Andean Experience Ch. 02: Marina's Choice

"This is a Nazca cemetery, used from the third to eighth centuries CE. You'll remember that they believed in the Oculate Being, like the Paracas, and that both groups used mummified burials, the dried bodies in woven shrouds. The intricate designs for the elite showed the Oculate. You'll see some shrouds here, but after the site was discovered in the 1920s, tomb robbers took the best for international sale."

"Jag, I heard that this place was featured in an Indiana Jones movie, right?" Chloe commented.

"Yes. 'The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.' Have any of you seen it? Shot on location right here. But, they dressed it up a bit for the story, with hidden underground chambers, things like that."

Jaguar led the group through the gates and into the cemetery itself. The ground was level, with stone-walled pits about ten feet deep scattered across the area. In them were grotesque skeletons, sitting upright, wrapped in either their mummy bundle or a woven burial shroud. Some were simply a skull with bones, while others had the remains of hair and flesh. Parts of hands, arms and legs poked out from the cloth.

Jag explained that many of the skulls had holes drilled into the back of them, probably so they could be hung from a rope as 'trophy heads', like those carried by the Oculate Being.

"The bodies and even the cloth is so well preserved because of the extremely hot, dry climate, like you're feeling today. Dead bodies may have been put on platforms to dry out in the sun, shrinking the flesh like dried fruit to preserve it from rotting. Then they were wrapped in bundles and shrouds before going into the burial pits."

"This is just so creepy!" Lee-Ann exclaimed, and several others voiced agreement, as they walked through the site, gazing at the macabre skull faces looking out from their shrouds.

"So, you won't mind getting a cold drink now, and going back to the bus?" Jaguar asked, already knowing the answer.

"Yeah. A beer, then let's get the Hell out of here!" Martinez called.

****

That night, they all slept in a little motel near Nazca, clean enough and next to a restaurant where Jaguar knew they could get a quick breakfast. In fact, they'd eaten there at lunchtime yesterday, and nobody went away hungry. There had been plenty of beer to wash down plates and bowls full of good food.

They all went to bed happy- except for Marina. Jaguar wanted to get to know more about Lorenzo, so she had her own room tonight.

Jag was still trying to get the measure of his new passenger. He made a point of sitting with him at the restaurant, but the man had hardly spoken. Instead, he gobbled down his food and tossed back more than his share of wine before going outside by himself. Jaguar tried again when they went to their room for the night.

"So, what did you think of the plane trip today?" Jag asked.

"Fine, yeah. Those designs on the desert are interesting," Lorenzo replied, without any enthusiasm.

"Had you seen them before?"

"Just in pictures, I think. I haven't seen much of Peru yet?"

"You haven't? Just been around Lima all your life?"

"No, I came from Bolivia a few years ago. Maybe I'll go back there one day?"

"We're in Bolivia in four more days. Just the edge of it around Lake Titicaca though."

"Yeah, I know. Part of the reason I chose this trip."

"Family there to visit?"

"You could say that. Look my friend, you ask far too many questions for a tour guide."

Jaguar got the hint and didn't say much more. He was picking up bad vibes about this guy, so he'd wear his money belt to bed and stop at the first reputable bank along the way tomorrow to deposit Lorenzo's cash payment.

What did he mean that part of the reason he had chosen this trip was because it went into Bolivia? Was it important to him to get across the border? And, why did Lorenzo get touchy about conversational questions? He would keep a close eye on his new customer.

****

Later that night, Jaguar heard his new room mate step outside. Listening carefully, he could hear Lorenzo talking to someone. Jag soon realized that he was on his cellphone, so he crept closer to the door, resolved to pretend he was going out to the shared toilets if Lorenzo came back inside unexpectedly.

He could make out some of the conversation, snippets in Spanish, but just enough to get the general sense of it:

"peligroso en lima"... dangerous in Lima... "acercandose en"... closing in... "esconderse en un reorrido"... hiding in a tour... "Bolivia en cuatro dias"... Bolivia in four days... "Copa"... Copacabana... "escalones de la basilica"... steps of the basilica..."el apartamento La Paz"... the La Paz apartment.

Just before Lorenzo came back inside, Jaguar quickly scooted into bed and pulled the blanket half over his head, pretending to sleep. He was alarmed by what he had heard.

Now Jag knew that his new client was using The Andean Experience simply as cover to flee from danger in Lima into Bolivia. There he would meet someone at the basilica in the border town of Copacabana, before going to an apartment in the Bolivian capital.

But why?

He guessed that it might have something to do with the international trade in illegal drugs. Peru is deeply embedded as a global source of cocaine and other hallucinogens for the black market.

However, Jaguar would soon find out that Lorenzo Martinez was even more notorious. He was far more dangerous than that.

Readers: Another installment, Chapter 3: A Shining Path, will follow shortly. Please take a moment to rate Chapter 2. Thanks.