So much for the privacy he had sought by upgrading from business class after the attendant told him the first-class car was empty: Apparently none of the other passengers thought the Egg Scramble was worth the extra $80.
Except Big Bob a few seats back.
Conrad swore to himself and looked out the giant picture window at the barren pastures of Pennsylvania flashing by. The Acela Express was the fastest train on the continent, racing at speeds up to 150 miles an hour between Washington, D.C., and New York City. Conrad had hoped to reach Serena before lunch and make it back to Brooke by dinner without anybody knowing. Obviously, he wasn't moving fast enough.
Because there sat Big Bob, smiling at the attendant as he took a couple of tubs of cream and three blue packets of artificial sweetener with his coffee and pretended to peruse the Wall Street Journal until his Egg Scramble arrived.
Conrad got up from his seat and, without looking back, walked down the aisle to one of two bathrooms at the end of the car closest to the locomotive.
Conrad closed the door and braced himself. 'Acela' was one of those names made up by some New York branding company that combined the words 'acceleration' and 'excellence.' The secret to the Acela's speed was its ability to tilt in curves without slowing down or spooking passengers. Conrad could feel a slight tilt coming on now as he looked at himself in the mirror and thought about what he was doing.
He couldn't involve Brooke in any of this, for her own sake. At least that's what he told himself. Maybe he just didn't want her to know he was involved at all with Serena. But Brooke was a big girl. She knew he had never made her any promises. She probably also knew, better than he perhaps, just how slim the odds were of his ever getting together with Serena.
Facing the mirror, he slowly unbuttoned his shirt to reveal the envelope he had taped to himself. He removed the map from inside and flipped it over to look at the text:
763.618.1793 634.625. ghquip hiugiphipv 431. Lqfilv Seviu 282.625. siel 43. qwl 351. FUUO.
179 ucpgiliuv erqmqaciu jgl 26. recq 280.249. gewuih 707.5.708. jemcms. 282.682.123.414.144. qwl qyp nip 682.683.416.144.625.178. Jecmwli ncabv rlqxi 625.549.431. qwl gewui. 630. gep 48. ugelgims 26. piih 431. ligqnniphcpa 625.217.101.5. uigligs 2821.69. uq glcvcgem 5. hepailqwu eu 625. iuvefmcubnipv 431. qwl lirwfmcg.
280. qyi 707.625. yqlmh 5.708.568.283.282. biexip. 625. uexeqi 683. ubqy 707.625. yes.
711
All his father had translated was the alphanumeric salutation-To the chosen descendent of Robert Yates in the Year of Our Lord 2008-and the numeric signature-General George Washington. Perhaps his father thought that was enough information for him to crack the rest of the cipher. Or perhaps his father could never figure it out.
All Conrad really knew about Robert Yates was that his father's side of the family had adopted the 'Yeats' spelling to distance themselves from Robert Yates, who was one of America's more controversial Founding Fathers. Besides helping to draft the first Constitution for the State of New York, he represented New York as a key delegate at the convention in Philadelphia to draft the U.S. Constitution.
That's where things got ugly.
For it soon became clear to all that the Constitutional Convention, under the leadership of George Washington, wasn't tweaking the Articles of Confederation among the thirteen states as advertised. It was creating a new, centralized power: the federal government. A new sovereignty with the power to levy taxes and maintain an army.
That's when Robert Yates berated Washington, stormed out of the proceedings, and did everything in his power to defeat ratification of the U.S. Constitution, going so far as to run for New York governor in 1789. He failed. But in 1790 he became Chief Justice of the New York Supreme Court, and for the rest of his life was one of America's fiercest and most outspoken defenders of state rights and critics of federal authority.
Even the grave couldn't silence Yates. In 1821, twenty years after his death, his notes from the Constitutional Convention were published under the title Secret Proceedings and Debates of the Convention Assembled…for the Purpose of Forming the Constitution of the United States. By then, of course, the Louisiana Purchase had doubled the number of states in America, and the notion of still questioning the constitutionality of the federal government became, well, embarrassing for the family.
That's about the time, Conrad recalled, that his father's branch of the family stopped calling itself 'Yates' and joined their cousins by spelling their surname 'Yeats.'
At least that's what Conrad could recall. He never paid much attention to the Yeats family tree growing up because he was adopted.
Conrad felt another tilt and acceleration as the Acela took a curve. He taped the map with the text under the phone shelf and buttoned up his shirt. Somehow he had to elude Big Bob and reach Serena.
He pulled out his Vertu cell phone and was tempted to dial Serena's private number to arrange a pickup at Penn Station. But he slipped it back into his pocket, figuring that somehow Big Bob's friends would be listening. Ditto for any text messages.
Instead he would have to use one of the train's onboard phone booths in the dining car. And for that, he'd need a credit or debit card, and it would have to belong to somebody else.
When Conrad emerged from the lavatory, breakfast had been served on the extra large tray tables. He walked past his seat, which still said OCCUPIED on the LED readout in the overhead bin console, picked up his coffee, and went straight up to Big Bob, who had already scarfed down half his Egg Scramble.
Conrad said, 'Looks like you overdid it with the Tabasco sauce.'
Big Bob glanced down at the orange smudge on his tie and swore. He dabbed it with his napkin as the train took another curve.
Conrad went with it, swaying enough to spill his coffee on Big Bob. The guy bolted in his seat, knocking the tray table up and hitting his head on the overhead bin.
'Gosh, I'm sorry,' said Conrad, steadying Big Bob as he slipped his hand inside the guy's suit and lifted his wallet.
Big Bob said, 'What's the matter with you?'
'Let me get something from the snack car for you,' Conrad said, slipping the wallet into his own pocket and walking away. 'My apologies.'
Conrad approached two pneumatically operated sliding glass doors. They whooshed aside like the deck of the Starship Enterprise, and he passed through the spacious and quiet intercar passageway into business class.
Both business cars were half full, maybe forty passengers each, most busying themselves with their newspapers, laptops, and iPods when they weren't cursing at their BlackBerries and mobile phones for cutting out in the middle of conversations.
He passed through two more sliding doors to reach the snack car. About a dozen patrons were in the lounge area, perched uncomfortably on the high and low stool seating. A plasma TV on the wall flashed highlights of the weekend in sports.
At the far end of the snack car was a business center with a fax machine, copier, and two onboard Railfones, one of them in an enclosed booth. Conrad stepped inside. The Railfone didn't accept coins or bills and required payment by a major credit card. Fortunately, Conrad had a Visa card with the name Derrick Kopinski, Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps, aka 'Big Bob.'
Conrad dialed Serena's number and looked at Kopinski's ID card while the other end rang. The driver's license had him in Oceanside, CA. That meant Kopinski had until recently been stationed out of Camp Pendleton. Kopinski was a Marine. Probably green at the Pentagon. Definitely DOD, one of SecDef Packard's men. An E-9 Special pay grade.
Besides forty dollars in cash, Kopinski's wallet included a picture of his wife and kids in a Sears portrait, for sure. She looked like Goose's wife from Top Gun, a young Meg Ryan. Very nice. Same with the kids, who fortunately looked more like their mother. Even a little baby baptism card. Eastern Orthodox. And coupons for Starbucks coffee, McDonald's Extra Value meals, and Dunkin' Donuts. Lots of Dunkin' Donuts coupons. Jeez, they didn't pay this guy enough.
The call finally connected and Conrad got a voicemail from Serena speaking French that asked him to leave a
