The Dig (17 page)

“Thank you, Enzi. I do feel safe with you watching over us all. Night!”

She unzipped her tent and entered as Enzi unrolled his sleeping bag on the metal trailer floor and rolled up a shirt to use as a pillow. He reached up and touched the shotgun on the rack to be sure it was still there. Enzi wondered if Matthew would really leave tomorrow night. And if not, what would the professor do to get rid of them all? Enzi knew that Rheese wished to resume their search for diamonds, and Enzi wanted it, too. But the magic he had witnessed in the motor home—it meant something.

Tuni stared up at the roof of Peter Sharma’s tent. Outside, the chirping of crickets and the plaintive call of a nightjar were the only sounds. She hoped Mr. Pups was well fed. He was surely sleeping on her pillow every day despite the stern warning she had given him as she left.

She felt for Matthew—this would be a difficult night. His motivations around the artifact had changed admirably, but he remained adamant about departing tomorrow. If he did, wonderful—she would join him with pleasure. If he decided to stay, though, what would she do? It wasn’t just her cat that beckoned her home, but the cleanliness of her apartment and the warm comfort of her bed.

She was proud of herself for keeping up a tough-woman image before the group, shrugging off the bugs, the dirt, the heat, and the residual stench of death, when it all bothered her enormously. She had listened in wonder to Matthew retelling his experiences. She could see it all in her head and had hung on his every word. Matthew clearly was beginning to care about these long-dead people, just as she did. As her eyes watched a flying beetle of some sort bounce up and down on the roof of the tent, she wondered whether there could be a happy ending to their tale.

Was that Matthew’s real apprehension? The people were clearly all dead and had been so for ages. Was that what it was? Was it that he didn’t relish reaching the story’s inevitable end—which could only be Irin’s death, however it might come about? Perhaps it was as Matthew had mentioned on the jet: he didn’t like feeling forced to use his ability—likely the legacy of his father’s selfish, ill-considered decisions.

Tuni turned on her side and closed her eyes. She chose to hope that Matthew might decide to stay for one more night, and then she settled down to sleep.

Peter tried to lie still in the queen-size bed. Staring at the cloth-covered wall just inches from his face, he hoped Matt would be able to sleep. Pete had asked him if he wanted the wall side or the open side, and Matt called open. Though they faced away from each other, giving the other as much space as possible, Peter could feel the presence of another person in the bed. Surely Matt had the same sense of him, though multiplied by ten.

He remained disappointed that Matt would be leaving tomorrow, but he understood—Matt was, after all, an unwilling participant in all this. People were depending on him to experience things that made him uncomfortable, and under conditions that probably felt anything but safe. Matt had said years ago that he had always had this crazy paranoia—one of many—about someone doing something to his body while he was unconscious. That was why he preferred to do his sessions by himself. And here they all were, hovering over him and staring at his bare hands and expressionless face, when he would prefer not to be doing it at all! So it was just a bad situation from beginning to end.

“You still awake?” Matt whispered from behind him.

“Yeah,” Peter replied softly.

“I think the asteroid thing is real.”

“Oh, yeah?” He liked that Matt was thinking about it in bed and not just fantasizing about escape.

“Yeah. There is no question in Irin’s mind. Do you?”

“If
you
do, then I do. You were there. I just hope we have enough time with you to find out.”

Matt lay silent and never replied.

The pillowcase over his head irritated his nose, so Matt pulled it forward to make a small pocket of air between his face and the cloth. He had tucked his sweatpants into his long tube socks, and Pete had helped him tie the gloves to his wrists, with the shirtsleeves tucked tightly into them.

As he lay thinking about Irin and his constant intense emotions, he wondered how long the impressions would go on. It was apparent that the ever-present concerns of living in this village ensured a never-ending flow of thoughts and feelings. All were well imprinted into the artifact. When did it end?

If it were Matt’s choice, he would take the piece of k’yot with him and read it from the reclined seat of the private jet on his way home. Well, maybe not—eighteen hours in that world would be a little much. He recalled experiencing much worse for much longer, then immediately chided himself for going there and tried his best to shut it out of his head. But her sobbing, dirty face and streaming tears wouldn’t leave his thoughts. His breath trembled, and he hoped Peter wouldn’t hear or feel it. He could hear her…
Think of something else,
anything
else! Think of the silver coins somewhere in the Atlantic!

There they are: a typical pirate story treasure chest, sitting in white sand, deep under the ocean. A happy little crab scuttles by, and my hand reaches out to open it. Bubbles rise from it, of course, and inside… oh, so
shiny.
Are those pearls, rubies, and emeralds in there, too? Delightful. Oh, my, and diamonds? But, I couldn’t… Okay, if you insist, my little crab friend. Diamonds. Enzi was thinking about diamonds. Why was Enzi thinking about diamonds when the elephant was trampling into the site? Who knows? Back to my fabulous treasure…

Rheese, snoring in his small bunk, dreamed of a screeching monster with an ostrich bottom half and
Velociraptor
neck and head, chasing him along the banks of the River Thames and snapping at his ankles. He tripped over a bench and fell into a garbage bin of rotting meat, whereupon the monster began devouring his protruding legs.

Peter’s wristwatch beeped three times before he pinched the button to silence it. It was six thirty a.m..

Through the miniblinds of the RV’s narrow rear window he could see that the eastern sky was brightening, though the sun had not yet crested the tree-lined horizon. He sat up in the bed, tilting his head so as not to bump it on the ceiling. Matt still had his back to him and was in the same position he had gone to sleep in. Peter reached over to Matt’s shoulder and touched it.

“I’m awake,” Matt said in a normal voice.

“Oh, good—my watch?”

“No,” Matt replied as he slid out of bed. “I didn’t really sleep.”

“Oh, no way! Sorry about that. Was I snoring or anything?”

Matt tugged the bow knot, releasing the shoestring tied around his neck, then removed the pillowcase from his head.

“Nope. I guess I just had a lot on my mind. So, straight to work?”

Peter looked at Matt’s droopy eyes. “I think we have time to get some instant coffee in you.”

“I don’t drink it—gets me too wired. Bad memories. No worries—let’s just do this.”

Peter slid down and grabbed his bag from the corner as Matt ran his fingers through his hair and shook his head.

“How about a little breakfast?” Peter asked as he pulled out a fresh pair of jeans. I’m starving.”

Matt pulled a knit cap down over his ears before violently rubbing his face.

“Yeah, that’ll work. Tumtum’s a rumblin’, as my mom used to say.”

They pulled on jackets and passed Dr. Rheese, snoring away. Outside, they poked through field cases of nonperishables under the food tent and decided on a breakfast of tortillas, honey-roasted peanuts, and raisins.

“Any coffee to be had around here?” Tuni asked, poking her head out of her tent.

“At your service, milady,” said Pete. And firing up the propane stove in the cook tent, he put on a pot of water. From across the site, they heard the sound of the generator motor turning over and then putt-putting to a stop. Enzi stood beside it, yanking a pull cord. It started on the third try, and the familiar background rumble returned to the clearing.

As he joined them at the food tent, Pete said, “Hope we didn’t wake you, Enzi. Coffee?”

“No, sah. And yes, please, for the coffee.” He turned to Tuni. “You sahvived?”

She smiled at him, “I did. Thank you.”

In a few minutes, the sun blazed through the treeline. Looking at Matt, Peter cocked an eyebrow.

“Let’s do it,” Matt said, grabbing one last tortilla to devour on the way to the RV.

“Hang on,” Tuni interrupted. “What time is it in New York?”

“Um…” Pete closed his eyes tight for a few seconds, then said, “Almost midnight.”

“Do you think we could have a chat with Jon?” she asked, blowing over her coffee. “He was expecting an update last night, but in all the excitement I forgot.”

“Yeah, that’s no problem,” replied Pete. “The sat phone should have a good charge.”

“Oh, yeah,” Matt piped up, “and don’t you have to call for the helicopter to come pick me up before it gets dark?”

Pete and Tuni exchanged a look.

“Yeah,” Pete sighed. “I’ll do that before we call Dr. Meier. We’ll make sure they’re dispatched with enough time to return to the airport before sunset.

“Thanks, Pete.”

“You going with him, Tuni?”

She nodded guiltily.

“Very well, let’s go call it in.”

The phone on Dr. Jon Meier’s nightstand startled him awake. As he fumbled for it, he realized he had fallen asleep with his glasses on and his book lying on his chest.

“Who is it, Jon?” his wife, Marisol, asked groggily beside him.

“At this hour? Must be the expedition… hello?”

“Dr. Meier, this is Peter Sharma.”

“Oh… Peter.” Meier cleared his throat. “Do you know what time it is here?”

“Sorry, Doctor, I’m in Kenya. I’ve got Matt and Tuni here with me!”

Meier sat up, instantly awake, and asked that they hold so he could switch to his cordless phone and let his wife sleep. “I didn’t know you were going there, Peter—but who cares? Tell me everything!”

Peter activated the speakerphone, and Matt proceeded to relay all he had experienced thus far. Dr. Meier plied him with questions afterward.

“Let’s try not to get lost in the details, Doctor,” Peter interrupted. “We only have Matt until this afternoon.”

“Is that right? So you’ve already determined the age of this civilization, Matthew?”

“No, Doctor. We’re hoping I’ll be able to get something today.”

“But am I to understand that you are leaving regardless of what you discover today?”

Matt sighed.

Tuni leaned toward the phone on the table and answered for him. “That is the plan, Jon.”

“Okay, and you understand that your end of our agreement will not have been met—right, Mr. Turner?”

Matt shook his head in disbelief. “If you say so, Doc. If you find the work I’ve done so far to be worthless, I guess I shouldn’t waste my time with any more readings.”

Peter saw where the conversation could easily lead, and he well knew that Meier’s pigheadedness might actually doom their chances of discovering any more about the
Pwin-T
people.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” Peter interrupted, “I’m sure we can continue with the existing arrangement. There’s also something else I’d like to ask you, Doctor.”

Peter switched off the speakerphone and stepped away with the sat phone to his ear.

“I’m having a bit of a problem tracking down some resources.”

“Just tell me what you need, Peter,” Meier replied.

“We don’t have any astrogeologists on staff, and I had my assistant back at the center contact some different research centers. I think you know Gerhardt in Berlin—well, he said he knew of only three that we might be able to work with. One is in Antarctica for the next six months, another is on some other prolonged assignment in Africa, and the third… well—”

“You want Felch,” Meier interrupted.

“Tell me he’s still over there.”

Meier considered it for a moment and intentionally let the line fall silent.

“Doctor, are you still there?”

“I’ll think about it,” he finally replied. “You know he hasn’t done any fieldwork in a decade, right?”

“Heck, it’s been a few years for me, too, but here I am!”

“I don’t know if we can spare him, though, Peter. He’s the only one who gets anything done around here.”

“Just a few days—I mean it.”

“Would he get a private jet, too?”

“I think we’ve tapped the budget after that first one, but he could certainly ride back with Matt and Tuni. That would work…”

“Like I said, I’ll think about it.”

Pete plugged the phone back into its charger and returned to the table. He could see that Matt looked angry and tense.

“Now, Matt,” Pete said, “something to consider: the
greatest
interest in our success is not at the NYMM but at
my
organization in London. I appreciate Dr. Meier’s assistance in getting you out here, but in reality, I’m sure I can arrange a similar form of compensation. Okay? Let’s not let that be any deciding factor in what goes on out here. You’ve more than earned your keep in the past two days. Got it?”