“I can take you where I dropped them off. For a price…”
“How soon can you be ready to leave?” the American asked.
“Tomorrow at first light.”
The younger man relayed the information to Gus, who frowned. “We’re going to be too far behind them. Find out where he left them, and we can see about getting a helicopter. Worst case you can take him up on it tomorrow, but I’d rather get a bird in the air this evening.” Gus stared at the darkening sky with a sinking feeling, knowing that the odds of being able to arrange for transportation for a team into the Amazon at night were less than slim.
The man took out a wad of bills and peeled several high-denomination notes from it, and then handed them to the captain. “Where exactly did you drop them off?”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The next day began much as the previous one, up at dawn, trudging through the undergrowth trying to find a viable game trail, locating a promising one, and following it deeper into the jungle. It didn’t start raining until ten, and when the heavens opened up, everyone was relieved, the heat having built to an almost intolerable level in the interim. They marched along silently, occasionally pausing when Spencer would point out an animal or bird moving through the thickets, the downpour denting the leaves around them as they marched steadily forward.
They spotted several more snakes, most notably a large bushmaster, easily six feet long, that they startled as they came around a bend in a trail as they forged their way east. Spencer froze when he saw it, and held them back until the drowsy serpent had moved off the trail, preferring a less trafficked spot for its slumber.
At noon they entered an area with numerous waterfalls and took a break near one of the largest as Jack made calculations on his GPS.
He glanced at Drake as he entered coordinates using the keypad. “This area looks familiar. We’re half a mile from the first outpost your father and I located. It’s a little northeast of us, and as I recall, it was close enough to a stream to camp in.”
“Then that’s our target for the day,” Spencer said. “Half a mile shouldn’t take us more than an hour, unless everyone would prefer to stay here. Is there any reason we should go on to the outpost now, Jack?”
“Not really. There’s not a lot to see. A few remnants of stone walls overgrown with vegetation. I’d say this is as good a place as any to stop. We’re sixteen miles west of the spot where…where the final camp was located.”
Allie shook her head. “I want to see the outpost. We’ve come this far.”
“Why?” Drake asked.
“Because I trained my entire life for this, and I may see something that everyone missed.”
Jack nodded. “I suppose we can afford another hour. Let’s keep at it.”
The slog took forty-five minutes. When they made it to the outpost, everyone but Allie took a break while she explored the ruins. The stone outcroppings appeared unremarkable to Drake, but he went to join her later as she was still clearing an area beneath two piles of stone.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“This would have been the stone arch. It’s collapsed, but for our purposes, it’ll do.”
“Does it fit with my Dad’s theory about the paver stones that ran through the arch pointing to the next spot?”
“It’s interesting how they aligned them. A continuation of the path, but with enough variation so that anyone trying to chart a straight line between the outposts would be stumped — if you didn’t know that the pavers exiting the arch indicated the new bearing, you’d be wandering in the jungle forever. My guess is they used the stars as an orientation — you can see grooves cut into the arch base that probably coincided with the angle the sun would hit at a certain time of the year.”
“Were they advanced astronomers?”
“Yes, actually. They built observatories and timed their harvests based on celestial observations — often solar, but also of stars and planets, like Venus and the Pleiades,” Allie explained.
“Interesting. But how precise would that be for the purposes of plotting a course to the next outpost?”
“There would be a margin of error, sure, but it would be slimmer than you’d think.”
Spencer and Jack approached. “So? Anything unusual?”
Allie shook her head. “No, but the layout confirms we’re on the right track.” She pointed to where the stone arch had stood. “That would have stood about twelve feet high, and it would have established the direction of the next outpost.” She turned to Drake. “How far are we from the campsite?”
Drake did a quick calculation. “Seventeen miles.” He regarded Spencer. “Do you think we can make that tomorrow?”
“It’ll be a push. We’ve been averaging twelve per day so far. It really depends on the terrain. If we get lucky and there’s a clear trail most of the way, and it’s not too hot, it could happen. But it’s a long trek in these conditions. Don’t get your heart set on it.” Spencer looked around. “Do you want to stay here or keep going?”
“Let’s keep at it,” Drake said. “Maybe we can get another couple of miles under our belt before we stop for the afternoon. Every day of delay is another that the Russians have to catch up to us.”
“He’s right. We should keep moving,” Jack said. They spent another ten minutes resting before continuing east, leaving the outpost behind. Half an hour later they encountered a fair-sized game trail, and they were able to make it to a shallow stream two miles farther before stopping. It had begun raining again, which they were now used to, and they made short work of raising the tents far enough from the stream so anyone following it wouldn’t spot them — although the chances of that were slim given the overgrowth on both banks.
Once camp was set up, Spencer spent some time at the water’s edge. When he returned, he had a smile on his face — the first since the trip had started. He approached Drake, who was preparing to drowse in the shade of his tent.
“You got that big knife of yours handy?” Spencer whispered.
“Sure. Why?”
“I want to make a couple of spears. We’re going to eat well tonight.”
Drake unsheathed the knife and handed it to Spencer. “What are you planning to spear?”
“Pirarucu.”
“What’s that?”
“Big catfish. I saw a couple of them near some rocks. The smaller one looked like a good eighty pounder.”
“Eighty pounds? Are you kidding?”
“They get up to four hundred. But they’re not bad eating. And anything we don’t finish, the animals will take care of. Nothing goes to waste in the Amazon. I want to find a few sturdy saplings I can sharpen so once it gets closer to dusk we can spear one for dinner. Your knife’s got a better edge than my machete after a long day of hacking.”
Spencer returned in a half hour with three eight-foot staffs, their tips whittled to sharp spikes. He gave Drake back the knife, leaned the spears against a nearby tree, and wiped the sweat from his face.
“There. After siesta, we’ll spear us a fish.”
“Sounds good.”
Birds called to one another up in the canopy as the day wore on. The rain eased for an hour and then resumed with renewed vigor. Drake slept lightly for much of the afternoon, his prior night having been difficult, especially after his shift, when his adrenaline had been pumping with every stirring in the brush.
At five, Spencer’s voice called through the tent fabric. “You ready to play hunter?”
Drake roused himself and poked his head out. “Sure.”
They made their way down to the stream, spears in hand, and Spencer picked his way onto a jutting outcrop of boulders as the cloudburst eased to a drizzle. “There are three here,” he called softly, and Drake hurried to join him. Spencer pointed to the long, dark shapes in the water, the closest only four feet from the rocks.