Part 6 (2/2)

He'd left the sack in the tunnel when he and Perry had first arrived, never suspecting the need for emergency supplies would come from such an unpredictable quarter. Along with the additional food Perry had left him, there might be enough to tide two people over for a week, no more.

Two men. A woman was another matter entirely. If she were truly alone herea He jerked awake, shoved back his hat and sat up. The long shadows and dim light told him that over an hour had pa.s.sed. d.a.m.n it, he'd slepta”an amateur's mistake.

There was still a faint throbbing in his knee where something had struck it. Mac couldn't have come out of the tunnel without tripping over his legs; Liam stood and looked from the tunnel entrance to the faint clearing beside the temple.

She was sitting on a fallen stele, staring into the jungle. Her pack lay at her feet. There was something strange in her bearing, in the way she didn't move as the seconds pa.s.sed, the way she held her hands out in front of her with a peculiar stiffness.

She turned her head as he came near. Her gaze held his with a vulnerability that stopped his questions before he could voice them.

”Something isa very weird here,” she said. ”I found the wall, buta it just ends. There's no way through. It's the same and not the same. I know it's the right wall, but the bonesa” She shuddered. ”They aren't there anymore.”

He knew the wall she meant; it was the place he and Perry had found the carved plaque of stone from which they'd made their matching pendants. Symbols of a brotherhood that no longer existed.

He shook off his lapse and crouched before Mac. ”The wall with the hieroglyphs?” he asked. ”It ends the tunnel. There is no way through. What bones are you talking about?”

”I thought they werea”” She lifted her hands. For the first time he saw that her palms were raw with bleeding scratches, as if made by ragged stone. ”This isn't possible, you know. There isn't any real proof. Ia””

Liam caught her hands and held them still. ”What in h.e.l.l did you do to yourself?”

She laughed raggedly. ”I was sure there must be something, buta””

Her coherence hadn't improved since she'd gone into the tunnel again, and neither had her rationality. ”Be quiet,” he commanded. ”Just stay there and be quiet.” He went back for his sack and dropped it beside the stele, pulling out his own canteen. She remained unnaturally still, watching him as he poured water over her palms and washed away the blood.

”You don't have to do this,” she said, smiling with the distracted air of a good-natured lunatic. ”I'm okay. Everything will be fine.”

He caught her chin in his hand. Her cheek was clammy, and the pulse that beat under the skin at the base of her neck was faint and rapid. She was in a state of shock; he'd seen such conditions before. ”I told you to be quiet,” he said gruffly. ”Sit still and do as you're told.”

She blinked and shrugged without protest, proving just how disturbed she must be. Liam used his knife to tear off pieces of mosquito netting from the sack of emergency supplies and made bandages for her hands, knotting them firmly behind her knuckles.

”You know, the Maya were obsessed with time,” she went on. ”It would make a weird kind of sense, if it's true. The funny thing is, I know I'm not crazy.”

Liam lifted her in his arms and carried her to the shade under the ruined wall. ”Of course not,” he grunted. Slender as she was, she was no wraith. He eased her down on what remained of the mosquito netting.

”I'm just not the kind of person who has delusions,” she said, sliding bonelessly onto the makes.h.i.+ft bed. ”Whatever Homer said, I don't have the imagination to come up with so mucha perfect detail.” She flexed her hands in their bandages, counting off on her fingers. ”The wall is the same, but the bones aren't there. Neither is Homer's cap. And the first path is gone. And it did look like Tikal, only not the way it did when I left ita”the way Maudslay photographed it. And then there's youa” She squinted up at him. ”You're just too perfect.”

”Thanks.”

”And I think I've established that it can't be some sort of practical joke. Just not possible. I'm not deada””

”It's a wonder,” Liam murmured, cursing his lack of a blanket to cover her with. He had only his s.h.i.+rt, and it was too' damp and thin to be of much use.

”a”so if I'm not crazy,” she mumbled, ”it must be real. Doesn't that make sense?”

”Perfect sense.” G.o.d save him.

She tried to sit up, and he pushed her back down. Already her pulse seemed stronger, her skin less pale. He removed the cap of his own canteen, pulled down her lower lip with his thumb, and poured water into her mouth as if she were a child. After the first few swallows she gave a m.u.f.fled protest and took the canteen herself.

When she'd finished he reached for the canteen, but she stopped him with a touch. Her fingers were trembling as they brushed his hand and pointed at the engraved metal band near the mouthpiece.

”Youa really area Liam O'Shea,” she whispered.

He followed her stare. The engraved, silver-chased canteen had been a gift from Caroline's father the year they'd met, when Liam had been a simple miner and Gresham the mine owner whose life he'd saved. Gresham was dead now, and he'd left Liam a far more precious endowmenta”a trust Liam was failing at this very moment.

d.a.m.n Perry.

”So my sainted mother named me,” he said acidly. ”Why does that surprise you?”

She inched backward on her elbows and propped herself against the wall. ”I don't know,” she said. ”No. I don't know howa”

He took her shoulders between his hands. ”Were you expecting to find me here?”

”Here?” She chuckled weakly. ”No. Not likea”” She closed her eyes, laughter dying. ”Can you give me my pack?”

He did as she asked. Her movements were deliberate as she opened the top flap; for the first time he noticed the strange interlocking teeth that held it closed. But when she'd pulled out the photograph she pushed the pack behind her, out of his reach.

”You wanted to know about this photograph?” she said. ”It was taken in Tikal in 1880.”

Liam restrained his impatience. At last he was getting answers, however jumbled. ”I was there,” he said.

”Okay. Now look at it closely.” She held it up with all the exaggerated pedantry of a professor in a cla.s.sroom. ”Does it look like it's only a few years old?”

He humored her, ignoring the stab of anger that came with the sight of Perry. Indeed, there was something aged about the paper, creased and a bit ragged about the edges, the image faded. He'd seen this photograph in Perry's rooms only a month ago, protected behind gla.s.s.

There was no question about it. Perry must have given it to Mac. Their meeting in the tunnel couldn't have been coincidence.

”How long have you had this?” he demanded.

She didn't even flinch at his harshness. ”Not long. But it's been around for quite some time. You're seeing a century of wear and tear.”

Liam laughed. There was nothing else to do. But she didn't draw back, didn't smile, didn't do anything but gaze at him with a sort of desperate earnestness.

”Don't you see?” she begged. ”Of course you don't. You think I'm nuts. I would too, excepta”I can't even explain it myself. Something happened to me in that tunnel. Before I met you. Oh, d.a.m.n.” She wrapped her arms around her narrow waist and bent over.

If he was right about her she deserved to suffer. And yeta ”Lie down,” he ordered. ”You're ill.”

Her head snapped up. ”You want answers, O'Shea? You want to know how I got here? I can tell you how I got to Tikal the first time. By airplane and tour bus, with a bunch of other tourists. Does that make any sense to you?”

Sense? Nothing about her made sense. ”Airplane,” he repeated flatly.

”You know, the metal things that fly in the sky.” She nodded at his silence. ”You don't know. The Wright brothers haven't done their thing yet. They're only teenagersa uh, now. And there were no tour buses in the Petn in thea 1880sa” She drifted away again. ”This is too fantastic. Homer would never accept this.”

Liam's fingers itched, whether to strangle her or merely shake her he didn't know. ”Homer?”

”My grandfather. He gave me the photograph. It wasa pa.s.sed on to him. He never knew Perry. I never knew him. But now he's actually alive in San Franciscoa”

Enough was enough. ”What in h.e.l.l are you trying to say?”

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