One Grave Less

by Beverly Connor

“This is a delaying tactic,” said Michaels.

  “What is your hurry, Mr. Michaels?” said Cordeiro. “Sit down. There is a chair over there. Now, Mrs. West, why do you want to speak with Catia?”

  “I was on vacation with my daughter when we were attacked and had our papers stolen. We escaped and had to make our way here.” She left out any description of their adventure, hoping he really didn’t want details anyway. “It wasn’t far,” she continued, placing herself far away from the village where she was held prisoner and the route where she did indeed kill the men in question.

  She took a deep breath. “It wasn’t a terribly long trip, but it was an interesting one. On the way we found something I need to tell an archaeologist about. I was going to send a letter to the Ministry of Culture, but your daughter is here.”

  “What did you find?” asked Catia, her dark eyes wide with interest.

  Maria stuck her hand in her bag.

  “She’s going for a gun,” said Michaels.

  “Oh, please,” said Maria. “I’m getting my notes. What have you been drinking, Mr. Michaels?”

  Maria’s hand landed first on Rosetta’s doll, which she pulled from the knapsack and handed to Rosetta. Rosetta hugged the doll to her and whispered in the doll’s ear. Senhor Cordeiro smiled at Rosetta and gave Michaels a bemused glance. Maria put her hand back in the knapsack and pulled out her notes and the envelope with the sherds.

  “We came across a place where the rain forest was recently burned off. It revealed an Incan site, the biggest I’ve ever seen. Although the Incas aren’t my specialty, I studied up on them before I came here and I am familiar with the known sites. This was not among them and it is at least eighty hectares or more. It needs to be secured against vandals and pothunters.”

  Catia’s eyes grew even wider. She understood the significance of a find of that size. Maria was hoping that a newly minted archaeologist would jump at the information, and her father would not only feel really grateful, he would find Maria a credible person and not a killer. Appearances were everything, because that was all she had.

  “There are no sites that big,” whispered Catia.

  Maria showed Catia her drawing and her notes. “Here is the large mound. I saw several, but this is the largest. These”—Maria pointed to some rock ruins on the drawing—“are domiciles, I suspect. Notice these lines, they are scars in the ground, possibly part of the road system. . . . These are my notes and drawings. You can see the site extends into the rain forest, so it’s larger than the clearing, which is about eighty hectares, I would guess.”

  Catia picked up the drawings and studied them, reading Maria’s notes. She nodded to her father.

  “I picked up these two ceramic sherds.” She handed them to Catia. “Like I said, the site needs the attention of an archaeologist. To my knowledge it would be the largest in Brazil—a national treasure.”

  “Papai,” Catia said, and spoke rapidly to him in Portuguese.

  “We are getting off track,” said Michaels. “I’m all for your daughter’s career, but we need to secure this woman. Some ancient Incan site is not going anywhere.”

  Cameron Michaels was frustrated. Good, Maria thought. She wanted to keep him that way.

  “Where is it?” said Catia. Both she and her father ignored Michaels. “Is there any way you can tell me?”

  “Do you have a map? And a ruler?” Maria did not want to show them her map. She was not sure what all it had written on it. It certainly had notations that would raise questions about her story.

  Cordeiro opened a drawer and pulled out a map of Brazil and handed her a ruler.

  Maria looked around the room for a flat surface. She settled on a table by a wall. Catia helped clear it of books and papers. Maria spread out the map and took her notes and looked at her figures. She was about to ask for a pen when Catia handed her one. Maria worked backward in her mind from Tabatinga to where they had been on their trek. She took the scale of the large map of Brazil and calculated some approximate distances. She quickly did some calculations and made several measurements on the map, drawing lines, and finally making a circle around an area on the map.

  “I had no tools with me except a compass, but my estimate is that the site is here,” she said.

  Catia looked at the map and drew her finger down a river past the site and nodded. She smiled at Maria and took the map and folded it up. “This is very exciting,” she said.

  “Now can we get down to the business at hand?” said Michaels.

  “Very well, Mr. Michaels,” said Cordeiro. “We will get down to your business.”

  As he spoke Maria saw a plane land and begin taxiing to a gate. It had a painting of Betty Boop on its nose. She was never so glad to see a cartoon character in her life.

  “Yes, thank you,” said Maria. “Could I have some water for me and my daughter? Perhaps a bottle of orange juice?” She dug in her purse for some change.

  “I’ll get you some from the machine,” said Catia. “Please, put your change back.”

  When Catia was out the door, Michaels turned on Maria. He closed in on her until his face was inches away from hers. He smelled like garlic.

  “I’ve had about enough of your delaying tactics,” he said.

  Rosetta buried her face behind Maria and started crying. Maria picked her up and held her close.

  “Mr. Michaels. Sit down,” said Rodrigo Cordeiro. “You are forgetting whose office you are in. You come here with a third-rate flyer that a child could have produced and tell me you are from Interpol. Is this the kind of work they do? Sit down, I say. You will not harass people in my office or anywhere in my jurisdiction, do you understand? Until proven otherwise, this woman is a guest. And I’m still not entirely clear what your interest in this child is.

  “Now, Mrs. West, do you have anything to say to his accusations?” asked Senhor Cordeiro.

  “I don’t know where his accusations come from. He’s made this whole thing up for his own purposes. His real interest is in my daughter. After we were attacked he showed up in Benjamin Constant and stalked us, speaking to my daughter in Portuguese, which neither of us understands. He told me he was telling her how beautiful she is, and now he has followed us here. He has become obsessed with my daughter and is trying to get me out of the way. That is the only answer I have to his accusations,” she said.

  “Mr. Michaels?” said the airport manager.

  “She is twisting my concern for the little girl into something sinister,” he said.

  “I believe that is a mother’s job, to be vigilant to those kinds of things,” said Cordeiro.

  So far, Cordeiro appeared to be on her side. But soon they would come to the problematic fact that neither she nor Rosetta had passports or papers of any kind.

  Catia came back with a bottle of orange juice for the two of them. She opened Rosetta’s and put it in her small hands. Rosetta took a sip and wrinkled her nose.

  “It’s a little tart, isn’t it, Rosetta?’ said Catia. “It’s good for you, though.”

  Maria opened hers and took a long swallow. It was a little tart.

  “Are we finished with the delays?” said Michaels. “I’m here to warn you of a dangerous woman, and you don’t seem to be taking it seriously.”

  Before Cordeiro could respond, there was a knock on the door.

  “Entrar,” said Cordeiro.

  Cameron Michaels threw up his hands.

  Good, keep getting more and more frustrated, thought Maria.

  Chapter 61

  John West walked into the office. He was wearing a dark pinstriped business suit and black cowboy boots. His white shirt had a string tie knotted with a turquoise stone. On his wrist he wore a beaded strip of leather made for him by his sister. His shiny black hair was straight and parted in the middle and hung just past his shoulders. He had a small hawk feather tied to a lock of hair in back. John liked to mix traditional Native American with modern trappings. It gave him an interesting air and clients like
d it.

  Rosetta took one look and ran to him.

  “Daddy!” she said, jumping up into his arms. He picked her up and she hugged his neck.

  She spoke to him in Cherokee, a simple phrase, but with perfect intonation. The kid was good. John responded in kind. Then he made a series of gestures with his hand—“I love you” in sign language—fully expecting Rosetta to mimic him because it’s what kids do. She did a pretty fair job. Maria smiled. It was a precious moment and totally convincing.

  Rodrigo Cordeiro, Catia, and Cameron Michaels looked at the two of them. Maria marveled at how the similarity of deep ancestry passed for familial likeness. Cordeiro was convinced, as was his daughter Catia. Michaels actually looked slightly confused. By this time he had probably recognized Ariel, but here was what looked and interacted like family.

  Maria went up to John and he kissed her cheek.

  “Are you all right?” he said.

  “I am now,” she said.

  John’s gaze shifted from one person to the other. He zeroed in on the airport manager and held out his hand. Maria introduced all of them to John.

  Rosetta pointed to Michaels. “He’s the bad man they tell us about in school,” she said. Maria almost laughed and wondered where she came up with that.

  “I resent that,” Michaels said.

  “Are you going to argue with a child?” said Cordeiro. He sounded weary of the whole thing. “She knows you are trying to take her away from her parents.”

  There it was. Cordeiro believed her. Maria felt relief beyond words.

  The airport manager turned to John. “Mr. West, Mr. Michaels has accused your wife of the murder of ”—he looked down at the flyer—“of four men. He says he is from Interpol.”

  “Maria . . . killed four men? How?” he said.

  “This piece of paper doesn’t say,” said Cordeiro. “He also accuses your wife of kidnapping this child from her native village.”

  John turned to Michaels. “Interpol doesn’t make these kinds of accusations on its own in person; they work with the local authorities. Where are the local authorities?”

  “Here.” Michaels pointed to Rodrigo Cordeiro.

  “I manage the airport, Mr. Michaels. I am not the polícia ,” he said.

  “She doesn’t have papers,” said Michaels, playing his trump card, though Maria had already told Cordeiro she’d lost their papers during the attack. She supposed that Michaels thought Cordeiro needed reminding.

  “We can get them replaced at the embassy in Rio de Janeiro,” said Maria. She looked over at John. “I thought we could take a little vacation there while we wait.”

  He stared at her. The look in his eyes was stern. “I would have thought you’d had enough of vacations,” he said. She recoiled as if stung.

  Michaels clapped his hands together slowly. “Well played. I can see when I’m out of my league. Good day. I would say it’s been nice.”

  He left the room. Maria would have preferred he stay so she would at least know where he was.

  “Senhor Cordeiro,” John said, paying no attention to Michaels. “My wife is not a murderer, nor a kidnapper. She sometimes makes bad judgments about where to vacation with our daughter. But other than that, she is a good mother. I am not familiar with your laws in this country. Is there a provision in your law for expediting a matter like this so I can take my family home?”

  Neither Lindsay nor Ariel was at ease until the plane was in the air for several minutes. Lindsay half believed they would be shot down. John was up front with the pilot, Arthur Youngblood, a cousin of his. The Betty Boop was owned jointly by several corporations, of which West Construction was one. Lindsay was grateful for it. Grateful for John. Just grateful.

  Ariel had never flown in a plane, but she didn’t look nervous. She looked disbelieving. Lindsay smiled at her. She knew she was thinking of Diane Fallon and her dream to find her.

  “We did it, kid. I guess I can call you Ariel now, huh?” she said.

  Ariel was sitting in one of the cushioned seats across from her. She was still belted in. She unclipped her belt and ran over to Lindsay and hugged her.

  “Thank you for not leaving me,” she said.

  “That was never going to happen,” said Lindsay, holding her tight. “Never, never, never.”

  John came out of the cockpit and sat down in a seat opposite them across the narrow aisle. He smiled. “At least if I go to jail and lose my company for smuggling a kid into the United States, I can fall back on acting when I get out.”

  Lindsay suddenly realized how much he trusted her. It was enough for him that she said bringing Ariel into the United States without a passport was the right thing to do. She walked over to where he was sitting and kissed him. She put her hands in his long hair and looked him in the eyes.

  “Thank you. Thank you for everything.”

  He put his arms around her waist and pulled her onto his lap. “When I found out you were missing, I was . . . I thought we wouldn’t get lucky again like the time you disappeared coming back from that conference. I thought, we won’t get lucky twice. Then you called. I would do this and more. Though you are getting a little expensive.”

  “I hate to ask,” she said. She knew he had paid a substantial bribe to fly out of Tabatinga. “I’ll pay you back,” she said.

  He laughed. “Archaeology doesn’t pay that well,” he said.

  Lindsay kissed him again. For the first time she felt calm, safe. She kept forgetting they weren’t home yet.

  She got up out of his lap and sat down in the seat.

  “Can you tell me what happened?” he said.

  She and Ariel told the story, the whole story, the parts that were Lindsay’s, the parts that were Ariel’s, and the parts that were theirs together. It poured out of them, sometimes out of order and sometimes confused, but they didn’t stop until John knew everything—Lindsay’s kidnapping, the massacre at the mission, Ariel’s plans to find her mother, their experiences in the jungle. The people she killed in self-defense.

  “I just wanted to get back to Mama so bad,” Ariel said.

  John was private with his emotions most of the time, but Lindsay could see the glistening in his eyes. She was afraid to speak because she knew her voice would crack.

  “We’ll get you to your mama,” he whispered. He looked back at Lindsay. “I’m glad you’re here. It’s worth any price.”

  “Can we call Mama?” asked Ariel.

  John grinned at her. “Sure.”

  Lindsay wished she could bottle the look of excitement and joy on Ariel’s face. John picked up the phone built into his chair and called information. Then he dialed the RiverTrail Museum. He said nothing for several moments and hung up the phone.

  “Can’t get through right now,” he said. “I’ll try again in a few minutes. Don’t be worried. This happens sometimes. We’ll get hold of her.”

  Arthur Youngblood came out of the cockpit and stood at John’s chair. He winked at Lindsay and Ariel.

  “Who’s flying the plane?” said Ariel.

  “Otto,” he said.

  Ariel looked down the passageway into the cockpit. “Who’s Otto?”

  “Otto Pilot,” he said. “Always take him with me.”

  He gave a hearty laugh. Lindsay wondered how many times he had made that joke and how many times he had laughed at it. He turned to John.

  “There’s a big weather system stalled over North Georgia. We won’t be able to get near the place. Our best bet is to go home to Cherokee and land in our private field, especially since we kind of took that long detour from our flight plan. I could try for Atlanta, but it’s bad weather there too, and they have a lot of security.”

  John nodded. “The bad weather is probably why I can’t get through on the phone. We can drive down to Rosewood,” he said.

  He looked over at Ariel. She had an anxious look on her face, like maybe her dream wasn’t going to come true after all.

  “It’s not that far,” said J
ohn. “We’ll get you there.”

  “You don’t think the bad man will get there first, do you?” she said. “He knows I’ll tell Mama about him and what he did to Father Joe and the others. What if he tries to hurt her?”

  Chapter 62

  Diane awoke from a three-hour nap and took a shower. It left her less refreshed than she would like. Star was still asleep. Frank was having coffee and doughnuts with David and Izzy. She found Gregory Lincoln sitting alone on a bench near the huge dinosaur paintings in the Pleistocene Room.

  He sat with his forearms resting on his knees. He was in quiet contemplation, looking through a packet of postcards he carried with him. Each card was a small reproduction of a Vermeer painting whose subject was people doing everyday things. It’s what he did when he was under stress. The cards had grown rather ragged around the edges from frequent use.

  It was early, too early for visitors, so she and Gregory had the Pleistocene Room to themselves. Gregory smiled and put his arm around her shoulders when she sat down beside him.

  “I love your museum. What an utterly calm environment. Even when you have all the noisy schoolchildren it is a calm place. I love the tiny unicorns in the dinosaur paintings. Quite intriguing.��

  The huge murals of dinosaurs, painted at a time when everyone thought dinosaurs dragged their tails on the ground behind them, were treasures uncovered during the renovation of the museum. The artist had put tiny unicorns in his artwork here and there to the delight of everyone who looked at the paintings.

  “Life is good here,” she said.

  “I thought I might be moving here, you know, but it turns out that Marguerite and I are having a girl. So I can go home.” He smiled.

  Diane put a hand on his arm. “Congratulations,” she said.

  “After the boys, it will be quite a different experience having a girl. Marguerite is pleased. She’s given up on trying to make the boys wear dresses on special occasions. Now I may have to install concertina wire on top of the wall around the house. I understand girls can be quite tough on parents.”

  “I’m sure the two of you will manage very well,” said Diane.