by Mark Alpert
Of course she couldn’t express all this with a gag over her mouth. Instead she stared at Gupta and shook her head.
The professor raised an eyebrow. “What is it? Are you afraid?”
She nodded vigorously.
Gupta moved a step closer and rested his hand on her shoulder. “Fear can be a very debilitating emotion, my dear. Herr Doktor was afraid, too, and look what happened. Kleinman and the others kept the Einheitliche Feldtheorie hidden for half a century. And did their timidity help anyone? No, it was a waste, a shameful waste. We need to overcome our fears before we can step into the new age. And that’s what I’ve done, Dr. Reynolds. I’m not afraid of anything anymore.”
The old man squeezed her shoulder and Monique was suddenly filled with revulsion. She howled behind her gag and tried to hurl herself at Gupta’s computer. But the professor caught her before she fell out of the chair. He smiled again, evidently amused. “I sense you have some doubts, but soon you’ll see that I’m right. The world will hail us as saviors once we unveil the theory. They’ll forgive us for everything once they see—”
Gupta was interrupted by a crackle of static. Unhooking a radio from his belt, he muttered, “Excuse me,” and went to the other end of the cargo hold. After about twenty seconds he returned to his students and raised his hands in a benedictory gesture. “Gentlemen, we’re making another stop before we reach Fermilab. We need to pick up some equipment for modifying the Tevatron.”
DAVID SAT WITH HIS BACK against the wall of the cargo hold. The truck had stopped fifteen minutes ago and the students had loaded a dozen wooden crates inside. Because the crates took up nearly all the space in the hold, the students had moved to a different truck in the convoy, and now David was alone with the bald maniac in the camouflage pants, who was alternately cleaning his Uzi and swigging from a bottle of Stolichnaya.
For the thousandth time, David tried to loosen the cord that bound his hands behind his back. His fingers were numb but he kept trying anyway, twisting his arms until he could feel the tendons strain and scrape. Sweat dripped down his cheeks and soaked into his gag. As he struggled against the cord he fixed his gaze on the bald mercenary, the son of a bitch who’d held a knife to Jonah’s throat. David’s fury put new strength into his sinews, but after a minute or so he closed his eyes. It was his own damn fault. He should’ve surrendered to the FBI agents when he’d had the chance.
When he opened his eyes he saw the bald man standing over him. The mercenary held out the bottle of vodka. “Relax, comrade. Take a break from your valiant efforts.”
Repelled, David tried to back away, but the bald man crouched beside him and waved the Stoli bottle under his nose. “Come on, have a drink. You look like you need one.”
David shook his head. The smell of the vodka was sickening. “Fuck you!” he shouted through the gag, but it came out as a desperate gurgle.
The mercenary shrugged. “All right, then. But it seems a shame. We have a whole case of Stolichnaya and not much time left to drink it.” Grinning, he tilted the bottle and took a long pull. Then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “My name’s Simon, by the way. I want to offer my compliments, Dr. Swift. The book you wrote about Einstein’s assistants was very helpful. I’ve consulted it quite often since taking this job.”
David fought to control his rage. Taking a deep breath through the fetid gag, he focused all his attention on the killer’s voice. Although he had a thick Russian accent, his command of English was excellent. Contrary to appearances, this was no brainless hit man.
Simon took another swig of vodka, then reached into his pocket. “The past few hours have been a little dull for me. Before the last stop I was in the professor’s truck, the one ahead of us, but he was busy interrogating his grandson and giving orders to his students. To pass the time, I had a chat with Gupta’s daughter, and I found something that might be of interest to you.”
He pulled a circular object out of his pants and cupped it in his palm. David recognized it at once: it was the gold locket that Elizabeth Gupta wore around her neck. Simon opened it and stared at the picture inside. “In your line of work, I suppose you’d consider this a piece of evidence. A late addition to your historical research, eh? It certainly explains a few things.”
He turned the locket around so David could see the picture. It was an antique photograph, a sepia-toned portrait of a mother and daughter. The mother was a beauty with long dark hair; the girl was about six years old. Both stared blankly at the camera, unsmiling. “This photo was taken in Belgrade before the war,” Simon noted. “The late thirties, most likely. Elizabeth was unsure of the date.” He pointed first to the daughter. “This is Hannah, Elizabeth’s mother. She came to America after the war and married Gupta. An unfortunate choice.” His finger shifted to the dark-haired mother. “And this is Elizabeth’s grandmother. She died in the concentration camps. She was half Jewish, you see. Here, I’ll show you.”
He pried the picture out of the locket and turned it over. On the reverse side of the photograph, someone had scribbled Hannah and Lieserl.
Simon grinned again. “You recognize that name, don’t you? I can assure you it’s not a coincidence. Elizabeth told me the whole story. Her grandmother was Herr Doktor’s bastard daughter.”
Under any other circumstances, David would’ve been bowled over. For an Einstein historian, this was the equivalent of discovering a new planet. Like most researchers, David had assumed that Lieserl died in infancy; now he knew she’d not only survived, she had living descendants. But in his present state he felt no joy in the revelation. It was just another reminder of how blind he’d been.
Simon put the photograph back into the locket. “After the war, Herr Doktor learned what had happened to his daughter. He sent for his granddaughter, Hannah, who’d been hiding with a Serbian family, but he never acknowledged his relationship with the girl. As you know, the old Jew wasn’t much of a family man.” He closed the locket and slipped it back into his pants. “Hannah told Gupta about it, though. And Kleinman, too. That’s why they fought over her. Both of them wanted to marry Herr Doktor’s granddaughter.”
He took another gulp of vodka, tilting the bottle straight up. He’d drunk more than half of it. “You’re probably wondering why I’m telling you all this. It’s because you’re a historian. You should know the history behind this operation. After Gupta married Hannah, he became Herr Doktor’s protégé, his closest assistant. And when Herr Doktor confided that he’d discovered the Einheitliche Feldtheorie, Gupta assumed the old Jew would share the secret with him. But Herr Doktor must’ve sensed there was something wrong with Gupta, even back then. So the old Jew passed the theory to Kleinman and the others instead. And that’s what drove Gupta mad. He thought the theory should be his.”
Simon was starting to slur his words. David leaned forward and studied the man carefully, looking for other signs of vulnerability. Maybe an opportunity would present itself. Maybe the son a bitch would do something stupid.
The mercenary turned toward the front of the truck. He was quiet for half a minute or so, staring at the walls of the cargo hold. Then he turned back to David. “Gupta’s been planning this demonstration for years. He put millions of dollars into building up his little army of students. He’s convinced them that they’re going to save the world, that people will start dancing in the streets once they see the flash in the sky from the neutrino beam.” He made a disgusted face and spat on the floor. “Can you believe anyone would fall for such nonsense? But Gupta believes it, and now his students do, too. He’s a madman, you see. And madmen can be very persuasive.”
Simon took one more swallow of Stoli, then thrust the bottle at David again. “Look, you have to drink. I won’t take no for an answer. We’re going to make a toast. To tomorrow’s demonstration. To Gupta’s new age of enlightenment.”
He began to fumble at the knot that tied the gag over David’s mouth. The vodka had made his fingers clumsy, but after a while he managed to loo
sen the cloth. David felt a surge of adrenaline. This was the opportunity he’d been waiting for. Once the gag was off, he could scream for help. But what good would that do? In all likelihood they were driving through deserted countryside, the woods and fields of Kentucky or Indiana. Screaming would accomplish nothing. He had to talk to Simon. He had to convince the mercenary to set him free. It was their only chance.
David’s jaw ached as the gag came off. He took a gulp of fresh air and looked Simon in the eye. “And how much is Gupta paying for your services?”
Simon frowned. For a second David feared that the mercenary would change his mind and retie the gag. “That’s an impolite question, Dr. Swift. I didn’t ask how much money you earned from your book, did I?”
“This is different. You know what’s going to happen after everyone sees the burst. The Pentagon will start doing its own research and—”
“Yes, yes, I know. Every army in the world will try to develop this weapon. But no one’s going to be doing any research in the Pentagon. Or anywhere else near Washington, D.C.”
Thrown off track, David stared at the mercenary. “What? What do you mean?”
Simon was still frowning, but his eyes held a glint of satisfaction. “Professor Gupta’s demonstration will be even more impressive than he expects. I’m going to change the orientation of the neutrino beam so that it reenters our universe inside the Jefferson Memorial.” He pointed the Stoli bottle at the back of the truck and closed one eye as if he were aiming down the bottle’s neck. “Not that I bear any ill will toward Thomas Jefferson. I’ve chosen the target because its location is conveniently central. Equidistant from the Pentagon, the White House, and Congress. All three will be completely incinerated in the blast. Along with everything else in a ten-kilometer-wide circle.”
At first David thought the mercenary must be joking. He did have a strange sense of humor. But Simon’s face seemed to harden as he peered down the neck of the vodka bottle. His upper lip pulled back from his teeth, and as David stared at the man’s vicious frown, his own mouth went dry. “Who’s paying you to do this? Al-Qaeda?”
Simon shook his head. “No, this is for myself. For my family, actually.”
“Your family?”
Very slowly, Simon put down the bottle of vodka and reached into his pocket again. This time he took out a cell phone. “Yes, I had a family. Not so different from yours, Dr. Swift.” He turned on the phone and held it so that David could look at the screen. In a couple of seconds a picture appeared: a young boy and girl smiling at the camera. “Those are my children. Sergei and Larissa. They died five years ago in the Argun Gorge, in the southern part of Chechnya. You’ve heard of the place, I assume?”
“Yes, but—”
“Shut up! Shut up and look!” He leaned forward, shoving the phone into David’s face. “My boy Sergei, he was six years old. He looks a bit like your boy, doesn’t he? And Larissa, she was just four. They were killed with their mother in a rocket attack. A Hellfire rocket launched from a Delta Force helicopter that was operating near the Chechen border.”
“An American helicopter? What was it doing there?”
“Nothing useful, I can assure you of that. It was another botched counterterrorism operation that killed more women and children than terrorists.” He spat on the floor again. “But I don’t really care about their reasons. I’m going to eliminate everyone involved in commanding and deploying that unit. That’s why I’ve targeted the Pentagon and the civilian leaders as well. The president, the vice president, the secretary of defense.” He snapped the phone shut. “I have only one opportunity to strike, so I need a wide blast zone.”
David felt sick. This was the very thing Einstein had feared. And it was going to happen in a few hours. “But it sounds like what happened to your family was an accident. How can you—”
“I told you, I don’t care!” He picked up the bottle of Stoli by its neck and waved it like a club. “It’s intolerable! It’s unforgivable!”
“But you’re going to kill millions of—”
Something hard smashed into David’s cheek. Simon had struck him in the face with the bottle. David fell sideways and his forehead slammed against the truck bed. He would’ve passed out, but Simon grabbed his collar and pulled him up. “Yes, they’re going to die!” he screamed. “Why should they live when my children are dead? They’re all going to die! I’m going to kill them all!”
David’s ears were ringing. Blood streamed from the gash on his cheekbone and swarms of greenish dots clouded his vision. All he could see now was the enraged face of the mercenary and even that image was blurring in his mind, melting in red, pink, and black rivulets. Hoisting David with one hand, Simon raised the bottle of Stoli with the other. Remarkably, it was unbroken and still held a few ounces of vodka. He lifted it to David’s lips and poured the alcohol into his mouth. “Here’s to the end of everything!” he shouted. “The rest is silence!”
The vodka stung the back of David’s throat and pooled in his stomach. When the bottle was empty, Simon tossed it aside and let go of his collar. Then David sank to the floor and let darkness overtake him.
LUCILLE ARRIVED AT THE FBI headquarters very early Monday morning so she wouldn’t run into any of her colleagues, but when she got to her office she discovered that the goons from the Defense Intelligence Agency had already cleaned out her desk. Her files on Kleinman, Swift, Reynolds, and Gupta were gone. So was her copy of On the Shoulders of Giants. The only things left were her personal effects: her payroll stubs, her certificates of commendation, a glass paperweight in the shape of a Texas six-shooter, and a framed photograph of her shaking hands with Ronald Reagan.
Well, she thought, they did me a favor. Now it won’t take so long to pack.
She found a cardboard box and in half a minute loaded everything inside. It was amazing—the whole kit and caboodle weighed less than five pounds. For thirty-four years she’d poured her heart and soul into the Bureau, but now there seemed precious little to show for it. She gazed with resentment at the antiquated computer on her desk, the cheap plastic tray of her in-box. It was depressing as hell.
And then she saw the folder lying on the tray. One of the agents on the overnight shift must’ve delivered it after the DIA goons came through. For several seconds Lucille just stared at the thing, telling herself to leave it alone. But in the end her curiosity got the better of her. She picked it up.
It was a list of Professor Gupta’s recent telephone calls. Lucille had requested the information from his cellular carrier three days ago, but the idiots at the phone company had taken their sweet time. The records were pretty sparse—Gupta didn’t use his cell phone much, only two or three calls a day. As she leafed through the pages, though, she noticed something unusual. Every day for the past two weeks he’d placed a call to the same number. It wasn’t Swift’s number or Reynolds’s or Kleinman’s. What made it suspicious was that Gupta had always made the call at precisely 9:30 A.M. Never a minute earlier or later.
Lucille reminded herself that she was no longer assigned to the case. In fact, she’d already filled out her retirement forms.
But she hadn’t submitted them yet.
SIMON WAS DRIVING THE TRUCK at the head of the convoy as they sped toward the lab’s East Gate. It was five o’clock in the morning, just a few minutes after dawn, and most of the houses along Batavia Road were still dark. A lone woman in red shorts and a white T-shirt jogged past the driveways and lawns. Simon stared at her for a moment, admiring her long mane of auburn hair. Then he pinched the bridge of his nose and yawned. He was still a bit wobbly from last night’s binge. To wake himself up, he reached into his windbreaker and clasped the stock of his Uzi. The day of retribution was here. Very soon it would all be over.
Just past the intersection with Continental Drive the truck jounced over a railroad crossing and the landscape opened up on both sides of the road. Instead of suburban homes and lawns, Simon saw a vista of wide green fields, a stretch of virgin I
llinois prairie. They were on federal property now, the eastern edge of the laboratory’s grounds. Up ahead was a small guardhouse and sitting inside it was an enormously fat woman in a blue uniform. Simon shook his head. It was hard to believe that the laboratory would hire such an obese person to do security work. Clearly, no one at this installation was expecting any trouble.
As Simon slowed his truck to a halt, the woman heaved herself out of the guardhouse. He smiled at her and handed over the paperwork that Professor Gupta had prepared, a thick sheaf of forged invoices and requisition letters. “Here you go, sweetheart,” he said, trying to sound like an American truck driver. “We’re making an early delivery today.”
The woman didn’t smile back. She carefully examined the papers, comparing them with a list on her clipboard. “It’s not on the schedule.”
“No, but we have all the approvals.”
She continued studying the paperwork. Either she was a very slow reader or she enjoyed making him wait. Finally she lifted her massive head. “All right, step out of the truck and open the back doors. And tell the drivers behind you to do the same.”
Simon frowned. “I told you, it’s been approved. Didn’t you see the letters?”
“Yeah, but I gotta inspect everything that comes in. Just turn off the engine and—”
He cut her off by pumping two bullets into her skull. Then he went to the back of the truck and knocked three times on the rear door. “Open up, Professor,” he shouted. “We need to take on another load.”
One of the students pulled up the door and helped Gupta out of the truck. The professor seemed alarmed when he saw the security guard on the ground. “What happened? Didn’t I tell you to avoid any more casualties?”