The Gorgon Field (6 page)

Don Carlos sighed. “Please sit down. I want a drink. I seldom do anymore, but right now that’s what I want.”

Ramón mixed drinks for all of them, and then he sat down for the first time since the meeting had started.

Don Carlos drank straight bourbon, followed by water. “Have you told Deborah any of this?”

“No.”

“It was as you guessed,” Don Carlos said finally. “I was back in the formations and didn’t even hear the shots. I came out and he was the only one; the others were lying in blood. He raised the gun and aimed at me, and then he put it down again and started to dig graves. I don’t know why he didn’t shoot. He said from then on, I was to be his son and if I ever told anyone, he would shoot me too. I believed him. I was five.”

“He killed your mother,” Constance said, horrified, “and your father.”

“Yes.”

“How terrible for you. But I don’t understand what that has to do with the present.”

Don Carlos shrugged. “How much more have you guessed, or learned?” he asked Charlie.

“He couldn’t find the valley again, but you did. I suspect there was gold and that it’s under the lake today.” Don Carlos nodded slightly. “Yes. You took away enough to get your start, and later you bought the valley, and the first thing you did was dam the stream, to hide the gold vein under many feet of water.” Again the old man nodded.

Charlie’s voice sobered when he continued. “Years passed and you preserved the valley, until one day Ramón appeared. Was he hired as a servant? A business associate? It doesn’t matter. He read that history and looked at the waterway and drew the same conclusions I did. You felt that the gorgons had saved your life, that there was a mystical connection there. And he found how to capitalize on it.” He was aware that Constance was signaling, but this time he ignored it and said bluntly, “I have as much right to call you Daddy as he does.”

Don Carlos smiled faintly and lifted his glass, finished his bourbon. “You’re a worthy adversary,” he said to Charlie. “Will the others unravel it also? How did you discover this so quickly?”

“Ramón left a good trail, just hidden enough to make it look good, not so much that it can’t be found. He did a fine job of it.” He added dryly, “If you spend enough money, you can make the world flat again, enough to convince most people, anyway. I spent only a little bit and learned everything Tony’s detectives had uncovered, and it hit me that if a man of your wealth really wants to hide anything, it gets hidden. I didn’t believe a word of it.”

Constance looked at Ramón in wonder. “You left false evidence that makes it appear that you are his son? Is that what you did?”

“
Si
.”

“When?”

“For the last two years, we have been working on this.”

She felt completely bewildered now. “But why? What on earth for?”

“I knew Tony would investigate Ramón,” Don Carlos said. “As soon as he found out I intended to leave the valley to Ramón, he would hire investigators to find out why. I tried to come up with something else, but I couldn’t think of anything different that he would accept as a good-enough reason. He won’t talk in public about his father’s illicit sex life. I don’t want a fight or publicity about this.”

“And if you told the truth,” Constance said in a low voice, “they could press for a sanity hearing, and probably win.” She felt a wave of disgust pass through her at the thought of the hearing, the taunting questions, the innuendos.

“They might have won such a hearing,” Don Carlos said just as quietly as she had spoken.

“And maybe they should have had that chance.” Charlie sounded harsh and brusque. “This valley is worth ten million at least, and you’re giving it away because he says there’s power in the gorgons. Maybe Tony should have his chance.”

“Señor,” Ramón said, “come to the gorgons at sundown today. And you, señora. This matter is not completed yet, not yet.” He bowed to Don Carlos and Constance and left the room.

They stood up also, Charlie feeling helpless with frustration. “We won’t be able to make that,” he said to Don Carlos. “Give him our regrets. We’re leaving.”

“We’ll be there,” Constance said clearly.

Don Carlos nodded. “Yes, we’ll all be there.” He looked at Charlie. “I ask only that you say nothing to my daughter or son today. Tomorrow it will be your decision. I ask only for today.”

“You’re not even offering to buy us,” Charlie said bitterly.

“Mr. Meiklejohn, I am extremely wealthy, more than you realize. But over the years, I have learned that there are a lot of things I can’t buy. That was a surprise to me, as it must be to you, if you believe it at all.”

Charlie’s frustration deepened; wordlessly, he nodded and stalked from the room, with Constance close behind him.

“That was brilliant,” Constance said, walking by Charlie’s side along the lakefront.

“Yeah, I know.”

“We’re really not finished here.” She was not quite pleading with him.

“Right.”

She caught his arm and they came to a stop. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I have to see it through and I can’t say why.”

He nodded soberly. “That’s what scares me.” He never had doubted her, never had thought of her with another man, never had a moment’s cloud of jealousy obscure his vision of her. And he knew she felt the same way about him. Their trust in each other was absolute, but… He knew there were areas in her psychic landscape that he could not enter, areas where she walked alone, and he knew that when she walked those infinite and infinitely alien paths, the things that occupied her mind were also alien and would not permit translation into his mundane world. Standing close to her in the warm sunlight, a gleaming lake at one side of them, luxurious buildings all around, cars, helicopters, computers, servants by the score available, he felt alone, abandoned, lost. She was beyond reach even though her hand was on his arm.

He lifted her hand and kissed the palm. “It’s, your party.”

She blinked rapidly. “We should go back to the house. Tony scares me right now.”

They stopped when Tony and Deborah came into view, heading for the area behind the boathouse. Tony was carrying a rifle; Deborah was almost running to keep up, clutching his arm.

She saw Charlie and Constance and turned to them instead. Tony continued, stony-faced.

“What’s up?” Charlie asked pleasantly.

“He’s going to do target practice. Kill time.” She laughed with a tinge of hysteria in her voice.

“Well, I’m looking for a drink,” he said, so relaxed and quiet that he appeared lazy.

She walked with them, studying the path they were on. “Tony’s so much like Father. It’s uncanny how alike they are.”

They all started a few seconds later when a shot sounded, echoing and chasing itself around the granite walls of the valley for a long time.

“He’s as violent as Father must have been when he was younger,” Deborah said as they started to walk again. “More so maybe. Father is said to have killed a man back in the twenties. I don’t know how true it is, but it doesn’t really matter. People who tell the story know it was quite possible. He would kill to protect his interests, his family. And so would Tony.”

“So would I,” Charlie commented.

Constance shivered.

Another shot exploded the quiet and then several more in quick succession. It sounded like thunder in the valley. They paused at the house, listening, feeling the vibrations in the air, and then entered.

The fountain splashed; the red tiles on the floor glowed; an orange tree in a pot had opened a bloom or two overnight and filled the air with a heady fragrance. It was very still.

Deborah paused at the fountain and stared at the water. They had started up the wide stairs; her low voice stopped them.

“When Tony and I used to come here, we just had each other; we were pretty close in those days. He was Lori’s age when he… when something happened out there. He wouldn’t talk about it. He was ashamed because he ran and left me behind, and everything changed with us after that. Just like with Lori. I don’t think he’s ever gone back. And he shouldn’t go back. That target practice… he claims an eagle has been snatching chickens. He says he’ll shoot it on sight.” She bowed her head lower. “How I’ve prayed for an earthquake to come and shake them all down, turn them to dust!” She jammed her hands into her pockets and walked away without looking back at them.

In their room Constance watched silently as Charlie unlocked his suitcase and brought out his .38 revolver. She went to the window then. “Charlie, just for a minute accept that there might be some force out there, some power. Tony said places like this are vanishing, remember? He was more right than he knew. They are. What if there are places where you can somehow gain access to the power people sometimes seem to have, like the inhuman strength people sometimes have when there’s an emergency, a fire, or something like that.”

He made a grunting noise. She continued to look out the window. The sun was getting low, casting long shadows now.

“If people can manipulate that kind of power, why don’t they?” he demanded.

She shrugged. “New priests drive out the old priests. New religions replace the old. The conquerors write the books and decide what’s true, what’s myth. Temples are turned into marketplaces. Roads are built. Admission is charged to holy places and the gum wrappers appear, the graffiti… . But the stories persist in spite of it all. They persist.”

She looked at him when she heard the sound of ice hitting a glass. His face was stony, unknowable.

“When we lose another animal species,” she said, almost desperate for his understanding now, “no one knows exactly what we’ve lost forever. When a forest disappears, no one knows what marvels we might have found in it. Plants that become extinct are gone forever. What drugs? What medicines? What new ways of looking at the universe? We can’t really know what we’ve lost. And this valley’s like that. Maybe we can’t know what it means today, or even next year, but it exists as a possibility for us to know someday, as long as it remains and is not desecrated.”

He picked up the two glasses and joined her at the window, where he put the glasses on a table and took her into his arms. He held her very close and hard for a minute or two and then kissed her. “Let’s have our drink,” he said afterward. “And then it’ll be about time to mosey on downstairs.” And he tried to ignore the ice that was deep within him, radiating a chill throughout his body.

Manuel drove them without a word. He was subdued and nervous. Ahead of the Jeep was a Land Rover moving cautiously, avoiding the ruts in the tracks, easing into and out of the holes. Deborah and her father were in it. Also ahead of them was Tony on a horse, in no hurry, either. He had a scabbard with the rifle jutting out.

Manuel stopped near the stream where he had parked before, but Deborah drove her father closer to the formations and parked within fifty feet of them. Manuel got a folding chair from the car and set it up; he placed a large Indian blanket on the back of the chair and then looked at Deborah with a beseeching expression. She shook her head. Silently, he went back to the Jeep, turned it, and drove toward the house. Tony was tying his horse to a hitching post near the mound of the graves.

Don Carlos walked slowly over the rocky ground; there was a line of sweat on his upper lip when he reached the chair and sat down. No one offered to help him, but they all watched until he was settled. Probably, Charlie thought, they knew better than to try to help. If he wanted help, he would ask for it politely, matter-of-factly, and unless he did, they waited. A worthy adversary, he thought again. He had no doubt that Don Carlos had killed, maybe more than once, and that he would not hesitate to kill again if he had to. Don Carlos knew, as Charlie did, that the world was not always a nice place.

Tony drew nearer. He and Charlie eyed each other like two alley cats confined in a too-small space, Constance thought, watching everyone, everything closely.

She heard a faint singing and glanced about to see if the others were listening too, to see if Ramón had approached from behind the gorgons. Charlie’s expression of lazy intention did not change; no one moved. They didn’t hear it, she realized. The singing was more like chanting, and louder. The earth rolled away from the sun and caught the light in the stream at the far end of the valley: a dagger of golden light slicing through the cliffs, pointing the way.

It was time. She touched Charlie’s arm. When he looked at her, she said softly, “Don’t let them follow me. Please wait I’ll be back.”

The ice flowed through him, tingled his fingers and toes, froze his heart. He nodded silently. Their gaze held for another moment, then she turned and walked toward the entrance of the gorgons. He had known this was her part, just as she had known; he had been braced, waiting for this. He had not known he would be frozen by the icy fear that gripped him now. She did not look back at him when she reached the right place. She took another step and was out of view. He let out his breath.

A right way, a wrong way. Her pace was steady this time, unhesitating. It was as if the wrong way was barred to her, as if she was being channeled only the right way. The chanting was all around her, inside her; it had an exultant tone.

I’m here, Ramón.

Si, señora. 1 was waiting for you.

Sunlight flowed between the highest pillars, spilled like molten gold downward, touching the path before her. Then the sunlight dimmed and the shadows became deep purple. She continued to walk steadily.

“Look!” Deborah cried, and pointed toward the top of the gorgons.

For a second, Charlie thought he saw a human figure; it changed, became an eagle. That damn story she had told, he thought angrily. When he looked back at the others, Tony was at the scabbard, hauling out the rifle. The twilight had turned violet, the shadows very deep and velvety. Charlie watched Tony for a second; very soon it would be too dark to see him. He drew his revolver and fired it into the air. Deborah screamed. Tony straightened, holding the rifle.

“Drop it,” Charlie said. “Just let it fall straight down and then get back over here.”