Pandora's curse

brown hair had retreated up his forehead and looked like it wasn’t going to stop until only a fringe remained. His once strong jaw was starting to show a little fleshiness underneath. He wore tortoiseshell glasses that were too small for his face and made his dark eyes appear narrower then they were. A banker by profession, Bryce wore a discreetly striped blue suit with a white shirt and club tie.

“Great to see you, Charlie,” Mercer said, shaking hands. “For a nine-to-fiver, you don’t look too bad.”

“That’s the problem,” Bryce said with a chuckle. “Somewhere along the line, nine to five turned into twenty- four/seven. I can’t complain. Another ten years I’ll have a massive heart attack and leave Susan with a couple million dollars.”

Mercer laughed. “Always the optimist. How is Susan?”

“Good, thanks for asking. With the kids at prep school, she’s had a lot of time to raise money for the city’s animal shelters.”

“What’s the count these days?”

“We now have three dogs and six cats and every month she brings home a couple more for foster care. I feel like Noah,” Bryce said as they began climbing the stairs. “Congratulations, by the way. I read the Time magazine article about you finding that diamond mine in Eritrea. I can’t tell you how glad I was when you called back. This has all been rather short notice, and I didn’t know if you were even in the country.”

“I’ve been back from Africa for a while,” Mercer explained. “After taking some time off to recover from that one, I had a contract to teach mine rescue in western Pennsylvania. That’s where I was when I got your message.”

“Who answered your home phone? He sounds like a real character.”

“That’s Harry White. He’s a cantankerous old bastard who watches my place when I’m away. He tends to move in and make himself right at home.” Mercer didn’t need to add how much Harry meant to him. The affection was in his voice. “He and I have been friends since I moved to Arlington. He just turned eighty, and while he smokes and drinks like tomorrow’s doomsday, he’ll probably outlive us all.”

On the second floor, Mercer glimpsed a large dining room with eight tables set for lunch. There was a fire- place at the far end of the room faced by an arc of overstuffed chairs. A couple of old men sat there either dozing or reading the paper. Bryce continued down a narrow hallway adorned with an assortment of weapons, big Holland and Holland nitro express rifles, swords from medieval Europe and Asia, spears from Africa and the South Sea islands, and blowguns from South America and Australia. They came to a closed office door that belonged to an assistant administrative director.

“Here we go,” Bryce said.

The office was small, crammed with books and yet more artifacts. The single window behind the desk overlooked an airshaft between the club and the neighboring brownstone. Mercer noted the window was wired for a security system and he’d already spotted five roving cameras.

“I thought we would chat in private first,” Bryce said, “though I’m not too sure of the protocol. You are the first invitee the Society’s had since the Titanic was discovered.”

Bryce took one of the seats in front of the desk and invited Mercer to sit in the other. From a pile of papers on the tooled desktop, Charles grabbed an issue of the Society’s quarterly magazine, Surveyor. “This comes out next week. Thought you might want one early.”

Called one of the finest magazines in the world, Surveyor had won every award it could. Its photographers were all the tops in their profession, and most of the articles were written by authors and journalists who’d at least been nominated for a Pulitzer. Its readership wasn’t as large as the better-known National Geographic, but its followers were more fiercely devoted to collecting each one. Since the Society pre-dated Geographic by fifteen years, some of the early editions went for tens of thousands of dollars at auction.

“I don’t know much about publishing, but I can’t imagine you make any money with this,” Mercer said, holding up the two-hundred-page glossy magazine.

“Oh God, we lose thousands on each issue, I suspect. Subscription and circulation barely cover the printing costs. But the money’s not important. I should explain a little about how the Society works. There are three types of people who belong: real explorers, like yourself, who are invited to join; those of us who wish we were real explorers, which is my category, I’m afraid; and those who are rich enough to pay others to explore for them. They pick up the tab for the expeditions we sponsor and the publishing of our magazine and video documentaries. Did you notice the gentleman in the dining room wearing the tan suit?”

Mercer nodded.

“His name is Jon Herriman. Back in the early 1970s he invented some little gadget that goes into automobiles, something about pollution control. That device was only recently replaced with something newer and better. He earned royalties for every car sold in this country until about five years ago.” Charles noted Mercer’s awed expression. “He’s only one of eight billionaires on our board. That’s why I say money isn’t important. A few years ago, one member paid five million dollars to the Russian government so he could use their submersible Mir to visit his old ship, the USS Yorktown, which was sunk during the Battle of Midway.

“The Surveyor’s Society is a labor of love to most of us. Of course we have paid staff to maintain our collections, produce the magazine, and all that, but the actual members are here because we have an interest in exploration and have the money or influence to buy our way in.”

“No offense, Charlie, but I didn’t think you fit into the billionaire category.”

Bryce laughed. “Too true. Actually, Susan’s grandfather spent his family’s fortune tramping around South America looking for the El Dorado treasure before World War Two. He didn’t find anything, of course, but his work garnered him an invitation to join. He brought me on board mostly because I’d begged him for years and also because of my banking connections.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’ve recommended you because you actually are an explorer, something the club is sorely lacking.”

“I want you to understand what this means to me. I know the caliber of people who’ve been members, and I never thought I would be considered. But I’m not an explorer. I’m a mining engineer.”

“You’re being modest, Mercer. That mine you discovered in Eritrea would be reason enough to bring you in, but your reputation has more than qualified you. I read in the Time profile on you that accompanied the story that the value of the minerals you’ve found since you became a prospector-for-hire is around four billion dollars and your fees total three percent of that number.”

“Consulting geologist, please,” Mercer laughed. Secretly, he admitted Charlie’s description better defined what he did. “And both figures were grossly inflated.”

“No matter. Your work has helped our understanding of the planet and our ability to use its resources more than any geologist since Alfred Wegener first proposed the continental drift theory.”

“Does all this flattery mean I don’t have to pony up membership dues?”

“Afraid not. However, your dues entitle you to a room here at the club five nights a year, use of our dining room for private functions, and of course a seat for our weekly lunches, provided you tell the staff a week before you come. Our new chef was stolen from the hotel Georges V in Paris and makes the best chateaubriand you will ever taste. I think, though, just being a member is what most interests you.”

Mercer didn’t respond. He didn’t need to. The golden age of exploration and discovery was long gone. It was part of a bygone era, much like the Society itself. And yet to be invited to join, to be a part of the organization that had helped open up so many frontiers, was an honor that Mercer couldn’t refuse. His education and work entitled him to a string of initials after his name if he so chose, but the prestigious MSS — Member Surveyor’s Society — was a title he’d coveted since first reading their magazine as a boy. Much to his irritation, a great deal of his work now took place in front of a computer rather than in the field. The invitation was a way for him to reconnect with the pioneers of his profession. He broke himself from his silent musings. “There’s that, and I want to find out if some of the rumors are true about parts of your collection.”

“Ah, the rumors.”

Speculation about the Society’s secrets had run rampant for generations. Because of its private status and the powerful people who’d always run it, many believed it had become a repository for a great many unsettling discoveries. Some said they had a portion of Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed Electra and others believed the Great Mogul Throne from India was here. He’d heard of a group who believed the Society’s vault contained definitive proof of