“Have you ever seen Ben Hood?”
“Why no, I haven’t. I’m sure my employees have. Is there something he’s done?”
“Or not done. Look, if I go upriver, can I find him?”
“I’m sure you can. Everybody knows everybody up there. Just approach carefully. Upriver folk are possessive of their privacy, and some shoot first and ask later.”
“I’ll be careful.” He thought. “This woman-she ever talk crazy?”
“What do you mean?”
“About treasure, or knowing something secret, or having to hide things from the world?”
“She doesn’t talk at all. A real tight-lip for these parts. Good-looking dame, but nobody really knows her. You think she’s some kind of Axis spy?”
He put his hands up, laughing. “Don’t start that rumor. The war’s over, buddy! No, no, not a spy. Just some anomalies on a tax form.” He winked.
“ What on a tax form?”
“Mistakes. And that’s just between you and me.” The gossip would be from one end of Concrete to the other by suppertime, he knew, which was just what he wanted. “Thanks for the help. Your government appreciates it.”
“Well.” Henderson puffed proudly. “Glad to serve.”
Hale picked up his briefcase. “Just one more thing. You said there was a kid?”
“Yes, a girl by rumor. Daughter, I assume. She should be in school by now, but the district hasn’t seen her.”
“Ah. I’ll ask about that, too. There are laws.” He tipped his fedora. “Good day to you, Mr. Henderson.”
“And good day to you.”
Hale stepped outside, breathed in the clean air, and looked at the patriotic bunting. Concrete was probably a nice place. A decent place. It was too bad about the kid.
He walked to a garage where he’d been told he could rent a car, bought a county map, and asked some directions.
Then he slipped in the front seat, opened his suit jacket, and checked the load on his. 32 Colt M1903 automatic. The OSS issue was light, deadly, and small enough that it was said gangster Bonnie Parker taped one to her thigh to break Clyde out of jail. Sweet little gun.
Time to tie up loose ends.
As Hale drove off, the gas station attendant looked again at the card given by an oddly pale stranger who’d shown up in town the day before, asking where a man might rent a car. The fellow didn’t rent one, but the business card came wrapped in a one-hundred-dollar bill, a staggering sum. Now the attendant mouthed the number, picked up the phone, and cranked for the operator.
He was going to report who did rent a car.
41
The Kunlun Mountains, Tibet
September 19, Present Day
N ine days after leaving Lhasa, the trio of Americans stiffly got out of a Land Cruiser that had been transformed from white to brown from dust and mud. There’d been three flats and one broken water pump, all patched by Sam. Pavement had turned to dirt road, and dirt to rocky track. They jounced down jumbled dry streambeds and ground through the gears to creep up snaking passes. Rominy’s heart almost stopped as they crept over a rope-and-wood suspension bridge hung across a precipitous canyon, water shining a thousand feet down. Had the Germans come this way? Later, the wind cut like a knife on one particularly high pass. There were still patches of dirty snow from the winter before, and the smell of new autumn storms in the air. Beyond were a vast basin, and then the white wall of the Kunlun. Now they parked directly below those remote and lofty mountains.
To their left ran a cold river, gray with glacial silt. They’d picked up its trace where it sank into the sands on the plain. As they drove toward its source the river became loud and vigorous, originating in a waterfall that plunged hundreds of feet before running white down a slope of shattered rock. The escarpment ahead was otherwise as sheer as a fortress wall, its black rock cliffs topped by slopes of ice and snow. They’d come to a dead end.
“This is where you want to be?” Sam asked.
Jake studied his GPS unit. “If the coordinates from the documents are correct, yes. Instruments weren’t as good in those days, but Hood and Calloway had navigation skills.”
Their guide turned and surveyed the landscape. Behind a pitiless plain, ahead precipitous mountains, chill gray sky, and lonely wind. “Scenic. If you like eastern Wyoming.”
“What’s beyond that waterfall?”
“Never been here, man. I’m feeling pretty cocky I got you here at all. This is pretty intense. It’s not like we can call for pizza.”
“No, Sam, we cannot.” He took out the binoculars and studied the cliff. “Rominy, what did Hood’s satchel say about the waterfall?”
“That there was one, low on the cliff, with a canyon above it. This looks different from the drawing, Jake. The falls seem much higher. I’m not sure we’re at the right place.”
“We’d better be in the right place.” He studied the falls, as if willing them to look like he expected. “We’ve come ten thousand miles to be in the right place.”
There was silence. Jake was the one who had used his GPS to direct them here.
“So,” Sam finally asked, “we just going to hang out? Is this what you came for?”
“We could camp by the river,” Rominy said.
“I came for the history of the Kurt Raeder expedition of 1938,” Jake finally said. “We’re going to climb that cliff and see what’s on the other side.”
“You don’t mean we the literal way, right?” Sam said. “It’s like the royal we, meaning you?”
“We’ve been sitting on our asses in that Land Cruiser for nine days. The exercise will do us good. I’ll lead the way.”
“Jake, I can’t climb that,” Rominy said.
“I think I see a way up. We’ll fix some ropes.”
“And just what’s so fascinating on the other side?” Sam asked.
Jake considered the guide before answering, debating how much to confide. “Shambhala,” he revealed. “If the stories are correct.”
“Shambhala!” Sam groaned. “Come on, we’re not here for some Shangri-la legend, are we? I could have talked you out of that one over beer in Lhasa.”
“I’ll tell you when I look over the top of that waterfall.”
Sam shook his head. “Tourists.”
Jake smiled. “Guides. You can’t get decent help these days.”
“Why don’t I just wait with Rominy down here?”
“It’s not safe to climb alone. Besides, I feel better having us all together. We’re united on this. Right, Rominy?”
She frowned, looking up the falls. “I’ve never felt so far from everything. Sam, is there anything out here?”
“No. But I’m getting paid to humor your boyfriend. He’ll see for himself, we’ll come back down and console ourselves with Rice Krispies Treats and Bailey’s. Sugar makes everything go down.”
“Gear up, Mary Poppins,” Jake said.
Once more, the ever-surprising Mr. Barrow seemed to have a good idea of what he was doing. They each took two coils of line, heavy but reassuring, and a hammer with some spikes Jake called pitons. “We’ll string a rope across the worst pitches. It’s mostly a scramble across rubble. Won’t be too bad.”
