He stared at his father, whose dead eyes caught no glint of light. He had so much to say. He wanted to tell him that he'd been a good son, a good naval officer, a good agent, and, he believed, a good man. Six times he'd been awarded commendations. He'd been a failure as a husband, but was working on being a better father. He wanted to be a part of Gary's life, always. All his adult life he'd wondered what had happened to his own father, imagining the worst. Sadly, reality was more terrible than anything he'd ever concocted. His mother had been similarly tormented. She'd never remarried. Instead she'd endured decades, clutching her grief, always referring to herself as Mrs. Forrest Malone.
How was it that the past never seemed to end?
A shot sounded, like a balloon popping beneath a blanket.
He envisioned the scene above.
Dorothea Lindauer had ended her life. Normally suicide would be deemed the result of a sick mind or an abandoned heart. Here, it was the only means to stop a madness. He wondered if Isabel Oberhauser would even comprehend what she'd wrought. Her husband, grandson, and daughters were gone.
A loneliness crept into his bones as he absorbed the deep silence of the tomb. Proverbs came to mind.
A simple truth from long ago.
He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind.
NINETY-FOUR
4:15 PM
STEPHANIE ENTERED THE OVAL OFFICE. DANNY DANIELS STOOD and greeted her. Edwin Davis and Diane McCoy were already seated.
'Merry Christmas,' the president said.
She returned the greeting. He'd summoned her from Atlanta yesterday afternoon, providing the same Secret Service jet that she and Davis had used, over a week ago, to travel from Asheville to Fort Lee.
Davis looked fine. His face had healed, the bruising gone. He wore a suit and tie and sat stiffly in an upholstered chair, his granite facade back in place. She'd managed a fleeting glance into his heart and wondered if that privilege would doom her from ever knowing him any further. He did not seem a man who liked to bare his soul.
Daniels offered her a seat, next to McCoy. 'I thought it best we all have a talk,' the president said, sitting in his own chair. 'The past couple of weeks have been tough.'
'How's Colonel Gross?' she asked.
'Doing good. His leg is healing fine, but that round did some damage. He's a bit irritated with Diane for giving him away, but grateful that Edwin can shoot straight.'
'I should go see him,' McCoy said. 'I never meant for him to get hurt.'
'I'd give it a week or so. I meant what I said about the irritation.'
Daniels' melancholy eyes were the embodiment of woe.
'Edwin, I know you hate my stories, but listen up anyway. Two lights in a fog. On one, an admiral stands on the ship's bridge and radios the other light saying he's commanding a battleship and the light should veer right. The other light radios back and tells the admiral he should veer right. The admiral, being a testy sort, like me, comes back and reorders the other ship to go right. Finally, the other light says, 'Admiral, I'm the seaman manning the lighthouse and you better damn well go right.' I went out on a limb for you, Edwin. Way out. But you were the guy in the lighthouse, the smart one, and I listened. Diane, there, the moment she heard about Millicent, signed on and took a hell of a chance, too. Stephanie you drafted, but she went the distance. And Gross? He took a bullet.'
'And I appreciate everything that was done,' Davis said. 'Immensely.'
Stephanie wondered if Davis harbored any remorse for killing Charlie Smith. Probably not, but that didn't mean he'd ever forget. She looked at McCoy. 'Did you know when the president first called my office, looking for Edwin?'
McCoy shook her head. 'After he hung up, he told me. He was concerned that things might get out of hand. He thought a backup plan might be needed. So he had me contact Ramsey.' McCoy paused. 'And he was right. Though you two did a great job flushing Smith our way.'
'We still have some fallout to deal with, though,' Daniels said.
Stephanie knew what he meant. Ramsey's death had been explained as a murder by a covert operative. Smith's death was simply ignored since no one knew he even existed. Gross' injuries were attributed to a hunting accident. Ramsey's chief aide, a Captain Hovey, was questioned and, on threat of court-martial, revealed everything. In a matter of days the Pentagon cleaned house, assigning a new management team to naval intelligence, ending the reign of Langford Ramsey and anyone associated with him.
'Aatos Kane came to see me,' Daniels said. 'He wanted me to know that Ramsey had tried to intimidate him. Of course, he was long on complaints and short on explanations.'
She caught a twinkle in the president's eye.
'I showed him a file we found in Ramsey's house, inside a safe. Fascinating stuff. No need to go into the details-let's just say that the good senator will not be running for president and will retire, effective December thirty-first, from Congress to spend more time with his family.' A look of unmistakable command swept over Daniels. 'The country will be spared his leadership.' Daniels shook his head. 'You three did a great job. So did Malone.'
They'd buried Forrest Malone two days ago in a shady south Georgia cemetery, near where his widow lived. The son, on behalf of the father, refused interment in Arlington National Cemetery.
And she'd understood Malone's reluctance.
The other nine crewmen had likewise been brought home, their bodies delivered to families, the true story of NR-1A finally being told by the press. Dietz Oberhauser had been sent to Germany, where his wife claimed his and her daughters' remains.
'How is Cotton?' the president asked.
'Angry.'
'If it matters,' Daniels said, 'Admiral Dyals is taking a lot of heat from the navy and the press. The story of NR-1A has struck a nerve with the public.'
'I'm sure Cotton would like to ring Dyals' neck,' she said.
'And that translation program is yielding a wealth of information about that city and the people who lived there. There are references to contacts with cultures all over the globe. They did interact and share, but thank heaven they weren't Aryans. No super race. Not even warlike. The researchers stumbled onto a text yesterday that may explain what happened to them. They lived in Antarctica tens of thousands of years ago, when it wasn't iced over. But as the temperatures fell, they gradually retreated into the mountains. Eventually, their geothermal vents cooled. So they left. Hard to say when. They apparently used a different time measurement and calendar. Just like with us, not everyone had access to all of their knowledge, so they couldn't reproduce their culture elsewhere. Only bits and pieces-here and there-as they worked their way into our civilization. The best informed left last and wrote the texts, leaving them as a record. Over time, those immigrants were absorbed into other cultures, their history lost, nothing of them but legend remained.'
'Seems sad,' she said.
'I agree. But the ramifications from this could be enormous. The National Science Foundation is sending a team to Antarctica to work the site. Norway has agreed to give us control of the area. Malone's father, and the rest of NR-1A's crew, did not die for no good reason. We may learn a great deal about ourselves, thanks to them.'
