A Golden Legend

Chapter 25

Three days later, McPherson ordered to stop the works for a meeting with all the members of the venture in the central square of the town that had already been cleared by the works.

“I think that at this point we can already anticipate some conclusions that, although preliminary, I do not think that will be denied by the future” this phrase was able to attract the attention of all members, common achievement of the American in his lectures.

“There is no doubt that we are in the site of an Inca town from the period that interests us, and in all probability is related to exiles, whether they were Tarco Huaman and his followers or others. We have found remains of pottery and textiles, which we will be analyzed now by the Peruvian Professor Gamarra and his colleagues to see what history they tell us.”

“Sorry for the question of a layman, but I thought that the Incas did not have writing systems. What are you planning to translate?” ventured Marcelo in a friendly tone.

“Your question is valid “said McPherson, always looking to leave good standing to its partners to encourage their participation “indeed the Incas did not write on substrates such as paper, leather, or other, as did other civilizations. But they have left messages in the quipus, which are real strings of textile materials knotted ropes. But I leave the word to our dear Professor Gamarra.

“We have found several samples of quipus in the ruins, like this” said Gamarra displaying a plastic bag with one of the mentioned groups of ropes hanging from a thicker rope which served them as physical support “May I ask you to circulate this sample among you?” he handed the bag to the closest person” but please do so with care, since it is a true miracle that has arrived at our days given that the organic materials rot easily in this humid and warm environment.”

“The number of knots “ continued “ its type, the distance between them and the colors of the strings that were used, using mnemonic rules which we have been able to discover at least in part, to convey messages and preserve knowledge and news to their offspring. Before, it was believed that they were only numeric messages, but we now know that they were used also for coding textual messages in this way. Some of these quipus have been preserved in this hostile environment although the original colors that were dyed with have disappeared. On the other hand, we have also found remains of pottery with geometric designs, which are also carriers of messages. We plan decoding this in the coming days.”

That said Gamarra gave the word back to McPherson.

“ And although I can say that what we have found is a historic discovery of great importance, it is likely that it is not the great Paititi, our primary objective”  a murmur of disappointment towered above the Group of assembled people; expectations of being part of a milestone of archaeology vanished, at least temporarily.

“The total number of ruins found, some thirty, and the alleged ones that we can estimate in about the same number, give us a stable population of this settlement of four to five hundred people, far from the size that is attributed to Paititi, which was always estimated to be about ten times more.”

The rest of the exhibition of the professor was technical, and it was followed with interest by attendees. At the end of the same added.

“But I beg you not to be discouraged. The expedition will continue! As everyone remembers, we have located a second site in the region of the Peruvian yungas, and there we will go when we have extracted from this site all the information that the weather and climate have allowed to keep.”

“I was already expecting this conclusion” Teresa told Lupita and Marcelo once the meeting was over “these ruins could not be the source of something as persistent as the Paititi legend.”

The helicopter landed two hours late. Marcelo said goodbye to Teresa with a hug and a kiss. He had come to an end the license in his job in Buenos Aires and he should return to home; the night before they had had strenuous s*x and promises and very heartfelt confidences had been made. The young man went up to the vehicle without looking backwards to avoid losing courage; with him were four others. After a few minutes the powerful blades of the machine began to turn, forcing everyone to move away from the gust of wind originated.

The man with camouflage jacket got to finally make his satellite call, after an hour of attempts.

“Our contact has communicated with me. He says that McPherson has ruled out this site, but has promised to continue looking in the mountains... no, he did not disclose the place... yes, we will keep monitoring... don´t worry, we will not proceed until you give the order... do you planning to join us? We will then look for a site so you can land.”