The Codex

by Douglas Preston

  Skiba turned down the volume on the arrogant, quacking voice. He didn’t believe he had ever hated a man as much as he hated Hauser right now.

  “A second problem is the oldest son, Philip. At some point I’m going to have to deal with him. I’ll need him for a while longer, but when he’s outlived his usefulness, well, we can’t have him ‘popping up’ (that was your phrase, or was it mine?) claiming ownership of the Codex. Nor can Vernon or Tom. And that goes for the woman Tom’s traveling with, Sally Colorado.”

  There was a long silence.

  “You do understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

  Skiba waited, trying to control himself. These conversations were a colossal waste of time. Even more, they were dangerous.

  “You there, Lewis?”

  Skiba said angrily, “Why don’t you just get on with it? Why these calls? Your job is to deliver the Codex to me. How you do it is your business, Hauser.”

  The chuckle swelled to a laugh. “Oh, that’s beautiful. You’re not going to get away so easily. You’ve known all along what has to happen. You’ve been hoping that I’d take care of it on my own. No such luck. There isn’t going to be any deniability here, no selling out the little guy, no plea bargaining. When the time comes, you’re going to tell me to kill them. It’s the only way, and you know it.”

  “Stop this kind of talk immediately. There will be no killing.”

  “Oh, Lewis, Lewis ...”

  Skiba felt sick. He felt the nausea contracting his stomach in waves. Out of the corner of his eye the stock was ticking down again. The SEC hadn’t even halted trading, had hung Lampe out to twist in the wind. There were twenty thousand employees depending on him, millions of sick people who needed their drugs, there were his wife and children, his house, his own two million stock options and six million shares ...

  He heard a loud honk on the line—evidently a laugh. He suddenly felt very weak. How had he allowed this to happen? How had this man escaped his control?

  “Don’t kill anyone,” he said, swallowing before he could even finish the sentence. His stomach was going to heave at any moment. There was a legal way to do this; the sons would bring out the Codex, and then he’d negotiate with them, strike a deal ... But he knew it wouldn’t happen, not with Lampe under a cloud of rumor and investigation, with a collapsing stock price ...

  The voice suddenly became gentle. “Look, I know it’s a tough decision. If you really feel strongly about this, I’ll turn around and we’ll forget all about the Codex. Really.”

  Skiba swallowed. That knot in his throat felt like it was going to choke him. His three towheaded sons smiled at him from the silver frames on his desk.

  “Just say the word and we’ll head back. Call it a day.”

  “There’s to be no killing.”

  “Look, no decision has to be made just yet. Why don’t you sleep on it?”

  Skiba staggered to his feet. He tried to make it to his leather-covered gold-tooled Florentine wastebasket but only got as far as the fireplace. With the vomit crackling and sizzling in the fire, he came back to the phone, picked it up to say something, then changed his mind and slowly placed it back in its cradle with a shaky hand. The hand snaked out toward the top drawer of his desk, and searched out the cool bottle of plastic.

  22

  Thirty minutes later, Tom saw movement in the forest, and an old, shawled woman came tramping down the trail. Marisol rushed forward with a sob, and they spoke rapidly in their own language.

  Marisol turned to Tom and Sally with a look of huge relief. “It is as I said. The soldiers just shot into the air to frighten us. Then they went away. We convinced them that you had not come to the village, that you had not passed by. They have gone back downriver.”

  As they approached the hut, Tom could see Don Alfonso standing outside, smoking his pipe, looking as unconcerned as if nothing had happened. His face broke into a big smile as they approached. “Chori! Pingo! Get out here! Come out and meet your new yanqui bosses! Chori and Pingo do not speak Spanish, they speak only Tawahka, but I yell at them in Spanish to show them my superiority, and you must yell at them, too.”

  Two magnificent specimens of manhood bowed out of the door of the hut, naked from the waist up, their muscled bodies gleaming with oil. The one named Pingo had Western-style tattoos on his arms and Indian tattoos on his face and held a three-foot machete in his fist, while Chori had an old Springfield rifle slung over his shoulder and carried a Pulaski—a firefighter’s axe—in one hand.

  “We will load the boat now. We must leave the village as soon as possible.”

  Sally glanced at Tom. “Looks like Don Alfonso’s going to be our guide.”

  Shouting and gesticulating, Don Alfonso directed Chori and Pingo as they carried the supplies down to the river’s edge. Their dugout was back, looking as if it had never been moved. In a half hour everything was all set, the supplies loaded in a great heap in the middle of the dugout and tied down with a plastic tarp. Meanwhile a crowd had been gathering on the bank, and cooking fires were lit.

  Sally turned to Marisol. “You’re a wonderful girl,” she said. “You saved our lives. You could do anything in life you want, do you know that?”

  The girl gazed at her steadily. “I only want one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “To go to America.” The girl said no more but continued looking at Sally with her grave, intelligent face.

  “I hope you do go to America,” said Sally.

  The girl smiled confidently and stood up straighter. “I will. Don Alfonso promised. He has a ruby.”

  The riverbank was now crowded with people. Their departure seemed to be turning into a festive occasion. A group of women was cooking a communal dinner over a fire. Children were running, playing, laughing, and chasing chickens. Finally, when it seemed that the whole village was assembled, Don Alfonso moved through the crowd, which parted for him. He was wearing a brand-new pair of shorts and a T-shirt that said “No Fear.” His face was wreathed in smiles as he joined them on the bamboo dock.

  “Everyone has come to say good-bye,” he said to Tom. “You see how I am a beloved personage in Pito Solo. I am their special Don Alfonso Boswas. You see proof here that you chose the right person to guide you across the Meambar Swamp.”

  Some firecrackers went off nearby, and there was a squealing of laughter. The women began passing out food. Don Alfonso took Tom and Sally by the hand.

  “We get into the boat now.”

  Chori and Pingo, still stripped to the waist, had already taken their places, one in the bow and the other the stern. Don Alfonso helped them while two boys stood at either end of the boat, holding the lines, ready to cast off. Then Don Alfonso got in himself. He steadied himself, turned, and faced the crowd. A hush fell: Don Alfonso was about to give a speech. When the silence was absolute, he started, speaking in a most formal Spanish.

  “My friends and countrymen, many years ago it was prophesied that white men would come and I would take them on a long journey. And now they are here. We are setting off on a perilous journey across the Meambar Swamp. We will have adventures and see many strange and wonderful sights, never before seen by man.

  “You may ask why we make this great journey! I will tell you. This American has come here to rescue his father, who lost his mind and abandoned his wife and family, taking with him all their possessions, leaving them destitute. His poor wife has been weeping tears for him every day and she cannot feed her family or protect them from the wild animals. Their house is falling down and the thatch has rotted, letting in the rain. No one will marry his sisters and they will soon be forced into whoredom. His nephews have taken to drink. This young man, this good son, has come to cure his father from his madness and bring him back to America, where he can live to a respectable old age and die in his hammock and not bring further dishonor and starvation to his family. Then his sisters will find husbands and his nephews and nieces will take care of his milpas and he will
be able to play dominoes in the hot afternoon instead of working.”

  The village was spellbound at the speech. Don Alfonso, Tom thought, certainly knew how to tell a good story.

  “Long ago, my friends, I dreamed a dream that I would leave you in this way, that I would go away on a great journey to the end of the earth. I am now one hundred and twenty-one years of age and finally this dream has come to pass. There are not many men who could do this thing at my age. I still have much blood in my veins, and if my Rosita were still alive she would be smiling every day.”

  “Good-bye, my friends, your beloved Don Alfonso Boswas is departing the village with tears of sadness in his eyes. Remember me always and tell my story to your children and tell them to tell their children, to the end of time.”

  A great cheer went up. Firecrackers went off, and all the dogs began barking. Some of the old men began beating sticks together in a complex rhythm. The boat was pushed out into the current, and Chori started the engine. The laden boat began nosing forward in the water. Don Alfonso continued standing, waving and blowing kisses to the wildly cheering crowd until long after the boat had rounded the first bend.

  “I feel like we just took off in a balloon with the Wizard of Oz,” said Sally.

  Don Alfonso finally sat down, wiping tears from his eyes. “Ahee, you see how they love their Don Alfonso Boswas.” He snugged himself into the heap of supplies, extracted his corncob pipe, packed it full of tobacco, and began to smoke, a pensive expression on his face.

  “Are you really one hundred and twenty-one years old?” Tom asked.

  Don Alfonso shrugged. “No one knows how old they really are.”

  “I know how old I am.”

  “You have counted every year you have lived since birth?”

  “No, but others counted for me.”

  “So you don’t really know.”

  “I do know. It’s listed on my birth certificate, signed by the doctor who delivered me.”

  “Who is this doctor and where is he now?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “And you actually believe some useless piece of paper, signed by a stranger?”

  Tom looked at the old man, defeated by his crazy logic. “We have a profession for people like you in America,” he said. “We call them lawyers.”

  Don Alfonso laughed loudly, slapping his knee. “This is a good joke. You are like your father, Tomasito, who was a very funny man.” He chuckled for a while, puffing his pipe. Tom took out their map of Honduras and examined it.

  Don Alfonso eyed it critically and then snatched it out of his hand. He examined it first one way, then another. “What is this? North America?”

  “No, it’s southeastern Honduras. That’s the Patuca River, and there’s Brus. The village of Pito Solo should be here, but it’s not marked. Neither, it seems, is the Meambar Swamp.”

  “So according to this map, we do not exist and the Meambar Swamp does not exist. Take care to keep this very important map dry. We may need it to start a fire someday.” Don Alfonso laughed at his humor, pointing to Chori and Pingo, who took the cue and belatedly began laughing along with him, even though they hadn’t understood a word he’d said. Don Alfonso continued laughing uproariously, slapping his thigh, until the tears streamed.

  “We have begun our journey well,” he said when he had recovered. “There will be much humor and jokes on our trip. Otherwise the swamp will drive us mad, and we will die.”

  23

  The camp had been set up with the usual military precision on an island of high ground surrounded by swamp. Philip sat by the fire, smoking his pipe and listening to the evening sounds of the rainforest. It surprised him how competent Hauser had proven to be at jungle-craft, organizing and laying out a camp and directing the soldiers about their various tasks. Hauser asked nothing of Philip and had rebuffed all his efforts to help. Not that Philip was anxious to go off wading in the muck hunting giant rats for dinner, as it seemed they were doing now. It was just that Philip disliked feeling useless. This was not the challenge his father had in mind, sitting by a fire smoking his pipe while others did all the work.

  Philip kicked a stick back into the embers. The hell with the “challenge.” It had to be the most asinine thing a father ever did to his children since King Lear divided his kingdom.

  Ocotal, the guide they had picked up at that sorry town on the river, was sitting by himself, tending the fire and cooking rice. He was a strange fellow, this Ocotal—small, silent, utterly dignified. There was something about him that Philip found attractive; he seemed to be one of those men who had an unshakable, inner conviction of his own worth. He certainly knew his stuff, guiding them through an incredible maze of channels, day after day, without the slightest hesitation, paying no attention to Hauser’s exhortations, comments, and questions. He was impervious to any attempts at conversation, whether on Philip’s part or Hauser’s.

  Philip reamed out the dottle, glad he had thought to stock up on tins of Dunhill Early Morning, and repacked the pipe. He really should cut back, especially in light of his father’s cancer. After the trip. For now, the smoke was the only way to keep off the mosquitoes.

  There were shouts, and Philip turned to see Hauser coming back from the hunt, with a dead tapir slung on a pole, carried by four soldiers. They hoisted the animal up with a block and tackle from a tree branch. Hauser left the men and came to sit down next to Philip. There was a faint smell of aftershave, tobacco smoke, and blood. He took out a cigar, clipped it, and lit it. He took in a lungful of smoke and let it trickle back out of his nose, like a dragon.

  “We’re making excellent progress, Philip, don’t you think?”

  “Admirable.” Philip slapped at a mosquito. He couldn’t understand how Hauser managed to avoid getting bitten, despite the fact that he never seemed to use insect repellent. Maybe his bloodstream had a deadly concentration of nicotine. Philip noticed that he inhaled his fat Churchill cigars the way most people inhale cigarettes. Strange how one man dies of it, another lives.

  “Are you familiar with Genghis Khan’s dilemma?” Hauser asked.

  “I can’t say I am.”

  “When Genghis Khan was getting ready to die, he wanted to be buried as befitted the great ruler he was—with heaps of treasure, concubines, and horses to enjoy in the afterlife. But he knew that his tomb would almost certainly be robbed, depriving him of all the joys due him in the afterworld. He thought about this for a long time and could come up with no answer. He finally called in his Grand Vizier, the wisest man in his kingdom.

  “ ‘What shall I do to keep my tomb from being robbed?’ he asked the Vizier.

  “The Vizier thought about it for a long time and finally came up with an answer. He explained it to Genghis Khan, and the ruler was satisfied. When Ghenghis finally died, the Vizier put the plan into action. He sent ten thousand laborers off to the remote Altai Mountains, where they built a great tomb hewn down into the living rock, filling it with gold, gemstones, wine, silks, ivory, sandalwood, and incense. More than a hundred beautiful virgins and a thousand horses were sacrificed for the great Khan’s pleasure in the afterworld. There was a grand funeral with much feasting among the laborers, and then Genghis Khan’s body was shut up in the tomb and the door carefully concealed. The area was covered with dirt, and then a thousand horsemen rode back and forth over the valley, obliterating all traces of their work.

  “When the laborers and the horsemen returned, the Vizier met them with the Khan’s army and killed them to a man.”

  “Nasty.”

  “Then the Vizier committed suicide.”

  “The fool. He could’ve been rich.”

  Hauser chuckled. “Yes. But he was loyal. He knew that even he himself, the most trustworthy of men, could not be trusted with such a secret. He might utter it at night in a dream, or it might be tortured out of him—or his own greed might eventually get the better of him. He was the weak link in the plan. Therefore, he had to die.”

  Phi
lip heard a hacking noise and glanced over to see the hunters gutting the animal with machetes. The guts spilled to the ground with a wet sound. Philip winced and turned away. There was something to be said for the vegetarian lifestyle, he mused.

  “Here’s the rub, Philip, the weakness in the Vizier’s plan. It required Genghis Khan to trust at least one other person with his secret.” Hauser exhaled a cloud of pungent smoke. “My question to you, Philip, is who was the one person your father trusted?”

  It was a good question, one that Philip had been considering for some time. “It wasn’t a girlfriend or ex-wife. He constantly complained about his doctors and lawyers. His secretaries were always quitting on him. He had no real friends. The only man he trusted was his pilot.”

  “And I’ve already determined he wasn’t in on the deal.” Hauser held the cigar at a steep angle against his lips. “There’s the rub, Philip. Did your father have some kind of secret life? A secret affair? A son born out of wedlock that he favored above you three?”

  Philip felt himself go cold at this last suggestion. “I have no idea.”

  Hauser waved his cigar. “Something to think about, eh, Philip?” He fell silent. The intimacy encouraged Philip to ask a question he had been wanting to ask for some time. “What happened between you and father?”

  “Did you know we were childhood friends?”

  “Yes.”

  “We grew up together in Erie. We played stickball together on the block where we lived, we went to school together, we went to our first whorehouse together. We thought we knew each other pretty well. But when you go out there into the jungle, when you’re shoved up against the wall of survival, things come out. You discover things in yourself that you never knew were there. You find out who you really are. That’s what happened to us. We got out there in the middle of the jungle, lost, bitten, starving, half dead with fever, and we found out who we really were. You know what I discovered? I discovered that I despised your father.”