Serpent nf-1 Read online

  "No different from the industrial espionage that goes on today," Austin commented. "Instead of bribes, listening devices, and prostitutes to gather information on corporate . rivals, Columbus pumped his sources with food and drink."

  "He may have pumped them with more than food and drink."

  Austin raised an eyebrow.

  All five men died after dinner," Perlmutter said.

  "Overindulgence?"

  "I've been at a few meals that nearly killed me, but de la Vega had his own ideas. He implied that the men had been poisoned. He couldn't come right out and say so. Columbus had powerful connections. Consider this, however. It is a historical fact that Columbus had a map of the Indies on his first voyage." He took a sip of wine and paused for dramatic effect. "Is it possible his map was based on what he learned from those unfortunate sailors?"

  "Possible. But from what the letter says, Columbus disavowed their deaths."

  "Correct. He blamed it on this so-called brotherhood. Los Hermanos. "

  "Didn't Columbus have a brother?"

  "Yes, his name was Bartolome. But Columbus used the word in the plural. Brothers."

  "Okay, suppose you're right. Let's give. Chris the benefit of the doubt. He invites these guys to his house to see what information he can get out of them. Los Hermanos take the extra precaution of seeing that they will tell nobody else what they've seen. Columbus may be a hustler but he's no killer. The incident haunts him..

  "A plausible scenario."

  "Do you have any idea what this brotherhood was, Julien?"

  "Not a clue. I'll return to my books after lunch. Speaking of which . . . ah, the Thai fish soup." Perlmutter had spotted the first of many dishes making its way to their table.

  "While you're doing that I'll ask Yaeger to see if he has anything on them in his computer files."

  "Splendid," Perlmutter said. "Now I have a question. You have a practical rather than a historical knowledge of the sea, as I do. What are your thoughts on this talking stone Columbus mentioned, this torleta of the ancients that was described in the letter?"

  "Early navigational techniques have always fascinated me," Austin said. "I consider their development to be a huge intellectual leap for mankind. Our ancestors had to bring abstract concepts such as time, space, and distance to bear on the problem of getting from one place to another. I love the idea of punching a button and having a signal bounced off a satellite tell me exactly where I'm standing anywhere on the globe. But I think we rely too much on electronic gadgets. They can break And we're less inclined to understand the natural order of things; the movement of the stars and sun, the vagaries of the sea."

  "Well, then, let's put those electronic gadgets aside," Perlmutter said. "Stand in the shoes of Columbus. How would you go about using your torleta?"

  Austin thought about the question for a moment. "Let's back up to his earlier voyage. I'm stranded on an island where I'm directed to some kind of stone or tablet with strange inscriptions. The locals tell me it's the key to a great treasure. I take it back to Spain, but nobody can figure out what it is. Only that it is very old. I look at it from a mariner's point of view. The markings are similar in some respects to the kind of plotting board I've used all my sailing life. It's too hefty to haul around, so I do the next best thing. I have charts made based on the inscriptions and set sail. Only problem is, I haven't got it quite right. There's a gap in my knowledge."

  "What sort of gap, Kurt?"

  Austin pondered the question. "It's hard to know without an idea of what the torleta actually looks like, but I'll describe a hypothetical situation. Suppose I'm a sailor from Columbus's time and somebody gives me a NOAA chart. The geographical depictions would help me get around, but the lines with the long-range navigation coordinates wouldn't make sense to me. I'd know nothing of electronic signals sent out by shore stations or receivers that could translate the signals into pinpoint. locations. Once I was on the water out of sight of land, I'd have to go back to traditional methods."

  "A most lucid analysis. So what you're saying is that once Columbus was at sea, he found that the torleta of the ancients was only of limited assistance."

  "That's my guess. Ortega's books say Columbus didn't have much faith in the navigational instruments of his day, or maybe he simply wasn't competent in their use. He was a dead reckoning sailor of the old school. It served him fine on his first voyage.

  He knew he needed to be precise on this final trip, so he hired someone who could use navigational instruments."

  "Interesting, in view of the last passage in the letter, which is written by the Nina's assistant pilot."

  "There you go," Austin said. "It's no different from hiring a specialist to do a job today. Now it's my turn to bat a question back to you. What do you suppose happened to the stone?"

  "I called Don Ortega again and asked him to chase it down. His guess is that it was part of the estate Luis Columbus squandered to raise money to support his degenerate lifestyle. Ortega will contact museums and universities in Spain, and if he's not successful he will expand his circle of inquiry to surrounding countries.".

  Austin was thinking about Columbus the sailor, how he went back to the Nina, the doughty little vessel that had served him so well on previous journeys. Maybe a modern-day Nina could help carry them to a solution of the mystery.

  "The tablet originated on this side of the Atlantic," Austin observed. "After brunch I'll call my archaeologist friend Dr. Kirov and ask if she has ever heard about an artifact like it." He chuckled. "Odd, isn't it? We're looking for clues to contemporary murders in events that possibly happened centuries ago."

  "Not so unusual. In my experience the past and present are often the same. Wars. Famine. Tidal waves. Revolutions. Plague. Genocide. These happen over and over again. Only the faces change. But enough of such morbid considerations. Let us turn to happier pursuits," Perlmutter said, beaming. "I see another course is on its way"

  San Antonio, Texas

  29 WHILE AUSTIN ENJOYED HIS EXPENSIVE gourmet lunch, Joe Zavala was sixteen hundred miles away munching a honey-glazed doughnut at a coffee shop on the Paseo del Rio, or Riverwalk, the picturesque tourist district on the banks of the San

  Antonio River. Zavala checked his.watch, gulped down the last of his coffee, and head away from the river to the business district, where he entered the lobby of a tall office building.

  After wrapping up the strategy session, Zavala had packed an overnight bag and flown to Texas, hitching a ride on an Air Force flight to Lackland Air Base. From the base he caught a taxi to a downtown hotel. Yaeger could do wonders with his computer babies, but even he admitted Time-Quest was a tough nut to crack. Sometimes a human eye and brain, with their capacity to sense and analyze nuance, were far more efficient than even the most sophisticated machine.

  Zavala looked up Time-Quest on the lengthy directory of occupants. Moments later. he stepped from the elevator into a spacious lobby whose walls were covered with oversized sepia photographs of the archaeological wonders of the world. Directly in front of a picture of the Great Pyramid was a black enamel and steel desk that seemed out of time and place in contrast to the pictorial antiquities. Even more so was the brunette in her late twenties who sat behind the desk.

  Zavala introduced himself, handing the receptionist a business card printed that morning at Kinko's.

  "Oh, yes, Mr. Zavala the travel writer," she said. "You called yesterday." She consulted her daybook, punched a button on her phone, and murmured a message. "Ms. Harper will see you in a moment. You're very lucky to get an appointment on such short notice. It would have been impossible if she hadn't had an unexpected cancellation."

  "I really appreciate this. As I explained, I would have called earlier, but this was a lastminute thing. I'm out here doing a piece on San Antonio night life and thought I could double it up with another travel piece."

  She gave him a friendly smile. "Stop by after you talk to Ms. Harper and I may be able to suggest some h
ot spots."

  The receptionist was young and darkly attractive, and Zavala would have been surprised if she didn't know the city's fun places.

  "Thank you very much," he said in his most charming manner. "That would be a great help."

  The public affairs director of Time-Quest was a handsome and smartly dressed woman in her forties. Phyllis Harper emerged from a corridor and shook Zavala's hand. with a firm grip. Then she guided him along thickly carpeted corridors to an office with big windows that offered a panoramic view of .the sprawling city and its centerpiece Tower of the Americas. They sat informally on either side of a coffee table.

  "Thank you very much for your interest in TimeQuest, Mr: Zavala. I must apologize for only being able to give you a few minutes. Melody probably told you that I had a brief appointment slotted."

  "Yes, she did. I appreciate the fact that you were able to give me any time at all. You must be very busy."

  "I've got fifteen minutes before my meeting with the executive director." She rolled her eyes. "He's a stickler for promptness. In the interests of brevity, perhaps I can simply rattle on for ten minutes and allow five minutes if you have any questions. The press kit on the organization is quite informative."

  From his jacket pocket Zavala extracted a Sony minitape recorder he bought at a discount outlet and a notepad picked up that morning in a drugstore.

  "Fair enough. Rattle away."

  She gave him a dazzling smile that reminded him how a mature woman with class could often be so much sexier than a young unformed beauty like Melody, the receptionist.

  "Time-Quest is a nonprofit corporation. We have a number of goals. We wish to promote an understanding of the present and prepare for the future by studying the past. We are educative, in that we support learning about our world, particularly through our in-school programs for the young and our field work. We give the ordinary person a chance at an unusual vacation adventure. Many of our volunteers are retired people, so for them we are the fulfillment of life's dream."

  She paused for breath and went on. "In addition we support many archaeological, cultural, and anthropological expeditions. We are known to be a soft touch," she said with her pleasant smile. "Universities are always calling us for support. Usually we are glad to give it. We use money paid by our volunteers, so many of these expeditions are self-sustaining. We provide experts or help pay for them. We have sponsored expeditions to every corner of the globe. In return we ask mainly that we be informed of special discoveries before anyone else. Most people consider it a small demand for what they get. Any questions?"

  "How did the organization start?" .

  She pointed to the ceiling above her head.

  "We are a nonprofit subsidiary of the company that occupies the six floors immediately above us."

  "Which is . . . ?"

  "Halcon Industries."

  Halcon. The Spanish word for "falcon" or "bird of prey." He shook his head. "Don't know it."

  "It's an umbrella corporation with many divisions. We're one of them. Most of its revenue comes from a diversified portfolio

  that includes mining, mainly, but also shipping, livestock, oil, and. mohair."

  "That certainly is diversified. Is the company publicly traded?"

  "No. It is wholly owned by Mr. Halcon."

  "Quite a leap from digging mines to digging in old tombs," Zavala said.

  "It is rather an odd juxtaposition, but not really when you think of it. The Ford Foundation has funded esoteric projects that have nothing to do with manufacturing cars.. Mr. Halcon is an amateur archaeologist from what I'm told. He would have liked to have been a scholar, but he was much better as an industrialist."

  He nodded. "Halcon sounds like an interesting person. Would there ever be a chance of interviewing him, perhaps if I gave you advance notice?"

  "You'd have a better chance of interviewing Henry Ford." The dazzling smile again. "I don't mean to be flip, but Mr. Halcon is a very private man."

  "I understand."

  She looked at her watch. "I'm afraid I have to go." She slid a thick folder across the desk "This is our press kit. Give it a read, and if you have any more questions, please call me. I'd be glad to put you in touch with volunteers who could give you a firsthand account of their experience."

  "That would be very helpful. Maybe I could sign up for an expedition myself. They're not dangerous, are they?"

  She gave him an odd look "We pride ourselves on Time-Quest's safety record. Even in the remotest locations safety is our most important consideration. You remember, I said many retired people participate in our program." She paused. "Those are the expeditions we organize. The ones we support with partial funding are on their own. But overall our record is very good You're safer on one of our adventures than you are crossing the street in San Antonio."

  "I'll remember that," Zavala said, wondering if Ms. Harper were truly aware of all that went on in her organization.

  "There's a calendar of events for the upcoming year in that kit. If something interests you, let me know, and I'll see what can be arranged."

  She ushered him back to the lobby, shook hands, and disappeared down a corridor.

  Melody smiled. "How was your interview?"

  "Short and sweet." He looked after the retreating figure. "She reminds me of that old television commercial where the guy talked like a machine gun."

  Melody cocked her head coquettishly. "Well, there are always the night spots."

  "Thanks for the reminder. I'm looking for the really out-of-theway places where the younger, inside group goes. If you don't have other plans, maybe I can buy you lunch and we can talk about the night life in this town."

  "There's a great restaurant not far from here. Eclectic and very popular. I could meet you there around noon:"

  Zavala scribbled the directions and took the elevator down to the lobby He went over to the directory again and listed the subdivisions of Halcon Industries in his notebook There were eight in all. Mainly concentrated around mining and shipping, as the PR director had explained. He took the elevator up past Time-Quest and stepped out into a big lobby with a receptionist and mural-sized wall pictures of ore carriers. Halcon Shipping. He told the receptionist he must have the wrong floor and got back in the elevator.

  He repeated his routine at every other company under the Halcon aegis. The offices were all pretty much the same, except for the murals. The receptionists were all young and attractive. He pressed the button for the very highest office in the Halcon tier, but the elevator sped right by it. When he got out he was in the hushed precincts of a law firm.

  "Excuse me," he asked the secretary, who was plain and efficient looking. "I just pressed the button for the floor below and ended up here."

  "That happens all the time. The suites below us are for Halcon executives. You need a special code to make the elevator go there."

  "Well, if I ever need legal advice, I'll know where to come."

  He returned to the lobby, hoping he hadn't stirred the suspicions of security staff in his on-a-gain, off-again elevator rides. After the destruction of the federal office building in Oklahoma City, it would not be wise to be seen casing an office building. He went down to ground level, caught a cab, then another to make sure he wasn't being followed, and hung around a bookstore until it was time to meet Melody.

  The restaurant was called the Bomb Shelter, and it was decorated with a 1950s theme. They sat at a booth made with seats from a 1957 DeSoto convertible. Melody was a Texas girl, born and bred in Fort Worth, and had been with Time-Quest about a year.

  Over lunch, Zavala said, "Ms. Harper was telling me about the big guy Mr. Halcon. Have you ever met him?"

  "Not in person, but I see him every day. I stay at the office an extra hour after everybody else leaves so I can do some studying. I'm taking law courses." She smiled. "I don't intend to be a receptionist forever. Mr. Halcon stays late, too, and we leave the same time. He comes down in his private elevator, and a limo picks h
im up."

  She'd heard Halcon lived outside the city, but beyond that Melody didn't know much about him.

  "What does he look like?" Zavala said.

  "Dark, thin, rich. Handsome in a creepy sort of way" She laughed. "Maybe it's just the light down there in the garage."

  Melody was intelligent and witty, and Zavala felt like a cad when he took her number to set up a tour of night spots. He made a note to smooth things out with a call when he got back to Washington. After lunch he found a library and used the Internet to read about Halcon Industries holdings. His findings pretty much conformed to the brief description Ms. Harper had given him. Then he went to an auto rental place where he rented an ordinary-looking mid-sized car and picked up a tourist brochure on the Alamos. Might as well absorb some Texas history while he waited for his rendezvous with the mysterious Mr. Halcon.

  Cambridge, Massachusetts

  30 NINA KIROV SMILED AS SHE PLACED the telephone in its cradle, thinking how interesting her life had become since she had met Kurt Austin. When the platinum-haired man with the linebacker's physique and remarkable eyes wasn't plucking her from the Moroccan sea or running sting operations in Arizona, he was, popping up with the strangest requests. Like this one. See what she could find out about an artifact, probably made of stone, perhaps removed by Columbus from Jamaica on one of his expeditions, which may have had a navigational function and might still be in Spain.

  Wait'll Doc hears this, she thought as she dialed the phone. Doc was Dr. J. Linus Orville, a Harvard professor with more letters behind his name than a can of alphabet soup. Orville made his lair behind the ivy-covered walls at Harvard's Peabody Museum. He had gained international repute as an ethnologist specializing in Meso-american culture. Among Cambridge academics he was recognized for his brilliance and his reputation as something of a nutty professor