Both Pepe and Eulogio went stiff, their faces frozen as memories of ancient tales stirred, brought to life by the sight of these stone warriors.
For a long moment no one said anything, overawed by the immensity of the hall, the gravity of the silent stone guards. Even Rick, who revered nothing and whose interest in ancient cultures was nil, seemed to sense something—a solemnity, perhaps. There was no hint of danger; rather it was as if they had intruded on a sacred place, a place meant for peace.
Jorge walked over to the foot of one of the figures and stared up at it. Tentatively he reached out and fingered the stone. “Who are they?” he finally whispered, his voice full of wonder and curiosity. Even though he had whispered, the vast expanse of the hall caught the sound and amplified it, so the words were perfectly audible.
Jillian was still trembling and leaning against Ben’s strength. “I think they really must be . . . the Amazons,” she replied in the same wondering tone, as if this was more than she could take in. Ben knew just how she felt. He still hadn’t completely recovered from his initial shock on seeing them.
Her mind was whirling, trying to cover all the angles, consider all the ramifications of what the existence of these statues meant. How had these women warriors come to be here, in the South American jungle? The Amazons were myth, nothing more. They were supposedly a tribe of warrior women who had once a year bred with a neighboring tribe of men in order to produce offspring, and who had fought for Troy in the Trojan War. No proof had ever been found that even hinted at their true existence, any more than proof of Atlantis had ever been found. Both were just myths.
And yet. . . here they were. In a place where there was no logical reason for their existence. How could the mythology of ancient Greece have somehow reached deep into these jungles, when there were entire tribes who had never seen a white person, or been exposed to any form of outside civilization until only a few years before? How could these statues be based on Greek mythology? Or was it just a similarity? Had tribes of warrior women once existed on both continents?
A tantalizing possibility was that somehow the Greek tales were based on the Anzar. Who knew how long the Anzar had existed? Perhaps, untold thousands of years before, some ancient wanderer had come across these female warriors and returned to his own land with the seeds of a myth.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered.
“Yeah, I know. That’s close to what I thought when I saw them,” Ben said. “The sepulcher is at the far end.” He used his flashlight to show the way, but the hall was too long for the light to penetrate to the tomb.
The party trooped down the huge stone hallway, dwarfed by the dimensions of the hall itself as well as the rows of silent guards. Any talking was still done in whispers, as if anything louder would disturb the sanctity of the place.
Then they reached the sepulcher, and the combined beams of their flashlights played over the tomb, over the bas-relief on the top. Jillian caught her breath at the male features etched in stone: strong, roughly handsome, calm and sure even in the long sleep of death. This was a man who would give his life without hesitation, without doubt, in defense of the woman he loved. This was a man for whom a woman would grieve a lifetime, around whom legends were woven. There was no hint of where the queen’s tomb might be, but in the niche over the sepulcher was the place where she had left her heart, the heart of a warrior, to stand guard over her beloved through all eternity.
An empty, dusty niche.
Unable to help herself, trembling with relief, she turned her face into Ben’s shoulder, and his arms came strongly around her. Thank God there was no Empress, she thought, no huge red diamond to endanger their lives with its worth. Kates wouldn’t be interested in the statues, no matter how revolutionary they would be to the world of archaeology. They were of stone, without inherent value except as what they represented, and taken out of the context of the Anzar they were worthless. Each would weigh hundreds of pounds, probably half a ton or more, so they would be impossible to transport even if they did have a monetary value. Later on, once their existence was recorded and their context known, they would, like the Mona Lisa, be beyond price, but in this case value depended on the world knowing about them exactly as they were now, in their original setting.
Kates had shone his flashlight across the floor, looking at the footprints Ben had left earlier. He walked to the sepulcher and peered behind it.
“Watch out for snakes,” Ben said casually.
Kates squeezed behind the tomb and shone the flashlight on the niche for closer observation. He ran his finger through the dust.
“Evidently there was a real Empress stone,” Jillian said, finally finding enough strength in her legs to stand away from Ben. He seemed reluctant to release her, keeping his hand on the small of her back. “But there’s no way of telling how long it has been gone or who took it. Since nothing else has been disturbed, it’s likely the Anzar took it with them wherever they went.”
“Well, if this goddamn tomb is so important, why didn’t they take it with them, too?” Kates demanded. He was in a savage temper, and restraining it with difficulty.
Jillian eyed the sepulcher. It had to be eight feet long, or more. “There’s no telling what it weighs, and it would be impossible to move it through the tunnel, anyway. From what I’ve seen, the Anzar didn’t die out; it looks as if they left this place, carrying their personal goods and treasures with them. All that they left behind, other than a few pots, was this temple.”
“What good is a stone tomb?” Kates yelled, his face twisting with rage at finding his dream of riches turn to nothing but dust. “And these goddamn stone statues?”
“You knew this trip was a gamble,” Ben said coolly. “Nothing in the jungle is a sure thing.”
Kates looked ready to explode, a muscle in his jaw trembling and his fists clenched. He was sick at the thought of the money he’d spent, the money he owed . . . the people he owed it to. His eyes fell on the tomb. “Maybe there’s something inside,” he said.
Jillian jerked visibly at the idea of disturbing the sepulcher. “Not likely,” she forced herself to say. “They didn’t leave anything of value that we’ve been able to find. No gold, no silver; nothing.”
His tenuous control broke again. “Goddamm it, there has to be something!”
“Look around,” she said sharply. “Do you see anything with even silver plating? There’s nothing. If there was a treasure, they took it with them. It’s gone. Maybe the Anzar were absorbed into the Incan culture; maybe that’s what made the Inca culture so rich. Whatever happened, there’s nothing here now.”
He looked dazed, sick. “There has to be,” he mumbled.
She waved her hand, indicating the surroundings. “Not that I can see.”
Kates turned away and walked hurriedly toward the entrance, the beam of his flashlight bobbing. Dutra followed, but the rest of them remained in the temple, still awed by what they had found.
“Shouldn’t you be taking some pictures?” Ben prompted, smiling at her.
Amazed that she could have forgotten, she began fumbling with her camera, but her hands were shaking so much she couldn’t hold it steady. “I can’t,” she finally said raggedly, looking up at him. “I’m shaking too hard. Can you do it for me while I take notes?”
He took the camera from her, while she described how it worked. It was an “idiot” camera, with automatic everything, so simple to use anyone could operate it—assuming the idiot could hold it steady, which at the moment was beyond her. All Ben had to do was aim and press the button. The automatic flash and focus would take care of everything else.
He took several of the tomb, then walked from statue to statue while Jillian scribbled hasty notes by the light of a flashlight clumsily tucked under her arm. What amazed her even more, now that she noticed it, was that the statues all had subtly different features. That made her think these were statues of actual women, perhaps women who had in truth stood guard over the warrior’s tomb. Th
eir individuality made the statues all the more precious, unequaled anywhere else in the world.
“Happy?” Ben asked, looking down at her.
She turned a brilliant smile on him. “‘Happy’ isn’t the word for it.”
“I thought you’d like them.”
“I never, never thought there’d be anything like this. These will be even more famous than the Elgin Marbles.”
He gave her a quizzical look. “Some guy collected old marbles?”
She gave a low laugh. “Marble statues, not shooting marbles.”
“Well, that makes more sense.” He grinned, unabashed.
“Senhor! Senhor, look.”
The urgent call came from Jorge, who had dug his fingers into a crack in the stone and was tugging with all his strength. “Senhor, I think it’s a door.”
Jillian’s heart leaped into her throat as they all went over to investigate Jorge’s find. It did indeed look like the outline of a door, arched at the top. But tug as they might from any point, the stone door didn’t budge.
“Try pushing on it,” she suggested.
Ben placed both hands on the right edge and obeyed. Nothing happened. He moved to the left and pushed again. The stone slab creaked. He gave her an exasperated look and bent his strength to the door. Slowly the narrow slab creaked open, stone grinding against stone, and cool air rushed at them.
“It’s another tunnel,” Ben said, shining his flashlight into the darkness beyond. “So they did have more than one exit.”
“Shall we follow it?” she asked.
“Not now; we don’t have time. Let’s finish taking the pictures so we can get back to camp before dark.”
It was sunset when the group left the temple. Jillian was surprised that Rick had remained with them, but he had been amazingly interested. He fell into step beside her on the walk back.
“This is what Dad was trying to find when he was killed?” he asked after several minutes of silence.
“Yes. Proof of the Anzar.”
“So he wasn’t a crackpot?”
“No. His head may have been in the clouds, but his feet were definitely on the ground.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Have these pictures printed up; notify the Brazilian government. This will clear Dad’s name. Archaeologists will be swarming over this site soon, and it will all be because of Dad and his work.”
He was quiet for a while longer. “Then I’m glad you found it, even if there isn’t any treasure or anything.”
“There is a treasure,” she said gently. “It just isn’t the type of treasure you expected.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Rick let himself drop back, evidently having said all he’d intended to say. Since she had risked her life to save his, his hostility toward her had disappeared, but he seemed ill at ease with her, as if they were two strangers forced to converse. She was glad that he no longer seemed to so bitterly resent her, even hate her, but she accepted that they would never be close. They were too different, without even the common memories of childhood to bind them together. Rick had been so wildly resentful when the professor married her mother that he had effectively sealed himself off from the family, with only minimal contact between himself and his new stepmother and, later, even less with Jillian. By the time she was old enough to really notice things, Rick had already moved out.
As soon as they reached the camp, Rick began telling Kates about the new tunnel they had found, but Kates didn’t seem interested. He growled at Rick to shut up and took himself off to his tent. Rick shrugged and went over to the other men, who were settling down for a card game.
Jillian sat and wrote, totally absorbed in her thoughts as she explored various theories of the statues’ existence. The ramifications were so enormous that she couldn’t absorb them all. This opened up possibilities that seemed ludicrous, completely unreal. But the statues were very real; she had seen them, she had them on film. Perhaps, with careful exploration of the surrounding area, more information on the Anzar would come to light and their history would be known. She would have liked very much to know what happened to them. What had caused them to leave this place, and where had they gone? Had the tribe consisted only of women, or were the statues only of women because women had, for some reason, been dominant? If they had bred with a tribe of men, who were those men? Where had they lived? Were the men responsible for the disappearance of the Anzar? Had the two tribes simply merged, and if so, what had happened to them?
So many questions, and all of them fascinating.
It was later than usual when she retired to her tent, her mind still whirling. The men still sat outside, talking and laughing. She almost immediately began to doze, rather than lying awake for most of the night as she had thought she would. She couldn’t remember ever having felt this happy before.
16
Ben slipped silently out of camp the next morning before dawn, while the others still slept. Unless he missed his guess, Kates wouldn’t see any point in prolonging the stay here, since there obviously wasn’t any treasure to be looted. It would be smart to retrieve the Empress while he had the chance.
In the camp Kates, who hadn’t slept well all night, woke just in time to peer through his open tent flaps and see Ben disappear from view. He frowned; just what was that son of a bitch up to? He got his pistol and crawled out, then went over to Dutra’s tent, taking care to make as little noise as possible. “Dutra!” he hissed.
The snoring from within missed a beat, then resumed. “Dutra!” Kates said again. “Wake up, damn it.”
The snoring stopped, and Kates could hear the movement of Dutra’s massive body as he sat up. “What?” came the sullen rumble.
“Lewis just sneaked out of camp. I’m going to follow him. If you hear any shots, you know what to do.”
“Yes,” Dutra said.
Kates didn’t bother with any further explanation but went after Lewis, trying not to lose sight of the thin beam of light he could see, now that Lewis was away from the camp. He didn’t trust Lewis out of his sight, and all night he had been thinking about the fact that Lewis had been in the temple alone before telling any of them about it. If the diamond had been there, would he have just left it there, or would he have taken it? Kates knew damn well what he would have done under the same circumstances, so why would Lewis have done anything differently? Lewis had never struck him as a man who played by the rules.
After Kates had left, Dutra crawled out of his own tent and stood silently with his pistol in his huge fist, his sharp incisors showing in a smile of cruel anticipation.
Rick, in the tent closest to Dutra, rolled over with a grunt, then settled into sleep again.
Pepe and Eulogio had both awoken at the first sound of Kates’s urgent whispers. They lay very still in the darkness.
Jillian awoke suddenly, to an odd sensation of alarm. She listened, concentrating very hard. She couldn’t hear anything close to her tent, but she could hear . . . something. Breathing. Had some predator negotiated one of the tunnels? Not likely, she thought. There was absolutely no light in the tunnels, and no animal would willingly go where it couldn’t see. She reached for her flashlight, thinking of unzipping her tent flap a little and shining it on whatever was out there.
The others snored peacefully.
Ben went down on one knee and brushed the dirt away from the handkerchief-wrapped diamond, then carefully lifted it out of its hiding place. He removed the handkerchief and shook it out, so he wouldn’t have so much grit inside his shirt, then rewrapped the diamond in the cloth.
“I thought you were up to something,” Kates said viciously behind him.
“Shit,” Ben muttered, even as he automatically threw himself to the ground, dropping the flashlight as he did so, but he sure as hell didn’t drop the Empress. Kates fired at him, missing in the darkness.
* * *
At the camp, everyone came awake at the sound of the gunshot and began scrambling out of the tents. Pepe and Eulogi
o sliced open the rear of their tents and slithered out of view. Vicente was the first one out, and with a grin Dutra shot him in the head.
The sound of a shot rang out from the camp, echoing around the bowl. Ben’s blood froze in his veins even as he drew his pistol. Jillian! He fired at Kates, but didn’t take the time to aim. His shot went wide, though it served the purpose of making Kates hit the dirt. Ben scrambled up and started for the camp at a dead run, knowing that the poor light and heavy brush would give him cover. He’d take care of Kates later. Right now he had to get to Jillian.
Jillian was the second one out of the tents. Dutra pinned her with that animal grin but held his fire, thinking how much he would enjoy her in a few minutes. Jorge scrambled out and Dutra fired at him, but missed as Jorge dodged to the side. Behind him, Rick was already halfway out of his tent, his eyes wide with confusion. He saw Vicente, saw Dutra standing there with the pistol in his hand, saw Jillian, and yelled, “Jillian! Run!” even as Dutra swung on him. At such close range, Dutra couldn’t miss. The first slug caught Rick in the middle of the chest and slammed him to the ground. He didn’t even twitch at the second one. Jillian was frozen for one horrified second; then she dived into the foliage. She crawled, scrambling on her hands and knees, Ben’s instructions ringing in her ears: Head for the tunnel. Don’t let them get in ahead of you. Run like hell. Ben! she thought despairingly. Oh, God, Ben! She would do what he said and get out, but if he didn’t follow shortly she would take her chances and return.
Shots were still ringing out. Then there was an eerie silence.
She reached the tunnel and flung herself into the darkness, running blindly and crashing into the wall before she remembered the flashlight in her hand. She didn’t turn it on, for it would have targeted her if anyone was right behind her. Instead she placed one hand on the stone wall and used it for guidance, stumbling on the wide, shallow steps as if she truly were blind. She closed her eyes and found it was easier, as if the total darkness confused her brain when her eyes were open. She waited until her senses told her she had gone around a curve before she switched on the flashlight. The light seemed obscenely bright after the utter black, and at the same time very weak, a small effort against the overpowering night.