Amazonia

Inside, a deep, rumbling voice greeted him. 'Deputy Director Fielding, I appreciate you coming in person.' Marshall O'Brien stood up from his chair. He was a towering man with silver-gray hair. He dwarfed the large executive desk. He waved to a chair. 'Please take a seat. I know your time is valuable, and I won't waste it:'

Always to the point, Fielding thought. Four years ago, there had been talk that Marshall O'Brien might assume the directorship of the CIA. In fact, the man had been deputy director before Fielding, but he had bristled too many senators with his no-nonsense attitude and burned even more bridges with his rigid sense of right and wrong. That wasn't how politics were played in Washington. So instead, O'Brien had been demoted to a token figurehead here at the Environmental Center. The old man's urgent call was probably his way of scraping some bit of importance from his position, trying to stay in the game.

'What's this all about?' Fielding asked as he sat down.

O'Brien settled to his own seat and opened a gray folder atop his desk.

Someone's dossier, Fielding noted.

The old man cleared his throat. 'Two days ago, an American's body was reported to the Consular Agency in Manaus, Brazil. The deceased was identified by his Special Forces challenge coin from his old unit:'

Fielding frowned. Challenge coins were carried by many divisions of the military. They were more a tradition than a true means of identification. A unit member, active or not, caught without his coin was duty--bound to buy a round of drinks for his mates. 'What does this have to do with us?'

'The man was not only ex-Special Forces. He was one of my operatives. Agent Gerald Clark:'

Fielding blinked in surprise.

O'Brien continued, 'Agent Clark had been sent undercover with a research team to investigate complaints of environmental damage from gold-mining operations and to gather data on the transshipment of Bolivian and Colombian cocaine through the Amazon basin:'

Fielding straightened in his seat. 'And was he murdered? Is that what this is all about?'

'No. Six days ago, Agent Clark appeared at a missionary village deep in the remote jungle, half dead from fever and exposure. The head of the mission attempted to care for him, but he died within a few hours:'

'A tragedy indeed, but how is this a matter of national security?'

'Because Agent Clark has been missing for four years:' O'Brien passed him a faxed newspaper article.

Confused, Fielding accepted the article. 'Four years?'

EXPEDITION VANISHES IN AMAZONIAN JUNGLE

Associated Press

MANAUS, BRAZIL, MARCH 20- The continuing search for millionaire industrialist Dr. Carl Rand and his international team of 30 researchers and guides has been called off after three months of intense searching. The team, a joint venture between the U.S. National Cancer Institute and the Brazilian Indian Foundation, vanished into the rain forests without leaving a single clue as to their fate.

The expedition's yearlong goal had been to conduct a census on the true number of Indians and tribes living in the Amazon forests. However, three months after leaving the jungle city of Manaus, their daily progress reports, radioed in from the field, ended abruptly. All attempts to contact the team have failed. Rescue helicopters and ground search teams were sent to their last known location, but no one was found. Two weeks later, one last, frantic message was received: 'Send help . . . can't last much longer. Oh, God, they're all around us:' Then the team was swallowed into the vast jungle.

Now, after a three-month search involving an international team and much publicity, Commander Ferdinand Gonzales, the rescue team's leader, has declared the expedition and its members 'lost and likely dead:' All searches have been called off.

The current consensus of the investigators is that the team either was overwhelmed by a hostile tribe or had stumbled upon a hidden base of drug traffickers. Either way, any hope for rescue dies today as the search teams are called home. It should be noted that each year scores of researchers, explorers, and missionaries disappear into the Amazon forest, never to be seen again.

'My God:'

O'Brien retrieved the article from the stunned man's fingers and continued, 'After disappearing, no further contact was ever made by the research team or our operative. Agent Clark was classified as deceased.'

'But are we sure this is the same man?'

O'Brien nodded. 'Dental records and fingerprints match those on file:'

Fielding shook his head, the initial shock ebbing. 'As tragic as all this is and as messy as the paperwork will be, I still don't see why it's a matter of national security.'

'I would normally agree, except for one additional oddity.' O'Brien shuffled through the dossier's ream of papers and pulled out two photo-graphs. He handed over the first one. 'This was taken just a few days before he departed on his mission:'

Fielding glanced at the grainy photo of a man dressed in Levi's, a Hawaiian shirt, and a safari hat. The man wore a large grin and was hoisting a tropical drink in hand. 'Agent Clark?'

'Yes, the photo was taken by one of the researchers during a going-away party.' O'Brien passed him the second photograph. 'And this was taken at the morgue in Manaus, where the body now resides:'

Fielding took the glossy with a twinge of queasiness. He had no desire to look at photographs of dead people, but he had no choice. The corpse in this photograph was naked, laid out on a stainless steel table, an emaciated skeleton wrapped in skin. Strange tattoos marked his flesh. Still, Fielding recognized the man's facial features. It was Agent Clark-but with one notable difference. He retrieved the first photograph and compared the two.

O'Brien must have noted the blood draining from his face and spoke up. 'Two years prior to his disappearance, Agent Clark took a sniper's bullet to his left arm during a forced recon mission in Iraq. Gangrene set in before he could reach a U.S. camp. The limb had to be amputated at the shoulder, ending his career with the army's Special Forces.'

'But the body in the morgue has both arms:'

'Exactly. The fingerprints from the corpse's arm match those on file prior to the shooting. It would seem Agent Clark went into the Amazon with one arm and came back with two:'

'But that's impossible. What the hell happened out there?'

Marshall O'Brien studied Fielding with his hawkish eyes, demonstrating why he had earned his nickname, the Old Bird. Fielding felt like a mouse before an eagle. The old man's voice deepened. 'That's what I intend to find out:'

ACT ONE - The Mission

CURARE

FAMILY: Menispermaceae

GENUS: Chondrodendron

SPECIES: Tomentosum

COMMON NAME: Curate

PARTS USED: Leaf Root

PROPERTIES/ACTIONS: Diuretic, Febrifuge,

Muscle Relaxant, Tonic, Poison

CHAPTER ONE

Snakes Oil

AUGUST 6, 10:1 1 A.M.

AMAZON JUNGLE, BRAZIL

The anaconda held the small Indian girl wrapped in its heavy coils, dragging her toward the river.

Nathan Rand was on his way back to the Yanomamo village after an early morning of gathering medicinal plants when he heard her screams. He dropped his specimen bag and ran to her aid. As he sprinted, he shrugged his short-barreled shotgun from his shoulder. When alone in the jungle, one always carried a weapon.