Текст книги "Night Probe!"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

Соавторы: Clive Cussler
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Pitt turned. "Ghost?"

"An unmentionable subject around here," said Chase. "Nobody likes to admit they've seen it."

"Speak for yourself." Giordino cracked a smile. "I've only heard the thing."

"Its light was brighter than hell when it swung up the old grade to the bridge the other night. The beam lit up half the east shoreline. I don't see how you missed it."

"Wait a minute," Pitt broke in. "are you talking about the phantom train?"

Giordino stared at him. "You know?"

"Doesn't everyone?" Pitt asked in mock seriousness."

"Tis said the specter of the doomed train is still trying to cross the Deauville-Hudson bridge to the other side."

"You don't believe that?" Chase asked cautiously.

"I believe there is something up on the old track bed that goes chug in the night. In fact, it damn near ran over me."

"When?"

"A couple of months ago when I came here to survey the site."

Giordino shook his head. "At least we won't go to the loony bin alone."

"How often has the ghost called on you?"

Giordino looked at Chase for support. "Two, no, three times."

"You say some nights you heard sounds but saw no lights?"

"The first two intrusions came with steam whistles and the roar of a locomotive," explained Chase. "The third time we got the full treatment. The clamor was accompanied by a blinding light."

"I saw the light too," Pitt said slowly. "What were your weather conditions?"

Chase thought a moment. "As I recall, it was clear and blacker than pitch when the light showed."

"That's right," added Giordino. "The noise came alone only on nights the moon was bright."

"Then we've got a pattern," said Pitt. "There was no moon during my sighting."

"All this talk about ghosts isn't putting us any closer to finding the real train," said Giordino blandly. "I suggest we get back to reality and figure a way to get under the bridge wreckage in the next"-he hesitated and consulted his watch– "seventy-four hours."

"I have another suggestion," said Pitt.

"Which is?"

"To hell with it."

Giordino looked at him, ready to smile if Pitt was joking. But he was not.

"What are you going to tell the President?"

A strange, distant look came over Pitt's face. "The President?" he repeated vaguely. "I'm going to tell him we've been fishing in the air, wasting an enormous amount of time and money searching for an illusion."

"What are you getting at?"

"The Manhattan Limited," Pitt replied. "It doesn't lie on the bottom of the Hudson River. It never has."

The setting sun was suddenly snuffed out by the clouds. The sky went dark and menacing. Pitt and Giordino stood on the old track bed, listening to the deep rumbling of the storm as it drew closer. And then lightning crackled and the thunder echoed and the rain came.

The wind swept through the trees with a demonic whine. The humid air was oppressive and charged with electricity. Soon the light was gone and there was no color, only black pierced by brief streaks of white. Raindrops, hurled in horizontal sheets by wind gusts, struck their faces with the stinging power of sand.

Pitt tightened the collar of his raincoat, hunched his shoulders against the tempest and stared into the night.

"How can you be sure it will appear?" Giordino shouted over the gale.

"Conditions are the same as the night the train vanished," Pitt shouted back. "I'm banking on the ghost having a melodramatic sense of timing."

"I'll give it another hour," said a thoroughly miserable Chase. "And then I'm heading back to the boat and a healthy slug of Jack Daniel's."

Pitt motioned them to follow. "Come on, let's take a hike down the track bed."

Reluctantly Chase and Giordino fell in behind. The lightning became almost incessant and, seen from shore, the De Soto looked like a gray ghost herself. A great shaft of brilliance flashed for an instant across the river behind her and she became a black outline. The only sign of life was the white light on the mast that burned defiantly through the downpour.

After about half a mile, Pitt halted and tilted his head as if listening. "I think I hear something."

Giordino cupped his hands to his ears. He waited until the last thunderclap died over the rolling hills. Then he heard it too: the mournful wail of a train whistle.

"You called it," said Chase. "It's right on schedule."

No one spoke for several seconds as the sound grew closer, and then there came the clang of a bell and the puff of the exhaust. It was drowned out momentarily by another burst of thunder. Chase swore later that he could feel time grinding to a stop.

At that moment a light came around a curve and washed its beam on them, the rays eerily distorted by the rain. They stood there, each seeing the yellow reflections on the face of the others.

They stared ahead, disbelieving, yet certain it was not a trick of their imaginations. Giordino turned to say something to Pitt and was astounded to see him smiling, actually smiling at the expanding blaze.

"Don't move," Pitt said with incredible calm. "Turn around, close your eyes and cover them with your hands so you aren't blinded by the glare."

Instinct dictated they do just the opposite. The urge for selfpreservation, to run or at least throw themselves flat on the ground tore at their conscious senses. Their only bond with courage was Pitt's firm words.

"Steady…... steady. Be ready to open your eyes when I yell.

God, it was unnerving.

Giordino tensed for the impact that would smash his flesh and bones into a ghastly spray of crimson and white. He made up his mind he was going to die, and that was that. The deafening clangor was upon them, assaulting their ear drums. They felt as though they had been thrust into some strange vacuum where twentieth-century reasoning lost all relevance.

Then, as if by magic, the impossible thing passed over them. "Now!" Pitt shouted above the din.

They all dropped their hands and stared, eyes still adjusted to the dark.

The light was now aimed away and traveling down the abandoned track bed, the locomotive sound diminishing in its wake. They could clearly see a black rectangle centered in the glow about eight feet off the ground. They watched fascinated as it grew smaller in the distance and then turned up the grade to the bridge, where it blinked out and the accompanying clatter died into the storm. "What in hell was that?" Chase finally muttered.

"An antique locomotive headlamp and an amplifier," answered Pitt.

"Oh, yeah?" grunted Giordino skeptically. "Then how does it float in mid-air?"

"On a wire strung from the old telegraph poles."

"Too bad there has to be a logical explanation," said Chase, sadly shaking his head. "I hate to see good supernatural legends debunked."

Pitt gestured toward the sky. "Keep looking. Your legend should be returning anytime now."

They grouped around the nearest telegraph pole and stared upward into the darkness. A minute later a black shape emerged and slipped noiselessly through the air above them. Then it melted back into the shadows and was gone. "Fooled hell out of me," Giordino admitted.

"Where did the thing come from?" asked Chase.

Pitt didn't answer immediately. He suddenly stood illuminated by a lightning strike in a distant field; the flash revealed a contemplative look on his face. Finally he said, "You know what I think?"

"No, what?"

"I think we should all have a cup of coffee and a slice of hot apple pie."

By the time they knocked on Ansel Magee's door they looked like drowned rats. The big sculptor cordially invited them in and took their wet coats. While Pitt made the introductions, Annie Magee, true to expectations, hurried into the kitchen to rustle up coffee and pie, only this time it was cherry.

"What brings you gentlemen out on such a miserable night?" asked Magee.

"We were chasing ghosts," Pitt replied.

Magee's eyes narrowed. "Any luck?"

"May we talk about it in the depot office?"

Magee nodded agreeably. "Of course. Come, come."

It took little urging for him to regale Chase and Giordino with the history behind the office and its former occupants. As he talked, he built a fire in the potbellied stove. Pitt sat silently at Sam Harding's old rolltop desk. He'd heard the lecture before and his mind was elsewhere.

Magee was in the midst of pointing out the bullet in Hiram Meecham's chessboard when Annie entered, carrying a tray with cups and plates.

After the last scrap of pie was gone, Magee looked across the office at Pitt. "You never did say whether you found a ghost."

"No," Pitt replied. "No ghost. But we did find a clever rig that fakes the phantom train."

Magee's broad shoulders drooped and he shrugged. "I always knew someone would discover the secret someday. I even had the local folks fooled. Not that any of them minded. They're all quite proud of having a ghost they can call their own. Sort of gives them something to brag about to the tourists."

"When did you get wise to it?" Annie asked.

"The night I came to your door. Earlier I was standing on the bridge abutment when you sent the phantom on a run. Just before it reached me the lamp blinked out and the sound shut down."

"You saw how it worked then?"

"No, I was blinded by the glare. By the time my eyes readjusted to the dark it was long gone. Baffled the hell out of me at first. My gut instinct was to search the ground level. That only added to my confusion when I failed to find tracks in the snow. But I'm a man with a curious streak. I wondered why the old railbed was torn up and hauled away down to the last cross tie and yet the telegraph poles were left standing. Railroad officials are a tightfisted lot. They don't like to leave any reusable equipment behind when they abandon a right-of-way. I began following the poles until I came to the last one in line. It stands at the door of a shed beside your private track. I also noticed that the headlamp was missing from your locomotive."

"I have to give you credit, Mr. Pitt," said Magee. "You're the first to hit upon the truth."

"How does the thing operate?" asked Giordino.

"The same principle as a chair lift on a ski slope," Magee explained. "The headlamp and a set of four speakers hang suspended from a continuous cable strung along the crossbars of the telegraph poles. When the light and sound package reaches the edge of the old Deauville bridge, a remote switch shuts off the batteries and then it makes a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn and returns to the shed."

"Why was it that some nights we only heard the sound but saw no lights?" asked Chase.

"The locomotive headlamp is rather large," answered Magee. "It's too easily detectable. So on moonlit nights I remove it and run only the sound system."

Giordino smiled broadly. "I don't mind admitting, Chase and I were ready to take up religion the first time it paid us a visit."

"I hope I didn't cause you any unnecessary inconvenience."

"Not at all. It was a great source of conversation."

"Annie and I stand on the riverbank nearly every day and watch your salvage operation. Looks to me like you've experienced problems. Have any pieces of the Manhattan Limited been pulled up yet?"

"Not even a rivet," Pitt answered. "We're closing the project down."

"That's a shame," Magee said sincerely. "I was rooting for your success. I guess the train wasn't meant to be found."

"Not in the river at any rate."

"More coffee, anyone?" Annie came around with-the pot.

"I'll take some," said Pitt. "Thank you."

"You were saying." Magee probed.

"Do you own one of those little motorcars that railroad gangs ride on when they repair track?" Pitt asked, changing the subject.

"I have an eighty-year-old handcar that moves on muscle power."

"May I borrow it along with your phantom train gear?"

"When do you want to use it?"

"Now."

"On a stormy night like this?"

"Especially on a stormy night like this."

Giordino took up his station on the platform bordering the tracks. In one hand he held a large flashlight. The wind had died down to ten miles an hour, and by keeping to the corner of the depot he was sheltered from the sweeping rain.

Chase was not so lucky. He stood huddled atop the handcar a quarter of a mile up the track. For perhaps the tenth time he dried off the battery terminals and checked the wires leading to the locomotive headlamp and sound speakers that were jury rigged on the front of the handcar.

Pitt stepped to the doorway and made a signal with his hand. Giordino acknowledged it and then jumped down onto the track bed and blinked his flashlight into the darkness.

"About damned time," Chase mumbled to himself as he pushed the battery switch and began pumping the hand levers.

The headlamp's beam glinted on the wet rails and the whistle shriek was swept ahead by a following gust of wind. Pitt hesitated, timing in his mind the advance of the handcar. Satisfied that Chase was approaching at a good clip, he reentered the office and absorbed the warmth from the stove. "We're rolling," he said briefly.

"What do you hope to learn by recreating the robbery?" asked Magee.

"I'll know better in a few minutes," Pitt replied evasively.

"I think it's exciting," Annie bubbled.

"Annie, you act out the role of Hiram Meechum, the telegrapher, while I play the station agent, Sam Harding," Pitt instructed. "Mr. Magee, you're the authority. I'll leave it to you to take the part of Clement Massey and lead us through the events step by step."

"I'll try," Magee said. "But it's impossible to reconstruct the exact dialogue and movements of seventy-five years ago."

"We won't need a perfect performance," Pitt grinned. "A simple run-through will do fine."

Magee shrugged. "Okay…... let's see, Meechum was seated at the table in front of the chessboard. Harding had just taken a call from the dispatcher in Albany, so he was standing near the phone when Massey entered."

He walked to the doorway and turned around, holding out his hand in simulation of a gun. The locomotive sounds drew nearer and mingled with the occasional boom of thunder. He stood there a few seconds listening, and then he nodded his head. "This is a holdup," he said. Annie looked at Pitt, unsure of what to do or say.

"After the surprise wore off," said Pitt, "the railroad men must have put up an argument."

"Yes, when I interviewed Sam Harding he said they tried to tell Massey there was no money in the depot, but he wouldn't listen. He insisted that one of them open the safe."

"They hesitated," Pitt conjectured.

"In the beginning," said Magee, his voice taking on a hollow tone. "Then Harding agreed, but only if he could flag the train first. Massey refused, claiming it was a trick. He became impatient and fired a bullet through Meechum's chessboard."

Annie hesitated, a blank look on her face. Then, carried away by her imagination, she swept the board off the table and scattered the chess pieces over the floor.

"Harding begged, tried to explain that the bridge was out. Massey would have none of it."

The headlamp beam on the handcar flashed through the window. Pitt could see that Magee's eyes were looking into another time. "Then what happened?" Pitt prompted.

"Meechum grabbed a lantern and made an attempt to reach the platform and stop the train. Massey shot him in the hip." Pitt turned. "Annie, if you please?"

Annie rose from her chair, made a few steps toward the door and eased down in a reclining position on the floor.

The handcar was only a hundred yards away now. Pitt could read the dates on the calendar hanging on the wall from the headlamp. "The door?" Pitt snapped. "Open or closed." Magee paused, trying to think. "Quickly, quickly!" Pitt urged. "Massey had kicked it closed."

Pitt pushed the door shut. "Next move?"

"Open that damned safe! Yes, Massey's very words, according to Harding."

Pitt hurried over and knelt in front of the old iron safe.

Five seconds later the handcar, with Chase pumping up a sweat, rolled by on the track outside, the bass of the speakers reverberating throughout the old wooden building. Giordino stood and swung the flashlight at the windows in a wide circular motion, making it seem to those inside that the beam was flickering past the window glass in the wake of the handcar. The only sound missing was the clack of the steel coach wheels.

A shiver crept up Magee's spine and gripped him all the way to the scalp. He felt as if he had touched the past, a past he had never truly known.

Annie lifted herself from the floor and put her arms around his waist. She looked up into his face, her expression strangely penetrating. "It was so real," Magee murmured. "All so damn real."

"That's because our reenactment was the way it happened back in nineteen fourteen," said Pitt.

Magee turned and stared at Pitt. "But there was the real Manhattan Limited then."

Pitt shook his head. "There was no Manhattan Limited then."

"You're wrong. Harding and Meechum saw it."

"They were tricked," Pitt said quietly.

"That can't be…..." Magee began, then stopped, his eyes wide in un comprehension He started over. "That can't be…... they were experienced railroad men…... they couldn't be fooled."

"Meechum was lying wounded on the floor. The door was closed. Harding was bent over the safe, his back to the tracks. All they saw were lights. All they heard were sounds. Sounds from an old gramophone recording of a passing train."

"But the bridge…... it collapsed under the weight of the train. That couldn't be faked."

"Massey blew the bridge in sections. He knew one big bang would have alerted half the valley. So he detonated small charges of black powder at key structure points, coinciding the blasts with the thunderclaps, until the center span finally gave way and dropped in the river."

Magee, still puzzled, said nothing.

"The robbery of the station was only a sham, a cover-up. Massey had bigger things on his mind than a measly eighteen dollars. He was after a two-million-dollar gold-coin shipment carried on the Manhattan Limited."

"Why go to all the trouble?" Magee asked doubtfully. "He could have simply stopped the train, held it up and made off with the coins."

"That's how Hollywood might have filmed it," said Pitt. "But in real life there's always a catch. The coins in question were twenty-dollar pieces called St. Gaudens. They each weighed close to one ounce. Simple arithmetic tells us that it took a hundred thousand coins to make two million dollars. Then allow sixteen ounces to a pound, do a little dividing and you come up with a shipment weighing over three tons. Not exactly a bundle a few men could unload and haul away before railroad officials figured the cause of the train's delay and sent a posse charging down the tracks."

"All right," said Giordino. "I'll bite and ask the question on everyone's mind. If the train didn't pass through here and take a dive in the Hudson, where did it go?"

"I think Massey took over the locomotive, diverted the train from the main track and hid it where it remains to this day."

If Pitt had claimed to be a visitor from Venus or the reincarnation of Napoleon Bonaparte, his words couldn't have received a more dubious reception. Magee looked downright apathetic. Only Annie had a thoughtful expression.

"In some respects, Mr. Pitt's theory isn't as farfetched as it sounds," she said.

Magee stared at her as if she was an errant child. "Not one passenger or crewman who survived to tell the tale, or a robber confessing on a deathbed, not even a corpse to point a finger? Not a fragment from an entire train come to light after all these years…... not possible."

"It would have to be the greatest vanishing act of all time," added Chase.

Pitt did not look as though he was listening to the conversation. He suddenly turned to Magee. "How far is Albany from here?"

"About twenty-five miles. Why do you ask?"

"The last time anyone saw the Manhattan Limited up close was when it left the Albany station."

"But surely you can't really believe."

"People believe what they want to believe," said Pitt. "Myths, ghosts, religion and the supernatural. My belief is that a cold, tangible entity has simply been misplaced for three quarters of a century in a place where nobody thought to look."

Magee sighed. "What are your plans?"

Pitt looked surprised at the question. "I'm going to eyeball every inch of the deserted track bed between here and Albany," he said grimly, "until I find the remains of an old rail spur that leads to nowhere."

The telephone rang at 11:15 p.m. Sandecker laid aside the book he was reading in bed and answered.

"Sandecker."

"Pitt again."

The admiral pushed himself to a sitting position and cleared his mind. "Where are you calling from this time?"

"Albany. Something has come up."

"Another problem with the salvage project?"

"I called it off."

Sandecker took a deep breath. "Do you mind telling me why?"

"We were looking in the wrong place."

"Oh, Christ," he groaned. "That tears it. Damn. No doubt at all?"

"Not in my mind."

"Hang on."

Sandecker picked out a cigar from a humidor on the bedside table and lit it. Even though the trade embargo with Cuba had been lifted in 1985, he still preferred the milder flavor and looser wrap of a Honduras over the Havana. He always felt that a good cigar kept the world at bay. He blew out a rolling cloud and came back on the line. "Dirk."

"Still here."

"What do I tell the President?"

There was silence. Then Pitt spoke slowly and distinctly. "Tell him the odds have dropped from a million to one to a thousand to one."

"You found something?"

"I didn't say that."

"Then what are you working on?"

"Nothing more than a gut feeling."

"What do you need from me?" asked Sandecker.

"Please get ahold of Heidi Milligan. She's staying at the Gramercy Park Hotel in New York. Ask her to dig into old railroad archives for any maps that show New York Quebec Northern Railroad tracks, sidings aivd spurs between Albany and the Deauville-Hudson bridge during the years eighteen eighty to nineteen fourteen."

"Okay, I'll take care of it. Got her number?"

"You'll have to get it from information."

Sandecker took a long puff on the cigar. "How does it look for Monday?"

"Grim. You can't rush these things."

"The President needs that treaty copy."

"Why?"

"Don't you know?"

"Moon clammed up when I asked."

"The President is speaking before the House of Commons and the Senate of the Canadian Parliament. His speech centers around a plea for merging our two countries into one. Alan Mercier let me in on it this morning. Since Quebec went independent, the Maritime Provinces have been considering statehood. The President is hoping to talk the Western Provinces into joining too. That's where a signed copy of the North American Treaty comes in. Not to coerce or threaten, but to eliminate the red-tape jungle of the transition and stonewall any objections and interference from the United Kingdom. His pitch for a unified North America is only fifty-eight hours away. You get the action?"

"Yes…..." Pitt said sullenly. "I've got it now. And while you're at it, thank the President and his little group for letting me know at the last minute."

"Would it have mattered otherwise?"

"No, I guess not."

"Where can Heidi get in touch with you?"

"I'll keep the De Soto moored at the bridge site as a command post. All calls can be relayed from there." There was nothing more to say. So Sandecker simply said, "Good luck."

"Thanks," Pitt came back. And then the line went dead.

Sandecker had the number of Heidi's hotel in less than a minute. He dialed direct and waited for the connection.

"Good evening, Gramercy Park Hotel," a sleepy female voice answered.

"Commander Milligan's room, please."

A pause. "Yes, room three sixty-seven. I'll ring."

"Hello," a man answered.

"Is this Commander Milligan's room?" Sandecker demanded impatiently.

"No, sir, this is the assistant manager. The commander is out for the evening."

"Any idea when she'll return?"

"No sir, she didn't stop at the desk when she left."

"You must have a photographic memory," said Sandecker suspiciously.

"Sir?"

"Do you recognize all your guests when they pass through the lobby?"

"When they're very attractive ladies who stand six feet tall and wear a cast on one leg, I do."

"I see."

"May I give her a message?"

Sandecker thought a moment. "No message. I'll call again later."

"One minute, sir. I think she passed by and entered the elevator while we've been talking. If you'll hold on, I'll have the switchboard ring her room and transfer your call."

In room 367 Brian Shaw laid down the receiver and walked into the bathroom. Heidi lay in the tub, covered by a blanket of bubbles, her cast-enclosed leg propped awkwardly on the edge of the tub. Her hair was covered by a plastic shower cap and she lazily held an empty glass in one hand.

"Venus, born of the foam and the sea." Shaw laughed. "I wish I had a picture of this."

"I can't reach the champagne," she said, pointing to a magnum of Tattinger brut reserve vintage in an ice bucket perched on the washbasin. He nodded and filled her glass. Then he poured the remainder of the chilled champagne over her breasts.

She yelped and tried to splash him, but he ducked nimbly back through the doorway. "I owe you for that," she shouted.

"Before you declare war, you've got a call."

"Who is it?"

"I didn't ask. Sounds like another dirty old man." He nodded at a wall phone mounted between the tub and the commode. "You can take it here. I'll hang up the extension."

As soon as her voice came on the line, Shaw clicked the connection and then kept his ear pressed to the receiver. When Heidi and Sandecker finished their conversation, he waited for her to hang up. She didn't.

Smart girl, he thought. She didn't trust him.

After ten seconds he finally heard the disconnect as she placed the handset in its cradle. Then he dialed the hotel switchboard.

"May I help you?"

"Yes, could you ring room three sixty-seven in a minute and ask for Brian Shaw? Please don't say who you are."

"Nothing else?"

"When Shaw himself answers, just punch off the connection. "Yes, sir."

Shaw returned to the bathroom and peered around the door. "Truce?"

Heidi looked up and smiled. "How'd you like it if I did that to you?"

"The sensation wouldn't be the same. I'm not built like you. "Now I'll reek of champagne."

"Sounds delicious." The phones in the suite jangled.

"Probably for you," he said casually.

She reached over and answered, then held the handset toward him. "They asked for Brian Shaw. Perhaps you'd like to take it in the other room."

"I have no secrets," he said, grinning slyly.

He muttered through a one-sided conversation and then hung up. He made an angered expression.

"Damn, that was the consulate. I have to meet with someone."

"At this time of night?" she asked.

He leaned down and kissed her toes that protruded from the end of the cast. "Revel in anticipation. I'll be back in two hours.

The curator of the Long Island Railroad Museum was an elderly retired accountant who nourished a lifelong passion for the iron horse. He walked yawning through the relics on display while grumbling incessantly about being abruptly awakened in the dead of night to open the building for an FBI agent.

He came to an antique door whose glass was etched with an elk standing on a mountain, looking down on a diamond stacked locomotive puffing a great billow of smoke as it rounded a sharp curve. He fished around with a large ring until he found the right key. Then he unlocked the door, swung it open and switched on the lights.

He paused and stuck out an arm, blodking Shaw's way. "Are you sure you're an FBI man?"

Shaw sighed at the stupid wording of the question and produced a hastily forged ID card for the third time. He waited patiently for the curator to read the fine print again.

"I assure you, Mr. Rheinhold."

"Rheingold. Like the beer."

"Sorry, but I assure you the bureau wouldn't have put you to all this bother if the matter wasn't most urgent."

Rheingold looked up at him. "Can you tell me what this is all about?"

"Afraid not."

"An Amtrak scandal. I bet you're investigating an Amtrak scandal."

"I can't say."

"A train robbery maybe. Must be pretty confidential. I haven't seen any mention on the six o'clock news."

"Might I ask if we can get on with it," Shaw said impatiently. "I'm in a bit of a rush."

"Okay, just asking," Rheingold said, disappointed.

He led the way down an aisle bordered by high shelves crammed with bound volumes on railroading, most of them long out of print. He stopped at the end of one bookcase containing large portfolios, peered through the bottom lenses of his bifocals and read the titles aloud.

"Let's see, track layouts for the New Haven Hartford, the Lake Shore Michigan Southern, Boston Albany…... ah, here it is, the New York Quebec Northern." He carried the portfolio over to a table and untied the strings on the cover. "Great railroad in its day. Over two thousand miles of track. Ran a crack express called the Manhattan Limited. Any particular section of the track you're interested in?"

"I can find it, thank you," said Shaw.

"Would you like a cup of coffee? I can make some upstairs in the office. Only take a couple of minutes."

"You're a civilized man, Mr. Rheingold. Coffee sounds fine."

Rheingold nodded and walked back down the aisle. He paused and turned when he came to the doorway. Shaw was sitting at the table studying the faded and yellowing maps.

When he returned with the coffee, the portfolio was neatly tied and replaced in its proper niche on the shelf. "Mr. Shaw?" There was no answer. The library room was empty.

Pitt felt inspired and determined, even exhilarated.

A deep sense of knowing he had opened a door that had been overlooked for generations acted on him like a stimulant. With an optimism that was not there before, he stood in a small, empty pasture and waited for the two-engine jet to float in for a landing.

Under normal procedures the feat would have been impossible: the field was pockmarked by old tree stumps and riddled with dry gullies. The longest flat spot ran no more than fifty feet before ending at a moss-covered rock wall. Pitt had expected a helicopter and he began to wonder if the pilot had a death wish or had brought the wrong aircraft.