Remi hunched down in her seat, braced her feet against the dashboard.
The Rover’s bumper crashed into the chain. Sam and Remi were thrown forward against their seat belts. Sam’s forehead bonked into the steering wheel. He looked up, half expecting them to be sitting still, but was instead greeted by the sight of tree branches whipping past the windshield. Remi checked the side mirror. Both entrance posts had been uprooted like rotten stumps.
“Are they following?” Sam asked.
“Not yet. They’re both still sitting in the parking lot.”
“Good. Let them debate it.”
What Sam had thought was a service road was in fact little more than a rutted trail barely wider than the Rover. As in the parking lot, the right side was bordered by an embankment; to the left, through a veil of trees, was the riverbank. He gripped the steering wheel tighter and tried to keep the Rover from lurching off the path.
“You’ve got a knot on your forehead,” Remi said, touching the spot. “What’s the plan?”
“Get ahead of the ferry and race to the next landing. That’s where you and your guidebook come in.”
She began flipping through it. “It’s less than thorough, I’m afraid.”
“There’s no stop listed?”
Remi shook her head, then checked the map. “And according to this, there’s no road.”
“Interesting. We’re on a road that doesn’t exist going nowhere. Are our friends nonexistent as well?”
Remi glanced back and ducked her head this way and that to see through the trees. “No, sorry, they’re coming.”
“The ferry?”
“No, I don’t . . . Wait! There it is! About two hundred yards behind us.” Her eyes brightened. “It’s a Mississippi-style stern-wheeler, Sam.”
The tract slanted upward and the ground grew more cratered until the Rover was bumping over exposed roots. At the top of the rise the ground flattened out. Sam slammed on the brakes. Twenty feet ahead stood a wall of trees; paralleling this, a hiking trail.
Sam said, “The trail to the left . . .”
“Goes down to the river.”
Sam shifted the Rover into Park and pushed the tailgate button; the tailgate popped open. “Take everything we’ve got.” They gathered their belongings, raced around to the back, and grabbed their backpacks.
Down the slope, the blue Nissan rounded a bend in the road and started climbing.
Sam handed Remi his pack. “Can you manage these?”
“Yes.”
“Run.”
Remi took off. Sam returned to the driver’s seat, switched the transmission into reverse, then jogged beside the Rover, steering, until the rear tires bumped over the lip of the slope. He slammed the door and jumped aside. The driver of the Nissan saw the Rover rolling toward him and slammed on the brakes. The transmission ticked as he switched into reverse. Behind him, the red Nissan came around the corner and skidded to a stop.
“Too late,” Sam said.
The Rover’s back tires bumped over a bundle of exposed roots. The tail vaulted, then crashed down onto the Nissan’s hood. The driver’s door opened. Sam drew the Webley, crouched down, fired a round into it. The door slammed shut. Sam adjusted his aim, put a bullet through the red Nissan’s hood for good measure, then turned and ran.
SAM CAUGHT UP to Remi a minute later. They’d been mistaken; the trail didn’t go down to the river but rather over it. Remi stood at the head of the footbridge. As Sam drew alongside her, she handed him his pack. Behind them, through the trees, voices called to one another in Spanish.
“Looks sturdier than the last bridge,” Remi said. The construction was remarkably similar—planks, crossbeams, ropes, and two suspension cables. To their left they could see the bow of the ferry coming around the bend, its funnel belching black smoke. Aside from a dozen or so people lining the rails and a few on the forecastle, the ship was empty.
“Come on,” Sam said, and took off in a sprint, Remi at his heels.
They stopped in the center of the span. The ferry was a hundred feet away. Sam looked back down the bridge. Through the trees he glimpsed movement, arms flailing. Someone was trying to climb the slope.
Remi was leaning over the handrail. “The drop’s too far.”
“To the forecastle, it is,” Sam agreed. “See the upper deck behind the wheelhouse? It’s fifteen feet, maybe less.”
“Why not the wheelhouse roof? It’s only—”
“We’re trying to stow away. Wave, Remi, attract attention!”
“Why?”
“Rivera’s less likely to start shooting if he’s got an audience.”
“Always the optimist.”
They started waving, smiling, hooting. People on the forecastle and along the rails saw them and waved back. The ferry’s bow slid beneath the bridge.
“Ten seconds,” Sam told Remi. “Hug your pack. As soon as you hit the deck, bend your knees and roll into it. Okay, up you go!” Sam helped her over the guardrail. “Ready?”
Remi gripped his hand. “You’re coming, right?”
“Absolutely. When you’re down, find some cover in case they start shooting.”
The wheelhouse roof disappeared beneath their feet, followed a moment later by the funnel. Black smoke billowed around them. Sam glanced left. Through the haze he saw Itzli Rivera skid to a stop at the head of the footbridge. Their eyes met for a moment, then Sam turned away, gave Remi’s hand a squeeze, and said, “Jump!”
Remi fell away into the smoke. Sam felt the bridge shiver beneath his feet with the pounding of footfalls. Rivera and his men were coming. Sam climbed over the railing, looked down. Through the gaps in the smoke he saw Remi on the deck, scrambling clear on her hands and knees.
Sam pushed off.
He hit the deck hard, bounced once off his pack, then rolled right. From out of the smoke Remi scrambled forward and latched onto his forearm. “This way.” He followed her, crawling blindly until he bumped into what he assumed was the wheelhouse’s aft bulkhead. They sat together, gulping oxygen until their heart rates returned to normal.
Now that they were past the bridge, the funnel’s exhaust cleared. Fifty yards away, Rivera and three of his men stood at the bridge railing, staring down at them. One of the men reached for something in his belt and pulled out a semiautomatic pistol. Sam reached into his own belt, drew the Webley, held it above his head in profile, and gave it a waggle.
Rivera barked something at the man, who holstered his gun.
Sam said, “Wave to the nice men, Remi.”
CHAPTER 36
GOLDFISH POINT,
LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA
“MYSTERIES HAVE BEEN SOLVED AND ENIGMAS FATHOMED,” SELMA announced, walking into the workroom with Pete and Wendy trailing.
Still on Madagascar time, Sam and Remi sat at the worktable, each nursing a double espresso. As before, they’d slept through most of the transatlantic flight home, but still they were exhausted.
After jumping from the bridge onto the paddle-wheel steamer they decided to simply act the part of tourists and, after cleaning themselves up as best they could, strolled the decks and took in the scenery with their fellow passengers. Not only did no one ask to see their tickets, but they were served cocktails and a supper by white-coated stewards in the main salon. After having spent the day crawling through caves, wrangling crocodiles, fighting rebels, dodging falling boulders, and being chased through the Madagascar countryside, Sam and Remi relished the chance to simply sit and be pampered.
Two hours after they jumped aboard, the steamer docked at a pier jutting from a forested peninsula. Sam and Remi disembarked with everyone else and walked through a stone archway onto a well-groomed gravel path. At the end of this they found a four-story mansion whose architectural style landed somewhere between antebellum plantation house and French country. A post-mounted plaque read HÔTEL HERMITAGE.
Dumbfounded at finding such a place in the middle of the Madagascan wilds, Sam and Remi lingere
d as the rest of the ferry’s passengers proceeded through the pergola-covered lobby entrance.
Behind them a female voice said in flawless French, “Welcome to the Hôtel Hermitage.”
Sam and Remi turned to see a smiling black woman in a blue skirt and a crisp white blouse standing before them.
Remi said, “Parlez-vous anglais?”
“Of course, madam. Can I be of assistance?”
Sam said, “It seems we’ve gotten separated from our tour group. Might you be able to arrange transportation for us back to Tsiafahy?”
The woman smiled. “Bien sûr.”
An hour later they arrived in Tsiafahy. One call to Selma took them to a private hostel for the evening, and the next morning they were on a charter flight to Maputo, Mozambique.
NOW SELMA TOOK a stool beside them. “You two look tired.”
Sam said, “Perhaps we didn’t properly regale you with the details of our Madagascan adventure.”
Selma nodded and waved her hand. “Crocodiles, rebels, boulders . . . Yes, I remember. Meanwhile, we’ve been hard at work unraveling the unravel-able.”
“That’s not a word. Did we mention the bridge we—”
Remi intervened: “Selma, you have our full, if not fully animated, attention.”
“Good. First things first: We sent your samples from the outrigger to the lab in Point Loma. We should have results in a couple of days. Remi, as you requested, I e-mailed your pictures of the outrigger and a scan of the Orizaga Codex to Professor Dydell. He said he’ll have some preliminary thoughts sometime tomorrow.”
Remi saw Sam’s questioning expression and said, “Stan Dydell. My anthropology teacher at Boston College. Selma, did you—”
“I didn’t give him any details. I simply said you wanted him to do a cursory examination. Moving on to the mysterious Mr. Blaylock,” Selma continued, “Pete and Wendy and myself—”
“Mostly us,” Wendy said.
“—have read through most of Blaylock’s letters to Ophelia’s sister, Constance. Miss Cynthia was wrong: We think there was love between Blaylock and Constance—more on her part than his, though.”
“Why do you say that?”
“The first couple of letters Blaylock mailed from Africa were mostly travelogue. Blaylock is affectionate in a restrained way. He mentions that he wishes he could reciprocate Constance’s feelings but that he was”—Selma consulted the legal pad before her—“‘Afraid my grief over my dear Ophelia would turn to heartrending guilt.’ He talks a lot about his early days in Bagamoyo and even mentions ‘my mission’ several times but doesn’t go into detail.”
“Or so we thought,” Pete added.
“Right. After the initial ones, we noticed that each of Blaylock’s letters contained random dots beneath characters within the text.”
Sam was nodding. “A code: Pull out the marked characters and combine them in a hidden message.”
“Yes. But Blaylock, ever the mathematician, didn’t make it that simple. I’ll spare you the details, but he used the dates and page numbers to create a subtraction filter. For example, if the filter is a three, you take the letter G, subtract three characters, and get the letter D.”
“One of the first things we learned,” Wendy said, “is that Constance Ashworth was working for the Secret Service. She was his conduit to the powers that be.”
Sam chuckled. “I did not see that coming. How did you find out?”
“The hidden message in Blaylock’s third letter read, ‘Inform Camden ship in Bombay for repairs; crew, Maximilian men all, quartered Stone Town.”
“What are Maximilian men?” asked Remi.
Sam answered. “After the Civil War ended, Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico opened his doors to Confederate soldiers who wanted to fight on. At the time, the U.S. was backing partisans who were trying to overthrow Maximilian. He offered the Confederates quid pro quo: Fight for me first, then we’ll take on the U.S. government. Estimates vary on how many Confederates went down there, but it was enough that Washington was concerned. When you combine Dudley’s report that white men were crewing the El Majidi with Blaylock’s mention of Maximilian . . . It adds up to a rogue Confederate intelligence operation. Someone went down to Mexico, recruited some sailors, and dispatched them to Zanzibar where the El Majidi was waiting.”
“To what end?”
“To continue where the Shenandoah left off, I imagine. That ship did immense damage while she was active, and there were plenty of powerful factions in the Confederacy that swore to fight on regardless of the surrender.”
Wendy said, “What confuses me is, how did they get access to the El Majidi?”
“Hard to say. One thing we do know is, the second Sultan of Zanzibar—the brother of the man who initially bought the Shenandoah—had no love for either his brother or that ship, and yet, when he had a chance to scuttle her after the 1872 hurricane, he didn’t do it. In fact, he had her towed to Bombay and repaired at what was probably great expense.”
“Maybe this secret Confederate cabal had already purchased her, and the Sultan had no choice,” said Pete.
Sam’s brows furrowed at this. He stood up and walked to one of the computer workstations, where he began typing. After a couple minutes he turned in his seat. “Before he died, the first Sultan of Zanzibar had started to secretly crack down on the slave trade in his country. When his brother took over, the policy was reversed.”
Selma was nodding. “So if, against all odds, the Confederacy rose again, the second Sultan would have a built-in market for his slave industry.”
“It’s all speculation, of course, but the pieces seem to fit.”
“Okay, go back to Blaylock’s first coded message,” Remi said. “He mentions ‘Camden.’ Who’s Camden?”
“Camden, New Jersey, is where Thomas Haines Dudley was born,” Selma replied. “We think it was Blaylock’s nickname for him rather than an official code name. In fact, Dudley had his own moniker for Blaylock: Jotun.”
“It’s from Norse mythology,” Wendy added. “Jotun was a giant with superhuman strength.”
“Of course,” Sam said. “Jotun. I don’t know how I missed that.”
Remi lightly punched his arm. “Smart aleck. Don’t mind him, Wendy. Go ahead, Selma.”
“In another letter to Dudley via Constance, dated July 1872, Blaylock reported that the El Majidi—now re-dubbed Shenandoah, we presume—had returned to port with her crew already aboard. Blaylock suspects the repairs on the ship had been completed at least a month prior and that the ship and crew had been at sea since then.”
“Were there any unaccounted-for attacks or losses in the area during that time?” asked Sam.
“Dozens. For a long time the Indian Ocean was a bigger pirate haven than the Caribbean. But we weren’t able to connect the Shenandoah II to any of the losses. It’s at this point the story gets stranger. Blaylock ends his report with this line: ‘Have acquired reliable vessel and received Sharps.’”
“As in Sharps carbines?” Sam asked; Selma nodded. “Dudley must have arranged for them to be shipped to Blaylock.”
Selma went on. “‘Nilo-Hamitic crew learning rapidly and overcoming fear of water; expect to be fit to give chase by month’s end. Intend to catch them red-handed.’”
“Nilo-Hamitic?” Sam repeated. “Never heard of them.”
“I have,” Remi replied. “Nilo-Hamitic is an outdated name for the Maasai tribe. It appears our mysterious Mr. Blaylock recruited a guerrilla army of Maasai warriors to chase down the Shenandoah II.”
“Well, I’ll give him this much,” Sam said. “The man had a flair for the dramatic. According to Morton’s biography of Blaylock, he lived with the Maasai for a while.”
“He did,” Selma replied. “As far as we can tell from his letters, he explored the area inland from Bagamoyo and became friendly with some Maasai. That’s how he started the recruitment.”
“Okay, so it’s July 1872. The Shenandoah II has a new crew and she’s prep
ped for battle. What then?”
“Most of what happened next we got from Blaylock’s coded reports, and some of it we matched against what few dated entries we found in his journal.
“A couple weeks later, Blaylock and his crew put to sea in a boum—essentially, a large two-masted dhow—and begin hunting the Shenandoah II, which slipped out of port a few days ahead of them. This cat-and-mouse game goes on for a month. Blaylock hears a report that a ship matching the Shenandoah II’s description has sunk two U.S.-flagged cargo ships near the Gulf of Aden. According to our databases, two ships were sunk in that area around the dates Blaylock mentions; the losses were attributed to pirates.”
“Not far off the mark,” Sam observed.
“Though Blaylock isn’t a seaman, he proves an able captain, and the Maasai an adept crew. Blaylock knows he doesn’t dare attack the Shenandoah II either directly or at sea, so all through July and August he does his best to shadow her. He gathers intelligence reports and bides his time until the night of September sixteenth.
“He catches the Shenandoah II at anchor off Sainte Anne Island in the Seychelles, about thirteen hundred miles east of Zanzibar. Blaylock anchors his boum in a nearby cove, then he and his men go ashore, sneak across the headland, and, in true pirate fashion, swim out to the Shenandoah and take her by storm. Not a single shot is fired, but the Maasai, being the warriors they are, show little mercy. Of Shenandoah II’s crew of seventy-eight, only six survive—the captain, another officer, and four enlisted men.
“Blaylock’s official report of the capture reaches the U.S. in November. He tells Dudley that he put the Shenandoah II’s survivors ashore on Sainte Anne Island.”
“Do we know what became of them?” Remi asked.
“Unfortunately, I found nothing. Blaylock then splits his crew between the boum and the Shenandoah II and sets off for the return voyage to Zanzibar. Three hundred miles east of the Seychelles, they encounter a storm, and the Shenandoah II sinks.”
At this, Sam and Remi leaned forward together. “Sinks?” Remi repeated. “How in the world—”
Lost Empire: A Fargo Adventure Page 26