The Basques exchanged a look of bewilderment among themselves.
“You say the American Aztecs worshipped a god who looked European?” Iker asked.
“Not just the Aztecs,” the scrivener replied. “White gods as bringers of culture appear in many indigenous myths of the Americas. The Incas called this figure Viracocha. The Mayans called him Kukulcan. Even the plains Indians of North America may have had a female counterpart in White Buffalo Woman.”
“But where would they have gotten such ideas?” Ortzi asked.
“Where indeed,” Griffin said cryptically. “There is strong evidence for the presence of visitors to the New World long before Columbus.”
“You mean the Vikings,” Cassie said.
“Much older than the Vikings,” the scrivener countered. “You haven’t heard about them because it is politically incorrect for mainstream archaeologists to admit that outsiders set foot in the Americas. The conventional belief is that the only people to inhabit the New World were the descendants of Asians who crossed the Bering Strait. In reality, the Americas were a melting pot from the very beginning. There are Caucasian mummies and skeletons strewn all over the landscape of both North and South America.”
“What?” his listeners all asked in unison.
“Where shall I begin? There’s Kennewick Man found in Washington State whose age is estimated at over 9,000 years. In Spirit Cave, Nevada a man and female child were found aged over 10,000 years. Buhl, Idaho contains a 10,000-year-old female skeleton. Ginger-haired mummies have been discovered in pre-Inca graves in Peru. There are even blond-headed Toltecs. The list goes on and on.”
“But how did they get there?” Cassie asked.
“The currently fashionable theory is that a huge ice sheet covering much of the North Altantic created a temporary land bridge which allowed them to walk from Europe.”
“That’s some hike,” Erik observed. “Maybe that explains the Caucasians in North America but what about South America.”
“Ah,” Griffin replied knowingly. “It’s quite likely that many of the anomalous inhabitants of the Americas didn’t walk there at all. They arrived by boat. Scholars choose to ignore the mountain of evidence demonstrating frequent interaction between native Americans and other cultures. There are Norse rune markings from the 14th century on a stone in Minnesota—Celtic ogham inscriptions dating from the 6th century in caves in West Virginia, Colorado, and Oklahoma. A Roman figurine was found off the New Jersey coast. North African gold pieces have been discovered in Illinois. There is a fifth century Christian church in Connecticut. Japanese pottery from the Jomon period has been found in Equador. A copper mine in Michigan dates from the Bronze Age. A two-thousand-year-old highway exists in Iowa. The Olmecs of Mexico carved giant stone heads with black African features. Chinese merchants, Jewish refugees, Phoenician castaways, African sailors. There is evidence that all of them set foot in the New World thousands of years ago.
“And the traffic passed in both directions. Traces of nicotine and cocoa have been found on an Egyptian mummy. Both the tobacco plant and the cacao tree are indigenous only to the New World. In fact, New World maize was being cultivated in Egypt four thousand years ago. Contact with Egypt might also explain the American pyramids as well as the patriarchal overlord social structure adopted by its three major civilizations.”
“So where do all those facts about strange visitors to the New World leave us with our relic search?” Cassie asked.
The scrivener frowned in deep concentration for a few seconds. “I’m still inclined to believe that the Spanish Aztec colony would have been the lost sentinel’s most probable destination, but I can’t for the life of me think of a convenient hiding place near Mexico City.
“Maybe there’s someplace in North America?” Cassie urged hopefully.
Griffin sat back and gazed at the ceiling as if he were counting off numbers in his head. “I can’t think of any connection with dragons or feathered serpents in North America. There’s no real connection to Spain either. With the exception of founding St. Augustine in Florida and massacring a French settlement near Jacksonville, it’s as if the Spaniards never set foot on the eastern seaboard at all.”
“But we did.” Ochanda’s voice echoed around the room.
Everyone turned to stare at her.
“I beg your pardon?” Griffin sat forward.
“There is a story from a long time ago. A member of my family left farming and became a fisherman. We are not far away from the sea here, so he tried his luck on the fishing boats. They followed the cod—all the way across the ocean to America.”
“Yes, I recall those stories too,” Iker added. “Our people and the Portuguese fished the waters along the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. Some went farther south.” He chuckled. “I remember hearing that when a French missionary first met the natives in Nova Scotia, he was greeted with the word adesquidex.”
At this, the three Basques laughed outright.
Iker explained to the puzzled Arkana team. “In our language, adeskide means friend. Other English and French explorers were greeted with the word ania. In Euskara, anaia means brother. You can tell from such stories that the Basque fishermen were already well acquainted with the Indian tribes of your Atlantic coast long before the history books say.”
“So, the sentinel might have gone straight across the ocean to the Basque fishing grounds and found a handy place to dump the treasure,” Erik theorized. “I like it. Straightforward. Simple.”
“It would have been a bonus that New England and Canada weren’t under Spanish rule,” Cassie added. “No Inquisition.”
While they were speaking, Griffin’s eyes had glazed over.
Cassie noticed his dramatic change of expression. “Are you alright?”
“Half a mo’,” he replied absently.
Leaning over toward Erik, Cassie whispered, “Dude, do you really think he wants us to bring him one-sixth of the Three Stooges?”
Erik chuckled. “Good one.” He whispered back, “I think he’s just being veddy British.”
Even though Griffin appeared not to be paying attention, he
