Inca Gold

    "Indeed," Bender answered triumphantly. "Cuttill gave it to the leader of the Portuguese survey party with the request that it be sent to London. The Portuguese, however, turned it over to the viceroy at Macapa. He included it with dispatches he forwarded to Lisbon, where it passed through any number of hands before ending up in an antique bookstore, where I bought it for the equivalent of thirty-six dollars. That was a lot of money back in 1937, at least to a lad of twenty-three who was wandering the globe on a shoestring."

    "The journal must be worth considerably more than thirty-six dollars today."

    "I'm sure of it. A dealer once offered me ten thousand for it."

    "You turned him down?"

    "I've never sold mementos of my journeys so someone else could profit."

    "May I fly up to Vermont and read the journal?" asked Perlmutter cautiously.

    "I'm afraid not."

    Perlmutter paused as he wondered how to persuade Bender to allow him to examine Cuttill's journal. "May I ask why?"

    "I'm a sick old man," Bender replied, "whose heart refuses to stop."

    "You certainly don't sound ill."

    "You should see me. The diseases I picked up during my travels have returned to ravage what's left of my body. I am not a pretty sight, so I rarely entertain visitors. But I'll tell you what I'll do, Mr. Perlmutter. I'll send you the book as a gift."

    "My God, sir, you don't have to--"

    "No, no, I insist. Frank Adams told me about your magnificent library on ships. I'd rather someone like you, who can appreciate the journal, possess it rather than a collector who simply puts it on a shelf to impress his friends."

    "That's very kind of you," said Perlmutter sincerely. "I'm truly grateful for your kind generosity."

    "Take it and enjoy," Bender said graciously. "I assume you'd like to study the journal as soon as possible."

    "I don't want to inconvenience you."

    "Not at all, I'll send it Federal Express so you'll have it in your hands first thing tomorrow."

    "Thank you, Mr. Bender. Thank you very much. I'll treat the journal with every bit of the respect it deserves."

    "Good. I hope you find what you're looking for."

    "So do I," said Perlmutter, his confidence soaring over the breakthrough. "Believe me, so do I."

    At twenty minutes after ten o'clock the next morning, Perlmutter threw open the door before the Federal Express driver could punch the doorbell button. "You must be expecting this, Mr. Perlmutter, " said the young blackhaired man, wearing glasses and a friendly smile.

    "Like a child waiting for Santa." Perlmutter laughed, signing for the reinforced envelope.

    He hurried into his study, pulling the tab and opening the envelope as he walked. He sat at his desk, slipped on his glasses, and held the journal of Thomas Cuttill in his hands as if it were the Holy Grail. The cover was the skin of some unidentifiable animal and the pages were yellowed parchment in a state of excellent preservation. The ink was brown, probably a concoction Cuttill had managed to brew from the root of some tree. There were no more than twenty pages. The entries were written in the quaint Elizabethan prose of the day. The handwriting seemed labored, with any number of misspellings, indicating a man who was reasonably well educated for the times. The first entry was dated March 1578, but was written much later:

Mine strange historie of the passte sexteen yeares, by Thomas Cuttill, formerly of Devonshire.

    It was the account of a shipwrecked sailor, cast away after barely surviving the sea's violent fury, only to endure incredible hardships in a savage land in his unsuccessful attempt to return home. As he read the passages, begi

    After finding himself the only survivor on the galleon after the tidal wave carried it far inland, Cuttill chose the unknown horrors of the mountains and jungle rather than capture and torture by the avenging Spanish, who were mad as wasps at the audacious capture of their treasure galleon by the hated Englishman, Drake. All Cuttill knew was that the Atlantic Ocean lay somewhere far to the east. How far, he could not even guess. Reaching the sea, and then somehow finding a friendly ship that might carry him back to England would be nothing short of a miracle. But it was the only path open to him.

    On the western slopes of the Andes the Spanish had already created colonies of large estates, now worked by the once-proud Incas, who were enslaved and greatly reduced in numbers by inhumane treatment and infection from measles and smallpox. Cuttill crept through the estates under cover of darkness, stealing food at every opportunity. After two months of traveling a few short kilometers each night to elude the Spanish and remain out of sight of any Indians who might give him away, he crossed over the continental divide of the Andes, through the isolated valleys, and descended into the green hell of the Amazon River Basin.

    From that point on, Cuttill's life became even more of a nightmare. He struggled through unending swamps up to his waist, fought his way through forests so thick every meter of growth had to be cut away with his knife. Swarms of insects, snakes, and alligators were a constant peril, the snakes often attacking without warning. He suffered from dysentery and fever but still struggled on, often covering only 100 meters (328 feet) during daylight. After several months, he stumbled into a village of hostile natives, who immediately tied him with ropes and kept him imprisoned as a slave for five years.

    Cuttill finally managed to escape by stealing a dugout canoe and paddling down the Amazon River at night under a waning moon. Contracting malaria, he came within an inch of dying, but as he drifted unconscious in his canoe he was found by a tribe of long-haired women who nursed him back to health. It was the same tribe of women the Spanish explorer Francisco de Orellana had discovered during his futile search for El Dorado. He named the river Amazonas in honor of the Amazon warriors of Greek legend because the native women could draw a bow with any man.

    Cuttill introduced a number of labor-saving devices to the women and the few men who lived with them. He built a potter's wheel and taught them how to make huge intricate bowls and water vessels. He constructed wheelbarrows and waterwheels for irrigation, and showed them how to use pulleys to lift heavy weights. Soon looked upon as a god, Cuttill made an enjoyable life among the tribe. He took three of the most attractive women as wives and quickly produced several children.

    His desire to see home again slowly dimmed. A bachelor when he left England, he was sure there would be no relatives or old shipmates left to greet his return. And then there was the possibility that Drake, a stern disciplinarian, would demand punishment for losing the Concepcion.

    No longer physically capable of suffering the deprivations and hardships of along journey, Cuttill reluctantly decided to spend the remaining years of his life on the banks of the Amazon. When the Portuguese survey party passed through, he gave them his journal, requesting that it be somehow sent to England and placed in the hands of Francis Drake.