The Aztec Heresy

by Paul Christopher

  ‘‘What about your bombs?’’ Finn asked, handing Garza the binoculars.

  ‘‘Gone,’’ answered the Mexican. ‘‘You can see where the excavation was.’’

  ‘‘Inside the temple thing?’’ Billy asked.

  ‘‘Doubtful,’’ said Garza, peering through the glasses again. ‘‘There’s a trail off on the right. It looks as though they were dug up and then dragged off somewhere to the north.’’

  ‘‘All right,’’ said Billy. ‘‘You’ve seen where your bombs have gone, we’ve surveyed the temple thingee, and I’m being eaten by mosquitoes and every other kind of nasty creature your wretched Yucatán Peninsula has to offer. Can we consider the survey done and beat a hasty retreat?’’ The Englishman sighed. ‘‘What I wouldn’t give for a pint of Thwaites Best Mild right now.’’

  ‘‘We’re not going anywhere just yet,’’ said Garza. ‘‘We’re talking about World War Three, not a couple of firecrackers.’’

  ‘‘And I want to know why there’s a Mayan observatory in the middle of nowhere,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘Everywhere around here is the middle of nowhere,’’ grumbled Billy.

  Garza continued to scan the clearing with the binoculars. Finally he put them down and turned to Finn. ‘‘In some ways I agree with his lordship,’’ said the Mexican. ‘‘Guzman and his men must be nearby. To remain here is foolish bravado. I could be back here in force within four or five days. It would be safer if you and your friends were not here at all.’’

  ‘‘This man Guzman has already moved your bombs once. He could do it again,’’ responded Finn. ‘‘You said there was a chance the Cubans were involved. Could they get the bombs to the coast? Get them to Cuba?’’

  ‘‘There are rumors . . . ,’’ said Garza hesitantly.

  ‘‘Rumors?’’

  ‘‘Foolishness. There is talk of a phantom submarine that Guzman uses to transport his narcotics.’’

  ‘‘A Cuban submarine?’’ Eli Santoro scoffed. ‘‘They don’t have enough gasoline to put in the limo Ted Turner gave him a few years back, let alone a submarine. That’s crazy talk.’’

  ‘‘The Cubans have some close friends in Venezuela. Sympathetic ones. Don’t let your patriotism blind you to reality. If Fidel wants to keep a submarine in play, he has the means to do so. The idea is one my office takes quite seriously.’’

  ‘‘So they could get the bombs out of Yucatán?’’

  ‘‘It’s possible.’’

  ‘‘You must have had a plan,’’ said Finn. ‘‘You had some idea of what you were going to do. You can’t tell me you came in blind.’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘So what was the plan?’’

  ‘‘Disable the bombs. Destroy the plutonium cores if necessary.’’

  ‘‘Disable as in explode?’’

  ‘‘Remove the cores, explode the mechanisms. One thing we know for sure, the Cubans have no nuclear program.’’

  ‘‘But they could trade the plutonium.’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘Can you do it by yourself, without your men?’’ Billy asked.

  ‘‘With some help. Someone who knows a little of electronics.’’

  ‘‘That would be me,’’ said Eli.

  ‘‘Some physical strength.’’

  ‘‘Hello there,’’ said the big bald Dutchman. ‘‘Ik heet Guido Derlagen.’’

  ‘‘This is Mexico’s problem. I cannot have you involved,’’ said Garza, shaking his head.

  ‘‘What about the necessary explosives?’’

  ‘‘In the pack,’’ said Garza. ‘‘Two shaped charges.’’

  ‘‘And radiation?’’ Billy asked. ‘‘You weren’t wearing those badges for nothing.’’

  ‘‘It is not really a problem, at least in the short term,’’ Garza explained. ‘‘The cores in the bombs are covered in hexagonal plates of explosive. Plutonium can be obtained from special-purpose plutonium production reactors, or as a by-product of commercial power or research reactors. The plutonium produced by special-purpose production reactors has a relatively low plutonium-240 content, less than seven percent, and is called weapons grade. Commercial reactors may produce plutonium with Pu-240 with concentrations of more than twenty percent and is called reactor grade, but because it must be handled remotely it is not economic to make bombs with. Weapons grade really means cheap. A pair of rubber gloves would be good enough. The cores only need to be separated from the shaped charges. Sinking them in a cenote would be good enough for the time being.’’

  ‘‘How about the observatory over there?’’ Finn suggested.

  ‘‘What do you mean?’’ Garza asked.

  ‘‘I’ll bet that structure is seated directly over a cenote pool,’’ said Finn. ‘‘It’s often how Mayan and Aztec astronomers worked. They used a cenote pool or an artificial disk of still water to reflect the night sky for easier study. They even had numbered grids in some of them with painted lines or rows of stones as dividers to map the entire sky.’’

  ‘‘What are you suggesting?’’ Garza asked.

  ‘‘You, Guido, and Eli see if you can track down the bombs. Billy and I will find the entrance to the temple. I can almost guarantee a cenote for your plutonium. We drop the cores in the pool. The perfect hiding place, at least for a little while. Until you can call in the cavalry. ’’ She turned and glanced at Eli and Guido. ‘‘Did you find any tools back at the campsite?’’

  ‘‘Couple of folding shovels, mountaineering axes. Some rope, trowels. A few flares. Basic stuff. Nothing fancy.’’

  ‘‘It should be enough. There won’t be much blocking the entrance. It doesn’t look like the structure’s been overbuilt very much, if at all. Virgin territory.’’

  ‘‘Then what?’’ Billy asked, lying between Garza and Finn. ‘‘A game of whist perhaps?’’

  ‘‘We run like hell,’’ said Finn.

  23

  Cardinal Rossi, dressed in a natty pair of Greg Norman single-pleat golf shorts, a dark blue Ben Hogan golf shirt, and a top-of-the -line pair of FootJoy shoes, addressed the ball carefully and whacked the little white orb two hundred yards down the fifth fairway of the Windsor Downs Golf Course on Cat Cay. He watched its flight, tilting his head slightly as the ball arced over the expansive sod and headed toward the green. Not bad for an old man with a bit of bursitis.

  ‘‘Looks like God’s on your side,’’ James Noble said, grumbling as the ball dropped straight as a die.

  ‘‘Always.’’ Rossi smiled. ‘‘One of the perks of the job.’’ He dropped his titanium driver into his golf bag and began pulling the cart down the fairway. ‘‘Heard from your son lately?’’

  ‘‘He’s been out of contact for the last few days.’’

  ‘‘He’s in the jungle?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘With your friends?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘I’m worried,’’ said the cardinal.

  ‘‘There’s no reason for you to worry about anything.’’

  ‘‘There’s always a reason to worry about everything, ’’ answered the cardinal. ‘‘I’ve been at the Vatican for the better part of half a century. I’ve seen everything from murders to miracles. Worry accompanies both and everything in between. Control is everything.’’

  ‘‘I’ve got it under control,’’ Noble said. His relationship with the Italian was a continuing source of irritation. How could you expect a man who believed in virgin births to know anything about business?

  ‘‘No, you don’t,’’ said the cardinal flatly. ‘‘You’ve involved the Church with a Mexican drug lord and a Cuban dictator.’’

  ‘‘Not the Church,’’ argued Noble. ‘‘One of the banks owned by the Church.’’

  ‘‘Don’t be an idiot. The relationship leads right back to the Vatican.’’

  ‘‘You mean to the Twelve,’’ said Noble.

  ‘‘Don’t try to threaten me with what you think you
know, Mr. Noble. Last year your company did twelve billion dollars in business. Of that twelve billion roughly half was invested on your behalf by friends of mine. Powerful friends.’’

  ‘‘Now who’s doing the threatening?’’ Noble snorted.

  ‘‘I never threaten, Mr. Noble. I merely inform.’’

  ‘‘What are you saying?’’

  ‘‘If Noble Pharmaceuticals doesn’t get celatropamine to the marketplace within the next eighteen months your losses are going to be immense. If there is any chance of that happening, Banco Venizia will withdraw its support immediately.’’

  ‘‘Why? Drugs take time to introduce. It’s not as though we need FDA approval. Celatropamine is an additive, not a drug in its own right.’’

  They reached the spot on the fairway that held the cardinal’s ball. He chose a smaller Callaway wood, barely hesitated, and knocked the ball easily up onto the green.

  ‘‘I am a prudent man, Mr. Noble. I research things. Celatropamine is listed as a nutrient additive with the Federal Drug Administration in the United States. When the FDA discovers that celatropamine enhances the addictive potential of anything it is combined with from toothpaste to baby formula, there is going to be an immediate attempt by your government to have the drug restricted if not banned outright. Celatropamine added to cigarettes, for instance. Good God, man!’’

  ‘‘I thought that was your interest in the first place,’’ said Noble as they tromped toward the patch of brighter green in the middle distance.

  ‘‘Which brings us back to the question of control. Too many people are becoming involved. A leak would be disastrous.’’

  ‘‘There won’t be any leak,’’ Noble said. ‘‘My son has been given strict instructions.’’

  ‘‘Regarding Guzman?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘The Cubans?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘You have the assets necessary to deal with the situation?’’

  ‘‘The best.’’

  ‘‘When will you know?’’

  ‘‘Tomorrow night. That’s when the extraction is to take place.’’

  ‘‘He’ll have the necessary sample?’’

  ‘‘If he doesn’t I’ll kill him,’’ said Noble.

  Rossi reached his ball and took a lovely new Ping putter out of the bag. He knelt with the putter and lined up the shot. It was twenty-five feet uphill with a slight break to the right. He tossed a grass clipping into the air. Barely any breeze. The cardinal stood, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. He turned to Noble, his expression blank.

  ‘‘If he doesn’t, I’ll kill you,’’ he said. He turned back to the ball and made the putt.

  Max Kessler stood in the middle of Boulder Bridge in Rock Creek Park, his hands clasped together as he stared over the edge at the shallow waters of the little stream that ran beneath the old single span built back before the twenties. Except for the faint burbling of the water below and the sighing of the breeze in the trees all around, there was only silence. There hadn’t been a vehicle on the road behind him for the better part of half an hour now. It was a nice evening, the last light of a summer day in Washington, D.C., fading gracefully away into night. The trees were heavy enough to prevent the use of line-of-sight optical lasers to record voices and the tumbling waters directly below the bridge would make any wiring of his companion useless if he was being set up for some sort of sting operation. Kessler also had a vibrating pocket detector in his suit jacket that would pick up virtually any RF signal from a transmitter, just in case.

  The very tall bald-headed man standing beside him was Dr. Simon Andrew Grunnard. Grunnard wore heavy horn-rim spectacles and orthopedic shoes. He was a senior research scientist for Noble Pharmaceuticals and director of their ethno-botanical research division. He had come to Max Kessler through a long and careful chain of connections that originated in Las Vegas and meandered across the nation to the Noble Research Center in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

  ‘‘Perhaps we should begin,’’ murmured Kessler.

  ‘‘I’m not sure if I’m doing the right thing,’’ answered Grunnard.

  ‘‘I’m not your conscience, Doctor. I am here to facilitate your interests and further my own. I am not here to discuss right and wrong with you.’’

  ‘‘This is hard for me.’’

  ‘‘That’s too bad,’’ said Kessler. ‘‘And frankly, sir, I don’t really care. What do you know about celatropamine?’’

  ‘‘Noble Pharmaceuticals is about to release a form of the drug trade-named Celedawn.’’

  ‘‘A weight-loss remedy.’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘In what form?’’

  ‘‘An over-the-counter nutrient bar.’’

  ‘‘A meal replacement?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘When?’’

  ‘‘Eight months. We’re waiting for a sample of the base nutrient to be delivered.’’

  ‘‘What is a base nutrient?’’

  ‘‘A plant extract from which the drug can be synthesized.’’

  ‘‘The drug can’t be synthesized without it?’’

  ‘‘Eventually, but it’s much easier to clone molecules from the original plant source. It’s why they send ethno-botanist plant hunters to the Amazon.’’

  ‘‘You discovered celatropamine?’’

  ‘‘The original plant base, yes. In the Yucatán.’’

  ‘‘As I understand it the drug comes from some sort of mutated plant.’’

  ‘‘Yes, a small concentration of radically altered Allamanda cathartica. I’ve never seen it anywhere else.’’

  ‘‘You brought some back to Chapel Hill?’’

  ‘‘Yes. Enough for small-scale studies.’’

  ‘‘But not for synthesis.’’

  ‘‘No.’’

  ‘‘The drug is apparently highly addictive, yes?’’

  ‘‘Not the drug itself. It makes whatever it’s added to addictive to an incredible degree.’’

  ‘‘So people will become addicted to these Celedawn bars then.’’

  ‘‘Yes. The bars are already a laxative. Someone on a diet of nothing but the bars will lose weight very swiftly. The long-term effects could be quite dangerous, however. Dehydration, for one.’’

  ‘‘Celatropamine can be added to other products?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘With the same result?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘And if news of the drug was released prematurely?’’

  ‘‘It would probably be banned almost immediately. ’’

  ‘‘Causing great losses to Noble Pharmaceuticals. ’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘Or great wealth if you knew beforehand the drug was going to be banned before it ever reached the market. You could sell the stocks short.’’

  ‘‘I don’t know anything about stock trading, but as I understand it, yes.’’

  ‘‘And you have stock options?’’

  ‘‘I’ve worked at Noble for twenty-five years. Right from the start.’’

  ‘‘And now you wish to retire a wealthy man.’’

  ‘‘I suppose that’s a blunt way of putting it,’’ said Grunnard.

  ‘‘I am a blunt man, Doctor.’’

  ‘‘Can you help me?’’ asked the ethno-botanist.

  ‘‘We can help each other.’’ Max Kessler smiled. He put his hand under the taller man’s elbow and guided him across the bridge. ‘‘Let’s walk a little and discuss details.’’

  24

  They smelled the camp before they saw it.

  The rank odor of a hundred or so men living in close quarters and rarely bathing. Body odor, human waste, and the sweet-sour smell of food cooking over charcoal fires. By the time they reached the edge of the large clearing it was almost sunset, the guard towers standing out in stark silhouette against the dying sun.

  ‘‘How do we get in?’’ Eli San
toro asked in a whisper. Beside him, prone in the last of the foliage at the jungle’s edge, Garza peered through his binoculars. The camp was a huge rectangle with a wall of bulldozed dirt topped by a palisade of bamboo stakes. There were two guards in each of the towers manning .50-caliber machine guns. There was a large front gate made of bamboo and barbed wire with four more guards. Over the top of the bamboo palisade they could see the crumbled ruins of an old temple at the far end of the camp. There was a surprising amount of noise—shouting voices, laughter, and a general growling undertone of sound.

  ‘‘Noisy,’’ commented Guido, who was carrying Garza’s pack across his broad shoulders. He passed one hand over his big bald head in a nervous gesture.

  ‘‘Careless,’’ answered Garza. ‘‘They don’t care who hears them.’’

  ‘‘They’re in the middle of the jungle, why should they care?’’ scoffed Eli.

  ‘‘Because of people like us,’’ said Garza grimly.

  ‘‘You still haven’t answered my question,’’ said Eli. ‘‘How do we get past the guards and the towers?’’

  ‘‘The ruins,’’ answered Garza. ‘‘It’s the only blind spot from the towers.’’

  Like most ancient Mayan temples, the one that formed part of the eastern wall of the camp had been built in stages over a number of centuries, each dynasty adding on to the one that had gone before. This particular one, never discovered, excavated, or looted, was at least twenty-five hundred years old and at one time must have loomed at least a hundred feet above the jungle floor. Now it stood barely twenty feet above the ground and was covered with vines, trees, and dense foliage, barely recognizable as man-made.

  It took Garza, Eli, and Guido the better part of half an hour to move around to the far end of the clearing, and by then the shadows had deepened even further. Garza was right; where the temple wall rose over the wall of bermed earth there was no palisade and the wall itself was angled slightly, just enough to make it impossible to see from either of the corner guard towers. The trio waited another fifteen minutes until full dusk and then simply walked into the clearing and quickly clambered up through the maze of vines and foliage that covered the slightly sloping pyramid wall.

  ‘‘Now what?’’ Eli said as they settled down behind the decayed remains of what had once been a huge stone statue of a jaguar set at the corner of the wall. The long rectangular compound was spread out below them. There was a large main building with a tin roof and set on stilts to the north, a number of smaller barracks buildings against the south wall by the main gate, and a large, World War II-style Quonset hut at the opposite end of the compound. In front of the Quonset hut an open-fly tent had been set up on metal poles. Beneath the open canvas several bright arc lights had been set up, thick rubber cables running back to the hut. They could hear the muffled sound of a thumping generator coming from inside the Quonset hut. The two bombs had been set out on heavy wooden trestles that looked as though they had been specially constructed for the job. There were four men under the canvas cover, three of them apparently disassembling the devices, the fourth man supervising. All four men were dressed in military uniform, unlike the pattern of the camouflage worn by the guards and other personnel they could see within the compound. All four were wearing surgical masks and all four were Chinese.