Lost in Translation Page 0,49

place to hide Peking Man. It all fits. Except that little drawing—I don’t know what that is."

"That’s the Helan Shan petroglyph," Kong said promptly.

"What?" Spencer’s eyes popped. "You know it?"

"Of course. It’s a rock art design found only in the Helan Shan Mountains around Eren Obo—that’s a village over the border in what’s now Inner Mongolia. They’re quite controversial, these petroglyphs. Nobody knows whether they are from a thousand years ago or twenty thousand years ago. And no one knows what they signify. Or what culture created them." Kong’s thin, high-cheeked face was lit with knowledge and pleasure. "Here!" He reached for one of Spencer’s maps, uncapped his ballpoint, and drew a circle around a section of the Helan Shan mountains. "This is where they’re found. No place else."

"Only here?" Spencer’s grin pulled slowly at his mouth. "This is great. We’ve got to check this out. I’ve never seen any design like this in the Americas, a sun with the face of a monkey."

"Isn’t it so. Moreover, monkeys were never native to this part of north China. Never."

That stopped Spencer cold. "Then the image must date from after trade was established."

"Yet the patina on the rocks suggest these petroglyphs are much, much older," Kong countered. "We don’t know. We only know that this motif—we call it the monkey sun god—is unique to the Helan Shan."

"And it was sketched in this letter, written to Father Teilhard in 1945. What does that tell us?"

Dr. Kong touched his fingertips together. "Let me think back and forth. Certainly by 1945 nothing would have been published about this rock art. At that time the monkey sun god would only have been known to local people."

"Suoyi, " Alice said, "whoever wrote this letter lived in or near the Helan Shan Mountains."

Spencer picked up the map Dr. Kong had drawn on. "So worst case—I mean, suppose we don’t find what we’re looking for here? We could go on to"—he squinted—"Eren Obo." He propped open his notebook and wrote swiftly, beaming. "You’re something, Dr. Kong. How’d you know about this petroglyph?"

"How could I not know? Late Paleolithic hunter-gatherers are my specialty."

"Late Paleolithic ..." Spencer glanced from Kong to Lin. "I’d assumed both of you were Homo erectus specialists."

"Dr. Lin is an expert on Homo erectus," Dr. Kong clarified, pointing to the other Chinese. "Early-Middle Paleolithic."

Dr. Lin nodded. "And I study nomadic foragers in the Late Paleolithic," he finished. "Also the Neolithic, the transition to agriculture."

"Ah. Like me," Spencer said.

Kong nodded.

"Then why were you selected to come, Dr. Kong?" Alice asked.

"Oh! Because I am the vice director’s cousin."

Aha, Alice thought. Of course.

"The vice director depends on me to take care of you. And, of course, to watch you."

Alice jumped on his candor like a small animal. "Do you know anything about those men who were following us in Beijing?"

He shook his head. "I don’t know who they were. But it was ordered, I know that. They are watching you. Surely you realize they watch foreigners."

"Yes—sometimes—" Alice said.

"It’s because you’re looking for Peking Man. Please understand, this is considered most important."

"Of course it is," Spencer agreed. "And thanks for being honest. I appreciate it. I think you’re all right, Dr. Kong. I like you."

"Bici." Kong smiled. It’s mutual.

An hour later they were bouncing out of Yinchuan in a cheap rented jeep, an old machine that had seen many better years. It had gray splotches of primer everywhere, rudely patched tires, and one door that wouldn’t shut. The driver grinned at Alice crazily when she addressed him in Chinese and asked if he thought the jeep would make it. He had a mouthful of silver teeth and lentil-shaped freckles splashed over his jutting cheekbones. "I have my tools!" he explained, waving a thin, muscled arm at a single screwdriver and a plastic jug filled with water. "It’s no problem!"

"Those are your tools? That’s it? You have a spare tire?"

"Foreign woman, don’t worry. I can drive to the shores of the four seas and back."

"What’s he saying about the jeep?" Spencer asked nervously.

"He says it runs great."

And it did attain surprising speeds as they roared out of the city, out of the oasis with its lush fields and into the desert. The dirt and rocks became a carpet, rolling gently away toward the horizon, where the wall of the Helan Shan could faintly be seen. No one followed them. Alice could see miles of empty road behind. Scotch broom and sagebrush and other scrubby plants Alice could not name grew in patches.