"Down," ordered his passenger.

"There are many things in the Jungle, señor, that one should not see too closely," Jesus said.

The passenger pointed an automatic at Jesus's right temple.

"Down," he repeated.

"Down it is," Jesus said. He put the plane into a steep bank, then came back around, circling twice more before dropping onto the now-tranquil waters of the stream.

The passenger was a stocky, bullet-headed man whose name, Oscar Brack, suited his disposition. He not only disliked and distrusted people, he hated them, regarding dislike and distrust as mere pissant emotions, too moderate to count for anything.

Brack also hated animals, machines, and art. The only thing he cared for in the world were trees, which was suitable since, like Stacy and Webenhaus, he was a forester for Tulsa Torrent, the biggest and richest lumber and paper-products company in the world.

The plane coasted up to the riverbank by the camp. Brack jumped off the plane's pontoon and took the line ashore. He aimed his gun in the general direction of the pilot until Jesus cut the engines and joined him on land.

It was five minutes before they found Helga Webenhaus's body. She had been staked out on top of a fire-ant hill, twenty yards into the jungle from the main camp. It was obvious that something sweet, perhaps honey, had been stuffed into her body openings and generously applied to her breasts, where it now dripped as an invitation to the ants to come and eat.

Brack buried what was left of her before moving on. From a distance, he thought he saw a small stack of firewood. But that made no sense because there was already a big stack of firewood in front of what must have been Webenhaus's tent. Besides, the smaller stack was topped with a huge black ball. |

Brack decided to take a closer look. Another man t might have chosen not to. What from a. distance seemed to be logs were actually parts of arms and legs. The black ball was Webenhaus's head, swollen to twice its normal size.