Restless Soul. Alex Archer

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СКАЧАТЬ from the truth. She hadn’t planned to let real life interfere with this long-overdue vacation.

      She shook her head and turned away from the window. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close; he couldn’t see the sour, conflicted expression on her face.

      “I saw a flyer about it in the lobby—a spirit cave,” Luartaro continued. “And I remember it was also mentioned on the internet when we found this place. Ancient coffins carved from trees, burial grounds inside the mountains. There’s such a cave less than a day’s hike from here, and a guide takes you out in the morning. This area is known for its spectacular limestone caverns. There are hundreds of caves in the mountain ranges. It would be a shame not to visit at least one while we’re so close…especially since you want to venture outside.”

      She could tell by his voice that the prospect enticed him.

      “All right,” she said after a moment. “A spirit cave. First thing tomorrow morning.” Another shiver coursed through her.

      “Wonderful! And we’ll manage to make time for an elephant ride or some rafting before we leave,” he added. “And maybe see the long-necked women and that big Buddhist temple. But for the moment, since it’s raining…” He drew her toward the bed.

      2

      At first glance, Annja couldn’t tell whether the guide was thirty or fifty. His eyes were bright, hinting at youth, but his skin was tanned and leathery from the sun, the wrinkles deep especially at the edges of his eyes. Careworn, she judged his face. His black hair was thin and short, slick with either sweat or oil, and his shoulders hunched slightly.

      He smiled broadly and nodded to their little group. “Zakkarat,” he said, holding his index finger to his chest.

      He wore khaki pants, frayed and stained green and brown at the ankles as if he’d never bothered to hem them, instead letting the ground and his heels wear the fabric down to a more suitable length. He had a faded polo shirt with an illustration of a gibbon on it, and over that an unbuttoned short-sleeved shirt that was a riot of color—red, blue, green, with birds and flowers. He also wore a cord around his neck with a whistle dangling from it and old black-and-white tennis shoes.

      “Zakkarat,” he repeated. “Zakkarat Tak-sin. Your guide to Tham Lod Cave.”

      Luartaro reached for Annja’s hand and swung it as if he was a child. He was smiling, too, obviously happy to be off to the spirit cave, as the pamphlet called it. His skin felt warm against hers, and she intertwined her fingers with his and reveled in his boyish attitude.

      With them were two other couples, one in their twenties—on an ecohoneymoon, they’d proudly announced. The other was a middle-aged Australian pair who were on their third trip to Thailand.

      “Comfortable shoes, all?” Zakkarat looked at everyone’s feet.

      “Comfortable shoes, yes,” Luartaro replied. The others nodded in agreement.

      “Five, six miles to the cave,” Zakkarat said. “Two hundred baht now, more later for extras. Not much more. This is one of the cheapest trips for tourists.”

      Luartaro was quick to pay the guide, whispering to Annja that the pamphlet said there would be a charge to enter the cave and for the raft.

      After passing out small water bottles, Zakkarat led the way. He had a quick gait and was nimble, ducking under branches and stepping over ruts, and Annja put him closer to thirty for it. He chattered as he went, pointing first to the tops of the mountains and mentioning the mist. They were unlike other mountains she’d traipsed through, certainly unlike the familiar Rockies and the mountains she and Luartaro had combed through for the ancient penguin remains. These peaks had been weathered away into twisted shapes and odd-looking knobs largely covered by jungle. They were beautiful and ghostlike in the mist.

      She regretted not bringing her camera. Luartaro wasn’t taking as many pictures as she would have, or from what she deemed the proper angles. The path Zakkarat took was wide and flat from the traffic of countless tourists. To the sides stretched swaths of dark green moss, still shiny from yesterday’s rain.

      Though practically everything was green, there were remarkable variations, Annja noted. Some of the leaves were so pale they appeared bleached bone-white by the sun. Others were a deep green that looked like velvet. Shadows were thick near the ground where the large leaves reminded her of umbrellas. If there were patterns to the colors and light, she couldn’t discern them—everything was a swirl.

      Had someone taken a picture of the scenery and turned it into a jigsaw puzzle, it would be one of the most difficult ever to assemble, she thought.

      Annja listened intently to hundreds of tiny frogs that chirped like baby birds. After a mile, she spotted a fence far to her left, and a tilled field beyond. On the opposite side the ground rose at a steep angle, and she wondered if there were caves beneath.

      A bit farther along, the Australian man drained his water bottle and looked at his watch. “My feet are hurtin’, Jennie,” he said. His wife smiled sympathetically and pointed to a thin river that meandered out of the fields to their left. It widened as they kept walking, eventually paralleling the path, which had started to narrow.

      “More than two hundred caves in Pan Mapha in Mae Hong Son alone,” Zakkarat announced. He numbingly rattled off facts about their length in meters and feet with so little inflection that Annja guessed he’d been repeating his speech and leading tours so long that he was bored by it all. “This cave we go to, a most popular spot. Tham Lod Cave does not need climbing equipment. Easy on the feet, yes?”

      Good for most of the tourists, Annja thought, wishing for something a little more adventurous and taxing.

      The path narrowed to the point they had to walk single file, and Annja noted faded signs tacked on trees written in Thai and English advertising a bird show. They’d obviously been posted years earlier, and she wondered if the show still continued and, if so, what it entailed.

      They came to a fork in the trail. Zakkarat pointed to his right and said, “Temple. Tours available there, too.” Through the mist, Annja could barely make out a large stone building with hints of ornate corners. The other course, the one they followed along the river, led to an old wooden gate that hung off its hinges and which they easily stepped through.

      The path became rougher, and gnarled tree roots poked through here and there. Zakkarat slowed his pace and jabbed his finger at the largest roots.

      “Take care,” he warned. “Take care that you do not trip.” He nodded to another sign advertising a bird show. “Going out with a big group tomorrow night for the birds.”

      “So there is a bird show,” Annja mused.

      “Ain’t there birds out now?” This came from Jennie, who was looking up into the trees and alternately watching her husband, who was still grumbling about his feet.

      Apparently, she’d not noticed the other bird-show signs.

      “Ah, there’s a red one with black streaks on its wings.” Jennie pointed. “And there’s another red one. So what’s with the bird show? Are they trained? Parrots?”

      The ecotourist wife answered before Zakkarat had a chance. “We’re in the bird group tomorrow night,” she said. “At sunset, all the bats fly out of the cave we’re going to right now and a colony СКАЧАТЬ