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Estevanico’s party who were bloodied and beaten. They told him that the Moor had been killed at Cibola.”
    “Correct,” said Lazarus. “De Niza dared not enter the city and only saw it from a distance. When he returned to Mexico City, he told what he had seen but mentioned nothing of gold. This did not perturb the Spaniards, who were more convinced than ever that this Cibola and its sister cities must be the golden empire they sought. Another expedition was organized with de Niza as a guide and the governor of Nueva Galicia—a man called Coronado—as its leader.
    “Coronado,” put in Vasquez. “Now there’s a fella I heard tell of.”
    “And with good reason,” said Lazarus. “Not just because you share his name. Francisco Vazquez de Coronado was the fellow who exposed the whole thing as a fraud, however inadvertently. When he and de Niza arrived at Cibola, they found only a meager Zuni pueblo called Hawikuh. With Coronado and his men cursing de Niza as a phony, a battle broke out with the Zuni warriors, and the pueblo fell to the Spaniards.”
    “So Coronado and his pals hadn’t found Cibola, then?” asked Vasquez.
    “That’s a matter of opinion,” said Lazarus. “There is no doubt that they found the city Estevanico had dubbed Cibola, but nobody had ever said anything about it being a city of gold. That was just in the imaginations of the Spaniards. And it was a myth the Zuni and other pueblo peoples were happy to propagate. Soon Coronado was heading out again on instructions given to him by the defeated Zuni, that golden cities lay further north east. He got as far as Kansas before giving up and returning in debt and in disgrace.”
    “So he didn’t find it,” said Vasquez, lighting up a cheroot. “That don’t mean it don’t exist.”
    “Its existence is highly unlikely,” said Lazarus. “This continent has been occupied by white men for over four hundred years. Seven cities made of gold couldn’t have escaped notice for that long.”
    “As you said, opinions are opinions,” said Vasquez. “All I’m saying is I’ve got a map which is yours for the right price.”
    “My mission was to deliver you, not a map,” said Lazarus.
    “Well no dice on that one. It’s the map or a mouthful of dust. You’ll have to make your mind up on that.”
     

Chapter Five
     
    In which a mountain journey ends in betrayal
     
    They spent the following morning drifting towards the mountains which hove into sight like golden teeth. By noon, Vasquez and Hok’ee were making plans to set the balloon down. Lazarus squinted into the distance, shielding his eyes against the glare. At the foot of the mountains he could see the ruins of what looked like an old fort. The wooden palisade had collapsed in places and there seemed to be no life about at all.
    “What’s this place?” Lazarus asked.
    “An old outpost from the early days of the war,” Vasquez replied. “It was once the northernmost airship dock in Arizona Territory, but it’s fallen into disrepair now. We use it occasionally as a hideaway. Most of its various functions still work, and I keep a few supplies stockpiled.”
    They drifted over the base and Vasquez began to inflate the ballonets; balloons within the balloons that were slowly filled with air, compressing the helium which caused the dirigible to slowly sink. When they were a few feet from the dock, Hok’ee leapt overboard to secure the anchor lines.
    Lazarus was glad to feel solid ground beneath his feet, and looked around the abandoned base with interest. The buildings were in a poor state of repair—broken windows and dusty timbers with tangles of dry desert growth in every crack. The rusty carriages for anti-airship batteries were visible beneath the overgrowth, their guns long since towed away. There was a dilapidated telegraph shack, but Lazarus could see no telegraph wires leading away from the fort and assumed that the Confederacy must have used a ground wire.
    “I got weapons