"If you want to help, you can send a message for me."

  "To whom and what will it say?"

  "Tell Sallah to meet us in Delhi. I figured out the piece of a map he sent me. He'll know what that means."

And that's how Sallah Moammed Faisel el-Kahir of Cairo, Egypt found himself at the airport in Delhi, India with a troop transport. He straightened and smiled as he recognized two Americans emerge from the plane, followed by a Chinese boy with a Yankees baseball cap and a bag in each hand. The tall man spotted him and climbed down the rolling ladder a bit faster.

Sallah stepped out of the vehicle and spread out his arms in greeting.

  "Indy!" he laughed joyously then embraced his friend in a bone-crushing hug. "It's so good to see you, my friend!"

  "Good to see you, too, buddy," Indiana grunted, but he was grinning.

  Then he greeted the woman with a slightly more gentle embrace. "Marion!"

  "Hello, Sallah." She was smiling brightly, inwardly just as excited to be reunited as Sallah, and pecked his cheek.

  "You're still stuck with this buffoon?"

  Marion smirked. "Can't seem to get rid of him." Indy rolled his eyes good-naturedly.

  "And who is this?" the Egyptian asked, gesturing to the boy.

  Indy placed a hand on the youth's shoulder. "This is Wan Li, but he goes by Short Round. He's my bodyguard."

  Sallah raised an amused eyebrow. "Your bodyguard?" he repeated, careful to not sound condescending. As a father, he understood the importance of entertaining a child's fantasies. There was no reason to stomp on their innocence.

  However, Indy's expression was genuine. "Short Round, this is Sallah, an old friend."

  "Nice to meet you, Sallah!"

  "Pleasure to meet you, too, Short Round." Then he gestured to the car. "Shall we go?"

Always the gentleman, Sallah opened the back door for Marion. After helping Indy put their bags in the back, Short Round crawled in beside her.

  "Seeing that you're here, I assume that means you got Marcus' message?" Indy began, claiming shotgun unopposed.

  "Yes; and I booked a flight here right away. I'm very eager to hear what you found about that scrap of cloth I sent you." Sallah started the engine and the jeep pulled out of the airport.

Driving through the streets, Short Round realized that Delhi wasn't very different from Shanghai.  The road was full and busy, forcing Sallah to drive slowly and carefully. Tall buildings surrounded them from either side. Carriages rolled past them. The only difference was there were three times as many white people.

He learned in school that India was currently under British control. Indians drove carriages and worked the fields for British landowners. When he was last here, Short Round had a mere taste of enslavement. He briefly dwelled on something he had known since he was four, but learned better when in school: Japan's war for conquest with his country. If they lost, China would be conquered by another land across the sea like India.

  "Marcus arranged lodging for us at a hotel somewhere around here," Indy told Sallah over the steady roar of the engine.

  Sallah nodded. "I know. He told me where and I stayed there last night after I arrived."

  "Where did you get this troop transport?"

  The Egyptian looked abashed and failed to hide it. "My brother-in-law acquired it."

  Amused, Indy raised his eyebrows as the corners of his lips turned upward. "And by acquired, you mean...?"

  "It wasn't stolen. Not by him anyways."

  "The black market, then."

The Egyptian focused on the road, confirming Indiana's theory. 

* * *

Arriving at the hotel, they discovered that Marcus had secured them two rooms: a larger suite for the three males and a smaller yet still comfortable room for Marion. The minute the boys' door opened, Short Round dumped their bags on the floor and launched himself onto the couch. Stretching out, he pulled his baseball cap over his eyes and crossed his arms behind his head; not quite napping, though resting from their long day of traveling.

The other two men were too excited to nap. After setting down his bag, Indy immediately began to lay out the map on the table. Sallah's eyes gleamed with hunger to know more. The archeologist and the excavator bent over the four pieces of fabric. Their experienced eyes took in every detail while their knowledgeable brains soaked up the information like a sponge.

  "That's the Eye of Mara," Sallah pointed out, circling the top left corner of the piece he had sent his friend with his finger.

  "I got the other half from Abner," Indy explained. "He thinks the map leads to the Temple of Mara and the Jewel of Power."

  "What does it say here?"

  "It's Marabic. It says, 'Seek and you shall find the Temple of Mara. Beware! Never look into the Eyes of Mara.'"

  "Do you really believe that the temple can grant people eternal youth, riches, and foresight?"

  "I learned from my last few adventures to give the supernatural the benefit of the doubt. Besides," Dr. Jones added, "if the Jewel of Power exists and is where Abner thought it was, it could be the source of the gifts."

A soft knock sounded at their door. Indiana opened it and welcomed his fiancée inside. Marion braced her palms against the table and observed the map along with the two men.

  "So, where does this map lead to anyways?"

  "Beside the Bengal in the jungle of Lost Delta," the archeologist told her after a moment of reading the map and comparing it to another more current one of India he had rolled out on the table beside the artifact. "This map is two thousand years old, so the map might not be exactly accurate from erosion, but it should still be nearby."

  Marion straightened and placed her hands on her hips "Great. When are we going?"

  "Tomorrow. It's getting late, and I don't know about you, but Shorty probably wants to rest after traveling."

  Marion glanced behind them. "Yeah, looks like he passed out."

Indy and Sallah followed her gaze. Short Round had abandoned his casual position in favor of curling up on the sofa like a kitten. One arm dangled. His cap had been pushed back in his sleep, revealing his peaceful face and some of his black hair.

  Marion folded her arms and titled her head, smiling affectionately. "He's adorable."

Quietly, Indy walked over and bent down beside the sleeping boy. Gently, he moved Short Round's arm back up beside him and removed his baseball cap. Sallah offered him a blanket from the closet and Indy draped it over the boy. Short Round shifted slightly, but continued sleeping.

  "How did you find him?"

  Indy grinned fondly at the memory. "I caught him trying to pick my pocket when he was eleven." Then he added a bit more somberly, "His parents were killed when the Japanese bombed Shanghai. He was living on the streets since he was four. So I brought him to America."

  Sallah shook his head in bewilderment. "I always knew you had a soft spot for kids seeing how you interacted with my own, but in your line of work, I never thought you would adopt."

  "That's why I didn't."

The archeologist pushed against his knees as he stood. Silently, he placed his fedora on the table beside the map to the Temple of Mara and grabbed a green apple from the dish in the center of the surface.

  "No bad dates this time," he joked to his friend meaningfully. And no eyeball soup, monkey brains, or beetles, he mentally added with a crisp crunch.

Blissfully unaware of the eyes that have been watching them since they took that first step off the plane and onto Indian soil, the treasure hunters turned in for the night.