The Medusa Stone

Arlington, Virginia

Because Mercer had no way of knowing if phone lines had been tapped or his home bugged at the same time the tape was delivered, he spent the day in Tiny’s cluttered back office, a room just bigger than a phone booth and plastered with horse-racing pictures. While he worked, Paul kept him supplied with coffee and sandwiches. Mercer told Paul everything, and the former jockey agreed that in a situation like Harry’s kidnapping, involving the police wasn’t the right move.

Mercer did place a call to Dick Henna, and they agreed to meet later that night. Mercer suspected he would be tailed but had a plan for shaking them while not drawing attention to the fact. Much of what he did during the afternoon could have been accomplished at his place, but Mercer hated the idea of working under a microscope, and as he made his preparations for going to Africa, there were a few details he wanted to keep to himself. It was a little past four when he was ready to tell Selome Nagast and Hyde that he would go to Eritrea after all.

“Embassy of Eritrea, how may I direct your call?” The receptionist’s accent was thick.

“Selome Nagast, please.”

Mercer waited fifteen seconds as the woman checked her directory. “I am sorry, sir, but there is no one here with that name.”

“Are you sure?” Mercer realized it was a stupid question.

“Yes, sir.”

“Is it possible she works at the embassy but doesn’t have a phone listing?” Mercer asked hopefully but a niggling doubt was forming in the back of his head.

“We have a new voice-mail system,” the receptionist explained. “Even temporary employees can receive messages.”

“Thank you.” Mercer kept the suspicion out of his voice and dialed Prescott Hyde. He wondered if his dismissal of Selome Nagast as Harry’s kidnapper had been premature.

“I’m surprised to hear back from you, Dr. Mercer. You made it clear yesterday that you aren’t interested in our venture.”

“Let’s just say I’ve had a change of heart. I’m on board now one hundred percent and wanted you to be the first to know.” Mercer said nothing about Selome. At this point, any information he had was a weapon, and now wasn’t the time to use it. “I’ve already started working on the project. I’ve got heavy equipment en route from South Africa, three D-11 dozers, a couple of big front loaders, six Terex dump trucks, and a Caterpillar 5130 hydraulic shovel. All of the iron is leased for six months except the 5130, which Eritrea is going to have to buy.”

“Hold on there. I’m with Selome right now and you’re on a speaker phone. She’s shaking her head something fierce.”

“Dr. Mercer, I can’t authorize any of that. It’s just too much money.” Selome’s voice sounded distant over the speaker connection.

Somehow he’d expected her there. It only deepened his suspicions.

“Listen, you two wanted this project in the first place. If I’m going to get results, it’s got to be done my way or not at all,” Mercer said sharply. “I didn’t set this six-week rule, you did. If I’m expected to find anything, I’m going to need to move a lot of dirt. I’ve got a pretty good lease package for us, and if need be, I can get a sales contract on the excavator for when we’re finished with it. That’ll save you a couple million bucks. You’re lucky — my first idea was to bring in a walking dragline with a forty-million-dollar price tag, but we’d lose too much time with its on-site assembly. As it is, the 5130 will take two weeks to put together once it’s shipped in.”

“You don’t understand. We just can’t do it this way,” Selome protested. “I can’t guarantee your safety if you present that kind of target.”

“By the time the equipment rolls in, I’ll have pinpointed the best site, and you’ll only have to protect a single camp. From what I understand, nearly every Eritrean over the age of thirty has a military background, so surely you can muster a protective force? When I’m doing the actual prospecting, I’ll basically be on my own, so you won’t have to worry about me.”

“We wanted something much more low-key,” Selome said.

“You know what she means,” Hyde broke in. “A small team, minimal equipment and maximum secrecy. You’re talking about bringing in an army.”

“That’s what it’s going to take,” Mercer snapped. “I tried telling both of you that earlier. Selome, you said your government doesn’t want to get involved in a mining operation. You just wanted oversight, right? Well, consider this a trial run, but this is going to be my show. I’ll bring in the equipment I need and any people I want. If you don’t like it, if it isn’t what you expected, well, tough shit. This is what you got.”

Hyde finally broke the silence. “I guess we caught a tiger by the tail here. You’ve taken us both a little by surprise. We need some time to digest all of this.”

“You’ve got until Friday. That’s when I catch my flight to Eritrea. I plan to be in Asmara on Saturday morning and in the area of the search no later than Monday. I have a lot to go over with both of you before I leave, but that can wait until tomorrow. For now, you need to start working on getting me local support once I’m in country.”

“And if we take your earlier advice and abandon the project?”

There was no malice in Mercer’s voice when he responded. “Then I call a few friends, and within a month Eritrea will be dug up from one end to the other. I’ve got the contacts to guarantee your nation will be stripped clean with total impunity, and there is nothing either of you can do about it. I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.”

Mercer was panting when he hung up. He was gambling with Harry White’s life when he just bluffed Hyde and Selome, and it made him tremble. His nerves were fraying. He dialed the phone again.

“The Knight Medical Group,” a receptionist chirped.

“Is Terry there?”

“Dr. Knight is with a patient. May I have him call you back?”

“He’s playing video games in his office,” Mercer said. “Why don’t you give him a buzz and see if he’ll talk to me. This is Philip Mercer.”

A minute later Terrance Knight came on the line. “Great timing, Mercer. I was on the final level of Doom and I still have two men left.”

“I’m getting better. The last time I called it was coitus interuptus with one of your nurses.”

“Yeah. She sued me for sexual harassment a week after she discovered my sperm count is too low to knock her up.”

“That’s what I love about you, Terry. Your lurid attention to detail.” Mercer chuckled for the first time today. Terry Knight had been his personal physician ever since he moved to Washington. “I’m going to Africa again. I need a gamma globulin, a cholera booster, and I think I’m ready for another tetanus. And I’ll also need anti-malarial pills for a couple of months.”

“God, I love patients who know what they want. I’m going to give you an oral polio booster as well. The CDC in Atlanta posted warning for most of the continent. Since you’re headed to Africa, I’ll throw in a box of condoms while I’m at it. I doubt you’ll get lucky, so give them to a doctor before you come back. Anything else?”

Mercer laughed again. “Yeah, put together a med kit for me, nothing more elaborate than a couple of aspirin and a suture set. Write me a prescription for morphine and antibiotics.”

“You sure you don’t want a defibrillater and a portable CAT scanner?” Terry joked.

“No, not this time, but maybe later. I’ll be in sometime tomorrow for my shots.”

“Hey, I’m the doctor, I tell you when you come in, remember?”

“Go back to Doom, Terry.”

“Knowing you is doom.”

Mercer sat back as far as possible in the cramped office, rubbing his eyes. There were a million details to be considered, yet his thoughts kept returning to Harry White. He was a tough old bird, a war veteran, but he was eighty now. Mercer focused on what his friend must be going through and used that anger to shove aside the exhaustion and refocus.

Tiny ducked his head into the room. “How you doing?”

“I’ve been better.”

“I know what you mean. Do you realize today is the first day in twelve years that Harry hasn’t come in. God, I never realized how much I loved the bastard until he’d gone.”

Mercer straightened quickly. “He’s not gone, Paul. I’ll get him back. No matter what it takes, I’ll get him back.” His bravado sounded empty even in his own ears.

After Mercer had hung up on them, Prescott Hyde and Selome Nagast looked at each other, both having similar thoughts. Hyde’s office in Foggy Bottom was well appointed, more New York executive than government official, with oil paintings gracing the walls and an antique desk that had been in his family for generations. The carpet was a thicker pile than standard issue, and the matching wing-back chairs had been given to Hyde’s father by President Kennedy. Selome was sitting in one of the chairs, dressed in a simple business suit.

“Well, what do you think?” she asked, breaking the silence.

“I just don’t think we can afford it. He’s talking about millions of dollars, and the best we’ve been able to come up with is three hundred thousand and a lot of that is for Mercer’s consulting fee. I never thought about all the equipment we would need.” Hyde’s voice was dull with defeat. “We should call the whole thing off. It was a long shot at best anyway.”

“You call it off, and I’ll have a congressional committee knocking down your door within twelve hours. They would love to hear how you really obtained the Medusa pictures from the National Reconnaissance Office,” Selome hissed. “We can come up with the money somehow.”

“Buying those pictures from Donald Rosen cost me nearly everything I have. If my wife finds out I took a second mortgage on our house, she’ll kill me.”

“I don’t care about your domestic problems. We are going to need more money very soon if this is going to work. I’ve had expenses on my end, too. Do you hear me complaining about them? Mercer is the best shot we’ve got. We need to support him, and that means cash. We both have our sources. If need be, we can cut in a few more people. We’re talking about a billion-dollar payoff when this is done. That’s worth a little more risk.”

“This is getting out of control,” Hyde complained.

“No, it isn’t. We’re still in control. We just can’t allow ourselves to forget it, that’s all.”

“I don’t know…” Hyde’s voice trailed off.

“You don’t know what?” she accused. “We’re about to make a major discovery, one that will lift my country into the twenty-first century and provide jobs for thousands. Both of us will get what we want if we don’t lose perspective. We’ll get the money, Bill. We have to.”

“You’re right,” Hyde nodded slowly. “I just don’t like the fact that Philip Mercer has suddenly decided that he is in charge.”

“But that’s why we wanted him in the first place. Like he said — what he wants, he gets. It’s up to us to make sure it goes smoothly.”

“You scare me, Selome,” Hyde said suddenly, looking her directly in the eye, seeing beyond the beautiful shell to the person who lay beyond.

“Good.” She had Hyde caught between his greed and his fear of exposure. To her, he was inconsequential, a means to an end, but it was reassuring to know how easily he could be dominated. She knew it wouldn’t be possible, but she wanted to see what happened when Hyde’s wife discovered how her husband had lost their house. The greedy pig would get what he deserved.

Paul Gordon drove, the headlights of his aging Plymouth lancing into the night. Mercer sat next to him, sweating heavily in two bulky sweaters and a leather jacket, a pair of skateboarder’s knee pads over his jeans. He fingered the motorcycle helmet on his lap. Both the helmet and the pads had been borrowed from his neighbor’s son.

“About another mile.” Paul glanced at Mercer in the intimate confines of the car. “You sure you want to do this?”

On this deserted stretch of road deep in the heart of Virginia horse country, it was easy to spot the headlights of the car that had been following them since Arlington. “Yeah, Tiny, I’m sure. It’s the only way.”

“I’ll say some good words at your funeral,” the little man said, his eyes barely above the arc of the steering wheel. “We’re coming up on it now.”

Mercer put on the helmet, cinching it tight beneath his chin. Ahead, the road curved sharply, the turn traced on its outside by a white picket fence belonging to one of the numerous Farquar County farms. Just out of view, Mercer knew there was a thick copse of pines within feet of the uncoiling road.

Easing into the corner, Tiny used the emergency brake to avoid telltale brake lights. Mercer didn’t even take the time for a breath. He threw open the car’s door and allowed himself to be sucked out by the vehicle’s centrifugal force, landing hard on the macadam and tucking into a tight ball as his body began to roll. The darkness swallowed him as Tiny accelerated away, his car vanishing even before Mercer came to a stop. New scuffs marked his battered bomber jacket, and his shoulder ached from the first contact with the road. He scrambled into the woods, ducking into the underbrush as another car passed by. He caught a glimpse of two dark-complected men as the car continued in pursuit of Tiny’s Plymouth.

Mercer checked the luminous dial of his stainless watch and found that he only had a few minutes to wait. Standing at the side of the road, he massaged his sore shoulder with his free hand, the helmet dangling negligently from his other. There was a low moon, a pale glow hidden behind tumbling clouds, and the night insects made a steady, soothing rhythm.

Five minutes later, Mercer saw the approach of another set of headlights. He eased back into the woods, watching. The car stopped no more than twenty paces from where he was crouched.

“Come on, I haven’t got all night. Fay is pissed enough that I’m out here at all.” Dick Henna was behind the wheel of his wife’s car, a light blue Ford Taurus that had been brutalized by too many Washington rush hours. “I’ve been in New York for the past few days, and I’m leaving tomorrow for Los Angeles. I promised her that I’d be home for tonight, at least.”

Mercer broke away from the shadows and hopped into the passenger seat. Henna backed the car around and started toward the nation’s capital. “You’re lucky she likes you or I wouldn’t be out in the middle of nowhere playing cloak and dagger. She wanted to talk about buying another dog, a corgi of all things, and she’s not too pleased you called. This is worth it, right?”

“Harry’s been kidnapped,” Mercer said flatly.

“Jesus, Mercer, why didn’t you tell me on the phone.” Henna had swerved the car dangerously. “What happened?”

Dick Henna wasn’t an imposing man, just below average height, with a rounded stomach and a heavily jowled face. While Henna had achieved the highest position in the FBI, he hadn’t forgotten what it was like to be a field agent. He’d been on the streets for thirty years before being tapped to head the Bureau. His mind was sharp and he had instincts better than nearly anyone Mercer had ever met. It had been Henna’s recommendation during the Hawaii crisis that allowed Mercer to stop a secret operation code-named Vulcan’s Forge. The two had been friends ever since.

Mercer related the whole story, his narrative coming in a rush, for it was the first time he was able to speak about the horror he felt. He’d told Tiny the dry facts, but with Dick, he talked about his own feelings of responsibility.

“Marge Doyle mentioned you’d been in touch about Prescott Hyde,” Henna remarked when Mercer was done. “I can tell you right now, his days are numbered. Justice has a file on him about four inches thick. Nothing to indict him on, but certainly enough to get him out of State.”

“Pursue that, but I don’t think Hyde is behind Harry’s kidnapping.”

“Christ, Mercer! Of course he’s not.” Henna was startled that Mercer would so nonchalantly suspect an undersecretary of state. “The guy may be shady, but he’s not a violent criminal.”

Mercer’s voice was hard-edged, his emotions barely contained. “I’m talking about the abduction of my best friend, a total innocent, and right now I suspect everything and everyone. For now, I’ve got to believe it has a connection to a woman named Selome Nagast. She’s lied to me at least once, claiming to be affiliated with the Eritrean embassy when she’s not, yet she and Hyde are working together.”

“Is she Eritrean?”

“Either Eritrean or Ethiopian. Almost six feet tall, great body and a face that should be on the cover of fashion magazines. I’d like you to check her out. If she isn’t with the Eritreans, then who does she belong to?”

“And if that’s a blind alley?”

“I don’t know,” Mercer admitted. “I don’t have a Suspect B.”

“I’ll get a team into Harry’s place first thing in the morning, in case whoever grabbed him left physical evidence.”

“Don’t. The video made it clear that if I went to the authorities, they’d kill Harry immediately. I’m sure his place is being watched for just that reason.” There was something else on the tape that bothered Mercer, something either Harry or the kidnappers had said that didn’t make sense, but the answer wouldn’t come.

“I think we know what we’re doing.”

Mercer handed the videotape to Henna. He’d made a copy for himself but felt the FBI could do more with the original. “This is the tape. I’m sure I destroyed crucial evidence by handling it.”

“Don’t sweat it. Today’s technology can do wonders.”

“Listen, Dick, I’m responsible for what happened to Harry. He’s just a tool to get to me, and I’m afraid I’m using you to get him back. I’ve never tried to presume on our friendship until now. But every day Harry’s being held is a day I feel like I’ve failed. Can you understand that?”

“Yeah, I can. As a field agent, a lot of my cases became more personal than was healthy, and I know Harry too, don’t forget. I’ll get our A-Team into action for his sake.” Henna clasped a hand on Mercer’s forearm. “What are you going to do?”

“I called Chuck Lowry. Do you remember him? He used to be the computer archivist at the U.S. Geological Survey.” Henna nodded. “I’ve got him hacking airline reservations. If the group that took Harry are foreign, they’ll want out of the country but won’t have had the time to make an earlier booking. Chuck’s checking on reservations made since yesterday for a flight out of Washington in the next day or two. Long shot at best, but it’s something.” Mercer had seen Dick bend the laws a few times and didn’t worry about his disapproving frown. “And I’m going to Eritrea to find the pipe.”

“In these situations, we tell people not to give in to demands,” Henna said quietly, expecting an explosion from Mercer.

“These situations,” Mercer emphasized the words, “don’t usually include eighty-year-old victims and they never include me.”

Henna pulled into a gas station just moments before Tiny’s Plymouth arrived from the opposite direction. The FBI director promised Mercer that he would call the next evening at Tiny’s with any information. Mercer dodged unobserved from Henna’s car to Paul Gordon’s before the sedan trailing Tiny came into view. Tiny put a couple of gallons into his tank, paid at the pump with a debit card, and the two were on their way quickly.

“Any problems?” Mercer asked as they sped back to Arlington.

“They never got close enough to see I was alone.”

“Great,” Mercer said with relief. “Thanks, Paul. I owe you big for this.”

“If it was for anyone other than Harry, I’d agree. But for him, it’s a wash.” Tiny kept his eyes on the road as he spoke. “Is Henna going to help?”

“Yeah, he’s in. They’re going over Harry’s place tomorrow. He’s going to call me at your bar and tell me if they turned up anything.”

“You’re still going to go to Africa, aren’t you?”

“I’m covering my bets, so yeah, I’m going.”