"That's Rick's hat." Damon started to rise. His hand reached for his weapon.

"Hold it right there, pal." Harley brought his own gun up.

"Settle down people." Strom raised his hands. "Ask him what happened."

"Ask him yourself, he speaks English." Vincent was irked at Strom's lie but had expected something like that.

Han Pok tossed the hat to Damon who glared fire back at him. "His friend crawled over an old booby-trap. Dead now." Han jerked his head toward the path the men used to enter the camp.

"Booby-trap! What the hell are you talking about?" Vincent was on his feet staring at the ground around him.

Garvey grabbed a gun off the pile and left the site uncontested.

"He's going to check so let's just all stay calm here, okay?" Strom sat back, trying to ease the tension. "What's this about booby-traps?"

Han Pok related the details of the Huk battle with the soldiers and how they peppered the forest with deadly, spring-loaded traps made of sharpened stakes, coated with curare, which shot up out of the ground when tripped.

"Jesus, why are we just hearing about this now?"

"I am guide. You still alive, no?"

"Still..." Vincent's anger gave way to embarrassment.

Garvey walked back into the campsite looking shaken. He glanced at Damon and shook his head then stared at Han Pok with a look of hatred.

"Damon, he's dead alright. The stake went right through his chest. He must have tripped the thing crawling forward."

"And you wondered about me trusting you?" Vincent aimed his rifle at Strom. "What was the plan, he gonna pick us off while you chatted us up?"

"Don't be stupid. It was just in case you were planning something when we came in. You'd have done the same. I just happened to know there were only three of you. A simple matter of asking questions in town. You should pay your pilot a little extra to keep information to himself."

"Bastard." Vincent scowled.

"The point is we now either call a truce and join forces for this hunt or we settle who's boss right now."

Garvey raised his weapon slightly and Vincent followed suit, directing it at Strom. Harley stood and shifted his gun toward Garvey. Damon was still on the ground, and he watched Han Pok unhook the machete from his belt.

"I vote for a truce, if anybody cares," Damon said, feeling at a great disadvantage.

"I can see that as a solution." Strom looked at Vincent.

"And what happens when we find it?"

"We'll think of something, I'm sure. Let's find it first." Strom nodded to the others, "Okay then, a truce?"

After they had settled down again, Vincent asked how Jenner learned about the Gold.

"Same way Gravestone did I guess. Through their cronies in the lumber business. I compiled my own information from the source." Strom gave Vincent a smug look.

"What source would that be?"

"Not what, who. Chad Kent was a member of the force hired by the lumber mob to squash the Huks. He went out on patrol with half a dozen guys and they all got killed except him. While he was running for his life he fell into a hole or a cave or whatever and found a stash of the famous treasure."

"You got this from him?"

"Nah. But I'm coming to that." Strom could not resist flaunting his information. "The kid was rescued by another guy that got captured and was given up for dead. The kid was so remorseful he spent all his time trying to find the guy, to give him the location of the gold, without success and then goes and gets terminal cancer—"

"Does this have an ending sometime soon?" Harley complained.

"On his deathbed he gets his uncle to continue the hunt and the guy finally tracks down the family and, figuring they're just as deserving, since the guy never came back, leaves the information with the wife." Strom smiled with superior pleasure. "Now, I showed you mine, how did you guys find out?"

Vincent was not keen on giving Strom any information, but they were all there anyway, so he could not see what difference it would make.

"Gravestone's buddies in the lumber business told him. They said that the mercenaries complained about the kind of battle they were trying to fight so they sent one of those Huey gunships in loaded with rockets and blew the hell out of place, effectively decimating the Huk force... along with a good chunk of the forest they were trying to harvest." He chuckled along with the others. "The lumber guy gave Gravestone a similar story about the patrol and the capture of one of their men. He got the coordinates from the head honcho of the mercenaries."

"And he gave them to you."

"Yeah, Strom, to me. I been workin' for Gravestone for a long time. He trusts me and I ain't sayin' any more."

"Gee, just when we were getting all buddy, buddy."

><><><><

Gretta crawled away silently. She thought the jig was up when the one called Garvey picked his way out of the camp and found his pal skewered on a poisoned stake. She had been hiding from the Filipino who first found the body and when she closed in to have a closer look the other guy showed up and nearly walked over her. The booby-trap gave her the chills and she hoped they had not set them too close together. The trip back was a long and very careful exercise in prodding every inch of ground in front of her with a long stick.

"Where were you? Jesus, Gretta, you've been gone over an hour?" Arny was wringing his hands and trying to sound mad, but he was relieved beyond belief that she was okay.

"I have news, Master," she teased; giving him a kiss on the cheek and then telling him everything she saw and heard.

"This is silly. We can't take on six armed men in a forest full of poisoned booby-traps." He stared at her incredulously. "What the hell does CONGA say about all this?"

"I'm calling Cheesy now so we'll just see." She took out her phone and activated it.

"Gretta, I've been trying to reach you!"

"I had to leave the phone off, Cheesy. We're in pretty close quarters will all our competition."

The silence was brief and then he came back on. "There have been some disturbing developments. Walter Gervais is dead... murdered. And the agent we had watching him was also killed." Gretta recalled Strom talking about his source and realized now that it was Walter.

"It was Jacob Strom. He's working for Jenner and good old Vincent Crocadero is the designated hitter for Gravestone. The two groups are having a sit down."

"Gretta I think we have bitten off a little more than we can comfortably chew on this one. You can't face those men alone. I realize Arny is with you but..."

"Cheesy, we're practically on top of the cache and these guys are not going to let the other side win so if we're lucky they'll eliminate themselves from the game."

Arny slapped his thighs, mouthing the word game, and stomped away.

"I don't want to have to make it an order." Chester sounded very disappointed but he was layered with genuine concern and she knew if she fought him it might affect his health on top of everything else.

"You won't have to, but we are too exposed right now to just walk away.... Tomorrow will give us a better idea on how to proceed. Give me until morning, Cheesy. I promise I will call."

Arny wandered back still wearing his frown. "I hate it when you call this business a game."

"Get over it. Lover. It's a figure of speech." She put the phone away and dug into her pack for the map. "Cheesy is calling 'mission' off." She stared at him, purposefully emphasizing the designation. "I've asked until the morning for our plan to disengage."

"Now that's an order I call sensible."

"We still have to get through the night, Arny, so start setting up our gear."