The Serpent's Bite by Warren Adler Page A

own tent, which he had placed at a distance from theirs, crawling inside, possibly for a nap before dinner or some deeper sips on his liquor supply.
    â€œTo the Temple clan,” their father said, reaching out with his cup. Scott and Courtney clanked their cups to his. They drank in silence, looking about them at the ruggedly beautiful landscape and occasionally observing Tomas at his cooking chores. The wine seemed to work its charms on their father, who grew increasingly mellow.
    â€œI wish your mom was here,” he sighed. “I think she would have loved being here again. Remember how good a sport she was, determined to make a go of it? That was your mom. She would never let any of us down.”
    â€œI’ll buy that,” Courtney said, a comment laden with irony.
    â€œShe was always there for both of you,” Temple said. “Always.” He turned toward Scott. “When you were three, you had asthma, Scott. Probably don’t remember. She would sit up with you night after night to be sure you were breathing.” He turned to Courtney. “When you began to date, Mom would never go to sleep until you got home. If you were late, it drove her wild with anxiety and worry.” He shook his head and sighed. “Not easy to be a parent.”
    The man is reviewing his relationship with his children, Scott thought, reflecting, evaluating. It was a good sign. He looked toward Courtney who, despite her avowed purpose, was behaving herself, pleasantly nodding her understanding.
    Scott had only the vaguest memories of his early bout with asthma, but the recall brought it to the surface and set him on a course of deep introspection. He felt the swift, mellowing effect of the alcohol, remembering that it worked faster at high altitudes. That, plus the changing glow of the fading light, seemed to cast his thoughts in an aura of warm sentiment, helping him to revisit pleasant childhood moments before puberty had intervened and created a stark new reality.
    All in all that period of his life had been happy. The atmosphere in their spacious apartment was placid. He and his sister had separate rooms, and their parents were, in every respect, traditional and certainly loving. He could not recall anger, animosity, harshness, or conflict. Nor could he ever detect signs of dysfunction or any hint of what would transpire later in the lives of their children. They could be characterized as an ordinary, privileged, upper middle class family. He could recall no financial worries, although his parents did maintain a certain discipline about expenditures.
    In retrospect, family life was, up to a point, tranquil, comfortable, hardly unique. He could not remember an argument between his parents nor could his mother be characterized as repressed. By all measures, they lived in a happy home. Scott knew he and his sister were loved children, and he supposed that neither had any doubts that they loved their parents nor seemed uncertain that they returned such emotion. The loving family bond was simply accepted, never questioned, debated, or analyzed. Like the air itself, it was simply there.
    Scott studied the man resting on the log drinking wine from a metal cup and tried to imagine him as the father of that early life. Physically, the comparison was barely familiar. The once-jet-black hair had been chemically turned to rust brown. The face had become more rounded, with flesh that drooped around the chin line; the brown eyes seemed highlighted, now that the slack skin around them had been excised, although the shape of his eyes had changed. His skin was partially speckled and ravaged by exposure and chronology, and the back of his hands, the fingers of which could delicately hold the smallest gem, were mottled with liver spots.
    Despite the encroachments of age, there was still a jauntiness to his carriage. He could be taken for at least ten years younger than he was. Despite his disappointment with his father’s