|
|
He woke to a headache, not knowing where he was ... or even who he was.
Klaus. Someone had told him his name was Klaus. That someone lay next to him, in another sleeping bag.
Dorian.
Dorian looked exhausted, dark semi-circles under his eyes, hair tumbled.
Thinking more clearly now, Klaus began to piece together what he knew. The pain in his head, and the bandage he could feel, verified his head injury. That accounted for the amnesia.
How strange. He knew what amnesia was, and didn't know his own name. But the contents of his pack lay beside his sleeping bag. A quick search unearthed a passport. Klaus Heinz, from Düsseldorf. German citizen - but he had known that, he realized. He also knew he wasn't in Germany. The visa stamp of latest date in the passport told him he was in Peru.
What was he doing in a cave in Peru with this Dorian person? Business associate? He didn't think he had ever seen anyone who looked less like a businessman!
And Dorian had said, "Du heißt Klaus," not "Sie heißen Herr Heinz." They were friends. Perhaps vacationing together? He looked over at Dorian again. What kind of man wore his hair in curls reaching halfway down his back?
He touched a strand of his own hair. It was longer than in the passport photo, well below his collar. Apparently ... he was the same kind of man.
Perhaps they were entertainers, actors or musicians. They were too old to be students. Ah, but they could be university professors. That made a bit of sense. Suddenly he recalled that despite Dorian's fluent and accentless German, he knew the man to be English. But although he tried, he could not remember anything else about him.
He knew, when he thought about it, that he himself spoke English with the same fluency, although he could not pass for a native speaker.
He frowned as he looked about. Something was different from when he had wakened before. He was less confused, less panicked. He felt stronger. Dorian had been awake and up before, of course, instead of asleep as he was now ... but the sleeping bag Dorian now slept in had formerly been used to cover Klaus.
A hazy memory surfaced: he had seen Dorian asleep before, in a narrow bunk in some tiny room with walls of painted steel. Rows of rivets were the only decoration. A ship ... or a submarine. The flash of memory was brief, his hand slapping the bunk, Dorian starting awake, then smiling as he saw who it was. That was all.
But it woke another memory: he and Dorian knelt side by side in church. He looked up at the sculpture of the horned Moses. They were in St. Paul's Outside the Walls, in Rome.
Again, that was all, just a brief flash that told him nothing ... except that he and Dorian obviously did a great deal of traveling together. Perhaps there was nothing unusual about their being in a cave in Peru.
It lent credence to the idea that they might be a pair of rather adventurous university professors. Who else traveled so much? Spies? Another glance at Dorian and he had to chuckle at the very idea of that man blending into a crowd. He would attract attention anywhere he went. Mein Gott, but he was exotic!
And good. He remembered the comforting voice, gentle hands tending to his wound, strong arms supporting him. There was unexpected strength beneath Dorian's fragile appearance. Well, there had to be, didn't there, if he spent his vacations climbing mountains and exploring caves?
Resisting the urge to wake Dorian with a string of questions, Klaus looked for something to wear, and found a stack of freshly-washed clothing next to his pack. No wonder Dorian was exhausted, doing all the work that camping always took, and caring for a sick man at the same time. Well, he didn't feel sick anymore.
Gingerly, Klaus climbed to his feet. He wasn't as steady as he would like to be, but he could manage without falling. The soft wool sweater Dorian had put on him before was the closest thing to a bathrobe available, so he slid back into it and made the trip to the oubliette and back without incident. As long as he didn't make any sudden moves, his head felt better and better - that is, he felt it less and less.
He was hungry. Dorian had made hot coffee and porridge before - but there was no sign of a fire. The water had come from the spring that fed the pool ... ah, there were two springs, one of them steaming. How convenient!
He made another cup of coffee, and sat down to chew on some jerky, and dried berries he found in a clay pot. Where had that come from? Nobody traveled with breakable containers like that.
It hurt his head to chew the tough dry meat, so he gave it up and opened a foil packet of trail mix.
He wanted a meal, but didn't know how long Dorian needed to sleep yet. He might have just dropped off.
But as he sat watching the blond, Dorian took a deep breath, and opened his eyes. "I smell coffee," he said with a smile.
Klaus held out the cup to him. He took a swallow, and winced. "I don't know how you can drink that stuff!"
"But ... you were drinking it before," Klaus said, bewildered.
"I needed the caffeine. You're feeling better, I see."
"Much better, thanks to you." At that point he realized that they were conversing in English, as Dorian had started the conversation in that language. He was right about his fluency; he found he could think in English as easily as in German.
"Have you ... remembered anything?"
"Yes. You and I often travel together."
"Absolutely true."
"Rome."
"Right."
"We went to church together."
"That's right. It was Christmas," Dorian confirmed.
"St. Peter's is too full of tourists then," said Klaus. "We went to a smaller church."
"Do you remember anything else about Rome?" Dorian asked hesitantly.
Klaus concentrated, but there was nothing beyond that one moment. "No. You look as if there's something about Rome you don't want me to remember."
"So you haven't forgotten your interrogation skills."
"Interrogation?" Klaus pounced. "Dorian, what do I do for a living?"
Why did Dorian have to stop and think before he answered? "You are ... career army."
"Career army? Me?!"
Dorian's face crinkled with laughter. "Don't sound so astonished! You're not at all like yourself when you do that."
"What am I doing here?"
"You're on leave."
Klaus lifted a strand of his hair and asked sarcastically, "How long have I been on leave - a couple of years?"
"No, about a fortnight. Don't ask me to explain how you get away with that hair, Klaus. You do intelligence work, so at first I thought it was so you could pass as a civilian when necessary. But everyone in the intelligence community knows you. That long hair's your trademark. So ... my guess is that you're another John Milton."
"John Milton? The poet?"
"That's interesting. You remember Milton, but not your own life."
"How am I like Milton? Don't tell me I write poetry."
"Not that you've ever let me know of. Milton was a Puritan, one of Cromwell's men. Puritan men were called Roundheads because they cut their hair off to shame the vanity of the Cavaliers with their long curls. Milton was as loyal a Puritan as they came, and pretty conspicuous in the government as Cromwell's Latin secretary, but he never cut his long hair off."
"Why not?"
"It was beautiful," Dorian said,"but not as beautiful as yours. Apparently Cromwell found Milton too valuable to quarrel with him over his hair. I think your superiors don't quarrel with you for the same reason."
"I'm good at my work?"
"The best."
"And you - what do you do for a living, Dorian? Something tells me you are not career military."
Dorian laughed aloud at that. "No. I don't know how you can stand all that discipline." Then there was another of those pauses before he answered Klaus's question. "I don't have to work for a living. I inherited an independent income."
"Then ... what do you do with your life?"
"Well ... you might say I spend a good deal of time being a nuisance to you."
"I might say that?" He frowned."Dorian, I get the impression that while you may be telling me the truth, it is far from the whole truth."
Dorian took a deep breath, and let it slowly out again before he answered. "Your instincts are as sound as ever. That's exactly what I'm doing, for good reason. You have to remember your own memories, Klaus, not my version of them. I'm trying to answer your questions objectively. I had no idea how hard it is to say anything that isn't colored with my opinion."
"You've studied psychology."
"I went to university, of course."
"Is that where we met?"
"No."
"Just ... no?"
"I don't think I could possibly be objective about how we met."
Some vague memory stirred, but refused to surface. Klaus realized, "I didn't like you at first. In fact, I thoroughly disliked you."
"That's right."
"But we're friends now."
"I like to think so."
"What are we doing in Peru?"
"You've remembered that we're in Peru!"
"I looked at my passport. Why are we here?"
"To see this temple that we're in. When you feel stronger, I'll show you the chapel with the mosaics. We're trapped here for a while, until you're strong enough to travel, and until the snow and ice blocking our exit melt."
"The avalanche."
"Yes. But we'll be okay. Uh, I found a storage room with plenty of food. The people who worship here provide it for stranded travelers. We've got everything we need until it's safe to leave."
"So that's where the clay pot came from," said Klaus.
"You're amazing," said Dorian, giving him a sidelong glance from under long, thick lashes. Then, as if to cover a tactical error, he got up, saying, "Are you hungry? I'm famished. Can you cook? I can follow the instructions printed on foil packets, but I'm not sure what to do with plain flour and corn meal!"
"I don't remember if I know how to cook," Klaus replied. "I'll just have to try, and see what happens."
Forward to Part Seven
Back to Fiction Page