The Devil Colony (39 page)

“I think it should be okay,” Painter said. “It’s been frozen for centuries.”

Painter remembered Ronald Chin’s contention that the explosive compound needed
warmth
to keep it stable, or extreme heat to destroy it. It only destabilized when it got
cold
. Still, he held his breath as he reached toward the wolf’s-head lid. He lifted it free, cracking through a thin scrim of ice, then shone his flashlight down inside.

He let out the breath he’d been holding. “Just as I thought. It’s empty.”

He passed the cap to Hank, then set about breaking the jar loose from the ice. With a few sharp tugs, it came free.

“It’s heavy,” he said as he replaced the cap. “I wager this gold is the same nano-dense material as the plates. The ancients must’ve used the metal to insulate their unstable compound.”

“Why do you think that?”

“The denser the metal, the better it retains heat. It might take longer to warm, but once this gold heats up, it would retain its warmth for a longer span of time. Such insulation would act like an insurance policy in case there were any sudden variations in temperature. It would also allow them additional time to get the substance from one heat source to another.”

Hank shook his head at such ingenuity. “So the gold helped these ancient people stabilize their compound.”

“I think this jar might have been one of their
unused
containers. But considering what happened at Sunset Crater, the Anasazi must have also stolen one that was
full
.” Painter turned the jar over in his hands. “And look at this. On the opposite side of the jar.”

Hank moved closer, standing shoulder to shoulder with him.

Inscribed on the back was a detailed drawing of a landscape: a winding creek, a steep mountain fringed by trees, and in the middle of it all, something that looked like a small erupting volcano.

“What do you make of it?” Painter asked.

“I don’t know.”

Before they could ponder it further, a rope fell heavily, coming close to knocking the jar out of Painter’s hands.

“Careful, Kowalski!” he called up.

“Sorry.”

Painter stepped under the opening and lifted the jar with both arms. “Come take this!”

Kowalski gladly took the prize and held it at arm’s length, letting out an appreciative whistle. “At least we found some treasure! Makes my bruised ass feel less sore.”

With a bit of effort, Painter and Hank climbed out of the
kiva,
and they all worked their way free of the frozen pueblo. Once out in the open cavern, Painter packed the gold jar, accepting the burden for the return trip, wrapping it next to the plates Kai had stolen. His pack had to weigh something like sixty or seventy pounds. He did not look forward to the long climb back to the sun, but there was no choice.

“We should head up before Nancy calls in the cavalry.”

As he turned to the tunnel, a dark shape came flying out the opening and shot past his legs, almost knocking him off his feet. Hank stumbled back in fear—then suddenly recognized a familiar friend.

“Kawtch?” the old man blurted out, surprised.

The dog hugged the professor’s legs, circling and circling, whining deep in his throat. The leash still hung from his collar, tangling up Hank’s feet. He dropped to a knee to calm his dog.

“Must’ve run away from Nancy,” Hank said.

“I think it’s worse than that.” Painter pointed his flashlight down at the ice. A dark crimson streak skittered across the surface, left behind by the dragging leash.

Blood.

Chapter 26

May 31, 8:07
P.M.
Louisville, Kentucky

Hurry up and wait . . .

Monk kept forgetting that this was the motto of the military. He hated cooling his jets—in this case, literally. The three of them sat in the cabin of a Learjet 55 outside a private terminal at the Louisville Airport. It was an older model, but it got them here to Kentucky in one piece, and he appreciated these aged birds with a little air under their tails. He stared out the window, looking down the length of the white wings, searching the dark tarmac.

The trio was waiting for a military team from the U.S. Army Garrison over at Fort Knox to arrive and escort them to the Bullion Depository. They’d been here for over ten minutes. His knee began to bounce. He’d hated leaving Kat over at Sigma. She was starting to have cramps, which, with her being eight months along, set him on edge. She claimed it was just back spasms from sitting for long stretches, but he was nervous enough to interpret every bit of indigestion as a potential miscarriage or impending labor pains.

Kat had practically pushed him out the door for this trip, but not before a long embrace. He had kept one palm resting on her belly—as proud
father,
as loving
husband,
even as
army medic,
making sure she was doing well. He knew how frightened she’d been during the debriefing following the events in Iceland, though she kept her game face on the whole time.

But he knew better.

And now this evening hop to Kentucky. He wanted to get this over with and be back at her side ASAP. He loved missions, hated downtime, but with a baby due any day, he just wanted to be at her side, rubbing her feet.

Yes, he was
that
much of a man.

Monk pressed his forehead against the glass. “Where are they?”

“They’ll be here,” Gray said.

Monk fell back into his seat, glaring at Gray, needing someone to blame. The bird’s-eye maple interior of the jet was configured with four leather seats: two facing forward, two toward the tail. He sat directly across from Gray, while Seichan sat next to his partner, her bad leg propped up on the opposite chair.

“Do we even know what we’re looking for here?” Monk asked, not expecting an answer, just seeking to distract himself.

Gray continued to stare out the window. “Maybe I do.”

Monk’s knee stopped bobbing. Even Seichan looked over at Gray. Before the wheels had lifted off in D.C., the basic plan had been simply
to pop in and take a look around Fort Knox.
Not exactly the most brilliant strategy, but no one knew the mysterious source behind these radiating neutrinos. The anomalous readings picked up by the Japanese physicist might be significant, or they might not. The three of them were on a fishing expedition and had left home without their poles.

“What’s your idea?” Monk asked.

Gray picked up a folder tucked into the side of his seat cushion. He’d been reading through all the intelligence reports concerning this mission. If anyone could pick through miscellaneous details and come up with a pattern, it was Gray. Sometimes Monk wished his own mind worked that way, but maybe it was better it didn’t. He knew the burden often placed on his friend’s shoulders. He was more than happy to play the support role. Somebody had to haul out the garbage and make sure the dog got fed.

“I read over the physicist’s assessment again,” Gray said, and glanced up. “Did you know he has Asperger’s syndrome?”

Monk shrugged and shook his head.

“Guy’s a genius, likely a superb intuitive, too. He believed the small neutrino bursts he detected—here, out west, and in Europe—came from something closely related to, but different from, the compound that destabilized and exploded both in Utah and Iceland. He posited that the new substance might be a closely related isotope or maybe even a by-product of the explosive material’s manufacture. Either way, he’s convinced they’re connected somehow.”

“So what are you getting at?” Seichan asked, suppressing a yawn with a fist.

“Hear me out. The other ancient nanotech artifacts found inside that Indian cave were the strange steel daggers and those gold tablets.” Gray stared hard at Monk. “Painter has a couple of those gold plates with him out
west
.”

“Where the other readings were recorded,” Monk said, catching on.

“They also picked up a reading in Belgium, where the Guild team that we tangled with in Iceland originated. I’m guessing the Guild has one of those plates. Look at how hotly they went after Painter’s niece. Maybe their plate is secured in Belgium.”

Seichan lowered her injured leg and sat straighter. “And now all of us are heading to a
gold
depository.”

Monk thought he understood. “You think there might be some of those gold tablets hidden at Fort Knox.”

“No,” Gray corrected him, and tapped the file on the seat. “I’ve been doing research on the history of Fort Knox and the early United States Mints. Did you know Thomas Jefferson helped found the very first mint, located in Philadelphia? He even had a set of silver coins minted with his face that were sent with the Lewis and Clark expedition. But he also had
gold
coins minted.”

Monk tried to follow Gray’s train of thought, but it left him at the station.

“The Philadelphia Mint’s first director was a man named David Rittenhouse. Like Benjamin Franklin and Jefferson, the guy was a Renaissance man: clockmaker, inventor, mathematician, and politician. He was also a member of the American Philosophical Society.”

Monk recognized that name. “Like that Frenchman. Wasn’t Fortescue part of that group, too?”

Gray nodded. “In fact, Rittenhouse was great friends with Jefferson, like all the significant players involved in this affair. He was surely in Jefferson’s inner circle, a trusted companion.”

“Okay . . .” Monk said hesitantly.

“According to Fortescue’s journal, the Indian map was hidden by Jefferson.” Gray quoted from the diary by heart.
“ ‘Ever crafty, Jefferson devised a way to preserve the Indian map, to protect it, yet keep it forever out of the hands of the faceless enemy. He would use the very gold to hide it in plain view of all. None would suspect the treasure hidden at the heart of the Seal.’ ”

Seichan got it before Monk. “You think Jefferson had Rittenhouse help him hide the map at the mint,” she said. “To
hide it in plain view
.”

“I do. Then in 1937, the Philadelphia Mint was emptied, and its gold transported to Fort Knox by boxcar. There are reports from that time about the discovery of old bullion caches found deep in the Philadelphia Mint, gold going back to the colonial era. That gold was also moved to Fort Knox.”

“Which means the map might’ve been moved, too,” Monk said. “But how can we be sure? Wouldn’t someone have noted a map made out of gold, especially one stuck on chunks of mastodon bone?”

“I don’t know,” Gray said. “We’ll have to go look ourselves. But one last item. Fortescue described that Indian map as being made out of the same
gold that would not melt,
the same material as the inscribed tablets.”

Monk understood. “So if the tablets are emitting neutrinos, so would the map.”

Gray nodded.

Monk leaned back, selfishly appreciating how his friend’s unique mind worked. With such insight, they might all just get back to D.C. before midnight.

A squeal of brakes drew his attention back around. A large sand-colored Humvee pulled to a stop alongside the jet.

Monk pushed up. “Looks like our ride’s finally here.”

8:37
P.M.

Could the map truly be hidden at Fort Knox?

Nagged by worries, Gray sat in the rear seat of the Humvee, staring out as the massive vehicle roared down the Dixie Highway and swung sharply to take the Bullion Depository exit. The armored beast also carried their escorts: four combat brigade soldiers from the U.S. Army Garrison at Fort Knox. When they reached the base’s main gates, passes and identification were shown and a guard waved them through. From there, the vehicle forged on through the warm evening, heading toward the country’s most guarded structure: the Fort Knox Bullion Depository.

Gray spotted the fortress ahead, lit up in the night like a granite prison, rising from a cleared field and ringed by fences. Sentry boxes guarded the gates, while four guard turrets rose from each corner of the depository, like stubby towers on a castle. He knew that once they were inside, there would be additional layers of countermeasures defending the premises against attack: alarms, cameras, armed guards, and more esoteric technology, like biometric analyzers, facial-recognition software, even seismic sensors. And that only accounted for the defenses that were generally known. The remaining defenses were classified. It was rumored that the facility could be flooded at a moment’s notice—whether by water, as was done at the Bank of France, or even by toxic gases.

Of course, reaching the ring of fortress gates meant first penetrating the hundred-thousand-acre military base surrounding the depository—a daunting task, considering the base’s numerous helicopter gunships, armored tanks, artillery, and its thirty thousand soldiers.

Gray stared down at his lap.

Entry was a difficult task unless you had the golden ticket.

The presidential order, folded and resting on his knee, bore a wax seal, both official and archaic at the same time. Freshly emblazoned across the front was the signature of President James T. Gant. The depository did not offer tours, visitors were forbidden, and only two U.S. presidents had ever set foot inside. The only way to enter the Bullion Depository was by presidential order. Gray knew that these papers had already been forwarded to the facility’s officer in charge. They were to meet the man at the main entrance.

Gray fingered the seal, wondering what would happen if he broke it before the officer in charge verified the paperwork. It would be a foolish act. It had taken all of Sigma’s resources to wrangle this document on such short notice. But then again, President Gant owed Sigma for saving his ass in the Ukraine, so his chief of staff took Kat’s call.

The presidential orders were specific, covering the three visitors for tonight only. He glanced across the seat to Seichan and Monk. According to the paperwork, they were allowed a single supervised tour of the vault, in order to search for a threat to U.S. national security and remove it from the premises. That was the full breadth of their authority. To step beyond it would be deemed a hostile act.