power came from the crew, not the captain. He’d cautioned them a week ago that this plan was ill advised. He’d kept to himself a further observation that he thought it bordered on desperation. But when three of the four in charge issued an order, it was his duty to obey.
“Both your counsel and objections have been noted,” one of the men said. “We made the decision.”
But that might not be enough once Quentin Hale realized what the others had done. This particular course was one the Commonwealth had sailed before, but not in many decades. Knox’s father had been the last quartermaster to attempt the feat, and he’d succeeded. But that had been a different time, with different rules.
“Perhaps Captain Hale should be told,” he advised.
“Like he doesn’t already know,” one of the men said. “We’ll hear from him soon enough. In the meantime, what are you going to do?”
He’d been considering that move. No way existed for anyone to trace the mechanisms found in the two hotel rooms. They’d been manufactured in secret by crew members, every piece sanitized. No matter the outcome the machinery would have been discovered, so precautions had been taken. The two hotel rooms at the Grand Hyatt were registered to fictitious individuals-crew members who’d appeared at the front desk in disguise and paid with credit cards that relied on false identifications. Suitcases had held the various parts, and through the night he’d personally assembled the devices piece by piece. A DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door had ensured privacy all day. He’d controlled both weapons from here-blocks away-by radio, and the signals were now severed.
Everything had been carefully designed.
At times, in centuries past, quartermasters had been allowed to assume the helm, steering the ship’s course. The Commonwealth had just handed him the wheel.
“I’ll handle things.”
MALONE WRESTLED WITH A DECISION. HE’D SPOTTED AGENTS heading for the Grand Hyatt’s main entrance. The Secret Service was thorough, which meant there were most likely agents already in the hotel, stationed where they could have observed the street below. They’d surely been contacted and ordered to head for both rooms. Should he leave? Or just wait for them?
Then he recalled the envelope in his pocket.
He tore it open to see a typewritten note. I needed you to see these. Disable them before the president arrives. This could not be accomplished any sooner. I’ll explain why later. You can’t trust anyone, especially Secret Service. This conspiracy reaches far. Leave the hotel and I’ll contact you before midnight by phone. Stephanie
Decision made.
Time to go.
Apparently Stephanie was into something huge. He should at least follow her instructions.
For now.
He realized cellphones carried cameras and the sidewalks below had been crowded. His image would soon be splattered on every media outlet. He’d only been exposed for a couple of minutes, so he hoped that whatever pictures had been captured were not of the best quality.
He opened the door, not worrying about leaving evidence. His fingerprints were all over the device dangling out the window.
He calmly walked down the deserted hall toward the elevators. A lingering scent of nicotine reminded him that this was the smoking floor. No one appeared from any of the rooms that opened on either side.
He turned a corner.
Ten elevators serviced the hotel. Nothing indicated where those cars were currently located. He decided none of them was the smart play. His gaze searched left, then right, and he spotted the stairway exit.
He opened the metal door, listened, heard nothing, then slipped out.
He climbed two stories and hesitated at the 17th floor. All quiet. He stepped out into another elevator foyer nearly identical to the one two floors below. A similar side table with a flower arrangement and mirror adorned the wall.
He stared at himself.
What in the world was happening?
Somebody had just tried to kill the president of the United States and, at the moment, he was a prime person of interest.
He removed his jacket and exposed a pale blue buttondown shirt underneath. They’d be searching for a man with light hair and a dark jacket. He spotted a trash bin, topped by more artificial flowers, between two of the elevator doors, and stuffed the jacket inside.
From his left, down the hall, a family approached. Mom, Dad, three kids. They seemed excited and were talking about Times Square and one of its neon signs. Dad pressed the UP button, summoning the elevator. Malone stood patiently with them and waited for the car to arrive. These people had somehow missed the whole thing. You’d think it would have been hard to ignore a rocket propelling out into the sky, leaving a trail of smoke in its wake. Tourists, though, had always baffled him. Hojbro Plads, back in Copenhagen where his bookstore sat, was filled with them daily.
The elevator arrived and he allowed the family on first. Dad inserted a room card into a slot that granted access to the thirty-first floor. Apparently, that was reserved for special guests, probably the concierge level. Malone decided it might be a good place to think.
“Oh, you got it for me,” he said.
They rode in silence up another fourteen floors, then they all stepped off. Just as he suspected, the hotel’s concierge lounge was there, available only to guests who’d paid for the privilege. He allowed Dad to go first and the guy inserted his key card into another slot and opened the glass-paneled door.
Malone followed the family inside.
The L-shaped lounge was crowded with people enjoying a cold buffet of meats, cheese, and fruit. He surveyed the room and immediately spotted two suits with ear fobs and lapel mikes glued to the windows that faced East 42nd Street.
Secret Service.
He grabbed an apple from a wooden bowl on a table, along with a copy of the day’s New York Times. He retreated to the far side of the room, munched on his apple, and sat, one eye on the newspaper, the other on the agents.
And hoped he hadn’t just made a third mistake.
FIVE
HALE SAT IN ADVENTURE’S MAIN SALON AND NOTICED THEY’D veered west, leaving open ocean behind and entering the sound. What had been blue-gray water now turned coffee-colored, thanks to a steady flow of sediment brought east by the meandering Pamlico River. Log-hewn canoes, pole-propelled periaugers, and shoal- draft steamboats all once plied these waters. But so had sloops, corsairs, and frigates, manned by opportunists who’d called the densely wooded shores of the isolated Carolina colony home. The Pamlico comprised some of the most complex waterways on the planet. A vast array of oyster-rock islets, tidal marshes, hammocks, and sloughs. Its farthest coasts were stunted by dangerous capes whose names-Lookout and Fear-warned of tragedy, the open sea beyond so treacherous it had earned the title Graveyard of the Atlantic.
He’d been born and raised nearby, as had Hales back to the early part of the 18th century. He learned to sail as a boy and was taught how to avoid the ever-changing shoals and negotiate the dangerous currents. Ocracoke Inlet, which they’d just traversed, was where in November 1718 Black Beard himself had finally been cut down. Locals still spoke of both him and his lost treasure with reverence.
He stared down at the table where the two documents lay.
He’d brought them with him, knowing that once the matter of his accountant had been resolved, he would need to turn his attention back to a mistake made by Abner Hale, his great-great-grandfather, who’d tried, on
