CIA HEADQUARTERS, LANGLEY, VIRGINIA
Hell of a day,” said Mike Califano as he eased himself into one of the chairs around the small conference table in the DTAI workroom. Ana Thorne and Steve Goodwin were there, too, seated at the table.
“That’s an understatement,” muttered Ana.
“Anyone heard from Doc McCreary?” asked Califano.
Goodwin and Thorne both shook their heads.
“That can’t be good,” Califano mumbled.
“Should we wait for Admiral Armstrong?” asked Goodwin. “He said he’d be—”
“I’m here,” announced Armstrong as he entered the workroom. “Finally got all the birds on the same clock. Crisis averted. Lives saved. Jesus, what a mess.”
“So everyone’s got their navigation systems back?” asked Ana.
“Yeah, and their cell phones and satellite TVs, too,” Armstrong replied. “More important, NSA has all its spy satellites back. I’m telling you, I don’t ever want to go through that again. President’s still trying to decide whether he needs to address the nation about this tonight. In the meantime, will one of you geniuses please explain what the hell happened?”
The three “geniuses” at the table looked at each other, trying to figure out who should go first. Finally, Califano spoke. “I guess I’ll start.” For the next fifteen minutes, he explained to Admiral Armstrong everything that had happened that day, including the events at the Third Church of Christ, Scientist; the Russian and Ukrainian thugs; the man in the black leather coat and the old woman in white; the underground bomb shelter; and the bright flash behind the Hay-Adams hotel. He also explained how Steve Goodwin was able to use Califano’s data-mining program to figure out that the Hillcrest estate in Middleburg was the center of all this activity.
“Good job, Steve,” said Ana.
“Thanks. But Mike talked me through it.”
Finally, Califano concluded with an account of the Blackhawk landing at the Hillcrest estate and Ana Thorne’s escape.
“So these Russian assholes—Krupnov Energy—did they actually recover the material they were looking for? I mean, do we have to worry about more of these time events coming from Russia?”
“Yes and no,” said Ana.
“Not what I was hoping to hear,” Armstrong grumbled.
Ana straightened in her chair. “From what I could tell, Admiral, they did not recover any of the material from Thurmond. Of course, they obviously have some material, which we saw the effects of in the White Sea. But it sounded to me like they’re still looking for more.”
Armstrong was confused. “Wait. Other than the Thurmond material, where else do they expect to find more of this stuff?”
“Ah,” said Ana. She turned to Califano. “Mike, can you put something on the screen for me? It’s probably on the Internet.”
“Sure.” Califano rolled his chair over to his computer workstation. At the same time, Goodwin turned on the projector and lowered the screen at the front of the room.
“Okay, where to?” asked Califano, as the Google Web site slowly came into focus on the screen.
“Find me an image of the Madaba map.”
“Madaba? Like M-A-D-A-B-A?”
“Uh-huh.”
Seconds later, an image of an incredibly detailed mosaic map appeared on the screen.
“Whoa,” said Goodwin. “What’s that?”
“This is the oldest known map of the Holy Land,” Ana explained. “It’s located on the floor of an old Byzantine church in Madaba, Jordan, which dates from at least the sixth century A.D. I saw a copy of this same map on the wall of Dr. Reynolds’s home office in Florida. And there was one feature in particular he was very interested in.”
“Which was what?” asked Califano.
Ana stood and pointed to a spot on the lower-right-hand side of the map. “Can you focus in right about . . . here?”
Califano manipulated the image and eventually succeeded in zooming in on that particular spot. On the screen was a mosaic version of a houselike structure and twelve circles, similar to what Ana had been shown in the van:
“The men in the van asked me about a sketch that looked a lot like this,” she said. “Except it’d been photocopied from some old notebook, and it had notations on it in German. I recognized it right away because Tom Reynolds explained this exact feature of the Madaba map to me at his house.”
“And what do those words say?” asked Admiral Armstrong, pointing to the words above the house structure.
“In Greek, it says Galgala-tokai Dodekalithon, which means the town of Galgala with twelve stones.”
“And are those the twelve stones there?” asked Califano, pointing to the white circles.
“Uh-huh. The book of Joshua talks a lot about those twelve stones, and Dr. Holzberg was apparently very interested in them, too.”
“Of course,” whispered Califano to himself.
“What’s that?” asked Ana.
“Remember what Dr. Holzberg said? ‘There are ten more.’ Ten more stones. It totally makes sense now. He was worried about someone finding the other ten stones.”
Ana nodded. “I think you’re right. And there’s more. The sketch they asked me about in the van was annotated like this.” She stepped forward and drew an imaginary X over two of the white circles in the lower-right-hand corner. “These two stones had X’s through them.”
“Meaning what?” Armstrong asked.
“I don’t know. Could mean they’ve been found and retrieved. Who knows?” She next drew an imaginary box around the remaining ten stones. “These ten stones were boxed together like this and labeled as ‘Gefunden, Karte three.’ ”
“Found, see map three,” said Califano, translating from the German.
“Thanks, I was just about to say that. Anyway, those guys in the van were really interested in these ten stones. I think this is what they’re still trying to get their hands on. In addition to the Thurmond material, of course.”
“Hmm,” said Armstrong, stroking his chin. “And what exactly do these twelve stones do?”
“Good question,” said Ana. For the next twenty minutes, she repeated everything she’d learned from Tom Reynolds, including the accounts from the book of Joshua, the differing claims about the book of Jasher, and the three-thousand-year-old dispute regarding the word “Qaset” in the second book of Samuel. “What’s interesting,” she said in conclusion, “is that Dr. Holzberg apparently believed ‘Qaset’ referred to a technique for bending time.”
“Bogentechnik,” said Califano.
“Huh?” Armstrong looked momentarily confused.
“Bogentechnik. That’s the word Dr. Holzberg used to describe it. It means ‘bending technique’ in German.”
Armstrong was rubbing his eyes and his temples with both hands. “Okay, this is all very interesting. But where is the Thurmond material right now? Isn’t that what we should be most concerned with?”
“Absolutely,” said Califano. “To the best of my knowledge, that material is still with the woman in the white dress who we saw at the church.”
“Her name is Opal,” said Ana. “I overheard them calling her that.”
“And this Opal woman is the one you overheard down in the bomb shelter, the one you think caused the time incident that screwed up all of our satellites?”
Califano nodded. “As best as I could tell.”
“And you say Bill McCreary went to check it out?”
“Uh-huh.”
“And that was, what, about seven hours ago?”
Califano checked his watch. “A little more, actually.”
“And no one’s heard from him since?” said Armstrong.
“Well, speaking from experience,” said Califano, “we may not be seeing him for a while.”
Armstrong rolled his eyes and groaned. “Great. I’m sure the president will be thrilled to hear that. And what about this other person? The one they had in the back of the van with you, Ana?”
“They called him Malachi,” said Ana. “But I’m still not sure who he was or how he fits into everything.”
“Any chance we could just ask him?”
Ana shook her head slowly. “Unfortunately, no. He didn’t make it. Spec ops found him shot in the head.”
“Great,” said Armstrong. “So all our answers lie with this woman Opal. And we don’t know where she is or when she’s coming back. Did I get that right? Is that what I’m supposed to tell the president?”
All three of the “geniuses” around the table nodded their heads slowly.
Armstrong was just about to say something else when there was a knock on the door and it slowly swung open. On the other side of the door was Bill McCreary. He stepped into the workroom and then turned and ushered in another person who was standing behind him.
It was the elderly woman in white from the church.
“Everyone,” said McCreary. “I’d like you to meet Opal Chauvenet.”