Chapter 19

"Joey," Tex called, settling his gray-and-maroon flight bag farther back over his left shoulder and striding forward into the bright southeast Texas sunlight. "Joey Travis! Great to see you, compadre."

As Tex embraced a short, dark-haired guy in an army jacket, Annja staggered slightly. It wasn't because she carried the hefty bag of scrolls, as well as her own duffel, despite Tex's periodic gallant attempts to relieve her of the burden. But the sun's dazzle almost stopped her in midstride. The cantilevered awning in front of the tall glass-paneled facade of the GeorgeBushInternationalAirport kept the direct late-morning sun off but did nothing about the blinding reflection from the pickup lane and the cars jostling for position in it. The air hit her like a wet blanket. The humidity was no worse than in Copenhagen, perhaps, but springtime was already hot season here on Buffalo Bayou, a long spit from GalvestonBay and the Gulf of Mexico. She smelled petroleum and hot asphalt.

"Come and meet the ladies, Joey," Tex said, bringing his friend forward with an arm around his shoulder. "Joey, meet Annja Creed, archaeologist extraordinaire and sometime talking head on our friendly rival show, Chasing History's Monsters. And Jadzia Arkadczyk, who despite her youthful appearance is an internationally recognized heavy hitter on the subject of ancient languages."

"Hey, girls," Joey said.

"Women," Jadzia said. She snapped her gum. Still, the look in her blue eyes was calculating in a way that made Annja nervous. Delayed adolescence and hormones seemed to be rearing their ugly heads again.

"Sure," Joey said with a smile. He was thin and quick in his motions, with a face hollow enough in the cheeks Annja wondered if it resulted from poor nutrition rather than genes or fitness. His eyes were hazel with unusually long lashes. His hair was brown and retreating ever so slightly to either side. He had a couple days' growth of beard on his sunken cheeks. He seemed never to stay entirely still.

"Pleasure to meet you," he said.

Annja decided to give him the benefit of the doubt, and greeted him pleasantly. His grip was strong and firm but quite quick, as if he shied from contact.

Annja took over Jadzia's bag along with her own and the scrolls. She wanted a pretext to go around to the rear gate of the gray-and-white battered Jeep Grand Cherokee to share a quick word with Tex while Joey, all gallantry, helped Jadzia into the rear seat of the vehicle.

"He seems kind of anxious," she said softly, "your friend does."

Tex heaved his bag inside on top of a jumble of what looked like camping gear and drab olive groundsheets and, without asking, peeled Jadzia's bag away from Annja's left shoulder.

"He's just wound a little tight," he said, putting the girl's luggage in the hatch with considerably more care than his own. "Always been that way. Doesn't mean much. He managed to get through jump training and Ranger school with me."

A shadow crossed his face like a small cloud passing the sun. He smiled and relieved Annja of her own bag. She let him. She put the bag of ancient scrolls carefully inside.

Tex slammed the hatch shut. "Time to go."

****

Tex had thought he might know who could be of help to Annja and Jadzia in their quest and it came down to Joey Travis. Not on his own account so much as that of his uncle, Amon Hogue. Carthage Oil and Gas was a major second-tier U.S. oil concern. Annja wasn't sure whether he was chairman or president or CEO. All Tex or Joey would say was that Hogue was CO and G.

Tex and Joey sat in the front seat chatting amiably like two good ol' boys. No matter how much Massachusetts-born Idaho cowboy Winston hated his nickname, he could definitely pass for Texan. Then again, having seen him in action, Annja reckoned he could probably pass about as well in a Mumbai slum or an Atshuara village in the Upper Amazon watershed. He had a knack for fitting in and getting along. It made her feel insular and withdrawn, as if her psyche and her choices were constrained in some kind of thin glass bottle.

Jadzia leaned forward between the seats with her chin on folded arms, chewing gum and affecting fascination with a conversation she almost certainly would find stupid if Annja took part in it.

Annja glanced out the window at a semi headed the other way with a giant green bulldozer chained on the flatbed trailer and drummed her fingers on the cracked top of the door panel. A half dozen Gold Wing bikes roared past them in the fast lane.

Joey followed the Beltway bypass around where it curved south and ran along the west side of the Sheldon Reservoir, then turned east on the Beaumont highway that ran past the reservoir's south end. Every now and then they came across a single working oil rig of the kind Annja always thought of as "dickey bird," bobbing incessantly for black gold, sometimes literally in someone's backyard.

As they came up on what a sign identified as the San JacintoRiver, Jadzia let out a yip like a pup with its tail stepped on.

She pointed right. Annja looked to see, south of the bridge and on the river's far side, a collection of towers, scaffolding and white-painted pipes of a sizable oil refinery. Above it rose a white oval sign with a big blue EP logo.

Annja felt gut-punched.

"What?" Tex asked, turning around. Annja nodded toward the refinery.

"Whoa," he said. "Is that new?"

"Uh-huh," Joey said. "They bought out an American company a year or so ago. They're moving hard against the smaller companies. That's one of the reasons I'm sure my uncle will want to help you."

"I hope you're right," Annja said. It still sounded like a long shot – that Amon Hogue would be willing to use his power and influence to help them get more of the scrolls transcribed. Although Hogue was relatively small as players of the global oil game went, according to Internet sources his net worth hovered around $850 million. It was hard to think of eighty-five percent of a billionaire as small, but Annja realized the game was very large indeed.

What exactly the Texas tycoon – who was known for his fondness for fast horses, young women and old whiskey – might do to help them she also had no clue. On the other hand his kind of money could buy a lot of options.

"Are we in Louisiana yet?" Jadzia asked after they had been driving for some time. A big flight of cattle egrets lifted from a stretch of water winding sluggishly away to the southwest.

"Uh-uh," Tex said. "Still in Texas. Not planning on leaving, at least until we've talked to Uncle Amon."

They crossed the Trinity River, turned north up State Highway 140 at a town called Liberty. At a wide patch of road called Moss Hill they turned right. A mile or so past the turnoff to the Loblolly Unit of the Big Thicket National Preserve, Joey turned north onto an unmarked dirt road. It wound through alternating stands of pine, scrub oak and sweetgum for what Annja thought was at least a mile before Joey pulled off onto a wide spot in the road beside a bayou.

A little weathered wood shack stood there, the appearance of timelessness spoiled a little by a gas pump and a lot by the satellite dish on the roof.

"This is our stop, ladies," Joey said, killing the engine. "Better get your gear. Uncle Amon might want to spirit you away somewhere. Like a safehouse or something."

"A safehouse," Jadzia breathed. Her eyes glittered. She was clearly enjoying the cloak-and-dagger aspects of their journey.

More than Annja, anyway. As she hefted the scrolls from the opened back of the Cherokee she caught Tex's eye and arched an eyebrow. He shrugged. "I don't know what happens next," he said. "I guess all we can do is cross our fingers and keep moving."

Annja had no better idea to offer. Tex handed Jadzia's bag to her as Annja shouldered her own. Then they followed Tex to the dock. A white-haired black man wearing denim coveralls sun-faded and grease-stained to a sort of brown-and-white tie-dye stood talking to Joey. Beyond them a curious contrivance like a low platform with a big openwork cage at one end sat on top of some yellowing weeds flattened on the bank.

"What is that?" Jadzia asked, sounding a little dubious for the first time.

"An airboat?" Annja said incredulously.

Tex shrugged. "They got bayous," he said. "I guess they can have airboats."

"We use 'em a lot around here," Joey called. "All right, Vearle. We'll take it from here."

"You take care of yourself out there, Joey," Vearle said. To the others he waved, then shuffled back inside as if his feet hurt.

The boat sported a big airplane-style propeller with eight blades enclosed in the cage. In front of it was mounted what looked like a car engine. Before that a single bucket seat, built up about three feet above the hull with a long lever, evidently a tiller, to the right of it was obviously a driver's seat. Two bench-style seats were set in front of it, both facing forward.

Tex and Joey stashed the bags in a space under the operator's seat and pulled a blue synthetic groundsheet over them to protect them from spray and, Annja guessed, oil seepage from the engine. The water smelled of tannin and rotting vegetation. Minute flies or gnats swarmed around them. Fortunately they weren't the biting kind.

Joey helped the two women into the boat. Tex sat down beside Annja. Jadzia took the seat in front of them. Annja recalled a time when she'd always wanted to ride in the front on roller coasters. She didn't do that anymore. She didn't feel much desire to ride roller coasters at all. Her life had become enough of a thrill ride by itself.

Joey climbed in last, clambered up into his seat and fired up the engine. It roared and pushed the boat down the couple of yards to the bayou, throwing up a swirl of debris behind. The boat splashed and wallowed a little as it entered the water. Joey turned the square prow northwest. The engine noise rose to a howl and the small craft shot forward with an exhilarating rush.

They passed a stand of trees killed and silvered by a fire and partially swallowed by the bayou, then made their way through a half-drowned forest of living oak trees. The bayou bent east. A big gleaming white structure appeared ahead on the right as they followed the curve.

Out front stood a big well-kept wooden dock with a boathouse. With a flourish Joey turned the airboat and ran it up on the bank next to the dock, flattening the long grass beneath. When he killed the engine the silence fell like a blow.

Leaving the other bags, Annja retrieved the scrolls. Jadzia offered to carry them. Annja was a little surprised. Jadzia hadn't shown much disposition to physical work. Then she realized the younger woman probably felt proprietary about the artifacts and wanted to associate herself with them in the near-billionaire's mind.

They walked up a white-graveled path with old railroad ties for sidings to the porch. The hunting lodge had a sprawling, comfortable look. It was built of whitewashed wood with a cypress shake roof. Some old pecan trees, not yet coming into bloom, shaded the front and sides.

The porch boomed beneath their feet. Tex held the door while Joey pushed ahead. Jadzia went in after, then Annja. Tex came in last.

It was dark and seemed almost chilly. Annja wasn't sure if there was air-conditioning or just shade and contrast to the afternoon heat outside. Her eyes adjusted slowly, becoming aware of a calculated rustic-seeming interior. There was a longhorn rack on a dark-stained wood plaque on the wall above a fieldstone fireplace. Off to the right of the door a large figure sat in a chair covered in black-and-white cowhide. He faced away from the newcomers, toward a giant plasma TV in one corner of the room. He seemed to be asleep.

Joey took a step toward the seated figure. "Uncle Amon?" he said, sounding uncertain.

A small, slim man with white hair, a white tropical-weight silk suit and a lilac-colored tie that matched his eyes emerged from a door on the room's far side, and a shot rang out.