Elisha's Bones - Don Hoesel [28]
In response to my unasked question, Romero says, “He was a foreigner. Perhaps South African; I’ve never been good with accents.”
“What did he want?”
“To look at my merchandise.”
I consider this for a moment and stop myself from asking the obvious questions. Most of Romero’s clientele do not call this country home. They’re a community connected by money and enlarged by recommendations at lavish parties. To find someone from the other side of the world interested in his wares, then, should not have caused him any concern. Even so, I will not question my friend’s belief that this visit intimated something else.
“He purchased one pre-Columbian jade axe god pendant— for which I charged almost double my normal price—and then he left. And he paid in cash,” Romero says.
“That’s all?”
He nods.
“It was reconnaissance—fact-finding. Evidently he decided that asking questions would not have accomplished anything beyond causing suspicion. But I don’t believe in coincidence, my friend; this man visited me because you came here.”
Romero’s words roll around in my head, and I’m left not knowing how to respond, because there are a great many thoughts vying for position amidst the gray matter. Chief among them is worry that I’ve entangled one of my oldest friends in something that might be more dangerous than I’d anticipated. Just beyond that, though, is an uneasy feeling that I don’t have time to process, but I know it’s connected to what happened in Egypt. The seamy underside of this business; the politics that had Will’s death classified as an unfortunate accident, despite the fact that even someone with an untrained eye could see a blast pattern radiating from the trench. Dirt thrown upward. Guilt threatens to resurface; the self-directed accusation that I did not force a more thorough look into what happened at KV65 before retreating to Evanston.
I stop such thoughts at the threshold. I don’t have the time for such self-indulgence right now.
“Then I guess I better do this as quickly as I can,” I say.
Romero smiles. I think he knows what small battle I just fought with myself.
“Do you need a good historian?”
I’m not sure who is more surprised by Esperanza’s question—me, her, or Romero. His eyes are wider than they were when Espy and I walked into his store together. I know he thought there was a small chance she would kill me, and a very good chance that she would inflict some type of injury on my person. He’d never entertained the thought that our meeting would end with the two of us eating a nice lunch and then traversing the city together. Sometimes Romero can miss subtleties. The body language in the room is tense, the silences half pained. Espy and I both know that there are things we need to deal with. She won’t let me forget it. For now, though, I’m glad she’s invited herself.
“I could use one.”
“En serio?” Romero asks, his eyes still wide.
“Sí,” I say, hoping my smile masks the sick feeling roosting in my stomach.
CHAPTER 7
The Andes are immense and verdant—as if color were a tool, focusing all of the world’s mass into a landmark spanning seven countries, towering over national lines. In Venezuela the Andes split into two ranges: the Sierra de Perijá that run the border between Venezuela and Colombia, and the Cordillera Mérida that spread out along the east coast of Lake Maracaibo. It’s this latter range we’re crossing, on the way to San Cristóbal.
I’m amazed that we got everything into the small plane—a plane vibrating with the violence of a wet dog shaking the rain from its fur. For a while I thought we might have to leave a good portion of our equipment behind and pick up as much as we could when we reach our destination. But the pilot, a man named Raphael, directed the loading of our gear with an expertise born of years with this or similar planes. It’s cramped quarters, with eight people wedged into whatever free space there is, and I’m growing more aware that bathing frequency is a subjective value, but I’m buoyed by a sense of purpose and, if truth be served, of being in charge of a team again.