She brushed the suggestion aside. “All the runner’s stations are up in the mountains. The jungle would have slowed communication, not speed it up, and the selva tribes were hostile to the Incas.”

“There’s no treasure here.” Despite the delicate situation in which she found herself, Ashwood couldn’t pass up an opportunity to sneer. “You blew it, sister. The only ones who’ll make money on this little hike are the locals.” With a jerk of her head she indicated the three guides seated around the cookfire.

“We’ll see.” Da Rimini was gazing fixedly at the wall. “There has to be treasure here. There must be treasure!”

“Not necessarily,” Fewick began. The archaeologist’s ingenuousness made Carter wince. “If one considers the available literature it is clear that—”

“Shut up! Shut up, cállese usted!” Da Rimini slammed the barrel of the pistol across Fewick’s face.

Carter’s guts twisted but he said nothing. Fewick hadn’t welcomed his predecessors with open arms, but neither had he hurt them.

The archaeologist stumbled backward but did not fall. A trickle of blood started from where his lip had been split.

“Tie him with the others!”

Blanco Fernández slipped his rifle over his shoulder and moved to comply. As he did so Da Rimini spoke sharply to Fewick’s porters. With admirable alacrity, they grabbed what supplies they could carry and beat it into the jungle.

While Da Rimini angrily studied the unimpressive wall, Carter studied her. She had her hair secured with a single elastic band and her clothing was soaked through. Standing there clutching Fewick’s pistol she looked like she-was auditioning for a part in a cheapie Filipino adventure epic. Except that the gun she held wasn’t packed with blanks. The hint of madness in her eye did much to mitigate her physical attractiveness.

Meanwhile her guide, his uncle, and his grandfather nattered on, oblivious to the inexplicable doings of the Europeans who had variously employed them.

“What do you intend to do with us?” Igor inquired.

Her response was rather less considered than Fewick’s had been.

“Why, I’m going to kill you, of course. Did you think we carried these guns all this way to hunt hoatzins? But you will live for a while. We want that one,” and she gestured at Fewick, “in case there is information to decipher, and the rest of you to help with any digging.”

“What if there are no secrets here?” Carter asked her. “What if there is no treasure?”

Her lower lip pushed out slightly. “If we find the treasure I am going to shoot you to protect it. If we don’ I will shoot you out of disappointment. Or perhaps I will have you tied to palo santo trees. Have you been introduced to the charms of the palo santo?”

Within the limitations imposed by his current posture Carter adopted his best leading-man pose. “I thought you liked me.”

“You very pretty, but I prefer my men determined, with a little more here.” She tapped the side of her head. “Like the Fernández brothers.” Behind her, Manco Fernández shifted his AK-47 and grinned.

Carter was dubious as he studied the two older, unattractive men. Then he noted anew the fancy jungle attire, the expensive weapons. “Money,” he said. “You’re with them because they have money.”

“It don’ disinterest me,” she replied amiably. “We understan’ each other, Manco and Blanco and I. Sí, they have money. But not nearly enough for them, or me. So when I tol’ them that I knew of some rich norteamericanos who were goin’ to go looking for Paititi, they were anxious to come with me to see for themselves. This is not the first time we have done this, but it is the first time anybody has found something for us.”

“Hey, I recognize that one!” Manco Fernández was looking at Carter. “He’s an actor. I saw him at the Odeon in Miraflores, in Prison Planet. Santa Maria, what a stinker of a picture!”

Carter sighed. “Don’t expect me to give you your money back.”

Ashwood regarded the critic. “What do you boys do for fun when you’re not working as spear-chuckers for Fran the Giant?”

Self-importance colored Manco’s reply. “We are bottlers.”

“Pardon?” said a confused Carter.

The man straightened proudly. “Surely you have been in Peru long enough to have heard of Inca Cola.”

“Oh God.” Ashwood rolled her eyes.

“No, I haven’t.” Carter felt like he was acting a role in one of the screenplays his agent received on a regular basis from an eager slaughterhouse worker in Kansas City.

“It’s not cola like in Coca or Pepsi.” Blanco Fernández tied the last of his knots. “Actually it uses a grapefruit base. My brother an’ I,” he declared smugly, “own the concession for most of central Peru an’ the whole selva region as far north as Iquitos.”

“We have big plans,” Manco announced. “My brother an’ I are three-quarter Indio, one-quarter Spanish. All our lives we resent the way the Spanish imposed their culture on our people and destroyed much of our heritage. It has always been our dream to emphasize that culture in a contemporary way. For that we need much money. Hard currency, not intis. The profit margin in soda bottling is thin.”

“We have accumulated some dollars but not nearly enough,” Blanco added. “As you may know, there is a vast international black market for primitive art.”

“Oh no,” said Fewick, blithely disregarding his precarious position. “Any artifacts found here belong to the Peruvian government.”

“We will put them at the service of the Peruvian people,” Manco Fernández replied sharply. “The true Peruvian people. Los Indios. Some we will keep for future display and education, but we will sell what we must to raise the money we need for our great project.” He lifted his gaze to the ancient wall and its indecipherable petroglyphs.

“Paititi has been a legend for so long, it is the ideal place to make our beginning.”

“Beginning of what?” Igor asked.

Manco looked down at the guide. “Our dream, which is to promulgate our native heritage. To restore its influence throughout the modern world. To make it come alive for people everywhere, not just narrow-minded men who live in dry, dusty books.” He glanced disdainfully at the sullen Fewick.

“My brother and I,” he continued proudly, “have made a study of the success of American popular culture, which has spread itself to every corner of the globe. We have tried to learn the secrets of its success so that we may apply them to our own culture. Now we believe that we have learned enough to proceed. We have formulated an unbeatable plan … all that remains is to find a means of financing it.

“Not only will we spread our influence throughout the world, we will make money while doing so. This is our sacred trust.”

“Mind if I ask you a question?” Carter shifted his position on the hard ground. “Why do you call it Inca Cola if there’s no cola in it?”

Manco Fernández eyed him pityingly. “Do you know nothing of marketing strategy? And you call yourself an American. All the great soft drinks are named ‘something’ cola. What does it matter what it contains? All that is important is if people buy it or not.”

“What’s this ‘great project’?” Ashwood asked in spite of herself.

“A museum!” Fewick bestirred himself. “To showcase the great traditions of Inca culture, to display in a modern setting the grand achievements of your ancestors. Yes, I can understand, even sympathize with that.”

“A museum will be a part of the complex,” Manco admitted. “A small part. It is evident you too know nothing of marketing. Do you not study your own society?”

“Complex?” Carter said.

“We are going to build a vast park here on the site of Paititi. It will include a museum, sí. Also a part of the rainforest, preserved for all to see. Sanitized and cleansed of insects, naturally.” His gaze rose as he focused on his distant vision. “And rides, lots of rides. And shops, and theaters, and concession stands and fast-foot outlets!” His voice deepened with the sheer majesty of it.

“Shooting galleries where people can fire back at the hated conquistadores! An amphitheater where the festival of Inti Raymi can be performed every day. A selva water park! A petting zoo!

“Today Paititi, tomorrow Rio and Buenos Aires. Then on to the United States and Europe and Japan. It will be called”—his voice shook with emotion—“Incaworld!”

In the dazed silence that followed, Igor de Soto said softly, “Some of us prefer the selva the way it is.”

Manco regarded him pityingly. “Ah; un verdades loco. You are a crazy greenie. I might have guessed.”

“What makes you think you can get people to come to this sauna that bites, even if you put a roof over the whole thing and air-condition it?” Ashwood wanted to know.