The Ruins by Scott Smith Page A

too. Stacy
couldn't see any way around this.
     Eric
tried again. "Or we can always just wait them out,"
he said. "The Greeks will come sooner or later."
     "How
do you know?" Amy asked.
     "Pablo
left them a note."
     "But
how can you be sure?"
     "He
copied the map, didn't he?"
     Amy
didn't say anything. Stacy sat there, wishing she'd
speak again, that she'd somehow manage to clarify this
question, either refute Eric's logic or accept it, but Amy
remained silent, peering off across the hilltop at Jeff and Mathias.
There was no way to tell, of course. Pablo might've left a
note or he might not have. The only way they'd know for
certain was if the Greeks were eventually to show up.
     "I've
never seen a dead body before," Eric said.
     Amy
and Stacy were silent. How could they possibly respond to a statement
like that?
     "You'd
think something would've eaten him, wouldn't you?
Come out of the jungle and—"
     "Stop
it," Stacy said.
     "But
it seems odd, doesn't it? He's been there long
enough for those vines to—"
     "Please,
Eric."
     "And
where are the others? Where are the archaeologists?"
     Stacy
reached out and touched his knee. "Just stop, okay? Stop
talking."
     Jeff
and Mathias were coming back toward them. Mathias was holding his hands
out in front of himself, as if they were covered in paint and he was
trying not to get it on his clothes. As they came closer, Stacy saw
that his hands and wrists had turned a deep raw-meat red; they look
scarred.
     "What
happened?" Eric asked.
     Jeff
and Mathias crouched beside them. Jeff reached for the water bottle,
poured a tiny bit on Mathias's hands; then Mathias rubbed at
them with his shirt, grimacing.
     "There's
something in the plants," Jeff said. "When he tore
them off his brother, he got their sap on his hands. It's
acidic. It's burned his skin."
     They
all peered down at Mathias's hands. Jeff handed the water
back to Stacy. She took off her bandanna, started to tilt the bottle
over it, thinking the wet cloth might cool her head some, but Jeff
stopped her.
     "Don't,"
he said. "We need to save it."
     "Save
it?" she asked. She felt stupid with the heat: she
didn't know what he meant.
     He
nodded. "We don't have that much. We'll
each need a half gallon a day, at least. That's three gallons
total, every day. We'll have to figure out a way to catch the
rain." He glanced up at the sky, as if searching for clouds,
but there weren't any. It had rained every afternoon since
they'd arrived in Mexico, and now, when they needed it, the
sky was perfectly clear. "We have to get
organized," Jeff said. "Now, while we're
still fresh."
     The
others just stared at him.
     "We
can last without food. It's water that matters.
We'll have to keep out of the sun, spend as much time as we
can under the tents."
     Stacy
felt sick, listening to him. He was acting as if they were going to be
here for some time, as if they were trapped here, and the idea filled
her with panic. She had the urge to cover her ears with her hands; she
wanted him to stop talking. "Can't we sneak away
when it gets dark?" she asked. "Eric said we could
sneak away."
     Jeff
shook his head. He waved across the hilltop, toward where he and
Mathias had been standing. "They keep coming," he
said. "More and more of them. They're all armed,
and the bald one sends them out along the clearing. They're
surrounding us."
     "Why
don't they just kill us?" Eric asked.
     "I
don't know. It seems like it's something to do with
the hill. Once you step onto the hill, you're not allowed to
step off it. Something like that. They won't step on it
themselves, but now that we're on it, they won't
let us leave. They'll shoot us if we try. So we have to
figure out a way to survive until someone comes and finds
us."
     "Who?"
Amy asked.
     Jeff
shrugged. "The Greeks, maybe—that would be
quickest. Or else, when we don't come home, our parents
will—"
     "We're
not supposed to leave for another week," Amy said.
     Jeff
nodded.
     "And
then