The Lost Island

33

As consciousness slowly returned, the lovely dark gave way to a sickening, nauseating feeling of pain and exhaustion. Gideon coughed, his chest and lungs feeling like they were on fire. He opened his eyes. There was still the close roar of surf, but he realized he was lying on wet sand. It was still night.

With great effort he managed to get his arms underneath himself and sit up. His skin felt raw and cracked. He was surrounded by a dim, featureless beach, vanishing into darkness in all directions.

“Amy.” His voice came out as the merest croak.

The beach was empty. He struggled to get to his feet, head pounding, and was immediately overwhelmed with dizziness. Falling to his knees, he vomited salt water, again and again and again, until nothing remained but dry heaves. A few deep breaths and he collapsed, falling to the sand, curling into a ball, and losing consciousness once again.

After what seemed like an eternity, he slowly swam back to consciousness. He opened his eyes. Day. Again. A dull, zinc light suffused everything. He looked about through bleary eyes, at the empty beach, the dark gray ocean, the thundering parade of surf, a dark line of limp jungle. How he possibly could have ridden through and survived boggled his mind.

The wind had died away, and the clouds above had taken shape. The storm was clearing. His head was still pounding, but he felt a little better. He rose to his knees, and then lurched to his feet, fighting a wave of nausea and vertigo. In the light of a filthy dawn, he could now see where he was: on a deserted coast, the gray beach stretching in either direction as far as the eye could see, a few tattered palm trees, the land receding into jungle-clad hills. No sign of life; no sign of Amy; no sign of the raft or their drybags of supplies.

A raging thirst had taken hold. His lips were cracked and bleeding. His tongue was swollen. He felt so weak he could barely stand.

He had to find Amy. Or, at least, her body. And he had to find the bundle of life preservers and the drysacks with their water.

It took all his willpower to take a step, and then he fell once again to his knees. Despite every effort, he was unable to get back onto his feet. He continued slowly on, crawling down the hard sand until he could go no farther. He lay down. He wanted badly to sleep — or, perhaps, to die. He closed his eyes.

“Gideon.”

He opened his eyes to find Amy bending over him. She looked awful — pale, thin, wet.

“Amy…thank God…”

“Let me help you up.” She grasped him under the arms, and he rose to his feet even as she staggered with the effort.

“Water…”

A bottle appeared and he fumbled for it, unscrewing the top with trembling hands, jamming it into his mouth and sucking down the liquid so desperately it spilled over his shirt.

“Easy, easy.” She laid a hand on the bottle. “Wait a minute.”

He waited, trembling. He could feel an immediate surge of energy from the water. “More.”

“Pace yourself.”

He drank more, swallowing just a little bit at a time, until the liter bottle was gone.

“More.”

“Sorry, we need to ration.”

It was amazing how quickly the water helped him regain strength and alertness. He looked about, breathing slowly and deeply. There, a few hundred yards down the beach, was the sodden bundle of life preservers. He could see Amy’s footprints in the sand.

His tongue and mouth were becoming rehydrated, and he found he could speak without croaking. “How did you survive?”

“Just as you did, I got washed up on the beach. I don’t quite know how. Karma.”

“Where are we?”

“The Mosquito Coast of Nicaragua. I’d guess we’re about twenty miles north of Monkey Point.”

“How far to the nearest settlement?”

“We don’t have a local map. This is one of the loneliest coastlines in the world. Can you walk?”

“Yes.”

“I’m a little weak myself. Give me your arm.”

They walked down the beach, supporting each other. She led him into a grove of palm trees along the verge of sand. There were the drysacks, with various items laid out and drying on banana leaves — their two weapons, knives, the satellite-phone case, the briefing book with its wet pages laid out, a dozen granola bars, bottled water — and, to Gideon’s surprise, the mysterious computer printout of a Greek manuscript Amy had been looking at on the boat, sealed in a ziplock bag that had nevertheless suffered some leakage. She sat down on the sand, and Gideon collapsed next to her.

Even in his weakened state, he couldn’t help feeling annoyed at the sight of the printout. She must have taken it with her when they abandoned the Turquesa and put it in a drysack at some point while they were on the raft. “Of all the things you could have saved — maps, GPS — you rescued that computer printout? What’s the big deal with it?”

“It’s just something I’ve been working on.”

“What?”

A shake of her head. “Later. We both need to rest. And eat.”

Gideon felt utterly spent, but now a hunger was taking hold. Amy picked up two granola bars and passed one to him.

He lay back, peeling off the wrapper and stuffing the bar into his mouth. The clouds were breaking up, and a single ray of sun came streaming through them, illuminating a spot on the sea. The granola only seemed to make him hungrier, but he could feel his strength returning.

They lay on the beach, barely moving, barely talking, slowly recovering their strength, as the day passed. As the afternoon merged into evening, the last of the clouds cleared away. Gideon now felt nearly himself again, strong and alert, unhurt save for a kind of dull and universal ache — but the passage of time had him confused. How much time had elapsed since their vessel was scuttled? Forty-eight hours? Seventy-two?

“Does the sat phone work?” he asked.

“I think so. Container’s waterproof.”

“Then we’d better call Glinn,” he said.

Amy nodded. She finished her granola bar, then took up the sat-phone container, unlatched the seals, and opened it up. The phone appeared intact. She took it out, turned it on. The LED screen popped to life.

“A miracle,” said Gideon.

“Yeah, but the battery’s run down. We’ve only got five percent juice.”

“Christ.” Gideon shook his head.

She glanced at him. “I’ll do the talking, if you don’t mind.”

“Be my guest.”

She put it on speaker and pressed the FASTDIAL key to connect with EES headquarters. A moment later Glinn himself answered. He wasted few words.

“Where are you and what’s happening?”

“Had a run-in with some treasure hunters. They shot up the boat.”

“Life raft?”

“Destroyed.”

“Launch?”

“Gone. Look, it’s a long story. We were able to sink the treasure hunters in a storm but the Turquesa went to the bottom as well.”

“Position?”

“My best guess is eleven degrees forty-four minutes North, eighty-one degrees one minute West. We’re on the Mosquito Coast maybe twenty miles north of Monkey Point, Nicaragua.”

“Do you have food and water? We’ll get a rescue vessel out to you just as soon as we can.”

“We don’t need picking up.”

Gideon looked at Amy, startled. She held up her hand, asking for his silence.

“I don’t understand,” came Glinn’s voice over the sat phone.

“We’re right where we want to be. I know where we have to go next. We can get there on foot.”

Gideon listened. This was nuts. He grabbed for the radio, but Amy held it out of his reach.

“On foot?” Glinn’s voice crackled over the radio. “I’m extremely concerned about the situation you’re in. You’ve been shipwrecked on an unknown coast. How are you going to finish the mission? We’re going to outfit a second boat for you, bring you some crew. I’m looking at the map as we speak. If you can head toward Monkey Point, there’s a lagoon just north where we can rendezvous, refit the expedition, and get you back on your feet.”

“Your concern is appreciated — but misguided,” Amy said firmly. “We’re on track. The next landmark on the map is ten miles from where we are, maybe less — I know it.”

“How do you know it?”

A silence.

“Gideon,” said Glinn, “are you there? Do you agree with this plan?”

Gideon glanced at Amy. She was staring at him. He hesitated and then said, “Yes.”

A long silence. “All right. I’m going to trust you. But I want regular updates. Twice a day, morning and night. Do you both understand?”

“We may have to make them less frequent than that,” said Amy. “I’m getting a low battery signal.”

They disconnected. Amy looked at Gideon, a smile breaking over her pale face, producing dimples he’d never seen before. “Thank you for backing me up.”

“I only did so because I expect an explanation from you.”

“You’ll just have to trust me for a little while longer—”

“No. I want an explanation now.”

This was greeted by silence.

“Christ, Amy. Here we are, castaways on a deserted coastline with nothing but a few granola bars and half a dozen liters of water. How do you know we’re still on track?”

Amy picked up the sodden briefing book and opened it to the Phorkys Map. The picture showed a flat line rising into a sharp line pointing toward a rounded line. The clue simply said, aquilonius.

“You showed me that before. What does it mean?”

“Stand up and look inland.”

Gideon did as he was told, and was immediately staggered by the two hills in the near distance: one with a sharp peak, the second rounded. “Oh, my God.”

“Yes. Oh, my God. Aquilonius is one way of saying north. So we go north, looking for the next clue.”

“Damn it, Amy, it would’ve been nice if you’d shared this with me earlier. And why hide it from Glinn?”

“Because I’ve discovered something even more incredible. It has to do with that printout I’ve been dragging around.”

“What is that damn printout, anyway?”

“The Odyssey, by Homer. Perhaps you’ve heard of it?”