“What man doesn’t?”
Mercer gave a low chuckle. “True. I guess it’s just easier than admitting there’s something wrong. You pretend you can handle the pain, and usually you can, but sometimes…”
“Sometimes you need to talk.”
“Talk or just admit to yourself it’s okay to have feelings.”
“Women often complain about men shutting them out,” Cali said. “I’ve had my share of that, but I also came to realize that men’s silences can be just as cathartic as when women vent. The dangerous guys, the ones you have to look out for, are the ones that don’t even allow themselves the silence. I’ve never lost anyone close to me, so I can’t imagine how it feels. I will say that you seem to be handling it pretty well. I think we had a good time tonight. I know I did. Had you not been dealing with her death, you wouldn’t have allowed yourself even this.”
Cali let that sink in before setting her napkin on the table. They stood and made their way back to the elevator. “Why don’t we meet here at seven?”
“Okay. Sorry to end the night on a down note.”
Her smile was the most charming he’d ever seen on her. “You ended it perfectly.” When her elevator reached her floor, she gave his cheek a gentle kiss. “See you in the morning.”
Mercer held the elevator open until she was in her room. He thought he’d come off sounding like a morose dolt pining for an unrequited love, and she thought the night had ended perfectly. He repeated to himself something Harry was fond of saying: “The only thing you’ll ever truly understand about a woman is what she’ll let you understand.”
Atlantic City, New Jersey
Two minutes on the Internet would have saved Mercer and Cali about six hours but would have cost them a bucolic ride and a self-guided tour of Princeton’s campus. The Institute for Advanced Study wasn’t affiliated with the Ivy League school. It had been started in 1930 with money from Newark department store magnate Louis Bamberger as a place for theoretical mathematicians and physicists. The small institute did not archive any of their most famous thinker’s papers. In fact, Einstein’s home was merely another piece of property for faculty housing.
A harried staff member, who had answered the same question for countless people, told them that all of Einstein’s papers had been bequeathed to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In conjunction with Caltech, they were making much of the material available online.
Back in Mercer’s room at the Deco Palace, he handed her a beer from the minibar and opened one for himself. The sun was setting and the hotel cast a long shadow over the boardwalk. Cali checked that she had a connection with the hotel’s Wi-Fi and quickly located the archive. They found that there was a document of some sort in the collection from a Ch. Bowie; however, that particular piece of writing couldn’t be accessed through the Internet.
“What time is it in Israel?” Cali asked, reaching for the phone. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter.” She dialed a long number from memory, and when it was answered she asked for Ari Gradstein.
“Who is Ari Gradstein?” Mercer asked.
“The deputy director for Israel’s Demona nuclear research facility. We’ve worked together a few times on responses to nuclear terrorism,” Cali replied, then picked up the conversation with the Israeli when he came on the line. “Ari, it’s Cali Stowe from NEST.” She paused, listening. “Good, how are you?…Excellent. And Shoshana?… Great. Listen, Ari, I need an official favor. I’d like you to cut through the bureaucracy for me at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. I can’t tell you what it’s about yet other than to say I highly doubt the state of Israel is at risk. I’m researching an American who wrote to Einstein, and all his papers are archived at the university…. Yeah, I know. It surprised me too. I wasted a couple of hours at Princeton thinking they were there.
“Could you call over there for me and clear the way? I’m going under the assumption that as soon as I identified myself as someone from the DOE, all sorts of red flags would go up and it would be weeks before I got an answer.” Cali rattled off her e-mail address and then the university’s reference number for the document authored by Ch. Bowie. “Thanks, Ari, I owe you one. Bye.”
Mercer was impressed. “Even if I had a contact in Israel, I never would have thought of that. You were brilliant.”
Cali smiled at the compliment. “And sometimes knowing your way around a bureaucracy isn’t a bad thing.”
Harry returned to the room while they waited for an e-mail from Israel. He was bleary-eyed and his cheeks were prickled with silver stubble. It was the first Mercer had seen of him in nearly twenty hours.
“Well, well, well. Look what the cat dragged in. Have you been gambling this whole time?”
Harry lowered himself to the bed with an exaggerated groan. “God, no. I stopped for breakfast this morning.”
“And how’d you do?” Mercer asked, knowing the answer by Harry’s dejected look.
Harry propped himself against the pillows, his eyes closed. “Never ask a gambler that until he’s done.”
“That bad, eh?”
The old man suddenly leaned forward and pulled thick bundles of cash from both pockets of his windbreaker. He spoke mildly, as though it were no big deal. “Actually I think I did all right for myself.”
“Holy shit!” Mercer and Cali exclaimed at the same time. “How much?” Mercer asked.
Harry roared in triumph. “Thirty grand, my boy! I crushed ’em. I was unstoppable. I even told them I was staying at Trump’s so they’d comp me a suite last night to keep me here.”
“You wily son of a bitch,” Mercer muttered in astonishment.
“Congratulations,” Cali added. “What are you going to do with all that money?”
Harry eyed her as though she were an idiot. “Gamble it away tonight, of course.”
Cali looked like she was going to try to dissuade Harry from blowing his winnings. Mercer knew better. Her laptop pinged and all thoughts of Harry’s windfall vanished. It was an e-mail from the Hebrew University. The archivist who sent it wasn’t happy about answering a request past midnight but said they’d found what Cali had asked for. “This is it,” Cali said and opened the attachment. It was a telegram sent to Einstein in April of 1937 from Athens, Greece. Mercer read over her shoulder:
May I inquire as to your health, sir? It has been seven weeks since I left. I have spent my vacation near Lake Como. My hotel reminds me a little of that monstrosity Hearst built. At least there is plenty of sunshine and fresh air. I’ve found some trinkets you’d enjoy and plan to ship soonest. I could not find the Gibson print of Drake’s Golden Hind you so wanted. I did locate that recording by Stephan Enburg you asked for. In my opinion that is a small success, but I can’t imagine why you liked it. Too much oboe, not enough flute.
Ch. Bowie
PS fail fall ball bill fill pill poll pall pail pain gain
Cali was the first to voice her assessment. “What the hell is this? It’s meaningless. Lake Como? He was in Africa, and that bit about seven weeks. Bowie’d been gone for months. How did he end up in Athens? And what’s with the postscript?”
“It’s got to be code,” Mercer said. “Maybe he and Einstein had some prearranged signal concerning the expedition. He says he had a small success. The name Stephan Enburg could mean something specific, like that Bowie found the mine. Had he not found it, maybe it would have been a different name.”
“Maybe, maybe, maybe. Damn it.” She blew a frustrated breath.
“Let me see that,” Harry called. Mercer swiveled the laptop so Harry could read the telegram.
“Gibson’s print of Drake’s Golden Hind?” Cali questioned aloud. “What is that?”
“Drake is Sir Francis Drake,” Mercer replied, “an English admiral and privateer around the time of Queen Elizabeth the first. The
