“What was she researching?”
Michael got up and walked to a bookcase. He scanned the spines, pulled a weathered tome off the shelf, and brought it back to the couch. He sat next to Gabriel and opened the book. The title page said ANATOLIAN RELIGION AND CULTURE.
“Have you heard of the Three Eyes of Teshub?” Michael asked.
“I’ve heard of Teshub. Storm god of the Hittites, right?”
Michael turned the pages until he found the photograph he was looking for: a stone carving of a bearded man with a conical headdress standing on an ox’s back. Beneath the photo was the caption TESHUB IDOL, 15TH-13TH CENTURY B.C.E. “According to legend, Teshub gave the Hittites a powerful weapon called the Spearhead to protect them from their enemies. But the Spearhead was so powerful that Teshub had second thoughts. He came to believe that even his beloved Hittites lacked the wisdom to use such a weapon responsibly, so he took it away from them and hid it until some unspecified future date when three armies would meet in battle to decide its fate.” He flipped the page and handed the book to Gabriel.
On the next page was an illustration of three enormous jewels. “Looks like an ad for DeBeers,” Gabriel said.
Michael shook his head. “Those are the Three Eyes of Teshub. Supposedly, they were three gemstones that together were the key to using the Spearhead—or possibly to locating it, or perhaps to retrieving it from where it was hidden. The stories varied.”
“Don’t they always,” Gabriel said. He downed the rest of his scotch.
“Documents from the period say that when Teshub hid the Spearhead away, he called up three winds to blow the gemstones in three different directions, scattering them as far apart as possible, so that they would never be found. People have looked for them, of course. No one has found any evidence that the Three Eyes of Teshub actually existed.”
“But Joyce…?”
“Joyce discovered incomplete rubbings from a pair of tablets she thought might shed some light on the legend. The original tablets are buried away in the archives of Borneo University. She applied to us for a grant to cover the cost of her trip.” Michael returned the book to its spot on the shelf. “Her application might not have leapt to the top of the stack otherwise, but…” He went back to his desk, checked for new e-mail once more. Nothing. “But how could I say no to Daniel Wingard’s niece? And it wasn’t much money. I figured no harm could come of it, a trip to a university library.” He dropped into his chair. “And now she’s missing. I’ve tried calling her, I’ve called our man down there, I’ve asked people at the university if they’ve seen her—nothing. Who knows what sort of trouble she might have gotten herself into? I couldn’t live with myself if I thought anything had happened to her because of me.”
Gabriel set his glass down on the table, pushed the box containing the mummy’s hand to one side. “If you’re really worried about her, Michael, I can go down there and look around a bit. Shouldn’t be too hard to find her.”
Michael shook his head firmly. “No. Bad enough that she’s missing, think how I’d feel putting you in danger as well.”
“Putting me in danger? You’re kidding, right?” Gabriel said. “I don’t think a week’s gone by since Joyce Wingard was in pigtails when I wasn’t in danger. It’s what I do.”
“And you know I’ve never been comfortable with it,” Michael said. “I certainly wouldn’t want to be the cause of it.”
“You wouldn’t be the cause,” Gabriel said. “Joyce Wingard would. Besides, I haven’t been to Borneo in ages. About time for a trip back.”
“You might not recognize it,” Michael said in a quiet voice. “Half the rain forest’s gone.”
“All the more reason to go now, before they cut down the other half.”
“Gabriel…”
“She’s probably fine, Michael. I’ll probably find her in the museum archives, elbow deep in notes and files, with her phone turned off and no idea how long it’s been since she last e-mailed you.”
“But what if you don’t?” Michael said.
Gabriel thought of the headstrong, impish, pigtailed girl chasing him around her uncle’s picnic table, squealing with laughter as she tried to catch him. He remembered her showing him her toys, how she took special pride in one in particular, a Barbie dressed in safari gear and an explorer’s pith helmet. He remembered her playing tag in the woods with Michael, who’d been only a couple years older than her. Joyce had fallen, skinned her knee on a rock, and wouldn’t let anyone pick her up and carry her back to the house. She’d insisted on walking, even with blood trickling down her leg, and shouting that she could do it herself, didn’t need anyone’s help.
But this time maybe she did.
“Then you’ll be glad I went,” Gabriel said. “How soon can you have the plane ready?”
Chapter 3
It was Monday afternoon local time when the Hunt Foundation’s jet touched down at Sepinggan International Airport in Balikpapan, on the southern coast of Borneo. In the airport’s waiting area, small suitcase in hand, he scanned the crowd. Michael had arranged for a man named Noboru to meet him here. Formerly Japanese Intelligence, now employed by the Hunt Foundation, he’d been Joyce’s contact on the tropical island. If anyone was in a position to turn up any clues as to what had happened to her, it would be Noboru—though he hadn’t found any yet when Michael had spoken to him from New York.
The waiting area was crowded with people holding signs written in Indonesian and Malaysian Bahasa, Kadazandusun, Iban, Bidayuh, Arabic and a dozen other scripts. Despite the air-conditioning, the room smelled of sweat and spices. Small vendor huts were set up along the walls, selling dumplings, pork buns and bowls of noodles.
A hand fell on Gabriel’s shoulder. “Mr. Hunt?”
He turned. A man of about fifty stood behind him. He had long, shaggy black hair, Asian features, a jawline spotted with dark stubble and a face deeply wrinkled from the sun.
“Mr. Noboru?”
The man nodded and shook Gabriel’s hand. “Your brother told me you were coming. Welcome to Borneo. I just wish your visit were under better circumstances. Here, let me get that for you.” He took Gabriel’s suitcase and led the way outside. The moment Gabriel passed through the sliding glass doors into the open air, an oppressive humidity pressed down on him like a heavy, moist blanket. He followed Noboru to the parking lot, where hundreds of cars gleamed in the sweltering sun. Noboru threw the suitcase into the backseat of a mud-spattered, topless jeep and climbed into the driver’s seat.
Gabriel joined him up front. “Where are we headed?”
“Inland, toward Central Kalamitan,” Noboru said. “Where I dropped Joyce when she first arrived. It’s a long drive, but we ought to be there before nightfall, Mr. Hunt.”
“Mr. Hunt was my father,” he said. “And these days it’s my brother. I just go by Gabriel.”
Noboru nodded. “Make yourself comfortable.” He started the engine, stepped on the gas, and the jeep lurched out of the parking lot with a great roar and a plume of black exhaust. Gabriel grabbed the roll bar as Noboru sped through a series of hairpin turns to get them onto the highway.
The farther they got from Balikpapan, the more it felt like they were traveling back in time. The highway devolved into an unpaved dirt road and the tall apartment buildings of the city were replaced by wooden shacks surrounded by dense jungle. They passed a line of women walking alongside the road, dressed in the brightly dyed linens of the indigenous Dayaks and balancing water jugs and baskets of rice on their shoulders. A few minutes later, Gabriel saw another woman kneeling beside the road and hammering something into the ground. As they drove past, he saw it was a wooden post with the skull of a goat lashed to the top.