Temple of the Jaguar God Read online

  There was a foot and a half of water in the back end, less in the front end, tied up and grounded on shore as she was.

  “More serious, I think, is the motor—” Syrmes had put a couple of bullets through it, with engine oil leaking down into the water.

  His uncle looked up.

  “Right. We need some plugs. Make them about two or three inches long. A quarter-inch at the small end. Make them tapered. We’ll stick the small end in the hole, pound it in and then bail her out.”

  “Right, Uncle Harry.”

  “The motor’s useless, we’re better to take it off.”

  Apparently, they weren’t dead yet, although there were only one or two paddles in evidence.

  With the axe and a machete, they might be able to do something about that as well.

  Gerald Day appeared.

  “No guns, a couple of machetes.” He threw them down on the ground. “You were right. The cash box and all the natives are gone.”

  “That’s all right. I have a pistol in my tent. It’s under the pillow.”

  With a brief grin, Gerald pulled a small automatic pistol out of his own pocket.

  “Me, too—I never made a big thing out of it, but the thoughts of being eaten alive don’t exactly agree with me.” He put it away. “Mind you, it’s not much for hunting.”

  “Don’t worry. We’ll be out of here in three days.” They had some food, and only four mouths to feed.

  They had a boat and a river and probably some hooks and line.

  There were roots and shoots, fruits and berries if one knew where to look—

  In spite of recent events, Uncle Harry seemed oddly happy as their eyes met.

  Weird Uncle Harry—

  He gave Jeremy a firm nod.

  “Let us hope it is enough.”

  ***

  It was a big, heavy boat for four people.

  Mrs. O’Dell sat in the back, the motor removed and a lashed-up, home-made oar for steering.

  Using rope, they had improvised a pair of oar locks up front, with Gerald and Jeremy taking the first shift.

  Uncle Harry had decreed that they would all rotate through the positions, and that way no one would have to do more than an hour of rowing in a shift. He managed this by rotating on the half hour, at which time Jeremy took over the rudder and Mrs. O’Dell rested in the prow, with the secondary job of looking for submerged rocks and logs that would hang them up if they rode up on top of them.

  The current in the Cuao was sluggish, but it was there, and they seemed to be making fairly good time. The trouble was that the river went on forever…hot and silent once they were out of the actual brush.

  They hadn’t heard anything from the other boat. No motor, no gunshots, no voices.

  There was a certain logic in taking their time and not accidentally running into Syrmes and his party.

  Other than that, Jeremy tried to keep the boat straight up the middle of the channel and follow whatever directions he was given.

  He’d gotten Melody to come back to the rear of the boat, and she was bailing out a few buckets of water that had accumulated in the rear of the boat, riding low in the water as compared to the bow. The Evinrude motor, evidence of a kind according to his uncle, was coming along for the ride but lashed down amidships roughly speaking.

  “I’m terribly sorry about your husband.”

  She chucked a bucket over the side. The plugs would swell after a while, but in the meantime, there was still water coming in.

  “Yes. Well.” She looked up and sighed.

  She thought about something, coming to a decision.

  “I have a gun too, you know. Mister Syrmes might have guessed that, but he didn’t. If we catch him—which we probably won’t…”

  “Hmn. All these guns. Honestly. It’s not worth it, Melody. Besides, I’m sort of hoping that we don’t catch him. I hope never to see him again. Kevin was a good bloke. And I’m sure you feel the same way about Mister O’Dell—Peter.” He’d disappeared on Jeremy’s watch, so to speak.

  “Oh, I don’t know.” Her face fell.

  Oh, I don’t know—this was some kind of a revelation.

  She sat on the bench across from him, her mind far away.

  “Anyhow, if I get the chance…if I get the chance, I’m going to kill him.”

  Her eyes defiantly met his.

  It was enough to shrug and keep steering.

  Her hair hung down bedraggled. She was as wet and dirty as the rest of them.

  They must have come five or six miles by this point. The sun was directly overhead, and sooner or later they had to do something about lunch, or dinner or breakfast or whatever it was.

  ***

  The air was dense with the humidity, and having slowed down, the biting insects descended in clouds.

  “Argh.” Slap.

  They were all at it.

  “Well, well, well.”

  “I must say, Doctor Fawcett. That man is always thinking—” Mister Day was right.

  Syrmes had obviously planned this all out—and he wasn’t taking too many chances.

  They hadn’t heard anything. There was this breathless feeling that if not careful, they might stumble onto the other party—in the event of motor troubles, or something like that. Even then, Syrmes had a lot more people to fetch and paddle, so that might have just been nervousness.

  They’d also seen what he could do.

  A huge tree had been felled, at a point just before the Cuao widened out into a broader stream.

  The trunk had to be five feet thick. On the right bank, there was a bit of space underneath, but not enough to get their boat through. On the left side, a large number of hefty limbs poked up from glassy black water, still green with leaves.

  By Uncle Harry’s estimation, halfway through the third day, they were less than fourteen miles from Buena Vista. It was possible that Syrmes had been doing some thinking about the second boat. Even if he’d chopped a bigger hole in it, surely he must have foreseen the possibility of repair.

  He was just being thorough.

  It wouldn’t take too long before his victims would either start paddling, or start walking.

  “The thing is, he’s got a lot more people than us. I doubt if it took two, maybe three hours for them.” Up on the right bank, the white top of the stump and the scattered chips told their own story.

  As their resident axe expert, Jeremy spoke up.

  “There’s just no way to cut the trunk, not with half of it underwater like that. That’s like pounding sand. As for the other end, God. I think that might take a day or two, even with all of us taking turns.” For much of the work, they’d be standing on the boat.

  Clambering around on the branches was fraught with peril. Sooner or later, you were going to fall off in the middle of a good swing. If nothing else, they’d lose their only axe.

  With just the four of them, there was no way they could ever drag and lift the boat over it. The thoughts of sinking the boat and trying to work it under in five feet of water weren’t very appealing. They were all agreed on that. The trunk was a good six feet thick at the base…they’d picked the perfect tree and the perfect place to do it.

  The right bank was steep, albeit only about three or four feet high. The bank on the other side was lost in mangroves and other swamp trees and the right side looked like a better bet.

  “What do we do now, Professor?” Melody sat patiently in the back of the boat, although the rudder was useless at this point.

  Drifting still, oars shipped, the bow hit the log with a soft thump. Mister Day began fending her off, holding onto the bark, taking the nose of the boat over to the right so that they could get out and have a better look.

  Fourteen miles—fourteen long miles, overland, on an equatorial flood-plain and with thunderstorms hovering all along the western horizon. Assuming their map was relatively accurate. Assuming his guesses were accurate.

  Uncle Harry was in the bow as it pushed low branches ou
t the way, finally hanging up a few feet from shore.

  “Right. How in the hell am I going to get up there.”

  “Hold on, Uncle.” Going to the back of the boat, Jeremy found a spare piece of rope.

  Mrs. O’Dell and Mister Day clutched at the bark with their fingers.

  “Okay, hang on.”

  Carefully climbing up and onto the dead tree, Jeremy walked up the gentle slope, grateful for the rough bark and the sheer size of the thing. He dropped lightly down to the ground when he came to land.

  He swung the end of the rope out to Uncle Harry and then fed out some more.

  They had a good grip.

  “Right. Heave, ho, Mister Day.”

  ***

  They were extremely fortunate to find the trace of an old trail, and within a hundred yards there were signs of habitation, overgrown clearings, rotting shacks and bits of modern trash including empty tins and bottles scattered around old and cold fire rings.

  The trail got better as they went along.

  Half a mile after that, they came to the first encampment.

  There was an old man, a middle-aged couple, a couple of younger adults and a gaggle of children wearing shirts, boys and girls alike, but nothing else. Only the males had shorts, and the old woman, old before her time perhaps, a proper if rather shapeless dress. They were all barefoot and utterly fascinated by their visitors.

  Unfortunately, none of them spoke the language although Uncle Harry knew a handful of words, having picked it up by sheer osmosis. The most important word was boat, and the second most important word was money—good pay for a short paddle to Buena Vista, a name they obviously recognized. The trouble was that they didn’t have much money on them, but there was a bank in town—a very small one, but a bank nevertheless.

  Every coin that they had was given up, with Mrs. O’Dell digging around in the bottom her purse.

  Right about then the ocelot came racing up out of the bushes. There was quite the free-for-all, with half a dozen people trying to help Jeremy catch the beast, one or two young men running to get their spears and one or two of the women screaming.

  With some urging from the old man, who was remaining behind, the people eventually dragged their biggest canoe, a hollowed-out log, down into the water. A few minutes later, they were moving down the river again.

  Uncle Harry had his concerns.

  “I wonder how far ahead of us he is.”

  There was only one way to find out.

  The cat was all over the place, and that was just one more complication.

  ***

  When they got to the docks at Buena Vista, Senior Hernandez, Paolo and Paloma were gone.

  Luckily, Uncle Harry’s Spanish was better than his native language skills. With their new native friends trooping along, he headed up the main street from the dock. The bank was just up the road, and hopefully he could convince them to take a cheque. The other three waited on benches just outside the door and under the wide veranda. Directly across the street was a cantina, and the smell of home-cooked food was enough to drive one mad.

  Jeremy struggled to keep control of the animal.

  What in the blazes was he supposed to do with the poor thing? The cat was totally smitten.

  Uncle Harry came out and began distributing silver coins to the natives. When they seemed satisfied, he stopped. They turned away, chattering, heading to the river and the market square where they would no doubt pick up a few things and then go home.

  “What’s next? The police station?” Jeremy stood, eyeing his uncle and wondering how to bring up the subject of lunch. “For crying out loud, Ozzie.”

  Another scratch, more blood. One had to wonder just how much was left in him—

  “I’m afraid there’s not much point in that.”

  Gerald Day had been sitting with his head hanging, wrung right out by the last couple of days.

  His head came up.

  “And why is that, Doctor?”

  “Because I have it on pretty good authority, that Mister Syrmes is dead.”

  “What?” They all spoke at once.

  Uncle Harry nodded towards the place across the street.

  “Let’s have some lunch. Oh, the cashbox is gone—and our native friends have melted back into the bush.”

  They wouldn’t come out again until they were ready, and the truth was, they all looked the same anyways.

  According to Uncle Harry, with Señor Hernandez not knowing just how long they would be gone, he had seized the opportunity to make a quick cargo run a little further upriver. Syrmes would have missed the boat anyways. In which case he would have probably just stolen another small boat and run for it.

  That had always been the weakness of Syrmes’ plan, he said. Once you get the gold, how in the hell would you ever get away with it…it was a quiet and subdued little group listening to that sort of news.

  Argh.

  Damn that cat.

  ***

  “The other odd thing. I don’t know where all that treasure came from, but it wasn’t from our temple.” That was a mystery only Syrmes could have solved, according to Harry, and he wasn’t around to answer questions. “I would love to see where he got that from. It must have been an extraordinary discovery.”

  Jeremy wasn’t all that familiar with the food, but after letting Uncle Harry order for him it turned out to be good old grilled steak, with a genuine baked potato and some over-boiled mixed vegetables, probably from a tin but at this point he didn’t much care. Up until now, Jeremy had never really thought of learning Spanish.

  Hot rolls and real butter…God.

  The first bite was heavenly…they had all been sort of reconciling themselves to the smell. It took a very short time back in civilization. Their hostess, perhaps knowing something about them in such a small town, hadn’t said anything, but they were going to need a bath as soon as they could get it. The pong was mostly wood smoke, mixed in with stagnant water, filthy organic muck and human sweat.

  Lots and lots of sweat.

  Mister Day looked up from his first cold pint in many days.

  “So. What happened? What have you heard.”

  For surely Uncle Harry was just bursting with the news.

  “Did they cash your cheque, Uncle Harry?”

  “Ah, no. They didn’t, Jeremy. But Mister Cezar, in light of the circumstances, was kind enough to advance me some money. We’ve done business before, and he will wire an inquiry to the bank in Caracas. As you may recall, I went even further up the big river, ah, four years ago. In the meantime, we’re not going anywhere. No steamers due for another couple of days.” It was late in the day, telegraph and telephone lines were always uncertain, and such inquiries often took a while.

  “What do we do in the meantime?”

  “Eat your steak, Jeremy. It’s getting cold. Hmn. In the meantime, we could sleep in the tents—”

  “Professor. What happened to Mister Syrmes?”

  She’d been silent so far, face low over the plate and seemingly unengaged after their lucky escape from the jungle.

  “Ah, yes. About that. Well. Let’s wait for our coffee and then I shall tell you.”

  ***

  They were running out of patience as Harry stirred his coffee maddeningly, and at length. Lighting up the one cigar he allowed himself on any given day, he puffed at the blue smoke contentedly.

  “So. Here’s how it went. They were having trouble with the motor. According to Mister Cezar, who seems to know everything in this place, it was a simple fuel leak. Rather than stop and try and fix it, Mister Syrmes was out of control, yelling and shouting. The natives were just trying to please him, which is their way. No skin off their noses, right? They kept pouring fuel into it, and kept going as fast as they could. Bear in mind, Syrmes was alone, with a good eighty pounds of some of the finest and most valuable artifacts, certainly, that I’ve ever seen. He must have gone slightly mad. He was probably afraid of them to some extent, although I’ve neve
r had a lick of trouble. Foaming at the mouth, actually, which is no way to deal with the local people. He told Paolo to get the boat downstream any way he could, leaving the pay-box and showing them that he wasn’t just deserting them.”

  “Wait a minute, wait a minute—”

  “I’m getting to it. He was holding a gun on them by this point. Just mad. Insane, really. He made them run the boat up on the beach—just the odd, narrow little strand, which we did see along that stretch.”

  It must have been right close to town, or he never should have attempted it.

  “And then?” Jeremy prodded further.

  “And then, according to the natives, the biggest snake they’d seen in some time, came up out of the water and grabbed him before he even saw it. They say they were all yelling and screaming and trying to warn him, but of course he was too wrought up to even listen. According to them, he’s dead. Just dead.”

  “And—and the gold?” Mister Day was aghast. “The artifacts?”

  “Swallowed. He was wearing the backpack. The snake had wrapped itself around him. His arms were pinned. There was nothing anyone could do—” Syrmes had tried to break free, but it was all to no avail.

  Once he’d blacked out due to constriction, it was game over.

  Uncle Harry was staring at Melody O’Dell, silent so far and with her head down.

  “And so he’s gone. However, we have made a major discovery. As I believe I said earlier, our temple may very well be part of a larger complex. There may be tombs, other buildings and game-courts. There may be official and ceremonial buildings of all sorts, although the homes of the common people have probably left little trace.” He studied the tip of his cigar. “Anyways, that’s just the way it is—”

  In Harry’s words, Mister Syrmes had gotten exactly what he deserved, a bag of gold and then eaten by his own kind. As for himself, this was the dream, and the opportunity, of a lifetime.