Part Three of Four
"That was your best idea?" Pirenne taunted him. "Surely you can think of something else. You always had three plans going at once when I knew you. And here you have only two."
"Sometimes two were enough," Helm told him.
"Hmm. Of course, I always had four," Pirenne mused, puffing on his pipe.
"Fat lot of good that did you in Marseilles. You almost had me, didn't you?"
Pirenne took his pipe out of his mouth and regarded Helm with amusement. "I did. And you almost had me in Barcelona, but you let me escape. That ended your career in espionage, did it not?"
Helm smiled through the pain in his head. "I've missed you, my old enemy. I was sorry to hear you were killed."
"Never believe everything you hear, you know that." Pirenne tapped the ash out of his pipe and refilled it. "If you really want this new life of yours, you had better stop basing it on so many lies."
"I'll do whatever I have to, just as I always did." Exhausted, Helm lay down on the ground by the fire. Pirenne mercifully fell silent--satisfied, perhaps, that Helm had done as much as he could for now. Helm slept for a few more hours. When he woke, the sun was high, sending a slanting beam of light into the cave and lighting it up. He was surprised to see old graffiti, in Spanish, on the walls, along with stylized figures of animals overlaid with drawings of ships. The figures seemed to crowd towards the tunnel. Others had been here before him. That gave him hope, as there must be a way out of here, besides the hole above his head, and surely it lay through that tunnel. The walls sloped above him a good twelve feet to the hole. There were not enough hand or footholds to climb on. He would have to get out through the tunnel.
Pirenne's pipe glowed in the shadows. "Not much of a plan, when you cannot even walk," he said from his spot on the wall, as Helm twisted his bandanna into a torch and lit it from the fire. The fire itself he built up as much as he could, hoping that it might signal rescue.
"I can walk if I have to," Helm assured him grimly. His first attempt to do it, though, was thwarted when he got to his feet and fell back down onto his knees, his stomach heaving. He waited until the cave stopped rotating around him, then tried again, clutching the torch. He made it to the edge of the cave, sank down on his hands and knees, and crawled into the tunnel.
"Where is Tessa?" Elena asked Marta when she walked into the kitchen next morning. Marta looked up from the table and got up to pour her some coffee.
Marta sighed. "She has been out riding all night since the party ended, looking for Doctor Helm."
"As the Queen?" Elena asked quietly. Marta nodded. "Marta, it is Christmas Day."
"Doctor Helm was supposed to be back from Monterey yesterday. He never returned and no one has seen him."
Elena snorted, trying to mask her concern at the news. "Doctor Helm can take care of himself. And with his curiosity, I wouldn't be surprised if he'd found something in Monterey to make him linger there."
Marta grimaced. "He wouldn't miss Tessa's party. He...cares for her."
Elena nodded. "He loves her, you mean. And she feels the same. All right, I agree. It does seem strange. I hope that she's careful about whom she shows herself to, even as the Queen. Coronel Montoya has been very suspicious of her, I notice."
"He thinks that she is the Queen, yes." Marta nodded. "That is why Josephine went out riding as well. Between the two of them, they should do a very good job of confusing him."
"I should go help them," Elena said, patting her belly doubtfully. She wasn't sure that she could still fit into her Queen costume at this point.
"Do not even think about it, Elena," Marta scolded. "You are not running around the countryside on horseback, not in your condition."
Elena subsided with an embarassed grin. "It was just a thought. I'm not an invalid, you know."
"No. Merely pregnant, and now you must take care for two." Marta glowered at Elena. Elena bit down a laugh.
"Don't worry, Marta. I'll behave," she assured her. She smiled innocently at Marta's sour look of distrust. "After all, I have so many sensible friends to take care of me. What possible need do I have of riding a horse?"
"The Queen! The Queen!" The cry rang down the hallway. "She is on the road to Monterey!" Montoya sighed as the guard burst into Don Hernandez' party, panting, his fine blue-and-red uniform dark with sweat. Montoya sipped from his wineglass before replying. Really, this vintage was excellent. Juarez had not stinted on treating his guests.
"Private, please tell me why are you raising the alarm in such an incendiary manner?" Montoya growled. "Can you not see that we are celebrating a holy day, here?" Though he might have been looking for any excuse to get out of attending the fifth Christmas party of the day, this type of interruption was not what he had had in mind.
"But sir, I saw the Queen when I was out visiting my uncle and his family on the road to Monterey!" The soldier's eyes were so wide they seemed to start out of his head.
"Private, are you aware that the Queen has also been sighted in six different other locations, by those of your colleagues whose relatives do not live on the road to Monterey?" It was most annoying. Clearly, there was more than one Queen currently operating in Santa Helena, and Montoya wanted to find out why, but not today.
The soldier gaped at him. "N-no, sir. It hadn't occurred to me."
"I see." Montoya leaned forward, lowering his voice. "And what, exactly, was she doing?"
The soldier looked taken aback. "Uhh, she was riding, sir."
"Riding. I see. To where?"
"I don't know, sir." the man's bewilderment was growing. "She was riding around and around, as if searching for something. I would have chased her, but I thought I should come back for reinforcements."
"Of course you did." How did I end up with a Guard full of idiots and cowards? "I am going to make a suggestion, Private."
"Yes, sir!" the man said, much too loudly as people were staring. The sympathy in this milieu would incline towards the Queen. Here was not the place to discuss her with hostility.
Montoya smiled pleasantly. "This is Christmas Day. Unless the Queen is engaging in some criminal activity--and I do believe that riding aimlessly up and down the road to Monterey does not constitute as such--I would prefer that you leave her to her own devices. If you are truly searching for a reason to avoid visiting with your esteemed uncle and his family, I would suggest that you go looking for Dr. Helm. It is my understanding that he did not return from Monterey yesterday as he had promised. Feel free to go find out why, and encourage any of your comrades who feel similar enthusiasm in their quests to pursue the Queen to concentrate on that instead."
The soldier gulped. Ah, finally, enlightenment. "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. I'll do that right away, sir." He fled through the crowd and back out the door.
Gaspar Hidalgo drifted near, looking alarmed. "Dr. Helm has gone missing?" he asked Montoya quietly.
"I would not call him 'missing' just yet, Don Hidalgo," Montoya replied with a little bow. "But it seems that he is tardy. Seņorita Alvarado expressed some concern last night, as he was supposed to show up for her party and did not."
Gaspar's eyes narrowed. "Yes, I did notice his absence, and he is normally so attentive...ah, I mean, responsible, of course, about being so good to Seņorita Alvarado. It seemed very strange, not an absence that he would make willingly." He smiled. "Perhaps we should form a search party and look for him?"
"It seems to be a trifle premature, don't you think, Don Hidalgo?" Montoya purred, alarmed by visions of a mob of dons roaming all over the countryside, searching for Dr. Helm on Christmas Day.
"Coronel, I believe that we have already established that Dr. Helm's disappearance is most unusual and uncharacteristic. He could have fallen from his horse and be lying somewhere, badly hurt. I think that we should organize a search party now."
Before Montoya could answer, yet another of his soldiers burst into the party. "Coronel! Coronel! Something has happened to Dr. Helm! I found his horse wandering near the road to Monterey but I cannot find the Doctor anywhere!"
Helm woke to darkness. The torch had gone out, and only a few embers remained. His head felt better, though pain still sliced into him when he lifted it. He felt around in his pockets for his tinder box, groped for more moss and made a small fire. It lit up the small space, but also made it smoky. He coughed and moved down the tunnel a few feet, following the graffiti on the walls. Then, he took out the map and sat against the wall, squinting at the parchment.
"You know where you are, non?" Helm looked up. He could just see the glowing coal in Pirenne's pipe. "You are at the center, the reference point. Tesoro."
"I'm in the belly of the beast, that's where I am," Helm muttered. "And worse yet, I'm out of my head and talking to myself." He laid the map on his knees, as the ground was too wet, and angled it at the fire. As he stretched out the map, he saw something glinting next to his boot. Digging under the boot, he pulled out a gold coin. He stared at it stupidly. "Where did that come from?"
"A good question," Pirenne replied serenely.
"Shut up, Roger." Helm crawled along the wall towards the fire. He discovered another coin, half buried at the base of the wall. He dug it out. It scraped against another coin. "There's something buried here."
"I told you, didn't I?" Pirenne said, puffing on his pipe. Helm coughed, sickened by the stink of burning moss. He pulled out his knife and hacked at the dirt. He found a few more coins, but at just an inch or two under the surface, he hit something solid. He cleared the area, revealing the lid of a small box the length of his forearm. After some effort, which made his head throb, he pried off the lid. The coins underneath clinked as the lid disintegrated under his knife. He pulled off the fragments and stared down at the contents, his mouth hanging open. The coins glimmered very faintly in the firelight reflected from the walls.
"Tesoro," he said stupidly.
Act Three
"Anything?" Tessa asked Josephine the next morning as the other Queen rode up. Josephine shook her head.
"Nothing," she replied. "It is as if he disappeared into the earth. What now?" She glared up at the gathering clouds as raindrops began to fall.
"Now, we wait here. I sent word to the Chumash that I needed their help. We should be meeting them here."
Josephine nodded. "Elena said that Don Hidalgo arrived at the hacienda early this morning, asking where Helm was. He is sending his men all over the countryside, looking." Josephine grinned. "It seems that he was most annoyed at Coronel Montoya's lackadaisical attitude yesterday towards retrieving his pueblo doctor."
"I'm not surprised. I think Roberto scares the Coronel a little." Tessa frowned. "I'll have to warn the Chumash about Gaspar's men, so they don't end up fighting. That won't help anybody. It was why I didn't tell my uncle. Uncle Juan Rafael is a lovely man, but I'm afraid doesn't like the Chumash very much, and the feeling is mutual."
"Will the Chumash have a problem with seeing two Queens?" Josephine said.
"No. They know who I am. If they see me with you and I can explain that you are my friend, they won't have a problem with it." Tessa hesitated. "You, um...haven't gone out to Marta's casa and told Fenner or Roman or Juan Pablo yet, have you?"
Josephine shook her head. "I wasn't sure what you wanted to do about that. Since you didn't tell them yesterday, I thought you might be trying to keep it quiet for some reason."
"Good. I don't want Grisham to know about this. He hates Roberto. He'd sabotage anything we tried, just out of spite."
"And if you tell the men out at the casa, then you risk having Grisham find out," Josephine said thoughtfully. "All right. They'll want to know when they get back, though."
"Then, that's when we'll tell them. Hopefully, we'll have found Roberto by then." As Tessa spoke, several Chumash, led by her Blood Brother, Churi, appeared from the underbrush. Churi eyed both Tessa and Josephine as he approached. The rain was falling steadily now. Tessa ignored her increasingly sodden clothing and watched Churi.
"Sister, I take it by your friend's appearance that she knows your secret," he said in Chumash.
"Yes," Tessa agreed. "And I trust her with that secret, as well. Thank you for coming. This is a very important matter. It concerns our Blood Brother, Dr. Helm." Josephine looked confused, since she understood nothing of what was being said, but kept a polite silence.
Churi's expression did not change, but Tessa could tell from the way the others shifted uneasily that they were all concerned. "Is he in trouble?" asked Churi.
"He has disappeared. He was supposed to return from Monterey the day before yesterday, but no one has seen him." Tessa forced her voice to be steady. Now was not the time to weep and play the delicate Seņorita. The Chumash would not be impressed.
Churi narrowed his eyes. "On the road to Monterey, you said? Some of our brethren at Mission San Luis Obispo have been talking about two men who were seen in the hills to the east two days ago. When the monks had our brothers go look for them, the men had disappeared. The monks were very angry. Men ride those hills from time to time, following old legends of treasure."
Tessa leaned forward in her saddle, feeling sick. "There is treasure there? Can you tell me where this place was?"
Churi nodded. "Better, Sister. We can lead you there."
"Tessa, why would Dr. Helm be looking for treasure?" Josephine said, looking puzzled as they followed the Chumash and Tessa brought her up to speed. The rain shower was now passing to the south, over almost as soon as it had begun.
"I'm not sure that he was," Tessa admitted. "It's just a hunch, but it is the best idea that we have right now." And please, Dios mio, may it not have cost his life.
"Ah, sweet Christ, I'm lost," Helm panted. He sank down against the wall, stars of pain behind his eyes lighting up the complete darkness. The tunnel ceiling in some places was high enough to walk, but he could barely stumble along. His knee had stiffened right up. Mostly, he crawled. The torch had gone out long ago, which was just as well, since the smoke made him cough. With the light gone, he had folded the map and put it in a top pocket of his duster. He drank some water, felt in another pocket for the beef jerkey and ate some. It did not make him feel much better, but at least he didn't throw up this time. He thought about just lying down and sleeping again, but the last time he had done it, he had got confused when he woke up and backtracked out to the sinkhole.
Pirenne had been silent for a long time. "You're a bloody lot of help, now, aren't you?" Helm snarled to the empty air.
"You would have an easier time of it if you emptied your pockets," Pirenne said from the darkness. Helm blinked, unable to see Pirenne's glowing pipe anymore through the fire in his own head. "Those coins are weighing you down."
Helm clenched his teeth. "If I'm going to die anyway, I might as well die bringing them out. If I do live, I'll find them very useful, believe me." He shivered, feeling the coins clink in his pockets. He had had to fill all of the pockets in his duster, and any hole that he could find in his shirt and trousers, but he had managed to empty the entire chest of treasure. He thought vaguely of an old story he had read once--Dante's Inferno. In Hell, the hypocrites had worn cloaks of gilded lead. Stop grumbling. This is one Hell of a Christmas present you just stumbled on. Just think of what you could do with it if you get out of here. You could have your heart's desire. You could marry Tessa.
"And how do you intend to do that, mon ami," Pirenne said wryly out of the darkness, reading his mind, "when you are trapped down here, and don't even know which way to go?"
"I know which way to go," Helm said, just as he realized, to his horror, that Pirenne was right. He could not remember which direction he needed to go in at all. He closed his eyes and bowed his head. I do know which way. I can remember. Think! He held his breath, waiting for the disorientation to pass. As he did, a cool, fresh breeze blew against the left side of his face and his aching shoulder, and he both smelled and heard rain. He gasped in relief, nearly losing the sense of it. He forced himself to concentrate again. Lifting his head, eyes still closed, he groped along the tunnel toward the sound of the rain. The rising breeze reassured him of the way. The wall curved away from him and he followed it out into a larger hollow. Light touched his eyelids, real light not the sparks of his fever dream. When he opened his eyes, he squinted at the light coming into the cave from a hole near the floor. It was only a foot or so high, so choked was it by vegetation, but when he crawled into it, he found that he could squeeze through. He winced, shielding his eyes as he came out into daylight. The rain slowed and stopped. After a moment, he opened his eyes to see the rainstorm passing away. He was lying on a hillside, in bushes. He heard a woman calling his name.
"Tessa," he whispered. He crawled further down the slope, to an open, flat rock. "Tessa!" He heard hoofbeats, and then the woman appeared on horseback, below him. "Tessa!" he croaked again, forcing himself to get to his feet. Miraculously, she heard him and looked up. She reined in her horse and dismounted, climbing toward him.
"Dr. Helm, are you all right?" she said, reaching out to him.
He recoiled, backing away. "No. You're not--"
"Not Tessa, no. But she sent me." She smiled, approaching him as if he were a skittish horse. "It's me, Josephine. It's all right." She reached out, palm up.
The hillside turned slowly upside down as he felt his knees go underneath him. "I think I'm going to sleep now," he said in a very reasonable tone. He collapsed before she could catch him.
Continue to Part Four
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