"Alan Dean Foster - Interlopers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Foster Alan Dean)

would bet that she wrote regularly to several captivated males back in the States. Dazzling young doctors or
up-and-coming investment bankers, no doubt. Gangly half-breed dirt-grubbers from West Hicksville were not
likely to fit neatly into her definition of potential mate material.
Everyone had tried, he knew. He'd even seen the temptation in Harbos's face. You had to give the good
doctor credit, though. He might brush up against his students every now and then, but he was quick to voice
apologies-even if he didn't feel apologetic. It struck Cody abruptly that she was still standing there, looking
down and waiting for some kind of response.
"I'm just packing Curly here for the trip to the lab." He indicated the skull.
With the agility of a gymnast she hopped down to the mid-level shelf, careful not to kick any dirt into the
excavation. Kneeling while pushing back the brim of her rumpled hat, she scrutinized the vacant-eyed skull
thoughtfully.
"Not exactly the second coming of the Lord of Sipan," she quipped tartly.
"What is?" The great, unlooted tomb of the Moche chieftain that had been discovered near the coast was
 unparalleled in the history of South American archaeology.
9
Its gold, silver, and lapidary treasures were the stuff of every field worker's dreams.
"Nothing, I suppose. If this is Curly, where are Manny and Moe?"
"Show a little respect for the dead." He nodded to-ward the silent skull. "That's a cousin of mine. Distant, but
still a relation."
Straightening, she grinned down at him, enjoying the temporary and entirely artificial adjustment to their
re-spective height. "Don't try that politically correct guilt crap on me, Cody Westcott." She tapped the box
with a booted foot. "This dude's about as much your relative as Mary Queen of Scots is mine. It is a dude?"
"I believe so. Kimiko will make the final determina-tion." Kimiko Samms was the group's forensic
anthropologist, a specialty that required her to live in even closer proximity to the long dead than her
colleagues. "I can feel a kinship across the centuries to whoever this person was.
"Funny." Reaching back, she scratched the arch of her behind through the soft bush poplin of her pants. "All I
can feel are chigger bites."
"Salar should have something for that. If he doesn't, I do." Turning away, Cody started toward the steps that
had been cut into the dirt above a nonsensitive corner of the site. Sweat poured down his face, mixing with
accumulated dirt and dust-archaeologist's rouge. Time was passing and he wanted to get the skull to the field
lab and return in time to do some more digging before the daylight shrank too far below the undulating green
hori-zon. The sweat did not bother him. At Apachetarimac's altitude the air began to cool rapidly once the sun
had passed its zenith.
"What's that?"
He almost didn't turn. In addition to her beauty, wit,
"
10
down fast now. It would be dark soon, no time to be bumbling around in the area of active excavation. Aside
from the danger of stumbling into an open pit, a misplaced foot could do irreparable damage to half-seen,
half-exposed relics. Dr. Harbos was an easygoing individual, but not where the work of serious archeology
was concerned. One of his rules required everyone to be back in camp by the scheduled dinnertime. In
addition to preventing damage to the sites by overzealous diggers, this was also a safety measure. Snakes
and uncomfortably large spiders emerged soon after sundown, and in a land of precipitous cliffs and hillsides,
wandering about after dark was not a good idea anyway.
"It's another skull, all right," she murmured. Busy appraising the sunset, he did not look down. "But this one's
weird."
That drew his attention back to his companion. With the sun setting, it was already dark in the bottom of the
pit. "What do you mean, `weird'? That's not acceptable scientific terminology."
Bending over the spot, she blocked his view of the emerging bone. "It's got a hole in it, like the one you're
taking to the lab-but not like the one you're taking to the lab."