She stepped boldly forward on the plaza. Ahead of her, on both sides of the wide-open space, were huge pyramids, and to her side was the biggest one so far. And while the reporters were ignorant about the structure, she had already seen the beautiful paintings on stucco inside the temple at its top. The architecture and art revealed a society that had been rich and complicated, colorful and full of life. And the place had been abandoned before the Normans invaded England.
There were sure to be hoards of priceless artifacts hidden deep in the royal tombs of a place this size. It was spectacular. She had already found a few things and they had stimulated her appetite. But even more, she wanted these newspeople to see her doing some excavating. A couple of photographs and some actual footage that could be shown on television in Europe and the United States would further the process of her transformation. Right now, she was dismissed as just one more heiress with exotic tastes. When her discoveries were all revealed, she would be a major power in the world of archaeology. Nobody would know her discoveries had all come from her Mayan codex, so she could still stage a “discovery” of it years from now and get full credit for that too.
She was perfectly dressed in a tailored explorer’s outfit, a tan shirt with epaulets and the sleeves rolled up, tailored pants in the same fabric, and polished boots, and she strode ahead with a kind of heroic energy, moving toward the huge pyramid that dominated the end of the plaza as though it were a beast she was conquering, when she heard a sudden wave of chatter behind her. She stopped and looked over her shoulder.
The journalists had come about thirty yards into the great plaza. They all seemed to be awed by the enormous size and imposing character of the city’s buildings, all of them partially sheathed in vegetation. Unlike most of the lost cities Sarah had visited, the tallest buildings were not totally obscured by the plants and dirt. Their outlines were fairly clear.
But something was wrong. They weren’t all rushing after her, elbowing one another to get close and congratulate her, to pepper her with questions about the city. They were all standing in a tight knot, looking down at their telephones and reading text or facing away from the others with their phones held to their ears. Others were facing one another, talking rapidly in their various languages, as though they were discussing some piece of astonishing news.
The only ones not in the gaggle of chattering writers were the photographers, who stood in a loose circle, filming not the miracle of human accomplishment that towered over them but the reporters and their exclamations and questions and gestures of what seemed to be shock or outrage.
One of the journalists in particular caught Sarah’s attention. He was Justin Fraker from The Times(London), a classmate of her brother, Teddy, at Eton. He had come because Teddy had promised him something — she suspected it was an invitation to a future reception at No. 10 Downing Street.
She had high hopes that Justin would make the case for her at home. She stared at him now because he was the nearest of the English speakers and it was easiest for her to read lips in English. He seemed to be saying, “This is insane. She must be joking. She can’t be serious.” She wondered who he could be talking about. She sighed. It would be just her luck if some American actress did something so outrageous that it took their attention away from her.
She turned and walked back toward the crowd of newspeople. Michelle Fauret, a stringer for Paris Match, had agreed to come because of Sarah Allersby’s reputation as a partygoer in Europe. She hurried toward Sarah, calling out, “Sarah! Sarah!” She was holding a small video camera.
Sarah Allersby was reassured. The idea that she was about to become an even bigger celebrity was titillating. She had always liked being the very rich girl, with mysterious holdings in Central America, who would sometimes appear at parties in southern France or the islands of the Mediterranean. She sensed that she was about to go from “interesting” to “fascinating.” She smiled, and said, “What is it, Michelle?”
“They’re saying that you’re a fraud. They say this site is already registered with all the archaeological organizations — that you didn’t find it. Someone else did.”
Sarah was not pleased that while Michelle was saying all this, the red light in the front of her video camera was on. She feigned an amused smile. “That’s silly,” she said. “Why would I do such a thing?”
“Look at this,” said Emil Bausch, the German columnist. He held up an iPad tablet with a photograph of the large pyramid that dominated the plaza. “This is a picture that’s on the website of the Society for American Archaeology. This whole site has already been photographed and charted.”
Jim Hargrove, an American from National Geographic, said, “How could this happen? Don’t you consult any of the organizations in the field?”
“Of course I do.” Sarah hadn’t done it lately. She had been so busy.
“Apparently, not often enough. This set of ruins is on the lists of existing finds.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Sarah Allersby. “Is this some kind of joke? I invited very few reporters here to share in an extremely rare experience. Are you now accusing me of faking something?” She waved her arm in the direction of the ancient buildings around them. “Did I build all this to fool you? These buildings are masterpieces, and the last people here left a thousand years ago.”
“The people here left three weeks ago,” said Justin Fraker. “It’s listed in the British catalogs of discovery too.” He pointed at the image on his satellite phone. “They’ve got a complete description. The map coordinates are identical. And they marked it with a pipe with a red flag that pokes out of the ground below the stairs.”
“Who are these people who supposedly left three weeks ago?” said Sarah Allersby.
“The names listed are Samuel and Remi—”
“Fargo!” she interrupted. “They’re criminals, people who have no qualifications or academic intent whatever. They’re treasure hunters. This is a trick.”
“The find is listed as a joint project with the University of California,” said Van Muckerjee, the New York Timescorrespondent. “The University of California would seem to have academic qualifications and academic intent.”
“I have no more to say about these people,” she said. “I’ll be leaving here in a half hour. I would advise you all to make your way to the helicopter landing area as soon as possible. The pilots will not be flying anyone out after dark.” She turned and began to walk along the path.
Sarah held her shining blond head high and walked in silence. The chosen group of journalists trotted after her, the photographers racing ahead so they could get a picture of her face with a snarl or a tear. Both sold a lot of papers.
The next afternoon, Sarah Allersby sat in her bedroom and looked at her computer. Posted on YouTube was a video of Sarah Allersby. She looked beautiful and triumphant as she hacked her way through the brush and stepped onto the great plaza of the old city. Then, almost immediately, things changed. The newspeople were already preparing to surround her, saying in several languages that she was a fraud. It didn’t matter whether the viewer could speak all of those languages because the reporters yelling in his language would tell him the simple version of it: “This site has already been discovered by someone else.” “This city is known.” “It’s already registered with the international organizations.” “You’re trying to fool everyone.”