looked around at the faint outline of a much larger shelter than the others and instantly realised that this was the ‘temple’ Lambert had frequently mentioned in his journal.
‘Shit!’ He looked at Shepherd. ‘Is that Preston’s…?’
‘Yes,’ he replied evenly, ‘I believe it is. Preston’s belongings. ’
Julian shook his head. ‘How the hell did you find it so easily?’
‘I prayed,’ Shepherd shrugged and offered a hazy smile, ‘and the Lord showed me the way.’
Julian grinned. ‘Well, however you managed it, this is fantastic. You know, having read through Lambert’s journal last week, and reading about this’ — he pointed to the ditch, the nubs of dark rotten wood poking through the soil and moss — ‘… and here it is!’
‘Yes.’ Shepherd replied dully.
You know what needs to be done.
‘Perhaps, Mr Cooke,’ Shepherd continued, ‘you should gather up the other two and we shall celebrate this find properly.’
‘Yeah.’ Julian grinned. ‘Yes, of course.’
Shepherd’s slack face came to life with a generous smile. ‘Then, I think you and I should discuss how much money you’re going to need for your documentary. How does that sound?’
Cooke’s grin widened. ‘That would be good.’
‘Excellent,’ Shepherd replied, pulling himself up out of the muddy trench. Carl reached out a hand to help him. ‘Off you go and get the others, then.’
Julian turned away and headed back towards the tents. Shepherd watched him silently for a moment, the false smile draining away swiftly.
‘Carl,’ he said, ‘you know what needs to be done?’
‘Now?’
He nodded sadly. ‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’
Julian picked his way slowly across the clearing, confused. By all rights he figured he should’ve been tap- dancing across to tell Rose the news. But he wasn’t. Instead his mind was on something else, something that was troubling him… something he’d just caught a glimpse of — the faint flash of a dull blue tattoo across the back of Agent Barns’s hand.
I’ve seen that tattoo before.
It was distinctive: a fox.
Damnit, where’ve I seen that? On whose bloody hand did I…
A cold loop of realisation suddenly curled through his stomach.
That man was at Heathrow.
He glanced back over his shoulder and saw Barns watching him. If Barns was in London…?
He’s been following me.
Other things that he had almost managed to forget about, to dismiss as the product of an over-active imagination, came back to mind: a noise on his phone line, the suspicion that somebody had entered his flat. The unsettling curl of anxiety in his stomach turned into something more acidic and uncomfortable.
And Sean, dead twenty-four hours after doing lunch with me.
He remembered Tom’s caution about looking for skeletons in the closets of the powerful.
‘Oh, Christ,’ he muttered to himself as he stepped across a gentle hump in the ground. He knelt down outside Rose’s tent and fumbled for the zip.
Or am I being paranoid? Shit. I dunno…
‘Rose?’ he called out softly.
There was no answer, no noise at all coming from inside.
‘Rose, it’s me… coming in,’ he said, pulling the zipper up.
CHAPTER 80
Sunday
Sierra Nevada Mountains, California
Rose looked up at him as he stooped inside her tent. Still snuggled up in her sleeping bag, she had her laptop on and was staring intently at the screen.
‘Jules, there’s something that isn’t right.’
He squatted down beside her. ‘Rose, I need to-’
A slither of bright morning sunlight streamed across the floor and into her eyes. ‘Close the zip — I can’t see anything.’
He reached round and pulled it down.
‘Jules, you have to see this,’ she said, turning the laptop round so he could see the screen.
She moved the mouse across to the tab of another image. ‘I got an email back yesterday morning before we set off to meet Grace at the camp. I just didn’t have the time to read it and open the attachment before we set off.’ She waved her hand at the unnecessary digression. ‘Anyway, there’s a small museum, well… it’s nothing more than a photographic archive in Fort Kearny.’
Julian shook his head impatiently. ‘Rose, look can this wait a-’
‘Jules, just listen! It’s an archive of portraits taken of groups of settlers on the eve of departure. It seems nearly everyone at the point of stepping out into the wilderness had one of these portraits done.’
‘So?’
She clicked the mouse button on the image tab and a muddy brown portrait of a group of people, standing proudly in front of a wagon, filled the screen.
‘They had one image in their database of a certain Preston party, stepping out in 1856, which they kindly sent me.’
Julian studied the group portrait; several dozen men and a few women, all of the men bearded, the women wearing bonnets that modestly covered their hair. Each had a face betraying grim determination, and a readiness for everything nature could throw at them. Clearly not the entire group, just those elders senior enough to warrant being in the photograph. To one side stood another man, tall and gaunt.
‘My God!’ he whispered. ‘That’s Preston?’
Rose nodded. ‘And who do you think he looks a helluva lot like?’
‘Oh, shit, yes, he does,’ he whispered.
Shepherd.
It was the eyes — unmistakably deep and intense, the distinct brow above and the long, clearly defined jaw. She flipped the screen of the laptop down. ‘I’m really not comfortable with this, Jules, getting so into bed with this guy-’
Julian raised a finger to his lips to shush her, and then spoke quietly. ‘I think we’re way past not feeling comfortable.’
‘What do you mean?’
Julian pulled off his glasses and wiped the lenses, a stress habit he was vaguely aware of, but he felt too distracted to correct himself right now. Rose studied him with a growing expression of concern. ‘Julian?’
‘Shepherd is Preston’s descendant.’
Rose nodded. ‘Yes. That means he’ll want to bury this story.’
He looked at her. ‘I think we might need to leave.’
‘Leave?’
‘As in drop everything, no explanations, just leave.’
‘Julian? Why… what…?’
‘It’s something our friend, Dr Griffith, said,’ he whispered. ‘Something he said that’s really, really spooked me… and I want to get out of here, like, right now.’
‘Julian? You’re spooking me now.’
‘Get dressed. I’ll explain this all later on.’
