Fallon rigidly confined his relationship with Halstead to the matter in hand and would not overstep it by an inch. It was obvious to me that he did not particularly like Paul Halstead, nor did he trust him overmuch. But then, neither did I, especially after that conversation with Pat Harris. Fallon would have received an even more detailed report on Halstead from Harris and so I understood his attitude.
He was different with me. While regarding my ignorance of archeological fieldwork with a tolerant amusement, he did not try to thrust his professional expertise down my throat. He patiently answered my questions which, to him, I suppose, were simple and often absurd, and let it go at that. We got into the habit of sitting together in the evening for an hour before going to bed, and we yarned on a wide variety of topics. Apart from his professional work he was well read and a man of wide erudition. Yet I was able to interest him in the application of computers to farming practice and I detailed what I was doing to Hay Tree Farm. It seemed that he owned a big ranch in Arizona and he saw the possibilities at once.
But then he shook his head irritably. ‘I’ll pass that on to my brother,’ he said. ‘He’s looking after all that now.’ He stared blindly across the room. ‘A man has so little time to do what he really wants to do.’
Soon thereafter he became abstracted and intent on his own thoughts and I excused myself and went to bed.
Halstead tended to be morose and self-contained. He ignored me almost completely, and rarely spoke to me unless it was absolutely necessary. When he did volunteer any remarks they were usually accompanied by an illconcealed sneer directed at my abysmal ignorance of the work. Quite often I felt like taking a poke at him, but I bottled up my temper for the sake of the general peace. In the evenings, after our picture show and discussion, he and his wife would withdraw to their hut.
And that leaves Katherine Halstead, who was tending to become a tantalizing mystery. True, she was doing what she said she would, and kept her husband under tight control. Often I saw him on the edge of losing his temper with Fallon—he didn’t lose his temper with me because I was beneath his notice—and be drawn back into semicomposure by a look or a word from his wife. I thought I understood him and what made him tick, but I’m damned if I could understand her.
A man often sees mystery in a woman where there is nothing but a yawning vacuity, the so-called feminine mystery being but a cunning façade behind which lies nothing worthwhile. But Katherine wasn’t like that. She was amusing, intelligent and talented in a number of ways; she sketched competently in a better than amateur way, she cooked well and alleviated our chuckwagon diet, and she knew a hell of a lot more about the archeological score than I did, although she admitted she was but a neophyte. But she would never talk about her husband in any way at all, which is a trait I’d never come across in a married woman before.
Those I had known—not a few—always had something to say about their mates, either in praise or blame. Most would be for their husbands, with perhaps a tolerant word for their weaknesses. A few would praise incessantly and not hear a word against the darling man, and a few, the regrettable bitches, would be acid in esoteric asides meant for one pair of ears but understood by all—sniping shots in the battle of the sexes. But from Katherine Halstead there was not a cheep, one way or the other. She just didn’t talk about him at all. It was unnatural.
Because Fallon and Halstead were away most of the day we were thrown together a lot. The camp cook and his assistant were very unobtrusive; they cooked the grub, washed the dishes, repaired the generator when it broke down, and spent the rest of their time losing their wages to each other at gin rummy. So Katherine and I had each other for company during those long hot days. I soon got the film developing taped and had plenty of time on my hands, so I suggested we do something about the Mayan building.
‘We might come up with an epoch-making discovery,’ I said jocularly. ‘Let’s give it a bash. Fallon said it would be a good idea.’
She smiled at the idea that we might find anything of importance, but agreed that it would be something semiconstructive to do, so we armed ourselves with machetes and went down to the cenote to hew at the vegetation.
I was surprised to see how well preserved the building was once it was denuded of its protective cover. The limestone blocks of which it was built were properly cut and shaped, and laid in a workmanlike manner. On the wall nearest the cenote we found a doorway with a sort of corbelled arch, and when we looked inside there was nothing but darkness and an angry buzz of disturbed wasps.
I said, ‘I don’t think we’d better go in there just yet; the present inhabitants might not like it.’
We withdrew back into the clearing and I looked down at myself. It had been hard work cutting the creepers away from the building and I’d sweated freely, and my chest was filthy with bits of earth turned into mud by the sweat. I was in a mess.
‘I’m going to have a swim in the cenote,’ I said. ‘I need cleaning up.’
‘What a good idea,’ she said. ‘I’ll get my costume.’
I grinned. ‘I won’t need one—these shorts will do.’
She went back to the huts and I walked over to the cenote and looked down into the dark water. I couldn’t see bottom and it could have been anything between six inches and sixty feet deep, so I thought it was inadvisable to dive in. I climbed down to water level by means of the steps, let myself into the water and found it pleasantly cool. I splashed about for a bit but I didn’t find bottom, so I dived and went down to look for it. I must have gone down thirty feet and I still hadn’t found it. It was bloody dark down there, which gave me a good indication of conditions if I had to dive for Fallon. I let myself up slowly, dribbling air from my mouth, and came up to sunlight again.
‘I wondered where you were,’ Katherine called, and I looked up to see her poised on the edge of the cenote, silhouetted against the sun fifteen feet above my head. ‘Is it deep enough for diving?’
‘Too deep,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t find bottom.’
‘Good!’ she said, and took off in a clean dive. I swam slowly around the cenote and became worried when she didn’t come up, but suddenly I felt my ankles grabbed and I was pulled under.
We surfaced laughing, and she said. ‘That’s for pulling me under in Fallon’s pool.’ She flicked water at me with the palm of her hand, and for two or three minutes we had a splashing match like a couple of kids until we were breathless and had to stop. After that we just floated around feeling the difference between the coolness of the water and the heat of the direct sun.
She said lazily, ‘What’s it like down there?’
‘Down where?’
‘At the bottom of this pool.’
‘I didn’t find it; I didn’t go down too far. It was a bit cold.’
‘Weren’t you afraid of meeting Chac?’
‘Does he live down there?’
‘He has a palace at the bottom of every cenote. They used to throw maidens in, and they’d sink down to meet him. Some of them would come back with wonderful stories.’
‘What about those who didn’t come back?’
‘Chac kept them for his own. Sometimes he’d keep them all and the people would become frightened and punish the cenote. They’d throw stones into it and flog it with branches. But none of the maidens would ever come back because of that.’
‘You’d better be careful, then,’ I said.
She splashed water at me. ‘I’m not exactly a maiden.’
I swam over to the steps. ‘The chopper should be coming back soon. Another batch of film to be processed.’ I climbed halfway up and stopped to give her a hand.
At the top she offered me a towel but I shook my head. ‘I’ll dry off quickly enough in the sun.’
‘Suit yourself,’ she said. ‘But it’s not good for your hair.’ She spread the towel on the ground, sat on it, and started to rub her hair with another towel.
I sat down beside her and started to flip pebbles into the cenote. ‘What a
re you really doing here, Jemmy?’ she asked.
‘I’m damned if I know,’ I admitted. ‘It just seemed a good idea at the time.’
She smiled. ‘It’s a change from your Devon, isn’t it? Don’t you wish you were back on your farm—on Hay Tree Farm? Incidentally, do you always make hay from trees in Devon?’
‘It doesn’t mean what you think. It’s a dialect word meaning a hedge or enclosure.’ I flicked another pebble into the pool. ‘Do you think that annoys Chac?’
‘It might, so I wouldn’t do it too often—not if you have to dive into a cenote. Damn! I don’t have any cigarettes.’
I got up and retrieved mine from where I had left them and we sat and smoked in silence for a while. She said, ‘I haven’t played about like that in the water for years.’
‘Not since the carefree days of the Bahamas?’ I asked.
‘Not since then.’
‘Is that where you met Paul?’
There was the briefest pause before she said, ‘No. I met Paul in New York.’ She smiled slightly. ‘He isn’t the type you find on the beach in the Bahamas.’
I silently agreed; it was impossible to equate him with one of those Travel Association carefree holiday advertisements—all teeth, sun glasses and suntan. I probed deeper, but went about it circuitously. ‘What were you doing before you met him?’
She blew out a plume of smoke. ‘Nothing much; I worked at a small college in Virginia.’
‘A school teacher!’ I said in surprise.
She laughed. ‘No—just a secretary. My father teaches at the same college.’
‘I thought you didn’t look like a schoolmarm. What does your father teach? Archeology?’
‘He teaches history. Don’t imagine I spent all my time in the Bahamas. It was a very short episode—you can’t afford more on a secretary’s salary. I saved up for that vacation for a long time.’
I said, ‘When you met Paul—was that before or after he’d started on this Vivero research?’
‘It was before—I was with him when he found the Vivero letter.’
‘You were married then?’
‘We were on our honeymoon,’ she said lightly. ‘It was a working honeymoon for Paul, though.’
‘Has he taught you much about archeology?’
She shrugged. ‘He’s not a very good teacher, but I’ve picked up quite a lot. I’ve tried to help him in his work—I think a wife should help her husband.’
‘What do you think of this Vivero thing—the whole caper?’
She was silent for a time, then said frankly, ‘I don’t like it, Jemmy. I don’t like anything about it. It’s become an obsession with Paul—and not only him. Look at Fallon. My God, take a good look at yourself!’
‘What about me?’
She threw her cigarette away half-smoked. ‘Don’t you think it’s ridiculous that you should have been jerked out of a peaceful life in England and dumped in this wilderness just because of what a Spaniard wrote four hundred years ago? Too many lives are being twisted, Jemmy.’
I said carefully, ‘I wouldn’t say I’m obsessional about it. I don’t give a damn about Vivero or Uaxuanoc. My motives are different. But you say that Paul is obsessed by it. How does his obsession take him?’
She plucked nervously at the towel in her lap. ‘You’ve seen him. He can think or talk of nothing else. It’s changed him; he’s not the man I knew when we were married. And he’s not only fighting Quintana Roo—he’s fighting Fallon.’
I said shortly, ‘If it weren’t for Fallon he wouldn’t be here now.’
‘And that’s a part of what he’s fighting,’ she said passionately. ‘How can he compete with Fallon’s reputation, with Fallon’s money and resources? It’s driving him crazy.’
‘I wasn’t aware that this was any kind of competition. Do you think Fallon will deny him any credit that’s due to him?’
‘He did before—why shouldn’t he do it again? It’s really Fallon’s fault that Paul is in such a bad state.’
I sighed. Pat Harris was dead right. Katherine didn’t know about Halstead’s bad reputation in the trade. The advertising boys had got it down pat—even her best friend wouldn’t tell her! I debated for a moment whether or not to tell her all about Pat Harris’s investigations, but to tell a woman that her husband was a liar and a faker was certainly not the best way of making friends and influencing people. She would become more than annoyed and would probably tell Halstead—and what Halstead would do in his present frame of mind might be highly dangerous.
I said. ‘Now, look, Katherine: if Paul has an obsession it has nothing to do with Fallon. I think Fallon is eminently fair, and will give Paul all the credit that’s coming to him. That’s just my own personal opinion, mind you.’
‘You don’t know what that man has done to Paul,’ she said sombrely.
‘Maybe he had it coming to him,’ I said brutally. ‘He doesn’t make it easy for anyone working with him. I’m not too happy about his attitude to me, and if he keeps it up he’s going to get a thick ear.’
‘That’s an unfair thing to say,’ she burst out.
‘What the hell’s unfair about it? You asked to come on this jaunt on the grounds that you could control him. Well, you just do that, or I’ll do a bit of controlling in my own way.’
She scrambled to her feet. ‘You’re against him, too. You’re siding with Fallon.’
‘I’m not siding with anyone,’ I said tiredly. ‘I’m just sick to death of seeing a piece of scientific research being treated as though it were a competitive sporting event—or a war. And I might tell you that that attitude is one sided—it doesn’t come from Fallon.’
‘It doesn’t have to,’ she said viciously. ‘He’s on top.’
‘On top of what, for God’s sake? Both Fallon and Paul are here doing a job of work, and why Paul doesn’t get on with it and await the outcome is beyond me.’
‘Because Fallon will…’ She stopped. ‘Oh, what’s the use of talking? You wouldn’t understand.’
‘That’s right,’ I said sarcastically. ‘I’m so dumb and stupid I can’t put two and two together. Don’t be so bloody patronizing.’
It’s said that some women appear more beautiful when angry, but for my money it’s a myth probably bruited about by constitutionally angry women. Katherine was in a rage and she looked ugly. With one quick movement she brought up her hand and slapped me—hard. She must have played a lot of tennis in her time because that forehand swing of hers really jolted me.
I just looked at her. ‘Of course that solves a lot of problems.’ I said quietly, ‘Katherine, I admire loyalty in a wife, but you’re not just loyal—you’ve been brainwashed.’
There was a sudden throb in the air and then a roar as the helicopter appeared over the trees and passed overhead. I looked up and saw Paul Halstead’s head twist around to watch us.
SEVEN
Every three days a big helicopter came in from Camp One bringing drums of fuel for the diesel generators and cylinders of gas for the camp kitchen as and when necessary. It also brought in the mail which had been flown from Mexico City by Fallon’s jet, so I could keep in touch with England. Mount wrote to me telling me that probate was going through without much difficulty, and Jack Edgecombe had taken fire at last and was enthusiastic about the new plan for the farm. He was going ahead in spite of acid comments from the locals and was sure we were on to a good thing.
Reading those letters from Devon while in that stinking hot clearing in the middle of Quintana Roo made me homesick and I debated once again whether or not to quit. This business had got nothing to do with me and I was feeling more on the outside than ever because there was a distinct coolness now between Katherine and myself.
On the day of the quarrel there had been raised voices from the Halsteads’ hut quite late into the night and, when Katherine appeared next morning, she wore a shirt with a high collar. It wasn’t quite high enough to hide the bruise on the side of her throat and I felt an odd te
nsion in the pit of my stomach. But how a man and his wife conducted their marriage had nothing to do with me, so I left it at that. Katherine, for her part, pointedly ignored me, but Halstead didn’t change at all—he just went on his usual bastardly way.
I was just on the point of quitting when Fallon showed me a letter from Pat Harris who had news of Gatt. ‘Jack is making the rounds of Yucatan’ he wrote. He has been to Merida, Valladolid and Vigio Chico, and is now in Felipe Carillo Puerto. He seems to be looking for something or someone—my guess is someone, because he’s talking to some of the weirdest characters. Since Jack prefers to spend his vacations in Miami and Las Vegas I think this is a business trip—but it sure is funny business. It’s not like him to sweat when there is no need, so whatever he is doing must be important.’
‘Felipe Carillo Puerto used to be called Chan Santa Cruz,’ said Fallon. ‘It was the heart of the Mayan revolt, the capital of the indios sublevados. The Mexicans changed the name of the town when they got on top of the rebels in 1935. It’s not very far from here—less than fifty miles.’
‘It’s obvious that Gatt’s up to something,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ agreed Fallon pensively. ‘But what? I can’t understand the man’s motives.’
‘I can,’ I said, and laid it all out for Fallon’s inspection—gold, gold, and again gold. ‘Whether or not there is any gold doesn’t matter as long as Gatt thinks there is.’ I had another thought. ‘You once showed me a plate of Mayan manufacture. How much would the gold in that be worth?’
‘Not much,’ he said derisively. ‘Maybe fifty or sixty dollars.’
‘How much would the plate be worth at auction?’
‘That’s hard to say. Most of those things are in museums and don’t come on the open market. Besides, the Mexican Government is very strict on the export of Mayan antiquities.’
The Golden Keel / The Vivero Letter Page 42