“His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, is here to see the administrator,” Emerson said to the receptionist.
The receptionist stared down at Wayan, who really did look like the Dalai Lama in the glasses. “Are you really the Dalai Lama?” she asked.
Wayan Bagus nodded politely. “No.”
She looked back at Emerson. “I’m feeling generous today. What else do you have?”
“I’m really, really rich?”
The woman leaned forward. “That’s great. I really, really need a new Louis Vuitton handbag.”
Emerson turned to Riley. “Do you have any money?”
“Are you kidding me?” Riley searched in her purse. “I have seventeen dollars and fifty cents. Don’t you have any money? You’re the gazillionaire.”
“I don’t believe in carrying money,” Emerson explained to the receptionist. “How about a million-dollar smile?”
“Only if I can use it to pay for a new handbag.” The receptionist looked at Riley. “You’re up.”
What have I got to lose? Riley thought. I’m a nutcase by association.
“Dracula sent us to warn the administrator that Poseidon is about to release the Kraken,” Riley said.
A tailored woman in her midforties opened the door behind the receptionist and smiled. “I’m Cheryl Rhoads. I’m the administrator. What’s this I hear about the Kraken?”
“I’m Emerson Knight. This is Miss Moon, my amanuensis. And this is Wayan Bagus, who is a personal friend of the Dalai Lama,” Emerson said.
“Lovely to meet you,” Cheryl Rhoads said to Wayan. “Are you really a personal friend of the Dalai Lama?”
Wayan Bagus nodded politely. “No.”
“Well, then, I’m a personal friend of the Dalai Lama,” Emerson said, “not that it’s important. We’re investigating some unexplained discrepancies between your nautical maps in the Pacific Ocean.”
“Discrepancies?”
Emerson pulled the NOAA book from his knapsack. He’d circled the monk’s missing island in red pen. “I’m looking for an island that’s not on your current online maps.”
Cheryl came around to the receptionist’s desk and accessed the NOAA maps. “You’re right. It’s not there. Weird. It could be that it was never there, that we made a mistake in the older maps and corrected it in the newer.”
“Wayan was living at those exact coordinates five months ago,” Emerson said. “That was after the most recent maps were published.”
Cheryl shook her head. “An island doesn’t just disappear from our database, unless somebody deletes it manually.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Emerson said. “We want to talk with the somebody.”
Cheryl typed her password into the computer and logged in to her account. After a couple minutes, she looked up from the computer.
“Well, I’m sorry, but I can’t really help you. It turns out that this island and all the islands around it are part of the National Park of American Samoa. All the national parks are mapped by the Department of the Interior. Everything else is the responsibility of NOAA, at least when it comes to bodies of water. It’s been that way ever since the National Park Service was formed back in 1916. Interior is pretty territorial when it comes to the national parks.”
“Excellent,” Emerson said. “You wouldn’t happen to know who we should talk to over there?”
Cheryl scribbled down a name and phone number on a piece of notepaper. “I’d recommend you speak with the Park Planning, Facilities, and Land Directorate. They’re in charge of surveying all the national parks, including a lot of the waterways around American Samoa. If you want, I’ll send an email so you can get to see somebody without bringing the ‘Dalai Lama’ along with you.”
Emerson took the paper. “That would be helpful. Wayan Bagus isn’t a very convincing Dalai Lama, and the National Park Service has had it in for Dracula for years.”
The Office of Park Planning shuffled Emerson off to the liaison for the Pacific West Regional Office. The Pacific West Regional Office sent them to the Information Resources Directorate, and the Information Resources Directorate sent them back to Park Planning. Wayan Bagus had given up after the Pacific West Regional Office and was meditating in President’s Park.
“Look, James,” Emerson said to the paunchy middle-aged man sitting across the conference room table from him. “You’re in charge of surveying the national parks. Aren’t you the least bit curious how an island goes missing? An island that has been deleted from your survey, despite the fact that this emergency beacon clearly shows someone was living there?”
James shrugged. “Doesn’t seem especially significant to me.”
“And you don’t think it’s odd that my friend was forcibly removed from that same island, and when he came back it had disappeared?” Emerson asked.
James shifted in his seat and glanced at the security camera in the corner of the room. “Not really. These things happen all the time.”
Emerson paused for a moment. He leaned across the table and looked the bureaucrat in the eye. “Actually, they don’t.” He turned away and stared directly into the camera. “In fact, under normal circumstances, this never happens.”
“I’m not sure I’m the right one to help you,” James said.
Emerson continued to stare into the camera. “That’s the first honest thing anybody has said to me today. I won’t take up any more of your time.”
James stood to leave, but Emerson remained sitting.
“Um. Are we done?” James asked.
“You’re done. However, I am not.”
James turned the knob and opened the conference room door a couple inches. “You’re not coming?”
“No, I’d prefer not to.”
James opened the door fully and walked out into the hallway. He turned around to look at Emerson and Riley, still sitting at the conference table. “So, you’re really not coming?”
Emerson smiled politely. “Thank you. I’d prefer to stay here.”
“Okeydokey,” James said. “Can I get you anything? Coffee? Water?”
“No. We’re good,” Emerson said.
James stood in the doorway for a beat, unsure what to do next. He glanced at the security camera one last time, shrugged, and walked away down the hall.
Riley and Emerson sat in silence for what seemed like an eternity to Riley.
“So what are we going to do now?” she finally asked.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing! We can’t just do nothing!”
“Why not?” Emerson asked.
“Why not? Because this isn’t the couch in your living room. It’s a moldy old conference room in some government office building.”
Emerson slouched lower in the chair, getting more comfortable. “Wu wei.”
“Wu what?”
“It’s the Zen art of doing nothing. If we can do nothing in just the right way, the universe will provide the answers to all our questions.”
“How do we know if we’re doing it in the right way?”
“Spring comes effortlessly, the grass grows by itself,” Emerson said.
Riley gave him her most withering squint. “If you answer me with one more vague and basically meaningless piece of philosophical crap I’m going to kick you in the knee.”
Emerson opened his mouth to say something, thought better of it, and made the sign that he was zipping his lips shut.
Fifteen minutes later two men entered the conference room. The first was tall with a Mediterranean complexion and a lean and hungry look.
“Emerson Knight and Riley Moon? My name is Eugene Spiro. I’m chief scientist for the National Park Service.”
“The Park Service has a chief scientist?” Riley asked.
“It’s a relatively new position. I report to the director on the scientific assets of national parks and federal lands. I’m responsible for protecting park resources, ranging from dinosaur fossils to giant redwood trees.”
Emerson stood. “Then you’d be concerned to know that an entire island under your protection is missing.”
Spiro smiled. “I suppose an entire island would qualify as a park resource. Except that it’s impossible for an entire island to disappear. Do you know the principle of Occam’s razor? Given two explanations, the simpler one is usually correct.”
“I agree,” Emerson said. “Except that Occam’s razor assumes there are two explanations. I can think of only one.”
“And that is?”