“This is the translation I promised to make for you,” he said, placing the script in Jack’s hand. “Some of the passages are missing because my memory grows faulty with advancing years. I must confess too, that all portions of the manuscript are not strictly accurate. You may have this copy, and I sincerely hope it will be of use to you.”
“You never recovered the original parchment?” Jack inquired after he had thanked the missionary for the laborious work.
Father Francisco shook his head. “Lolita may have stolen it,” he remarked. “On a number of occasions I have scolded her for her behavior.”
Jack skimmed through the closely written pages.
“Say, this is rich stuff!” he asserted. “Listen, fellows! ‘Around the camp fire which we lit that night, we held council and decided that next morning all of us would set off cautiously down the trail to the city of the dead....’”
“There is a break at that point,” Father Francisco apologized. “My memory failed me completely.”
Jack read on:
“‘We came into the open from the trail, approached towering walls and passed under a gigantic entrance of three lofty arches. These were built of colossal stones, the center arch dominating the others.’”
“That’s an account of the Portuguese explorers’ first view of the ancient city?” War asked in awe.
The missionary nodded. “The original offers a most graphic description of ‘an ethereal region that served as a throne for the wind and stars.’ My translation is not the best, and my recollection of it, even poorer. It should, nevertheless, serve your purpose.”