Gold Trap

by Lilly Maytree

  “You can see that far away without your glasses?”

  “Far away I can see perfectly. It’s close up I have problems.”

  “Ah, so, that’s it. Well, the younger ones can be that shade, sometimes. They grow out of it though.”

  “It’s…oh, it’s just the most amazing place I’ve ever been!”

  He laughed at the exclamation, and it suddenly seemed to be the most pleasant sound Meg had heard in a long time. “You’re awfully easy to please, Meg,” he said. “A good sport, too, considering everything I’ve dragged you through.”

  “If you still think that at the end of all this,” she replied as they continued on. “I’ll believe you. Now, go on with your story, please. You were killing some time in London.”

  “So I thought I’d take in the Royal Geographical Society’s Africa collection. Anyway, I saw this hat. A strange-looking, battered, fur thing that didn’t even have a brim. Of no use under any African sun, in my estimation, and there it sat in a place of honor all by itself. Well—”

  He steered her clear of another swampy spot that she would have stumbled right into because she had been staring up at him instead of the road. Of course she knew about that hat. Mary Kingsley’s hat. Knew about it and wanted to see it with all of her heart.

  “Knowing how great a value the Africans place on respect”—he went on—”I suddenly wanted to know everything there was to know about a woman whose very hat was enough to inspire awe. Turned into something of an obsession for me. Been driving the rest of the crew crazy with it ever since.”

  “How so?”

  “For wanting to veer off the present and dip into the past, I guess. Like I said, historical biographies are a dime a dozen in this business. Especially, if you don’t have something new to tack on.”

  ****

  The wisps of fog finally began to disappear, and by ten o’clock, they had been walking in the direct sunlight for quite some time. And even though they came under another leafy canopy, again, the heat was stifling. Meg’s boots (practically new because she bought them expressly for filming) were starting to give her blisters. Just when she felt the most incredible urge to sit down on the riverbank, even if she couldn’t stick her feet in the water, Tom motioned her over to the side of the road.

  “Better sit on this and rest for a while.” He set the duffel down for her. “As beautiful as they are, lounging on riverbanks around here isn’t too enjoyable. Most of them are infested with ants.”

  He was reading her mind, again.

  He handed her one of the remaining water bottles from his backpack, and brought out the last orange, along with the cheese and crackers. They had been talking nearly non-stop, and it wasn’t until the silence of taking a long drink of water that Meg suddenly heard the unmistakable sound of something large moving through the trees a short distance away. A tremor of fear rippled through her. She glanced up at Tom. But he ignored it, intent only on drinking the entire bottle of water down at one time.

  He seemed very much at home in this environment. Almost as if being out in such places suited him more than suits or crowded cities. Still, no matter how strong and fit he looked, she wasn’t at all certain he could overcome an enraged lion or elephant, should they happen to run into one. Whether or not this was lion and elephant country, she had no idea. But her imagination was working overtime.

  “Tom, do you”—Meg handed him half the orange she had just nervously peeled—”Do you have a gun in that backpack?”

  “Of course not. You can’t carry guns on commercial planes these days.”

  “But how are we going to protect ourselves if some wild animal charges us?”

  “They’re more afraid of us than we are of them. You know they actually try to avoid people? Besides,”—he sat on the ground next to her—“ of all the times I’ve been here, I’ve never needed one. And I’m too much of a conservationist to enjoy hunting.”

  After that brief rest, they continued on for what seemed like hours. They talked about any and every subject that entered their minds and were continually surprised at how many things they had in common. They both had aggressive fathers and adoring mothers. Except Tom’s mother was French (no wonder he spoke the language so perfectly). His grandmother still lived just outside Paris, but his mother had spent years in the States, even before she married the professor.

  When the road began to pitch into a steep decline, Meg found it easier to close the umbrella and use it as a walking-stick rather than shade. She felt oddly unsteady all of a sudden. What was the problem? She loved hiking. Could walk for miles without getting tired. But there was Tom Anderson walking along beside her as if it were a couple of cool blocks in a park, while she suddenly felt eighty years old. Well, she wasn’t going to say a word. Not one word. Better to ignore it and keep talking.

  “The professor must know a lot of influential people around here if he can just call up somebody to take him wherever he wants to go in a private plane.”

  “Pop has a lot of friends everywhere. He’s like a magnet that way. Besides, it was about the only thing he could do without money or a passport. I just can’t figure out why he ditched Gilbert. Seemed for a while they had ironed out their differences. But where the devil does that put Gilbert? He should have called in by now. Or at least left another message. We’re out of range with all these trees and hills, though, so we’ll have to wait until town to find out.”

  “Strange being in the back regions of Africa and seeing so many people with cell phones. You would think they would need more consistent electricity.”

  “They’re pretty ingenious about that,” he replied. “You’ll see when we have to film in some of the more remote places. There are street vendors set up to charge them off car batteries.”

  Meg might have been more properly impressed if he hadn’t sent something of a thrill through her at the mention of filming in remote places. Maybe he really had meant what he said about working on her Mary Kingsley film…with a real film crew, yet! As if she wouldn’t gladly trade a voodoo tour (she had plans of skipping out of the voodoo parts, anyway) for an experience like that. Maybe that’s what had attracted the professor to her, too. Hadn’t he been unusually interested in her cameras? And if Tom had been talking to him all along about Mary Kingsley…well, it was no wonder he…

  “Do you want to rest, again, Meg?” He broke into her thoughts. “You should be careful in this heat until you get used to it.”

  “I do feel a bit lightheaded. But let’s just get this over with. Besides, maybe we won’t have to do the whole eight miles. I think I smell smoke somewhere…do you?”

  “Hopefully, it’s the road crew.”

  “Tom, you…well, you don’t suppose we’ll run into any unsavory characters, do you? The kind who like to rob stranded people like us, on the road?”

  Gold Trap

  14

  Bush Pagans and Cannibals

  “I must warn you also that your own mind requires protection when you send it stalking the savage idea through the tangled forests”

  Mary Kingsley

  “Shhh…do you hear that? Voices.” Meg stopped walking and listened. “Oh, and look…just above the tops of those trees, I’m sure that’s smoke.”

  “I think we’ve found the road crew,” said Tom.

  Within another few minutes, they came upon the slow-moving crew, burning the giant trunk of another tree that had fallen across the road. There were six or seven workers, along with an old flatbed truck that was loaded with saws, axes, shovels, and other road clearing equipment. The task was nearly finished, and even though most of the men were just visiting around the fire, no one noticed Tom and Meg until they were less than a hundred feet away.

  “What the devil happen to you?” A dark man in a blue, sweat-stained work shirt looked up with a startled expression.

  While Tom began to explain, Meg suddenly found it impossible to concentrate. Everything seemed to be happening around her in a movie-like slow motion as
the wafting fire engulfed her in its sickening heat. A man standing nearby offered her a battered, metal canteen, and she gratefully reached out for it before Tom noticed and waved it away.

  “Thanks, anyway,” he said. “But we tourists have to stick to bottled drinks.”

  “Tom,” Meg objected, “I hardly think…”

  “Do you have anything bottled?” he asked their hosts.

  “Got beer.” Another man replied with a broad smile.

  “Beer!” The man in charge gave the offender an incriminating glare. “I told you once already, next person bring beer on this government job gonna get beheaded!”

  “What?” Meg was appalled.

  “Have his pay chopped, he means,” Tom explained. “How far is it to Akosombo from here? Think you could give us a lift in your truck?”

  The town was only a little more than a mile away. After some debate over who would drive the American and his lady (as Meg was referred to) they started for the truck. For some reason the men seemed to think the task required two men, so Meg was squeezed into the cab next to the driver, and while Tom was busy tossing their bags up on the back, another man squeezed up against her from the other side.

  “Oh, but where’s Tom going to…”

  “You sit on top, missy.” The man scooped her onto his lap to the overpowering accompaniment of the smell of beer and sweat. “Plenty room for all.”

  Meg had heard it was typical to crowd as many people as possible into vehicles in these regions, but, between the heat and her exhaustion, she felt she actually might be ill if she had to breathe such fumes for any length of time. Much less bounce along a sodden, pot-holed road on a strange man’s lap. Just as she was contemplating if it would be more polite to insult someone by refusing the courtesy, or throw up on them, Tom climbed up into the cab and collected her (like a piece of luggage someone else had been holding for him) to sit on his lap, instead.

  “Better get as close to the window as you can, Meg.” He rolled the window down before closing the door after him. “At least you’ll get the feeling of a little fresh air when we’re moving.”

  Meg gratefully turned away from the offending workers and leaned her head toward the window, instead. At least Tom smelled like leather and Old Spice. It was a bumpy, noisy ride, and they had to ease their way gingerly around another fire that was little more than smoldering ash where yet another tree had fallen in the storm and been cleared away earlier. Still, they came into the town in less than twenty minutes, and the men dropped them off in front of a bustling outdoor cafe overlooking the Akosombo Dam and Lake Volta.

  Tom found an empty table, and Meg sank into one of the wicker chairs beneath the shaded patio while he stashed their bags underneath and sat down across from her. Moments later, a young waiter in a white linen jacket that had been donned over T-shirt and blue jeans, appeared to take their order.

  “Minerals for both of us, and something to eat.” Tom reached for the cell phone in his vest pocket. “Go ahead and order, Meg, just make sure it’s cooked. I’m going to try and get hold of some people.”

  “All right, but I’m not the least bit interested in minerals.”

  “It’s just a common term for bottled soft drinks.” After that he was engrossed in looking up numbers and left the lunch choices to her.

  She glanced at the smiling, eager young face and asked, “What sort of cooked food do you have?”

  “Tin soap, and…”

  “What?”

  “And chicken in castor oil.”

  “Well, of all things, I don’t think I could possibly…”

  The look of alarm on her face made him shake his head and point a dark, graceful finger to a printed card on the table. It read “Tinned Soup” and “Chicken in Casserole.”

  Meg smiled with relief and he grinned.

  “Chicken?” he asked. “It is quite good.”

  “Yes, please,” she replied, “for two.”

  After he had gone, Meg sighed and sat back comfortably. She was exhausted. Again. And her feet hurt where her boots had rubbed. The lake beyond the shady veranda was large and lovely, with a shimmering wave of heat that turned the forest along the opposite shore into dancing shadows of green and blue. In a few moments, the waiter returned with two open bottles and set them down on the table. It was ginger ale.

  “I’d like some bottled water, too, please. I’m very thirsty. I’ve practically walked all the way from Accra.”

  “Accra..” he gasped. “Sakes alive, missy…on the Akosombo road? At night?”

  “Well, we’ve only been walking since this morning. We came the rest of the way by jeep. But I feel like I’ve walked the whole way. This heat…” She pushed her hair back from her face and realized how disheveled she must look. “The heat here is incredible.”

  “Always hot before the rain comes. This is a cool place to cheer up.”

  “Do I look like I need cheering up?”

  “Akosombo road at night and nobody ate you? That’s a good reason to cheer up. Too many leopards and bush pagans on that road at night. Gawd must have blessed you.”

  “What’s a bush pagan?” she asked.

  “Meat hunters. Niama. Niama is meat. Snake, crocodile…” He reached across the table and pressed one of his fingers to her forearm. “Meat.”

  “You’re only trying to frighten me,” Meg chided, as she would have done with one of her students. “I am quite aware that the animals of this region are more afraid of us than we are of them.”

  He laughed. “Enjoy your minerals, then. I will bring the chicken.”

  She looked over at Tom. He had taken off his hat, tossed it on the empty chair next to him, and then ran a hand through wavy hair to try to bring some order to it while he talked quietly to someone. However, when Meg stood to her feet his attention was instantly riveted back on her.

  “I’m just going to freshen up,” she assured. “I’ll be back in a moment.”

  He relaxed and went on with the conversation, and Meg meandered through the crowded tables and headed for the nearest restroom. Tourists mostly. But some of the women looked local; dressed in colorful light scarves and cool dresses, and many of them wore ornate jewelry. Most of the men she could see wore western clothes, except some of them also had colorful sarongs tossed over a shoulder. One even had a brightly-colored head covering to match. Rather like the fez-type hat she had seen on the skycap the night she arrived.

  She felt a little better after she had washed her face and rearranged her hair. But she was more than looking forward to a cool shower and a real bed after they ate. She hoped Tom would manage to work things out with the professor in time for her to visit the Mole National Park, it was the only part of the tour she would be disappointed to miss. Getting to know each other as they had on the road today, she was almost certain he would agree to her connecting back up with her group instead of waiting the two or three days until he got back. Especially if she gave him the itinerary and agreed to meet up with them after it was over. Of course, she had no intention of bringing up the subject until he had rested a bit and eaten a good meal.

  Making her way back to the table seemed to take a lot longer than when she had left. What was the problem? And she suddenly had a splitting headache. It wasn’t that large of a place, yet she couldn’t seem to locate her seat. Where was Tom? Why, he wasn’t at any of the tables. She scanned the area for the familiar figure, only to finally catch sight of him at the bar off in one corner, sitting on one of the bamboo stools, engaged in an intense conversation with…

  Meg suddenly felt a chill go through her. Was her mind playing tricks on her? He was talking to the stewardess from her flight out of Paris (yes, that was the same girl, she would have recognized that exceptional beauty anywhere!), and…of all people…that most unnerving skycap who (in Meg’s estimation) was responsible for this entire mix-up. Only today he was dressed in a black, western-style suit with a white shirt opened nearly to his navel beneath it. But that was the same gold cha
in with the red-eyed crocodile resting against his chest. Such audacity! Hadn’t he been the one to book the room that night? Hadn’t he been the very person to send for the doctor who never even came?

  Now, things began to come terrifyingly clear.

  Who better than a stewardess would have the opportunity to spike someone’s drinks? And all that waiting before anyone came with a wheelchair…it was to make sure the other passengers had plenty of time to disembark the plane. That man was no skycap! Meg had been uneasy about him from the very beginning. Suppose there really had been some sort of conspiracy between them and Tom to kidnap the professor, and she had gone and stumbled right into the middle of it? Had these two people flown to Akosombo ahead of them?

  What could they have done with the Professor?

  Whatever it was, they were up to no good now. Meg could feel it in every fiber of her being. And it was at that precise moment that the skycap looked up from his drink and made immediate eye contact with her in spite of all the people around them. The effect of this strange man’s eyes, as if those eyes somehow saw exactly what she had been thinking, made her suddenly afraid. It was a feeling she had no control over.

  She was in terrible danger and not a soul on earth knew where she was! Why, if someone were to go looking for her, she wasn’t even in the same country anymore! Now, she was almost sure Professor Anderson’s disappearance had to involve some sinister plot that Tom was somehow at the center of. Hadn’t the Professor admitted his son was “a rascal” and up to no good? Who was to say these people hadn’t already done something terrible to him, for those millions of dollars in the Bank of California, and then cleverly managed to lure her so far away that no one would ever be able to find her, again?

  But how could that be? She had felt so sure of Tom in spite of all his blustery pushiness. In spite of everything. Not only had he convinced her that he was the man in the cafe, he had even managed to make her feel they were on the same side. To the point that she was actually starting to depend on him. Then another thought occurred to her, a desperate hope that could explain everything and keep things right between them. Because she suddenly wanted very much to have everything right between them.