Still no one moved, either at the site of the ceremony or in the bandits’ hiding place above it. The door rumbled open, and when it had formed a perfect ninety-degree angle with the surface of Puerta de Hayu Marka, it ground to a halt. The thick slab of rock stood open, once again solid and immovable, and the strange blue light continued billowing outward from somewhere deep inside the rock, forming a thick rectangular shaft of oddly hypnotic illumination.
And then a figure stepped through the opening.
***
The man, if it even was a man, was bigger by far than anyone Jackson Healy had ever seen. He – it – glided through the open doorway that had been nothing more than solid rock just moments before. The figure’s feet touched the ground but he moved with a smoothness and economy of motion Jackson had never seen out of another human being. His bearing was regal. His skin appeared paper-thin and translucent, and his body pulsed with a pale glow that seemed to emanate from deep within.
In his hands the visitor held a clear tubular container. From a distance the container resembled glass, although Jackson guessed it was not, and it was filled with an amber liquid that sloshed around inside it sluggishly like a thick gel. The rock doorway’s brilliant blue light illuminated the visitor from behind, casting his features in deep shadow. His clothing was unlike anything Jackson had ever seen: a billowing robe flowing off massive shoulders, stretched out behind him like the train on a society matron’s ball gown.
The visitor moved to a point directly in front of the shaman priest and stopped. He bent and spoke a few words into the priest’s ear before handing him the tubular container filled with the gel-like liquid, his movements somehow ceremonial. He straightened abruptly and gazed over the crowd and then up the hill in the direction of the Healy-Krupp gang’s hiding place.
For a long moment Jackson froze, certain the visitor’s penetrating eyes were locked onto his. Then the otherworldly being turned and glided back through the open Puerta de Hayu Marka, disappearing through the stone door, swallowed up almost immediately by the brilliant blue light.
And then the rumbling began again, seeming to originate from somewhere deep below the surface of the earth. The door swung slowly closed, and less than a minute later was gone, melted back into the surface of the rock, and the alcove appeared exactly as it had before the bizarre ceremony had begun.
And Jackson Healy knew now was the time to act.
3
The bandits herded the ritual’s participants into a more or less straight line in front of Puerta de Hayu Marka. The shamans’ meager security detail—a couple of tribal warriors armed with spears; it was clear the pagan priests had expected no visitors and certainly no trouble—had been brought under control quickly and easily. Jackson had simply shot the first man to act aggressively in the head, point-blank, and the remainder of the tribal members immediately recognized the wisdom in doing as they were told.
The fire continued to burn brightly in the stone pit behind them, throwing dancing shadows onto the once-again sheer rock face. The Peruvian natives gazed at their captors with stony expressions. They seemed to save the worst of their scorn for the young boy who had served as guide for the Healy-Krupp gang.
For his part, Juan seemed shell-shocked at the sudden turn of events. He had agreed to serve as guide in exchange for more American money than anyone in his family had likely ever seen, but he had clearly not expected violence, believing the three gringos wanted nothing more than to observe the mystical ceremony from a distance. Only in the last few minutes had he learned the truth.
Now he would be put to use as a translator. Although the language being spoken by the shamans was not quite the Spanish Juan was accustomed to, the dialects were similar enough that with a little effort the boy could make the two parties understand each other, more or less.
While the Krupp brothers brandished their revolvers menacingly to keep the natives under control, Jackson examined the alcove. He placed his hand on the rock, sliding it slowly across the smooth surface. It was solid and unyielding, with no sign that any part of it had only minutes ago swiveled as if on a hinge and opened into a door. A vibration, so faint Jackson wondered whether he was imagining it, seemed to emanate from the massive rock formation.
The golden disk, roughly a foot in diameter, remained locked into the depression in the middle of the alcove where it had been inserted to turn the massive rock into a mystical portal. Jackson grazed his fingertips lightly across the disk’s surface, and felt the vibration again. It was a little stronger, a humming that was felt rather than heard, and it ran up his fingers and into his hand, dissipating in his forearm.
Jackson shuddered with a sudden and irrational sense of misgiving. He was gripped by the thought that he should abandon this insane project, jump on the back of his burro and get out now, while he still could.
Before it was too late.
Then the feeling was gone, evaporating as quickly as it had arisen.
He shook his head, angry with himself for falling victim to what was clearly no more than superstitious pagan nonsense, and felt around the edge of the disk, probing and prying, looking for a handhold to use to pry the valuable golden relic out of the rock.
Within seconds he found one. On the right side of the circle, near the top, the otherwise uniform depression sank slightly deeper into the stone. It provided just enough room for him to slide his fingers between the disk and the smooth surface. Jackson patiently worked his fingers under the disk, conscious of the skin being rubbed off his knuckles, as well as of the angry stares of the natives from behind him.
At last the disk levered out of the depression. It slid away from Puerta de Hayu Marka slowly, as if doing so only with the most extreme reluctance. It began to fall and Jackson caught it with his left hand. As he did, a mutter of protest arose from the warriors. The sound was brief and ended abruptly, and he knew one of the Krupp brothers had raised his gun to the head of a random tribal member in an unspoken threat.
Jackson examined the back of his hand and observed blood welling through the scraped and shredded skin of his knuckles. He wiped the blood away on his vest, aware that the gesture was futile; more blood was already taking its place. He shrugged. A little scrape on his knuckles was a small price to pay for this solid gold disk, which was big and thick and heavy, and clearly worth a fortune.
He turned and moved away from the alcove. Walked to his burro and slid the priceless treasure into a saddlebag. Walked back to the rest of the gang and stood before Juan. The boy’s enormous smile had long since disappeared and he stared at Jackson with a mixture of fear and confusion.
Jackson ignored it. His plan was working to perfection and he wasn’t about to alter it because of the feelings of a little boy. He fixed the child with a stare and said, “Ask the priest what that…man…handed him before he disappeared back into the rock.”
The boy stared back, and for a moment Jackson thought the kid was going to spit in his face. Then he broke Jackson’s gaze and trudged toward the ancient shaman priest, whose skin was lined and weathered and who looked even older up close than he had from a distance.
The boy stopped in front of the old man and began exchanging words. Although Jackson had picked up a fair understanding of the Spanish language from his time in Texas and especially the gang’s more recent excursion into South America, the dialect was confusing and the conversation too rapid-fire for him to follow in any meaningful way.
Juan and the old man went back and forth, and then the young guide returned to Jackson. He kept his voice low when he spoke, and Jackson wondered why. What did it matter if anyone heard? “He…he says the liquid is…it is…”
The boy looked away, either embarrassed or afraid to continue, and Jackson waved his hand in an impatient circling motion. “Out with it,” he growled.
“He says it is the secret to eternal life,” Juan finished. Tears rimmed his bloodshot eyes and he looked miserable.
There was a long silence. No one moved
and no one spoke. Jackson didn’t know what he had expected to hear, but he knew that wasn’t it. Then one of the Krupp brothers giggled from somewhere behind him and Jackson turned and glared. Both brothers looked away, each appearing equally guilty, and Jackson was glad he would soon be parting ways with the two dullards.
He bent and said to the boy, “I want to make sure there was no misunderstanding. This is important. You go back and ask that old man what happens if someone drinks that liquid in the glass tube he’s holding, and then you come back to me and repeat exactly what he says, word for word.”
Juan did as he was told, and Jackson watched the exchange with a critical gaze. The old Peruvian shaman lifted his head and shot Jackson a look of hostility that went far beyond anything he had ever seen, even out of the good ol’ boys back in Texas just before he put bullets in their heads and made off with their money.
This time the conversation was brief, and when Juan returned, he said simply, “If you drink the liquid, you will live forever.” He refused to meet Jackson’s eyes and stood shuffling his feet uncomfortably in the dusty South American night.
Jackson Healy smiled. He had come to this desolate spot in the wilds of Peru in search of riches, and would leave with so much more.
***
The slaughter was sudden, efficient, and brutal. Jackson instructed Juan to take the tube containing the golden gel-like liquid from the hands of the shaman priest. He accepted it from the boy and walked over to his burro, placing it into the saddlebag already weighted down with the golden disk. Then he strode back to his position in front of the fire, which had begun to wane but was still burning brighter than any campfire he had ever seen.
The Peruvian tribesmen and the American outlaws faced each other, with Juan standing on the side of the gringos only because he had been forced there. The night breezes were humid and carried on them the promise of a coming storm. Off in the distance, thunder rumbled through the heavy air. The hint of a flickering glow appeared over the horizon, winking once, twice, three times, and then disappearing like the end of a nightmare.
Without warning Jackson turned and nodded to the Krupp brothers. The three men raised their Colt revolvers in perfect unison and began firing, and Peruvian tribesmen began falling, and within seconds it was over, the sound of the dying men’s moans barely discernible over the screams of the young boy the outlaws had hired as their guide. Juan stood off to the side, rooted to the spot in shock and disbelief, staring with wide, frightened eyes and screaming into the muggy night.
And then Jackson turned his pistol on Juan and fired.
And the screaming stopped.
***
The smell of gunpowder hung in the air as the three outlaws prepared to flee. Jackson Healy surveyed the devastation, the fallen bodies littering the flat plain in front of Puerta de Hayu Marka like a child’s dolls after a tantrum. Wesley Krupp asked, “How long d’ya suppose it’ll be before someone finds this mess?”
Jackson shrugged. “Couple of days. The kid’s ma and pa will wait for him to come home tomorrow, and when he don’t, they’ll get a search party together and head out here at first light the next day.”
“So we’ll have about a day-and-a-half head start on the locals. That ain’t much. We’ll have to ride non-stop for the next few days.”
“One of us will,” Jackson agreed, and then he drew his Colt again and gut-shot Wesley Krupp, then turned and fired on Amos almost before Wesley had hit the ground. Amos was so stunned he never even reached for his gun.
“Sorry about that,” Jackson said agreeably, aiming his voice in the direction of his fallen partners. “It’s nothin’ personal, but you fellas have outlived your usefulness. Know what I mean?”
He waited for an answer, but none was forthcoming. Pained gasps, punctuated by the occasional shocked curse, seemed to be the limit of the Krupp brothers’ current vocabulary.
Jackson shrugged, unsurprised. He gathered the reins of the four burros into one hand and began walking away from the carnage in what he hoped was the direction of Puno. He had no intention of entering the village—to do so would be the height of stupidity, given what he had just done to the twelve year old former resident of the place—but intended to skirt it to the west, then head north toward the good old U.S. of A.
Three of the burros he would release into the wild shortly, and the fourth—the one carrying the saddlebag containing a fortune in pure gold, not to mention the fountain of youth—would transport Jackson Healy until he could steal a horse to use to escape South America and move on to his suddenly limitless future.
As he departed, leaving in his wake bodies and blood and devastation, he could hear the muttered curses and vain threats of his now-dying former partners. He ignored them and walked on into the night.
4
June 18, 1858
Paskagankee, Maine
Lucas Crosby had just finished wiping down the bar at the Paskagankee Tavern when the horse-drawn carriage arrived. The evening’s last drinker had departed over an hour ago, and Luke would normally have been asleep in bed by now, but not on delivery night. Delivery night was different.
The clop-clop-clop of horse hooves on hard-packed dirt became stronger as the wagon approached from the south, then faded away again as it drove straight past the tavern’s front entrance. Luke knew the routine. It was always the same. The driver would turn his horse into the small delivery area hacked into the dense forest just past the building, then guide the wagon along the side of the tavern until reaching the rear service entrance.
Luke waited a couple of minutes for the driver to navigate the narrow, rutted pathway, then walked through the kitchen and out the back door to begin unloading supplies.
Receiving deliveries in the middle of the night was unusual, Luke knew that. And in fact the strange nocturnal schedule had raised a few influential eyebrows five years ago, when Luke had purchased the Paskagankee Tavern with his wife, Sarah. But he explained to the Town Council that arranging for supply deliveries to a location as far out in the wilderness as Paskagankee was no easy task, and when the distributor—located all the way down in Portland—offered Luke a discount if he would agree to the unorthodox schedule, he had jumped at the offer.
“It’s all in the name of giving the people of Pakagankee a place to wet their whistles,” Luke had explained, and while the town fathers were none too happy about the deal, they didn’t interfere, either, especially when Luke told them it was either that or he would not be able to open the tavern.
He walked out the back door into the uncertain light provided by two flickering gas lamps mounted on the exterior wall, one on either side of the door. Delivery man Matt Fulton grunted a greeting, his heavily muscled arms straining under the weight of three cases of liquor as he stumbled by, moving in the opposite direction. “Hotter’n the hinges of hell, ain’t it?” Matt mumbled after placing the cases just inside the door and returning to the wagon for more.
Luke nodded and said nothing. All of his concentration was focused on unlatching a small iron hook fastened unobtrusively onto the rear of the wagon. He struggled with the latch—it was intentionally difficult to loosen for their protection, a fact Luke could appreciate but which was, nonetheless, extremely frustrating at two o’clock in the morning. Finally the offending latch popped free with a heavy clank, and Luke pulled the wagon’s false bottom straight backward, as if opening a gigantic dresser drawer.
The contraption rolled straight out about four feet, then swiveled on an iron bar mounted under the wagon as a hinge. Luke lowered the free end of the false bottom to the ground and a man tumbled out. It was a black man. The man was sweating profusely, having been trapped inside the tiny space for virtually the entire ten-hour trip north from Portland.
The hidden traveler rolled onto the dusty ground and pushed himself onto all fours. He struggled to his feet with difficulty, his limbs clearly stiff and sore. It was painful to watch. Luke extended a hand to help the man but was ignored. The man
was old, wizened, with receding gray hair and rheumy brown eyes.
Most slaves willing to risk everything for a shot at freedom were younger, often with families; men and women with more of their lives ahead of them than behind them. This man seemed to be the opposite. He walked with a slight bend to his frame, as if unable to fully straighten his spine. He was short and frail-looking, and it looked as though a strong wind might reduce him to smoke and blow him away.
Luke was stunned that the frail-looking old man standing unsteadily before him had made the long, dangerous trip. He tried to guess the man’s age and settled on seventy-five, maybe eighty. That would make him easily a quarter-century older than any other slave that had ever used the Paskagankee Tavern waypoint.
Luke had purchased the tavern with the intention of making it the final stop along the Underground Railroad’s Portland route almost five years ago. After making some special modifications to the building’s basement, he did exactly that. The Canadian border was located just a few short miles to the north, close enough for escaping slaves to make the final freedom-seeking dash on foot, after resting up at the tavern for anywhere from a few hours to a few days.
For the last five years Luke had been helping make slaves’ dreams of freedom come true. There had been hundreds of deliveries just like this one, and in all that time, he had never seen anyone of this advanced age and frail physical condition tumble out of the wagon’s false bottom. The space was so small and cramped that one decent-sized adult was forced to lie either on his back or his front, with barely enough hip-room to turn over. Luke couldn’t imagine how this man had managed ten hours.
Luke waited patiently while the elderly slave brushed himself off. His clothes were threadbare and dirty and his brushing motion accomplished nothing besides smearing the dirt around. Finally he gave up and shook out his arms and hands vigorously in an attempt to restore some of blood flow.
Wellspring (Paskagankee, Book 3) Page 2