While unable to move as fast as the humans, the Boojums did not tire as easily in the heat. Furthermore, one of the devices they had insisted on bringing along turned a couple of beached logs into excellent dugout canoes within an hour of reaching the river. There was no need to waste time laboriously building Igor’s proposed raft.

Soon they were paddling their way downriver, the Boojums going rigid on the rare occasions when the travelers passed a house along the southern bank. Out in the center of the current they were blissfully free of insects, and Carter had time to wonder if the Contisuyuns had been able to call in the reinforcements Pucahuaman had spoken of. If not, they might have only the general and his staff to deal with.

Though he had confidence in the Boojums, he fervently hoped the latter would prove to be the case when they eventually arrived at Nazca.

XV

Contisuyun soldiers searched every inch of the cavern, even checking the vast main chamber below where the twelve huge cargo transports held fast to their secrets … not to mention tons of rapidly decaying fish. They did not linger long there, however, because the salty stench threatened to overcome them.

“No sign of the three escaped prisoners,” the officer in charge of the search finally had to report to Pucahuaman.

The general looked tired. “Then they must have transmitted, as we suspected. They surely did not slip away past us.”

“Can’ you go after them?”

He looked back at the viracocha Da Rimini. Another time, another place, he would have courted so attractive a woman. Now he was wholly occupied with professional concerns.

“My technicians inform me that the transmitter is no longer functioning. That means that not only can we not pursue the escapees, we cannot return to Contisuyu for help until it is repaired. If it can be repaired,” he added disconsolately.

“Then what are you going to do?” Manco Fernández asked.

Pucahuaman glanced at the “Peruvian,” as he called himself. “Some of my staff will try to effect repairs on the transmitter. The rest of us will work to devise still another plan of attack.”

“What? Just this handful of you?”

“I will not wait to see if the transmitter can be repaired. Soldiers grow stale if they are required to sit in one place and do nothing. Meanwhile we have much science at our disposal, technology such as the hated Pizarro never imagined. There are ways of conquering people without using guns.” He was grim and determined. “We came prepared for many eventualities. You will see.”

“I admire your boldness,” said Bruton Fewick. “You should not let the three who got away worry you. They are either dead or back at Paititi, from which they will be some time extricating themselves. The three of them combined would not constitute a single dangerous human being, and they will have a difficult time convincing the authorities that a threat to all Europe has materialized at Nazca, of all places.”

“That’s for sure,” Trang Ho added. “I write invasion-from-out-of-this-world stories all the time, and nobody ever believes them.”

Pucahuaman listened to his translator and found himself nodding in agreement. “Hesitation and uncertainty are what doomed our ancestors, a mistake I do not intend to repeat. We will move quickly.” An expression of distaste crossed his face as he observed the cat cradled contentedly in the archaeologist’s arms. “Do you carry that animal everywhere?”

Fewick smiled down at his pet. “Moe is my constant companion. He goes every place with me.”

“It is unnatural.”

“What can you possibly do?” Da Rimini wanted to know. “You can’ get no reinforcements, you can’ even tell your people that you in trouble.”

“You will see.” The chief technician was beckoning anxiously and the general left to confer with him.

“What do you think?” Da Rimini wondered aloud. “Have these people got anything?”

“They remain confident.” Manco Fernández continued to watch the general. “You have seen what they are capable of.”

“They don’ know what’s wrong with the transmitter.”

“That does not mean it is beyond repair,” Fewick told her. “Ah. Apu Tupa comes.”

The old man’s step was jaunty. “There is a way. Among the instrumentation we brought with us in the command transport is a device which when correctly tuned and suitably amplified affects human perception. A derivative of the original learning machines, it was to be used to help in pacifying the conquered civilian population after their military forces were defeated, and to assist in disarming recalcitrant soldiers.”

“You mean it’s some kind of mind-control machine,” said Fewick.

“Its application is not nearly so broad. But over a period of time it can persuade subjects to change their minds about specific matters. If included as part of an otherwise harmless broadcast and repeated at regular intervals, the subliminal suggestions it makes will not be noticed, but instead will be unconsciously absorbed and acted upon by the general population.”

“There’s no such thing as subliminal suggestion,” Trang Ho argued. “It’s an unfounded belief.”

“Our knowledge of human physiology is greater than yours.” Apu Tupa drew himself up. “The device will work. All that is required is an effective delivery system. In order to achieve the requisite results we must be able to reach a minimum of fifty percent of the target adult population.” He frowned slightly.

“Our only problem is that we do not have with us the resources to effect appropriate delivery.” His gaze narrowed as he regarded the five. “Any form of electronic mass visual communication would be adequate for our purposes. Does your world now possess such a system?”

Bruton Fewick pursed his lips thoughtfully, which gave him the aspect of a lewd Buddha as he exchanged a knowing smile with the ebullient Trang Ho.

“I believe we can be of assistance. You must trust us to do a little groundwork for you first.”

Apu Tupa was wary. “Why should we trust you?”

It was Trang Ho who replied. “Because each of us has ambitions as great as yours. Besides, you can send armed men to accompany us every step of the way.”

“I will speak to the general.”

Pucahuaman was reluctant but in the end agreed to accept their help.

The owner of the pickup truck they flagged down out on the plain was more than a little reluctant to take so many strangers all the way into Nazca, but the Fernández brothers managed to convince him with promises of payment in dollars instead of intis.

The first thing the brothers did upon reaching Nazca was to check in with their office. They were pleased to find that the soft-drink business had run smoothly in their absence. Trang Ho located a fax phone and filed her accumulated tapes and pictures with her agent in New York, knowing that while none of it would be believed, all of it would find a ready market.

Then they and their fascinated Contisuyun escort went shopping.

Even with an antenna set up in the bushes outside the entrance, the set could only pull in a few local channels. Fortunately, for a third-world country Peru boasted a surprisingly robust domestic television industry. There was more than enough available programming to be representational.

“You say that this ‘television’ is everywhere watched?” An amused Apu Tupa considered the cartoon which currently filled the screen.

“Not yet everywhere,” Fewick informed him. “But you’ll have saturation coverage in Spain, the rest of Europe, and America. That’s what you want.”

“It won’ work,” said Da Rimini. “How you gonna get people in England to watch the same program as people in Spain?”

Fewick smiled. “Europe now has widespread satellite television coverage. A transmission from one country can be viewed simultaneously everywhere else. If a sufficiently popular live broadcast can be developed it will be watched unaltered in every country at the same time.”

“Sure, but how you gonna get local TV stations to carry it?”

“By offering financial incentives they cannot refuse. You forget that the Contisuyuns’ Inca ancestors filled this cavern with considerable wealth. I think that if we offer to pay independent European channels to carry the broadcasts, instead of asking them to pay the producers, as is the usual arrangement, they will be eager to accept. Even if the broadcast is not to their liking they will be unable to bring themselves to decline the opportunity to reap enormous profits at little personal risk. Stations in America have been doing exactly that with religious programming for many years.”

Da Rimini was still skeptical. “Jus’ because we put somethin’ on the air don’ mean people are gonna watch it.”

“No indeed. We must therefore develop a carrier, a means of infection if you will, that is at least minimally attractive to a widely based audience. Something people in many different countries will enjoy watching. Something with universal appeal.”

“A comedy show,” Blanco Fernández suggested.