Genaro had served them breakfast, and the three of them were relaxing in his little back room. Juan had brought Dema here the night before, in the borrowed pickup he had left parked near the Devil's Cave.

She and Juan had agreed it was better for her not to return to her hotel just yet. If the brujos believed her dead, so much the better for their plans. So Juan had pulled up to the back door of this little shop. She was surprised to discover that Juan's old friend Genaro was the same shaman who she had watched perform psychic surgery on her first day in Catemaco.

"Tell us what you know of the one the brujos refer to as the Master," she asked him.

"He calls himself El Diablo, but pretends those who speak his name aloud will suffer misfortune. He is one of the black ones, one who practices the old ways, Aztec and Olmec, trying to accumulate as much personal power as he can, at the expense of the would-be brujos who follow him.

"He isolates himself, allowing rumors of his dark deeds to circulate and add to his reputation, so I have seen little of him, and don't have much direct knowledge. I had thought most of the rumors overblown until you told me what his brujos said to you. If in fact he is performing blood rituals, that is very bad. I should accompany you tonight."

"No, Genaro," said Juan, "If we make a mess of things, I'm afraid it will fall to you to clean it up. Best you stay out of it. But it will be helpful if you can arrange for us to borrow a boat."

"Too easily done. I have a little boat myself that I rarely use, tied up to a dock not far from here. You are welcome to it."

So Dema and Juan stayed hidden in Genaro's back room until mid afternoon, then slipped down to the dock and motored out onto the lake. They tied up at one of the monkey islands, and waited for night to fall, when the brujos would come out and lead them to El Diablo's floating lair.

While they waited, Dema drifted into her shaman dream, and entered the world of the island monkeys. Not being native to these islands, the monkeys had no natural predators here, so they had thrived and themselves become the dominant animals. They sensed this, and were very territorial, very protective of the special freedom they enjoyed. They capered incessantly through the treetops at the water's edge, to the delight of the passengers on the tour boats, but they could become vicious if anyone tried to venture ashore.

Dema had no trouble developing a rapport with them. She easily entered their monkey-dream, and spent the remainder of the afternoon enjoying the sensation of swinging through the treetops, until the sun set, and the full moon slowly rose above the eastern rim of the lake.

Eventually Juan roused her and said, "The brujos are coming." They untied their little boat and let it drift out onto the lake, not starting the engine but paddling it quietly closer to the path the brujos' boats were taking across the water, until they could see the larger craft these smaller boats were tying up to. It was a big houseboat, with square sides, resting on two long pontoons. They held back away from it, drifting casually back and forth across the path of the other boats, which arrived slowly, one by one.

Most of those in the boats Dema recognized as brujos from the Devil's Cave. None of them paid much attention to her and Juan drifting in their little boat. With the dark and the distance, and their own expectation that she was still in the cave, they clearly didn't recognize her at all.

Then the boats seemed to have stopped coming, but Dema was sure there would be one more, so they waited. A little while later it came. There were three in this boat, and one was a young girl. Juan started their engine, and pulled their little boat up beside this somewhat larger one, bumping its side, so that the man at the wheel pulled back the throttle to slow his boat, and turned to Juan angrily.

"What are you doing? Stupid peasant! Have you never operated a boat before? You could have capsized both of us!"

Juan fell into the role assigned him, meekly throwing up his hands and looking apologetic. As he did this he knocked his own throttle, so the boats bumped together again, rocking them both violently. The wheelman of the other boat was thrown off balance and had to catch himself, which made him even more angry. He made a rude gesture at Juan and turned back to his wheel. He was about to push his throttle forward and zoom away when Dema, in snake form, came up over the opposite side of the boat and wrapped him in her coils.

The other man in the boat exclaimed, "It is her, the witch from the cave! How can this be?" and remained where he was, petrified, while Dema squeezed the breath from the wheelman until he fainted. Juan casually tied the painter of his boat to a stern cleat of the bigger one and climbed aboard. He walked up beside the second man, still seated, and gently laid a hand on his shoulder. The man's eyes closed and he slumped over.

Dema, who had meanwhile uncoiled herself from the wheelman and returned to normal, said, "What was that, the Vulcan nerve pinch?"

"He was off center," said Juan, "I merely realigned him. He will feel much better when he wakes up. Unfortunately that may be a while."

They turned to the girl, who sat bound and gagged in the back of the boat, eyes wide and frightened.

"Don't be alarmed," said Dema, as she and Juan removed the gag and released her bonds. "Did they entice you with pretty words at first, or simply grab you from the street?"

Still wide-eyed, the girl said, "I was out shopping with friends. I stopped to look in a shop window and my friends walked on, so we were separated. I turned from the window and hurried to catch up, but I was grabbed and pulled into an alley. Before I could call out, a hand clamped over my mouth. I bit him."

She looked down at the man slumped in his seat. There was a white rag wrapped round his right hand. She smiled shyly at Juan and Dema. They smiled back at her.

"Good girl," said Dema.

"But then he hit me, hard, and the next thing I knew I was here in this boat, as you found me."

Juan had been busy, binding the hands of the two men behind their backs, and dumping them, as gently as possible, into Genaro's boat.

Dema said to the girl, "Are you all right now? Can you operate this boat?" indicating the one she and Juan had arrived in.

"Oh yes, I think so, it is like one I have used before."

"Good. You can take it back to shore. Just beach it anywhere, and leave these men in it."

They helped her into Genaro's boat, and Juan started the motor for her.

"I hope it's not too late to find your friends," said Dema.

The girl smiled a little, and turned up the throttle, heading off. They watched for a while to make sure she was going the right way, then Juan went to the controls of the boat they had commandeered, and Dema sat where the girl had been.