The Curious Quests of Brigadier Ffellowes Read online

  "Well, Lucas held up one hand to me in silence. Then he pointed to the forward path and tapped his own chest and shaded his brows with the other hand. Finally he pointed to me and then to the ground behind a giant tree. The whole message took one second. He would scout and I would remain and wait. I simply nodded and got behind the tree. I'm fairish in the woods but was not a patch on Lucas and we both recognized the fact.

  "It seemed a long time to me, once he had gone, moving off in the direction we'd been going, not on the path but near it and as silently as any native hunter I've ever seen. I've seen a goodish few in many parts of the world, so that's no mean compliment!

  "It wasn't really much actual time at all, no more than a few moments, he suddenly reappeared from behind the next tree to mine, coming back as noiselessly as he had left 'Follow now, Captain,' he murmured, his mouth next to my ear. 'Is very old city, close in front; very old, broken-up place, the kind place science men come from all over to look at an' study.'

  " 'Do'you mean an ancient Mayan ruin?' I whispered back. 'No!' came the quick reply. 'I got Mayan blood with French an' Spaniol too. I know the Mayan stuff an' I got plenty Mayan frens' too, and I can speak Mayan a bit. I know their old places, like Xunantunich, which is not too far Nort' of where we are an' I been to lots more up in Quintana Roo. This place, she's, well, different—' He paused a second, obviously trying to find some descriptive phrase in his slurred English. He soon gave up and shrugged. 'I tell you this, Sar. This place no more like any Mayan place than that stink of that hairy man we kill, the stink we smell now, like sputa's perfume!'

  "I couldn't help smiling and he gave one of his rare half-smiles back. The analogy was crude but effective. If the place he was describing was no more Mayan than that foul odor we'd learnt to know was like a whore's perfume, it must be very different indeed!

  "Well, there was no time for being humorous. I, in turn, tapped his shoulder and pointed to the trail's right, then tapped my chest and pointed to its left 'Go very slow and stay even with me,' I breathed. He understood at once that I was telling him I couldn't match his pace or his stealth in his own jungles and nodded. And so we set off, one on either side of the path where there was little scrub due to the dense foliage overhead and the shade it gave. The chief obstacles were the giant tree roots, some types of which spread out in huge flanges, tall as a man where they joined the tree."

  The Brigadier took a long drag on one of his thin cigars. Around us the big room was quiet, the few lamps illuminating only their own corners. I think the thick, old carpets added to the hush by absorbing sound. The roar of New York traffic was a monotonous and unheard or unnoticed hum, and only an occasional siren or police car whoop-whoop even drew one's attention to it. We, his audience, were like children told to be quiet or we'd get no story. We moved only when we had to, breathing as quietly as we could.

  "I got to hate those damned trees," he resumed. "The giant roots were a nuisance and so were the bunches of vines, some large and some thread-like, which hung to the ground in many places. But the real reason was simple fear of what might be up above, ready to drop on our backs and even worse, might be watching us and stalking us from up above.

  I had seen that great monkeyman we'd shot and knew quite well how quietly and agilely he had moved down a vertical rock face. Only his appalling odor had alerted me, though the others, the two younger men with their keen senses, had felt that we were under observation long before I did." He looked around at the intent faces and smiled.

  "I've been on shikar up in Garwhal after a maneater, a tiger who'd already got two experienced hunters. That was bad but this was worse, I can tell you. My own view is that we're too used to danger from two dimensions only. A bomb or a diving plane or even rocket or missile is different. One knows the danger but it is still a mechanism at its worst. No one thinks of an animal striking from above, save for a few folk in the world who live in leopard country. Aside from Pantherapardus there ain't no such animal, as you might say in this country. Despite a lot of nonsensical and faked stories by so-called 'explorers,' pythons do not drop from trees on human beings, of whom they have a very sensible fear. Very rarely, a big one may use that method on a small antelope, but I've never come across such a case aside from occasional comments by old hunters which are at least meant to be the truth and I mean not told to impress the ignorant or to make a news story.

  "From time to time I could see Lucas, though damn seldom hear him, as we both climbed over roots and ducked tangles of liana on opposite sides of the narrow trail.

  "In case either of us should forget where we were and why, that foul stench, the odour of those man-apes or apemen, was a persistent and excellent reminder to stay alert. It didn't seem to increase or get worse or such. It didn't need to. It was just there, all about us or rather about that track we were skirting. Once or twice a vast root led me a bit away from our route and it grew fainter rather swiftly. That to me clearly meant one thing. What we were sliding along was their path, and the smell was a result of constant usage.

  "We hadn't actually gone far when we checked and halted, both of us. I daresay Lucas alone could have done it in half the time and been not a bit less silent about it either. I suddenly saw his hand across the trail, just the hand projecting from a clump of glossy green bromeliads or something. I stopped short and saw one finger point ahead. It stayed that way for a second; then the hand flattened, fingers pointing ahead and all together. That gesture was held for a second too; then the whole palm, fingers and all, made a downward motion. It made the motion three times. I held a hand up so he could see it and made a circle with forefinger and thumb. Everyone seems to know that gesture. He'd told me that we were almost there, that we'd move ahead but would do so at a crawl. I'd answered that his signal was received. End of exchange.

  "So I went into a Boy Scout or, if you prefer, a Commando crawl at the very left edge of the path. Lucas appeared and did the same on the other side. We moved out.

  "It wasn't far or even much of a muscle strain for me. I'm sure that it was nothing to my partner. In about two hundred feet, the path made an almost right-angle curve. I got my head carefully around the corner as did Lucas. And there it was, a sight that any museum in the world would have given its last cent for and perhaps 5/6 of its endowment for even a verified set of photographs!

  "In front of us, a couple of hundred yards away, lay a hidden city. And I do mean hidden. The ground sloped down in front of us at about a 45° pitch. The trees stopped where we were concealed, leaving only low forms of vegetation, none over knee height, mixed with patches of smooth, damp, black rock and stretches of equally damp, brown sand. A couple of hundred yards away, the slope ceased and the ground became level. Well beyond the point where this started, there rose a high, stone wall, made of vast, reddish-hued blocks. Behind this obstacle and starting almost next to the wall were tall, cylindrical towers.

  "And, Gentlemen, why do I emphasize the phrase hidden? Simply due to one fact. A cliff lay just behind the city, a cliff perhaps a sixth of a mile high. Now, due to some earlier convulsion of Nature, of God knows how long ago and Central America is still a great active, volcanic spine the cliff had leaned out and over the strange metropolis. Much more likely, of course, this very odd formation had been discovered in ancient times by whomever built the perishing place to begin with. They'd simply used the cover of this, well, call it a geologic scoop turned parasol. They found the place and built their lair under it to suit. The result was, among other forms of protection, such as a weather shield and such, they had a place that enemies could only approach from one direction. Plus an added benefit and one they couldn't and in this case I'm frankly guessing, since there were strange things about this place, have calculated on it at least in their day. From the air, the whole complex was invisible! Nothing but smoke could give anything away, and planes over Central America were and are most unlikely to notice smoke. What with endless patches of vulcanism and thousands of unknown and/or tiny villages in de
nse rain forest or scrub forest why should any pilot even bother?

  "I looked at my watch. It was midafternoon and we could see very well how this extraordinary place was built or rather had been built for it was certainly very old indeed. And gone somewhat to ruin as well. There was a vast wooden gate in the wall's center. It was shut tight but there were gaps in it where the wood had rotted and they were unfilled gaps, some big enough to take a small car and with ragged edges. Some parts of the upper tier of the giant wall blocks were simply gone, leaving a broken, crenellated effect I could see a number of the great squares of stone lying outside the wall with grass growing around and over them but not enough to fill all those empty spaces by far. It was puzzling.

  "Lucas, who was lying beside me now behind a clump of bushes, was the faster thinker at this point as he was in others. 'Not enough stone in front, right, Captain? Not to fill them holes?' I simply nodded, having nothing to say.

  " 'I don't think that breakings were done by people, Captain,' he continued. 'Them stones they mus' weigh a half ton mebbe, each one. Well, mebbe I crazy but I think those other stones that don' be out front where we see them, I think they inside, behin' that monstruss wall. I don't think people done it, Nossuh. I think there be an earthquake, mebbe long time gone. Some of those ol' temple things that stick up behind, they look the same, I think.'

  "As his very shrewd reasoning proceeded, he grew quite excited and talked faster as well as pointing to what he meant 'See that tall towah on the lef? It still got a round top on but it ain't straight up and down. It lean a bit. There's two more like that in the middle an' on the right two that leaned over too much an' break halfway up.' The clever fellow looked at me with a rather pathetic inquiry in his eyes. 'I'm not much educate, not like you, but do that mebbe make a sense, Captain?'

  "My answer was enthusiastic and I showed it by punching his near shoulder. 'Dam right it makes good sense, man. You know more about this place than I ever will, Lucas, but by God it's more than that! You can think and you make me feel stupid! That's a perfect answer and one I'd never have got on to for months!'

  "It was worth a lot to see the broad grin, a thing I'd only seen once before from Lucas. He was a silent man and though always decent, he was both reserved and for this part of the world, very taciturn. Now his pleasure vanished as quickly as it had come, and with one accord we both turned back to study that amazing place before us.

  "I was fairly tired, though by no means exhausted, yet that hidden lair of strange architecture was like a stimulant, not just to the eye but to all the senses and of course, especially to the imagination, to what in a child is called 'a sense of wonder.'

  "We could see at least a dozen of the strange, cylindrical towers, all built of the same reddish stone, or at least those in front certainly were. Some could barely be glimpsed at all for they were far back in the shadow of that bizarre cliff which roofed the whole thing. The wall ran about three hundred yards on a flat plane across the front and then curved sharply in at each end. I imagine it ran right back to the cliff face, deep in the blackness of the great cavity's back. In the center, but well back, was a tower which looked much bulkier than the others. It got just enough of the brilliant sun so that I could see its domed roof was colored, and that the color was a golden hue. All the other intact, dome roofs were of the same red hue as the towers and the mighty wall. Why not, I thought Gold-plated temples ranged from central Mexico all the way to southern Peru in the Andes. The old MesoAmericans used the precious metal the way we Europeans used bronze or even tin. No doubt this was the main temple, the religious and political HQ. of the entire culture which had built the place. And who could they be? Just as I was slowly returning to the present, two things brought me back with a rush!

  "One was Lucas. 'How come there is no plant on them walls?' he whispered, 'an' I don' see any peoples at all. We can smell 'em good back on that track. Where they is, d'you think? All inside now?'

  "The other stimulant to end daydreams followed like an answer to his questions. I had just realized that the walls must have been cleaned to stay so free of any growth, when out of the depths of that incredible, cave city there came a sound. And what a sound! It was a long, howling wail.

  "How one noise, obviously from a throat not an instrument, could express all that this one did, I can't conceive still. It held menace, it held despair, it held defiance and even triumph, all in one hellish, ululating wail! I've heard badly-played bagpipes playing laments, gentlemen, but their bad mix of sadness and off-key notes was 'Merry Christmas' by comparison. And it had great depth and volume, too. Lucas and I cocked an eye at each other, at the same time we stopped slapping bugs, wiping sweaty faces and froze where we lay, listening and staring. We guessed what kind of throat that was!

  "The appalling sound died slowly away and once again one became aware of insect hums and bird calls. The pause was brief. Then it came again, exactly the same. Another brief pause and repeated a third time.

  "In bright sunlight, tropical too, I felt as chilled and numbed by that ghastly sound as if I'd been plunged into an Arctic night. As the third cry died slowly away, neither of us had any inclination to move. We waited, just lay there, not even hearing the normal forest sounds as they became audible again. My head was buzzing and not with deafness or shock either but with scrambled thoughts and recollections.

  "I thought of the long-lost 'Jones,' our sometime area agent, and the strange code message tossed into the Hooper's trading schooner. All stirred up in that was a mess of other points; the apeman thing we'd killed, my giant, lovely 'catgirl' we'd caught and left behind, the vague but quite definite avoidance of the whole region we were in, all of that and more. That lost and hidden site before us and its architecture, unlike anything I'd ever glimpsed, anywhere in the world, jumbled with 'Jones' and the warnings of danger and the demand for troops, fast, plus my own memories of reading the Tarzan stories and their 'lost city in central Africa' that Burroughs had named Opar, in his wonderful, self-taught, imaginative fiction. Fiction? Was it all fiction? Had he heard rumors or tales of something real? And then there was my recently-acquired 'catgirl' and the jumble of what might be legend and/or fact Lucas and I had got from her through the maze of partial comprehension. Through that last, ran another thought or rather a feeling, you know, an emotion so to speak. Very strong one, too; I felt that adjective 'my' and 'mine' to the depths of my being. My girl, that incredible, tall, female thing! And with that came more lunacy, such as her comparing me to another man, her alleged 'tale teller', whose name in English came out as 'Philip Joseph Farmer', and who 'knew all about everything and who had escaped her people.' "

  Here Ffellowes stopped for breath and a quick drink. The library stayed utterly quiet. Then he began again.

  "Must really sound as if I was and am still batty, eh? Felt a bit that way myself, though hopelessly confused, hyper-nerved up and more than a bit scared as well, might sum up what I was feeling then. The twin blows on eyes and ears at this point staring at this weird, shrouded city with its aura of abnormal age, and then those shocking sounds too. You fellows would have had to be there to understand.

  "Then I checked my watch for something to do that was normal. Damn if a full twenty minutes had passed since that third, moaning yell had quit. I looked at Lucas but his eyes were fixed in front locked on that great stone wall. I looked back at it too, as if pulled by the thing, sort of mesmerized. So I also saw it all, from the start.

  "As if laid on for an instant vision, pre-ordered by Fate or God, the great half-rotted gates in the wall began to open!

  "My jaw must have dropped and Lucas' did because I saw it out of the corner of my eye. Sort of thing one sees unconsciously and only recalls as fact long afterward. In any case, and my apologies for these random divergencies, slowly and creakingly the bloody things opened, shoving back built-up soil and plants as they did. There must have been one or more other exits from that cavernous fort and it really was more of a huge fort than a city. In a se
cond, you'll hear and realize why there had to be."

  He took a long breath, the only one to be heard in that big room, and continued. "Shocking the way I forget to tell details. Those gates were not pushed open by machines or electricity. On the inside of each half, exerting three times at least the strength that the same numbers of men could have done, were five goldy-red pelted bipeds. I didn't need to look at my neighbor. We knew what they were as if we'd smelt 'em. But these specimens were dressed, unlike what had fallen upon us earlier. They had short kilts of stuff that glittered like woven metal, which in fact it was, as we soon saw. There were things hanging from heavy belts as well, things that had to be weapons and some of them glinted brightly also. One had something strapped to his or her back which looked awfully familiar to me. If it wasn't a rifle it was a close copy, and I could discern the breech and metal-tipped butt easily.

  "This was all happening rather fast, but I'm trying to keep my tale a bit slow deliberately, so as not to miss anything else as I almost just did. Next, the ten gate openers fell back and lined up, each bunch of five with backs to its own half of the gate. There was a hush and even the distant birds seemed to shut up. All at once, there was movement in the shadowy opening, movement and noise. Barking cries, the clank of metal, the thudding of feet, all came at once. No problem for me to construe. I'd heard variants of that noise all my life. An armed body of considerable size had begun to move. If my eyes had been shut it might have been the Scots Guards, same number of U.S. Marines or probably even a gang of Alexander's hoplites for that matter. Any troops make the same noises at times. I expect Chaka's Zulu regiments would have sounded much the same when moving out. Because one thing allies all such groups, which is discipline and a cadence, a rhythm. And what was now appearing through the gate had it. The strangest little army on our planet was marching, not walking, marching out, and they were in both a formation, a column of fives, and in step to boot. Lousy pun, that, since they were barefoot.