Kai spoke up. “Surely you don’t expect us to fight the police while you carry away the treasure?”
“Not at all,” Barlow said. “Fighting the police is a losing game. They just call for more help until eventually you’re surrounded. I expect you to be wiser than that. I expect you to set up a distraction. One that will have the authorities focused on something far larger and more important than a few people digging in an obscure section of the desert.”
“And how, exactly, do we do that?” Xandra asked.
Barlow picked up a remote control, aimed it toward a screen at the front of the room and pressed the button. A photo appeared. It showed a large concrete dam wedged in between two walls of reddish sandstone.
“This is the Glen Canyon Dam,” Barlow said. “It sits upriver from the Grand Canyon. It holds back a billion tons of Colorado River water while providing large amounts of electricity to Arizona and New Mexico.”
“You want us to blow up the dam?” Fydor asked in shock.
“Of course not,” Barlow said. “I want you to simulate someone attempting to blow up the dam. Specifically, it needs to look like a large-scale terrorist attack and takeover. One that draws the eyes and ears of every local, state and national law enforcement agency. One that keeps them focused on it for a while. With their attention on preventing the collapse of the dam and rooting out the imaginary terrorists, we’ll be able to excavate the cave, take everything of value and vanish.”
“While we end up running for our lives,” Kai said. “Yes, I can see why that would appeal to you.”
Barlow was undaunted. “You’re going to have to earn this money. Your team’s share will come out between fifty and a hundred million dollars. Perhaps more. If that’s not worth the risk to you, I can find someone else.”
Xandra’s appetite had been whetted. “All we have to do is get their attention,” she said. “We can leave a few surprises and sneak out of there before any real counterterrorist force arrives.”
Barlow admired her. She was obsessively bold.
Kai nodded. He wasn’t the type to be outdone. And, as always, he needed the money. “Very well. We’ll figure out our own plan and escape route, but we’ll do our part.”
“The six of you are smart enough to handle the details,” Barlow said. “The dam is the target, you come up with a plan. In the meantime, Xandra, I’ll need that location.”
She nodded. “When the deposit hits our account.”
“Check with your bank,” Barlow said smugly. “It’s already there.”
Barlow waited patiently, considered his sudden turn of good fortune, while Xandra used her phone to check the status of their secret Panamanian account. He had everything he needed to finish the job now—the knowledge and insight of Professor Cross, the steady hand of Robson, reinforcements in Omar Kai and a pair of assassins who used remote vehicles to do their bidding—making them perfect for the job he wanted done. More importantly, Austin was gone, NUMA was out of the picture and Barlow would soon have the exact location of the treasure, speeding the process up exponentially.
Things had turned his way in the blink of an eye. He had no intention of allowing that to change. “Well?”
Xandra nodded. “The money is there, as you said.” She tapped a button on her phone. It sent an encrypted email to Barlow’s address. “Open the file. You’ll find everything you need.”
Barlow nodded and then turned to Robson. “You know what everyone needs to do. Let’s move like the wind.”
Chapter 53
Grand Canyon National Park, northern Arizona
Morgan Manning stood near the rim of the Grand Canyon, staring across it. So vast and all-encompassing was the view, she struggled to put it into words. To say it took her breath away would have been an understatement. She was awestruck, the weariness of eleven hours of traveling swept away in an instant.
Kurt, Joe and Paul stood off to one side while Gamay was a few feet away, riskily looking over the edge and staring straight down.
“It’s incredible,” Morgan said. “I’ve never felt so tiny and insignificant.”
“This place has a way of doing that to one,” Gamay noted.
Getting her bearings back, Morgan turned to Kurt. “Thank you for letting me come here and help finish this. I was sick to my stomach when I found that Professor Cross had been kidnapped. I can only hope Barlow will bring the professor here.”
“He’d be foolish not to,” Kurt said. “Considering what he’s expecting to find, he’ll need the professor’s help to identify the valuable treasures from the mundane.”
“How are we supposed to find this cave before they do?” Gamay asked.
“Hiram and Max matched the details of the old FBI photos with the current terrain,” Kurt said. “It’s a pretty remote spot, in a distant part of the canyon, but it’s accessible by an old road.”
“What are we waiting for, then?”
“Permission,” Kurt replied. “The cave is located outside the boundaries of the National Park, in an area that belongs to the Navajo people. It may even be sacred ground. We need to get the proper blessing before we go down there.”
As Kurt spoke, an old Chevy pickup came down the dirt road toward them. Its paint was faded and rust had crept in around the bed, but the engine sounded strong.
After the truck pulled to a stop, the driver’s door opened. A Navajo man stepped out. His jet-black hair was tied back in a ponytail. He had broad shoulders, a big chest and a large head. He wore faded jeans and a plaid shirt.
Kurt stepped forward and gave the man a bear hug. “Thanks for coming to meet us.” He turned to introduce the new arrival. “This is Eddie Toh-Yah. He’s an old friend of mine from the Navy.”
“Be careful throwing that word old around,” Eddie said. “I’m a year younger than you are.”
Like Kurt, Eddie had spent most of his life in the elements, though for him it was the High Desert of Arizona and of New Mexico while Kurt had spent his life out on the ocean and along its shore.
“How long has it been?”
“Eight years,” Eddie replied. “Can’t say time has been kind to you, Kurt. You look a little beat-up.”
Kurt laughed and took no offense. “I think aging has improved your looks. But, then again, you had nowhere to go but up. Can you help us out?”
“I told my grandfather about your request,” Eddie said. “He’s part of the tribal administration. He’s willing to see you, but you’re going to have to tell him why you want to go down there. I have to warn you, Kurt, he’s all about the old ways.”
“I’m partial to the old ways myself,” Kurt said. “Let’s go.”
A ten-mile drive brought them away from the canyon and down into a high valley where a small Navajo community lay. A collection of hogan-style buildings, built from timber and supporting earthen roofs, stood in the center. A fenced-in pasture sat off to one side while several horses lazily chewing hay occupied a corral behind the structures.
Shortly after arriving, Kurt and company were led into one of the buildings. The interior was a single large room with a dirt floor. The room smelled strongly of incense. The only illumination in the hogan came from candles.
Everyone sat on the floor and Eddie introduced them to his grandfather, speaking in Navajo. Kurt remained silent, studying the older man. Unlike Eddie, the elder was dressed in traditional garments made of wool and dyed with intricate patterns. Kurt guessed his age at somewhere between eighty and ninety, though it was hard to tell. There was wisdom in his face, knowledge far beyond even his many years.
Eddie turned back toward Kurt. “My grandfather extends his welcome. He wants to know where you wish to travel.”
Kurt pulled out a folded topographical map. “I marked the area on this. It’s called Silver Box Ravine. I read that some have suggested the area is sacred.”
Eddie
took a look at the map and then handed it over to his grandfather, who studied it before responding.
“Silver Box Ravine is not a holy place for our people,” the older Navajo said, “though other places in the canyon nearby are sacred.”
“We promise not to stray from the area I’ve marked,” Kurt said.
Eddie’s grandfather nodded, taking Kurt at his word. “Why is it you wish to go there? Are you looking for treasure?”
Kurt was taken by surprise.
“Eddie has told me all about you,” the grandfather said proudly. “He says you’ve found lost treasure all over the world and that when you were in the Navy you hardly ever stopped in a port without looking into any story or legend from the ancient days of whatever country you were visiting.”
“His description of me is accurate,” Kurt admitted.
The older man smiled. “I too am interested in stories from the ancient days. Here in our land, there are rumors of a treasure. It was said to be left behind by the People of the Sun, the Egyptians. The internet is filled with these stories. Even the old newspapers. Every few years, someone comes here claiming to have found something or seen something. They never have any proof, though.”
“I’m not surprised,” Kurt said. He didn’t elaborate. “But I’m not interested in any treasure that might be down there, just the people who are coming after it.”
Eddie asked the next question. “Are these people dangerous?”
“They are,” Kurt said. “Our plan is to capture them.”
Eddie’s grandfather went silent for a moment, contemplating what Kurt had said. Finally, he spoke again, this time addressing Eddie in their native language and allowing him to translate one more time.
“He says if that’s what you seek, we will help you, but he thinks you should know they won’t find what they’re looking for down there.”
Kurt didn’t waver. “As long as they show up and we get the drop on them, the treasure can remain a mystery for all eternity, as far as I’m concerned.”
Chapter 54
Silver Box Ravine, Navajo Nation, Arizona
The bottom of Silver Box Ravine lay at an elevation of twenty-five hundred feet, almost a mile down from the rim of the canyon up above. The terrain was loose rock and sand, as the ravine itself was dry year-round and only eroded when flash floods brought on by thunderstorms rushed through. Looking up at a blue sky devoid of the smallest wisp of a cloud, Kurt and the others could see there would be no storm today.
“It’s so hot,” Morgan said. She pulled at the neck of her T-shirt, trying to let some of the heat underneath escape. “It’s a wonder Herihor’s people didn’t think they’d circled the world and gone all the way back to Egypt.”
“But it’s a dry heat,” Gamay quipped, offering the classic desert dweller’s response.
“My shirt disagrees with you,” Paul replied.
Joe laughed. He’d grown up in the Southwest and felt right at home in this weather.
Kurt found the inferno invigorating, especially as it soothed the sore joints and muscles that had been strained and bruised over the last two weeks. “The sooner we find this cave, the sooner we find some shade. According to the old FBI report, the entrance is a large gap in the south wall not far from where the road let us out.”
They’d driven from the Navajo village to the edge of the canyon in a pair of pickup trucks pulling horse trailers. After finding the old road, Eddie had led them down on horseback and then taken the horses back up the trail, leaving Kurt and his crew to search on foot.
For Kurt’s plan to work, it was important that there be no sign of any activity in the ravine—and that meant no motorized equipment, tire tracks or helicopters buzzing about. Even more important, they had to find the cave and get inside before anyone from Barlow’s team arrived.
Kurt glanced up at the switchback road carved into the side of the canyon. It was a crumbling mule track at this point, but in the FBI photos it was freshly excavated and graded at no small expense.
Comparing the photos to the current view wasn’t an exact science, but they soon discovered a few landmarks and from those zeroed in on where the cave entrance should have been. Instead of an opening, they found a giant sloping pile of boulders and sand.
“It’s got to be behind that—” Joe started to say.
“Rockslide,” Gamay finished.
“Bound to have been several in the last hundred years,” Paul pointed out. “That’s how the canyon grows and changes. From the look of it, there are areas on both sides ripe for another break. Let’s be careful—if and when the shooting starts.”
“If we surprise Barlow, there won’t be much shooting,” Morgan insisted.
Kurt was already scaling the rocks, trying to get to the top without causing an avalanche of his own. He reached the upper reaches of the pile and found what he was hoping to discover—a narrow gap. Cool air from the cave inside was pouring out through it.
“This is it,” he told them.
The sand and rock had backslid into the cave over the years. The result was an opening at the top and a descending pile of rubble on the inside.
Aiming a flashlight into the dark space beyond, he saw nothing remarkable other than the walls of the cave itself. It didn’t matter. He knew they were in the right place.
He turned to the others. “Backtrack fifty yards and clear away any footprints we’ve left. Then get up here and join me inside.”
As the others went to work, Kurt made his way to the bottom of the slope inside the cave’s entrance. Reaching the ground, he aimed his flashlight into the void beyond.
Careful not to leave footprints, he walked on only the hard-packed ground and rock, avoiding the sand. The tunnel was wide—wide enough to drive a truck through. As he got away from the entrance, he found evidence that a truck may have indeed been driven in there.
In the dried mud on one side of the tunnel he noticed a tire track. It was narrow with a simple-patterned tread, a giveaway to its place in history nearly a century before.
Moving on, he found the first Egyptian-style artifacts. Furniture and disassembled chariots. Passing them by, he came to an expansive chamber in the cave. It spread wide and high, like an opera house or indoor arena.
Panning his light around revealed ramps and platforms and multilevel architecture carved out of the rock. In every direction, at every level, he found dust-covered figures and strange faces.
A muscular body standing against the wall with the head of a jackal represented Anubis, the god of embalming. A slim figure to the left of it had a falcon’s head and great painted eyes, which Kurt knew was a representation of Horus, the god of health, protection and power. Farther on, stacked up with what seemed like little care, let alone respect, were eight mummified figures, their strips of cloth gray and brown with dust and grime.
Kurt aimed his light deeper. In the middle of the cavern, he saw dozens of smaller statues, along with piles of gilded furniture, reed baskets and clay jars. A large throne-like chair lay surrounded by cat figures that looked to be made of alabaster, ornate treasure boxes and small versions of the Sphinx.
The arrangement was haphazard, as if it had been shoved in in haste instead of placed there with care. In the very center lay a single sarcophagus, not the fifteen that Professor Cross had envisioned.
Kurt approached it but dared not touch the top—the dust was distributed too perfectly, a handprint or rubbing would be too obvious. He aimed the flashlight at the surface, looking closely and spotting the glimmer of cracking gold leaf.
He’d found what the archeologists discovered in 1927. He’d discovered the exact secret that the Granzini family had killed to preserve. Now all he needed was for Barlow and his men to find it as well.
Chapter 55
Tuba City, northern Arizona
The sight of tractor-trailers rolling through
Tuba City was not an uncommon one. Not an eyebrow was raised as three nearly identical semitrucks passed through in a convoy. Garnering even less attention was a four-door crew cab pickup truck following behind them, pulling a powerboat on a trailer.
From Tuba City, the convoy traveled west on Route 160 before turning north on a narrow two-lane highway known as Route 89. Thirty miles on, without a car in sight in either direction, the tractor-trailers pulled off the highway and drove down a dirt road, where they disappeared behind a smooth-sided bluff of wind-eroded sandstone.
Using the dirt road as a parking lot, the trucks spread out, stopped and shut down their noisy engines.
Solomon Barlow climbed out of the lead truck, thankful to stretch his legs after twelve hours in the cab. Robson got out of the second truck and came to meet his boss. Fydor and Xandra climbed out of the third vehicle. Behind them, Omar Kai emerged from the pickup.
“This is where we split up,” Barlow said. “Are we all clear on the plan?”
Kai nodded. “My men and I will infiltrate the dam while Fydor and Xandra make mischief on the outside. We’ll sabotage the dam, setting some booby traps for the authorities to deal with, and then disappear.”
Kai was very confident. Barlow saw their chances of success at no more than fifty percent, but ultimately all he needed was a diversion. If Kai and his people got themselves shot or blown up in the effort, it was of little concern to him. All that mattered was that the eyes of law enforcement would be drawn to the dam and away from him and his illegal excavation.
“Very well,” Barlow said. “You’ve all set up your own extraction plans, so this will be it for a while. Let’s dispense with the threats of what happens if I double-cross you or if you double-cross me. We all know we can make each other’s lives miserable. Far better if we meet in a week to start splitting the wealth.”
Fydor and Xandra nodded. Kai did the same. “You two are with me,” he said.
Journey of the Pharaohs Page 27
