Hunt at The Well Of Eternity

Chapter 3

Gabriel figured it was best to get out of New York as quickly as possible, and Michael knew better than to try to talk him out of it.

Taking the flag and the bottle fragment with him, Gabriel made a quick stop at the Discoverers League to change out of the tuxedo and throw a few things in a bag. He was accustomed to traveling light.

The heaviest thing he put in the bag was his old Colt .45 double-action Peacemaker with well-worn walnut grips. Legend had it that the gun had once belonged to a notorious Western shootist, although the owner changed from Billy the Kid to Bat Masterson to Wyatt Earp depending on which Old West expert you talked to.

Gabriel didn’t know if any of the stories were true. All he cared about was that the revolver was a fine old weapon in top-notch shape, and that it packed plenty of stopping power.

Wearing a broken-in brown leather bomber jacket against the late-night chill along with brown boots, khakis, and a dark blue work shirt, Gabriel threw his bag into the backseat of the convertible he kept in the League’s garage and headed for the small private airfield on Long Island where several aircraft belonging to the Hunt Foundation were hangered. It was well after midnight by now, but there was still a considerable amount of traffic on the Queensboro Bridge.

Not so much, though, that Gabriel didn’t notice the headlights coming up fast behind him as he made the turn onto the on-ramp.

His right foot increased its pressure on the accelerator. The convertible didn’t look like anything special, but Gabriel had souped up the engine so that it responded with a smooth, powerful purr and shot ahead.

At the same time, keeping his right hand on the wheel, he reached into his jacket with his left hand and pulled a cell phone from his shirt pocket. He didn’t have to look to see what he was doing as he flipped it open and thumbed a speed-dial number.

“Michael,” he said into the phone when his brother answered, “lock the brownstone down now.”

“Gabriel?” Michael’s voice sounded fuzzy, as if the phone call had dragged him out of sleep. “What’s wrong?”

“Just get the place locked down, then I’ll tell you.”

“Are you in trouble again?”

The fast-moving headlights behind him had cut the gap between the cars by a considerable margin, and Gabriel wasn’t halfway across the bridge yet. He weaved around a van and heard tires screeching and brakes squealing behind him. His pursuers were taking chances, trying to catch up to him before he reached the other end of the bridge. They probably hoped to force him off into the East River.

“No more than usual,” Gabriel said.

“Damn it,” Michael said. “Hang on.” Gabriel heard some shuffling on the other end, then the triple beep of the security system being activated. “All right,” Michael said a second later. “I’m locked in. Now, what can I do to help you?”

“Nothing.”

“Where are you?”

“Queensboro Bridge.” Gabriel sped up even more, but the headlights were gaining on him. The vehicle, a big black SUV, loomed behind him and rammed into the convertible’s rear end with a bone-jarring jolt. The car skidded toward the railing, high above the river, but Gabriel coolly steered out of the skid and regained control. “Somebody’s trying to keep me from leaving town.”

“My God! Are you all—”

“I’m fine, but I’ve got to go. Stay inside until you hear from me. Have your guys check all deliveries, even food.”

Michael started to say something else, but Gabriel was already flipping the phone shut. He stowed it away in his pocket and got both hands on the wheel again just as the SUV pulled up on the convertible’s right rear corner. It rammed hard into the fender and sent the smaller vehicle into a spin.

The other drivers on the bridge had seen that something was wrong and had pulled out of the way of the speeding cars. Which was good in terms of reducing the odds that he’d hit anyone, but it also meant there was nothing to stop his spin. He kept his left hand on the wheel, for what little good it did, and reached into the backseat with his right. He’d left the top of his bag unzipped, and his fingers wrapped around the butt of the Colt.

He jerked the gun free as the car slid to a stop across two lanes, facing the lights of Roo sevelt Island. The driver’s side was pointing toward the SUV, which had braked sharply after the collision. It picked up speed now, though, and Gabriel realized that the driver was planning to T-bone the convertible.

Gabriel tried cranking the ignition, but the convertible’s engine had died. He shifted the revolver from his right hand to his left and thrust it out the window. He leveled the Colt at the oncoming SUV and squeezed off three rounds as he continued twisting the key in the ignition with his other hand.

All three slugs smacked into the SUV’s windshield, but they just starred the glass and didn’t even come close to shattering it. Still trying to start the car, Gabriel lowered his aim and put two shots into the SUV’s grille. That didn’t do any good, either. The damn thing had to be armored.

Just about what you would expect from professionals like the men who had raided the museum.

The engine finally caught. Gabriel slammed the convertible into reverse. Smoke rose from the tires as the car peeled backward. The SUV was practically on top of it already and clipped the front bumper as it rocketed past.

Gabriel dropped the Colt on the seat beside him and kept backing, twisting the wheel as he did so.

Now he was behind the SUV, which had screeched to a stop inches from the railing. He floored the accelerator and started crowding the other car’s right rear. Sparks flew in the night as metal clashed. The SUV’s rear end slewed to the left and clipped the railing. It began to drag against the metal beams. He considerer ramming the SUV, trying to push it off into the water, but the convertible was considerably lighter than the other vehicle—it wasn’t likely to work. And anyway, Gabriel had a plane to catch.

Gabriel whipped the wheel to the right and cut across several lanes. He kept the gas pedal pushed down as far as it would go and shot down the slope to the foot of the bridge.

The darkness of Queens Bridge Park loomed to his left. He sent the convertible skidding into a left turn on Vernon Boulevard and then almost immediately turned right on a smaller street. No lights appeared in his rearview mirror. Evidently the men who’d been trying to kill him weren’t prepared to follow him through the side streets of Queens.

He kept making turns for several minutes, just to throw off any possible pursuit, then cut back south toward the Long Island Expressway. His nerves were steady despite the attempt on his life. It wasn’t his first. But he heaved a sigh of relief anyway.

Then he reached for his cell phone.

“Everything’s quiet here,” Michael said. “Are you okay?”

“Just annoyed. Oh, and the convertible took some damage. I’ll leave it at the airfield and you can have somebody pick it up tomorrow.”

“Of course. What happened?”

“Somebody in an SUV just tried to push me off the Queensboro Bridge. Our friends from earlier in the evening, I’d guess.”

“How did they find you?”

Gabriel felt a pang of anxiety for Mariella. “I’m guessing they forced Señorita Montez to tell them who she was trying to give her package to. That’s why I told you to lock everything down at the brownstone. If they found me, they can find you.”

“Well, they can find me,” Michael said, “but no one’s getting in without my say-so.”

“Good,” Gabriel said. “Don’t give it to any men in a black SUV.”

“Or any waiters,” Michael said.

Gabriel grinned as he drove through the night. “That’s right. Or any waiters.” He shut the phone off. The airstrip was near.

Michael had shown him on a map where the Battle of Olustee had been fought in 1864. The nearest town with an airport was St. Augustine, “the oldest European settlement on the North American continent,” the guidebook entry Gabriel had consulted said, “founded by Spanish explorers more than five hundred years ago.” He had called ahead to have the Foundation’s private jet readied for takeoff, so as soon as he’d filed a flight plan for St. Augustine, Gabriel got in the air.

When he was at cruising altitude and had switched the autopilot on, he was finally able to sit back and think about everything that had happened over the past several hours. He had certainly never expected so much excitement when he’d struggled into that monkey suit for the reception at the museum. At most he had thought that he might find some willing female companionship for a late supper and a few drinks after the reception, followed by…

Well, things hadn’t gotten anywhere near that far, Gabriel reflected. The most attractive woman he had met tonight was Mariella Montez, and their relationship had been brief, hectic, and filled with mystery and danger.

Not the worst start to an evening, Gabriel reflected, but the ending could’ve been better. No man likes seeing his prospective date carried off by a linebacker in livery.

He had no idea where Mariella was and preferred not to think too much about what was happening to her. The men who had carried her off were clearly the sort to stop at nothing to get what they wanted.

And what, exactly, was that? A tattered battle flag and an antique whiskey bottle? What made those two items so special?

The flag and the piece of the bottle were in Gabriel’s bag. He went back into the jet’s passenger cabin, leaving the plane to fly itself, and got them out to study them. He looked at the bottle first.

There was nothing special about it that he could see. The printing on the label had faded with time, of course, but it was all still legible. He could still make out the two pine trees that flanked the name OLD PINEBARK. He turned the piece of glass over and peered through it at the back of the label, just in case something had been written or drawn on it before it was pasted on the bottle.

Nothing.

He set the piece aside and unfolded the flag, spreading it out on a table under a good light. The picture in the center of the flag had a lot of detail worked into it. Behind the cavalryman on the rearing horse was a large field of some sort.

A cotton field, of course. There were even tiny figures in the field. Slaves. Gabriel’s mouth tightened.

More men on horse back galloped over the hills to the right of the figure in the foreground, near the bullet hole. A hunt, perhaps? To the left was the plantation house, with more tiny figures in front of it. Southern belles in hoop skirts. It was like a scene out of Gone With the Wind.

He sat down in one of the cushioned seats around the table and leaned back. How had these artifacts of the Old South wound up in the hands of the beautiful young woman who had brought them to the Metropolitan Museum to give to Michael Hunt?

He didn’t have an answer. And he had no idea if any answers would be waiting for him in Florida. It was just the only place he had to start looking.

Gabriel stared at the flag until his eyes hurt, feeling like there was something there he wasn’t seeing. After a while he shook his head and gave up. It might be better to come back to it later, he decided, and study the situation with fresher eyes…and a fresher brain, to boot. It had been a long night and he hadn’t had any sleep so far, not to mention having to fight for his life several times. And he still had miles to go.

Florida loomed up ahead in the darkness as hereturned to the cockpit and the jet continued to arrow southward. The Sunshine State.

Maybe it would shine some light on the ugly mystery that had already cost a dozen people their lives.