8:30 a.m.
7 hours until kickoff
The cup of coffee had really hit the spot.
In fact, I’d also taken a cup to go and had it here with me now in the conference room of the Field Office.
Ingersoll and Voss were here, as well as half a dozen agents who were working the case.
I started by telling them about Ralph flying home for the birth of his daughter, then we turned our attention to the search for Kurt Mason. I shared all that I knew about him from apprehending him last summer.
“And he escaped from prison with the help of Richard Basque?” Voss asked.
“Yes. The surveillance video at the prison confirmed it.”
“If it was confirmed, why didn’t the guards stop it?”
“It was only later that they identified him. He played himself off as Mason’s lawyer. He snuck in the materials Mason needed to escape.”
“And now Mason went after Basque’s sister? Killed her?”
“That’s right.”
“Does that make any sense to you?”
“No.”
“Let’s ask Mason why he did it when we find him,” Ingersoll said.
“I’m good with that,” I replied.
Unless we take him down first.
An outcome I was not exactly opposed to.
I finished my coffee while Ingersoll gave us an update on the HRT’s analysis of the mine shaft. “According to our calculations, the one Corrine was killed in is three hundred and fifty feet deep. I’m still not comfortable sending my men down there. We need to find out more about the tunnel network and structural integrity first.”
We spent several minutes discussing how to do that.
Then, during a video conference with Gonzalez, we laid out our plan for the day.
Ingersoll and his team would be using ground-penetrating radar that was being delivered from a mining company in West Virginia to try to map out the tunnels.
Voss’s agents would keep searching the city for the Buick LeSabre, following up on tips, interviewing people who had known “Danny Everhart,” and piecing together a timeline of his movements over the last month to see if that might lead us to anything specific regarding Mason’s current whereabouts.
We also had agents investigating myths and folklore, especially from the Catawba and Cherokee tribes, that might be related to seven gods.
* * *
After finishing up with Gonzalez, we phoned Guido and put him on the line for a conference call.
He’d located a UNC Charlotte professor who supposedly knew more than anyone else in the area about the gold mines. I wondered briefly why his name hadn’t come up earlier, but apparently the guy had been out of town speaking at a nanotechnology conference. He was driving back this morning and would be available to meet with someone from our team at the campus library at ten.
It seemed like a promising avenue of investigation, so I volunteered to go.
“A nanotechnology professor who’s an expert on the gold mines?” Voss said skeptically.
“He has varied interests,” Guido answered. “He’s also a member of the Charlotte Historical Society and is on the board at the Mint Museum. His name’s O’Brien.”
Frankly, if he could help us, I didn’t care what department he taught in—nanotechnology, scuba diving, or candle making.
We finished the call, wrapped up the briefing, and then it was time for me to leave to meet with Professor O’Brien.