Chapter 30

 

Trinity House

 

From the living room to the bottom of the steep, narrow run of stairs, Tara guessed she had descended at least twenty feet. The stair treads wore a thin layer of dust that had gone undisturbed until Rose had ventured down. The dust and cobwebs suggested to Tara that the room hadn’t been visited in a long while.

Whereas the grand living room above Tara’s head was circular, the wide-open space before her was rectangular, with the wall the stairs were anchored to being one of the short sides of the rectangle.

The wall to Tara’s fore was taken up by eight cathode-ray tube television monitors. A long shelf below the wall-mounted monitors was cluttered with desktop computers and all manner of electronic components whose purpose she didn’t immediately recognize.

As Tara waited for Rose to join her at the bottom of the stairs, she let her gaze wander the room. Plastic milk crates filled with books and papers were scattered about the poured cement floor. The wall behind her, a counterpart to the one bristling with monitors, was plastered with maps and newspaper articles. The articles seemed to be assembled in chronological order. One headline from the mid-80s screamed about a major stock market plunge that was purported to be the downfall of the United States as a major world power. Another detailed the lightning invasion of Kuwait by Saddam’s forces. Next to it was a full-page spread with a photo showing dozens of American tanks assembled and awaiting the beginning of Operation Desert Storm. Near the midpoint of the wall were clippings of the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. Another spoke of the terrorist attack on the U.S.S. Cole and showed a photo of the badly damaged destroyer which had been attacked in 2000 while refueling in the port of Aden in Yemen.

A full third of the wall was dedicated to the 9/11 attacks and our Nation’s response to that awful day in American history. Tara was especially moved by a front-page photo showing the towers burning after being hit by the second passenger jet.

Dead center on the same wall was a square sign warning against the dreaded Y2K bug. Someone had drawn a black X across the sign. Funny, thought Tara, because, at the time, both of her late parents had been especially concerned about a societal collapse resulting from the dreaded coding anomaly that had been poised to affect computer operating systems the world over.

Large clocks, each displaying a different time in red digital numerals, were mounted at uniform intervals high up on the wall. The first four were set to the United States’ time zones and labeled Pacific - Los Angeles, Mountain - Santa Fe, Central - Chicago, and Eastern - Washington D.C. Clock number five was set to Moscow time. The clock taking center stage was labeled Greenwich, England - Zulu Time. The other clocks were also labeled and displaying the current times in Berlin, West Germany; Jerusalem, Israel; Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Seoul, South Korea; Beijing, China; and Canberra, Australia.

On the wall underneath the clock showing Zulu time was a small, square sign bearing the easily identifiable radiation symbol known as a trefoil.

All of the evidence Tara had seen so far led her to believe the place was indeed a panic room, only the particular reason for panic wasn’t necessarily of the two-legged variety. This hundred-by-fifty-foot cement tomb was to serve one purpose: save whoever had designed it from the immediate effects of a nearby nuclear detonation.

Reaching the bottom step, Rose said, “Cool space, huh? What do you think? Was this a CIA safe house or something?”

Tara shook her head. “Nope,” she said matter-of-factly, “it’s a fallout shelter. Judging by the fact that one of the clocks is dedicated to West Germany, it’s been here a long time. It may have been here long before the house was built.”

Hands on hips, Rose said, “Pretty impressive.”

Tara said, “Agreed. It’s pretty low on tech, though.” Figuring the televisions were top of the line in the year 2000, she crunched some numbers. “I wasn’t even voting age when those televisions were new.”

Rose said, “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

“Good point,” Tara said. She glanced at the top of the stairs. Dozer was there, peering down at them. Clearly, his short legs and the high-rising stairs were not a good match. Regarding Rose, she said, “I guess in realtor speak this would be considered a bonus room.” Rose shrugged. “Seeing as how our agent didn’t mention it,” Tara added, “I’m good calling it a freebie room.”

Pointing toward the concrete ceiling some ten feet over their heads, Rose said, “When I was down here earlier, I noticed these pipes. What are they for?”

Tara shielded her eyes against the fluorescent lights. “Clean air? Water?” she speculated. “I bet Lee would know.”

Rose said, “We should call him.”

“When he called earlier, he said he was on the edge of his radio’s reach. They’re well out of range by now,” Tara answered. Eyes following the pipes, she walked the length of the room, then stopped before a large oak desk pushed up against the wall furthest from the stairs. All of the pipes converged above the desk and disappeared into the wall.

“Those have got to be for bringing clean air in. I bet there’s one for purging the bad air. Wires are probably routed through another of the pipes.”

Rose said nothing. She seemed fixated on a bookshelf brimming with well-worn paperbacks.

Tara regarded the desk before her. Instead of the usual office accoutrements, the desktop was home to books, piles of gun and hunting magazines, and what looked like more maps. She stooped and brushed dust from the map atop the pile. She waved the dancing motes from her face, then let her eyes roam the map.

The map was actually a blueprint. A little more scrutiny told Tara she was looking at plans for a subterranean structure. There were eight sheets in total. Each sheet was labeled LAZARUS at the top and roughly the size of the desktop—maybe three feet by five. Underneath the stack of plans, she found a pair of topographical maps. A to-scale overhead of Trinity House was located centrally on the first map. The circular patch of ground Tara had been working on getting cleared was also depicted. And once again Lee had been right: The crisply drawn circle sprouting well-defined paths to the southwest and northeast was labeled HELIPAD.

She said, “The agent didn’t mention any of this, either,” then moved the top page aside. The second topo-map was of the land behind Trinity House. When both topo-maps were aligned, the path shot northeast from Trinity House, then followed a perfect diagonal tack that took it through the helipad and all the way to a to-scale overhead shot of the bunker on the blueprints.

Holy shit, thought Tara, I hope these plans are more than someone’s pipe dream. Then her stomach churned at the notion that a former owner of Trinity House may now be calling this Lazarus place home.

Rose had been powering on the monitors. Displayed on the slightly rounded screens were color images piped in from the perimeter cameras. Turning to Tara, she said, “Check this out. These are showing the same camera views as the monitors upstairs. There’s a bank of radios, too.” In her hand was one of the books taken from the shelf. “Ever heard of Jerry Ahern?”

Tara took the book from Rose. “The Survivalist,” she said, turning it over in her hand. “Now we know where Mr. Nuclear Bomb got his inspiration.” She tapped a finger on the plans. “I think this little hideout of his is just the tip of the iceberg. If this Lazarus place is real, our man was keeping some mighty big secrets from his next of kin who inherited the place.”