“I’ll take that.” Bones tore the shovel out of the hands of O’Meara’s digger. He could see the coffin already exposed.
“Looks like they did all the work already, Maddock. Doesn’t look like they’ve opened it yet.”
Dane watched O’Meara’s eyes for any kind of sign that O’Meara already had the document, but he saw none. “Seems to me it wouldn’t be with the body itself. Too much chance of damage. It could be in a compartment inside the lid or outside the lid.”
“A compartment outside the lid? Are those even a thing?”
“I couldn’t say. But Franklin was pretty big on ethics. He wouldn’t have wanted it to require desecrating the body to recover this. I say look on the outside, first.”
“Yes, sir.”
Less than a minute later, Bones let out a whoop. “You da man, Maddock. It’s invisible unless you’re looking for it, but there’s a small removable compartment here. Would you believe it contains a brown oilskin envelope?”
Dane felt a surge of excitement which exceeded even the discovery of the lost Library of Congress. That was great, but now they’d found the item that had triggered everything. He wondered what it said.
“Bring it over here, Bones. Open it where I can see it.”
“Sure thing.” He came around and stood next to Dane, AR-15 tucked under one arm and the envelope in his hands. Both men stared at the envelope.
“I’ll take that.” A raspy voice came from behind them.
Bones sprung around, bringing his weapon up. It took all the concentration Dane had not to do the same, but he knew if he took his focus off O’Meara, the cop would be on him in no time. He just had to trust that Bones could handle it.
The raspy voice spoke again. “Mr. Bonebrake, you have exactly two seconds to drop the weapon before you get a third eye. No warning shots.”
Dane’s hope sank when he heard the AR-15 clatter to the ground.
“Mr. Maddock, there are five of us with weapons trained on you. Kindly drop your weapon as well.”
“Hate to say it, but she’s telling the truth, Maddock.”
Dane heard the frustration in Bones’ voice and dropped his rifle.
“O’Meara put down your hands, you look ridiculous. Go search them for more weapons.”
O’Meara walked towards Dane, taking out some sort of pistol as he did. He threw an elbow to Dane’s jaw. “No gun in your mouth. Let me check elsewhere.”
The rest of the frisking was less forceful but still involved pain. It also involved the confiscation of the Glock from the holster around Dane’s calf. Then O’Meara moved onto Bones.
His initial elbow struck Bones in the sternum, but the big man didn’t show any sign he’d felt it. When O’Meara reached Bones’ waist, Bones giggled and bent over slightly.
“Careful there, people might get the wrong idea.”
O’Meara scowled and drove a knee into Bones’ groin; the blow didn’t strike particularly hard, but instinct took over and Bones double over with his hands in protective mode. O’Meara ignored this and continued his search, eventually finishing without finding any additional weapons.
Dane had turned around during this time and came face to face with a slender figure dressed all in black. The hood covered most of the face, but Dane knew who it was. “Ms Wright, I presume.”
Her head raised enough that he could make out her face. It looked just like the newspaper clipping.
“Very good, Mr. Maddock, though I don’t exactly try to hide.”
“No, you don’t. Too busy trying to expose corruption. Corruption like Edmund Randolph engaged in, right?”
Her face tightened. “He was—”
“Vindicated, I know. Still, where there’s smoke, there’s usually fire.”
She took several steps closer to him, carrying her small pistol. The men around her all had long guns, and shifted on their feet as Wright stepped toward him. She stopped and reached her wrinkled fingers up to his cheek. Dane couldn’t stop an involuntary shudder at her cold touch.
“Mr. Maddock, I expected better of you than some transparent attempt to make me angry. The truth is that you’re going to die after you tell me all you know. The only variable is how much pain you’re in and for how long before that happens.”
Dane saved his breath, but internally he was thinking of and eliminating options as fast as his brain would operate. He couldn’t think of any scenario for escape where he and Bones weren’t both cut down instantly.
Wright removed her hand from his face. “Hold out your wrist, Mr. Maddock.”
He hesitated, then shrugged and offered his left hand. She gripped his wrist with loose fingers and met his eye. He saw the cold blue there, a mirror image of what he saw when he shaved every day.
The next thing he knew he was on the ground, chin pressed into the grass. She had tightened her grip and somehow twisted his arm and caused him to go down. It didn’t hurt, but it was fast, as fast as anything he’d experienced in the military. He looked up and saw her looking down at him. When she spoke, her voice betrayed no sign of having expended any effort.
“I would offer you a hand, but you’d be a fool to take it. I trust you can get up on your own.”
She whirled, the first visible movement with any speed. Without stopping she snatched the envelope from Bones and moved back towards the men with the rifles. She stopped next to O’Meara, who had also moved to where they were.
“Were you going to tell me about your little midnight digging session?”
O’Meara opened his mouth but nothing came out. She shook her head slightly and then unleashed a movement with her arm. Dane sort of made out the shadow of it, but the movement was too fast for him to really pick it up. The end result was clear, though: O’Meara collapsed to the ground.
Without looking at his prone form, Wright opened the envelope and peered inside. She looked at Dane and Bones.
“This will have to wait for a more suitable location. We wouldn’t want to damage Mr. Franklin’s copy of such a special agreement.”
Bones exaggerated a sigh. “Sheesh. It’s just an order for pizza.”
“I assure you, it’s more than that.”
“Yeah? Then what is it?”
“It’s something you won’t live long enough to find out about.”
“Easy for you to say standing over there with guns. How about you try your Bruce Lee crap on me, or are you chicken?”
She moved towards Bones, and to Dane it seemed as if she almost glided over the earth. Part of Dane was truly curious to see how Bones would handle this. He couldn’t imagine an old woman weighing less than a hundred pounds taking him down, but he couldn’t have imagined her doing it to him, either.
He never got a chance to find out.
Automatic gunfire erupted from at least two sides. Dane and Bones reacted with the speed ingrained by endless training, heading for the dirt. Dane couldn’t have said what made him do it, but instead of diving straight down, he launched himself at Wright. She reacted just as quickly, sidestepping him. His right hand grabbed nothing but air.
Fortunately he had two hands, and his left snagged the oilskin envelope from her grip. He paid for his attempt with a full superman right onto the sidewalk. He could feel himself drifting when his head made impact, and in the final moments before he passed out, he tucked himself in a fetal position, protecting the envelope against his chest.
“Dude, wake up.” Hard slapping on his cheek caused Dane to open his eyes. Bones’ face took up nearly the entire range of his vision.
“I’m awake, I’m awake.”
Bones moved back and Dane lifted his cheek off the concrete, shaking his throbbing head to disperse the cobwebs in his brain. He still felt some dizziness, so he only raised himself to a seated position. He peered around and noticed a number of bodies lying still in the immediate area.