“Help!” he cried, the small part of his brain not yet in panic mode registering how stupid the cry was. “Help me!” The muck was now above his waist; his arms flailed instinctively, trying to push himself out, but this merely anchored both his arms and drew him in deeper. It was as if he were fastened in a straitjacket. He thrashed, trying to get at least one arm free, but he was powerless, like a fly in honey, sinking slowly and helplessly into the mire.
“Help me, for God’s sake!” D’Agosta screamed, his voice echoing over the empty moors.
You idiot, that small rational part of his brain told him, stop moving. Every movement was driving him farther under. With a superhuman effort, he willed his panic into submission.
Take a deep breath. Wait. Don’t move.
It was hard to breathe with the pressure of the mud encircling his chest. It was up to the tops of his shoulders, but by not moving, by remaining absolutely still, he almost seemed to have stopped sinking. He waited, trying to overcome the panicky sensation of the mud creeping up toward his neck, slower now. Finally it stopped. He waited in the driving rain until he realized that he had, in fact, stopped sinking; he was stable, in equilibrium.
Not only that, he now realized he was only five feet from the trail on the other side.
With exquisite slowness he began to raise one arm, keeping his fingers straight, extracting it slowly from the muck, avoiding any suction, giving the mud time to flow around it as he drew it out.
A miracle. His arm was free. Keeping it buoyed above the surface, he ever so slowly leaned forward. There was a huge moment of panic as he felt the mud creep up his neck, but by immersing more of his upper body he could feel a buoyancy effect on his lower extremities, and his feet felt like they might have risen just a little. As he leaned forward more, his feet rose in response. Gingerly, he immersed part of his head in the muck, which increased the effect and brought his legs up still more, tilting his body toward the embankment of the bog. Keeping as relaxed as possible, moving with agonizing slowness, he continued leaning forward and — just as the mud came up to his nose — he managed to reach out and grasp a branch of heather.
With slow, easy pressure, he drew his body toward the embankment until his chin rested on the grass. Then he extracted his other arm — slowly, very slowly — and reached out with it as well, grasping another bush and pulling himself out onto firm ground.
He lay there, feeling a wash of infinite relief. Slowly the pounding of his heart subsided. The heavy rain began to rinse the mud from him.
After a minute or two, he managed to stand up. He was chilled to the very bone, dripping with foul-smelling mud, his teeth chattering. He held up his wrist and let the rain wash the mud from his watch: four o’clock.
Four o’clock! No wonder it was getting so dark. The sun set early in October in these northern climes.
He felt himself shivering uncontrollably. The wind was gusting, the rain was lashing down, and he could hear rumbles of thunder. He didn’t even have a flashlight or a lighter. This was insane — he was risking hypothermia. Thank God he had found the trail. Squinting into the gloom, he saw the cairn ahead that he had been trying so hard to reach.
After shaking off as much mud as he could, he started cautiously toward it. As he approached, however, it began to look wrong somehow. Too thin. And then when he came up to it, he saw what it really was — a small dead tree trunk, stripped and silvered and scoured by the wind.
D’Agosta stared in pure disbelief. A freakish dead tree trunk, here in the middle of nowhere, miles from any live trees. If he had passed this before he would surely have noticed.
But wasn’t he on the trail…?
As he looked around in the gathering gloom, scrutinizing the trail, he began to realize that what he’d thought was a path was just a collection of random patches of sand and gravel interspersed among the bogs.
Now it was really getting dark. And the cold was deepening. It might even go below freezing.
His colossal stupidity in venturing alone out on the moors began to sink home. He was still in a weakened condition. No flashlight, no compass, his solitary sandwich long-since eaten. His concern for Pendergast had led him to take foolish risks and push himself to the edge… and then over it.
What the hell now? It was already so dark that trying to continue would be stupid. The landscape had dissolved into a dim, mottled gray and there was no hope of identifying any cairn now. God, he’d never been so cold in his life. It felt like the cold was hardening the very marrow of his bones.
He would have to spend the night on the moors.
He looked about and saw, not far off, a pair of boulders. Shivering, teeth chattering hard, he went over and hunkered down between them, out of the wind. He tried to make himself as small as possible, curling up into a fetal position, forcing his hands under his arms. The rain pounded on his back, creeping in rivulets around his neck and down his face. And then he realized it was no longer raining but sleeting, the heavy drops of slush splattering on his mac and sliding down its surface.
Just as he was thinking he couldn’t stand the cold anymore, he began to feel a creeping warmth. Unbelievable — the strategy was working, his body was responding. Adjusting to the intense cold. The warmth began at his very core and slowly, slowly, radiated outward. He felt sleepy and strangely peaceful. He grew calmer. He might just be able to weather this night after all. And in the morning the sun might be up, it would be warmer, and he could start afresh and pick up the trail.
Now he was feeling quite warm and his mood soared. This was going to be a piece of cake. Even the ache of his injury was gone.
Darkness had fallen and he felt unbelievably sleepy. It would be good to get some sleep, the night would pass a lot faster. As the darkness became complete, the sleet tapered off. More good luck. No — it was now snowing. Well, at least the wind had died down. God, he was sleepy.
And then in adjusting his position, he glimpsed it: a faint light in the fields of blackness — yellow, wavering. D’Agosta stared. Was he seeing things? It had to be Glims Holm — what else could it be? And it wasn’t all that far off. He should go there.
But no; he was so wonderfully sleepy he’d spend the night here, and go in the morning. Good to know it was close by. Now he could go to sleep in peace. He drifted off into a deliciously warm sea of nothingness…
CHAPTER 16
Antigua, Guatemala
THE MAN IN THE LINEN SUIT AND WHITE STRAW FEDORA sat at a small table in the front courtyard of the restaurant, eating a late breakfast of huevos rancheros with sour cream and jalapeño sauce. From his vantage point he could see the Parque Central, fringed with green, tourists and children gathered around the rebuilt fountain at its center. Beyond lay the Arco de Santa Catalina, the rich deep yellow of its arch and bell tower more suited to Venice than Central America. And still farther — beyond the pastel-colored buildings and brown roofs — rose huge volcanic peaks, their dark crowns smoked by banks of cloud.
Even at this hour, music echoed faintly from open windows. Cars passed in the street, stirring up occasional bits of trash.
It was a warm morning, and the man removed the fedora and placed it on the table. He was tall and imposing, and the linen suit could not fully hide the massive, sculpted physique of a bodybuilder. His movements were slow, almost studied, but his pale eyes were alert, taking in everything, missing nothing. His deeply tanned skin was in marked contrast to the full head of pure white hair, and it had an unusual suppleness, almost a silkiness, that made it hard to guess his age: perhaps forty, perhaps fifty.