by Steve Berry
• • •
Moonstone, crownchaka, five milks from the banyan, fig, magnet, mercury, mica pearl, saarasvata oil, and nakha taken in equal parts, purified, should be ground and allowed to rest until congealed. Only then mix bilva oil and boil until a perfect gum forms. Spread the varnish evenly on a surface and allow it to dry before exposing it to light. For dulling, to the mixture add pallatory root, maatang, cawries, earthen salt, black lead, and granite sand. Apply in abundance onto any surface for strength.
• • •
The peetha is to be three commons wide and one-half high, square or round. A pivot is fixed to the center. In front is placed a vessel of acid dellium. To the west is the mirror for enhancing darkness and in the east is fixed the solar ray attraction tube. In the center is the wire operating wheel and to the south is the main operating switch. On turning the wheel toward the southeast the two-faced mirror fixed to the tube will collect solar rays. By operating the wheel in the northwest the acid will activate. By turning the wheel west, the darkness-intensifying mirror will function. By turning the central wheel, the rays attracted by the mirror will reach the crystal and envelop it. Then the main wheel should be revolved with great speed to produce an enveloping heat.
• • •
Sand, crystal, and suvarchala salt, in equal parts, filled in a crucible, placed in a furnace then cast will yield a pure, light, strong, cool ceramic. Pipes fashioned of this material will transport and radiate heat and can be bound strongly together with salt mortar. Color pigments made from iron, clay, quartz, and calcite are both rich and lasting and adhere well after casting.
Stephanie stared at Edwin Davis. “On the one hand they were playing around with electricity in infant stages while, on the other hand, they were creating compounds and mechanisms we’ve never heard of. We have to find out where these books came from.”
“Going to be difficult since, apparently, every record from High-jump that could tell us is gone.” Davis shook his head.
“What damn fools. Everything top secret. A few narrow minds made monumental decisions that affected us all. Here is a repository of knowledge that could well change the world. It could also be garbage, of course. But we’ll never know.
You realize in the decades since these books were found, foot after foot of new snow has accumulated down there. The landscape is totally different from what it was then.”
She knew Antarctica was a mapmaker’s nightmare. Its coastline constantly changed as ice shelves appeared and
disappeared, shifting at will. Davis was right. Finding Byrd’s locations could prove impossible.
“We’ve only looked at a handful of pages in a few scattered volumes,” she said. “There’s no telling what’s in all these.”
Another page caught her eye, filled with text and a sketch of two plants, roots and all.
She scanned that folio into the computer and translated.
Gyra grows in dim damp recesses and should be freed from the ground prior to the summer sun leaving. Its leaves, crushed and burned, abate fever. But take care that the Gyra stays free of moisture. Wet leaves are ineffective and can cause illness. Yellowed leaves the same. Bright red or orange is preferable. They also bring sleep and can be used to quell dreams. Too much can cause harm, so administer with care.
She imagined what an explorer must have felt when standing on a virgin shore, staring at a new land.
“This warehouse is going to be sealed,” Davis declared.
“That’s not a good idea. It’ll alert Ramsey.”
Davis seemed to see the wisdom of her observation. “We’ll work it through Gross. If anybody moves on this cache, he’ll let us know and we can stop it.”
That was a better idea.
She thought about Malone. He should be nearing Antarctica. Was he on the right trail?
But there was still unfinished business here.
Finding the killer.
She heard a door across the cavernous interior open, then close. Colonel Gross had maintained a vigil in the anteroom to afford them privacy, so she assumed it must be him. But then she heard two sets of footsteps echoing through the dark. They sat at a table just outside the refrigerated compartment with only two lamps burning. She glanced up and saw Gross materialize from the dimness followed by another man—tall, bushy-haired, wearing a navy-blue
windbreaker and casual pants, the emblem of the president of the United States over his left breast.
Danny Daniels.
EIGHTY-TWO
MARYLAND, 10:20 PM
RAMSEY LEFT THE DARK HIGHWAY AND DROVE INTO THE WOODS,toward the Maryland farmhouse where
he’d met Charlie Smith a few days ago.
Bailey Mill, Smith had called it.
He hadn’t liked Smith’s tone. Smart-ass, cocky, irritating—that was Charlie Smith. Angry, demanding, belligerent? No way.
Something was wrong.
Ramsey seemed to have acquired a new ally in Diane McCoy, one that had cost him twenty million dollars. Luckily, he’d stashed much more than that in various accounts across the globe. Money that had fallen his way from operations that either ended prematurely or were aborted. Thankfully, once aCLASSIFIED stamp was placed on a file, little in the way of a public accounting ever occurred. Policy required that whatever resources had been invested be returned, but that wasn’t always the case. He needed funds to pay Smith—capital to finance covert investigations—but his need was becoming more finite. Yet as that need tightened, so did the risks.
Like here.
His headlights revealed the farmhouse, a barn, and another car. Not a light on anywhere. He parked and reached into the center console, removed his Walther automatic, then stepped out into the cold.
“Charlie,” he called out. “I don’t have time for your crap. Get your ass out here.”
His eyes, attuned to the darkness, registered movement to his left. He aimed and ticked off two shots. The bullets thudded into the old wood. More movement, but he saw that it wasn’t Smith.
Dogs.
Fleeing the porch and the house, racing off toward the woods. Like last time.
He exhaled.
Smith loved to play games, so he decided to accommodate him. “Tell you what, Charlie. I’m going to flatten all four of your tires and you can freeze your ass off here tonight. Call me tomorrow when you’re ready to talk.”
“You’re not a bit of fun, Admiral,” a voice said. “Not a bit at all.”
Smith emerged from the shadows.
“You’re lucky I don’t kill you,” he said.
Smith stepped from the porch. “Why would you do that? I’ve been a good boy. Did everything you wanted. All four dead, nice and clean. Then I hear on the radio that you’re going to be promoted to the Joint Chiefs. Just movin’ on up, to the east side. To that deluxe apartment in the sky. You and George Jefferson.”
“That’s unimportant,” he made clear. “Not your concern.”
“I know. I’m just hired help. What’s important is that I get paid.”
“You did. Two hours ago. In full.”
“That’s good. I was thinking of a little vacation. Someplace warm.”
“Not until you deal with your new task.”
“You aim high, Admiral. Your latest goes straight into the White House.”
“Aiming high is the only way to achieve anything.”
“I need double the usual price for this one, half down, balance on completion.”
Didn’t matter to him how much it cost. “Done.”
“And there’s one more thing,” Smith said.
Something poked into his ribs, through his coat, from behind.
“Nice and easy, Langford,” a woman’s voice said. “Or I’ll shoot you before you move.”
Diane McCoy.
MALONE CHECKED THE PLANE’S CHRONOMETER—7:40 AM—ANDgazed out the flight deck at the panorama
below. Antarctica reminded him of an upturned bowl with a chipped rim. A vast ice plateau almos
t two miles thick was bordered for at least two-thirds of its circumference by black jagged mountains lined with crevasse-ridden glaciers that flowed toward the sea—the northeast coast below no exception.
The pilot announced that they were making a final approach to Halvorsen Base. Time to prepare for landing.
“This is rare,” the pilot said to Malone. “Superb weather. You’re lucky. Winds are good, too.” He adjusted the controls and gripped the yoke. “You want to take us down?”
Malone waved him off. “No thanks. Way beyond me.” Though he’d landed fighter jets on tossing carriers, dropping a one-hundred-thousand-pound aircraft onto perilous ice was a thrill he could do without.
The brawl between Dorothea and Christl still concerned him. They’d behaved themselves the past few hours, but their bitter conflict could prove vexing.
The plane began a steep decline.
Though the attack had raised warning flags, something else he’d witnessed caused him even more concern.
Ulrich Henn had been caught off guard.
Malone had spotted the momentary confusion that swept Henn’s face before the mask rehardened. He clearly hadn’t expected what Dorothea had done.
The plane leveled and the engine’s turbines slackened.
The Hercules was equipped with landing skis and he heard the copilot confirm that they were locked. They continued to drop, the white ground growing in size and detail.
A bump. Then another.
And he heard the scrape of skis on crusty ice as they glided. No way to brake. Only friction would slow them. Luckily there was plenty of room to slide.
Finally the Hercules stopped.
“Welcome to the bottom of the world,” the pilot told everyone.
STEPHANIE STOOD FROM HER CHAIR. FORCE OF HABIT.
Davis did, too.
Daniels motioned for them to stay put. “It’s late and we’re all tired. Sit.” He grabbed a chair. “Thank you, Colonel.
Would you make sure we’re not disturbed?”
Gross disappeared toward the front of the warehouse.
“You two look like hell,” Daniels said.
“Comes from watching a man’s head get blown off,” Davis said.
Daniels sighed. “I’ve seen that myself, once or twice. Two tours in Vietnam. Never leaves you.”
“A man died because of us,” Davis said.
Daniels’ lips tightened. “But Herbert Rowland is alive because of you.”
Little consolation, she thought, then asked, “How are you here?”
“Slipped out of the White House and rode Marine One straight south. Bush started that. He’d fly all the way to Iraq before anyone knew. We have procedures in place to accommodate that now. I’ll be back in bed before anyone knows I’m gone.” Daniels’ gaze drifted toward the refrigerator door. “I wanted to see what was in there. Colonel Gross told me, but I wanted to see.”
“It could change how we view civilization,” she said.
“It’s amazing.” And she could see that Daniels was genuinely impressed. “Was Malone right? Can we read the books?”
She nodded. “Enough to make sense.”
The president’s usual boisterous bearing seemed in check. She’d heard he was a notorious night owl, sleeping little.
Staffers constantly complained.
“We lost the killer,” Davis said.
She caught the defeat in his tone. So different from the first time they’d worked together, when he’d tossed out an infectious optimism that had driven her into central Asia.
“Edwin,” the president said, “you’ve given this your best shot. I thought you were nuts, but you were right.”
Davis’ eyes were those of someone who’d given up expecting good news. “Scofield’s still dead. Millicent is still dead.”
“The question is, do you want their killer?”
“Like I said, we lost him.”
“See, that’s the thing,” Daniels said. “I found him.”
EIGHTY-THREE
MARYLAND
RAMSEY SAT IN A RICKETY WOODEN CHAIR, HIS HANDS, CHEST, ANDfeet bound with duct tape. He’d
contemplated attacking McCoy outside but realized that Smith was surely armed—and he could not elude them both. So he’d done nothing. Bided his time. And hoped for a fumble.
Which may not have been smart.
They’d herded him into the house. Smith had lit a small camping stove that now provided weak illumination and welcome heat. Interesting how one section of the bedroom wall was swung open, the rectangle beyond pitch-black. He needed to know what these two wanted, how they’d joined forces, and how to appease them.
“This woman tells me that I’ve been added to the expendable list,” Smith said.
“You shouldn’t listen to people you don’t know.”
McCoy stood, propped against an open windowsill, holding a gun. “Who says we don’t know each other?”
“This isn’t hard to decipher,” he said to her. “You’re playing both ends against the middle. Did she tell you, Charlie, that she shook me down for twenty million?”
“She did mention something about that.”
Another problem.
He faced McCoy. “I’m impressed you identified Charlie and made contact.”
“Wasn’t all that hard. You think no one pays attention? You know cell phones can be monitored, bank transfers traced, confidential agreements between governments used to access accounts and records that no one else could get to.”
“I never realized I interested you so.”
“You wanted my help. I’m helping.”
He yanked on his restraints. “Not what I had in mind.”
“I offered Charlie half the twenty million.”
“Payable in advance,” Smith added.
Ramsey shook his head. “You’re an ungrateful fool.”
Smith lunged forward and raked the back of his hand across Ramsey’s face. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time.”
“Charlie, I swear to you, this you’re going to regret.”
“Fifteen years I’ve done what you asked,” Smith said. “You wanted people dead. I made them dead. I know you’ve been planning something. I could always tell. Now you’re moving to the Pentagon. Joint Chiefs of Staff. What’s next?
No way you’ll be satisfied and retire out. That’s not you. So I’ve become a problem.”
“Who said that?”
Smith pointed at McCoy.
“And you believe her?”
“She makes sense. And she did have twenty million dollars, because I now have half of it.”
“And we both have you,” McCoy said.
“Neither one of you has the guts to murder an admiral, the head of naval intelligence, nominee for the Joint Chiefs.
Going to be tough to cover that one up.”
“Really?” Smith said. “How many people have I killed for you? Fifty? A hundred? Two hundred? I can’t even
remember. Not a one of which has ever been tagged murder. I’d say cover-up is my specialty.”
Unfortunately the cocky little weasel was right, so he decided to try diplomacy. “What can I do to assure you, Charlie?
We’ve been together a long time. I’m going to need you in the years ahead.”
Smith did not answer.
“How many women did he kill?” McCoy asked him.
Ramsey wondered about that question. “Does it matter?”
“Does to me.”
Then he realized. Edwin Davis. Her co-worker. “This about Millicent?”
“Did Mr. Smith here kill her?”
He decided to be honest and nodded.
“She was pregnant?”
“That’s what I was told. But who knows? Women lie.”
“So you just killed her?”
“Seemed the simplest way to end the problem. Charlie here was working for us in Europe. That’s when we first met. He handled the job well, and he’s been mine ever since.”
�
�I’m not yours,” Smith said, contempt in his voice. “I work for you. You pay me.”