CHAPTER TWO

“Gordon sneaked up on you, too, did he?” Charles’ mind’s eye had the scenario down pat. “Shot him before he knocked your brains out?”

Obviously, Teddy wasn’t following the projection as well as the others. “Shot who?”

“Shot Gordon?” Melanie put to him. The idea made her queasy. She didn’t want responsibility, and the tale, as conjured by Charles, painted her as some kind of femme fatale, right in the middle.

“You think I shot Gordon?” Teddy sounded incredulous.

“Didn’t you?” Charles held fast to his theory of an attractive woman, two jealous swains, and the passion-spawning isolation of the Amazon Basin.

“We heard three shots.” Carolyne blew a stray wisp of grey-rooted red hair out of her green eyes. “You did say Gordon was dead?” She didn’t trust her memory.

“He’s dead, all right, but I didn’t kill him. My gunshots were attempts to save him; I was just too late.”

“Take it from the top, why don’t you?” Melanie figured any reality was better than her uncle’s fanciful imagination.

“Jaguar got him,” Teddy obliged.

“Jaguar?” It was Carolyne’s turn at incredulity.

“Cat, big as a house.”

Carolyne had trouble buying it. It contradicted her theory of wildlife, that size, forced into deeper jungle by encroaching civilization.

“It had to have taken him unaware; I didn’t hear Gordon make a sound.” Teddy gave Melanie a comforting hug. “It was the animal growls that got my attention.”

Melanie shivered. Disappointed by a jungle so apparently sterile of fauna, she’d wished for one of the big cats, and here it was. It just went to prove that the bane of all wishing was the chance the wish might come true.

“Once I had the cat in sight, I saw it was mauling Gordon; I fired and scared it off. I may even have hit it. Whatever, it genuinely took off like a bat out of hell.”

“Horrible!” Melanie didn’t doubt.

“We’ve seen no previous sign of any big cats,” Carolyne complained. “We’ve seen no sufficient amount of smaller animals to support a carnivore.”

“Which might account for the animal attacking Gordon,” Felix, eyes shut, added his two cents.

Teddy noticed Felix for what seemed the first time. “What happened to you?”

“The same fate as happened to our radio.” Felix tried to open his eyes but decided against it. The pain was receding but had a long way to go.

“Someone sneaked up and laid poor Felix low,” Carolyne clarified. “Same person apparently smashed our radio and ran off with our SOS device.”

“Uncle Charles figures it was all part of Gordon’s plan to get back at you.”

“Get back at me?” Teddy answered his own question: “Because of our little to-do last night, you mean?”

“Seemed more than a little to-do to me,” Charles argued.

“You think I’d blow Gordon away for his wanting to kiss Melanie? Lighten up, Charles!”

“I see it as a spontaneous reaction to Gordon coming at you with a club.”

“What club? There was no club.”

“I keep trying to tell him that the thing with Gordon was no big deal.” Melanie couldn’t believe her uncle kept trying to make it something more than it was.

“Oh, it was a big enough deal, all right,” Teddy disagreed with Melanie. “It just wasn’t so big that I’d kill the guy over it.”

“You sound more magnanimous in retrospect.” Charles held firmly to his way of seeing things.

“With time to think it over, I figure I might have tried a kiss from Melanie, too, in Gordon’s shoes,” admitted Teddy, an accusatory glance in Melanie’s direction.

“Where’s Gordon now?” Carolyne brought the conversation back to where she wanted it.

“That way,” Teddy said, his arm movement encompassing a lot of the surrounding jungle. He narrowed it down: “Not far from the river. I was going to bury the poor bastard, but there are only a couple feet of topsoil.”

“We better move fast,” Carolyne took charge. “If a big cat is hungry enough to attack a man, your shots won’t scare him far, especially if he’s now wounded.”

Melanie released her hold on Teddy. “I’ll get my camera.”

“God, Melanie!” Teddy was aghast.

Carolyne was less shocked. “It’s best to have a record, Teddy. It’ll be at least a week before we get out with the bad news, longer before anybody gets back here. A lot can happen to a body in that time, considering this environment.”

“It’s not something Melanie should even see,” Teddy insisted.

Once again, Carolyne argued Melanie’s case. “It’s something none of us should see, but that doesn’t mean we won’t later be asked questions whose answers will be better accompanied with substantiation. Melanie knows photography better than the lot of us.”

“It’s okay, Teddy.” Melanie was less certain than she sounded, but she went for her camera nevertheless.

Teddy continued to object: “It just, somehow, seems macabre to photograph the corpse.”

“The police do it all of the time,” Melanie reminded, camera in hand. “My college photography class had one of the cameramen who do that sort of thing come around to guest-lecture.”

“From whom you gleaned enough insight to handle this?” Teddy didn’t make it a statement.

Melanie was piqued. She wasn’t a child but a grown woman good at her chosen hobby. Carolyne had had no trouble seeing that, so what was Teddy’s problem? “I’m doing this as much for you as for anyone, you know?” Melanie said. His look said he didn’t follow that, so she spelled it out. “You think Uncle Charles has given up on his version of the story, especially when he’s had a few drinks? Without the very best photographic record of this, do you really want to tell the authorities that a jaguar killed the man you assaulted, and it did so at a spot that probably hasn’t seen another jaguar in years?”

“Look, Melanie,” Teddy was conciliatory; “while I’ll concede that pictures are a great idea, I’d just prefer it if I took them. Or, how about Felix? He has a camera.”

“Felix is staying right here with his headache,” said Felix. “If whoever wants to finish me off, the way I feel, he’s welcome to me.”

“Shouldn’t someone stay with you?” Carolyne suggested.

“If anyone had really wanted me dead, I’d likely be dead,” Felix said and rubbed the bump on his head.

“Nevertheless.…” Carolyne was prepared to argue the point.

“No baby-sitter required!” Felix insisted.

Meanwhile, Melanie had conflicting emotions: appreciation of her fiancé’s concern, loathing of his assumption that he, Felix, or both, were better prepared to photograph death than was she, a woman. It was a streak of male chauvinism she’d recognized in him before; not appreciated.

“It’s a matter of depth perception, clarity of focus, perspective,” Melanie reminded. “There are certain learned techniques of photography that make me the obvious best choice. For instance, consider the scratch marks on the victim.”

“What about the scratch marks?” Teddy asked.

“Has anyone else, here, realized that something like, say, a tube of lipstick, laid out beside them, can help immeasurably in later determining how long and wide the marks are, or, more importantly, how far apart they are, for comparisons, should the jaguar claim another victim?”

“I never realized you were such a forensics expert,” Teddy said and didn’t sound all that impressed with his discovery.

* * * *

“How much farther?” Charles complained.

Teddy’s answer: “Closer than Melanie or you should find yourselves wishing.”

Melanie was no longer even vaguely flattered by Teddy’s protective attitude. She found it condescending. When was the last time, not counting this one, that he had seen a jaguar-ravaged body? Had he been made dysfunctional by the experience?

Actually, he had looked in quite a state when he’d stumbled into camp; that memory made her less critical.

As predicted, the scene wasn’t pretty. Melanie got ill before, during, and after photographing it; she wasn’t alone if green faces and gagging reflexes were any indication. It was only her inherent need to do the job right that provided the impetus she needed to see her through it.

“How many pictures did you take?” Carolyne held Melanie’s head while the young women dry-heaved for not the first time.

“A twelve-picture digital chip’s worth.” Melanie accepted another wet-wipe and wondered how Carolyne kept producing them from a seemingly endless supply. The taste in her mouth wasn’t to be believed; Carolyne offered a breath mint.

“Wouldn’t you agree that’s enough?”

Melanie nodded.

When they rejoined the men, it wasn’t Melanie’s photographs any longer in question.

“Unbelievable!” Teddy didn’t look happy. He slapped his hat against his right thigh; no dust resulted, but there was a spray of dampness and perspiration. “I tell you, I heard and saw the animal.”

“No one denies the animal,” Roy argued. “It’s the time sequence suddenly in question.”

This perked Melanie’s ears, even before her uncle’s follow-up, “It just pulls Felix’s bonk on the head, and the radio’s destruction, in out of left field.”

“What does?” Carolyne asked.

“Roy here.…” Teddy’s hat-holding hand irritatingly swung in the prospector’s direction. “…says we’ve a murder.”

“Murder?” Melanie and Carolyne harmonized; Melanie, already weak, accepted Carolyne’s offer of momentary physical support.

“Something about rocks in the head,” Charles added cryptically. He corrected: “Rather, rock on the head.”

“This rock in particular.” Roy knelt on one knee and turned back the upper edge of the blanket they’d used to cover the body. Most of the dead man’s face remained blessedly concealed.

“On which Gordon hit his head when the jaguar took him down?” Carolyne interpreted.

“Wrong sequence of events,” Charles corrected but left Roy to provide specifics.

“No way would that rock be there for his head to hit, if left to Mother Nature.”

“I don’t understand,” Melanie confessed.

Once again, Carolyne was quicker on the uptake. “It’s river rock.”

“So agrees our visiting geologist,” Charles confirmed.

“Just over there is the river,” Melanie pointed in that direction.

“And there the river has been for a very long time, geologically speaking,” Roy explained. “But, dig down to bedrock, anywhere on this side of the river, and you’ll not find another stone like this one, here. It’s water-smooth and round.”

“Rivers flood,” Teddy reminded. “Stones in those rivers bang together and get smooth.”

“Indeed,” Roy agreed. “However, indicative geology says this river always floods eastward. It’s a matter of a steep western gradient formed by an intrusion of igneous rock along an ancient fault line.”

“All you grad students understand?” Charles was delighted by his comprehension. “We’re right back to passion as a motivation for murder.”

“You’re back to saying I killed him, you silly old fool?” Teddy challenged.

“Self-defense is an acceptable motive for murder,” Charles reminded. “Maybe, that rock was meant for your head before you wrestled it away from him.”

“Assisted by a conveniently handy hungry jaguar? Take my word: had I wanted Gordon dead, I would have shot him and dumped his body where no on would ever find it.”

“Stop, you two!” Carolyne insisted.

She turned back to Roy who seemed the only man present with his full wits about him. “Let me see if I’ve this geology stuff straight.”

He obliged by reiterating in layman terms. “The river flows along a fault line with harder rock on this side than on the other. The softer, more easily eroded, soil has always seen the water flood in its direction. No matter the volume, the water wouldn’t naturally have put that river rock, here, where it presently is. To have it here, someone would have had to go to the river and get it.”

“There’s always the possibility someone, for some other reason than murder, toted that rock here,” Carolyne pointed out. “There was once a substantial Indian population in residence, correct?”

Melanie confirmed, in that her father’s journals had mentioned as much. “Likewise, prospectors, geologists, anthropologists, zoologists, lepidopterists, botanists, and who knows who else tramp, tramp, tramping through.”

“The world is full of weirder coincidences than a man attacked by a jaguar and gone down to hit his head on a rock brought in by natives to sharpen spear points.” Carolyne decided that was a more comfortable alternative than murder.

Teddy turned on Charles. “If you don’t buy that, you old fool, how about you as the killer?”

“I?” Apparently, Charles found that notion so ludicrous that it bore repeating. “I? Why would I want Gordon dead?”

“He attacked your niece. You weren’t the one to protect her. That must have played havoc with your manliness.”

“Absurd!” Charles looked around for additional support.

“You have an alibi for the time of the murder?” Teddy pressed; Melanie wished he’d quit goading her uncle, and vice versa.

“You tell me the exact time of the murder,” Charles said, craftily, “and I’ll tell you exactly where I was.”

“It’s doubtful any of us have alibis.” Carolyne figured it was time to pull them together, their bickering not helping anything. “Gordon died between leaving Charles on the other side of the gully and.…”

“With him at the last, weren’t you, old man?” Teddy interrupted.

“Please!” Melanie gave a small tug on Teddy’s muscled arm; he glowered but shut up.

“Just when did he leave you, Charles?” Carolyne stepped in.

“Eleven o’clock. I waited until almost noon to cross back over that rotting tree trunk he insisted was a viable bridge.”

“He told you where he was headed, did he?” Teddy remained prosecutorial; Melanie suspected it was in return for Charles’ romantic fantasies, but she couldn’t enjoy her uncle pitifully on the defensive.

“He was going to the toilet if you must know.”

“Mighty long potty break,” Teddy decided to no one’s appreciation but his own.

“He complained of dysentery. We’ve all had it.”

Teddy enjoyed the spotlight shifted to Charles; Melanie continued to think her fiancé cruel to bombard her uncle who, despite all his ridiculous conjecture, had always given Teddy the out of self-defense. “I figure Charles followed Gordon, did the dastardly deed, and scurried back to camp before I found what his obliging accomplice, the jaguar, had left of the corpse.”

“Even I could have gotten here and back without being seen,” Melanie emphasized Carolyne’s earlier comment that any one of them could have committed the deed—if the deed had been done.

Teddy didn’t like her blood-thicker-than-water attitude. “Melanie had a motive, too, did you, my dear, having been mauled by Gordon even if in a different way than Gordon was mauled by the jaguar?”

Melanie’s response was sarcastic to cover her hurt. “Thank-you so much for that!” She broke all physical contact with him and moved apart. “How quickly I’ve gone from poor little thing, hardly up to photographing a dead man, to cold-blooded killer responsible for making the man dead in the first place.”

Teddy looked apologetic but didn’t say as much. This did little to endear him to Melanie who stepped closer to Charles without completely closing the gap; Charles’ accusations remained as ridiculous.

“Let’s leave the cross-examination to those more qualified, shall we?” Carolyne couldn’t swallow the love sick psychopath, the jealous fiancé in self-defense, the irate uncle, or the Melanie only got kissed, as real motives for murder. Maybe, she was too old to remember intense passion sparked by love, lust, infatuation, or whatever, but this Gordon-Melanie-Teddy-Charles quadrangle seemed too sophomoric as foreplay to murder. Pretty young women, even those with good-looking fiancés, had always flirted with other handsome young men; those same young women, as often as not, having second thoughts when things got too far out of hand. The world over, fiancés defended their bruised honors by fisticuffs, not murder. It was a rite of passage that only occasionally exploded into the seriousness of homicide. Besides, Gordon had simply not seemed all that smitten by Melanie, or all that resentful of his well-deserved comeuppance at the hands of Teddy, to go off the deep end and get himself killed in the process. As for her even imagining that Charles hit Gordon with a stone carried from the river, her mind’s-eye picture of that would have made her laugh aloud if not for the sobering body laid out less than six feet from her.

“Do we bury the evidence?” Roy’s question sounded more aptly put to cohorts in a crime than to the present group; belatedly, Carolyne realized he referred to the body. “If so, we’ll have to take him across the river, in that any grave in this insufficient layer of topsoil invites vulnerability.”

Carolyne didn’t ask, “Vulnerability to what?” what with a hungry jaguar still on the prowl. Claws that had done what they had already done would have little trouble displacing a few feet of newly turned soil. Nor did she need it pointed out that any grave on the other side of the river was vulnerable, in its own right, albeit to subtler despoilers, like heat, moisture, and bacteria. Things were recycled mind-bogglingly fast in surroundings like these. Obviously, the killer, if there was one, had taken advantage by assuring expert analysis of his deed was more than a week away. Whatever forensics had to work with when they arrived, it wouldn’t be nearly as good as if a radio transmission or satellite-transmitted SOS had brought them running sooner.

“Definitely, I don’t think we should give the jaguar another chance at him,” Charles decided. “Surely, between us, we can get him to a suitable site and buried deep enough.”

“I say we inter him behind the waterfall.” It was a suggestion made by Carolyne with some trepidation. She hadn’t liked Gordon all that much, and antagonizing his possible killer wasn’t something at the head of her to-do list. On the other hand, she never took kindly to people who played God, let alone to those who tried to put something over on her. If Roy hadn’t pointed out the incongruity of that particular stone, would Carolyne have seen it on her own? Probably not.

She tried to minimize her present cleverness, in the eyes of any killer who might take umbrage to her efforts to thwart him. “The cave is closer and more convenient than ferrying the body across the river.”

“Brilliant!” Melanie congratulated. “It’s cooler, too, isn’t it? The body will be better preserved when the authorities finally do arrive on the scene.”

Silently, Carolyne bemoaned Melanie having brought that to the attention of any killer. In consolation, it was unlikely any killer would have missed the obvious even if Melanie hadn’t spelled out the obvious. Which was no derogatory reflection on Melanie’s intelligence, except so far as Carolyne, never a beauty herself, had an inherent bias that made it difficult to equate prom queen with discoverer of a possible cure for cancer. She sometimes forgot the genes of Cornelius Ditherson were locked somewhere within that attractive package. Charles, not too shabby a scientist in his own right, had arisen from that very same impressive gene pool.

“Natural refrigeration, so to speak.” It wasn’t a question but Teddy pondering that possibility. “It might work.”

“It’ll certainly be worth the try,” Roy agreed.

“There are those natural niches in the cave wall,” Melanie reminded. “We can put Gordon in one of those and block it off with stones.”

“Stones big enough to thwart any recovery attempts by Mr. Hungry Jaguar,” Charles added his congratulations.

“Two at a time on the litter,” Roy summated logistics, “the third walking shotgun and trading off duties with the other two.” Felix, back at camp, wasn’t counted. “The ladies can devote full-time to making sure the cat doesn’t appear unexpectedly.”

The speed and ease with which everyone fell into litter construction and assigned roles denoted universal acceptance. Although, Carolyne hardly expected the killer, if there was one, to draw attention to himself by arguing for a less acceptable—except for him—alternative course of action.

They were headed out when Melanie was distracted by a faint glitter of green. She stooped to retrieve the cause from the otherwise concealing mat of leafy decay. “Something else I suspect Mother Nature didn’t put here?” she said and held up her discovery for more light.

“Is that an emerald?” Charles asked in amazement. Walking shotgun, he’d seen Melanie kneel to claim the prize. Now, preferring a professional opinion: “Roy, my niece has a possible emerald, yes?”

None too ceremoniously, the litter, with Gordon on it, was lowered by Teddy and Roy, the latter’s expertise immediately available.

“Damn if it isn’t one of mine!” Roy surprised after his initial examination of the stone that wasn’t overly large but definitely a beauty as far as its deeply translucent green was concerned.

“My niece found it while you were hitched to the litter,” Charles indignantly begged to differ; he snapped the gem from Roy’s hand.

Roy realized his announcement had sounded like a bully staking claim to some little weakling’s prize marble. “I mean, it was once part of a cache I brought back from the headwaters of the Jurua.”

“So, what’s it doing here?” Teddy waited for Melanie to take the stone from her uncle and pass it on.

“Beats me. I sold it to John Leider awhile back.”

“How can you be so sure it’s the same stone?” Teddy was doubtful. “One emerald looks pretty much like another, yes?”

Roy had news for him. “Gems of this exceptional green don’t grow on trees. They’re damned hard to come by, and I remember every one I ever had the luck of finding.” He retrieved a small spiral notebook from his shirt pocket, shuffled its pages, and pointed to a pencil drawing. “That’s it; its inclusions form a distinctive ‘J,’ just slightly to the left of center. John’s wife’s name, Jane, starts with a J, too, and he was hot to have it. I jacked up the asking price, because of his obvious anxiousness to have it, and he still bought it.”

“Inclusions?” Teddy held the emerald elevated between his thumb and forefinger; it converted all refracted light into green sparks.

“Its flaws.” Roy wasn’t a jeweler explaining stone qualities to a prospective buyer; he was a jeweler begrudgingly indulging questions from some know-nothing bum who’d accosted him on the street. “It’s how you tell the real things from the fakes; it’s the fakes, in the case of emeralds, that are always perfect.”

“So, does this expand our list of suspects by putting Mr. Leider at the scene of the crime?” Suddenly, Charles was willing to welcome that additional scapegoat.

“There’d be a lot of people interested to hear it, if it does,” Roy revealed. “Jane Leider included. John was due back in Manaus ages ago, but his wife insists he’s never shown.”

“Disappeared in order to off Gordon?” Teddy was magnanimously as anxious as Charles to shift the blame outside the immediate group.

“I can’t imagine John misplacing an emerald, let alone this one,” was the way Roy saw it. “Besides, I’d know if he’d reappeared around these parts.”

“Maybe, my unexpected appearance on the murder scene didn’t give him time to realize the emerald was gone,” Teddy suggested.

“Meaning, we should keep our eyes peeled for a two-legged John Leider as well as a four-legged jaguar?” Charles ventured.

“Cheery thought!” Carolyne’s tone came across anything-but.

“Congratulations, Melanie, it’s a beautiful stone and will make a nice souvenir.” Roy watched the gem pass back to its latest discoverer’s hands.

“I get to keep it?” Possession pleased her, despite the tragic circumstances.

“At least until Mr. Leider comes to collect it,” Teddy said ominously; it wasn’t something Melanie wanted to hear; having heard it, she was sorry Teddy was so killjoy.

“Finders-keepers, I suspect,” Roy was more optimistic. “Of course, the authorities will want to take a look.”

“All chocked up as a very interesting interlude, but shouldn’t we get Gordon taken care of before nightfall?” Charles suggested. “I suspect both our jaguar and Mr. Leider have better night vision than we do.”

The ensuing burial proved anticlimactic, the trip down to the river and behind the falls entirely without incident. One of several niches was sufficiently large so that Gordon fit without any undignified efforts to stuff him into a better fit. Convenient rocks, fallen from the cave ceiling over the centuries, made only a few additional stones necessary from the river.

The natural chill of the cave was enhanced by the sounds of the water that curtained the entrance without splashing anything but a leading lip of stone.

Roy asked Carolyne if she would read something appropriate from his weather-worn miniature Old Testament. She chose the “Twenty-third Psalm.” That walk through the valley of the shadow of death was an old standard that always fit. She’d learned early that anyone who spent time in the wilderness should be prepared for the eventuality of dying there—herself or others.

Back at the campsite, they apprised Felix of the situation. He surprised Carolyne with his personal interpretations, and thankfully he did so in a private conversation. Had he publicly voiced his opinions, he would have found Carolyne completely unsure how to have handled them.

“If you ask me, put the blame squarely on you, or on Charles,” said Felix.

Carolyne was flabbergasted by that insinuation. “On me? On Charles?” The echoing of his words was all she could manage.

“What has the death of Gordon accomplished, huh? It’s nipped this little expedition right in the bud. It puts us on a beeline out of here, not only because we don’t have a guide to take us farther, but because that guide’s death, possibly by foul play, must be reported.”

This, as far as Carolyne was concerned, didn’t tie Charles or her to any murder.

“Neither you nor Charles wanted this trip to succeed.”

It was a statement, not a question, and it left Carolyne wondering from where he and his lunatic accusations came. “I gave up a chance to teach at Oxford to assure the success of this trip!” She thought him mad!

“Assure its success, or assure its failure?” He allowed her no more than her what an absurd notion gasp. “The last thing you want is more accolades for Melanie’s father. Cornelius Ditherson had way too many while he was alive, didn’t he? Had way too many after he married Margaret instead of you, yes?” Her look of drop jawed surprise didn’t fool him. “Did you think none of us saw what was going on when you pulled out, claiming an offer you couldn’t resist from JanEx Pharmaceuticals?”

“It was simply a career move.” She wasn’t hot to discuss this, especially with Felix, especially here.

“Expected him to beg you to stay, didn’t you, Carolyne?” It was a challenge. “Counted yourself chiefly responsible for all the successes of Ditherson/Santire, right? Didn’t you locate Habernia Carolyne-cornelius in the Begum’s garden; no matter Cornelius had put three years into cutting the legalities and red tape that put you two there at the right time? Didn’t you find the illusive Boletus Carolyne-cornelius; no matter that Cornelius’ friend of a friend of a friend got you access to that restricted Indian territory? You always figured Cornelius just a tag-along to be tolerated because he was such prime husband material.”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” How many, besides Felix, saw things that way?

“Surprised you, didn’t he?” Momentarily his headache, still pounding beneath the wispy strands of his almost bald head, was forgotten. “Not only made do without you but proved himself more the plant-hunter than you ever were. Where were you when he found Anemone cornelius from which Crystin Companies developed their breakthrough arthritis pill, or when he discovered Nymphaea cornelius to give Crystin its active ingredient for Pelincidrinal-Z14? You were so far faded into the backdrop that it must have been hard, after all your years of imagining yourself the key ingredient of that relationship, to take in the reality.”

Carolyne was too stunned by his vindictiveness to offer any immediate rebuttal.

“As for Charles, so long the ignored brother,” Felix continued, “he could only gain his bit of the limelight once Cornelius was dead. How frustrating it must be for him to have some plant that Cornelius stumbled upon two decades ago suddenly come into prominence as a possible cure for cancer, just because Melanie experimented with the properties of a musty flora specimen pressed for years in the dusty basement of the University of Washington? You think Charles wants us to find enough Lygodium cornelius to confirm something in it destroys malignant cells in rats and may do the same for people?”

“He’s here to do just that!”

“Except, we’re scooting on out of here, our supposed objective not met.”

“You think we won’t be back to try again?”

“Back to what? Whatever the potential of our illusive Lygodium cornelius, it will likely be the victim of Kyle Georni’s own personal slash and burn definition of progress. You think the authorities are going to renew our present permits, what with a possible murderer, let alone a man-eating jaguar, on the loose? This country is too indebted to U.S. banks, too hopeful that American aid is going to bail it out of its impossible financial predicaments, to ever risk the bad publicity that would attend the murder of prominent American scientists by man or beast. Melanie had trouble getting the permits in the first place.”

Carolyne had quite enough and was finally recovered sufficiently to prove it. “People living in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones!”

“Meaning?” He didn’t seem threatened; she’d soon fix that.

“Whose name do you think was whispered to me as the ‘other’ man to whom Margaret was headed on that rainy night her car skidded off the road?” Carolyne had always wanted to believe Cornelius’ wife was the slut Carolyne had always imagined her to be, but she had, at the time, resisted and laughed in Charles’ face when he’d suggested Felix, this little nobody selected by Cornelius to fill the void left by Carolyne’s departure, was ever Margaret’s paramour.

“What an obscene, filthy-minded, ludicrous suggestion!” Felix had taken way too long to formulate his response; even if he hadn’t (look how long it had taken Carolyne to muster any response during his verbal attack on her), she refused to grant him even the shadow of a doubt; bad-mouthing was a two-way street. Felix wasn’t finished: “Margaret was the finest woman I ever knew, and I resent your attempts to tar her reputation when she’s not alive to defend herself.”

After all the bilge his sewer mouth had just spewed, did he really expect her to stop now? “Just the response I’d expect from the man who bedded Margaret because he was so jealous of Cornelius with whom he couldn’t compete in any way, shape, or form. The last thing you want is Cornelius to one-up you, once again, especially now, from the grave.”

“You’re eaten by jealousy toward a woman whose only sin in living was to love and marry the man you’d laid claim to for yourself.”

“And you’re a weak, no-chinned, no-account bastard who was too afraid to come out in the open about your sordid part in Margaret’s death for fear Cornelius would sack you on the spot and no one else would ever take you on.”

For just a second, she thought she sensed something about him ready to scream, “Yes, by God, yes!” right in her face. She was disappointed and a little frightened by his, “If I did kill Gordon, I suggest you watch your tail, from here on out!” said just before he got up and stormed off to the other side of the campsite, everyone else not hearing his threat but wondering what in the hell he and Carolyne were up to.