooo uhhh were it now..shaking like the perfect pair of autumn shrivelled leaves I see stand before me?” I laughed.
In all honesty I’d lost all mirth. I’d just received word from France that my bastard daughter hadn’t survived the tuberculosis. Yet, in its place, in the place of levity a certain ecstatic freedom took hold. This made me quiet jolly but with a sort of thrilling chill rather than happiness.
Everything felt liquid, fluid, cool and malleable.
It is an odd thing to see yourself in the daughter of a whore. She’d called me Papa. Six years old…moving onto the seventh…I did not have the courage to take her with me…to avoid that harsh little apartment in Tours.
It is odd to see yourself in the daughter of a whore. To see your self-same hazel fire and jetty locks to see a twist of the lips so familiar….so peculiar.
“Are you afraid of eternity?” I bellowed tossing the sphere onto an armchair.
My two tenants stood dumbstruck as I unfastened my trousers.
I urinated on the pretty thing. My offal running in gold rivulets off its perfect geometry and staining the mahogany fabric of its throne.
“It is a holy thing Hamilton…have you no shame…”
“I don’t care if its God’s own eye!” I laughed again dancing a jig.
“He’s mad…” Betty murmured.
“Oh,” I said. “No, no darling I am perfectly beautifully sane. You see I did nothing wrong not one thing wrong. Was it I who bargained with the colonials? Was it I that shot Ferdinand? What was I to do with my loneliness in France….what was I to do with that shrieking image…that homage to the great god pain. Did I invent the trench or fashion the bullet that rained upon it?
…NO!…
And neither did I fashion angels, or hells, or Gods, or magick, or its implements. Why should I give fealty to that which is not my own! There is nothing holy Jones. Not a thing upon the Earth, nor below, nor above!”
Jones simply shook his head sadly wiping away the urine with a kerchief. He moved past a weeping Betty to secret the thing…perhaps make obeisance to it.
I didn’t care one wan iotalated damn.
“Eh ! Pantruchar ! C’est y qu’ tu s’rais malade
Ou que l’ cafard te rendrait tout transi ?
Ce soir, t’as pas l’ cœur à la rigolade”
Lobo was heading over. I’d long ago grown weary of his perpetually critical outlook. There was only one cunt in this camp that had the divine sanction to be cynic sovereign.
“You are taking these with us?”
“Unfortunately.”
“Why?”
“Is this your first encounter with NATO?”
“Huh?”
“What do we do every day Pinky?”
Lobo laughed. The one endearing quality about him was his near encyclopedic knowledge of cartoons.
“You do know that this will slow us down?”
“Us Carolina boys might be barefoot and bucktooth but we ain’t stoopid .”
“Huh.”
“We don’t have a choice, and yes I’m well aware that a high-tech toy chest is gonna kill speed faster than when Aunt Bertha hopped onboard the carpool.”
“They will break…or be broken…”
“Yea..well I ain’t too attached.”
Lobo appeared to be lost in thought.
“We are only taking them fifty miles in.” I intruded into his reverie confident that I’d guessed where his mind was going.
“So you’re saying that if they’re damaged…”
‘Well…fuck.’
It was true that I’d relished the chance to get a couple of good licks in even if it meant getting twisted into a pretzel. But now that the opportunity presented itself I wasn’t happy. If he succeeded in sabotaging the equipment we’d have to go back. I wanted to go back but I didn’t…I’d gone too far on this weird ride.
“Bad idea, bub.” I said placing myself in his path. At 6’ 2” I’m not exactly short but I found myself staring at his nipples.
Lobo laughed. “I am doing you a favor.”
“I appreciate that…but you are also doing yourself a disservice.”
“How?”
“You think Uncle Sam likes having his toys broken?”
He laughed again. “So you are saying they will come to Brazil…to Cuiaba…find me…”
“They’re already here.”
Lobo glanced around.
I shook my head. “Don’t you think that a lot of the tourists cityside seemed a little too fit. That their size and haircuts didn’t exactly fit the profile of bored dentist?”
Again Lobo laughed. “Yeah…I guess you have a point…but I have a suggestion…American soldiers should stay in America…”
He was holding an apple in his right hand. An apple that instantly exploded and oozed out in between his clenched fingers.
Guess he knew I was angling for a fight. I was glad that I had backup. Not because I minded having my ass kicked. The thought of bruises on his face gave me a near sexual thrill… even if it cost me a fracture. No I was glad because the shit storm of paperwork and bitching that would have come as a result of sabotage would have cost more careers than my fingers could count.
He walked off leaving me in the small clearing between our tents.
Briefly, for a few blessed moment I was alone with my thoughts. I gave myself permission to assess how I was feeling about all this. Unfortunately my introspection didn’t go past base instincts.
I was tired. I was horny. The native girls who I’d at first had difficulty seeing as sexual creatures despite their near constant nudity began to look more and more appealing. They weren’t ugly just very primitive and removed from my world. The longer I stayed here though the further away seemed that world and I began to experience an erotic dimension in the busy rhythms of the village women. I liked watching them tend to their homes, to their families, I liked their soft dark eyes and the feminine tone of their musculature.
I chuckled internally at the fantasy of going native. Yes, I Alan Baird would become ‘Karakiki’ and along with my comely village bride raise a clan of strong clever lads that stood head and shoulders over their more compact brethren. I would learn the rhythms of the wood and forget the poison of asphalt and plastic.
Despite this amusing distraction I couldn’t in good conscience go around getting my dick wet. Horny wasn’t a problem I could solve. But I could and should take a nap.
The hammocks were in a tent thirty or so paces from the high-tech igloo.
O yeah! This felt fantastic. There was air conditioning and a fan to soothe my nerves and lull me to sleep with the gentle sway of the unorthodox bed.
7.5 Should be ready by tomorrow evening EST. Cheers and thanks for stopping by.
Contact and Shill!
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It was cold in the spook tent. I was in a cryogenic womb made from space age canvas, fiberglass, and fans.
It was dark save for the glow of monitors and the Christmas light array of blinking LEDs.
There in cramped quarters we traced the paths of several drones. It was a microcosm of full spectrum dominance. Sea, air, and land were at our fingertips. Yes, I said land.
I sat below the image of a grinning witch. The toy at my disposal was the HAG – I . High Agility Ground Intelligence or the Hag Eye.
These were devices as experimental as PLATO itself. I’d played with early iterations in a highly controlled environment. This was the wet test, Thornton wanted deployment data, and so here we were putting her through her paces.
Despite being glad for the feel of cool air I soon grew to hate it. The jungle outside was bad but this cramped, sterile, ice box was built for the comfort of machines, not men.
“Cut me a sample.” Cooks voice crackled in my headset.
The robotic spider never ceased to amaze me. My horizontal trajectory became vertical. Some of the multijointed legs flashed briefly in my field of vision. Then I behold the uppermost branches of the Kapok tree.
Ascending to the impressive height of a hundred and seventy some feet I paused before a patch of leaves. Briefly striking a hotkey combination engaged an automatic process. The reason for this tent was manifold. We were transmitting data back to a neural net in Langley. HAG – I was not only being tested but trained.
I watched in fascination as the little abomination adjusted itself and a slight mechanical whirring informed me that its tiny mechanical arms were coming online. A clamp and some sharp calipers emerged. The little circle of dots that appeared on my monitor informed me that calculations were under way.
Then slowly methodically the clamp extend and closed around a branch bearing the lance shaped leaves, and several pepper/nut like seed pods. It then proceeded to cut with the calipers just above initial grip. The branch came loose and Laura adjusted herself. I’d decided to call this particular HAG machine Laura after my exes mother.
A-Seq; Complete, the green font at the bottom of my screen informed me, I was pilot again. Slowly I made my way back down the trunk of the tree. Branch in hand mind you. Laura was primarily a surveillance device. There was no storage container. The only reason she’d been equipped with arms, and other tools, was in case there was a need for quick conversion for bomb diffusion.
We weren’t about to insect scuttle our way back across two and a half miles of jungle though. A few feet from the base of the Kapok sat a gaping mouth. The mouth was open and a little metal ramp led to the depths of the beasts bowels. Laura scuttled her way inside.
I switched to night vision. There was a darkened pad in the corner. I placed the branch on the pad. It opened and swallowed the sample. I pressed another hot key combination and watched as Laura took her place in the pen next to her sisters.
Though I couldn’t see it I knew that the gaping mouth monster closed its jaws and wheeled its way to the most open patch of canopy it could find. Schmidt’s aerial machine descended and attached itself to the calipers atop the mobile garage.
Our toys were homeward bound.
Unfortunately another short abomination. I work the AM shifts and have been waking up at eight/nine PM the past couple of days. Really hoping to resolve this bullshit soon. Probably going to post more than twice this week to make up for my constant cock ups. Cheers and thanks for reading.
I never got those Cubans. I felt better as predicted. There was also a fresh distraction to take my mind off physical woes.
It was the oddest thing. Watching the natives avoid Hoyt.
Apparently there wasn’t a medicine strong enough to purge whatever demon he had.
He never stopped smiling that same unpleasant Sphinx lip smile. His demand and tolerance for tobacco was disturbing. I swore he went through a pack and a half a day. None of our protests meant anything and not even Lobo was able to stop him from using some unknown connection supplying him with a crate of Pall Malls.
‘Wherever particular cacodemons congregate.’ I mused.
His accent was now 100% British but unlike any variation I’d heard before. I don’t know why he’d decided to pull a Madonna. But it was certainly creepy. And made creepier by the fact that he seemed to be trying to mask it.
Otherworldly influence certainly seemed the correct position. Given our line of work it wasn’t unlikely. But, given our line of work skepticism was in order. Martial grade psychedelic research for the express purpose of fashioning a new religion to nudge the herd from the cliff edge required scientific precision.
He did suffer a psychotic break at the lodge. Who knows what sorts of novel neural connections our various disciplines and chemical regimens produced. Who knows what sort of subliminals Thornton was implementing.
I chuckled briefly as I was transported back in time to my introductory philosophy course. I’d just reconsidered the brain in the vat hypothesis. What if our experience is merely a fantasy and we are all just brains in vats fed memories and experiences by some alien? I think this was a variation on something Descartes had theorized in a similar vein involving a demon.
What if we weren’t in the jungle at all but strapped to gurneys at some black site? Or catatonically entranced by some new electromagnetic gizmo at the lodge.
Well…I guess I didn’t feel entirely better. I’d downed a bottle of honey jack to allay the monotony of preparing for the first leg of the journey. The hangover certainly felt real.
The old man that the kid had gotten the planty tasting thing from shook his head as I passed to fetch a coffee from the mess tent.
It was going to be a long trek east towards some half guessed location. It had to be made on foot. Cook wasn’t about to toss away his opportunity to document jungle depths on Uncle Sam’s prodigious war dime. Furthermore there were preestablished, roads, circles, and ruins that had to be ugh…I think the word they used was activated…Thornton was definitely taking vision inducement seriously. The honeyjack was warranted.
What if I didn’t want to converse with my holy guardian angel? Angels are boring. The most boring concept of all an angel, a demon, really it is…it’s just a clerk with fancy keys. They can’t do anything outside of a certain determination…unlesss…anyway…
I felt water hit my face.
“AH!” … “Hey! Watch it fella…”
The elder was grinning. His fingers half-submerged in some other earthen bowl full of god knows what. Part of that whatness was now drops rolling down my cheek. Had he flicked it at me?
“What the hell are ya doin you goof…” I said trying to hide my annoyance. But I didn’t have to try for long. My hangover was gone.
I cocked back my head. The old man laughed, teetered, and mumbled.
“Uh…thank you.” I said.
He just stared at me. I remembered that Portuguese was probably a better choice. Though I wasn’t sure he spoke it either.
“Obrigado.”
The wizened head nodded in acknowledgement. His hand waved me on.
The healthy sized Professor was spreading a nice thick schmear on his breakfast bagel.
“Uh, who’s the geezer with all the potions?” I inquired.
“Not sure.” Cook said stirring his coffee.
“Well, he’s the Shaman right?”
Cook shook his head.
“Old man, weird, healing potions, talks about spirits…not a shaman?”
“Well, I suppose he probably is a shaman but he is not their shaman.”
“Come again?”
“They say that he’d emerged from the jungle in the middle of broad daylight. Nobody had seen him coming. He was alone and seemed harmless so they let him stay. They were glad they did.”
“How long ago was this?”
“About a month.”
“Doesn’t speak a word of Bakairi…or any related dialect…but seems to understand some Portuguese…weirdest damned thing….”
“Bakairi?”
“Yes, that’s the language here…these are the Bakairi.”
“Not Kuikuros?”
“You really ought to stop drinking Mr. Baird.”
“Not to be a bigot but…all these tribes look pretty similar to me.”
Cook laughed. “Really?”
“What?”
“I thought CIA was supposed to be observant.”
It was my turn to laugh… “I’m not CIA…and…hah…he..CIA is not observant.”
“That is hard to believe.”
“Donut dippers love to mythologize.”
“Well, the cultures around here also love to mythologize and though there is a common thread, the clothing, ritual, and customs vary greatly from tribe to tribe.”
“All I see are feathers, bowl cuts, and body paint.”
“Sure, but you wouldn’t call yourself Moldovan.”
“What?”
“Think about it, Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, even some parts of Central Asia all share the business suit. Generally eye and hair color stay within the same range. Social organization also has a very similar culture. Drop one of the Bakairi man in any of the aforementioned places and he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.”
“Yeah, I get that, but I mean this is more like the difference between a Welshman and a Scott…if that…hell this is more like…”
Cook sighed.
“I don’t blame you for neglecting one of my favorite disciplines. But really you did not note the thatched dress and the masks?”
“On occasion but again…doc…that ain’t my field.”
“Well, you’d better start taking an interest. We’re going to need many pairs of sharp eyes out there.”
“I’m not against it. You’re just going to have to help me put on the old anthropologist goggles.”
“Well, let’s start with something interesting then.”
“O?”
“Have you noticed how no one talks to Senhor Hoyt, how they disperse at his presence?”
“You bet.”
“Have you seen how all the Shamans the stranger included draw shapes in the ground in front of Senhor Hoyt?”
“No.”
“So you have not seen Senhor Hoyt invariably step around them?”
“Well, it would be rude to trample some recent graffiti.”
“Hmm.. I don’t know…but I do know what the Bakairi here call him…”
“O?”
“Kurâmã.”
“And that means…”
“It is hard to translate exactly…but…it means roughly…conceptually…demigod…”
I laughed so hard I shot coffee from my nose.
Well, I didn’t quite make my marathon as epic as I’d intended. But to be fair to my poor bones I did intend for five hours and completed four. In the update post I said I’d be awake till 3 AM. That would be seven hours. Woulda been badass but too much content reaching to make for a good read. Gonna catch some ZZZ’s, as concerns this story, see ya’ll Tuesday.
I awoke with a start. I was no longer floating. As I sat up I noticed that we had landed in front of a settlement.
Various porters were conveying our gear to what I assumed was the village square. There had already appeared a neat little stash of our alien looking wares beneath a grey canvas.
They must have decided to let me sleep. I suppose I was grateful for this. Every so often a deep fatigue would settle over me. The warm sticky air, the feeling of being swallowed in some great green blanket, it was a feeling of depth, of heaviness, and it drug me down.
I wasn’t the only one. Which is I suppose why they’d decided to extend a courteousy they no doubt wished to have reciprocated.
The ground that greeted my boots was muddy, it sank, but not overmuch. I mused on the now familiar sight of Indians – Kuikoros milling about in various states of undress and ornament as they had done for time immemorial.
It was odd to imagine that Fawcett had seen a nearly identical sight nearly a century prior. It was one of those things that made you feel part of a vast eternal sea. The sea of time, ever undulating, yet remaining one.
I was suddenly struck with panic. What if this deep fatigue was the result of some infection? I hastily inspected any readily bare portions of flesh for ticks, or bites of any sort. True, we had been thoroughly inoculated but didn’t put my mind any more at ease.
We were in an ocean of trees, and neither boats, nor helicopters seemed sufficient insurance.
“You look like hell.” Lucas said.
“Yea…I’m not sure about this.”
“Me either…but…since we’re here you should probably follow Lobo’s advice and refrain from drinking. I’m sure it’s not helping matters.”
“Alcohol cleans the blood Schmidt. This place is crawling with parasites.”
“Trying to keep your precious American fluids clean?”
“Always.”
A kid ran up to us and just stood there staring out of rich dark eyes. He muttered something and ran off before we could respond. We ignored it.
The village wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with outsiders but its remoteness meant that the appearance of brancos was rare enough to make us a novelty.
“So, really…. what’s up? I mean I’ve never known you to be pensive.”
“I just feel really tired. Like something is sucking the life right out of me.”
“Dude, it’s called a hangover.”
I was getting annoyed. I really hadn’t been drinking that much.
“It could be any number of things. When I got excited for this I didn’t consider the fact that I might die shitting myself or muttering in the grips of yellow fever. I don’t want a weak statistical death.”
Lucas laughed. “I see that you still have your Viking complex.”
“Absolutely, I watched that man die slow, wither up like a shit stained raisin…no way man…”
No sooner had I entered into this reverie then the kid returned holding some sort of earthen bowl.
He extend it up to me and muttered something.
“Yo,” I said lapsing into American pseudo-urbanism, “I ain’t about to start this party with poisoning.”
“Don’t be rude.” Lucas said motioning for Cook to join us.
The squat bespectacled pit bull sauntered over.
“Yes?”
“Tell us what he wants.” Lucas said.
Cook engaged in some native banter and then pointed off to a nearby hut at the front of which sat an old man before a small fire. The man regarded us calmly.
“They say you have a demon.”
Lucas laughed again. “I think they’re a bit mixed up. We’re NATO boys…we are demons.”
Cook didn’t seem amused. “Look, things here work a little differently, there’s stuff in the air, I know it sounds insane, but I’d listen to them, especially if you don’t feel right…you certainly don’t look right…”
I threw up my hands.
“You should drink it.” Lucas said.
“Dude…hell no…I have no idea what that is…”
“Please, Mr. Baird drink it…I assure you that it will not harm you…we do not want to alienate these folks…please take the gift…”
“What the hell is in it…”
“I wasn’t really able to gather but I’m pretty sure it’s nothing more exotic than some Guarana blend. It’s not so much the actual chemistry…it’s the spirit they infuse into it…”
I was getting tired of this woo. And I felt like shit…so fuck it….
I drank it up. It was bitter but the bitterness soon resolved into a sort of pleasant plantiness that tickled my tongue.
“Did you like it?” Lucas asked.
I shrugged.
The kid smiled and scampered off.
“If you don’t feel better in a couple of hours I’ll give you three of my Cubans.”
“It’s a deal.”
I have to eat crow again and make excuses for falling short of my posting goals. The good news is I have four days in which to research and write the rest of this chapter. Thanks for your patience and stay tuned.
There is an ennui. It is the nagging suspicion that everything has been mapped. It’s that claustrophobic sensation that all serious mysteries have been surmounted.
What is one to do with wanderlust?
In the Amazon all such worries evaporate. The explorer whose footsteps we were tracing had called it “the last great blank space in the world.”
Henry Percival Fawcett, his son, and a family friend had disappeared somewhere round the Xingu National Park. The vanity of early twentieth century exploration had certainly spelled doom for that vastly inadequate force. Fawcett did not want to suffer the fate of Scott who had glory stolen from him by Amundsen. Towards this end he had provided false coordinates.
The real goal lay somewhere between the Tapajos and the Xingu tributaries. A fact that was uncovered by the unlikely David Grann a nebbish news hound in 2005.
All these years and that statement “the last great blank space in the world” remains as salient as ever. Despite satellite imaging, drones, and the whole blasted litany of high-tech abominations… that thick impenetrable canopy still hid as much as it had in Carvajals time and many aeons prior.
It was a rare treat. I blessed Thornton for the opportunity as these thoughts ran through my head. The mystic sensations swirled round me like the currents round the aluminum hull of the twenty-five foot outboard driven boat that served as my bed.
We were following in the footsteps of Expedition Fawcett and Expedition Lynch. The latter having occurred in 1995 was more closely aligned with our current method. Much as it had appeared those two and nearly half decades prior…that was the state of the jungle. Overgrown. So we had to proceed up the Xingu by boat and have our supplies air dropped in the field next to Kuikuros settlement.
Although it was an altogether different Kuikuros settlement, an altogether different dead horse camp, because we followed the true coordinates from Fawcett’s diary rather than those published in Expedition Fawcett.
We were not after Fawcett, we’d be thrilled to learn of his real fate, to find his bones, but what we sought was far more elusive. What we sought was not some dead mans fate but what Fawcett had sought: The Lost City of Z or rather its method. If this seem unduly cryptic I apologize and promise that it will become clear soon enough. My circuitous methods may be unsavory to some but there is a reason for them.
It is difficult to piece together these mad events so many years after their occurence. More difficult still after the chemical lobotomy I’d narrowly thwarted at the facility. I do remember the salient details. Yes, many of them are too deeply buried in esoteric contexts that too few could fathom. But the core of what I communicate should help bolster our flailing humanity despite such hurdles.
Hoyt’s map that was the key. It was what Fawcett had been missing. Even if Fawcett had found the actual location of Z he would never have been able to enter it. This was not a labyrinth that could be decrypted. And so it was that the old Portuguese map Graham’s ancestor had pilfered from RGS had found its way into the hands of P.L.A.T.O. the organisation most suited to implement it.
As the gangly scion of that weird little Cambridge club played strange airs on the guitar I fell into even stranger dreams.
NOTE – I know that I promised in my last post to start making these longer and I will! Bad habits die hard but die they will. As I promised I will post again on Monday. I’m hoping for at least a quarter of a chapter. I hoped you enjoyed what I was able to muster and see you soon!
Annual eye exam means dilation which means two hours of potential research time gone to the blur!
As we proceeded topside Harris chuckled.
“That was a mighty fine speech you gave. You should have taken on the cloth.”
“I do not fancy my fathers profession.”
“A nice parish in the country? That is not favorable to scurvy and the sword?”
“The parish is worms and dust. It is stifling to both mind and spirit. There are such vistas both mortal and metaphysic…that to burrow ones nose in the narrow confines of Saxon renderings of oriental myths is a crime against God.”
“You call the Bible a myth? I’m sure the senior Halstead would make one out of your hide for that.”
“He already has.” I said musing on the steady application of physical discipline by that tall, thin, ascetic thing I called father. I owed him much in the way of education but was very glad on the day that I put distance between myself and that holy terror.
“So that’s why you took so warmly to those diabolists in Boston.”
It was my turn to chuckle.
“Diabolists?”
“They have quite the reputation.”
“Yes, I’m sure that all the superstitious babblers fancy us the new Salem. But to imagine George as a diabolist…well that is some devilry indeed.”
“Is that the portly fellow?”
“Yes, portlier and jollier than you, more patient then a saint….more generous than the Samaritan.”
“So what is it that you do there?”
“That’s the thing I’ve told you and we’ve told the whole town a million times over. We collect books, curiosities, and entertain ideas…that’s all besides a good bit of mutton and beer. Perhaps some take to whoring more often than is proper but how uncommon is that in a port city? Does not the governor himself that pious picture of Protestant virtue…. not entertain more beauties than the king of France?”
“Tis true.”
“So why do you keep asking?”
“It’s just there’s so much seen round that Inn, so many odd folks, and lights, and voices.”
“Well what do you expect from a party if not folks, and lights, and voices.”
“Well…some have said they’ve seen fairies….” Harris said sheepishly.
“You are a fairy you great port barrel fool.” I said gripping his neck and rubbing my knuckles into his bald head. I also had my father’s height to thank for this capacity to molest the crowns of my fellows. I suppose that’s one more thing I could thank him for.
“Alright, alright! hands off you spindly monstrosity, before I sit on you.”
“Ooooff…” I exploded. “That is certain death!” And released him.
“So what do you think old Death will make of this Canaries business?”
“I rather think he will agree.”
“Really!”
“Yes, you noted yourself, the change in him. He is no longer as keen on politics and service as he is on the Contemplation of God.”
“He has gone a bit queer hasn’t he.”
“Shhh….” I said putting my finger to my lips. “We just passed his new lodging.”
“Ah! I always forget he gave up his quarters to that magician. Besides aren’t we about to meet him topside.”
“You can never be certain and…Magician?”
“Yes, that’s how I’ve come to think of him…you know like from the Bible…the magi…”
This statement threw me into a heady flurry of thought that was as brisk as the salt air that kissed my face as we emerged topside onto the deck.
I don’t know why I confided in her. I guess it wasn’t anything important. There was no way this was a breach of security. Who cares if she knew about Sam’s vision. High ranking academics like Cook and Bohm were of course privy to the true nature of our presence. She didn’t have that clearance.
Anna and I were the last to be sitting around the fire that final night. She was calm and looking forward to getting back to Cuiaba for a proper shower. I was slightly inebriated. Something in the feminine prosody of her voice made me open up.
“You know,” I said, “I’ve been having the most fucked up dreams.”
“Hmmm…?” She queried midsip.
“You know just those really vivid things….that come like pictures…of really different kinda shit…but somehow seem to have a certain logic?”
“O you haven’t dreamed of a panther have you?” She asked with genuine curiosity.
“No…but Graham had a massive freakout at Luckadoo’s…cause of a picture with a jaguar…”
“Luckadoo’s? That’s a funny name…”
“It’s not important.” I said quickly shifting the conversation away from a classified subject. “What makes ya ask? Did you?”
“Well…no not personally but you shouldn’t be afraid if you had…it’s considered good luck by the Achuar.”
“The Achuar?”
“They’re a tribe from the Amazon basin, not far removed from our position relatively speaking, but…uh yea.. they are unique in that they place a special prominence on dreams. Each morning they wake up before dawn and drink a tea that they then spit up for purposes of purification. After this they each describe their dreams to one another. The world of dream is considered more important than the waking world. It is their reality. This notion has been implicated in their survival as a people in this harsh environment. Very, very fascinating from an anthropological standpoint.”
“And they think jaguars or panthers are uh good luck?”
“Well, it’s a bit more complicated than that. The panther is a manifestation of the spirit of the rainforest…something that they call “Arutam” and it seems that your friend saw this before you guys came down here. That’s the strange guy right…the tall one…? What exactly happened?”
“Tell me more about these tribespeople.” I said deflecting again.
“Umm…well not long ago or relatively not long ago they had dreams about us “the people of the north, the people of the eagle” we’re called that because we are technology and mind oriented whereas they the people of the condor are more imagination and heart oriented. Anyway, the interesting part was that they dreamed something malign coming from us just as Peru, Bolivia, etc were talking with powerful companies about oil extraction. These dreams that they take seriously as a sort of divination and navigation tool stirred them to action. They formed a coalition with missionaries and local tribes to protect their area. It was effective. So it looks like the Arutam was with them and if you saw it…or weirdo saw it well that’s a good sign. They say that one day the eagle and the condor will fly together.”
“Hmm…well…that’s nice…and I don’t mean to be a prick…but I’d like to have good dreams tonight so I’ll leave on that note.”
“But…hold on I’m curious about Graham…”
“Ok I lied the real reason I have to go is that I can’t bear to sit next to a pretty girl, beside a dwindling fire, and not try something. It’s maddening…like castration of the sou…”
She laughed. “Well then…you’d better go unless you want to feel a real castration.”
“Right.” I said and shuffled off to my tent.
‘Phew.’ I breathed a sigh of relief. Any longer and I might have spilled the whole tale.
I fell asleep before my head hit the pillow.
That night I did indeed experience good dreams. A sort of Wizards nod. I awoke the next morning knowing precisely what I was about.
End of Part II
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Two days to departure and I watched Graham like a hawk. There was something that I couldn’t place. Yes, by now it’s well established to the point of tedium that he was decidedly freaky. But there was a fresh aura of mischief about him now.
That silent placid gaze in which nothing could be read but everything was mocked. The thin cruel smile that was unsettlingly familiar yet unplaceable.
I even decided to try a trick. He was reading something a few yards away. I fetched a loaded Colt from the arsenal.
Removing my shoes I slowly crept behind him. I was absolutely certain that the ambient noise of the jungle masked any stray noise that escaped my stride. I’d taken the safety off yards and yards away. I’d already cocked.
I stood a mere ten feet behind him. I aimed directly at his head and allowed my finger to tease the trigger.
Fluidly, he turned his head so that I was able to see that smile in profile. “And what’s the point of that?”
I was momentarily lost. “Just testing your situational awareness.”
Hoyt laughed in a hollow amused sort of way. “There are more situations to be aware of than you can possibly imagine.
I believed him.
“Graham,” I said. “What happened back at the lodge.”
“Well, you know already. I dreamed about a jaguar and had a stimulant induced seizure. Because of Sam’s picture. Right?”
“Yes…but…” Something kept me from prodding further. Like an invisible sucking drain that drew away all will to know.
Hoyt just regarded me with the same cold amusement.
“Nevermind.” I said departing and he returned to his reading.
There was a blankness in my mind. There had been something strange about his terse sentences. Each word, each phrase, its order, its cadence took root somewhere deep in the spine and suggested vistas and chains beyond all reckoning. I wasn’t the only one that felt this way.
I didn’t mind accidentally killing him during that test. That’s what I found the oddest. It was like he was a nonperson. It wasn’t even hatred or disgust or any such thing. There was something in me that wanted to join oblivion with oblivion. Of course I couldn’t because oblivion had become flesh.
‘I guess I’ll just let zero unfold.’ I said as I drew an ankh in the dirt.
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“Well that there along the side…you see it…the sort of interlocking thing…yes…” I said running my finger along the edge. “That is the tree of life – the world tree…”
“Like in the Bible.”
“Somewhat..though this is a Yakut story likely given our guests origin…and the pearl atop really seals it as belonging to that tradition – the white mother.”
I watched the Turk. I knew that he understood English. Yet nothing that I said. Things that I was sure were familiar to him. Nothing of that had caused so much as the hint of a tinge of a change in expression.
In my experience Turks were usually lively. Maybe it was his role as guest rather than host that caused his ascetic reticence. Yet…no…that couldn’t be it. There was something off about this man.
He had not given any explanation of the strange box that he had insisted we help him pry from the Spanish. He said that they had stolen it. Though how they had effected that given its nature was beyond me. I suppose this was a problem of language. He had probably been taken together with the box and when we had first liberated him had gotten separated.
His face bore many marks of abuse. Apparently he had been ill treated. The Castilians are as hot blooded as the Moors and I wouldn’t put a single travesty past them once they were under the influence of zeal.
“Timurhan…” I said as gently as I could. “You know that we are men of faith…not the faith of Spain…no…we are not papists..we are free Englishmen and you will receive no coercion or abuse at our hands. As far as we are concerned your soul and your secrets belong to you and to God. That being said…we are mortals…and most curious about the nature of your treasure…is there any chance that you would share your knowledge…”
Timurhan sat in silence for eternities. Then he motioned for some parchment.
After some scribbling he handed it to me.
It was a series of dots appearing off the coast of Africa.
“You wish to sail to the Canaries?” I asked.
He nodded slowly.
Van Yost gave a low whistle.
“That is thousands and thousands of miles off course…” Harris began.
I held up my hand.
“Timurhan if we take you to the Canaries…will you sate our foolish lust for knowledge?”
Again the Berber nodded slowly.
“Well that is hardly an incentive…” Harris guffawed.
This was true. What I had difficulty in ascertaining was why the Spaniards had dragged him all the way to the Americas.
“I can see that you are a man of devotion…Allah has blessed you with a gift for silence…but I fear you may be misusing it. I do not mind the box so much now as I mind knowing what it is that finds you in Florida?”
This time he responded quickly in surprisingly good English. “I had been fooled. Those papal dogs had promised safe Harbor in the colonies. That is where I was bound before my fool of a captain got captured by your countrymen. Then the Spaniards freed me. Then you in turn put me back in English hands. They lied to me. Are you now lying to me also?”
I took a few moments to process this barrage of words.
“Well, I have promised nothing, I have simply inquired as to what would get you to part with your wisdom. I am not an honest man and I believe that statement lends me virtue. I avoid lying but as I have said I am carnal and as subject to sin as any. I will lie for days for my country for my family even for a fatter wage. Now I have bared myself to you.”
“So you have.” The berber said with the air of one considering some words.
“Now, tell me honored guest why is it that you sought the new world and now wish to return to the old? You are not setting a trap for us. Those are in effect the Caliphs waters…”
“The original project is now impossible due to politics…and I must return to perform a certain rite. I guarantee that you will not be molested so long as I am sent in advance with Solomon’s gift.”
“Solomon’s gift?”
“Yes, you have doubtless heard of Solomon.”
“Indeed.”
“This was gift..from the Queen of Sheba.”
“Is that all.” Harris quipped.
The Turk resumed his silence as if in penance for giving up too much too quickly. Well, that was good enough. There was much to discuss and I set off to find the Captain.
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