Pendleton reached into the concrete box and pulled up on something, which appeared hinged on one side. She couldn't discern what it was from her position, but an object rose from the box and floated to the surface. He picked up the crowbar and smashed it down into the box. More debris floated out of the box.
He buried his arms down into the box to his elbows. Both women leaned over with the dive lights. He rose up and she saw small bright objects glistening under the bright dive lights as they slipped through his gloved fingers.
Something shiny.
Something gold.
She readied her spear gun and made her move.
38
He didn't know which was harder, loosening the bolts or rotating the heavy metal plate covering the concrete vault to the side. Jake left one bolt in place so he didn't have to lift the metal plate. He used Regan's crowbar to wedge the plate away from the concrete vault then, using it as a lever, rotated the metal plate away from the opening.
Inside was the casket.
The same make and model as all the others.
He hesitated. Did he really want to disturb Norman Reese's grave? He didn't, but his orders were to acquire the book and stop any further marauding of WWII graves. Regan had offered him a deal and he took it.
He was a man of his word.
When the deal was consummated and the book in his hands, the grave robbing would stop. If President Rudd wanted to pursue what happened to the contents of the graves, she could do that through other means. His objective was to retrieve the book. He thought about Wiley's words to him last year when he was pursuing a terrorist, Meet the objective, the how doesn't matter.
Jake reached into the concrete vault and lifted both lids to the casket. Pieces of Welkin Twill, braided cords, and tassels floated out with a few escaping air bubbles. Beneath the glass he saw more air bubbles and remnants of a tattered uniform. He lifted the crowbar and slammed it into the glass seal.
Thud.
The glass didn't break, but it did crack. He watched the cracks move from the impact point outward toward the edges. He raised the crowbar again but before he could take a swing the glass seal exploded. Pieces of glass peppered his dry suit, none compromising its integrity. He looked at the women, Regan was fist-bumping Barnett. Debris spiraled upward toward the surface. He recognized pieces of uniform mixed with decayed liner.
The casket was empty — nothing inside.
No corpse.
No bones.
Nothing.
He looked at Regan who motioned for him to lift the bottom. It made no sense but he did it anyway and soon realized the casket had a false base. He ripped out the remaining liner and removed the base. Fontaine had not prepared him for what he saw under the dive lights.
Built into the base of the casket was a grid of compartments, two widthwise, six lengthwise. Each compartment contained a leather pouch with a leather drawstring top. He lifted a pouch and emptied its contents into the compartment.
Gold ingot bars. Each with an inscription. He picked one up and rubbed his thumb across the engraving.
Deutshe Reichbank
1 Kilo
Feingold
999.9
At the bottom of each one was inscribed a serial number. Each different from the next. There were dozens of ingots, glistening in the light. He grabbed another pouch.
Silver Reichsmark coins.
With the playfulness of a child, he emptied each one in the compartment it came from. Amazed at the dazzling display of gold and silver. Under the bright lights it reminded him of a pirate's treasure. In a sense, it was. This time the pirate was Major Don Adams.
All total, he emptied one bag of Silver Reichsmarks, three of gold ingots, two of gold English Sovereigns, one of gold Napoleons, one of U. S. $20 gold coins, and four of gold Swiss Francs.
He cupped his hands, scooped out Swiss Francs, and held them up into the light. He let the coins slip through his fingers as he watched in amazement at the brilliance of the metallic gold reflection under the dive lights. He didn't know how much the cache was worth, but in today's commodities market, he figured it was well into the millions of dollars. No wonder Regan wanted to negotiate for the book.
Barnett motioned to get his attention. He looked and saw her unzip an outside pocket on her dry suit. She pulled out a clear dry bag and extended it in his direction. He recognized it immediately.
The journal.
Suddenly a glint of light, a flash of metal reflected by a dive light, and then the book fell to the muddy bottom. A shadow moved behind Barnett. A torrent of bubbles escaped from behind her head. Her air hoses had been severed. Her eyes bulged and she streaked upward. Her dive light fell from her hand and started rolling down toward the bottom of the lake. He tried to grab her fins but was too late.
He turned to Ashley Regan. An ever-expanding halo of red encompassed her body. Blood oozed from the hole in her dry suit. A metal spear tip protruded from the center of her chest. The grimace on her face said it all; there was nothing he could do for her now. He recognized the look in her eyes.
Ashley Regan was already dead.
Her body floated upward until it reached the end of the tether.
A shadow moved toward him, gobbling the book from the muddy bottom. He blocked the dive knife with his right forearm as the shadow swam past him, over the grave and the gold, and down toward the deep bottom of the lake. The same direction his dive light fell last night. He should have anticipated it, but he didn't and now Regan was dead. At the hands of the assassin Abigail Love.
He looked upward as Christa Barnett's silhouette ascended toward the surface. She was on her own now. Love had the book and was swimming away. She was his number one priority. With the low visibility in the lake, he couldn't let her get out of sight or he might never find her or the book again.
With every passing second, Abigail Love's shadow grew fainter in the murky depths of Watauga Lake. He propelled himself off the lip of the concrete vault and kicked furiously over the muddy mound that was once the dry knoll where Norman Reese was born. The deeper they dove, the dimmer the ambient light and the fainter her image appeared.
She was a strong swimmer and he began to think he was chasing a mermaid. He wasn't losing ground but he wasn't gaining either. She was faster than he'd anticipated and his extra tank was slowing him down. As they approached the bottom, he knew she could use the silt as a cover. He kicked harder hoping his Navy endurance training would give him an edge. He'd stayed in good shape, but his Navy days were a long time ago.
The lakebed flattened out, as he knew it would, and Love's fins stirred up silt further restricting his visibility. He ascended a few feet to get out of her wake and could barely discriminate her fins kicking fifteen feet in front and below him. He kicked harder.
Jake knew he had an advantage over Love, several of them actually. Even though she was still swimming at a fast pace, she was tiring and had slowed. He knew he still had plenty of kick left in him. And with only one tank at a depth of 115 feet and, at this furious pace, she would soon run out of air. He had two tanks, which gave him a longer bottom time. More time to recover the book, and still make his decompression stops with air to spare.
Out of nowhere a four-foot stone wall appeared on the bottom outlining a raised foundation. Halfway down the wall he saw five wide steps leading down to what he assumed was an old street. They had stumbled on Old Butler. The old town that was relocated prior to the flooding of the valley.
Love doglegged around the felled skeleton of a large tree and doubled back leaving him no alternative but to circumnavigate the tree as well. He closed the gap to ten feet when Love turned again. His leg muscles burned. He felt like he had run a marathon but he refused to slow his pace. Now it was an underwater race — winner takes the prize — only in this race, the stakes were much higher.