by the ancients to find their way. The stone being unwieldy, I had charts made of its markings and set as I said above on my ,fifth voyage, vowing to
find some who could understand the strange writing.
That explained the references to the torleta of the ancients. It was apparently a stone tablet, a large and heavy one from the description, carved in a way to indicate it had been used for navigation. Since Columbus couldn't use the stone without explanation, it must not have been a map in the conventional sense. The letter returned to the fifth voyage account.
August 10
We continued westerly, favored by good winds as before. And now at last we are anchored off a shore more distant than any
man has gone. The native people we have talked to have said that there is more gold nearby than we can ever imagine. l think
I am close to the treasure of King Solomon. I am not wel having been made ill and weak once more by the heat and disease, but feel the gold to be near and ask your Majesty that when I return with these mountains of gold and precious levels I be allowed to make a pilgrimage to Rome and Jerusalem. I will write no more until I have the gold in my possession . . .
The next entry was dated two days later. The script was written in a firmer hand.
The Admiral is gone! When the crew arose at dawn we found that a small boat had disappeared and that the Admiral's cabin is empty. Gone too are his maps. I have sent ashore a party to search for him, and they found the boat, but they were driven back to the ship by group of natives who showered then with arrows. Alas I fear the Admiral is dead, killed by these ungodly savages! We shall wait safely offshore, but unless we see a sign that he lives, we must soon weigh anchor and will sail to Hispanola to seek help. God bless the Admiral of the Ocean Sea.
Signed this day by Alonso Mendez, apprentice pilot.
Perlmutter tapped his plump chin in thought. Columbus was clearly delirious in his last hours. Solomon's gold indeed! He wondered off what shore the Nina was anchored. He consulted the map again. Sailing westerly from Jamaica would have put him into Central America. Anywhere from Mexico's Yucatan peninsula down to Belize or Honduras if he were a few degrees off. When he had more time he would go over the daily observations and see if he could plot an exact course to its end.
Columbus took his maps and charts with him, but what became of the stone? Perlmutter shook his head, amused at how he had let himself be pulled into the story. He was acting as if the document he had just finished reading were real when it might be no more historically meaningful than a challenging crossword puzzle.
But what if the document were the real thing?
What relevance might it have to the modernday melodrama Austin had told him about, with blackclad bands of assassins dashing about killing innocent archeologists? What was that odd reference to the 'death of the five'? Columbus apparently felt so guilty about his involvement in this . incident that he thought his marooning was divine punishment. Perlmutter decided to go through the letter again in case there was something he missed. Then he would start digging into his own library.
But first a snack was in order.
Cancun, Mexico
24 THE MOOD ABOARD THE CANCUM flight had been one of joyful expectation since the plane took off from Washington shortly after the meeting at Zavala's place. As the pilot made his runway approach vacation-bound travelers craned their necks to peer down at the luxury beachfront resort hotels lining the clear blue-green water, and the atmosphere ratcheted up to one of unbridled excitement. With his conservative gray suit and flamboyant bow tie, and the way his head towered over the seats, Paul Trout would have stuck out from the happy crowd even without the gravity of his expression. His nose was buried in a map of the Yucatan peninsula, his thoughts on Gamay, and only when he felt the plane bank did he break his concentration to see where they were.
Within minutes the plane was on the ground. Trout broke off from the stream of passengers flowing toward the waiting hotel shuttle buses and headed for the counter of a small charter airline. Minutes later he was buckling into the seat next to the pilot of a twin-engined Beechcraft Baron. He was the only passenger, the other seats in the four-passenger aircraft having been converted to cargo space.
As the Beechcraft lifted into the sky Trout silently thanked the travel experts at NUMA who had done an incredible job patching together his trip, finding an empty seat on the commercial flight on short notice and hitching him up almost immediately with the charter: The smaller plane was making a run to Campeche to pick up a party of Texas oil technicians who were meeting their wives and girlfriends in Cancun.
The trip should take about an hour, said the pilot, a talkative Mexican in his thirties who had a good command of English and a firsthand knowledge of the best bars to meet tourist women in Cancun. Before long his voice merged with the drone of the engines. Trout's worry about Gamay had kept him awake during the overnight stay in Tucson. He closed his eyes, to be awakened at one point when the pilot said they were passing over Chichen Itza. Trout looked down as the pilot pointed out tire great four-sided pyramid temple and the ball court.
About halfway to Ciudad del Carmen,' the pilot said. Trout nodded. Mesmerized by the flat green landscape stretching out to the horizon, he closed his eyes again until the pilot nudged him awake. 'There's your ship.'
The sleek blue-hulled Nereus lying at anchor among. the other oil tankers and fishing boats in the harbor was a welcome sight. Trout found it hard to believe he had left the ship. and Gamay> , only a few days before. He wished now that he had prevailed upon her to come back to Washington. She would never have agreed, he admitted to himself; she was intent on meeting Dr: Chi.
Before leaving Washington 'Bout had called the Mexican anthropological museum and talked to Dr: Chi's secretary. She checked the professor's calendar and confirmed he was planning to meet Gamay The professor spent much of his time 'out in the field' and called in for messages when he happened to be near a phone, but he had no set schedule. If he were to be found anywhere, she said, it would be at his lab.
As the pilot waited for permission to land, Trout asked him to radio ahead and notify those handling his next ride that he was coming in. He didn't want to waste a minute cooling his heels in an airport lounge. As soon as the Beechcraft taxied to a stop, Trout bolted from the cabin with his one bag, flinging an adios' and a 'gracias' over his shoulder in New England Spanish.
A stocky man in a police uniform and reflective sunglasses was waiting in the airport lobby.
'Dr. Trout,' he said with a toothy smile. 'My name is Sergeant Morales. I am with the Mexican federal police. The fed I've been asked to act as your guide.'
Trout had called in a marker with the Drug Enforcement Agency. The DEA owed NUMA for some past favors and was happy to oblige when Trout asked to set up a contact with the Mexican national police.
'Nice to meet you,' Trout said, glancing at his watch. 'I'm ready if you are.'
It is getting late,' the policeman said. 'I wondered if you would rather go tomorrow.'
Trout's answer was softspoken, but there was no mistaking the determination in the serious brown eyes. 'With all due respect, Sergeant, I took great pains to get here in a hurry so I could start searching for my wife as soon as I arrived.'
'Of course, Senor Trout,' the policeman said, nodding in understanding. 'I assure you, this is not a case of manana. Simply common sense. I, too, wish to locate your wife. However, it will be dark before long.'
'How much light do we have?'
'One, two hours, maybe.'
'Finest kind, Cap,' Trout said, answering in fisherman's slang. 'We can cover a lot in two hours.'
Morales saw there was no use trying to put off the tall American.
Bueno, Dr. Trout. The helicopter is this way.'
The Bell 206 JetRanger helicopter was warming up, its rotor and tail blades turning slowly, as Trout eased into the three-passenger backseat and Morales slid in next to the pilot. Seconds later the turbo motor kicked into action and the runners lifted off the tarmac. The helicopter leaped into the air and climbed in two minutes to an altitude of more than three thousand feet. They swung out over the water and headed inland from the coast, following the railroad tracks that snaked into the interior.
Morales gave the pilot directions, frequently consulting from a folded-up map.. They left the railroad track and picked up a narrow highway running more or less eastwest. The chopper kept its altitude, cruising at a speed of 125 miles per hour until they were well into the interior. The dense woods were broken here and there by a village or
