The Lost Island (15 page)

I
S THAT THE
one where this guy who’s really lost ends up in a cave with a hot enchantress?” said Gideon.

“Very funny. I’ll tell you what I’ve found, but first, let’s build a fire, dry out our clothes, and try to bring a little comfort and civilization to this god-awful place. Then we can talk.”

Half an hour later, they were both sitting in the sand by a small fire. The sun had set in a glory of vermilion, and the stars were coming up in the sky. A breeze rustled the leaves of the palm trees above them.

There was something rather glorious, Gideon decided, in simply feeling dry. “All right,” he said. “Let’s hear it. And it had better be good.”

Amy began by declaiming something in a language unknown to Gideon.

“What is that?” he said. “Are you still gargling salt water?”

“It’s ancient Greek.”

“Sorry, but my ancient Greek is a little rusty.”

“I just wanted you to hear the sound of it. It’s the most beautiful language in the world—and I don’t just say that because I was a classics major. You can’t truly appreciate Homer in English.
ἄ
νδρα μοι
ἔ
ννεπε, μο
ῦ
σα, πολύτροπον,
ὃ
ς μάλα πολλ
ὰ
Πλάγχθη
.
‘Sing to me of the man, O muse, that wily hero who traveled far and wide’—Sorry, the English just doesn’t cut it.”

Gideon shook his head. “Here we are, lost on an unknown coast, and you’re quoting Homer.”

“There’s a point to all this.” She tapped the damp pages of the printout.

“Which is?”

“Let me start at the beginning, so you can understand my reasoning. We already know the Phorkys Map was based on an earlier Greek map. Glinn said as much. That map was discovered by the monks of Iona, among their stores of old vellum.”

Gideon nodded.

“Which means that the Greeks got here first. The Greeks ‘discovered’ the New World.”

“Glinn told us that, too.”

“But that begs an obvious question:
Who
was the Greek Columbus? And
how
did he get here?”

Gideon waited.

“In 1200
BC
, the Greeks laid siege to the city of Troy—the famous Trojan War. Which they won, of course, by tricking the Trojans with the hollow horse filled with Greek warriors.”

“Beware of Greeks bearing gifts and all that.”

“Exactly. Now let’s turn to the Phorkys Map.” She flipped the pages of their briefing book, with each clue enlarged. “Here it is, the first clue.
Ibi est initium
, it reads. And look at the little drawing of a horse. Remember? That was the clue old Brock back at EES couldn’t figure out. And it says: ‘There is the beginning.’ The beginning of what?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea,” Gideon said.

“Of the voyage of Odysseus.”

“The voyage of…” Gideon stopped. “Are you saying that the
Odyssey
should be taken literally? I don’t know what’s crazier—that, or the idea that he traveled all the way to the New World.”

“It isn’t crazy. And I’m not the first to propose it. A group of dissident Homer scholars have argued precisely this point for years. They’ve been ridiculed and marginalized.”

“With good reason,” said Gideon.

“Because they didn’t have the proof we now possess—thanks to your theft of that page from the Book of Kells.” Amy’s voice was low, quiet, but full of conviction. “I’ve been comparing the Phorkys Map with the
Odyssey
. It all fits. After the defeat of Troy—using a wooden horse, recall—Odysseus and his men left in six ships. They were caught in two incredibly violent storms: one that drove them westward for three days, and another for nine days. It’s obvious to me now that he was driven, first across the Mediterranean, and then across the Atlantic—all the way into the Caribbean. That’s how the Greeks discovered the New World. And that, in turn, is how the Phorkys Map was created. It was based on the earlier Greek map of Odysseus’s voyage. That’s the map the monks found among their old stores of vellum. And
that
is how the monks of Iona were able to reach the New World. Odysseus was the Greek Columbus.”

“If you hadn’t been a classics major yourself, you’d never have dreamed this up. It’s totally far-fetched.”

“No, it isn’t. It took Odysseus ten years to get home. All those islands he visited, all those adventures he had—they all took place here, in the Caribbean. The key text is right there.” She flipped through the printout. “This is from Book Nine of the
Odyssey
. I’ll translate as I go along.”

Amy lowered the printout. “Most scholars think Cythera was an island off the Greek mainland. But here’s the catch: Cythera was
also
an ancient name for the Straits of Gibraltar. In other words, they were blown past Cythera into the Atlantic—the ‘deepest ocean.’ From there they were driven nine days westward, carried by high winds and currents.”

“Nine days to cross the Atlantic?”

“The main route of tropical storms goes southwestward from the Cape Verde Islands straight across into the Caribbean. In such a storm, he would have been driven along by the effects of wind, reinforced by the powerful Main Equatorial Current. This is exactly the route mariners took in times past. In reasonably favorable winds they could make the crossing in twenty days. There are many instances of ships caught in storms making the crossing in as little as a week—if they survived.”

Gideon fell silent. He felt skeptical—and annoyed. “So you strand us here on this desolate shore, refuse help, place us both in jeopardy—just to prove this ridiculous theory of yours.”

Amy sighed with impatience. “Haven’t you been listening? If Odysseus had been pushed across the Atlantic in a storm, his ships would have been subsequently caught in the Caribbean Loop Current, which connects to the Main Equatorial Current. And that would have brought him right here.” She hesitated. “That’s the research I was doing on the boat before we were attacked.”

“Why did you keep it such a big secret?”

“Because I was afraid of exactly the negative reaction I’m getting from you now.”

Gideon shook his head. It all seemed so speculative. He couldn’t bring himself to believe it.

“There’s something else in the
Odyssey
—something you might find more persuasive.” She read again from the printout: “‘. . . a delicious fruit, which is said to give health and heal all manner of infirmities, but at the expense of mind and memory.’ What does that remind you of?”

“I suppose it could be a reference to the medicine we’re looking for.”

“Of course. Can you imagine a clearer description of the
remedium
Glinn has sent us searching for?”

Gideon stared into the fire, thinking. He was beginning to feel weary again—too weary to be angry. If this were all true, it could be further proof the medicine was real…and might actually help him. Immediately he was seized with the foolishness of this line of thought and pushed it out of his head. He had to stop dwelling on this false hope, which would only bring him disappointment and grief.

“Consider the Phorkys Map. ‘Follow the Devil’s vomit.’ We’ve done exactly that. The spume trail leading out from Jeyupsi Cay naturally followed the Loop Current, which fetched us right up here. This is precisely where we’re meant to be—right where the next clue is. Right where Odysseus and his men landed three thousand years ago.”

Gideon tossed a stick into the fire. “When did this first occur to you?”

“I was familiar with the speculations of the dissident scholars. When I heard Glinn’s theory about the Greeks reaching the Caribbean, when I saw the Phorkys Map, I began to recall certain passages from the
Odyssey
. That’s when I began my research in earnest.”

For a moment Gideon was silent. Then he shifted before the fire. “I’m not saying I buy into any of this. But for the time being, it looks as if I have to go along. So what next?”

“
Aquilonius
. The unusual Latin term for ‘northerly.’ Which is where we must head to find the next clue—the very last clue. We’re almost there.”

“What is that clue?”

She pointed to the page. The drawing on the map showed a partially twisted rectangle without a bottom. The Latin inscription read:
Trans ultra tortuosum locum
.

“
Tortuosum locum
. Twisted place.
Trans ultra
. Beyond the beyond. That’s what we’re looking for, ‘beyond the beyond of the twisted place.’ Which should be a little north of here. And—” Her eyes glittered in the dying light—“when we get there, we’ll be in the land of the Lotus Eaters.”

H
IS THIRTY MINUTES
in the whirlpool bath was up. Using the powered platforms and the robotic arm, Eli Glinn raised himself with painstaking slowness—his narrow body dripping water perfumed by soothing herbs and oils—and transported the platform to his dressing alcove. It was the work of another difficult thirty minutes to dry and dress himself.

After the accident, Glinn had spent a great deal of time finding the kind of clothes that were most comfortable and easy to put on and remove. He had ultimately settled on warm-up pants of ultrasoft Persian cotton with an elastic waistband—tailored precisely to his needs by Jonathan Crofts of Savile Row—and mock turtlenecks one size too large. He now had several dozen pairs of each, and he used them as both daywear and nightwear.

The arduous process completed, he clicked the remote to extinguish the candles, lowered himself into the wheelchair, and rolled out of the bathroom, through his bedroom, and into the main living area. As was his custom, he maneuvered the wheelchair through the spare, cool-gray space to the massive window overlooking the Hudson. Glinn slept very little, and he often sat here for hours, reading poetry or simply gazing out over the landscape, his thoughts far away.

The monks used this secret alchemy and were able to heal themselves of “grievous wounds, afflictions, diseases and infirmities.”
Was it really true? Was there a secret arcanum—or was it just another primitive legend, born of a crude and imperfect understanding of the world? Perhaps Brock’s skepticism was rubbing off on him.

But then there was the evidence of the skeletons. That was real.

His thoughts turned to Gideon and Amy. He felt a most disquieting mix of concern and uncertainty over the pair…and over the direction the project had taken. Their boat had sunk; they were marooned on the Mosquito Coast—and yet Amy had refused help. It was consistent with her Quantitative Behavioral Analysis. At the same time, they had not anticipated an attack from treasure hunters. They were in uncharted territory. Another item of concern lay in the team’s sat phone, which Amy had reported as being low on batteries. Ongoing communication with the two was of vital importance.

His selection of Amy for this project had been one of the more extensive and arduous headhunting tasks EES had ever performed—and the Quantitative Behavioral Analysis tests on her had proven most interesting. EES was in the business of failure analysis as a means of preventing failure—and her QBA had indicated that, during this mission, she would fail. Yet ironically, the failure would be vital to the mission’s success.

But that failure was not supposed to take place this early, or take such a form. Curious—and most disturbing. For the time being, however, Glinn realized he would simply have to take her report on faith.

His thoughts were interrupted by the low chiming of the telephone. Glinn glanced at the clock: five thirty
AM
. He pirouetted the wheelchair, reached for the phone.

“Yes?” he said.

“Weaver. I wonder if you could get down here. As soon as possible.” The technician’s voice was tight with anxiety—or, perhaps, fear.

“What is it?”

“It would be easier to show you in person, Mr. Glinn.”

“I’ll be right there.” Hanging up the telephone, Glinn aimed his wheelchair at the elevator and whirred slowly over the expanse of polished slate.

G
ARZA ARRIVED IN
the lab at a quarter to six, bone-tired and sick to death of dramatic, early-morning confabulations.

Weaver, the tech, looked weary and drawn. But on top of that, he looked tense, unsettled. Brock was standing in a far corner, hands crossed over his chest, equally put out. Glinn sat beside him, motionless, his face betraying nothing.

“The DNA test on the two follicles is complete,” Weaver said, and then seemed to falter.

“Go on, man,” Garza said.

“Remember how I told you my belief that the vellum on this page might be made from human skin?”

Garza nodded.

“It turns out I was wrong.”

“Exactly what I predicted,” said Brock, primly.

“
And
right.”

Garza said, “Just get to the point.”

The tech took a deep breath. “According to our analysis, the DNA sequences of these hair follicles match up with human DNA about ninety-seven percent. Yet there are significant sequences that do not match up with the human genome.” He looked around the room. “That’s why I say I’m both right and wrong. It’s humanoid. It’s
almost
human. I mean, it’s one percent less than a chimp-and-human match, but two percent more than, say, orangutan-and-human.” Weaver swallowed, plucked at his collar. He seemed to be downright frightened by the results.

“What rot!” Brock cried. “You’ve had the greasy fingers of unwashed monks turning that page over for a thousand years—no wonder it’s permeated with human DNA.”

“We were very,
very
careful. And we got the same results from both samples. We took the sample from the binding edge of the page, which presumably was handled less. And we ran controls for contamination. That doesn’t appear to be the case.”

“It doesn’t matter!” Brock retorted. “It’s been bound and rebound many times! There’s human DNA all over it.” He turned to Glinn. “Human skin simply wasn’t used for making vellum. It’s nothing more than animal skin—I would guess pig—that’s been badly contaminated.”

Ignoring Brock, Glinn came forward slightly in his wheelchair. “You say you obtained similar results from both follicles?”

Weaver nodded.

“
Almost
human.” Garza had to make an effort to keep the skepticism out of his voice. “Weaver, this makes no sense. I’m with Brock. It’s contamination.”

“No hasty conclusions, Mr. Garza,” Glinn said quietly, then turned back to Weaver. “How, exactly, do you check for contamination?”

“We use a standard technique called BLAST—Basic Local Alignment Search Tool.”

“How certain is it?”

“It’s not one hundred percent.”

“There it is,” Garza said, with a wave of his hand, his irritation beginning to crest—especially at Glinn’s solicitous reception of this nonsense.

“Are there other ways to check for contamination?” Glinn asked.

“Well…there’s a new technique we developed for our Swiss client last year, a hybrid version of the BWA-SW algorithm. We could run the sequences through that. Unfortunately, it’s much slower than BLAST.”

“How does it work?” Garza asked.

“The Burrows-Wheeler Aligner. Basically, it’s an algorithm for aligning nucleotide sequences against a referent, with the intent of uncovering any sequence contaminants. The variation we developed can work with longer query sequences, and with a higher toleration for error, than the original.”

“Get started,” Glinn said.

Weaver nodded.

Garza spoke. “While you’re at it, do another run or two on those samples. Let’s see if you get the same results.” This all seemed unnecessary to him—but he knew they’d make no further progress until Glinn himself was satisfied.

“I’d also like to know,” Glinn said quietly, “assuming there is no contamination—what that three percent difference represents.”

“We could try to match it up with the genomes of any other species.”

“Exactly. And see if you can extrapolate from that to see what sorts of anatomical differences those genes might represent. I want to know precisely what kind of creature we’re talking about. What it looks like, what its capabilities are—if we’re indeed dealing with a new hominid species.”

Weaver’s face—already pale—turned a shade paler. No doubt, Garza thought, he was mentally counting up the additional hours of sleep he was about to lose.