Porter’s shoulders melted beneath his beaten suede jacket.
“Too busy looking for you,” she said. She smelled blossoms but had to be mistaken. Who smelled flowers on rainy days?
“Atkins did the dating?” said Porter.
“I didn’t trust her. Not after everything with the KM-2 codex. I talked one of her doctoral candidates into doing it for me.”
“Do…you have it here?” He eyed her portfolio.
Alred unzipped the top and drew out the ancient book, folded like a fan, so similar to the codex they’d recently lost. The shade of the paper was slightly darker.
Porter took it with slow hands, sliding it out of the plastic bag protecting it.
* * *
The man in the Volvo jolted forward, ramming the telephoto lens into his windshield.
He swore and fumbled with the instrument before banging it on his face where it should have stayed.
Pinching his lips together, he held his breath.
Click-click. Click-click-click-click-click-click-click….
* * *
Porter turned the pages while his tongue dried between his parted teeth.
The marrow of every bone in his system froze in waves. First in his hands, then from his arms to his shoulders, and quickly down his back.
“This is what we got out of Ulman’s secret security box,” said Alred, “I was waiting to tell you, but circumstances never permitted it.”
His fingers and wrists shivered with building emotion. His voice came out as a whisper. “You gave Stratford KM-2 to throw them off.”
Alred nodded.
“I…could kiss you!” he said in the same hiss, his eyes great ovals with pupils aimed at the dusty record.
She shook her head.
Three manuscripts all from the same find. Four, counting the one Peterson had cooked! This…the last….
“The bank box also contained a paper of Ulman theories and observations at the Kalpa site.
That
, I have read. It’s enough to stop
your
heartbeat.”
Breath escaped Porter’s lungs as if he’d been punched in the sternum.
“He wanted it published,” Alred said, “but-but evidently decided to do it himself when he got home from Guatemala. Of course I’m guessing. His wife has no academic blood in her whatsoever and would rather hide in a corner than shake a man’s hand, so sending her the essay would only add further stress to matters. I get the impression Dr. Ulman sent previous works to other parties for entering into professional journals or magazines, but they never made it.”
“Mrs. Ulman said she’d handed everything over to the FBI,” said Porter.
“Must have given them other things Ulman mailed home. We’ll never know what those artifacts were. I still wonder what the Bureau—”
“They weren’t FBI,” Porter said, putting KM-3 back in the bag, while his eyes scanned for unfavorable persons.
The sky hung gray and wet, turning the whole world a dim color.
He never looked at the blue Volvo down the road.
* * *
Click-click-click-click-click.
* * *
“How do you know?” Alred looked into his squinting eyes.
Porter grabbed her arm. “Ulman
is
alive!
We
have to find him…before he gets killed.”
7:51 p.m. PST
“Porter, we have to talk…now!”
The ex-doctoral candidate turned to see Dr. Kinnard holding himself firmly in the doorway of the little office. The professor had 8 x 10 inch photographs in his hand.
“You don’t seem like one bearing gifts to lift my burden,” Porter said placing his copy of
Sumerian Ostraca
in a brown box on his desk. With one hand he took three gray volumes with the title
Hebrew Eschatology
off the floor and put them on top of the first book. His black copy of the Tanach followed. He eyed the other filled containers, all four with the familiar word ‘U-Haul’ in bold letters on the side.
Kinnard lowered his voice and his brow. “I don’t care how you got it, but you’d better hand it over to the University.”
Porter glanced at him with a wiry smile. “My new Stone Edition of the
Tanach
? Are the Aryans persecuting the Jews again?”
Kinnard flashed the pictures.
“What are those supposed to be?” said Porter unworried. He stopped loading to look anyway.
Three shots. All details of Porter examining KM-3 on the street where Alred had caught up to him. But she was outside every frame. Who had taken the pictures? Who’d doctored the prints to show only Porter with KM-3?
“Where should I go, you think,” Porter said, returning to his packing. From the corner of the white room, he grabbed eight old Loeb Library books with red covers. “I admit my ignorance when it comes to applying for a Ph.D.—after failing the first. Suppose any school will take me? I can’t believe I waited so long to get it done,” he laughed to himself, because there was nothing else to do.
“You hear what I said?” Kinnard came into the room as Porter went to the far side of his desk, keeping his eyes on the papers and books on the floor. He carried two volumes by Michael Grant, one from Joseph Campbell, and an old E.A.W. Budge book.
Shuffling through the menagerie, gathering files in semi-organized fashion, Porter stuffed the rest of the box. He held a copy of Wardarcher Tiel’s,
Merenptah
, in the air and eyed it as if he’d never seen it before. “Whoops. Bet I have a major fine to pay for this baby.” With a smile, he looked at his supervisor. “Disagreed with the old man anyway.” He set it on the corner of his desk as Kinnard shook his head.
“In order to be successful in the world, Porter, you need to learn the rules of the game!”
“You know I don’t play sports, Kinnard,” said the student. Porter pulled on the roll of packing tape, and it screamed like a mugged woman in an echoing alley. The box sealed, he grabbed another and taped the bottom before loading it.
“I want the book!” said Kinnard, slamming his hand on the table.
Porter looked up, his face as bland as it could be. “
You
want it? What would you do with it?”
Kinnard’s tongue stuck to the bottom of his open mouth.
“Let me know one thing,” Porter said, packing as fast as a bank robber would if stashing money into his duffel bag. “I thought I saw sincerity in your eyes when you first gave me KM-2. Were you really helping me…or just giving me something to run around with since I had so little time anyway? Did you have any intention of letting me do a dissertation on Ulman’s find?”
“I tried to assist you,” said Kinnard taking off his dark-rimmed glasses.
“And then what happened,” said Porter. “When did you lose heart? When the other professors shoved you in a different direction?”
“It was a race that couldn’t be won.”
“Were you blackmailed? Coerced?” Porter said, looking at him with stabbing eyes. “Was there someone involved…that wasn’t Stratford staff?”
Gazing at Porter as if his mind had been read, Kinnard shut his mouth.
“Then I hold no blame on you.” Porter went back to packing, finding papers written by other students which he should have read and corrected by now. He left them next to the library book.
“You’re in a lot of trouble,” said Kinnard, his voice low and serious. “Where is the codex.”
“See it here?” said Porter waving an arm but not turning up his eyes.
“You are not listening to me, are you.” Kinnard leaned on the card-table desk, which rocked beneath his weight. “You could go to jail for this. You could be killed.”
Grinning again, Porter said, “Oh is that all? I thought you’d say something that would get my heart going. I’m already desensitized to those things, you see. Well, maybe you don’t. We’re driving on different tracks now.”
“I gave you Ulman’s manuscript,” said Kinnard, “I’m responsible.”
“You’re afraid they’ll kill you?” Porter flopped in his screaming chair to be closer to the stacks on the ground to his left, which he immediately reached for.
The heater came on.
“You don’t see how serious this is,” said Kinnard.
“Better than you realize!” Porter almost chuckled, tossing
The Dead Sea Scroll Companion
into the box, followed by
Civilization Before Egypt and Mesopotamia
, and the new one volume edition of the
Oxford English Dictionary
. “So who are
they
?”
Kinnard put his glasses back on his face and stood straight.
Porter stopped and looked at his teacher. “You taught me yourself that throughout history there have been shadow parties, gangs who have operated in the background, people who started small, but through secrets and careful planning rose to prominent power until they ran the government alone. Pharaohs, Roman Emperors…they’ve all been oppressed by these hidden sects built up for power and financial gain.” He lifted his eyebrows. “I agreed with you, remember? Great discussion we had that day. Lasted way into the night.”
“Give me the manuscript,” said Kinnard.
“How do you know I have it? Who took those photographs?”
“Where is the document, Porter!” Kinnard said, trembling. “I know you have it—everyone knows you have it!” He slowed his words but the energy stayed. “Shrapnel will fly until you hand it over. A lot of people will get hurt. I hate these people. I had to deal with them in the war, and I thought they were all gone.”
“‘Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to—’”
Kinnard wiped his hands on his blue slacks. “I’m through running around! I already told you this project is terminated. If you still don’t get it, Porter…you can consider your time at this university finished.”
“There’s a threat!” said Porter with a relaxed smirk. “That mean I get credit without the dissertation?”
Kinnard slammed two fists into the desktop. “It means you’re done, Porter! The University doesn’t know you anymore!”
* * *
Knocking on his forehead as if it were a door, Porter moaned and stared at the computer screen.
He typed the e-mail address, cocking his head, hoping it was right. If it wasn’t, there wasn’t anything else he could do.
Date: Wed, 30 April 1997 8:45:19 -0500 (PST)
To: [email protected]
From: Tomodachi
Subject: Immediate assistance
Stan,
I’m in the computer lab at Stratford University. Don’t reply to this message.
I need your help.
I don’t know if there is anything you can do. You’re a busy man but you are in the FBI so maybe you’ll have some ideas.
I’ve fallen into a very messy hole out here.
About three months ago, Dr. Christopher Ulman found a city in the highlands of Guatemala. Somewhere inside, he came upon a library with books written in some early form of Mayan. One of the codices has both this proto-Mayan and, though you won’t believe it, Reformed Egyptian.
One of the books fell into my hands. I translated half of it before it was taken from me. Albeit, the document came into the country illegally, that’s not what worries me. Someone else has been hovering around me like a silent cloud ready to snap out lightning.
I’ve already dodged bullets, if you see what I’m getting at.
I’m sorry, I can’t stay here and type.
They are after me again.
This is worse than I thought, but you can see the implications. This is a solid link to the Book of Mormon. I can’t put it down. Even though they are kicking me out of the University because of it. What would my father think….
They won’t give me my Ph.D.
If you can come to California, please do. I need to talk to you in person.
Gotta go.
John D. Porter
(If you don’t come, the
D
might stand for
Dead.
I’m serious. You won’t be able to contact me, so don’t try. Use your oh-so-special FBI skills to find me. I’ll be watching for you.)
* * *
9:21 p.m.
With the funny feeling that he shouldn’t, Porter left the motel room to see if the liquor store two buildings away had pistachios. He would dream they came from the Near East and relish the days when he’d pondered entering the exciting life of a professor discussing ancient texts in a squalid room.
The shadow in the alley had a familiar voice, crisp like autumn leaves, clear like a train whistle far up a valley, old as mummy’s breath. “Living in motels will break you.”
Porter stopped and looked into the dark, lifting a hand to block the obstructing light from the street lamp attached to the wall of the brick building. “My card isn’t maxxed yet.”
“Easy to track you down when you use plastic to pay.”
“I’m out of cash, old man. It’s either the card, a bush, or back to my apartment,” said Porter stepping into the shadow to see the gentleman.
It was the same one at Bruno’s, the same guy in the nice suit of gray tweed at the other cafe across town who’d called himself Joseph Smith. Seemed to have a knack for catching up to Porter. He hadn’t realized it was such an easy job. He had to check his back more often.
“Oh, you’re a smart person, Mr. Porter, you learn quickly,” said Mr. Smith as if he could read minds or was cruelly sarcastic. “Tell me, young man…is there really such a thing as
truth
? Or is it just a word describing an abstract idea that doesn’t exist?”
“It’s real,” Porter said.
“Then why doesn’t anyone see it?”
“
You
do,” said Porter, trusting his instincts. The scent of short trees in the sidewalk blossomed around them. Some plants were determined to force spring upon the world, whether or not the sky cooperated. But it was still cold.