by Hep Aldridge
Over these past three weeks, Doug, his wife, and Sean and his crew had become almost part of the expedition, certainly part of the family, and provided us with a wealth of local knowledge. They had put us in contact with others who provided additional information that we hoped would help in our quest. We found out from Doug’s girlfriend, Theresa, that her father, who taught at the university, was a true believer in the Metal Library and had told her he had seen artifacts supposedly from it, books with metal pages of gold and what looked like silver, with strange writing on them unknown to him.
They had been given to a Father Crespi, a friar who had also lived with the Shuar for many years and ministered to their needs. He had moved to Cuenca as he was getting up in years and spent his final years at a church in the city where he had become friends with her father.
We had seen his name on the internet many times and referenced in books. Unfortunately, many of the fantastic artifacts he had disappeared after his death. There are those who have called into question their very existence, but we now have a first-person eyewitness account that can vouch for their being real. We were making progress, albeit slow; progress none-the-less. We asked to meet with Theresa’s father, and she agreed to set up a meeting soon.
We continued to familiarize ourselves with our environment, and our forays into the mountains built our confidence in our new vehicle, its reliability and ability to handle the dangerous mountain roads if you could call them roads- many times not much more than trails barely wide enough for the Beast. We felt confident we could extricate ourselves from pretty much any situation we might run into. Wrecks and overturned vehicles had become an all too familiar sight in our travels as our trips were taking us further and further into the mountains.
We had been in country for over three and a half months and this Wednesday started out like most of the previous days but with a slightly more positive air. The night before, while having supper at Diego’s, Doug had told us of a village he had just heard about that supposedly had two Shuar elders living there who had come from another village high in the mountains. He said it was about five hours’ drive and then maybe another two to three-day hike. It was in a section of mountains rarely traveled.
They had been visited by Anglos before and were not unfriendly to them as some villages were. We got the general location, thanked Doug and made our plans for a four-day trip into the mountains, leaving the next morning. As we sat there digesting this new information, I said, “We have a conundrum here, folks,” as I got stares from the group.
“What do you mean, Colt?” Doc asked.
“Well,” I started, “all the stuff we are hearing about the library is based on this guy Moricz’s claim to have found it in the Tayos cave. All the expeditions to the cave, as far as we know, have turned up nothing, right?” All agreed. “Now, we have the friar ’s journal, which seems to indicate he was living in a Shuar village with connections to the library pretty high in the mountains AND his trek to this place of the gods took him even further up into the mountains.”
“So?” Dimitri asked.
“So,” I said, “these accounts seem to be mutually exclusive. The Tayos region is further southeast from here and at a lower elevation. We know from our research the Shuar region ranged from the Amazon basin to about 3,500 to 4,000 feet altitude in the Andes. But it seems the friar is talking about a village at a much higher altitude. Now, Doug tells us about these elders that may be living in a village in the mountains, and they may have come to that village from a place even further up in the mountains. It would seem that all this stuff about the Tayos cave is wrong and, if our friar’s account in his journal is accurate, people have been looking for the library in the wrong place!”
After pondering my statement for a minute or so, O’Reilly said "Seems to make sense, but that is speculation based on a vague description of location in the journal."
“I know,” I said “but I’ve got a gut feeling that it is right. What do the rest of you guys think?” After more discussion, it was decided that we should follow the lead we were getting from the journal for now and see if we came up with any more promising clues. For now, we put Tayos on the back burner and prepared to track down the Shuar elders if they existed.
We came out of the hotel early the next morning. We had packed our gear the night before and headed to our vehicle that was kept in a secure parking area at the side of the hotel. We had to pay extra for the two guards keeping an eye on the vehicle but felt it was well worth it. You can imagine our surprise when we approached the vehicle and found Eduardo wiping it down with clean rags, removing the morning dew and talking and laughing with our two guards.
“What the heck are you doing?” I asked Eduardo in my sternest voice, and, “Why did you let him near the vehicle?” I said to the guards.
Our guards spoke passable English and sheepishly replied, “Senor Burnett, we have known Eduardo for years, and he said he worked for you now and was getting la Bestia ready for your trip into the mountains.”
“He said what?” I blurted.
Eduardo jumped in and said, “Please, Senor, it is not their fault; I just wanted to help a little more, and besides it needed some cleaning.”
“That’s not what I meant,” I said. “You told them you work for me?”
“Well, Senor Burnett I would like to, and Senor Sean said it would be okay with him if I were gone for a few days, and I know the mountains where you are going well, and I could help translate for you and…”
I stopped him there. “I appreciate your enthusiasm, I really do, but Doc here has a good handle on the language.” I turned and looked at Doc who promptly said something in the Shuar dialect to Eduardo, who promptly replied in Shuar, and then continued the conversation, much to Doc’s surprise.
After a few minutes of back-and-forth Doc looked at me and said, “He’s good, very good. He has the language down perfectly, better than me.”
Eduardo heard this and said, “I am Shuar, my whole family was Shuar, and before I came to the city, I lived in Shuar village high in the mountains. In the same area you are going today.”
“What? How do you know where we are going today?”
“Senorita Theresa told me last night when I went by Diego’s, so I knew I had to be here early.” Now, he was looking very sheepish, eyes down and shuffling his feet. I looked at Doc, and he shrugged; Dimitri and Joe just grinned as Eduardo spoke again, not looking up… “…and, Senor Burnett, I worked very hard on your Beast, and I worked with Senor Joe and was hoping to have at least one ride in it.” I guess that did it; call me a softy or whatever, but the kid did deserve a lot of credit for helping with the vehicle.
After expelling an exasperated breath, I walked toward the vehicle and said, “Okay get in back, but the first bit of trouble and you’re back at Senor Sean’s, comprende?”
He almost jumped out of his skin, “Si Jefe,” and was in the back sitting on our backpacks before the rest of us could get in the vehicle.
I looked at the guards and said, “Don’t worry about it; you did fine.” They both grinned with a sigh of relief, nodding, but I said, “NO ONE gets near this vehicle except my crew, understand?”
“Si Jefe,” they both responded and then opened the chain-link gate and we headed out of the city with our newest team member excitedly jabbering to Doc in Shuar and grinning from ear to ear. I hope I don’t regret this I thought as we left the city behind and began climbing the mountain road.
Darn Kids!
Chapter Twenty-Three
O’Reilly had stayed at the hotel. She had planned to download some new real-time satellite images of our search area, through Fitz’s connections. Little did we know what a stroke of good fortune that was. The roads were bad; it had rained the night before, and the mud and slippery rocks made for even more dangerous driving once we left the blacktop. After about an hour and a half’s drive, we left the main gravel road, which had had traffic on it… old trucks, and busses mostly, a few horse
-drawn carts, and some foot traffic and started up a single lane mountain road that was in worse shape than the one we had just left. We were lucky to run 15 to 20 mph on this track and that even slowed when we came to the blind 90-degree turns that were numerous.
Dimitri was driving. I had shotgun and the view out the passenger’s window was breathtaking, literally. The valley below dropped away over 700 feet, almost straight down, and the driver’s side was a sheer wall that had been cut, dug into the side of the mountain. Beautiful, yes; relaxing, No! We had been on the road for about an hour when we rounded a blind hairpin turn and came upon a sight that made my stomach wrench.
Hanging over the edge of the road was an old gaudily painted school bus filled with people and still moving slightly as it dangled over the precipice. A small sapling had caught between the rear bumper and the body of the bus as it had gone over the edge and was the only thing keeping it and its occupants from a 700-foot drop into oblivion. As we pulled up and jumped out, we could hear the screaming and crying coming from the bus; we ran over, and our hearts sank even further.
We all know school busses have emergency rear doors. However, this one was covered with luggage and boxes. They had been strapped to a frame welded over the rear of the bus, making more room for passengers inside. The luggage was barely sticking above the edge of the road as the bus hung at a severe angle from the small tree. Doc and Eduardo had run to the edge of the drop off and were shouting to the passengers inside, trying to calm them. They were trying to get them to be still as their efforts to escape were stressing the tenuous grasp of the small tree even further.
Imagine a clock pendulum swinging back and forth… well, this one wasn’t swinging, yet, but if it started, that tree wouldn’t hold, and there would be no hope for anyone’s survival. I quickly assessed the situation and saw small clumps of dirt and rock falling away from the tree’s shallow root structure and knew we had just minutes to do something. I did a quick survey of the surroundings and spotted another tree on the uphill side of the road about twelve to eighteen inches in diameter, twenty feet up the side of the mountain. It was almost directly in line with the back of the bus.
They say necessity is the mother of invention, so I guess that’s what kicked in as I shouted for Dimitri to back the Beast up about 30 feet and start un-spooling the front winch cable.
“Roger that,” he responded, jumped into the vehicle and got it into position.
As he was working on the winch, he shouted, “You know we can’t pull that bus back up with this winch, right?”
“We don’t have to,” I shouted, “we just need to help that tree hang on a little longer! See that tree up there?” I pointed up the slope to the one I had spotted, “Get the cable played out and throw it around its trunk and get it down to the back of the bus.” He understood what the plan was and, before I could tell Joe to grab the cable and climb the side of the hill to the tree, Eduardo had grabbed the cable hook and was halfway up the slope. He had heard my call to Dimitri and figured out what we were going to try to do. Damn smart kid! “Stand by the winch, Dimitri.”
“Standing by,” he replied.
“Doc, how are they doing?”
“Best I can tell, we have two unconscious with possibly severe injuries and a pregnant lady who is injured.”
“Got it,” I shouted as I reached the Beast and grabbed the SAT phone and punched in O’Reilly on speed dial.
She picked up on the second ring, “What’s up, Boss?”
I quickly filled her in on our situation and the info I had from Doc, told her I was turning on our Vehicle GPS locator and said we needed Medevac here ASAP.
“Copy,” she said as the line went dead.
Eduardo was draping the cable around the tree.
I shouted to Joe, “You ready to play Tarzan on that luggage?”
He looked at me and grinned “As soon as I get the cable secured, I’ll be good to go!”
I realized that Doc was making headway with the passengers as most of the screaming had stopped and mainly crying and sobbing along with some shouts were still coming from the bus.
I shouted, “Doc?”
“Making progress but the injured passengers need help now; the bus driver is unconscious along with a young girl that hit her head on a seat rail or something.”
Shit, I thought.
“Oh, and by the way the woman, who is about eight months pregnant on board, got slammed around pretty good, and is in serious pain.”
Double Shit… Eduardo had gotten the hook and cable to Joe by now, and he was hanging over the edge trying to find a solid connection point on the bus.
A couple of minutes later, I heard Joe shout from over the edge, “Good to go, Colt!” I gave Dimitri the hand signal for taking up the slack in the cable.
As the cable drew taught, I stopped him and called, “Joe?”
“Still looking good here, Colt.”
I gave the signal to take up more of the cable, slowly; I could hear the cable tighten and heard the singing sound steel cable makes when it’s put under extreme stress. Hang in there damn it; hang in there I thought. I was watching the little tree hooked to the bumper for any sign of stress relief when I heard rocks and dirt falling from the up-side of the road. I didn’t want to look and called, “Eduardo?”
“We are good, Senor, still holding.”
At that moment, I saw the little tree begin to straighten by about an inch. I gave Dimitri the sign for a halt and called, “Lock it down!”
“Roger that,” he replied.
“Joe?”
“Looking good here I got a good hook up on the frame where the bumper connects, and we’re good to go!”
“Okay, Tarzan, do your thing.” As I watched, he pulled his six-inch Gerber from its sheath and put it in his mouth, pirate style as he used both hands to inch his way up onto the luggage tied to the back of the bus. Within seconds he sliced the ropes and began shoving boxes, bags, and suitcases over the side of the bus, watching as they fell the 700+ feet to the valley below.
In minutes, he was down to the last crate and hanging on by one piece of rope still tied to the bus. The razor-sharp edge of the Gerber had made short work of the ropes. “Okay last one going,” he called, sliced through the rope, and watched as it fell away. “Colt, bad news; there’s a rebar frame they welded to the bus to hold all this shit, and it blocks the door.”
Triple shit, I thought. “How thick is the rebar?” I called.
“Not bad, but I think cutting at the welded points would be our best bet. Cut a couple of them and looks like we could bend the frame out enough to get the door open.”
“Doc, how are things?”
“Holding steady, but you need to hurry every chance you get…”
“Copy that!” While I had been talking to Doc, Dimitri had gone into the back of the Beast and pulled out our 24-volt-battery powered side grinder/cutter, part of our tool stash that could cut cable, chain, or steel re-bar as needed and was running to Joe. A million things were flashing through my mind… would the little tree hold? Would the bumper on the bus hold? Would the bumper on the Beast hold? And would the tree on the mountain-side hold? The only thing I was sure of was that the 25,000 lb. pull Warn winch would hold; it was just everything that it was attached to or wrapped around that worried me!
In the few seconds it took me to run that through my head, Joe had already cut through two welds and was working on the third. “Can we bend it now?” I called.
“Naw isn’t going to work; the door wouldn’t have opened wide enough to get them out. I’ve only got two more welds to cut, and the whole thing will be off.”
“Dimitri?” I called, he had gone back to winch duty at the Beast, “Still good, Colt.”
“Eduardo?”
“Tree is still holding Jefe.”
“Joe?”
“Crap, I’m going to need the small crowbar to get this door open.”
Eduardo was at a dead run to the truck, “I’ll be
right there, Senor Joe.”
“Doc,” I said, “tell everyone that when we get that door open, we need people to work their way slowly to it and, if I see anyone other than women, children, and the elderly trying to get out first, I will personally throw their asses over the edge. Anyone that is healthy and unhurt needs to help get the others out first.”
“Got it, Colt,” and I heard him burst into a Spanish tirade loud enough so all on the bus could hear. There were comments that came back from the bus that I couldn’t hear, but I understood Doc’s response, “Just try it!"
Joe, moving very carefully, was prying the door open with the help of Eduardo, both on the back of the bus, hanging in space. Oh, shit, I thought; well, at least it’s the two lightest guys in the group, as I saw the door slowly creak open. You could step from the rear bumper of the bus to the road’s edge, but there was about a four-foot gap between the two that you had to step/jump over to make it.
Dimitri had come up behind me with one of our climbing ropes and said we could tie it to the door; he would hold it on this side, and they could use it as a hand-grip as we reached to help them across the gap. Not the best idea, especially for the children and elderly, but I couldn’t come up with anything else, so we tossed the end of the rope to Joe and told him to tie it off and start the people across. We told them to use the cable attached to the bumper of the bus stretching across the opening as a step if they needed to while holding onto the rope. Eduardo was translating the plan and encouragement to the people coming out the door. I was holding onto the rope with Dimitri and reaching out to the people, helping, pulling, or jerking them across the opening as necessary, all the time keeping an eye on our little tree.
In what seemed like hours, but was only twenty-five minutes, we had all the children and elderly across and were helping the adults. Doc was moving the group around the curve in the road and getting them seated and getting water from the Beast. We wanted them out of the way in case the cable connection came loose, and we had a steel whip flying through the air. There were four young men in their 20’s who had been helping everyone out of the bus. Now, the only ones left were the pregnant woman, the unconscious girl, and the bus driver.