needed supplies and ammunition. They provided it. The British needed the same and they provided. That’s the way of the world. Those Jews are gone, but we’re still here.”
He thought back to what Tre had told him about the Cohen brothers and the Jews’ hidden wealth from the time of the Spanish.
And the Levite.
Who knew it all.
“You think the Jews may have hid their wealth in the mine, too?”
Frank shrugged. “It’s possible. All the legends seemed to have merged. That’s the thing, Bene. Nobody knows anything.”
He was glad he’d come.
Finally. Answers.
And what Clarke said was true. Money was indeed power. He was deeply connected with the left and the People’s National Party, but he preferred the ruling center-right Labor Party. Never were his phone calls to government officials ignored. His requests shoved aside. He rarely asked for anything from any minister but, when he did, the answer was always yes.
Something the Maroons believed came to mind.
He was neither.
“I’ll find the mine,” he told both his friend and the ancestors.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
ALLE RESENTED BRIAN JAMISON’S HOLIER-THAN-THOU ATTITUDE. Two hours had gone by since the video from Florida ended, and Brian had stayed on the phone in another room with the door closed the entire time. She sat in the house’s small kitchen and nursed a cup of coffee. The scene outside the windows was rural and wooded, no roads or other houses in sight. It was after 7:00 P.M. Czech time, which meant early afternoon in Florida. Her father was apparently coming to Vienna to make a deal for her release.
Which still surprised her.
A door opened and footsteps pounded the wooden floor. Brian walked into the room, still wearing a shoulder holster holding a weapon. He poured himself a cup from the coffeemaker.
“This is changing fast,” he said to her.
“I don’t like you.”
He laughed. “Like I care. If it were up to me, I would have let Simon kill you.”
His bravado was beginning to wear thin. “What happens now?”
“Aren’t you the least bit concerned about your father? He’s put his ass on the line for you. What do we do about that?”
She said nothing.
“He’s walking into a trap at that cathedral.”
“So stop him. Have your man in Florida tell him what’s going on.”
“How do you suggest I do that? We have no idea how he plans to get to Vienna. My man lost him after the orchard. He surely isn’t going to fly out of Orlando. I’m betting he drives to Tampa, or Jacksonville, or Miami. And he’s not a dumb-ass, contrary to what you might think, he won’t fly straight to Vienna. He’ll come in another way. So there’s no way to deal with him until he gets to the cathedral.”
“You don’t give a damn about my father. You just want what he has.”
“Sure I do. But I still have the problem of him in Vienna. And so we’re clear, he’s not
“My father was one of the best reporters in the world,” she said. “He knows what he’s doing.”
She’d never said any of those words before.
“Is that how you convince yourself to feel better? I assure you, your father has never dealt with a man like Zachariah Simon.” He sipped his coffee. “I want to know what this is about. The least you can do is tell me what’s going on here.”
“I don’t know.”
“Then tell me what you told Simon.”
