Notes

Soundtrack suggestions:

Letter from Matriarch — Trevor Jones, Dinotopia (Up to 02:30).

-o-

Continuing on the path in the direction from which Iris had come, they reached the top of the ridge and soon came out on another path, wider than the previous one. They turned to the right, in order to circle the bowl clockwise.

"I already told her to avoid making friends with the raccoons," the housekeeper said while Maisie walked ahead of them and tried to see the camp, its paddocks and its animals on their right, behind a more or less dense vegetation. "They become less fearful and then come to search the trash cans and beg at the kitchen door. We've had problems with them before. And I avoid telling her that these problems are often solved with a gun…"

"The essential is that she doesn't try to feed them or catch them. They are wild animals, their tranquillity has to be respected."

"That's what I'm trying to instil in her, but I prefer that she considers the forest's animals as her friends than she sits all day in front of the computer and makes strange and creepy human friends on the Web."

"Indeed."

They passed the entrance to another path on their left, but unlike the one taken earlier, it was blocked by a wooden lifting beam. Next to it, there was a No entry sign with the words "Restricted Area. Only cleared employees are allowed to use this path". Given the peeling degree of the paint on the panel and the stains and moss which coated it and its support, Guillaume knew it must have been there for at least a few years and was therefore older than InGen's enclosures. He paid no more attention to it, assuming that the path had to lead to an area too dangerous for walkers.

"She told me she was home-schooled," he said to Iris. "Why, if you don't mind?"

"Benjamin decided that… He said she would learn more and better here than in a classroom with other children. He thinks she is safer here and at his age, he would like to know that she is nearby, that he just have to call her if he wants to see her..."

"Honestly, I think it's a bit of a pity."

"I also wish that she go to school, socialize with other kids, and make real friends. That's what we did with her... mother."

"You also learn a lot of things outside of the comfort and safety of home," Guillaume said while the path rose gently.

"You are quite far from home, Mr. Vuillier. France is not next door. Are you not homesick?"

"Not particularly."

"You are like my parents. My father was English and my mother Spanish. They emigrated from Europe just before the war broke out. I was born a few years later, in California, and spent most of my life here."

"Have you worked for Lockwood long?"

"Oh yes. I was already there when he and Hammond met if that's what you want to know. I arrived here in '65, as a simple maid."

"'65..." Guillaume repeated before letting out an admiring whistle. "More than half a century..."

"Might as well tell you that I only know this place as a home. I saw Benjamin become a man, succeed his father, take over his business, develop it, found InGen with Hammond, going out with Susan before falling in love with Elizabeth, get married, become a father… and later a grandfather… I was there during his best as well as his worst moments."

Susan? Susan Lynton? Guillaume wondered, before realizing that it was quite conceivable that she and Benjamin Lockwood were in a relationship once.

"And I intend to be there when he will pass away. Let's face it, he'll die before me," Iris added in a whisper after making sure Maisie wasn't listening. "Unless something unexpected happens…"

The path forked and to its the right, the ground sloped steeply between the trees. Approaching the top of the slope cautiously, Guillaume looked down and saw that about thirty meters further down, there was a drop. Maisie copied his example.

"Please move away from the edge, Maisie" Iris ordered. "It's too dangerous, the ground is slippery. You will fall into their paddock and be eaten raw."

The housekeeper turned to Guillaume, who had just realized that the steep incline was the cliff against which the Acrocanthosaurus' paddock had been built, the only part of the perimeter where there was neither a large peripheral fence nor watchtowers.

"They should put a barrier here. Imagine that some from the camp get drunk and come here to mess around, or that a deer trips and falls in its panic."

InGen must have thought that the cliff was certainly sufficient to prevent predators from leaving the camp, but they forgot to think about the opposite situation.

Iris urged Maisie to not linger on this risky stretch of path and they continued. When a watchtower manned by a sentry and the beginning of the large fence appeared, the housekeeper relaxed. Morosely, she looked between the bars.

"This basin was once beautiful. We had a lot of picnics there in the shade of the trees, between the tall grass and the stream which flowed there, amidst the songs of the crickets and the birds," she described with nostalgia. "Too bad it was destroyed to house those monsters..."

"They are not monsters, but animals," the WDMC director retorted.

"For some, it makes no difference. Why didn't they send them to the first park, the one in San Diego? They have enough to house them there, an auction can easily be organized and it is closer to a big city and its infrastructures. The coming of buyers will cause quite a stir..."

"Although twenty-two years have passed since that incident with the Tyrannosaurus, you can imagine that the arrival of large numbers of dinosaurs in San Diego, including large predators, would cause a massive outcry among its inhabitants."

"In the end, all of this is just a game of passing the buck which those creatures are."

They saw Maisie watching the hadrosaurs in one of the central enclosures.

"How can she love them?" Iris wondered.

"Many children are passionate about dinosaurs," Guillaume replied with a shrug. "This passion disappears in some but remains in others..."

"Her mother loved them too. Benjamin even took her with him when he went to visit Hammond in the islands in Costa Rica."

The attention of the WDMC director increased.

"When did it happen?"

"I don't remember exactly. It was shortly before the incident. Elizabeth had just died. A rare disease had taken her and Benjamin wanted to take their daughter's mind off it. But the trip didn't go as planned... Benjamin and his old friend had an argument during their stay."

"What was it about?"

"I never knew. It was Charlotte who told me about it. After this argument, things changed between the two…"

"Charlotte?"

"Her mother."

Guillaume nodded.

"How did Charlotte…" he began.

"A car accident," she cut him off. "She was just a baby when it happened."

Guillaume nodded silently and they continued, passing over a culvert that once allowed a small stream, the one Iris mentioned, to flow freely into the basin and beyond. Before construction began, Lockwood had it walled in, forcing the water to drain elsewhere.

A little later, while InGen's camp was in sight further away, Maisie returned to Iris and Guillaume.

"Iris! Look at the berries I found," she said holding out the palms of her hands to her.

The housekeeper approached Maisie and saw that she was holding some shiny black berries the size of a small cherry. She frowned.

"Please give them to me."

Maisie sighed and handed them to her.

"Don't eat them, huh," she said.

But Iris didn't answer, too busy looking at one of the berries. The housekeeper noticed that the calyx was star-shaped, with five short leaves, and then crushed the berry between her index finger and thumb, revealing a juicy purplish pulp. Her eyes widened and she jerked her head up to look at Maisie.

"Maisie, don't…"

Too late. Maisie had her head arched back and had just thrown a berry in the air. Iris watched the berry rising in the air, stop for a fraction of a second, then fall towards the girl's wide open mouth, before suddenly disappearing into the hand of Guillaume, who had darted as quickly as a chameleon's tongue catching a fly. He tossed the berry to the ground and Maisie put her head straight.

"What's the matter?" She asked, surprised by the Frenchman's action and the housekeeper's worried look while she was sighing in relief.

"Belladonna, the devil's berries…" Iris told her.

"Belladonna? It's poisonous if I'm not mistaken," Guillaume recalled.

"Poisonous?" Maisie repeated hesitantly.

Iris nodded gravely.

"Yes. Both Agrippina the Younger and Macbeth used it as against their enemies," she told her.

"We better wash your hands once back at the manor...," the WDMC director said while rubbing his on his pants.

"I'll make sure she does," Iris said. "Come on… Let's go back to the manor, Maisie. It's almost time for dinner."

They set off again and reached the village, which they crossed before descending to the manor by the same path which Guillaume had taken the day before with Elijah.

They separated in the entrance hall, but as Guillaume was about to take the stairs, the manager of the Lockwood Foundation hailed him:

"Mr. Vuillier!"

Guillaume stopped.

"Yes?"

"Are you planning on going out to dinner somewhere in particular tonight?"

"No. Why?"

"Mr. Lockwood and I would like to invite you to our table this evening. Would you accept?"

"It will be with pleasure," the WDMC director replied politely. "I just have to wash and change first. I've been hiking all day."

"No problem, it will start only in an hour. It will be in the private dining room. It's right next to where you had your breakfast this morning."

"Okay."