Treasure of the Golden Cheetah (18 page)

A similar chill ran across her shoulders now. She shivered and tugged on Biscuit’s collar. “It’s time to get back, fellow. The old man won’t start the next story without you.” On her return, she passed by a grove of banana trees. Human skulls, the remains of long-dead ancestors, lay among the trunks. Nearby a horde of flies buzzed around a goat head.

Ancestor worship
. She wondered if this had anything to do with the recent curse. If so, the cursed woman had wasted no time trying to free herself.
Just how much time do you get with a curse?
At that moment, her ears buzzed as they had at the river with the low hum of whispering voices. The sounds were more than all around her; it felt as if they were coursing through her, sizing her up, plotting against her. They buffeted her face, her ears, crept across the nape of her neck. Jade shook her head and swatted at the air to be rid of them.

Harry noticed and hurried to her side. “Come away from here, Jade. Ruddy insects will drive a person crazy around these corpses.” He tugged on her arm and the voices vanished.

Jade followed Harry and Biscuit back to the elder’s hut. This time, Biscuit sat like a sphinx between Jade and Harry, his forepaws neatly together. From the front, the cheetah was a picture of docility and contentment. Jade knew better. She felt his tail twitching in irritation, the white tip beating a staccato rhythm in the small of her back. She reached her hand around and stroked him gently, grounding herself in the real touch of his fur.

“I will now tell the story of the old king,” began Sina. “It is a story told to me by my father, and by his father, and so back through my ancestors. Back to the time when we first came to the mountain.”

Jade watched Julian from the corner of her eye. He leaned forward in his chair, forearms on his thighs, hands clenched together. His eyes shone with an intensity she had seen before when people were consumed by greed, whether for money, power, or lust. The sight oppressed Jade as she saw behind it the root cause of all the destruction and death she’d witnessed in her life. She felt her temples tighten and wondered if that greed lay behind Wheeler’s death.

“This story lives in the memory of the ancestor spirits. And so it resides in the sacred groves where they are buried.”

Julian wriggled, and Jade knew he was growing impatient at all the preliminaries. To Harry’s credit, he gave a brief warning to sit still or they might not hear the story at all.

“I tell this story again so my sons will hear it and know it when I go to my ancestors and my bones sleep in the banana groves.”

Jade drifted into the account. She’d always appreciated a good storyteller, whether it was one of the cowboys spinning a tall tale on her father’s New Mexico ranch or her own father recounting his adventures. On rare occasions, even her mother would relate a story told to her by the Gypsies. Half the pleasure was in appreciating the teller’s style. This one had the singsong rhythm of a memorized legend, told by rote.

“A king, mighty in warriors, mighty in land, mighty before God, came from the east. He wore shining garments stronger than spears, and carried weapons that shone as the sun and could cleave a man’s head in two. He rode in a chariot pulled by wondrous animals that snorted fire. Beside him walked a great cheetah, his coat more golden than sunlight.” Sina looked at Biscuit. “His spots were as the leopard’s, and great stripes ran down his back. Every day he let the cheetah hunt, and every day the king’s cheetah took two antelope, one that he ate and one that he brought back for the king.

“His warriors and slaves were more than man could count, his maidens more beautiful than the flowers. They rode in litters carried by men whose arms were as tree limbs for strength. Even the slaves wore metal and stones that shone like the sun and glittered as light sparkles on water. Men and maidens held double bows that seemed like the horns of antelope and were covered in this shining yellow metal they called gold. Strings fastened to these bows made music when their fingers caressed them. They sang of the king’s glory. The king himself wore a purple robe, woven with threads of gold. It was held in place by an ornament made of clear shining stones the color of water, fire, and sky. Rings of gold and stones flashed on every finger. This king came from a land far to the north and east seeking to increase his kingdom. He fought many wars, each time growing in strength and wealth. His scepter was mighty and could kill a man just to look upon it.

“The Maasai fought with great strength against this king, for they hold their cattle as gifts from the Maker. But the king told them he would leave their cattle, taking only what he and his army needed for food, if they would give him their gold. This they did, but the king looked with wonder at the great mountain. ‘What is this mountain?’ he asked the Maasai. ‘It is the mountain of God,’ they told him. ‘I am God’s lion,’ he said. ‘I will climb this mountain and talk to God.’ So he went through this forest, he and all his great army. He went beyond the forest to the wild land where the antelope run.”

The Chagga elder paused here to drink and regain his voice. No one, not even Julian, interrupted him. Jade again looked across to the director and saw the gleam in his eyes. His mouth was parted slightly, as though he wanted to take in the words through his breath and not just his ears. Biscuit, she noted, had closed his eyes and a deep, rumbling purr churned in his throat. She closed her own eyes and let herself be swept away into the vision of majesty and glory that belonged to the time of Solomon.

“This king felt God’s hand on his chest. He could not breathe. His limbs weakened. ‘It is for this that God called me to climb his mountain. I am old and I shall die. But I shall die as befits a king and be buried on God’s mountain with all that I have won.’ So he dressed himself in his greatest robes and ordered the leaders of his army to stay where they were. Then his slaves and some of the army carried him and all the gold up to the top of the mountain. So much was their burden of treasure that their backs bent low under the load. Only his warriors came back to the leaders. The slaves were slain and all were buried with his riches inside the mountain. The leaders told the Maasai that they must not disturb the grave. Someday, it is said, it will be found by this king’s descendant and his glory will shine again. But not,” he added, “until the end days.”

When Jade opened her eyes, she felt disoriented. The village, Harry, Sina, all seemed out of place. Gone from her vision were the richly armored troops and an aging king who had seemed to look at her in her imagination and beckon to her to follow. Only Biscuit felt real to her in both times and places. A sharp hand clap by Julian rousted her out of her reverie.

“It is true!” Julian said. “The king
must
be Menelik to be known as the lion of God.”

“And how does this help you make your motion picture?” asked Harry. “I thought you knew this story already, since you came here to Kilimanjaro instead of Mount Kenya or some other mountain that the natives consider holy.”

“Well, it verifies it. And it will help me make the dialogue for the picture when we show the old man telling his tale.” He rubbed his hands together. “Can you imagine that treasure? A pharoah’s tomb would be nothing to it.”

Jade motioned for Zakayo’s attention. “Please ask the elder a question. Ask him what happened to the king’s cheetah.”

Zakayo repeated Jade’s question. For a moment, Jade thought she’d committed some breach of etiquette, because the old man stared at her as though he was surprised to see this woman sitting close by. Then his gaze passed over her to Biscuit. He stopped purring for only a second and blinked at Sina. Then he butted his massive head against Jade, for all the world as if he was introducing her. Sina answered.

“He says that the king’s great cheetah walked up the mountain with him but would not leave his master,” said Zakayo. “The warriors say that he sat beside the grave guarding it and that he still watches it today.”

“Why did you ask that?” asked Harry, but before Jade could answer, they heard a shrill scream from one of the huts.

A young Chagga woman ran out, her eyes wild and staring. She pawed at her cloth wrap and her skin as though trying to divest herself of both, leaving long red gashes on her neck and arms. The girl stumbled blindly through the village, crashing into cookpots and people. Then, after colliding with and tripping over a goat, she collapsed on the ground, convulsing.

Jade and Harry rushed to the woman’s side while the Chagga looked on with a mixture of wonder and fear. Harry took hold of the woman and turned her over.

“Get some water,” he ordered.

“Toss me that canteen,” Jade shouted to Julian.

He shook his head. “We can’t let her drink from our canteen. What if she’s contagious?” Jade snatched up a hollowed gourd from a nearby cooking fire and waved it. “I’ll use this. Now toss the canteen.”

Julian did as she commanded. Jade poured some water into the gourd and held it to the woman’s lips. The young woman’s mouth opened to drink and she struggled in vain to clutch the gourd. Her movements reminded Jade of someone who’d been dying of thirst, desperate for water. Her dilated pupils made her staring eyes look feral.

The native woman’s convulsions lessened, but she seemed to be slipping away from any chance of recovery. Her eyes rolled back, revealing the whites. Jade felt for a pulse. She found it, but it grew weaker even as she held her fingers to the woman’s jugular vein.

“We’re losing her,” she said.

“No. We’ve lost her,” said Harry. He laid her head on the ground and stood. “Do you recognize her?”

Jade nodded. “She’s the one who was cursed two days ago.” As she spoke, she felt the ground jiggle softly under her feet.
Earthquake!
The Chagga felt the tremor, too, and ran towards their huts. Jade turned to see how Julian fared and spied him directing the camera’s placement to film the dead girl. Jade cleared the distance in four long steps and positioned herself directly in front of the lens.

“Move out of the way, Miss del Cameron,” bellowed Mr. Julian.

“No! And if you or your crew cranks so much as one frame of that poor girl’s body, I’ll personally dismantle the camera and toss the parts in the Una. Do I make myself clear?”

Biscuit, hearing the tension in her voice, moved between her and the director, one paw on the man’s ankle.

“You must be joking,” the director said. “This is too good to waste. I already have the woman cursing her. Showing her lying there later is—”

“I said no!” Jade didn’t budge except to pull her knife from her boot and direct the hilt at the lens. “So help me, you’ll respect her death and leave her in peace or I’ll smash it.”

Julian exhaled loudly. “Have it your way, but I’ll have you know, miss, that I don’t care to be crossed.”

“Neither do I,” said Jade, but she took careful note of the hateful fury in the director’s eyes as he turned away.

CHAPTER 12

—The Traveler

JELANI PADDED CLOSER TO JADE’S TENT, A BRAIDED VINE ROPE HANGING from one shoulder and a fetish, a cowrie shell and a blue feather, strung from a leather strip in his right hand. He was about to drape the fetish over the front tent pole when he felt something simultaneously hard and soft butt his thigh. He put his free hand on the cheetah’s head and stroked it while he hung the protective charm.

“Guard!” he whispered in a voice barely louder than a breath. But Biscuit recognized the word and positioned himself in front of the flaps. Jelani nodded approval and slipped away towards the livestock pen. Jade’s situation was worse than he’d feared. It was only because Simba Jike herself possessed great power with the guardian spirits that she was still alive.

But it was only a matter of time. He’d seen her slip on the way down the mountain that first day. Normally her step was as sure as a cat’s. No, this was no accident. The avenging devils or ancestors or whoever that woman had called on had been merely testing Simba Jike. Even the mountain had sent a warning. Bwana Nyati said such shaking—earthquakes, he called them—were common here, but Jelani knew better. The mountain, a spirit, or Ngai himself was displeased.

Jelani took the rope from his shoulder and made a loop in one end. He slipped the loop over the neck of a kid goat and led the animal out of the pen. The kid
maa
ed softly but no one in the camp stirred. Jelani had seen to that when he put a sleeping draft in last evening’s meal. It was not very powerful—if real danger threatened the camp, Bwana Nyati or Nakuru would wake up—but it allowed him to leave the camp with the kid without anyone stirring over a small noise.

Once free of the camp and in the trees, Jelani headed up the Una River. Originally, he’d intended to sacrifice the animal in the Chagga village’s banana grove to appease the angered ancestors. But after the other woman’s death, he knew that these spirits wouldn’t be easily pacified, especially by an outsider. No, he needed to take a different tack.