The Jefferson Key

FIVE

HALE SAT IN ADVENTURE’S MAIN SALON AND NOTICED THEY’D veered west, leaving open ocean behind and entering the sound. What had been blue-gray water now turned coffee-colored, thanks to a steady flow of sediment brought east by the meandering Pamlico River. Log-hewn canoes, pole-propelled periaugers, and shoal-draft steamboats all once plied these waters. But so had sloops, corsairs, and frigates, manned by opportunists who’d called the densely wooded shores of the isolated Carolina colony home. The Pamlico comprised some of the most complex waterways on the planet. A vast array of oyster-rock islets, tidal marshes, hammocks, and sloughs. Its farthest coasts were stunted by dangerous capes whose names-Lookout and Fear-warned of tragedy, the open sea beyond so treacherous it had earned the title Graveyard of the Atlantic.

He’d been born and raised nearby, as had Hales back to the early part of the 18th century. He learned to sail as a boy and was taught how to avoid the ever-changing shoals and negotiate the dangerous currents. Ocracoke Inlet, which they’d just traversed, was where in November 1718 Black Beard himself had finally been cut down. Locals still spoke of both him and his lost treasure with reverence.

He stared down at the table where the two documents lay.

He’d brought them with him, knowing that once the matter of his accountant had been resolved, he would need to turn his attention back to a mistake made by Abner Hale, his great-great-grandfather, who’d tried, on January 30, 1835, to assassinate President Andrew Jackson.

The first time in history that a sitting president’s life had been directly threatened.

And Jackson’s response to that attempt-a handwritten letter to Abner, now sheathed in plastic-had tortured Hales ever since. So you have at last yielded to traitorous impulses. Your patience is no longer restrained. I am content with that. This shall be war, as great as when the martial hosts of this nation are summoned to tented fields. You have clamored for a fight and I shall not skulk in a corner now that the first shot has been fired. Because I would not yield to your advances, accede to your demands, or bow in your presence, my life is deemed unnecessary? You dare send an assassin? To retreat from such a gross offense would be shameful. My feelings are most alive and, I assure you, so am I. Your assassin spends his days muttering nonsense. You chose this servant well. He shall be adjudged insane and secreted away, not a single person ever believing a word he might utter. No evidence exists of your conspiracy, but we both are aware that you convinced the man named Richard Lawrence to aim those pistols. At this moment, when my feelings are thus so alive, I should do violence to them if I did not hasten your downfall. Yet I have been perplexed as to a response. And so, after seeking counsel and guidance from some who are wiser than I, a proper course has been chosen. My object in making this communication is to announce that what legal authority existed to shield your thievery is gone. I have stripped all reference to your letter of marque from the official congressional reports. When you approach another president and ask that your letter be respected, he will not be bound by the law as I have been. To increase your torment, and thus to prolong the agony of your helpless situation, I have not destroyed the authority. That would have been my course, I confess, but others have convinced me that such certainty might make your situation so helpless that it would inspire further acts of desperation. Since you adore secrets and plot your life along a path in the shadows, I offer you a challenge that should suit you. The sheet attached to this letter is a code, one formulated by the esteemed Thomas Jefferson. I am told he thought it to be the perfect cipher. Succeed in learning its message and you will know where I have hidden what you crave. Fail and you remain the pathetic traitors that you are today. I must admit, I like this course much better. I shall soon retire home to Tennessee and the final years of my life, awaiting the day when I will sleep beside my beloved Rachel. My sincerest hope is that the unmanly course ascribed to you shall be your ruin and that I shall live to enjoy that day.

Andrew Jackson

Hale stared at the second sheet, it also encased in plastic.

His family had tried to solve Jefferson’s cipher for 175 years. Experts had been hired. Money had been spent.

But the key had eluded them.

He heard footsteps approaching from the ship’s forward and his personal secretary entered the salon.

“Switch on the television.”

He saw the look of concern in the man’s eyes.

“It’s bad.”

He found the remote and activated the screen.

MALONE FINISHED HIS APPLE AND KEPT THE NEWSPAPER OPEN before him. He noticed no story about any presidential trip to New York. Odd. Presidents usually appeared with much fanfare. He should leave the hotel, and quickly. Every second he lingered was making the effort that much more difficult. He knew the Grand Hyatt lived up to its name, a massive, multistoried complex that thousands of people streamed into and out of twenty-four hours a day. Doubtful that the police or Secret Service could seal off every access, at least not this fast. Two televisions played in the room, and he saw how cellphone cameras had indeed captured images-but thankfully, most were blurred messes. No word as yet on Daniels’ condition. People chattered about the attack, remarking how it had occurred right below them. A few had heard the bangs and seen the rocket. The two suits with radios on the other side of the lounge kept their attention below, talking into their radios.

He stood to leave.

The agents abandoned the window and rushed straight for him. He braced himself to react, noting that the thick wooden table supporting the apples and newspapers could be used to break their advance.

Of course, they carried guns and he didn’t, so a table would go only so far.

The two agents brushed past him and bolted out the door, straight for the elevators, one of which they entered when an open car arrived.

He heaved a silent sigh, then left, pressing the DOWN button, deciding to take the direct approach.

Straight out the main doors.