Excavation (2 page)

 

Professor Henry Conklin's fingers trembled slightly as he unwrapped the final layer of blankets from around his frozen treasure. He held his breath. How had the mummy fared after the three-thousand-mile trip from the Andes? Back in Peru, he had been so careful to pack and crate the frozen remains in dry ice for the trip to Baltimore, but during such a long journey anything could have gone wrong.

Henry ran a hand through his dark hair, now dusted with a generous amount of grey since passing his sixtieth birthday last year. He prayed his past three decades of research and fieldwork would pay off. He would not have a second chance. Transporting the mummy from South America had almost drained the last of his grant money. And nowadays any new fellowships or grants were awarded to researchers younger than he. He was becoming a dinosaur at Texas A&M. Though still revered, he was now more coddled than taken seriously.

Still, his most recent discovery of the ruins of a small
Incan village high in the Andes could change all that—especially if it proved his own controversial theory.

He cautiously tugged free the final linen wrap. Fog from the thawing dry ice momentarily obscured his sight. He waved the mist away as the contorted figure appeared, knees bent to chest, arms wrapped around legs, almost in a fetal position, just as he had discovered the mummy in a small cave near the frozen summit of Mount Arapa.

Henry stared at his discovery. Ancient eye sockets, open and hollow, gazed back at him from under strands of lanky black hair still on its skull. Its lips, dried and shrunken back, revealed yellowed teeth. Frayed remnants of a burial shawl still clung to its leathered skin. It was so well preserved that even the black dyes of the tattered robe shone brightly under the surgical lights of the research lab.

“Oh God!” a voice exclaimed at his shoulder. “This is perfect!”

Henry jumped slightly, so engrossed in his own thoughts he had momentarily forgotten the others in the room. He turned and was blinded by the flash of a camera's strobe. The reporter from the
Baltimore Herald
moved from behind his shoulder to reposition for another shot, never moving the Nikon from her face. Her blond hair was pulled over her ears in a severe and efficient ponytail. She snapped additional photos as she spoke. “What would you estimate its age to be, Professor?”

Blinking away the glare, Henry backed a step away so the others could view the remains. A pair of scientists moved closer, instruments in hand.

“I…I'd estimate the mummification dates back to the sixteenth century—some four to five hundred years ago.”

The reporter lowered her camera but did not move her eyes from the figure cradled on the CT scanning table. A small trace of disgust pleated her upper lip. “No, I meant how old do you think the mummy was when he died?”

“Oh…” He pushed his wire-rimmed glasses higher on
his nose. “Around twenty…It's hard to be accurate on just gross examination.”

One of the two doctors, a petite woman in her late fifties with dark hair that fell in silky strands to the small of her back, glanced back at them. She had been examining the mummy's head, a tongue depressor in hand. “He was thirty-two when he died,” she stated matter-of-factly. The speaker, Dr. Joan Engel, was head of forensic pathology at Johns Hopkins University and an old friend of Henry's. Her position there was one of the reasons he had hauled his mummy to Johns Hopkins. She elaborated on her statement, “His third molars are partially impacted, but from the degree of wear on the second molars and the lack of wear on the third, my estimation should be precise to within three years, plus or minus. But the CT scan results should pinpoint the age even more accurately.”

Belying her calm demeanor, the doctor's jade eyes shone brightly as she spoke, crinkling slightly at the corners. There was no disgust on her face when she viewed the mummy, even when she handled the desiccated remains with her gloved fingers. Henry sensed her excitement, mirroring his own. It was good to know Joan's enthusiasm for scientific mysteries had not waned from the time he had known her back in her undergraduate years. She returned to the study of the mummy, but not before giving Henry a look of apology for contradicting his previous statement and estimation of age.

Henry's cheeks grew heated, more from embarrassment than irritation. She was as keen and sharp as ever.

Swallowing hard, he tried to redeem himself. He turned to the reporter. “I hope to prove these remains found at this Incan site are not actually Incan, but another tribe of Peruvian Indians.”

“What do you mean?”

“It has been long known that the Incas were a warrior tribe that often took over neighboring tribes and literally
consumed them. They built their own cities atop these others, swallowing them up. From my study of Machu Picchu and other ruins in the remote highlands of the Andes, I've theorized that the lowland tribes of the Incas did not build these cloud cities but took them over from a tribe that already existed before them, robbing these ancestors of their rightful place in history as the skilled architects of the mountaintop cities.” Henry nodded toward the mummy. “I hope this fellow will be able to correct this error in history.”

The reporter took another picture, but was then forced back by the pair of doctors who were moving their examination farther down the mummy. “Why do you think this mummy can prove this theory?” she asked.

“The tomb where we discovered it predates the Incan ruins by at least a century, suggesting that here might be one of the true builders of these mountain citadels. Also this mummy stands a good head taller than the average Inca of the region…even its facial features are different. I brought the mummy here to prove this is not an Incan tribesman but one of the true architects of these exceptional cities. With genetic mapping available here, I can substantiate any—”

“Professor Conklin,” Joan again interrupted him. “You might want to come see this.”

The reporter stepped aside to let Henry pass, her Nikon again rising to cover half her face. Henry pushed between the two researchers. They had been fingering the body's torso and belly. Engel's assistant, a sandy-haired young man with large eyes, was bent over the mummy. He was carefully tweezing and extracting a length of cord from a fold around the figure's neck.

Joan pointed. “His throat was slashed,” she said, parting the leathery skin to reveal the bones underneath. “I'd need a microscopic exam to be sure, but I'd say the injury was ante-mortem.” She glanced to Henry and the reporter. “Before death,” she clarified. “And most likely, the
cause
of death here.”

Henry nodded. “The Incas were fond of blood rituals; many involved decapitation and human sacrifice.”

The doctor's assistant continued working at the wound, drawing out a length of cord from the wound. He paused and glanced to his mentor. “I think it's some sort of necklace,” he mumbled, and pulled at the cord. Something under the robe shifted with his motion.

Joan raised her eyes to Henry, silently asking permission to continue.

He nodded.

Slowly the assistant tugged and worked the necklace loose from its hiding place. Whatever hung there was carefully dragged along under the robe's ragged cloth. Suddenly the ancient material ripped and the object hanging from the cord dropped free for all to see.

A gasp rose from their four throats. The gold shone brilliantly under the halogen spotlights of the laboratory. A flurry of blinding flashes followed as the reporter snapped a rapid series of photos.

“It's a cross,” Joan said, stating the obvious.

Henry groaned and leaned in closer. “Not just a cross. It's a Dominican crucifix.”

The reporter spoke with her camera still fixed to her face. “What does that mean?”

Henry straightened and waved a hand over a Latin inscription. “The Dominican missionary order accompanied the Spanish conquistadors during their attack upon the Central and South American Indians.”

The reporter lowered her camera. “So this mummy is one of those Spanish priests?”

“Yes.”

“Cool!”

Joan tapped at the cross with her tongue depressor. “But the Incas weren't known to mummify any of their Spanish conquerors.”

“Until now,” Henry commented sourly. “I guess if nothing else the discovery will be worth a footnote in some journal
article.” His dreams of proving his theory dimmed in the glare of the golden crucifix.

Joan touched his hand with a gloved finger. “Don't despair yet. Perhaps the cross was just stolen from one of the Spaniards. Let's first run the CT scan and see what we can discover about our friend here.”

Henry nodded but held no real hope in his heart. He glanced to the pathologist. Her eyes shone with genuine concern. He offered her a small smile, which, surprisingly, she returned. Henry remembered that smile from long ago. They had dated a few times, but both had been too devoted to their studies to pursue more than a casual acquaintance. And when their careers diverged after graduation, they had lost contact with each other, except for the occasional exchange of Christmas cards. But Henry had never forgotten that smile.

She patted his hand, then called to her assistant. “Brent, could you let Dr. Reynolds know we're ready to begin the scan?” She then turned to Henry and the reporter. “I'll have to ask you to join us in the next room. You can view the procedure from behind the leaded glass in the control room.”

Before leaving, Henry checked the mummy to ensure it was properly secured on the scanner's table, then slipped the gold crucifix from around the figure's neck. He carried it with him as he followed the others out of the room.

The adjoining cubicle was lined with banks of computers and rows of monitors. The research team planned on using a technique called computer tomography, or CT, to take multiple radiographic images which the computer would then compile into a three-dimensional picture of the mummy's interior, allowing a virtual autopsy to be performed without damaging the mummy itself. Besides the professional contact, this was the reason Henry had hauled his mummy halfway around the world. Johns Hopkins had performed previous analyses on other Peruvian ice mummies in the past and still had backing from the National Geographic organization to continue with others. The facility also had a
keen genetics lab to map ancestry and genealogy, ideal for adding concrete data to substantiate his controversial theories. But with the Dominican cross in hand, Henry held out little hope of success.

Once inside the control room, the door, heavy with lead shielding, closed snugly behind them.

Joan introduced them to Dr. Robert Reynolds, who waved them to the chairs while his technician began calibrating for the scan. “Grab a seat, folks.”

While the others scooted chairs into a cluster before the viewing window, Henry remained standing to maintain a good view of both the computer monitors and the window that looked out upon the scanner and its current patient. The large white machine filled the back half of the next room. The table bearing the mummy protruded from a narrow tunnel leading into the heart of the unit.

“Here we go,” Dr. Reynolds said as he keyed his terminal.

Henry jumped a bit, almost dropping the gold cross, as a sharp clacking erupted from the speakers that monitored the next room. Through the window, he watched the tray holding the contorted figure slowly inch toward the spinning core of the scanner. As the crown of the mummy's head entered the tunnel, the machine's clacking was joined by a chorus of loud thunking as the device began to take pictures.

“Bob,” Joan said, “bring up a surface view of the facial bones first. Let's see if we can pinpoint where this fellow came from.”

“You can determine that from just the skull?” the reporter asked.

Joan nodded, but did not turn from the computers. “The structure of the zygomatic arch, the brow, and the nasal bone are great markers for ancestry and race.”

“Here it comes,” Dr. Reynolds announced.

Henry turned from the window to look over Joan's shoulder. A black-and-white image appeared on the monitor's screen, a cross section of the mummy's skull.

Joan slipped on a pair of reading glasses and squeaked her chair closer to the monitor. She leaned forward to study the image. “Bob, can you rotate it about thirty degrees?”

The radiologist nodded, chewing on a pencil. He tapped a few buttons, and the skull twisted slightly until it was staring them full in the face. Joan reached with a small ruler and made some measurements, frowning. She tapped the screen with a fingernail. “That shadow above the right orbit of the eye. Can we get a better look at it?”

A few keys were tapped and the image zoomed in closer. The radiologist removed the pencil from between his teeth. He whistled appreciatively.

“What is it?” Henry asked.

Joan turned and tilted her glasses down to peer over their rims at him. “A hole.” She tapped the glass indicating the triangular shadow on the plane of bone. “It's not natural. Someone drilled into his skull. And from the lack of callus formation around the site, I'd guess the procedure was done shortly after his death.”

“Trepanning…skull drilling,” Henry said. “I've seen it before in other old skulls from around the world. But the most extensive and complicated were among the Incas. They were considered the most skilled surgeons at trepanning.” Henry allowed himself a glimmer of hope. If the skull had been bored, maybe he
had
uncovered a Peruvian Indian.

Joan must have read his thoughts. “I hate to dash your hopes, but trepanning or not, the mummy is definitely
not
of South American ancestry. It is clearly European.”

Henry could not find his voice for a few breaths. “Are…are you sure?”