“Which was probably the point,” Sam replied. “Doing that to six men while unarmed tends to create an impression.”
“Indeed. Within a week, he was serving as a bodyguard for a rich Irishman on safari; within a month, he’d started his own guide business. As good as he was with his hands, he was even better with the Henry. Where other European guides and hunters were using big-bore hunting rifles, Blaylock could take down a charging Cape buffalo—a mbogo—with one shot from his Henry.
“About two months after Blaylock arrived, he contracted malaria and spent six weeks on his back near death while his two mistresses—Maasai women who worked in Bagamoyo—nursed him back to health. While Morton never came out and said as much, Blaylock’s brush with death seemed to have left him slightly . . . touched in the head.
“After the malaria Blaylock would disappear for months on end on what he called ‘vision quest expeditions.’ He lived with the Maasai, took concubines, studied with witch doctors, lived alone in the bush, hunted for King Solomon’s mines and Timbuktu, dug fossils in Olduvai Gorge, followed the trail of Mansa Musa, hoping to find his staff of gold . . . There’s even an anecdote that claims Blaylock was the one who found David Livingstone first. According to Morton’s account, Blaylock sent a runner to Bagamoyo to alert Henry Morton Stanley; shortly after that the pair had their famous ‘Dr. Livingstone, I presume’ moment near Lake Tanganyika.”
“So if we’re to believe Morton,” Remi said, “Winston Lloyd Blaylock was the Indiana Jones of the nineteenth century.”
Sam smiled. “Hunter, explorer, hero, mystic, Casanova, and indestructible savior all rolled into one. But this is all from Morton’s biography, right?”
“Right.”
“By the way, we’re assuming Morton was named after the Morton—as in Henry Morton Stanley?”
“Right again. In fact, according to the family tree in the back of the book, all of Blaylock’s direct descendants were named after Africa in some fashion—the places, the history, the larger-than-life characters . . .”
“If you got all this from the biography, what about the journal you mentioned?” asked Sam.
“I used the word ‘journal’ for lack of a better term. In fact, it’s a potpourri: diary, field sketchbook . . .”
“Can we see it?”
“If you’d like. It’s in the vault.” Off the workspace, Selma had a temperature- and humidity-controlled archive area. “It’s in bad shape—insect-eaten, soiled, water-damaged pages stuck together. Pete and Wendy are working on the restoration. We’re photographing and digitizing what pages we can before we start work on the damaged portions. There’s one more thing: It appears the journal also served as Blaylock’s captain’s log.”
“Pardon me?” Remi said.
“While he never mentions the Shenandoah or the El Majidi, many of his entries clearly indicate he was at sea, on and off, for long periods. Blaylock does, however, mention Ophelia quite often.”
“In what context?”
“She was his wife.”
“THAT WOULD EXPLAIN his obsession, I suppose,” Sam said. “Not only did he mentally rename the Shenandoah, he also carved Ophelia’s name into the bell.”
“Ophelia is a distinctly un-African name,” Remi said. “It had to be the name of his wife back in the U.S.”
Selma nodded. “There’s no mention of her in the biography. And he never speaks in detail about her in the journal—just little snippets everywhere. Whether he was simply yearning for her or it’s something more, I don’t know, but she was never far from his mind.”
“Are there dates in the journal?” asked Sam. “Anything we can cross-reference with Morton’s biography?”
“In both books, only months and years are used; in the journal, those are far and few between. We’re trying to do some matching, but it’s turning up discrepancies. For example, we found a time where in the biography he’s trekking in the Congo, while according to the journal he’s at sea. It’s slow going so far.”
“Something doesn’t add up,” said Sam.
“Just one thing?” Remi replied. “My list is longer than that.”
“Mine too. But on the captain’s log angle: If we’re thinking Blaylock might have been at sea aboard the Shenandoah—El Majidi, I mean—then we’ve got a contradiction. By all accounts, after the Sultan of Zanzibar bought the Shenandoah in 1866 he all but abandoned her at anchor until she was destroyed either in 1872 or 1879. I think someone would have noticed her missing.”
“Good point,” Selma said, jotting down a note. “Another point of curiosity: Sultan Majid died in October 1870 and was succeeded by his brother and bitter rival, Sayyid Barghash bin Said. By default, he became the owner of El Majidi. Some historians find it curious that Sayyid didn’t change the ship’s name, let alone keep it around.”
Sam added, “Can we put together a time line of the Shenandoah/ El Majidi? Be easier to visualize the events.”
Selma picked up the phone and dialed the archive room. “Wendy, can you throw together a rough time line of the Shenandoah/El Majidi? Thanks.”
“We also need to find out more about Blaylock’s life before Africa,” Remi said.
“I’m working on that as well,” said Selma. “I reached out to an old friend who might be able to help.”
Wendy stepped out of the archive room, smiled at them, held up a Just one second finger, then sat down at one of the workstations. She tapped away at the keys for five minutes and said, “On your screen.”
Selma used the remote control to find the new graphic:
• arch 1866: Shenandoah sold to Sultan of Zanzibar.
• ovember 1866: Shenandoah arrives Zanzibar, renamed El Majidi.
• ovember 1866-October 1870: El Majidi spends most time sitting at anchor or on occasional merchant voyages.
• ctober 1870: First Sultan dies. Brother’s reign begins.
• October 1870-April 1872: El Majidi presumed at anchor.
• April 1872: Hurricane damages El Majidi. Sent to Bombay for repair.
• July 1872: El Majidi reportedly sinks en route to Zanzibar.
• July 1872-November 1879: Six years’ lost time. Disposition unknown.
• November 1879: En route to Bombay, El Majidi reportedly sinks near island of Socotra.
Sam said, “We’ve got two seemingly reliable accounts of her sinking that contradict each other, and over six years where the El Majidi is unaccounted for.
“Selma, what’s the earliest date in Blaylock’s journal?”
“As best we can tell, August 1872, about five months after he arrived in Africa. On our time line, that’s a month after the El Majidi’s first reported sinking and at the beginning of her lost years.”
“Six years,” Remi echoed. “Where was she all that time?”
MEXICO CITY, MEXICO
FIFTEEN HUNDRED MILES to the south, Itzli Rivera sat in President Garza’s anteroom waiting to be summoned, as he had been for the past hour.
Garza’s executive assistant, a doe-eyed girl in her early twenties with glossy black hair and an hourglass figure, sat at her desk typing, her index fingers wandering over the keyboard and occasionally punching a key. Her expression was one of puzzlement. As though she’s trying to finish a master-level Sudoku puzzle, Rivera thought. Clearly, the woman’s administrative skills had not been a priority during the hiring process.
Hoping to kill some time, Rivera wondered if Garza had ordered the woman to take a Mexica name. If so, what would it be? As if on cue, President Garza’s voice came over the intercom on the woman’s desk, answering Rivera’s question.
“Chalchiuitl, you may send Mr. Rivera in.”
“Yes, sir.”
She smiled at Rivera and gestured toward the door with one of her ridiculously long fingernails. “You may—”
“I heard him, thank you.”
Rivera walked across the carpet, pushed through the double doors, and closed them behind him. He strode to Garza’s desk and st
opped at semiattention.
“Sit down,” Garza ordered.
Rivera did.
“I was reading your report,” Garza said. “Do you have anything to add?”
“No, sir.”
“Let me summarize, if you don’t mind . . .”
“Go ahead, sir.”
“That was rhetorical, Itzli. You and your men, after being outwitted for days by these treasure hunters . . . these Fargos . . . You finally manage to take possession of the bell and transport it to Okafor’s island, only to have it stolen out from under your noses.”
Rivera nodded.
“Not only did they steal back the bell, but they also stole Okafor’s four-million-dollar helicopter.”
“And I lost a man. Nochtli fell from the helicopter and broke his neck.”
President Garza waved his hand dismissively. “You were vague about how the Fargos managed to get aboard the helicopter at all. Can you elaborate? Where were you when all this was happening?”
Rivera cleared his mouth and shifted nervously in his seat. “I was . . . unconscious.”
“Pardon me?”
“The man, Sam Fargo, attacked me aboard Okafor’s yacht. He surprised me. He clearly has some martial arts training.”
“Clearly.” Garza rotated his chair and gazed out the window. He drummed his fingers on his desk blotter for a minute, then said, “We have to assume they’re not going to give up. That could work in our favor. If they’re as clever as they seem, we know they’ll be visiting at least one of the areas we’ve already searched.”
“Agreed.”
“Start reaching out to your contacts—immigration officers, airport employees, anyone who will alert us when the Fargos appear.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll start with Antananarivo. Anything else?”
Garza stared hard at his underling. “You mean, are there going to be any repercussions for your failure?”
“Yes, sir.”
Garza chuckled humorlessly. “What are you expecting, Itzli? Something from the movies, perhaps? For me to pull out a pearl-handled revolver and shoot you? Or open a trapdoor beneath you?”
Rivera let himself smile.
Garza’s expression went cold. “For now, you’re still the best man for the job. The best I have, in fact. Now I want you to prove that my faith isn’t wasted. Ideally, that would involve Sam and Remi Fargo ending up dead.”
“Yes, Mr. President, thank you.”
“One more thing before you go: I want to make memorial arrangements.”
“For Nochtli,” Rivera said. “Yes, sir, I—”
“No, no, for the other one—Yaotl. It seems he and his wife died in a car accident this morning.”
Rivera felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. “What?”
“Sad, isn’t it? He lost control and drove his car off a cliff. They were both killed instantly.”
“They had a child, a five-year-old.”
Garza pursed his lips as though weighing the question. “Oh, the girl. She’s fine. She was at school at the time. I suppose we’ll have to find her new home. You’ll see to that as well?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
CHAPTER 23
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS,
WASHINGTON, D.C.
THEIR FIRST LEAD INTO WINSTON BLAYLOCK’S LIFE PRIOR TO HIS arrival in Africa came in the form of an old friend of Selma’s, Julianne Severson, who’d taken over the Library of Congress’s Special Collections Division after Selma’s departure.
Severson met Sam and Remi at the Second Street researcher’s entrance of the Jefferson Building. The other two buildings that made up the library’s campus, the Adams and the Madison, sat a block to the east and the south respectively.
After shaking hands, Severson said, “It’s a pleasure having you, Mr. and Mrs. Fargo—”
“Sam and Remi,” said Remi.
“Wonderful. I’m Julianne. I’ve been a fan of yours for quite some time. You probably don’t realize this but your adventures spark a lot of interest in history, particularly among children.”
“Thank you, Julianne,” Sam replied.
She handed them a pair of laminated badges attached to neck lanyards. “Reader identification cards,” she explained with a shrug and a smile. “All part of the CSP, Collections Security Program. Ever since nine/eleven, the protocols are much more strict.”
“We understand.”
“If you’ll follow me . . .” They started walking. “I’ll be helping you personally while you’re here . . .”
“That’s kind of you,” Remi said, “but we don’t want to take up your time.”
“Nonsense. The library runs smoothly on its own; my assistant will handle anything that comes up.” Severson turned up a marble stairway, and Sam and Remi followed. “How much do you know about the library?”
“We’ve visited several times, but never as researchers, believe it or not,” Remi replied.
The tour alone was a breathtaking experience, Sam and Remi knew. The oldest federal institution in the country, the Library of Congress was founded in 1800 and located in the Capitol Building until 1814, when British troops lit the building on fire and destroyed the library’s core collection of three thousand volumes. A year later, Congress voted to reestablish the LOC and purchased Thomas Jefferson’s personal library of some six thousand books.
The library’s collection had since grown significantly: 33,000,000 books and printed materials, 3,000,000 recordings, 12,500,000 photographs, 5,300,000 maps, 6,000,000 pieces of sheet music, and 63,000,000 manuscripts—in all representing almost 500 languages—some 145,000,000 items altogether on 745 miles of bookshelves.
“It almost seems more a cathedral than a library,” Remi said. “The architecture is . . .”
“Awe-inspiring?” Severson finished.
“Exactly. The marble floors and columns, the arches, the vaulted ceilings, the artwork.”
Severson smiled. “I think Selma once referred to this place as ‘part cathedral, part museum, part gallery, with a little bit of library thrown in for good measure.’ I suspect grandeur was foremost on the Congress’s collective mind in 1815. After the British sacked everything, I imagine there was a ‘we’ll show them’ mentality during the reconstruction.”
“Bigger, better, more ostentatious. Architectural nose-thumbing, if you will,” Remi said.
Severson laughed.
“Are we going to the Main Reading Room?” Sam asked.
“No, we’re going to the second floor—Rare Book and Special Collections. The Main Room is hosting a tour for local elementary schools. It’s going to be a bit wild in there today.”
They reached a door numbered 239 and walked through. “If you want to take a seat at the worktable, I’ll man the workstation. While our catalogue has gotten more user-friendly over the years, it might be easier if I do the legwork.
“Okay, Selma e-mailed me some of the documents and gave me a little bit of background: Winston Lloyd Blaylock, wife named Ophelia, believed to be in the United States prior to March 1872. Anything else?”
“We have a rough physical description,” said Remi.
“Everything helps.”
“Six feet four inches tall, around two hundred fifty pounds probably.”
“Also, he carried a .44 caliber Henry rifle,” Sam added. “As I understand it, those weren’t very common.”
“Certainly not as common as Winchesters, Remingtons, or Spring-fields. The Henry wasn’t standard-issue during the Civil War, but many Union soldiers used their own money to buy one. The government did, however, issue them to scouts, raiding parties, and Special Forces units. The Confederate soldiers hated the Henry. It could hold sixteen rounds, and a trained soldier could fire off twenty-eight in a minute. Back then, that was as close to a hand-carried machine gun as you could get. Do we know if Blaylock was adept with it?”
“According to our source, he was a crack shot.”
Severson nodded. She started typing, and for t
he next five minutes there was silence save for the clacking of the keyboard’s keys and the murmur of “Fascinating” or “Interesting” from Severson. Finally she looked up.
“I have a service record here, a microfiche copy from the National Archives. Two sources, actually: the CMSR, or Compiled Military Service Record; and Publications M594 and M861, which are the ‘Service of Military Units in Volunteer Union Organizations’ for both the Union and the Confederacy.”
“Any mention of Blaylock?”
“I’ve got fifty-nine entries, in fact. Since Blaylock carried a Henry rifle, let’s start with the Union list first.” Severson started typing again. “The problem is, many of the abstract entries list only the first name, middle initial, and last name. I’ve got several W. Blaylocks, and two W. L. Blaylocks. The first one has an attachment, a medical record. Did your Blaylock have any wounds?”
“Not that we know of.”
Smiling, Severson tapped the screen, clearly excited by what she’d found. “Right leg amputated at field hospital during the battle of Antietam. Guess that rules him out, huh? Oh, sorry, that sounded morbid, didn’t it?”
“It’s okay,” Sam said. “You and Selma share the same love of research. We’re used to it.”
“Okay, here’s the other entry. Well, this is interesting. This Blaylock was detached from the Union Army in September 1863, but there’s no reason listed. He wasn’t transferred or wounded. Just detached.”
“What does that mean?” Remi asked.
“I’m not sure. Let me see if I can find more than an abstract on him.”
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER Severson again looked up from her workstation. “Got it! A full service record. This might be your man: William Lynd Blaylock.”
“That’s close,” Sam said. “Conspicuously close.”
“His physical description is close as well: six feet four inches, two hundred ten pounds.”
“It wouldn’t be hard to gain thirty or forty pounds after leaving the army,” Remi observed.