Free Curses! by Aaron Elkins

meaningfully.
    "Copies are now being made for each of you,” she said, “but I think we should begin without waiting further. Dr. Villanueva and I must leave for Mexico City in less than an hour. An early-morning press conference has been scheduled."
    She straightened her pince-nez and folded her hands before her on the table. “I have rendered this material in as exact and literal a manner as possible, leaving interpretation to others,” she explained. “The polysynthetic Mayan characteristic of reliance on verbal nouns has necessarily been transformed into our own grammar. Beyond that, I have tried to be consistent with the historical conventions that have applied to previous works. I can assure you,” she added unnecessarily, “that I have used no poetic license."
    She began to read aloud with a velvety Georgia accent curiously at odds with her precise diction.
    "'The day Katun Thirteen Ahau,'” she intoned. “ Itzamna, Itzamtzab is his face during its reign.’”
    Julie leaned over to Gideon and whispered: “This is a translation?"
    Gideon spread his hands but said nothing. Explaining the Mayan system of dating would be hard enough with a couple of hours at his disposal. There wasn't much sense in trying to do it in an aside.
    Dr. Garrison continued. “'Those who come here to this place Tlaloc to disturb our bones and the dust of our bodies, let them know that many punishments will come to them. These are the punishments that will come to them.
    "'First, the bloodsucking kinkajou will come freely among them.
    "'Second, the darkness will be sundered and turned to light, and the terrible voices of the gods will be heard in the air, and there will be a mighty pummeling of the soul so that the spirit languishes and faints. Their treasures will be lost and their batabobs and ahlelobs will desert them...’”
    The pince-nez were plucked off. “I'm afraid I have no wholly unambiguous referents for batabobs and ahlelobs in this context."
    "The batabob was the governor of the area, the big chief,” Abe said promptly. “The ahlelob , I think, was the assistant chief."
    She looked at him. So did Gideon, to whom it came as a surprise that Abe knew something about the Mayan language. No, not a surprise; an item of interest, maybe. Gideon had been astonished too many times by the range of his knowledge to be surprised anymore.
    Under Dr. Garrison's uncompromising stare Abe smiled and shrugged modestly. “I guess I read it somewhere?"
    "Thank you.” With her index finger she found her place again.
    "Maybe we can get him to play Trivial Pursuit with us,” Julie whispered to Gideon.
    "Not with me,” Gideon muttered back.
    "'Third, the one called Tucumbalam will turn their entrails to fire and bloody flux.’”
    This caused Worthy to grimace and push the rest of his ice cream away.
    "'Fourth, the one called Xecotcavach will pierce their skulls so that their brains spill onto the earth.’”
    "Yuck, I'm grossing out,” Leo announced, shoveling ice cream into his mouth.
    Emma leaned stiffly toward him, her face intense. “Sh!” she whispered sharply. “This isn't a joke!"
    Gideon frowned. Dim memories stirred. Wasn't it Emma who had belonged to some oddball group dedicated to the otherworldly theories of Von Daniken, or Velikovsky, or someone like that? Yes, it was, he recalled. Once she had cornered him into a long, dippy discussion of how it was that a carved, five-thousand-year-old Japanese Dogu figure wore what could only have been an astronaut's helmet and goggles. ("And, as you must know, Dr. Oliver, goggles hadn't even been invented in the Stone Age!") He had spent much of his subsequent time in Yucatan trying to stay out of her way without offending her.
    Leo mimed a good-natured apology and quieted.
    Dr. Garrison had paused coolly at the interruption. Now she continued the litany of calamity.
    "'Fifth, the beast that turns men to stone will come among them from the Underworld.
    "'And all this will be only