The Sound of Many Waters (12 page)

“Untie me,” he said to Francisco, who sat in front of him, “so I may have a turn.”

Francisco looked back at him with a skeptical grimace. “You want to paddle?”

“I need to move my arms,” said Dominic. “There are eleven of you and one of me. What could I really do?”

Francisco consulted with Utina who then sat silent and pensive for a long time. This, it seemed, was the first chiefly decision Utina had to make. Finally, he nodded.

Francisco turned to Dominic. “Hold out your hands.”

Francisco put the rusty tip of the sword against the twine and pushed it down. The severed fibers fell away and Dominic pulled his hands as far apart as he could, stretching his arms and exhaling with relief. He massaged the deep red i
n
dentations on his wrists where the twine had dug in to his skin. Then he turned and reached out to the youngest native—the one who had gathered the cassina for him—and motioned for him to hand over the paddle; the native hesitated, but then he gave it to Dominic.

Dominic tried to mimic the motions of the other paddling native but the canoe decelerated and tracked to the left. The young native tried to show Dominic the proper technique by raising his arms into the air and bringing them down across the water in a circular motion. He said something that Dominic did not understand.

“What is this savage trying to tell me?” Dominic asked, frustrated.

“He says that you need to finish your stroke with a curve, as if you are tracing the rim of the moon. And commander, it may surprise you, but this
savage
does have a name.”

Dominic put a curve in his stroke. “Not that I care, but what is it?”

“Cual es tu nombre?” Francisco said to the native.

The native smiled. “Mi… nombre… es… Itori.”

Francisco nodded. “Very good.”

Dominic sat there stunned, his paddle frozen in mid-stroke. “He speaks Spanish?”

“He’s learning. I have been teaching him and several others from the tribe. To be effective warriors, after all, they must know everything about their enemy.”

Dominic’s face reddened. “So I am the enemy?”

“That is up to you.”

They stopped to fish at a sandy riverbank beneath the shade of an oak tree larger than any Dominic had ever seen. Its thick branches reached out over the river like claws. A cool northerly wind had developed. As it whistled through the tree, acorns fell upon the water like raindrops. One bounced off Dominic’s head; he whipped around to look for what had hit him.

“Angry… squirrels,” said Itori, pointing skyward. He repeated it in Timucuan and the others laughed.

Francisco grinned. “Wouldn’t that be the perfect Indian name for you, commander?”

“What?”

“Angry Squirrel.”

Something like a smile flashed across Dominic’s face, but it quickly vanished. “I will kill you if that sticks,” he said.

“Then I will ensure it does.”

Dominic watched Utina uncoil a long twine that had a fishhook carved out of a bone at its end. A clamshell was threaded through the line above the hook as a weight. Utina cracked open a mussel and impaled its meat on the hook, and then he turned to Dominic.

“He wants to know if you would like to try,” said Francisco.

Dominic took the line. Utina mimicked the motion of swinging the hooked end of the line toward the water. Dominic’s first throw launched the bait as far as the twine could reach and Utina nodded in approval. It did not take long b
e
fore the line twitched and went taut—Dominic held tight as something on the other end pulled back with surprising force. He smiled as he played the fish. The natives whooped and hollered. With one final heave, Dominic pulled a plump ca
t
fish onto the bank. Utina patted him on the back and then leaned down to subdue the writhing fish.

“Is it edible?” asked Dominic, his voice flush with excitement.

“Not just edible,” said Francisco. “Delicious.”

Utina unhooked the fish and held it up for Dominic to see. Its wormlike whiskers quivered as the fish gulped air and flexed its slimy fins. Utina tossed the fish back into the river.

Dominic was dumbfounded. “I thought that was our lunch? What’s the point?”

“The first fish is always thrown back,” said Francisco. “Next one is lunch.”

Before long they had caught enough catfish to make a meal. The natives gutted them with a crude knife—nothing more than a shark’s tooth mounted on a wooden handle—and then they wrapped them in wetted palm fronds and laid them over hot coals to cook. The meat came out flaky and moist, although it certainly would have benefited from a pinch of saffron to help mask the mud flavor. Nevertheless, it satiated Dominic’s hunger, and he felt a warm sense of accomplishment for having contributed to the meal.

Dominic insisted on paddling when they boarded the canoe again. The natives appeared amused by his enthusiasm for such a mundane task and seemed happy to ignore his lack of skill in exchange for entertainment. They soon came upon a basking alligator that crashed into the water and charged the canoe. Dominic held the paddle up in defense but the alligator stopped before it reached them.

Utina pointed at the alligator and said, “Itori.”

Dominic looked at Itori. “I thought that was
your
name?”

Itori smiled. He pointed to himself. “Me Itori. Me Alligator.”

“Your name is Alligator?”

Itori nodded and smiled. Then he pointed at Dominic and said, “You Angry Squirrel.”

Francisco and all the natives laughed. Dominic’s face turned red. “No,” he said. Soon, however, everyone in the boat was repeating it and he could no longer repress his smile. He bit his lip to quell it.

Chapter Twelve

Zane clung to the skeletal remains of the launch pad and tried to think of a way out of what had become a desperate predicament.

“You can drop the bag to me,” said Miguel, “or I can come up there and get you down the hard way. You have five seconds to decide . . . Five.”

If he dropped the bag, Miguel would quickly discover that most of the coins were no longer inside it. Miguel moved to the base of the ladder and gazed up. “Four,” he said.

The ladder extended only a few more rungs past Zane, ending at a twisted, rusted-out platform that looked like it could collapse at the slightest touch.

“Three,” said Miguel.

Zane thought about climbing out on the nearest crossbeam but he feared he would slip off if he did—it was slick with vulture droppings. He closed his eyes and hugged the metal ladder. There was no way out.

“Two.”

Zane tried to calm himself by looking at the phantasmal rafters around him and envisioning how the structure looked when it was still in use. Eager workers checking gauges. Steam rising from cooling systems. A freshly-painted spacecraft aiming for the stars. If only he were a rocket, he mused, when Miguel finished his vile countdown, his thrusters would burn the man to bits.

“One,” said Miguel. “Bad choice, my friend.” Miguel put the knife blade between his teeth and started climbing up. Zane had to do something. He scrambled up the last few rungs of the ladder and touched the crooked platform to test it but, as he expected, the entire thing lurched to one side and made a groaning sound as it did. Fragments of rusty metal fell off—which gave him an idea.

Miguel stopped and wiped the rust off of his head and then he took the knife out of his mouth. “Your father sold you out, you know. He won’t be able to blame anyone but himself for your death.”

“You’re lying,” said Zane.

“Deep down, you know I’m not.” Miguel bit down on the knife again and continued up.

Zane’s eyes fell on one of the platform’s girders. It was rusted through on each end. He reached out as far as he could and grabbed hold of it and strained to break it off. When it finally gave, he had to stop himself from falling backward. He took a deep breath. That was too close.

He looked down. Miguel was halfway up and still climbing with vigor. The knife blade glinted in his mouth and his clenched teeth were curved into what looked like a wicked smile. Zane held the heavy girder chunk over Miguel. “Stop, or I’ll drop this on you.”

Miguel kept coming, so Zane aimed and let go. It fell silently. Just as it was about to hit Miguel, however, it bounced off the ladder and deflected away. He heard it hit the ground with a solid
thunk
.

Now what?

He looked at the platform again but saw nothing else to detach. All he could hope for now was to kick Miguel away, but that would be difficult with a knife flailing at his legs. He put his head against the ladder and tried to think of a solution and that’s when he felt the thrumming of a vehicle engine in the metal.

It soon became audible. Both Zane and Miguel turned to look toward its source at the same time. There, passing by on the nearby dirt road and throwing a plume of dust, was a military Jeep. Large letters on the side spelled out
US Air Force P
a
trol
. The two men inside it wore full camouflage fatigues. Zane could hear faint music and the driver bobbed in his seat.

Zane waved his hand in a broad sweep and yelled. “Hey! Up here!”

Miguel stopped and took the knife out of his mouth. “Shut up!”

Zane yelled louder. “Help! I need help!”

The Jeep stopped and Zane could see the soldiers looking around for the source of the voice. The cloud of dust overtook the vehicle and concealed it. Miguel hurried down the ladder, half climbing and half sliding; when he reached the ground, he looked up at Zane. “I will find you and I will kill you.” Then he ran into the woods.

Zane looked toward the road—the dust had settled and the soldiers had spotted him. They jumped out of the Jeep with M-16s drawn; Zane started going down the ladder and lost sight of them among the treetops. For some reason, the large guns did not bother him. In fact, they made him feel somewhat safe; after all, Miguel was not brazen enough to go up against two automatic rifles with one little knife. Or was he? Zane’s hands became moist with nervousness and as he a
p
proached the last ten feet of the ladder, he slipped off.
Splat
. He landed in something gooey. Drawing a painful breath, he almost vomited when he tasted the air. He had fallen in a puddle of vulture excrement.

He tried to stand and almost slipped in the glop but he grabbed the ladder and caught himself. He picked up the duffel bag. It, too, was covered in the stinking grime. He tried to shake it off but it clung like some horrid glue.

“Sir, this is a restricted area,” said an approaching voice.

Zane looked up. The two soldiers stood at the edge of the slab, their guns pointed at him. He stood up straight and tried to brush the slime off his arms.

“Sir, did you hear me?” said the taller of the two soldiers, an African American man in his mid-thirties. “This is a restricted area.” The other soldier, squat and pale in contrast to his partner, looked to be even younger than Zane.

“Restricted?” said Zane, trying to act ignorant. “Really?”

He could tell from the looks on their faces that they assumed him to be some kind of vagabond, and he was not su
r
prised. His ripped shirt hung open and the wound on his head was caked in dried blood. The rest of his skin, covered in dirt, now boasted a generous splattering of bird filth.

“How the hell did you get out here?” said the younger soldier.

“With difficulty,” said Zane.

“Where are you from?”

“Jupiter.”

“Jupiter?” said the tall soldier, a slight smirk on his face. “Last dude said Mars.”

“Sorry?”

“You’re in one of them UFO cults, ain’t you.”

“Cult?” Zane let out a nervous laugh. But then he realized that going along with the soldier’s presumption might be a better alternative to the truth. “Well, to be honest,” said Zane, “we call it a
religion
, not a cult.”

The tall soldier looked at his partner. “See, what I tell ya? Seems like every year we catch one of these nut-jobs trying to stow away in a rocket, wanting to go up and rendezvous with their alien leader or some crazy story.” The other soldier laughed, and then the tall soldier looked at Zane. “How’d you get past the gates, buddy?”

Zane put his weight on one hip, trying to look casual. “That was the easy part. Came out on a tour bus and snuck off.”

“Then why’d you pick this launch pad? Ain’t been no rockets out here for decades.”

“Well, I was just waiting, I guess.”

“For what?”

Zane had to conjure a more convincing act. He looked at the sky and pointed. “For it to land,” he whispered, and then he twirled his fingers in front of his face as if doing something magical. “Behold, earthlings. The mothership is coming to get me, for I am the only being in the universe who can prevent the intergalactic war.”

He must have convinced them of his madness because they laughed out loud. A barrage of sarcastic questions ensued.