“Can you get this man another blanket!” Clusser said to the nurse. His voice was powerful, deep as a growling steam engine, fueled like a volcano made of endless burning stone.
“He’s reacting to the anesthesia used in surgery,” said the nurse. “It’ll go away. He’s not cold.”
Porter reached up with imploring eyes, though he couldn’t get them to latch onto his old missionary buddy. He already had weighty blankets over him, but…“P-p-please?”
“He’s in a hospital for heaven’s sake,” said Clusser. “Appease the man with another blanket!”
Porter stared at the floating ceiling, thankful for Clusser’s powerful voice. He sniffed cleaning chemicals and new plastic.
He heard the nurse storm across the room and pull a blanket from a cupboard, mumbling under her breath.
She put the blanket over him, and Porter made a frail smile.
“There’s a policeman outside your door, Porter. Try to relax,” Clusser said.
“Unless h-h-h-he’s working for G-Gadianton. Than-nks for coming, Stan.” Porter tried to put his left hand on Clusser’s, but it went aimless until his old missionary companion took it and gave it a squeeze.
“Well, he’s making the nurse nervous.”
Porter tried to focus on his friend, but confusion mixed with his dancing vision, so he closed his eyes. “How’s the w-wife.”
“Porter…I came after I got your e-mail. But I am here on business.”
“Convenient. Just-just like you to find a way to b-bring your business with you. You said FBI agents don’t jump state to state like in the movies.”
“You’re wanted by the Bureau and Customs, John,” Clusser said, looking down.
Porter made his face point at Clusser’s. “But the FBI…isn’t in-involved,” Porter told himself.
Clusser’s foggy face jumped, a shadow against the white walls behind him. “We are now.”
Feeling a hand touch his left forearm again, Porter closed his eyes. “I’ve made the want ads.”
Standing, Clusser said, “You don’t worry about that. Relax. I’ve got some things to do. I’ll take care of everything.” He went to the door.
Porter gazed at the rippling figure against the light background. “The guard…he’s to keep me here, isn’t he. Not p-protecting me.”
Clusser turned in the haze of the open portal. “He’ll do both, Porter. Hang in there.”
“Right.” No wonder the nurse wasn’t quick to fetch a blanket.
The alarm wailed…
6:50 p.m. PST
“You have another visitor, Mr. Porter,” said the nurse with a flat voice.
Porter opened his eyes. He could focus, now, so he examined his surroundings. He saw the IV tubing first, which didn’t please him. Baby-blue flowers lined the white wall close to the ceiling, and light pink hills rolled three feet from the floor around the room. There was an open curtain between his bed and another, but no one else slept there.
The nurse was beautiful. Solid black hair, sharp eyes, and lips that needed no liner. Too bad she looked at him with so much disdain.
Two men stood behind her. One, he recognized. “Mr. Porter, we’ve met before,” said the fellow without putting out his hand. He wore a dark blue suit, a Nick Hilton most likely, with a slight pattern Porter couldn’t make out. His tie was bloodshot red sprinkled with transparent paisley. His tight eyebrows were so perfectly shaped, Porter figured he plucked them. There should be a law against masochism, he thought. Women can have their own rules; Porter wouldn’t understand anyway.
“Arnott, right?” Porter said, relieved when he heard his natural voice. He rubbed his eyes with his free hand while his nose drew in the sterile smell of Lysol. His brain was working again.
“You have something that belongs to us.”
Porter pulled his fingers away from his eyes and looked at the man behind Arnott. Brown suit with a matching mustache. Slightly balding. “To both of you?”
“Are you calling it KM-3?” said Arnott. “You know we will get it in time. Question is how much you intend on hurting yourself before it happens.”
Porter looked at the IV. He couldn’t leave the bed, though his first thought was to run. But to where? The window?
The man in brown tapped Arnott. “You sure he’s all there upstairs? Nurse says he’s been out of it.”
Arnott never took his eyes off Porter’s. “Oh, you can see the life inside his head. The churning. He’s with us.”
Porter’s heart began to speed. He could tell his lungs were back to normal. How long had he been in the hospital?
“You have to make a choice, Porter,” said Arnott standing tall and immobile like an obelisk, his lips looking cold. “Put the most important things first. You wanna raise a family, John? What about finally finding a wife. Keep the end in mind. You’ll do what’s right then. Where’s the codex.”
“So you can burn it with the rest of the library?” Porter said. “Cover Ulman’s find and hope it goes unnoticed for another hundred years?”
Arnott kept his mouth a simple slit as he stared at Porter like a judge over a criminal found guilty.
“Let me take care of this guy, Peter,” said the man with the mustache.
Porter kept his lips closed.
“Your choice, Porter. We can ruin your life forever, you know that?”
A tear slipped from Porter’s closed eyes. He pictured Pontius Pilate standing in his judgment hall, listening to the accusations made against the man called Christ. He saw Jesus there, tall but unspeaking. He heard the voice of Pilate as he marveled at the silence: “Speakest thou not unto me? Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?”
Porter said nothing. He knew it could kill him. But he also knew Clusser would be back. Stan had a gun, if that meant anything. And if Porter was wanted by the government now, Clusser would be obliged to protect him. So would the guard outside.
He looked around for a buzzer to call for the nurse in the case he needed her. But what could she do?
Arnott turned to the man behind him. “All right,” he said, leaving the room.
The man with the mustache said to the officer beyond the door. “Would you come in for a minute. I don’t want any problems with this guy.”
“Yes, Detective Mercer.”
Porter’s heart sunk through the bed. His limbs went limp.
The detective returned with the policeman in a dark blue uniform behind him.
“John Porter,” said the balding detective.
“Yes,” he said with dread.
“I’m placing you officially under arrest for possession of stolen materials and artifacts from a foreign country. You have the right to remain silent. If you give up the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak with an attorney and to have the attorney present during questioning. If you so desire and cannot afford one-”
“I understand my rights,” said Porter, having heard it a million times on TV while growing up. “I just have one question. How much did it cost to corrupt a cop?”
The detective tightened his face. “If you so desire and cannot afford one, an attorney will be appointed for you…”
CHAPTER TWENTY — FOUR
7:23 p.m. PST
Stabbing her middle finger into her left temple, Alred fought against the throbbing in her head. She squinted her eyes and kept reading her written dissertation. I have come to the conclusion that KM-2 does not as yet contain enough evidence to substantiate the underlying theories of Dr. Dennis Albright and Dr. Alexander Peterson that there is in fact an Old World connection with this newfound Mesoamerican culture. As has been explained, the relative ambiguity of Dr. Ulman’s discovery may conclude many factors, insinuating possible ancient sea voyages or validating our old Bering Strait suppositions. When we think of how nearly impossible, or how highly improbable, our very own existence is-that we as human beings evolved one plane at a time from minuscule compounds of unorganized matter in a primordial swamp to the super-complex mass of genetic machinery making up our modern forms-one may easily devise the polemic that the apparent similarities between the Kalpa Culture and the Middle East are more than spontaneous aberrations, which we as scientists with pre-programmed paradigms may tie together and term as a new scientific discovery for fame and fortune. But is our ultimate and all-compelling goal to gain greater scholarly status? Though spectacular researchers they may be, I believe the aforementioned professors who have insinuated and outwardly professed relations between the KM manuscripts and the lands of ancient Egypt, Arabia, and Palestine have only proven the power of rhetoric and the amazing and dangerous ability to link two unrelated things by means of perceived similar attributes. The KM-2 document suggests the same Alred slapped the paper into her lap with a groan.