by Nadia Aguiar
The rain cleared, the posters were put up, and word traveled quickly through Port Town. By lunchtime there was a line at the gate of Senor Tecumbo’s house that ran all the way down the zigzag road to the town and then coiled back on itself. Senor Tecumbo stood in a doorway leading onto the marble rectangle, smoking his pipe and looking crossly at the line.
“Every single one of them is just here after the reward, I can promise you,” he said. “I’m tempted to have Lorco break the whole thing up.”
He turned to summon Lorco but Maya tugged his arm.
“No,” she cried. “Please, I’d like to see them all. Even if out of all of them there’s only one person who has any real information, it’ll be worth it. It’s all we have.”
Senor Tecumbo’s face softened. Still, he did not want to let his niece talk to the people in the line by herself.
“But I’m the only one here who has seen the missing people,” Maya said. “I’ll be able to tell right away if the people who have come are telling the truth or not.”
Senor Tecumbo relented, saying, “But I’m going to post Lorco at the door, just to be safe.”
A maid set up a little white table and chair at the gate, and Maya went to receive the line of people. Lorco lurked broodingly in the coolness of the main doorway to the villa. Maya tried to ignore him. She sat down at the table with her back to him and the villa and beckoned to the first person in the line.
Several hours later the sun had begun its descent over the rooftops into the jungle and Maya had talked to countless people, none of whom had any useful information. Most had clearly never seen either of her parents and had invented stories in order to get the reward. However, it seemed that a handful actually had seen her father. They gave plausible descriptions of him that sounded a lot like Kate’s, about a stranger searching for his three children. But they couldn’t offer any information about where he had been headed or where he might be now. Maya was sweating uncomfortably at the table, but she didn’t want to move into the shade closer to the villa because then she would be within earshot of Lorco. The line was down to the last few stragglers, anyway. In the end it seemed the plan had come to nothing. She felt hot, tired, and defeated.
The last person in line was an ancient-looking man with a crooked back, hands mottled with age spots, and terribly thin legs like a stork. Maya figured that it had probably taken him all day to walk up the hill from Port Town. Despite his age, he had a head of thick white hair that stuck out in tufts beneath an old green sailor’s cap. He sized her up for a moment before he spoke, which was something no one else had done.
“I saw him,” he said, peering with interest at Maya.
“Who did you see?” Maya asked tiredly.
“The man you’re looking for,” said the old man. “Not the woman, just him.”
“How do I know you really saw him?” Maya asked, her voice flat. She had little hope that this scraggly little old man knew anything.
“You want proof,” said the old man, a twinkle coming into his eye. “A detail to prove it was him.”
“Yes,” said Maya.
The old sailor chuckled softly. “All right,” he said. “You.”
Maya’s heartbeat quickened. “What are you talking about?” she said haughtily. “I’m Senor Tecumbo’s niece.”
“You can’t fool me,” he said. “You’re from the Outside. I can always tell an Outsider. I knew something was wrong here, but I didn’t realize until I got close to you what it was. But now I see . . . you take after your father. Same eyes. You’ve all ended up here somehow and now you want to go home.”
Maya’s mouth dropped open.
It was true . . . she did have her father’s eyes. People had always said so. She looked fearfully at the old man. He had seen right through her.
“Don’t worry,” said the old man, “I’m not going to give you away. I met your father some weeks ago now, when he was on his way out of Port Town. I live on the edge of town and he had come to ask for food. I had just made a stew to last for a few days, so I shared it with him. He told me his story and that he was on his way to the Ravaged Straits because he had heard that his children were there. Seeing you here now, though, it seems that he was misled.”
The old man broke off and glanced over Maya’s shoulder.
“We have to be quick,” he said. “Your friend is watching.”
Maya glanced behind her and saw Lorco eyeing her.
“Please,” she said. “What are the Ravaged Straits? How do I get there?”
“It’s a terrible place,” the old man said. “A terrible, terrible place. The current is wicked, the sun is blinding, the rocks are treacherous. Men who go down the Straits almost never make it out alive. And if they do, they’re never the same after. The place gets into them and destroys their minds. I only knew one man who returned, and until the day he died he never spoke a word again.”
Maya looked in shock at the old man. A breeze came up from the sea and goose bumps rose on her skin. Behind her she could hear Lorco’s footsteps getting closer.
“How do I get there?” Maya whispered urgently.
“Sail due south from the Black Cross and you’ll catch the current that leads into the Straits,” the old man whispered. “But don’t go alone. You must—”
But the old man was interrupted by Lorco.
“Is everything all right?” he asked, stopping beside the table. His oiled mustache twitched.
“Everything is fine,” snapped Maya. “I’ve learned all we need to, you can pay this gentleman the reward.”
“No, thank you,” the old man said, backing up, his hat in his hands. “I won’t have any reward. Not on my soul.” With that, he turned and began walking down the hill.
“What nonsense did he tell you?” Lorco asked.
“Nothing,” Maya murmured.
Lorco watched her closely. “I think that Senorita should come back inside now,” he said.
But before Maya could return to the villa, a new party showed up at the gates. There were three men. Stifling a gasp, Maya recognized one of them from the tavern on the day that she and Simon and Penny had fled from the bullies on the dock. He was impossible to mistake: a tall, bone-crushingly great man with a sheen of sweat shining on his bald head, and a glittering sapphire in place of a missing front tooth. His pistol sat firmly against his side.
“We’re here about the Pamela Jane,” he said. “We want to know where she is.”
Maya scratched the bridge of her nose, hoping to hide her face so the pirates wouldn’t recognize her. But she didn’t have to worry, because Lorco pushed her back toward the house and motioned toward the trees. Several guards stepped forward, hands on their rifles.
“We have nothing to tell you,” Lorco said to the pirates. “Stay on your ships or Senor will have you kicked out of Port Town for good.”
The guards cocked their guns—Maya even saw a couple of them aiming from perches in the branches of trees around the gate. The pirates spat on the ground, swearing, but they were outnumbered so reluctantly they turned and left down the hill. Lorco fixed his suspicious glare on Maya. She ran quickly back to the house, heart thumping. Why did the pirates want to find the Pamela Jane?
Back in her room, Maya paced anxiously. Now that she knew where her father was, she wanted to run away, back to Mathilde’s, so that she could get the others and they could start making their way to the Black Cross, wherever it was. But Senor Tecumbo’s villa was swarming with guards, and there was no way she could slip out unnoticed. She would have to stick to Helix’s plan—to leave during the opening party of the Festival, when the town was crowded and busy and everyone was in costume. She didn’t know exactly how it would work, though. Helix had said that he would give her a signal—but what? And how?
She sighed and closed her eyes, trying to quiet the questions that crowded her mind. How would they find the Black Cross? And what had the pirates wanted with the Pamela Jane? Their unexpected visit had alarmed her. She began
to feel like a prisoner in the villa.
That evening she joined Senor for dinner, her spirits leaden. She had been dreading having to see him again.
“Well,” he said, “did your posters work? Did you find out anything?”
“Some people may have seen the man we were looking for, but no one could tell me where he had gone,” Maya said. Another lie, she thought.
“I’m sorry, my dear,” Senor Tecumbo said. “I know it’s hard to be young and to be witness to such sad things. But in time you’ll learn there are things that you don’t have the power to change. The missing don’t return to us.”
They were interrupted by a servant. To Maya’s intense alarm, she realized he was holding the logbook out before him.
“Pardon me, Senor,” he said, bowing. “But a young man from Port Town brought this. He says it belongs to Senorita Isabella.”
“Oh, it must have been recovered from my trunk on the road,” said Maya, trying to hide her confusion. She took it quickly from the servant. “It’s my diary,” she said, holding it to her chest.
Simon and Helix must have sent the book to get a message to her, Maya realized. An ordinary note could have been intercepted, but a message could be concealed in the logbook. She was desperate to find out when she could get out of here, but the rest of dinner passed torturously slowly.
Finally Maya was able to excuse herself. Once she was inside she took off running up the stairs to her room with the logbook. She locked her bedroom door behind her and opened the book, turning the pages until she saw the message, written between the lines of one of her father’s log entries. Simon had written:
WAIT FOR A SIGNAL FROM THE DRAGON.
Wait for a signal from the Dragon? What could that mean? Then Maya remembered that everyone would be wearing masks, even her. Her m ask—a princess’s—had been given to her earlier and was now hanging from the hat stand, looking at her with its empty sockets. Either Simon or Helix must be planning to disguise himself as a dragon the following night.
Maya closed the book.
All right.
She would remain Isabella one night longer.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The Festival of Masks * A Magnificent Party * Dragon *
Latecomer * A Wild Ride * “A girl like you has plenty of beautiful
dresses in her future”
Port Town had been busy since dawn and the villa was teeming with staff preparing for the night’s party. Maya was excited because on the map in the logbook she had found a tall black X that Rodrigo had marked on a desolate part of the northwest coast of Tamarind. She believed it must be the Black Cross that the old sailor had talked about. She scrawled a quick note in the logbook to the others—PAPI IS AT BLACK CROSS. HELIX, WHAT IS THE QUICKEST WAY TO GET THERE? As an afterthought, she added, PIRATES CAME TO ASK ABOUT THE PAMELA JAME YESTERDAY—DON’T KNOW WHY??? She managed to slip the book in a pile of laundry going to Mathilde’s. She desperately hoped they’d receive it. There was no time to waste in getting to the Black Cross. Their father’s life might depend on it.
Maya spent most of the day observing the activity from her window, relieved to be away from the burden of conversation with Senor Tecumbo, and from Lorco’s scrutiny.
In the evening Maya put on the dress that Senor had given her to wear that night: a lovely yellow gown made up of layers and layers of silk, with pearl-encrusted straps that crossed over her shoulders and darker yellow silk roses that gathered around her waist. She brushed her hair and then swept it up as best she could, securing it with pins. She studied herself in the mirror. She looked very grown-up, she thought. You would never know she had just spent ages in a prison in the jungle. Then she took her mask—it was beautiful, with high cheekbones and full lips and jewels studding the temples—and lifted it to her face. When she looked at herself again, a thrill ran through her. She was transformed. In this mask and dress, it was going to be so much easier to pretend to be Isabella for the last few hours of their plan. She left her bedroom and went down the hall and down the marble stairs, her dress making a lovely swishing sound. She stopped at one point and, glancing furtively around her to make sure no one was watching, ran back down the hallway and began the walk again, just so she could hear the dress swishing once more.
Outside, the marble patio and gardens had been transformed. Flowers bloomed everywhere. Tables covered in ivory cloths were being heaped with food, and uniformed waiters dashed back and forth from the tables to the kitchen. Peacocks, their throats blue as the ocean, roosted in the limbs of the Mellora trees and strutted through the servants running hither and thither with platters laden with pineapple and cupuaçu, watermelon and icy-white slivers of coconut. There were meats, too, steaming as they were lifted off the grills: wild pigano, goat, snake delicacies. And fish! Dozens of different types of fish, grilled whole and filleted by the deft knives of the white-aproned chefs. Wahoo, reef mullets, deep-sea groupers, coneys, red and yellow snappers, mako shark, and a turtle turned upside down and roasted in its own shell. Bowls of moist yellow cassava were flecked with onions and fresh wild mint. Passing a table of jungle peppers roasting in their own juices, Maya’s mouth began to water. Wild mushrooms that had been gathered that day from the fringes of the jungle lay on beds of sea fennel. Stews of edible flowers bubbled gently in vats. A waiter appeared with fried sea urchins, oyster, octopus, and juicy pink crab.
Wood was being piled at the foot of the garden where later a bonfire would be lit. Dancers wearing leaves and feathers, faces stained with berries from the jungle, were set to perform old tribal dances around it for the entertainment of the guests.
The first guests were set to arrive in half an hour.
“There you are,” said Senor Tecumbo, coming out onto the marble patio behind Maya. The door shut behind him and for a moment the sea, reflected in its glass, swung around the garden. He put his hand on Maya’s shoulder. “Are you excited about the party, my dear?”
Maya nodded, her eyes shining.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” she said truthfully.
“Well, it’s more than we usually do, but I wanted a real welcome for my niece,” said Senor Tecumbo. “I pity you young people, growing up without music, joy, dancing! I wish you could have known Tamarind in the old days. It was a marvelous, marvelous place.”
Guests from neighboring villas began to arrive, the women lifting their bright, elegant dresses off the dusty road, the men wearing shirts of vibrant greens and blues and yellows. And each person wore a dazzling, elaborate mask, made of silk and sequins and jewels and shells and painted with pigments from the jungle. There were parrots, jaguars, monkeys, and all sorts of jungle animals, as well as mermaids, pirates, rainbow fish, and ferocious visages of tribal warriors.
When the parade began in the town below, the party at Senor Tecumbo’s went to the edge of the gardens and looked down on it from the hill above as the glittering pro cession, shaking tambourines and maracas, snaked its way through the flower-strewn streets. More music started up throughout the town, and the crowd in Senor Tecumbo’s garden drifted back toward the marble rectangle. The band beneath the Mellora tree struck up again and couples began to dance.
Maya looked through the crowd periodically for a dragon but saw none. It was dark now and the bonfire was doused in oil and lit, and the orange glow danced over the masked faces of the guests, making them mysterious. Where was Helix? Maya began to feel nervous—what if something had happened? What if the plan had gone awry? She lifted her mask away from her face frequently so that he would be sure to see her. Searching the crowd anxiously, she spotted someone in a green mask that looked like the face of an iguana—could that be him? She was about to walk over when the person lifted the mask to wipe his face with a handkerchief and she saw that it wasn’t Helix at all. Then, at the far end of the marble rectangle, she caught sight of a great glittering dragon with jeweled red eyes, and yellow and green scales glowing in the torchlight. The dragon raised his hand—it w
as Helix, she was sure of it. She began to make her way to him when Senor Tecumbo tapped her shoulder.
“A dance, my dear?” he asked.
Before Maya could respond, she was swept across the dance floor with him. Senor Tecumbo was a fine dancer, and he led her all around the floor. Maya’s face flushed beneath her mask and she began to enjoy herself for a moment. Her time at the magnificent villa was almost up. Soon she would be fleeing with Helix, back to Mathilde’s to pick up the others and set out to find the Black Cross. But right now she was dancing in the middle of a party more elegant and beautiful than any she could have ever dreamed of. She was happy that Helix could see her in her beautiful yellow dress. She swirled past him across the floor, an extra spring in her step.
The party was in full swing when a big, shiny black car came crawling up the hill—chrome gleaming—and stopped under the pavilion by the grand cedar door.
“Now who can that be?” Senor Tecumbo said, faintly annoyed, coming to a stop on the dance floor. “So late? I thought all our guests were here. Wait a moment, my dear, I’m going to see who this is.” He left Maya on the dance floor and walked toward the car. Maya suddenly felt nervous, and she lifted her mask in order to better search for Helix in the dragon mask, but the marble rectangle had filled with dancers and she could not spot him. She was on one side of the crowd and he on another.
As she turned back she saw the car door open and a foot— quite a tiny foot—in polished black shoes stepped out, followed by another, and a young girl emerged. A young girl who looked surprisingly like Maya. The girl’s eyes fell at once on Senor Tecumbo.
“Uncle Pedro!” she exclaimed, beaming.
She bounded over to Senor Tecumbo and flung her arms around his neck and planted a kiss on his cheek.
Senor Tecumbo was almost too stunned to speak. “What?” he stammered. “Who are you?”