The Charlemagne Pursuit cm-4 Page 13

  "Dietz wisely chose the Americans over the Soviets. They came here also, wanting his help, but he hated communists."

  "Do you have any idea what's in Antarctica?"

  She shook her head. "I've wondered a long time. I knew of Einhard's will, the Holy Ones, the two books Dorothea and Christl have. I've sincerely wanted to know what is there. So my daughters are solving the riddle and, in the process, hopefully learning they may indeed need each other."

  "That may prove impossible. They seem to despise each other."

  Her eyes found the floor. "No two sisters could hate each other more. But my life will end soon, and I must know that the family will endure."

  "And resolve your own doubts?"

  She nodded. "Precisely. You must understand, Herr Malone, we find what we search for."

  "That's what Christl said."

  "Her father said that many times and, on that, he was right."

  "Why am I involved?"

  "Dorothea initially made that decision. She saw you as a means to learn about the submarine. I suspect she rejected you because of your strength. That would truly frighten her. I chose you because Christl can benefit from your strength. But you are also someone who can level things for her."

  As if he cared. But he knew what was coming.

  "And by helping us, you may be able solve your own dilemma."

  "I've always worked alone."

  "We know things you don't."

  That, he couldn't deny. "Have you heard from Dorothea? There's a dead body in the abbey."

  "Christl told me," she said. "Ulrich will deal with that, as he will deal with the one here. I'm concerned about who else has involved themselves in this matter, but I believe you're the most qualified person to solve that complication."

  His adrenaline rush from upstairs was rapidly being replaced with fatigue. "The gunman came here for me and Dorothea. He didn't say anything about Christl."

  "I heard him. Christl has explained to you about Einhard and Charlemagne. That document you're holding clearly contains a challenge-a pursuit. You've seen the book, written in Einhard's hand. And the one from Charlemagne's grave, which only a Holy Roman Emperor was entitled to receive. This is real, Herr Malone. Imagine for a moment if there actually was a first civilization. Think of the ramifications for human history."

  He couldn't decide if the old woman was a manipulator, a parasite, or an exploiter. Probably all three. "Frau Oberhauser, I could not care less about that. Frankly, I think you're all nuts. I simply want to know where, how, and why my father died." He paused, hoping he wasn't going to regret what he was about to say. "If helping you gives me the answer, then that's enough incentive for me."

  "So you have decided?"

  "I haven't."

  "Then could I offer you a bed for the night, and you can make your choice tomorrow?"

  He felt an ache in his bones and did not want to drive back to the Posthotel-which might not be the safest haven, anyway, considering the number of uninvited visitors over the past few hours. At least Ulrich was here. Strangely, this made him feel better.

  "Okay. I won't argue with that suggestion."

  TWENTY-NINE

  WASHINGTON, DC

  4:30 AM

  RAMSEY SLIPPED ON HIS BATHROBE. TIME FOR ANOTHER DAY. IN fact, this could well become the most important day of his life, the first step on a life-defining journey.

  He'd dreamed of Millicent and Edwin Davis and NR-1A. A strange combination that wove themselves together in unsettling images. But he was not going to let any fantasy spoil reality. He'd come a long way-and within a few hours he'd claim the next prize. Diane McCoy had been right. It was doubtful he'd be the president's first choice to succeed David Sylvian. He knew of at least two others Daniels would certainly nominate ahead of him-assuming that the decision would be the White House's alone. Thank goodness free choice was a rarity in Washington politics.

  He descended to the first floor and entered his study just as his cell phone rang. He carried the thing constantly. The display indicated an overseas exchange. Good. Since speaking to Wilkerson earlier, he'd been waiting to know if the apparent failure had been reversed.

  "Those packages for Christmas you ordered," the voice said. "We're sorry to say they may not arrive in time."

  He quelled a renewed anger. "And the reason for the delay?"

  "We thought there was inventory in our warehouse, but discovered that none was on hand."

  "Your inventory problems are not my concern. I prepaid weeks ago, expecting prompt delivery."

  "We're aware of that and plan to make sure delivery occurs on time. We just wanted you to be aware of a slight delay."

  "If it requires priority shipping, then incur the cost. It does not matter to me. Just make the deliveries."

  "We're tracking the packages now and should be able to verify delivery shortly."

  "Make sure you do," he said, and clicked off.

  Now he was agitated. What was happening in Germany? Wilkerson still alive? And Malone? Two loose ends he could ill afford. But there was nothing he could do. He had to trust the assets on the ground. They'd performed well before and hopefully would this time.

  He switched on the desk lamp.

  One of the things that had attracted him to this town house, besides its location, size, and ambience, was a cabinet safe the owner had discreetly installed. Not flawless by any means, but enough protection for files brought home overnight, or the few folders he privately maintained.

  He opened the concealed wooden panel and punched in a digital code.

  Six files stood upright inside.

  He removed the first one on the left.

  Charlie Smith was not only an excellent killer, but also gathered information with the zeal of a squirrel locating winter nuts. He seemed to love discovering secrets that people went to great lengths to hide. Smith had spent the past two years collecting facts. Some of it was being used right now, and the rest would be brought into play over the next few days, as needed.

  He opened the folder and reacquainted himself with the details.

  Amazing how a public persona could be so different from the private person. He wondered how politicos maintained their facades. It had to be difficult. Urges and desires pointed one way-career and image jerked them another.

  Senator Aatos Kane was a perfect example.

  Fifty-six years old. A fourth-termer from Michigan, married, three children. A career politician since his midtwenties, first at the state level then in the US Senate. Daniels had considered him for vice president when a vacancy came available last year, but Kane had declined, saying that he appreciated the White House's confidence but believed he could serve the president better by staying in the Senate. Michigan had breathed a sigh of relief. Kane was rated by several congressional watchdog groups as one of Congress's most effective purveyors of pork barrel legislation. Twenty-two years on Capitol Hill had taught Aatos Kane all of the right lessons.

  And the most important?

  All politics were local.

  Ramsey smiled. He loved negotiable souls.

  Dorothea Lindauer's question still rang in his ears. Is there anything there to find? He hadn't thought about that trip to Antarctic in years.

  How many times had they gone ashore?

  Four?

  The ship's captain-Zachary Alexander-had been an inquisitive sort, but, per orders, Ramsey had kept their mission secret. Only the radio receiver his team brought on board had been tuned to NR-1A's emergency transponder. No signal had ever been heard by monitoring stations in the Southern Hemisphere. Which had made the ultimate cover-up easier. No radiation had been detected. It was thought that a signal and radiation might be more discernible closer to the source. In those days ice had a tendency to wreak havoc with sensitive electronics. So they'd listened and monitored the water for two days as Holden patrolled the Weddell Sea, a place of howling winds, luminous purple clouds, and ghostly halos around a weak sun.

  Nothing.r />
  Then they'd taken the equipment ashore.

  "What do you have?" he asked Lt. Herbert Rowland.

  The man was excited. "Signal bearing two hundred and forty degrees."

  He stared out across a dead continent swathed in a mile-thick shroud of ice. Eight degrees below zero and nearly summer. A signal? Here? No way. They were six hundred yards inland from where they'd beached their boat, the terrain as flat and broad as the sea; it was impossible to know if water or earth lay below. Off to the right and ahead, mountains rose like teeth over the glittery white tundra.

  "Signal definite at two hundred and forty degrees," Rowland repeated.

  "Sayers," he called out to the third member of the team.

  The remaining lieutenant was fifty yards ahead, checking for fissures. Perception was a constant problem. White snow, white sky, even the air was white with constant breath clouds. This was a place of mummified emptiness, to which the human eye was little better adjusted than pitch darkness.

  "It's the damn sub," Rowland said, his attention still on the receiver.

  He could still feel the absolute cold that had enveloped him in that shadowless land where palls of gray-green fog materialized in an instant. They'd been plagued by bad weather, low ceilings, dense clouds, and constant wind. During every Northern Hemisphere winter he'd experienced since, he'd compared its ferocity with the intensity of an ordinary Antarctic day. Four days he'd spent there-four days he'd never forgotten.

  You can't imagine, he'd told Dorothea Lindauer in answer to her question.

  He stared down into the safe.

  Beside the folders lay a journal.

  Thirty-eight years ago naval regulations required that commanding officers on all seagoing vessels maintain one.

  He slid the book free.

  THIRTY

  ATLANTA, 7:22 AM

  STEPHANIE ROUSED EDWIN DAVIS FROM A SOUND SLEEP. HE CAME up with a start, at first disoriented until he realized where he lay.

  "You snore," she said.

  Even through a closed door and down the hall, she'd heard him during the night.

  "So I'm told. I do that when I'm really tired."

  "And who tells you that?"

  He swiped the sleep from his eyes. He lay on the bed fully dressed, his cell phone beside him. They'd arrived back in Atlanta a little before midnight on the last flight from Jacksonville. He'd suggested a hotel, but she'd insisted on her guest room.

  "I'm not a monk," he declared.

  She knew little of his private life. Unmarried, that much she did know. But had he ever been? Any children? Now, though, was not the time to pry. "You need a shave."

  He rubbed his chin. "So good of you to point that out."

  She headed for the door. "There's towels and some razors-girlie ones, I'm afraid-in the hall bath."

  She'd already showered and dressed, ready for whatever the day might hold.

  "Yes, ma'am," he said, standing. "You run a tight ship."

  She left him and entered the kitchen, switching on the counter television. Rarely did she eat much breakfast beyond a muffin or some wheat flakes, and she detested coffee. Green tea usually was her choice of a hot beverage. She needed to check with the office. Having a nearly nonexistent staff helped with security but was hell on delegating.

  "-it's going to be interesting," a CNN reporter was saying. "President Daniels has recently voiced much displeasure with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In a speech two weeks ago he hinted whether that entire chain of command was even needed."

  The screen shifted to Daniels standing before a blue podium.

  "They don't command anything," he said in his trademark baritone. "They're advisers. Politicians. Policy repeaters, not makers. Don't get me wrong. I have great respect for these men. It's the institution itself I have problems with. There's no question that the talents of the officers now on the Joint Chiefs could be better utilized in other capacities."

  Back to the reporter, a perky brunette. "All of which makes you wonder if, or how, he'll fill the vacancy caused by the untimely death of Admiral David Sylvian."

  Davis walked into the kitchen, his gaze locked on the television.

  She noticed his interest. "What is it?"

  He stood silent, sullen, preoccupied. Finally, he said, "Sylvian is the navy's man on the Joint Chiefs."

  She didn't understand. She'd read about the motorcycle accident and Sylvian's injuries. "It's unfortunate he died, Edwin, but what's the matter?"

  He reached into his pocket and found his phone. A few punches of the keys and he said, "I need to know how Admiral Sylvian died. Exact cause, and fast."

  He ended the call.

  "Are you going to explain?" she asked.

  "Stephanie, there's more to Langford Ramsey. About six months ago the president received a letter from the widow of a navy lieutenant-"

  The phone gave a short clicking sound. Davis studied the screen and answered. He listened a few moments then ended the call.

  "That lieutenant worked in the navy's general accounting office. He'd noticed irregularities. Several million dollars channeled to bank after bank, then the money simply disappeared. The accounts were all attached to naval intelligence, director's office."

  "The intelligence business runs on covert money," she said. "I have several blind accounts that I use for outside payments, contract help, that kind of thing."

  "That lieutenant died two days before he was scheduled to brief his superiors. His widow knew some of what he'd learned, and distrusted everyone in the military. She wrote the president with a personal plea, and the letter was directed to me."

  "And when you saw Office of Naval Intelligence, your radar went to full alert. So what did you find when you looked into those accounts?"

  "They couldn't be found."

  She'd experienced a similar frustration. Banks in various parts of the world were infamous for erasing accounts-provided, of course, enough fees were paid by the account holder. "So what's got you riled up now?"

  "That lieutenant dropped dead in his house, watching television. His wife went to the grocery store and, when she came home, he was dead."

  "It happens, Edwin."

  "His blood pressure bottomed out. He had a heart murmur for which he'd been treated and, you're right, things like that happen. The autopsy found nothing. With his history and no evidence of foul play, the cause of death seemed easy."

  She waited.

  "I was just told that Admiral David Sylvian died from low blood pressure."

  His expression mingled disgust, anger, and frustration.

  "Too much of a coincidence for you?" she asked.

  He nodded. "You and I know Ramsey controlled the accounts that that lieutenant found. And now there's a vacancy on the Joint Chiefs of Staff?"

  "You're reaching, Edwin."

  "Am I?" Disdain laced his tone. "My office said they were just about to contact me. Last night, before I dozed off, I ordered two Secret Service agents dispatched to Jacksonville. I wanted them to keep an eye on Zachary Alexander. They arrived an hour ago. His house burned to the ground last night, with him inside."

  She was shocked.

  "Indications are an electrical short from wires beneath the house."

  She told herself never to play poker with Edwin Davis. He'd received both bits of news with a nothing face. "We have to find those other two lieutenants who were in the Antarctic with Ramsey."

  "Nick Sayers is dead," he said. "Years ago. Herbert Rowland is still alive. He lives outside Charlotte. I had that checked last night, too."

  Secret Service? White House staff cooperating? "You're full of crap, Edwin. You're not in this alone. You're on a mission."

  His eyes flickered. "That all depends. If it works, then I'm okay. If I fail, then I'm going down."

  "You staked your career on this?"

  "I owe it to Millicent."

  "Why am I here?"

  "Like I told you, Scot Harvath said no. But he told me nobody flies solo
better than you."

  That rationalization was not necessarily comforting. But what the hell. The line had already been crossed.

  "Let's head to Charlotte."

  THIRTY-ONE

  AACHEN, GERMANY

  11:00 AM

  MALONE FELT THE TRAIN SLOW AS THEY ENTERED THE OUTSKIRTS of Aachen. Even though his worries from last night had receded into better proportion, he wondered what was he doing here. Christl Falk sat beside him, but the ride north from Garmisch had taken about three hours and they'd said little.

  His clothes and toiletries from the Posthotel had been waiting for him when he awoke at Reichshoffen. A note had explained that Ulrich Henn had retrieved them during the night. He'd slept on sheets that smelled of clover then showered, shaved, and changed. Of course, he'd only brought a couple of shirts and pants from Denmark, planning to be gone no more than a day, two at the most. Now he wasn't so sure.

  Isabel had been waiting for him downstairs, and he'd informed the Oberhauser matriarch that he'd decided to help. What choice did he have? He wanted to know about his father, and he wanted to know who was trying to kill him. Walking away would lead to nothing. And the old woman had made one point clear. They knew things he didn't.

  "Twelve hundred years ago," Christl said, "this was the center of the secular world. The capital of the newly conceived Northern Empire. What two hundred years later we called the Holy Roman Empire."

  He smiled. "Which was not holy, nor Roman, nor an empire."

  She nodded. "True. But Charlemagne was quite the progressive. A man of immense energy, he founded universities, generated legal principles that eventually made their way into the common law, organized the government, and started a nationalism that inspired the creation of Europe. I've studied him for years. He seemed to make all the right decisions. He ruled for forty-seven years and lived to be seventy-four at a time when kings barely lasted five years in power and were dead at thirty."