Emma alighted from the taxicab and stood out in front of the striking building and admired the magnificent sculptures and ornate stonework of the great artist and sculptor, Francisco Narvaez.
She looked along the magnificent edifice of the museum, one of the country’s oldest. It was dubbed the Museum of Natural Sciences when it first opened, but the name was eventually shortened to Museo de Ciencias—the Museum of the Sciences — to reflect the broadening of its scope over the years. It didn’t matter what they now called it; like most places of public learning, they were dying, yet more victims of the fast-paced age of Internet learning.
Emma had come to this museum for one reason. Though it housed some of the country’s best collections in archaeology, anthropology, paleontology, and herpetology, there was only one thing she wanted to see.
Emma walked up the front steps toward the huge doors, seeing the ghostly apparition of her reflection doing the same in the glass panels. The polished glass was like a mirror, and she saw her familiar features staring back — the luminous green eyes, brown hair that shone with red highlights in the sunlight, and she knew there were still a few freckles smattering her upturned nose and cheeks.
But as she got closer, the ghost became clearer, and so did reality. She paused, staring for a moment. There was a streak of silver hair at her forehead that she didn’t bother masking, and at the corner of each of her green eyes, fine lines came about from squinting into the sun, plus a line between them, creating a permanent vertical frown, perhaps from worry. The face was older, wiser, and as some even said, haunted.
So be it, she thought as she blinked it away and pushed in through the huge doors, feeling immediate relief from the Venezuelan heat. She inhaled the odors of old wood and paper, floor wax, and something that might have been preserving fluid.
The rapid clip of shoes on marble turned her head, and she smiled and waved to a small, middle-aged man with perfectly groomed swept-back silver hair, wearing an immaculate three-piece suit. She took his outstretched hand, pressing firmly. She needed to win him over, and quickly.
“Greetings, Ms. Wilson, greetings.” The man beamed up at her. “Your travels were comfortable?”
She nodded. “Yes, thank you, Señor Alvarez. You look just like your pictures: handsome.”
The man beamed and also blushed a little. He continued to shake her hand for several more seconds as he smiled like a schoolboy. He finally shrugged.
“Ah, but I need new profile pictures.” He pointed at his head. “My hair is now fully grey.”
“Suits you.” Emma looked around. “Beautiful museum. Thank you for taking the time to see me.”
He turned, grasping her elbow and raising one arm to point to a corridor leading into the depths of the building. “Fact is, we are very quiet these times.” His lips turned down. “The young people of today, impatient, get their information, and perhaps their view of history, from the Internet.” He sighed.
“I know; their loss,” Emma replied.
The pair walked on in silence for a few more minutes with just the sound of their heels on the polished floor, and the occasional squeak of heavy wooden doors as they pushed through them.
Alvarez wasn’t kidding, Emma noticed, that they seemed to have the place to themselves. The man walked with his hands in his pockets and half-turned.
“You have been to our country before? The Amazon?”
“Yes, eight years ago.” She grunted softly. “Eight years, three weeks, and two days ago.”
Alverez’s brows shot up. “You seem to remember it very well?”
Emma’s eyes darkened. “It left… an impression.”
The man watched her face for a moment and then made a small noise in his chest. “Sometimes it is not a good experience for some people.”
He walked on for a few moments more, and obviously decided to fill the quietude with a little more small talk.
“Did you know the Amazon is still the world’s largest tropical rainforest?”
She smiled and nodded. “I did know that.”
He returned the smile. “Well then, did you know that the previous estimate of our magnificent jungle being 55 million years old has now been pushed back even further than anyone first thought? There are large tracts in the deepest parts of the jungle that may have existed for up to 100 million years.”
Her grin widened. “I even knew that too.”
“You have done your homework, Ms. Wilson; I salute you.” Alverez bowed his head slightly. “And now I can see why you are one of the few people in the world to even know about our artifact.” He stopped before a locked door, and then reached into a pocket to rummage for a moment before producing a large set of keys. “But exactly, how did you learn of it?”
Emma felt a tingle of excitement as she waited. “I heard about it from Professor Michael Gibson of Ohio University. He wasn’t sure if it was even real. He thought it might have been just a story.”
“Excellent archeology professor; I know of him.” He put the key in the lock, but paused to study her. “A long way to come for something that is certainly real, but is as confusing as it is confounding.”
“Curiosity.” She kept her eyes on the door.
“Killed the cat, yes?” He grinned up at her.
“It’s killed more than that,” she responded flatly.
His brows drew together momentarily. “Quite so.” Alverez then turned back to the door, unlocking it and pushing it open. He flicked on lights in a large room filled with exhibits that had most likely been stored or were yet to be classified.
Emma’s eyes were immediately drawn to a large cabinet against a far wall, and he flicked on a small spotlight that shone down on a bank of solid-looking drawers with brass handles.
She had to stop herself from racing ahead of the man and calmly walked at his side as they crossed the room. Alverez reached for one of the largest drawers and slid it open. Emma felt her heart begin to pound.
“La huella de Dios,” Alvarez said, almost reverently.
Emma whispered the translation, “The footprint of God.”
She stared at the object; it was a shard of stone, roughly two feet long and one foot wide, and at one edge, there was what looked like a portion of a human footprint with the toes pushed in hard. At the other end of the stone shard was a three-toed print of some sort of dinosaur. From the way the prints were pressed in, it looked like the human was running, the other creature in pursuit. Emma closed her eyes for a moment and felt moisture at the corner of each.
“The matrix rock is dated at around 100 million years old, the late Cretaceous Period. The last one of the Mesozoic Era.” He turned to her. “The great age of the dinosaurs.”
Emma continued to stare, her eyes blurring. “Do you think…?” She sniffed and quickly wiped a sleeve across her eyes.
Alverez nodded. “Impossible, I know. But the rock has been scientifically carbon dated. But there were no humans then. Many experts believe it is the distorted print of some sort of as yet unidentified animal. And others that it is proof that God walked our land to admire his creation.” He shrugged and grinned again. “This is why we call it the Surama mystery, named after a place that is a tiny dot on the map in the center of the Amazon.” He chuckled. “Who would believe it anyway?”
“Do you think… I can touch it?” She turned to him, hoping her flirting would now pay off.
“What?” He seemed confused, perhaps by the audacity of her request.
“It’s important.” She stared into his eyes.
His frown deepened. “But why? What would you…?”