Curious Minds (22 page)

“Why?” Riley asked.

“Another good question without a good answer. I was afraid she'd screw everything up. I was afraid she'd find the gold and blow the whistle on all of us and finally someone would believe her. It wasn't like I was innocent in all this. I had millions in bootlegged gold coins hidden away. Anyway, I thought I might be able to find her in time and persuade her to abandon the hunt.”

“And?”

“I found her but it was too late. At least it was too late for her.” He looked over at the salt flat. “There's a whole network of caves underneath the salt flats. People think extraterrestrial spaceships and alien bodies are hidden down there. I wish they were right.”

“You've been in there?” Emerson asked.

“Yes. It's incredible. There's more gold than you can possibly imagine. God, I'm sick of the stuff.”

“But no alien corpses,” Riley said.

“No. Just Yvette's. With her head smashed in. When I saw her I couldn't believe it. It was horrible. It had just happened. And I was almost next. Rollo was there with his scalpel. He came after me and I panicked. I grabbed a gold bar and threw it at him and caught him on the side of his head. I don't know how I managed to hit him. I was so scared, my vision was blurred. He staggered back and I hit him with another bar. Square in the forehead. Right between his eyes. I turned and ran and I've been running ever since.”

“This place is a fortress,” Riley said. “How did you and Yvette get in?”

“She told me she had an access pass. I think it was bogus but it got her in.”

“And you?”

“I'd done some research online. I'd studied satellite photos of the area and I'd eavesdropped on Werner and heard him talking about tunnels. I knew about the mining operation. Lead and silver were discovered in the southern part of the Groom Range in 1864. There are still entrances into those tunnels. I made a good guess based on my eavesdropping and chose the tunnel that led me to the gold. It turns out that security is high aboveground but lacking below. Some of the tunnels are randomly patrolled, and some not at all. There are cameras in the area close to the gold stash but they look rusted out. I'm not sure they're maintained. Although Rollo did know Yvette was in the gold vault. And he also knew I was there. So some of the security cameras must be functioning.”

“I
'm beat,” Günter said. “Has anyone got food?”

Emerson pulled granola bars out of his duffel bag and passed them around.

“How have you been eating?” Riley asked Günter. “Where do you stay?”

“I've been hiding out in an abandoned cabin not far from one of the mine entrances. For whatever reason, the guards don't seem to patrol that patch of the Tikaboo Valley. I have to be careful, but I can pretty much come and go without being seen. I have some money stashed away but it's not going to last forever.”

“I saw you at Fletcher's Cove,” Riley said.

“I was trying to help Maxine. She'd had an affair with Werner but he kicked her to the curb when she turned thirty. If that wasn't bad enough, he demoted her and gave her to me. The whole office knew. It was humiliating for her. I think she lived to get even. In the end, she didn't live at all.

“When I realized I had to disappear, I gave her a bar of gold to hide. And not just any bar of gold. It happens to have a serial number that identifies it as belonging to the German government.”

“That bar's worth about half a million dollars,” Riley said. “You trusted her not to just disappear with it?”

Günter smiled. “The one in my safe was a counterfeit and worth a hundred times more, at least to my brothers. It happens to have the same serial number as the German bar I gave Maxine.”

Riley shook her head. “If it was ever discovered, it could implicate the Grunwalds.”

“Bingo. I told Maxine she should get hold of the bar in my safe and turn both bars over to the press if anything bad should happen to me.”

“Like death?” Riley said.

“Yes. Like death. Unfortunately, Maxine didn't wait for news of my death. She got into my safe and switched the two bars. Then she went to Fletcher's Cove and showed it to Werner. She was trying to broker her own deal. To get some measure of revenge. She didn't know what she was getting into. If only I could have reached her in time to stop her.”

“How did you know she had the fake bar?” Riley asked.

“We would talk once a week. Just a short conversation keeping me informed. She told me she was going to get the bar and blackmail Werner. I told her not to do that, but she wouldn't listen. It was the last conversation we had. She wouldn't answer my calls after that so I returned to D.C. to try to stop her. I didn't dare go to her house but I suspected she would attempt the transfer at the cove. Werner went fishing there every Wednesday. It was a safe way to meet with his brothers and other partners in crime. Needless to say, I didn't succeed in making contact with Maxine.”

“And then you came back here?”

“I can't explain it. I feel safe here. It's like I'm hiding in plain sight. Or maybe I'm waiting for Werner to visit his gold and I'll sneak in and choke him while he sleeps.”

Riley cut her eyes to him. “You're kidding, right?”

“No,” Günter said. “I'm quite serious. I would like to kill Werner.”

“Okay then,” Riley said. “Good to know.”

“I'd like to see the gold and get a sample,” Emerson said to Günter.

“The nearest tunnel entrance is over an hour's walk from here,” Günter said. “Ordinarily I couldn't do it in the dark but I can find my way if I use your goggles.”

“How did you know we would be here?” Emerson asked Günter.

“I didn't,” Günter said. “I come here when I want to spy on the airfield. I saw the landing lights go on a couple hours ago so I hiked over. Seeing Miss Moon standing there was a shock.”

“I heard a plane fly in when I was halfway up the mountain,” Riley said.

“I got here just after it landed,” Günter said. “I was too late to see the passengers disembark, but I've seen Hans fly into Groom Lake in a similar plane.”

“Does he come here often?”

“Almost never,” Günter said.

R
iley was walking on autopilot. The day had been too long. She was wearing the wrong shoes and she was thirsty. She wanted a mojito.

“How much farther do we have to go?” she asked.

“Not much farther,” Günter said.

“I heard that three hours ago.”

“We've only been walking for two hours,” Emerson told her.

“So we should be there, right?” Riley said. “Remember how this magical tunnel entrance was over an hour away?”

“It's slower going in the dark,” Günter said.

“What happens when we find the tunnel?” Riley asked. “Is it attached to a Ritz-Carlton?”

“It's just a tunnel,” Günter said. “We need to find a big creosote bush. I wouldn't have a problem in daylight or even bright moonlight, but everything looks weird with these goggles.”

“There are creosote bushes all over the place,” Emerson said. “And bushes that
aren't
creosote bushes
look
like creosote bushes in the dark.”

“This is a big one,” Günter said. “And it has a hole mostly hidden under its branches. Don't step in the hole.”

Riley and Emerson fanned out and combed the scrub.

“Are you sure we're in the right area?” Riley asked.

“More or less,” Günter said.

“Found it,” Emerson said. “How stable is the ground around this?”

“Very stable. It's actually the beginning of a cavern.”

Emerson found a stone, dropped it into the hole, and counted. “I calculate that the floor of the cavern is thirty-six feet below us.”

Riley peered down into the hole. “How do you figure?”

“Physics. All you need is a rock, a stopwatch, and a simple equation derived from Newton's Laws of Motion.”

“So how fast is the rock going when it hits the ground?” Riley asked.

“Its terminal velocity is about twenty-five miles per hour,” Emerson said.

Riley took a step back. She didn't like the idea of disappearing down the hole and reaching terminal velocity. It sounded…terminal.

Emerson turned to Günter. “You've used this entrance?”

“Not exactly. I accidentally dropped a flashlight into it trying to see the bottom. I decided it was inaccessible and went back to using my original tunnel entrance. Two days later I found the flashlight while I was exploring underground. If you can get down there it's a shortcut to the gold repository. Otherwise we need to keep walking. There's an easier entrance about five miles from here.”

Riley looked at the hole in the ground. “Thirty-six feet is a long way down.”

“Fortunately this duffel I've been carrying not only contains emergency cash and granola bars but also emergency rappelling equipment,” Emerson said.

“You expected you'd have to rappel?” Riley asked.

“The bag has been in the safe for several months. I originally packed it when I thought I might go on a mountaineering adventure. The adventure never materialized and the bag remained in the safe.”

Emerson unzipped the duffel and pulled out a couple tight coils of rope, some clamps, a hammer, and a small headlamp attached to a headband.

“I have the bare minimum equipment here but I think it will do the job,” he said.

“Do you always take wads of money when you go mountaineering?”

“The adventure involved a possible ransom situation. Fortunately it resolved itself without my intervention.”

“How much money do you have in the bag?” Riley asked.

“Just short of two million. I've been paying cash for our motel rooms.”

Riley considered hitting him with the hammer. She'd been scrimping along trying to save money on cheap motels and he had millions in his duffel bag.

“You have that look,” Emerson said to Riley.

“What look?”

“Squinty eyes, jaw clenched, shoulders hunched. I've seen that look on women before and it's never turned out well.”

“Have any of the women with this look ever hit you with a hammer?”

“No,” Emerson said.

Riley made an effort to relax and unsquint her eyes. “There's always a first time.”

Emerson hooked clamps and anchor plates onto the rope and hammered the anchor plate into an outcropping of rock close to the creosote bush.

“That should do it,” he said, dropping the free end of the secured rope into the hole.

“I didn't hear it hit bottom,” Riley said.

“Nevertheless I'm sure it did. By my calculations we have more than enough rope. Have you done any rappelling?”

“No. None.”

“I didn't pack a harness so we'll have to make do.”

Emerson found a smaller length of rope, wrapped it around Riley's waist, tied it in a knot, and passed it between her legs.

“How do you feel?” Emerson asked her.

“Like I'm wearing a rope thong.”

“That's an erotic comparison,” Emerson said. “I like it.”

“You've done this harness thing before, right?” Riley asked. “You know what you're doing?”

“I was into rope bondage for a while in Japan. They call it
kinbaku-bi,
which means ‘the beauty of tight binding.' ”

“You're joking, right?”

“If it makes you feel more comfortable, then yes.” He bound the ropes together in a big loop at her waist and attached a carabiner with a spring-loaded gate onto it, then fed the rope through a large, intricately designed hook with a lever on the side.

“This device is called a descender,” he told her. “Grab the lever and it will control your rate of descent.”

“Couldn't they come up with a more ominous name for it?” Riley asked. “Maybe a ‘drop into hell machine'?”

“You're using humor as a defense. Very good.”

“Will it defend me against falling to my death?”

“No. Put these on,” he said, handing her leather gloves and the headlamp. “Turn the headlamp on once you're fully in the cavern.”

“Wait a minute. What about you?”

“I can manage with less equipment. When you reach the bottom give me a signal so I can descend.”

“You're going to send me down
first
?”

“I thought you would want to go down first.”

“I want to go down
never.
”

“It would be easier for me to help you get started if you go first.”

Riley looked over the edge of the hole. “What's the big deal? You just jump in, right?”

“More or less,” Emerson said.

“I'll go down first,” Günter said. “I did my share of mountain climbing when I was younger. I can do it.”

“I don't have enough equipment to make a harness for you,” Emerson said. “I only packed one descender and one headlamp.”

“No problem,” Günter said. “I'll be fine.”

“At least take the second pair of gloves,” Emerson said. “Go down as slowly as possible.”

Emerson eased Günter over the side of the hole. Günter wrapped a leg around the rope and swung off into space.

“Eeeeeeeee,” Günter screamed.
WUMP!

Emerson and Riley looked into the hole.

“Günter?” Emerson stage whispered.

“Unh,” Günter said.

“Are you okay?”

“No. The rope is too short.”

“I was certain I calculated correctly,” Emerson said. “Perhaps I underestimated the time it took for the stone to hit bottom.”

“I think I broke my leg,” Günter said.

“I'm going next,” Emerson said, hooking the duffel bag over his shoulder. “I need to assess the situation.”

“Sure,” Riley said. “Bon voyage. Happy landings.”

Emerson slipped over the side, and even in the almost total blackness Riley could see that he was controlling his descent. Emerson was toned muscle on a lean frame. And he was skilled on the rope. She heard him drop to the cavern floor, heard a murmured conversation between him and Günter.

“Riley, you're next,” Emerson called from below. “Pull the rope up and attach it the way I showed you. Remember to switch your headlamp on when you go over the edge and begin to drop.”