Assumed Identity

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“Now I realize you all want to hear about human sacrifice,” the professor said, allowing just the right mischievous glint in his eyes, signaling to his students that to study history didn’t mean they had to suppress their sense of humor. Each time he taught this course-and he’d been doing so for thirty years-he always began with the same comment, and he always got the reaction he wanted, a collective chuckle, the students glancing at one another in approval and sitting more comfortably.

“Virgins having their hearts cut out,” the professor continued, “or being thrown off cliffs into wells-that sort of thing.” He gestured dismissively, as if he was so familiar with the details of human sacrifice that the subject bored him. Again his eyes glinted mischievously, and the students chuckled louder. His name was Stephen Mill. He was fifty-eight, short and slender, with receding gray hair, a thin salt-and-pepper mustache, square-framed, wire-rimmed bifocals, and a brown wool suit that gave off the scent of pipe smoke. Liked and respected by both colleagues and students, he was beginning the last seventy minutes of his life, and if it was any consolation, at least he would die doing what he most enjoyed, talking about his life’s obsession.

“Actually, the Maya didn’t have much interest in sacrificing virgins,” Professor Mill added. “Most of the skeletons we’ve retrieved from the sacred wells-they’re called cenotes, by the way; you might as well begin learning the proper terms-belong to males, and most of those had been children.”

The students made faces of disgust.

“The Maya did cut out hearts, of course,” Professor Mill said. “But that’s the most boring part of the ritual.”

Several students frowned and mouthed “boring?” to one another.

“What the Maya would do is capture an enemy, strip him, paint him blue, take him to the top of a pyramid, break his back but not kill him-not yet at least; the temporary objective was to paralyze him-then cut out his heart, and now he’d die, but not before the high priest was able to raise the victim’s pulsing heart for everyone to see. The heart and the blood dripping from it were smeared onto the faces of gods carved into the walls at the top of the temple. It’s been theorized that the high priest may also have consumed the heart. But this much we know for certain: The victim’s corpse was subsequently hurled down the steps of the pyramid. There a priest cut off the victim’s skin and danced in it. Those who’d witnessed the ceremony chopped the corpse into pieces and barbecued it.”

The students swallowed uncomfortably, as if they felt sick.

“But we’ll get to the dull stuff later in the term,” Professor Mill said, and the students laughed again, this time with relief. “As you know, this is a multidiscipline course.” He switched tones with expert ease, deepening his voice, abandoning his guise as an entertainer, becoming a lecturer. “Some of you are here from art history. Others are ethnologists and archaeologists. Our purpose is to examine Mayan hieroglyphics, to learn to read them, and to use the knowledge we obtain to reconstruct Mayan culture. Please turn to page seventy-nine of Charles Gallenkamp’s Maya: The Riddle and Rediscovery of a Lost Civilization.”

The students obeyed and immediately frowned at a bewildering diagram that looked like a totem pole with two descending columns of distorted, grimacing faces flanked by lines, dots, and squiggles. Someone groaned.

“Yes, I realize the challenge is daunting,” Professor Mill said. “You’re telling yourselves that you can’t possibly learn to read that maze of apparently meaningless symbols. But I assure you, you will be able to read it and many others like it. You’ll be able to put sounds to those glyphs, to read them as if they were sentences.” He paused for dramatic effect, then straightened. “To speak the ancient Mayan language.” He shook his head with wonder. “You understand now what I meant. Stories about human sacrifice are dull. This”-he pointed toward the hieroglyphs in Gallenkamp’s book-“this is the true excitement.” He directed a keen gaze toward each of his twenty students. “And since we have to start somewhere, let’s start as we did when we were children, by making lines and dots. You’ll note that many of the columns of glyphs-which depict a date, by the way-look like this.” Grabbing a piece of chalk, Professor Mill drew hurried marks on the blackboard.

“Each dot has a value of one. A line-or what we call a bar-signifies five. Thus the first group I drew equals four, the second equals eight, the third is twelve, and the fourth. . Well, why should I do all the talking?” Professor Mill drew his right index finger down his list of students. “Mr. Hogan, please tell me the value of. .”

“Sixteen?” a tentative male voice responded.

“Excellent, Mr. Hogan. You see how easy it is? You’re already learning to read Mayan symbols. But if you put all the numbers on those glyphs together, the date they depict wouldn’t make any sense to you. Because the Maya used a different calendar than we do. Their calendar was almost as accurate as our own. It was also considerably more complicated. So, as our first step in understanding Mayan civilization, we’ll have to understand their concept of time. For our next class, read chapters one and two in A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient Maya by Linda Schele and David Friedel. Meanwhile, I’ll summarize what you’ll be reading.”

And so Professor Mill continued, taking obvious delight in his subject matter. With less than twenty minutes remaining in his life, he was enjoying every second. He concluded the class with a joke that he always used at this point in the course, elicited another anticipated chuckle, answered a few questions from students who lingered, then packed his books, notes, syllabus, and list of students into his briefcase.

His office was a five-minute stroll from the classroom building. Professor Mill breathed deeply, with satisfaction, as he walked. It was a bright, clear, pleasant day. All in all, he felt splendid (less than fifteen minutes to live now), and his delight with how he’d performed in class was enhanced by his anticipation of what he would do next, of the appointment he’d made for after class, of the visitor he expected.

The office was in a drab brick building, but the bleak surroundings had no effect on Professor Mill’s sense of well-being and eagerness. Indeed, he felt so full of energy that he passed students at the elevator and walked rapidly up the two flights of stairs to the dimly lit corridor halfway along which he had his office. After unlocking the door (ten minutes to go) and setting his briefcase on his desk, he turned to walk down to the faculty lounge but paused, then smiled when he saw his visitor appear at the open doorway.

“I was just going for some coffee,” Professor Mill said. “Would you care for some?”

“Thanks but no.” The visitor nodded in greeting and entered. “My stomach and coffee don’t get along anymore. I have heartburn all the time. I think I’m developing an ulcer.”

The visitor was a distinguished-looking man in his middle thirties. His neatly trimmed hair, custom-made white shirt, striped silk tie, hand-tailored double-breasted suit, and thin-soled calfskin shoes were in keeping with his occupation as a highly paid corporate executive.

“Ulcers come from stress. You’d better slow down.” Professor Mill shook hands with him.

“Stress and speed are part of my job description. If I start worrying about my health, I’ll find myself out of work.” The visitor sat.

“You need a vacation.”

“Soon. They keep promising me soon.”

“So what have you got for me?” Professor Mill asked.

“More glyphs to be translated.”

“How many?”

The visitor shrugged. “Five pages.” He frowned as a group of students went by in the corridor. “I’d prefer to keep this confidential.”

“Of course.” Professor Mill got up, shut the door, and returned to his desk. “Mayan pages or contemporary pages?”

The visitor looked puzzled, then realized. “Right, I keep forgetting Mayan pages are bigger. No, contemporary pages. Eight-by-ten photographs. I assume the fee we negotiated the last time is still acceptable.”

“Fifty thousand dollars? Very acceptable. As long as I’m not rushed,” Professor Mill said.

“You won’t be. You can have a month, the same as before. The same terms of payment-half now, half when you’re finished. The same conditions pertain. You may not make copies of the pages. You may not reveal what you are doing or discuss your translation with anyone.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t, and I haven’t,” Professor Mill said, “although there’s nothing so interesting in the translation that anybody except you and me and your employer would care. No matter. You pay me so well that I’d be insane to break the terms of the agreement and jeopardize my future relationship with you. I have a sabbatical next year, and the money you’ve generously paid me will allow me to devote the entire year to studying the Hieroglyphic Stairway in the Mayan ruins at Copan in Honduras.”

“It’s too hot down there for me,” the visitor said.

“When I’m at the ruins, I’m too excited to think about the weather. May I see the pages?”

“By all means.” The visitor reached into an alligator-skin briefcase, pulling out a large manila envelope.

With less than a minute to live, Professor Mill took the envelope, opened it, and removed five photographs that showed numerous rows of hieroglyphs. He shifted books to the side of his desk and arranged the photographs so that the rows of glyphs were vertical.

“All part of the same text?”

“I have no idea,” the visitor said. “All I was told was to make the delivery.”

“They appear to be.” Professor Mill picked up a magnifying glass and leaned close to the photographs, studying the details of the glyphs. Sweat beaded on his brow. He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have run up those stairs.”

“Excuse me?” the visitor asked.

“Nothing. Just talking to myself. Does it feel warm in here?”

“A little.”

Professor Mill took off his suit coat and resumed his inspection of the photographs. Fifteen seconds to live. “Well, leave them with me, and. .”

“Yes?”

“I. .”

“What?” the visitor asked.

“Don’t feel so good. My hands. .”

“What about them?”

“Numb,” Professor Mill said. “My. .”

“What?”

“Face. Hot.”

Professor Mill abruptly gasped, clutched his chest, stiffened, and slumped, sagging backward in his creaky swivel chair, his mouth open, his head drooping. He shivered and stopped moving.

The small office seemed to contract as the visitor stood. “Professor Mill?” He felt for a pulse at a wrist and then the neck. “Professor Mill?” He removed rubber gloves from his briefcase, put them on, then used his right hand to collect the photographs and slide them into the manila envelope, which he held steady with his left hand. Cautiously, he used the left hand to peel off the glove on his right hand, and vice versa, in each case making sure that he didn’t touch any area that had touched the photographs. He dropped the gloves into another manila envelope, sealed it, and put both envelopes into his briefcase.

When the visitor opened the door, none of the students or faculty passing in the corridor paid much attention to him. An amateur might have walked away, but the visitor knew that excitement could prime memories, that someone would eventually remember seeing a well-dressed man come out of the office. He didn’t want to create a mystery. He was well aware that the best deception was a version of the truth. So he walked rapidly to the secretary’s office, entered it in distress, and told the secretary, “Hurry. Phone nine one one. Professor Mill. I was visiting. . I think he just had a heart attack.”