Blood of the Incas

by David Harris

  To please the old man Castillo staggered under the weight and laughed.

  But Paltaybamba made a sobbing noise, flung his hands over his face and turned away. Bent over the hollow log he kept his face hidden until Hiram, his team and Castillo had disappeared into the jungle.

  Chapter 30

  ‘Time to wake up.’ Hiram opened the door of the doctor’s tent.

  ‘Not another mountain.’ The doctor wriggled deeper into his green sleeping bag until only his red eyes and red bandanna showed like the head of a large caterpillar. He saw the rain and quickly shut both bleary eyes. Behind Hiram, the world was that dismal, watery, grey-blue light called, ‘too early’. The doctor turned over. With his back to Hiram, he said, ‘It’s all yours, Hiram. Today’s the day I remove the last of Buchan’s shoulder strapping.’

  In the next tent, Erikson was already sitting up in his sleeping bag. On his lap was a clipboard. Leafing through sketch-maps and pages covered in columns of numbers, he scowled up at Hiram. ‘Not today,’ Erikson grumbled. ‘I’m too busy. Got to finish my contour maps. I’m way behind schedule. Close the door on your way out.’

  It was the same in every tent. ‘Sorry Hiram. It’s my best chance to net those rare blue butterflies along the river …’

  ‘Phew, just smell these socks. I’ve got to catch up my washing before we go.’

  ‘Sorry, Hiram. Must finish safely packing my specimens for the journey back to Cuzco.’

  ‘Nearly ready,’ Castillo called. He crouched by a small fire under a tarpaulin roof.

  A tin of baked beans steamed on warm ashes. In the frying pan crisp bacon sizzled. Castillo pushed the bacon to the side of the pan and poured in a thick pancake mix which hissed in the fat.

  ‘Too many mountains for your friends,’ Castillo said.

  Hiram sat two tin mugs on the ground. He put into each mug three heaped spoons of cocoa, three of sugar and two of powdered milk. Then he poured in hot water, stirred the cocoa and handed a mug to Castillo. They wrapped their cold hands around the mugs and sat studying the cliff across the river.

  Hiram said, ‘What if Vilcabamba is on the one mountain we don’t climb?’

  Castillo blew on his drink. ‘Will you come back if you don’t find lost city?’

  Hiram took a while to answer. ‘I don’t think so. It took two years to get the money together for this lot of scoundrels. If I don’t find Vilcabamba I get no money to come back.’

  Castillo sipped his cocoa and stared at the fire.

  Tiny air bubbles prickled on the top of the pancake. Castillo waited until they swelled and burst open. He flipped the pancake over. The bottom was a rich golden brown. After a little while he tapped the top with his fingertip. It made a soft, hollow sound. He tipped it onto his plate, cut it in half and slid Hiram’s share onto the other plate. Then he poured the can of baked beans over the pancake, put the bacon on top and spooned his homemade chilli jam over the lot.

  ‘But we have today,’ Hiram said. ‘And we have one last mountain to climb.’

  Chapter 31

  Two hours later — and two thousand feet up the canyon wall — Hiram and Castillo crawled on hands and knees up towards an outcrop of boulders where they could rest.

  Earlier the sun had burned through the clouds. Now it burned through their wet shirts. Ignoring the heat Hiram led the way, eager to see the top.

  Around the base of the boulders was a rampart of dense grass. Just as Hiram was about to sink his hands in for a grip, Castillo said, ‘Be careful. The mountains here are home for the Spear of Fire.’

  Hiram snatched his hand away from the grass. ‘Spear of Fire?’

  ‘He has a yellow head like a spear point. Spear of Fire is a bad snake. He jumps at you through the air, like a spear.’

  Hiram listened to the grass very, very carefully. Maybe it was the breeze, but the grass seemed alive with rustlings and slithery movements. To the left and right, a moat of deadly snakes protected the mountain top. As quick as lightning he was through that grass and among the boulders. Castillo was shoving him higher by the soles of his boots.

  Dragging himself up a gap between boulders, Hiram checked that the way ahead was clear of anything yellow. There was movement. It wasn’t the head of a snake or the flickering of a forked tongue. Hiram blinked in disbelief.

  Chapter 32

  A boy, maybe twelve years old, sat on the top of the boulder. His bare feet hung over the edge. He was in a tatty old poncho. He wore a hat like Castillo’s, with the soft brim around his face. Calmly, king of the castle, he chewed on a stick of sugar cane and watched the strangers climbing up.

  Hiram huffed and puffed up to the boulder and sat. Castillo joined them and for a moment the men caught their breath and wiped their faces.

  Looking from the boy to Castillo, Hiram asked, ‘Can you ask is name?’

  ‘Pablito.’

  The boy inspected his visitors and pointed to Hiram.

  ‘My name is Hiram. This is Castillo.’

  Pablito asked, ‘Why do you climb my mountain?’

  Translating into English as they talked, Castillo said, ‘Your mountain?’

  ‘I live here.’ He handed his sugar cane to Castillo, who ripped more husk away with his teeth and bit into the woody centre.

  Hiram prompted Castillo. ‘What’s the name of this mountain?’

  The boy watched Hiram carefully then answered.

  Castillo handed the sugar cane back to the boy. ‘He calls it Old Man Mountain.’

  Hiram sat up straighter. ‘Old Man Mountain? Who lives here with you, Pablito?’

  ‘My family and some cousins. They grow food on the terraces.’

  ‘Terraces?’ Hiram knew that word in Quichua.

  ‘Yes, many terraces,’ said Pablito.

  ‘How many?’ Hiram asked.

  Castillo translated the answer. ‘One hundred. Two hundred? More. My father burns down jungle on terraces for our corn.’

  Hiram and Castillo exchanged glances. They’d seen other ruins with substantial terraces. That didn’t prove anything. But up here, on this inaccessible mountain, it would take an army of workers to hack hundreds of terraces from the rock.

  Afraid of having his hopes dashed, Hiram asked again, ‘Is Pablito sure there are more than two hundred terraces?’

  The boy held up three fingers in answer.

  ‘Ask him if he’ll show us the terraces.’

  Chapter 33

  Pablito led them over the bulge in the mountain. Savage peaks stood like ferocious guardians. Hiram was entranced by the harsh, brooding beauty. It was like no other place on earth. It was beyond this earth in time and mystery. More wonderful even than the giant peaks of his childhood in Hawaii. More spectacular than he could imagine in his wildest dreams. Overcome by awe, Hiram felt as if the entire journey had led him to this place. Irresistibly enticed into an ambush.

  He was aware of Castillo and Pablito talking. ‘This peak is called Machu Picchu. That steep one is Huayna Picchu.’ Their voices were as faint as a dream remembered.

  A thin cloud like a veil passed across Machu Picchu. The peak ripped the cloud and loose threads drifted around the companion, Huayna Picchu.

  Wind scattered the frayed cloud. Hiram felt the wind on his face and the spell was broken. So many terraces. Where is the city?

  ‘Castillo, ask the boy if there are any ruins.’

  Pablito put his face up to the sun. ‘Look over there.’

  Camouflaged by creeping vines, a broad, majestic flight of stairs — wide enough for a procession of priests — marched up the granite slope and disappeared under thick jungle.

  Pablito tapped Hiram on the back of the hand. Castillo translated, ‘Do you want to see where I play?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I have my secret city. Father doesn’t know about it.’

  ‘Why secret?’

  ‘He is afraid of ghosts.’

  ‘What ghosts?’

  Pablito whispered, �
��I tell him of graves.’

  When Hiram heard this he needed to lean one hand on Castillo’s shoulder. ‘This is the city. Maybe.’

  Chapter 34

  Pablito ran up the stairway and scurried into a small hole in the jungle. He disappeared like a rabbit into its burrow.

  Hiram and Castillo tore off their backpacks. Rummaging in his work bag, Hiram grabbed his camera and crawled in after the boy.

  ‘This way,’ Pablito called.

  Inside the tunnel Hiram pushed and squirmed in soft green light. His hands carelessly grabbed ferns where snakes might hide. Stones hurt his knees. The jungle was suffocatingly close but he didn’t care. He moved through a fantastic world where tree roots grew from walls of ancient buildings. Vines twisted from windows of houses. A great tree trunk burst from the top of a house wall. His hands and knees were green from spongy mosses that covered cobblestones of a street where feet had trodden centuries before. Like a diver swimming in an underwater city, Hiram passed doorways and peered through windows.

  The tunnel opened into a cave. Pablito sat cross-legged and grinning on a ledge of flawless granite. His face was dappled with shadows and light. In the world above, wind moved branches and leaves.

  Hiram’s eyes grew used to the light. He called out, ‘Marvellous!’ He could only think one word. Marvellous. Again and again he repeated it.

  Curved walls of granite, precisely cut, fitted cleanly, with no gaps, no mortar. Some blocks were ten or more tonnes in weight. Hiram reached out and touched the stone, as smooth and cool as a mirror. ‘This is far more amazing than the walls in Cuzco. I’ve seen nothing as beautiful.’ The curvature followed the bedrock of the mountain, so that granite and cut stones merged like living rock.

  ‘What is this place?’ Castillo whispered.

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  Hiram didn’t want to admit, even to himself, what he guessed. He certainly wouldn’t say out loud, yet, that Pablito’s cave was a royal tomb.

  From the corner of his eye Hiram saw the end of a snake sliding away into a hole in the ground. He shuddered.

  Pablito called out, ‘Come on.’ His voice rang out against the walls. He ran up some steps. His feet skipped from this underworld towards the light — the World of Now, which the Incas represented as the jaguar.

  Above him the curve of the cave grew into the curve of another magnificent wall. The gentle curvature of both walls — the tomb below and the building above — and the purity of the granite astounded Hiram. Huge blocks of granite were fitted with such delicacy that it took away the breath.

  ‘A masterpiece,’ Hiram said.

  Hiram realised where he’d seen something like this building. ‘This is like the Temple of the Sun in Cuzco, but more wonderfully made.’

  ‘Higher, more,’ shouted Pablito, who skittered up the slope.

  Hiram was soon bewildered by shock upon shock. Temples made of gigantic granite blocks. Not one temple but a whole plaza of temples. Glimpses of mountains through temple windows. A remarkable, strange temple of three windows, it was like the mythical temple built by the first Inca eight hundred years ago. Hiram’s imagination ran wild. Is this the birthplace of the first Inca and the city of the last Inca? If this was the legendary Vilcabamba, then hidden in the earth must be hundreds of tombs, many of them with royal mummies sitting, knees tucked under their chins, marvellous artefacts buried with them.

  He called out excitedly to Castillo. ‘Thousands of artefacts must be here. In buildings, tombs. Sacred vessels, priests’ rooms, the Inca’s palace with kitchens, bedrooms, the court, art, weaving, pottery, music, meals, medicine …’

  Hiram knelt by an altar carved like a condor with wings stretched out to fly through the realm of the spirit. He remembered the condor hurtling towards him through the sky. The splendour, power, glory of the bird. The eye that saw into his naked soul. The shattering terror of not returning to seek the lost cities. Now, in the condor’s temple, Hiram ran his hand over the stone wings. Overwhelmed by joy and the mysteries surrounding him, he said to Castillo, ‘Now we can unlock the secrets of the Inca civilisation. Bring their world back into the light.’

  ‘So you will come back?’ Castillo asked.

  ‘Oh yes, Castillo. Many times.’

  Castillo had something in his eye. An insect, perhaps, or piece of grit. A tear? He blinked rapidly.

  For hours, Hiram pushed through the jungle to find a profusion of houses, ancient gardens, steep stone stairways, water channels, walls so strongly made that centuries of earthquakes had not shifted them. But a small shock showed on Hiram’s face. ‘Will people believe what we’ve seen today? There are so many legends and so many exaggerations.’ He took his camera from his pocket.

  Pablito shouted, ‘More. Come and see.’

  At the top of a flight of stairs was a rock pillar, carved square — north, south, east, west. The pillar was not much shorter than Pablito, who climbed up and perched on the top.

  But Hiram had caught a glimpse of the top, before Pablito sat there. The pillar was an Intiwatana, the hitching post of the sun. For centuries, on the winter solstice, a high priest tied a rope around this pillar and used all his strength to hold the outstretched rope with its great golden disc so that the sun would not escape further north and leave its children to die in darkness.

  ‘By all that’s wonderful, Castillo, it’s not broken. The conquistadors always smashed the tops of these pillars. This unbroken Intiwatana means the Spaniards never stood here in Machu Picchu. This is the city they never found. We’ve done it. Castillo, we’re standing in the lost city.’

  THE CUZCO HERALD

  7 JUNE 1956

  DISCOVERER OF MACHU PICCHU DIES

  The world mourns the loss of Hiram Bingham. He passed away peacefully, at the age of 80, in Washington DC, surrounded by his loving family.

  For almost 50 years, The Cuzco Herald has followed the remarkable life of this celebrated archeologist, soldier and political leader. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on 19 November 1875, Hiram Bingham was the son of an American missionary and he never lost his sense of duty and care for others. His father, a keen mountaineer, introduced Bingham to the thrills of climbing. Bingham climbed his first mountain when he was only four years old. Later, as a member of the American Alpine Club, he was the first to climb the 21,763 feet Mt Coropuma.

  From 1907 to 1924, he taught the History of Latin America at Yale University. During this time Professor Bingham made Cuzco his base for expeditions into Inca country.

  When war broke out in 1914, Bingham became a trainer of fighter pilots and led the American Air Force when the United States invaded France as part of the Allied Expeditionary Forces.

  After the war he turned to politics. He was elected Republican Senator for Connecticut from 1924 to 1932. Later he headed the Civil Service Commission Loyalty Review Board from 1951 to 1953.

  But his greatest claim to fame was his discovery on 24 July 1911 of Machu Picchu.

  His book of that momentous discovery, Lost City of the Incas, was an instant bestseller and placed him among such archeological luminaries as Layard of Nineveh and Schliemann of Troy, whose books also took the world by storm.

  We, his friends here in Cuzco, salute the bravery and mourn the loss of this great man.

  In recognition of his service to his country, his remains will be laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery.

  Copyright

  The ABC ‘Wave’ device is a trademark of the

  Australian Broadcasting Corporation and is used

  under licence by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia.

  First published in Australia in 2008

  This edition published in 2011

  by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited

  ABN 36 009 913 517

  www.harpercollins.com.au

  Copyright © David Harris 2008

  The right of David Harris to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him under the Copyright Amendmen
t (Moral Rights) Act 2000.

  This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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  National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

  David Harris

  Blood of the Incas/David Harris.

  ISBN: 978-0-7333-2097-2 (pbk.)

  ISBN: 978-0-7304-9542-0 (ePub)

  1st ed.

  Sydney: ABC Books, 2008.

  Time raiders

  For children.

  Archaeology — Juvenile fiction.

  Machu Picchu Site (Peru) — Juvenile fiction.

  A823.3