Caroline's husband and British Consul to Peru, Raymond Carol, had used his limited political influence to acquire the map for her. The map dated from 1911, from the days when the Peruvian government admitted the lake existed at all. The looming threat of civil war, coupled with strained relationships between the Peruvian Presidente Óscar Benavides and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, also complicated matters for Caroline and her husband.
Caroline brought the Ford to a stop outside a small, ramshackle beach house that sat somewhat lopsidedly at the side of the road. A sense of foreboding seemed to seep from every crack in the warped, wooden siding of the two storey structure, its tiled roof sagging from years of water and sand erosion. A small, somewhat newer looking boathouse peeked from behind. Uneasily, Caroline approached the front door and rang the bell. She heard a faint buzz from somewhere inside the house, and a few moments later a young, Peruvian native appeared from the back.
'Mrs. Carol?' the man asked.
Caroline smiled, 'Yes, are you Andres Ramos?'
'Your husband said to expect you.' he said, shaking her hand.
Ramos led her to the boathouse. He unlatched a side door and walked her inside. A Noorduyn Norseman floatplane, bearing the non-native registration CF-AZU, bobbed about in pristine condition. It could not be more than year old. Its bare aluminium skin bore a light blue and black cheatline, along with the word 'VENUS' in black lettering. A large, cabin-diameter aluminium drum filled the rear of the aircraft’s interior.
'Canadian design. Very reliable.' Ramos said.
Caroline nodded in awe, 'I trust you received the amount we agreed on.'
'Yes, four hundred U.S. dollars.'
'You do realise I could have bought one of these brand new for a little more...'
'The modifications you asked for were very specific. And the materials were neither cheap nor easy to come by...'
'Will it be able to reach El Lago de Meurto and return?'
'I should think so. Though understand with the additional weight in the rear it will be slightly tailheavy and the stall speed will be higher.'
'How much higher?'
'60 miles per hour. Maybe more.'
'I don't think that'll pose too much of a problem.'
'Are you still determined to travel to El Lago de Meurto on your own, Mrs. Carol?'
'Yes.'
'I hope you know what you're doing. The Amazon is no place for a woman. Or a man, for that matter...'
Caroline smiled, 'You sound like my husband'.
============
Six hours later and the Norseman was cruising high above the Amazon jungle. The sound of its single Pratt & Whitney engine drowned out all other noise except for the sound of air rushing past the aircraft's cockpit. Caroline consulted the map. El Lago de Meurto was still some ten hours away at least. She knew it was a ridiculous amount of time for one person to fly, though she had had no other option except to fly herself.
Hiring a pilot would have aroused too much suspicion; it was merely fortunate that Robert Noorduyn and herself shared a mutual friend in John Brady, who had arranged through Noorduyn to have CF-AZU shipped to Peru via Brady’s company, Southern Continent Shipping. Uncovering the events that had caused El Lago de Meurto to be blacklisted by the Peruvian government were far too important for her to ignore.
She banked the Norseman's to port slightly, realigning aircraft's nose inline with the compass bearing indicated on the map. She settled back in her seat for the uneventful flight ahead.
============
Caroline was struggling to stay awake. The long duration fuel tank she had had Andres Ramos install in the rear of the cabin was close to half empty, and there was still no sight of El Lago de Meurto. She wondered if rumours of the Peruvian government filling the lake with dirt were true or not. It seemed unlikely, though; the lake was virtually inaccessible even today.
Caroline glanced at the compass mounted above her head. Before she could take an accurate reading, its face shattered and the cockpit windows exploded in a shower of glass. Caroline blinked in confusion and struggled to regain control of the aircraft. The altimeter was dead also, and thin shafts of sunlight were streaming through several roughly circular holes in the Norseman's cabin roof. Caroline heard it now, the sound of anti-aircraft fire. She was under attack from below! The Norseman pitched to the left, its nose pointed downward. She had lost hydraulics. She vainly began transmitting over the short wave in the hope someone would receive her message:
'Mayday, mayday, mayday. Norseman Zulu Uniform. Last known position: latitude...'
The radio sparked and exploded as a second barrage of fire struck the aircraft. The ground was rushing up from below. Caroline scanned for a flat, open area to set the Norseman down, but found none. She felt one of the pontoons clip the top of a tree.
'This is it,' she thought to herself, 'I'm done for...'
TO BE CONTINUED…
