Blood of the Reich

27

Eldorado Mine, Cascade Mountains

September 6, Present Day

R ominy plummeted, slid, and dropped again. It happened so suddenly, in such disorienting darkness, that it was over before she could scream. She and Jake tumbled into a tangle at the base of some mine shaft, the rotting wood of an old lid piled around them. As her wits returned from the blast of adrenaline, the real fear began. What if they couldn’t get out?

“Rominy! Are you okay?”

“I can move.” She groaned, but when she tested her limbs they all seemed to work, thank God. “Barely.” She coughed. “I’m covered with dirt, my body aches, and I can barely see. I think my knees are getting scraped down to the bone.”

“I’ve got more bandages.”

Dim light filtered down from where the cave-in had occurred above. It was like looking at the top of a well.

“You know, you’re the worst date I’ve ever had.”

Jake coughed, too. “Ditto.”

She looked around. They’d tumbled at least forty feet and were in a wider cavity about ten feet high, which meant it was impossible to jump up to the narrow tunnel they’d fallen down. The walls and ceiling were rock, the floor dirt and rubble, and the darkness in every direction but up was profound. “This is very bad, Jake.” She tried to keep any tremor from her voice. “What now?”

He stood up, weaving a moment from dizziness before straightening and brushing himself off. “I’m guessing you found where X marks the spot. Maybe Great-grandpa came back to be some kind of hermit miner.”

“Great.” She wobbled to a stand, too. Yep, nothing broken. Not that it mattered if they couldn’t get back out. “It didn’t occur to him to dig sideways?”

“I don’t know. Maybe this is an old pioneer mine he found.”

“So why is it on his fingerprint map?”

“You’re asking all the right questions. Fortunately for us, I’m a Boy Scout, remember?” They’d fallen with their packs and he rooted inside for a moment before digging out a flashlight. “I’ll keep the other in reserve. Let’s see where this thrill ride goes.” The beam was as welcome as coffeehouse neon on a cold Seattle night. Gloom shrank back to reveal a horizontal shaft that must run toward the cliff face they’d spied from above; the old horizontal shaft would have opened to a view of Eldorado.

Mine timbers at the ceiling sagged from age. In a hundred feet, the tunnel ended disappointingly in a wall of rubble and snapped bracing.

“Cave-in,” Rominy said. “This place feels very unsafe.”

“You’ve got all the instincts of an investigative reporter.” He played his light on the blockage and then on the ceiling. Back and forth he shone the beam, like a paint roller. “Look at those streaks. Soot radiating from an explosion.”

“Which means?”

“That maybe this mine didn’t cave in, but was sealed. Dynamite, and boom. That closes the front door. We fell through the back.”

“So no way out.”

“Maybe there was a rope or ladder at one time. Would have rotted since the end of the war, of course.” He kept staring at the ceiling. “Looks pretty firm to me, but I’m not a mining engineer. Probably best to go back to where we fell in while we figure out what to do. But, you know, I don’t get it.” He sounded more puzzled than worried. “What did Hood expect us to find here?”

“My guess is an old gold claim,” Rominy said. “Maybe he thought his heirs could make something of this, but no way today. Too many environmental restrictions. I think we’re on federal land in the exact middle of nowhere.”

“Which means he definitely thought he had children, or a child. That’s interesting, isn’t it, because there’s nothing in the records about one living up here. So where was Great-grandma? Mystery upon mystery.”

“Jake, the mystery is how we’re going to get out of here.”

“Maybe I can lift you up until you can get a grip in that shaft.”

“I’m not much of a climber.”

“Consider the alternative.”

And then Rominy stumbled on something that gave way with an audible crack, an object softer than rubble on the floor. “Oh, Geez! What’s that? There’s something creepy, Jake.”

He shone the light. “Yuck. A shoe.”

A man’s dress shoe had been kicked out from the rubble by her stumble. There was a gleam inside. Barrow bent to peer.

“With a foot attached. You broke the bone.”

“Oh, my God. I’m going to be throw up.”

“It’s just a corpse, Rominy. Dust to dust.”

“Jake, let’s go. I’ll climb, I promise.”

“No, this is important. Great-grandpa led us to a body. The ankle bone is attached to the shin bone…” He sing-songed, playing the light. “There.” A bone projected from the loose rock, and near it was another shoe. “Hello. Looks like we really found someone.”

“This is so sick!”

“What if this is your illustrious ancestor?”

“Dunnigan said they found him in the cabin.”

“That’s right. So, in that case, who’s this?”

“I don’t think I want to know. I can’t take looking at bones, not when we’re trapped like this.”

“We can’t just walk away, girl.” He squatted and calmly began throwing aside rock. “Yep, there’s a whole dude in here.” What was wrong with him that he could just dig up the dead like that?

“Isn’t this desecration?”

“My guess is he’s been here since 1945 and either the explosion or subsequent rockfall covered him up. The poor guy has never had a decent burial. Maybe we can arrange one.”

“But what’s he doing here?”

“That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Here, shine the light, can you?”

The flesh had long since rotted away, thank goodness, but the skeleton was still enclosed in shreds of decayed clothing. There was no obvious injury to the skull, and no indication of how the man had died. It was a man, because the other shoe was male as well. The clothing looked like… the ruin of a business suit. Out here?

“Not really outfitted for mining, was he?” Jake asked.

“What was he doing in the woods dressed like that?”

“We need identification.” The flashlight danced. “Eureka!” He crouched again and threw aside more rocks to uncover a pack. “Look. Old oilskins to keep out the weather.” He pulled it out, ignoring the mold and grime. Bones fell aside, fabric deflated. “And inside… Ah. A leather satchel. Maybe this is what your calendar map was directing us to, Rominy.”

Despite herself, she was getting excited again. She played the light over what Jake held. “What’s inside?”

He opened the satchel carefully. There were papers, documents with script in a foreign alphabet, curious diagrams, and maps. He carefully unfolded one. Central Asia. They could still read it clearly in the flashlight beam: Tibet. “Hallelujah,” said Jake.

“So it is my great-grandfather?”

“In a business suit. A burial suit.” He rocked back on his heels. “Was he a suicide? He makes obscure clues, hikes in his funeral best to an old mine, and uses dynamite to seal himself in? Man, that’s grim. I don’t get it.”

“But they said they found him in the spring of ’46. Dead of natural causes.”

“Yeah. And this happy camper… has all ten fingers. Look.”

“So it’s not Benjamin Hood.”

“Or that’s not Grandpa’s finger.”

She shook her head. “I’m more confused than ever.”

“Me, too. But I think this is some other guy, who maybe Grandpa sealed in. So who is it?” He began digging through the leather satchel, looking for a clue.

Rominy had spied something else, caught among the tendrils of decayed fabric and old ribs. It was a much smaller bundle. She didn’t want to touch, but curiosity animated her arm. Besides, once they identified the body maybe they could concentrate on escape. Squeamishly she reached in, snagged the packet from the bones, and pulled it out.

Jake looked up from his papers. “What you got?”

“His wallet or something.”

“Open it up.”

It was a leather folder of the kind that carried official identification, stuck shut with moisture, grime, and time. Gingerly, the old leather cracking, she spread it apart. “It’s some kind of government credentials,” she read slowly in the beam of the flashlight. “A badge. Office of Strategic Services.”

“OSS? That’s the war’s predecessor to the CIA.” He frowned. “What was an overseas operative doing here?”

“There’s a name, too, I’ve never heard of. Have you?” She held it out.

He looked, his head next to hers.

Special Agent Duncan Hale.