“All right,” he said. “We’ll keep this to ourselves. Any and all Gordian resources are at your disposal.”
“Count me in too,” Aiden said. “My time is yours.”
“Thanks, guys.” He didn’t have to ask Grant. In fact, it would be insulting. Tyler knew that his best friend would be there to watch his back as he had in their Army days.
“I don’t understand why Orr would let you go off on this hunt for the Midas treasure by yourselves,” Miles said. “Seems like he’s taking an awful risk just handing the geolabe over to you and sending you on your way.”
“I thought so too,” Tyler said. “I also thought the timing of the explosion on the truck was convenient. He didn’t detonate it until we were far enough away to be safe.”
Grant narrowed his eyes in realization. “He knew where we were.”
“That was my guess, so I took the geolabe to the RF isolation room back at Gordian.”
“What’s that?” Stacy asked.
“It’s a room for testing electronic emissions from cell phones and other communication devices. It’s completely isolated from all outside radio-frequency sources.”
“You found a signal coming from the geolabe,” Grant said.
Tyler nodded. “It’s equipped with a GPS tracker. That’s how Orr is planning to keep tabs on us.”
“Did you decrypt the signal?” Miles asked.
“Not yet, but I recorded two burst transmissions from it with every detector we have.”
“I’ll get our comm guys to work decoding it. With any luck, we’ll be able to track it back to Orr.” Miles began typing a message on his phone.
“What can I do?” Aiden said.
“We need to ferret out Jordan Orr. Find out anything you can about him. If we get a lead that’s actionable, then we’ll call in the FBI.”
“I’m on it.”
“Great,” Tyler said. “Now, Stacy has a theory about the Archimedes device, the geolabe. Before the codex was sent to the auction house, it was separated from a wax tablet that had been found with it. She thinks the wax tablet may have a message that will be the key to deciphering the purpose of the geolabe.”
“How do you know that?” Grant asked.
“We’ll explain once we get in the air.”
“In the air?” Grant said. “Are we taking a trip?”
Tyler turned to Miles. “I was happy to hear you say that we could use any Gordian resource, because we need one of the company jets. We have to go to England.”
SIXTEEN
O rr took another swig of coffee and stifled a yawn as he drove the van into the vacant lot near Baltimore Harbor. With Crenshaw next to him, snoring for the entire five-hour flight from Seattle to Baltimore/Washington International, he’d napped only a few minutes at a time. Now, at 2:15 in the morning, Crenshaw was alert in the passenger seat, and Orr was ready to get back to the warehouse. But this excursion was crucial to the operation, and it had to be done tonight.
A semi was already waiting for them. A beefy black man in blue overalls leaned against the back of the trailer, sweating even though there was a cool breeze coming in off the water. For three years, Greg Forcet had smuggled goods for Orr out of a local shipping warehouse, but the delicate nature of this project meant they wouldn’t be working together again.
Orr put the van into park and looked around. Satisfied that they were alone, he got out, and Crenshaw did the same. As they approached, Forcet eyeballed Crenshaw.
“Who’s this?” he said.
“A friend,” Orr said.
“You never brought friends before.”
“He’s okay.” Crenshaw nodded, but said nothing.
“If you say so,” Forcet said.
“Is the package ready?”
Forcet wiped his brow. “Just like you asked. Real bear taking that thing apart. Took me a couple of hours. That’ll cost you another two grand.”
“You got it. Any problems?”
“No, but I’m glad you warned me to bring those heat-resistant gloves. Those capsules was superhot.”
“That’s the chemical reaction I was telling you about. These kinds of batteries can overheat if you’re not careful. That’s why we had you put them in the thermal-insulation container we gave you. Is it sealed?”
“Signed, sealed, and delivered.”
“Then let’s take a look,” Orr said.
Forcet raised the trailer’s door, revealing his night’s efforts. Nearest to them was the black metal box that Orr had called the thermal-insulation container. He noted with satisfaction that the lid was secure. Behind the box was a cylindrical lime-green object that Forcet had taken apart to get at the capsule. The cylinder was about four feet tall, with Cyrillic characters on the base, and it was designed with projections around the exterior that acted as cooling fins. Metal fixtures, fittings, and tools littered the floor. The sides of the crate that the item came in lay against the trailer wall.
Crenshaw held up an electronic device and waved what looked like a microphone in front of the open door.
“What’s that?” Forcet asked.
“A, uh, temperature gauge,” Crenshaw said. “We need to make sure it’s not overheating.”
“And? Did I do it right?” Forcet never did like having the quality of his work questioned.
After a few more passes, the device beeped and Crenshaw nodded. “We’re below safe limits.”
“We’ll need some help getting all this into the van,” Orr said.
“Hey, I’ll throw that in for free,” Forcet said.
The three of them heaved the thermal-insulation container into the van first.
As he strained at the effort, Forcet said, “What’s this thing made of anyway, lead?”
Orr laughed, not because it was a funny joke, but because Forcet was absolutely right. The box had walls of lead three inches thick.
The finned cylinder was next.
Once they got it secured in the van, Forcet wiped his forehead again.
“Sure is hot,” he said. “What the hell is that thing? Some kind of engine?”
Forcet didn’t normally ask questions, but then again this was the first time he’d seen the contents of a crate he’d delivered to Orr. It couldn’t hurt to tell him now.
“It’s a radioisotope thermoelectric generator,” Orr said.
“That’s a mouthful. What’s it used for?”
“For powering remote lighthouses. Totally automated. Can run for twenty years without maintenance.” Orr patted the cylindrical RTG where a yellowed and torn piece of paper was the only remnant of the radiation symbol that should have been there. “This one is from a peninsula on the Arctic Ocean. Took me months to find.” Although not as long as he thought it would. The diminishing summer pack ice along Russia’s northern coast made getting at these legacies of the Soviet Union much easier.
“Looks ancient.”
“Probably thirty years old.”
Forcet laughed. “I don’t know what you’d do with the battery from a thirty-year-old generator, and I don’t want to know.” He put a hand on his stomach. “I’ll need some Pepto-Bismol or something when I get home.”
He turned to climb back into the trailer. Orr drew a pistol from his jacket and shot him twice in the back, causing Crenshaw to jump back and squawk in surprise. Forcet crumpled to the ground. He gurgled blood for a few seconds and then stopped breathing.
