The Last Templar

Chapter 46

Tess stopped in her tracks the second she stepped into the meeting room. She'd been happy enough to hear from Reilly after three days of frustrating silence, three days during which she was finding it increasingly difficult to dodge her mother's insistent calls for her to join them in Arizona.

She had also started to feel antsy; she realized that the investigation had taken over her life, and 102

that, regardless of what Reilly advised, this wasn't something she could walk away from.

And now, seeing what was sitting on the conference table, any notion of her walking away from this was dead and buried.

There, built of solid, transparent plastic, was an exact replica of the multigeared rotor encoder.

She could barely manage to bring out the words. "How . . . ?"

She looked up at Reilly in utter amazement. He had obviously planned it that way; his call, asking her to come down to Federal Plaza, had mentioned nothing other than a mundane "going over a couple of things with you."

She was suddenly aware of all the other faces in the room. Jansson, Aparo, Gaines, a few others she didn't recognize—and the monsignor. She looked again at Reilly.

He just flashed a restrained, brief smile. "I thought you might want to be here for this." He pointed at one of the men she hadn't met before. The man was distributing a stapled printout to everyone in the room. "That's Terry Kendricks. He built it."

"Well, my team and I," Kendricks quickly interjected, smiling effusively at Tess. "Good to meet you."

Tess was finding it difficult to tear her eyes away from the machine. She perused the printout in her hands, which confirmed her hopes. She looked up at Kendricks.

"It works?"

"Oh yes. It all fell into place perfectly. In Latin, of course. At least, that's what I'm told by the team of linguists who translated it."

Tess still didn't get it. She turned imploringly to Reilly. "But . . . How?"

"Everything gets X-rayed when it goes through Customs," he explained. "Even when it's on loan from the Holy See."

Tess had to sit down. Her knees felt like they were about to cave in under her. With slightly trembling hands, she studied the document he'd handed her. Eagerly, she concentrated on the neatly printed words.

It was a letter, dated in May of 1291.

"That's the time of the fall of Acre," she exclaimed. "The last city the Crusaders held."

She turned her attention back to the letter and began to read, feeling the thrill of connecting directly over the centuries with men whose exploits had become the stuff of legend.

"It is with great sadness," the letter began, "that I inform you that Acre is no longer under our protection. We departed the city as darkness fell, our hearts heavy as we watched it burn ..."