Keepers of the Lost City Read online

  “Ah, you’re Aboriginal!” Purdue exclaimed without thinking. The other people in the room gawked at his response in silent horror. However, if their brainwashed morals felt the need to be offended on his behalf, the man did not share it. He responded to Purdue’s utterance by sarcastically acting out mock surprise. “A genius, hey, McKenzie?”

  Ben McKenzie, the opposing counsel who was the only one cordial enough to greet Purdue earlier, rose and buttoned his blazer. He addressed Purdue, who had just sat down with Robert Knox next to him, and retrieved some documents from his narrow messenger case. At the same time, he introduced his two clearly hostile clients. “Mr. Purdue, this is Miss Louisa Palumbo, Department of Nature Conservation in Adelaide,” he gestured to the stern woman. “And this is Mr. Eddie Olden, from the Wilderness Society.”

  Before Purdue, the lawyer set down two small silver containers, along with a dossier marked ‘Scorpio Majorus – lawsuit’. “The depositions are in there, along with the laboratory results from two different institutions from Brisbane and Perth.”

  Scorpio Majorus was an affiliate company of Purdue’s main holdings, of which he was the CEO. The company comprised of a chain of medical facilities and forensic laboratories, as well as three drug production companies, mainly for research purposes and testing of new drugs for terminal diseases.

  Knox immediately grabbed the file to check the papers filed while Purdue scrutinized the little boxes. From his expertise, he recognized them as biological samples. It was concerning, but he was not easily shaken by threats of lawsuits.

  “Let’s cut to the chase,” he said. “What are these samples of and what is the nature of your complaint?”

  “Mr. Purdue, let me do the talking, please,” Robert Knox requested in a professional tone, while his eyes scurried across the pages’ fine print.

  “With respect, Robert, how much do you know about chemistry and biology?” Purdue asked. “Let me talk to the people myself. They are sitting right in front of me, and they are obviously upset about something chemical, otherwise I would not be handed samples, would I?”

  With his own brand of firm conduct, Purdue regarded the complainants with no apprehension. He was tired of being nice, or maybe it was the appearance of the woman that automatically made him sour, but he was done being patronized. Purdue waited, switching his attention between Palumbo and Olden to assert his own intimidation. He was, after all, a very wealthy and influential man. Purdue’s status was of such a level that people like them should have felt privileged to address him directly. And he knew it.

  Stammering, suddenly a bit less condescending, Eddie Olden shifted in his chair. One glance to his lawyer gave him the green light to speak freely about his complaint. “We have discovered a scourge among the wildlife in our area, Mr. Purdue. Livestock and natural predators alike are dying from poisoning, as per our biological submissions to you,” he presented, pointing to the sample boxes. “The poison was analyzed and found to be a product of Scorpio Majorus, called ‘Pancreo D’. It is apparently a chemical compound used in current experimentation for pancreatic-based testing.”

  “That is correct, but it is not an isolated product…and it is not for sale. My companies use it as an ingredient only,” Purdue explained.

  “Well, have a look at the documentation, Mr. Purdue,” Louisa suggested calmly. “Your company is behind a spate of illegal scrapping enterprises in Australia.”

  8 Abandoned

  Cecil Harding was done with examining the dead sheep of Cockran Farm, although he, and Nigel Cockran, were left confused about the results.

  “Just you call on us if you need, Cecil,” Sally smiled, and shoved a lunch box with pie into the veterinarian’s hands.

  “Thank you, Sally,” he grinned. “You do know this pie is not going to last the road up to my dad’s gate, right?”

  “That’s what I hope,” she said. “It is not there to look at, you know.”

  “Come, the day is getting late, son!” Nigel Cockran howled from his truck. He had promised to accompany the stranger to the locked gate that prevented him from meeting his father and brother the day before. “I still have to get the sheep up to the ridge before midday!”

  “Alright! Thanks Sally!” the vet cried as he jogged to his rental car.

  The two cars left a trail of dust so prominent that they disappeared inside it. Cecil panted from the gaining heat and it was not even summer yet. Arid and desolate, the landscape swallowed the two vehicles up under a scorching sun in the deep blue sky. When they arrived at the gates of Nekenhalle, they pulled their vehicles out of the road, onto a small slant of black sand and gravel rocks.

  Outside, it was deathly quiet, save for the cicadas’ shrill announcements that the day would not be getting cooler anytime soon. The two men found the gate still padlocked tight with a chain.

  “It’s not too high, but that bloody barbed wire is going to eat at our hands,” Nigel remarked. “Do you have protective gloves there in your car?”

  “Nope, it’s a rental. I was only going to use hardware once I started helping my dad and my brother,” Cecil explained, while the old man was rummaging through the space behind his truck’s seat. Muffled, his voice sounded, “Never mind! Got you a pair!”

  “Thanks,” Cecil smiled, pulling on the small-sized gloves. They were obviously the timid old farmer’s, so his hands could not fit comfortably, but he was not about to insult the old man with a refusal. The gate was very old, yet remarkably sturdy.

  “You go first, Cecil,” the old man said. “I am not young anymore. I’ll hold us up.”

  “Are you sure?” Cecil asked, about to scale the tall rusty iron. When he looked at Nigel, he could have sworn that he saw a glimpse of fear in the farmer’s face. He was not looking at the gate at all, but rather cast his eyes to the distance, up to where the turret of the house peeked over the trees and brush. “What’s the matter?” Cecil asked.

  “What makes you think something is wrong?” the old man asked abruptly, pretending to fix his gloves. “Go on. I cannot waste too much time babysitting you.”

  It was strange that the farmer was suddenly so terse, and Cecil could tell that he was very reluctant to cross the threshold of the entrance. “Listen, Nigel,” he finally said, “thank you for everything, but I am sure I can manage by myself from here on.”

  At first, the farmer tried to keep up appearances. “No, no, I said I would come out here with you.” The look on Cecil’s face spoke volumes. “You know I am talking shit, don’t you?”

  “I do. Look, Nigel, I don’t know what you have against this place, but it is obvious that you are not going to tell me. Just,” he hesitated, “just, if anything dangerous is here and something could have happened to my dad and my brother, Nigel, I need you to tell me.”

  “I am sure they are fine, son,” the old man comforted him. “This place has just always had a reputation among the locals, and personally, I have never been on the other side of that gate. All I am saying is, I keep clear of places with reputations. I am not a man of courage, alright. I’m a bloody chicken shit.”

  “What reputation does it have?” Cecil pried. “Seriously, tell me. I am honestly curious.”

  Nigel gave a bitter chuckle, searching the ground with his eyes. He slapped the pair of gloves on his palm as he contemplated it. “I really don’t have time to tell stories, son. My sheep are waiting.”

  “Okay, I understand. After all, I can always call on you and Sally for a bit of ice tea or pie, right?” he presumed.

  Feeling liberated form a heavy yoke, the old man suddenly beamed, “But of course! Yes, at my house. Then we can tell you the stories from when I was young, the stuff our fathers chatted about when they thought we were not listening. Good. Good. We will get together sometime.”

  “Alright, Nigel,” Cecil smiled. “You take care now!”

  “You too, my boy,” the old man said plainly as he climbed into his truck. “You too.”

  Although Cecil was a vet,
he was dreadfully out of shape for someone who carried animals around. However, he was not a large animal veterinarian, so he was hardly capable of lifting bigger carcasses, such as his own. Scaling the gate proved to be exceedingly difficult for the chubby Cecil. As he summited the unsteady structure, straddling the jagged top beam, he hoped not to hitch his scrotum on the dangerously protruding barbs.

  “Why can’t he just leave the fucking gate open?” he mumbled furiously. “Jesus Christ, I am going to break my fucking neck!”

  Briefly, Cecil looked up while he prepared his footing on the rod below. Something moved in the bushes of the hillock behind the house. He could not see his father or his brother, but he could trace their movements along the ridge through the overgrowth.

  “There you are,” he gasped. Shouting at the top of his lungs from his vigil on the tall gate, Cecil bellowed Gary’s name a few times. “Dad! Dad! Come unlock the gate!” he hollered with such force that his voice broke like a pubescent boy’s.

  They ignored him, but by the swaying branches and tops of the thorn bushes, they were heading for a gaping crevice in the mountain rock. Fuming, the overweight brother cussed as he clumsily made his way down the other side of the gate. Hitching his shirt and ripping it did not aid in his spiraling mood either. By the time his feet touched the black sand, he was thoroughly annoyed. Thundering ahead up the winding gravel road, Cecil was mumbling profanities and threats to nobody in particular, lamenting all the unnecessary trouble he had to deal with.

  Out of breath, full of rust chips and dust, he labored up the slight incline to the house. His eye stayed on the rustling branches up on the hill, but he was too exhausted to cry out anymore. Another useless annoyance hit him. “Aw fuck, I forgot the pie in the car. Oh my God, I am so sick of this shit,” he whined. The idea of the scrumptious slice of shepherd’s pie made him so hungry, not physically, but in craving. It would have been the only small pleasure right now to keep him going up toward the house.

  Along the way, Cecil vigilantly kept his eye on the trees and bush flanking the road for bees or smaller vermin. Such high temperatures normally brought out the bees, and getting stung was another mild phobia Cecil harbored. As he peered through the tall, thin trunks of young beeches and rautinis, something peculiar caught his eye.

  Looking completely out of place, sporadic cement markers populated the shadowy understory. Clearly, the cement was very old, reminiscent of gravestones in Scottish and Irish historical documentaries. But they were not shaped like grave stones, they looked like miniscule monoliths, standing erect and tubular in shape to about a meter in height, each.

  “Hey, what is this all about?” he whispered, elected to have a closer look. After all, if his family did not show any bother in answering him or collecting him, they could wait. Off the gravel road, the cool shade was a godsend, at least. Insects buzzed around his face and Cecil pursed his lips shut to avoid them entry. Waving his hands wildly to keep them at bay, he inadvertently struck at branches and leaves, showering himself with falling leaves, spider webs and dust from the foliage that made him itch.

  With much moaning and wincing, he made his way deeper into the sheltered growth to see one of the markers up close. He crouched next to the first one he reached and noticed that it was carved with native symbols.

  “Maori,” he said as he traced his fingers over the indentations. He had no idea what they meant, but noticed that each post had a different motif arrangements. Some of the markers displayed a hint of paint over the symbols, as if some vandals wanted to hide the carvings or wipe them out like correcting an error with white-out. However, the paint had faded much over the years, leaving only traces of red coloring in the deeper fissures of the corroded cement.

  From where he was hunched, he could see that there were at least a handful more of these strange beacons planted in a circular pattern. “Creepy, creepy shit,” he mumbled as he took solace in the birdsong above him for a bit of company.

  Cecil was beginning to feel completely isolated and he was not far from wrong. Out of sight from the road and hidden from the windows of the house, he had disappeared. The movement at the top of the hill had ceased, so he figured it was time to get on to the house, assuming his kin had returned home from the hill.

  With the discovery he made in the trees, Cecil had to admit that he felt a bit better. Something exciting had happened for him thus far, which calmed his demeanor considerably and gave him new zest to see his father and brother. Not that he minded Gary too much. The two had always gotten along as best as brothers could, but he rued his father’s condescending remarks.

  At the end of the road, the unkempt domestic garden greeted him. It was beautiful in its wildness, but the house windows looked awfully neglected. It was unlike his father to leave the place looking like this.

  “If they left without telling me, I swear to G…,” he started complaining as he rounded the house, but a crash inside the house alerted him. “Dad?” he cried, as he skipped up the steps onto the porch. “Dad, where are you? I have been hooting and calling since yesterday!”

  No answer came from the house. Cecil kept talking and kept an assertive tone, because he was terrified of the prospect of what danger could be the cause of his family’s non-responsiveness. Inside him, he knew that something was very wrong, but he could not allow whoever was lurking there to know this. They would already have heard his cries from the road, so there was no use for stealth. All he could do was to play tough, take control of the situation as if he was fearless, and hoped to intimidate the stalker into leaving.

  Cecil reached for his cell phone, praying to God that there would be better signal up here than in the road below. His heart was throbbing in his ears as he stole along the veranda, surreptitiously checking his phone reception to dial the local police. Only one bar was not adequate to dial out, but he kept trying. He had to. On foot, he would have no chance to flee if the shit hit the fan. The phone yielded no successful dial tone. He was on his own.

  9 Closing the Door

  When Purdue arrived back at Wrichtishousis, he evaded most of his staff altogether and headed up to his private study. But on his way there, his assistant, Jane, found him on the landing of the first story. Like the rest of them, she had grown fond of Sam’s big old cat, and the feline was dosing happily against her bosom.

  “Mr. Purdue,” she smiled, but he was unexpectedly elusive in his reply.

  “Hi Jane. Listen, please excuse me from my guests for tonight. I seem to be coming down with something,” he explained briskly, eagerly trying to pass her to get to the beckoning double doors of his study. Jane stepped in front of him, keeping her actions subordinate.

  “They left, sir,” she reported.

  “They what?” he frowned, clutching the valise that bore his new worries. “Why?”

  “Dr. Gould felt that you would not need her before you have received the samples back from Dr. Harris, so she asked me to apologize on her behalf. She left the letter translation here for you, and asked that you call her as soon as she is needed again,” Jane elucidated.

  “Fair enough,” Purdue replied.

  “As for Mr. Cleave, he was called out on assignment by a friend from the Post, to advise on an important report they wish to cover…,” she paused, “concerning you.”

  “Excuse me?” he asked with wide eyes. It was turning out to be a miserable day indeed.

  “Apparently you made the Channel 8 news,” she sighed, looking very serious. “BBC Alba apparently asked for Mr. Cleave’s advice on a report about Scorpio Majorus’ alleged involvement in the culling of Australian wildlife?”

  “Oh God, it already got out?” Purdue muttered, running his long fingers along the side of his head. “This is a set-up, you know, or else someone in our ranks are sabotaging our work to ruin my reputation.”

  “Do you think…they…are involved in this, sir?” she asked with a raised eyebrow and wandering eyes. Of course, she was referring to the Order of the Black Sun. She had b
een Purdue’s secretary long enough to have learned of their obsession with destroying him.

  “My dear, I can almost guarantee it,” he hissed. “Please tell Charles that I will be unavailable for all calls until tomorrow, would you?”

  “Of course, Mr. Purdue,” she said. “Now please, go and relax. We’ll get back on the horse again tomorrow, aye?”

  “Absolutely,” he smiled wryly. “Good evening!”

  “Good evening, Mr. Purdue,” she answered as she descended the stairs to find Charles, while Purdue rushed to his reclusive study, where a fire was burning in the hearth already.

  “Ah, Charles, you are a god amongst men,” Purdue whispered as he entered.

  Once inside, he locked his door and opened his balcony doors for some fresh, cool Edinburgh air, and then proceeded to pour what bartenders did not have a name for. It was strong and it defied measurement, but it was just what Purdue needed to still the questions and subdued anger he felt after the meeting at Hayden & McCleod.

  He had the samples with him and had his lawyer make a copy of all the documentation in the dossier. After drinking down a considerable amount of the cognac in his glass, he picked up the phone and dialed the cell phone number of the freelance forensic expert who was working on the mummified tissue analysis.

  “Hello, Harris,” he said when the man answered the phone. “I know this is probably inconveniencing you, but I need you to run a secondary submission of samples for me. I need these results yesterday, understand? I will send Charles to bring them to you, and this test is just between you and I, please.” He took another big swig of the cognac, pulling a dreadful face as the alcohol assaulted his throat. “This analysis is priority. It is evidence in a court case, so I need you to keep this secret, alright? Nobody, and I mean nobody, at the lab is to know that you are running these tests, not even Sharon. Do you understand? I have reason to believe that some of my pharmaceutical employees are not as trustworthy as I thought. Thank you, Harris.”