Okay. She was the real deal. "What do you want?"
"Like I said, Ramsey has decided that you have to go. He's made a deal with a senator, one that doesn't include you. Since you're practically dead anyway, what with no identity, few roots, no family, how hard would it be for you to permanently disappear? Nobody would ever miss you. That's sad, Charlie."
But true.
"So I have a better idea," she said.
RAMSEY WAS SO CLOSE TO HIS GOAL. EVERYTHING HAD GONE AS planned. Only one obstacle remained. Diane McCoy.
He still sat at his desk, a swig of chilled whiskey resting nearby. He thought about what he'd told Isabel Oberhauser. About the submarine. What he'd retrieved from NR-1A and kept ever since.
Captain Forrest Malone's log.
Through the years he'd occasionally glanced at the handwritten pages, more out of morbid curiosity than genuine interest. But the log represented a memento from a journey that had profoundly changed his life. He wasn't sentimental, but there were times that deserved remembering. For him, one of those moments came under the Antarctic ice.
When he followed the seal.
Upward.
He broke the surface and swung his light out of the water. He was in a cavern formed of rock and ice. Maybe a football field long and half that wide, faintly illuminated in a gray-and-purple silence. To his right he heard the bark of a seal and saw the animal leap back into the water. He pushed his face mask to his forehead, spit the regulator from his mouth, and tasted the air. Then he saw it. A bright orange conning tower, stunted, smaller than normal, distinctive in shape.
NR-1A.
Holy Mother of God.
He treaded water toward the surfaced boat.
He'd served aboard NR-1, one of the reasons why he'd been chosen for this mission, so he was familiar with the sub's revolutionary design. Long and thin, the sail forward, near the front of a cigar-shaped hull. A flat fiberglass superstructure mounted atop the hull allowed the crew to walk the length of the boat. Few openings existed in the hull, so that it could dive deep with minimal risk.
He floated close and caressed the black metal. Not a sound. No movement. Nothing. Only water slapping the hull.
He was near the bow, so he drifted down the port side. A rope ladder rested against the hull-used, he knew, for ingress and egress to inflatable rafts. He wondered about its deployment.
He grabbed hold and tugged.
Firm.
He slipped off his fins and slid the straps across his left wrist. He clipped the light to his belt, gripped the ladder, and hauled himself from the water. On top, he collapsed to the decking and rested, then slipped off his weight belt and air tank. He swiped cold water from his face, braced himself, regripped his light, then used the sail fins like a ladder and hoisted himself to the top of the conning tower.
The main hatch hung open.
He shuddered. From the cold? Or from the thought of what waited below?
He climbed down.
At the ladder's bottom he saw that the flooring plates had been removed. He shone his light across where he knew the boat's batteries were stored. Everything appeared charred-which might explain what had happened. A fire would have been catastrophic. He wondered about the boat's reactor but, with everything pitch dark, apparently it had been shut down.
He moved through the forward compartment to the conn. The chairs were empty, the instruments dark. He tested a few circuits. No power. He inspected the engine room. Nothing. The reactor compartment loomed silent. He found the captain's corner-not a cabin, NR-1A was too small for such luxuries, just a bunk and a desk attached to the bulkhead. He spotted the captain's journal, which he opened, thumbing through, finding the last entry.
Ramsey remembered that entry exactly. Ice on his fingers, ice in his head, ice in his glassy stare. Oh, how right Forrest Malone had been.
Ramsey had handled that search with perfection. Anyone who could now be a problem was dead. Admiral Dyals' legacy was secure, as was his own. The navy was likewise safe. The ghosts of NR-1A would stay where they belonged.
In Antarctica.
His cell phone came alive with light, but no sound. He'd silenced it hours ago. He looked. Finally.
"Yes, Charlie, what is it?"
"I need to see you."
"Not possible."
"Make it possible. In two hours."
"Why?"
"A problem."
He realized they were on an open phone line and words needed to be chosen with care.
"Bad?"
"Enough I need to see you."
He checked his watch. "Where?"
"You know. Be there."
EIGHTY-ONE
COMPUTERS WERE NOT STEPHANIE'S STRONG POINT, BUT MALONE had explained in his e-mail the translation procedure. Colonel Gross had provided her with a high-speed portable scanner and an Internet connection. She'd downloaded the translation program and experimented with one page, scanning the image into the computer.
Once she applied the translation program, the result had been extraordinary. The odd assortment of twists, turns, and curlicues first became Latin, then English. Rough in places. Parts missing here and there. But enough for her to know that the refrigerated compartment contained a treasure trove of ancient information. • • • Inside a glass jar suspend two piths by a thin thread. Rub a shiny metal rod briskly on clothing. There will be no sensation, no tingle, no pain. Bring the rod close to the jar and the two spheres will fly apart and stay apart even after the rod is withdrawn. The force from the rod flows outward, unseen and unfelt but there nonetheless, driving the piths apart. After a time the piths will sink, driven so by the same force that keeps everything that is tossed into the air from remaining there. • • • Construct a wheel, with a handle at its rear, and attach small metal plates to its edge. Two metal rods should be fixed so that a spray of wires from each lightly touches the metal plates. From the rods a wire leads to two metal spheres. Position them one-half commons apart. Twirl the wheel by the handle. Where the metal plates contact the wires, flashing will occur. Spin the wheel faster and blue lightning will leap and hiss from the metal spheres. A strange smell will occur, one that has been noticed after a fierce storm in lands where rain falls in abundance. Savor it and the lightning, for that force and the force that drives the piths apart is the same, only generated in differing ways. Touching the metal spheres is as harmless as touching the metal rods rubbed to the clothing. • • • 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.