The Genesis Key

by James Barney

  Kathleen felt confused, scared, and, for some reason, vaguely ashamed. Something Dr. Sargon had said kept coming back to her: “This is connected to you, through your parents, through God.”

  She thought about her parents, whom she had barely known. They had dedicated their professional lives to something they didn’t live to see. Sargon had apparently found what they’d been searching for—a tomb, or something in the tomb, or something about the tomb. Kathleen didn’t know what. But her parents had risked everything to find it. Why?

  Agent Wills said that Dr. Sargon probably committed suicide. But Dr. Sargon had a secret—a very important secret—that he desperately wanted to tell her, and he was prepared to do so the very next morning. He wouldn’t have taken his own life, unless . . .

  Kathleen looked down at the paper in her hands.

  Unless this was the secret.

  Kathleen arrived at work at 9:45, three hours later than normal.

  “I was about to send out a search party,” said Carlos jokingly, greeting her at the front door. “Is everything okay?”

  “I’m fine,” said Kathleen. “Has anyone collected data in the lab this morning?”

  “Julie took care of it.”

  “Good. Tell her thanks. I’ll be in my office.” She rushed past Carlos and continued briskly down the hall.

  “Dr. Sainsbury?”

  Kathleen turned around but continued walking backward toward her office.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Carlos looked unconvinced.

  “I’m fine.” Kathleen slipped into her office and closed the door behind her.

  An hour later, Kathleen dialed Carlos’s extension.

  “Yes?”

  “Carlos, I need you to arrange a trip for me.”

  “Sure. Where to?”

  “Boston.”

  “When do you want to go?”

  “Right now.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Boston, Massachusetts.

  Logan International Airport was typically crowded for a Monday evening. Travelers trudged in every direction, some arriving, others departing, all moving with weary determination. Moms with strollers, groups of school kids in matching sweatshirts, grandparents arriving from Florida, college students on spring break, businesspeople, immigrants—people of every size, color, and description—all hustling with their carry-on bags, or sitting in chairs at the gates, or standing three deep at the airport bars.

  But there was only one person at Logan International Airport that evening with a five-thousand-year-old secret in her pocket.

  Kathleen Sainsbury made her way to the main terminal from Gate C12, where the flight from Reagan National had just arrived. She checked her voice mail on the way.

  There was a message from Carlos, confirming her hotel reservation at the Kendall Square Marriott. Another from Julie, asking some questions about an experiment Kathleen had left half-completed. It wasn’t like Kathleen to take off on such short notice. In the past two years, she’d barely traveled anywhere, other than periodic trips to Annapolis to visit her grandfather at his assisted living home.

  There was another message from Carlos, wanting to know if she’d arrived safely and whether she was all right. Almost as an afterthought, he added that Agent Wills had called to ask him a few questions about the other night. That was all he said—that the FBI had called him to “ask a few questions.” It didn’t sound like anything to be concerned about. But, then again, Carlos had a habit of downplaying things. Twenty years in the Marines would do that to a person, she figured.

  The last message was from Bryce Whittaker. The sound of his voice provided a pleasant distraction.

  “Hi, it’s me Bryce . . . Whittaker. I just wanted to tell you I had a really great time on Saturday. And uh . . . well, I’d love to see you again if you’re up for it. I was thinking maybe drinks tonight after work. What do you say? Give me a call.”

  The message had been left at 4:22 P.M. Kathleen checked her watch; it was already 6:15. “Not happening tonight,” she muttered. Her love life in the past few years had been an absolute disaster—a series of tragic miscues and false starts, mixed signals, misunderstandings, and generally just bad timing. On most days she reassured herself that the problem was QLS; it simply left no time for relationships. In more reflective moments, however, she allowed an alternative possibility: Maybe the problem was her.

  Kathleen waited in the taxi line for twenty minutes, shivering and impatiently checking her watch. It was bitter cold and windy outside, and she wished she’d brought a pair of gloves. But, in fact, she’d packed nothing at all. She carried only her briefcase with her. Eventually, she made it to the head of the line and climbed into a Bayside cab.

  “Where to?” asked the driver in a strong Boston accent.

  Kathleen’s hotel was in Kendall Square, but that’s not where she was heading right now.

  “Fifteen Chauncy Street in Cambridge.”

  It had taken Kathleen less than fifteen minutes to track down Dr. Charles Eskridge via a Google search in her office. Within minutes, she’d learned that Eskridge had been Dean of Near East Studies at Harvard University from 1976 to 1983, and then executive director of the Oriental Institute from 1984 to 1990. A phone call to the Institute revealed that he was no longer the director but that he still worked at the Institute’s museum as a docent on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Ten minutes later, Kathleen was speaking with him on the phone.

  The conversation had been awkward at first. He sounded like a nice-enough man—gruff but amiable. But Kathleen was nervous and unsure of how to explain why she was calling. In fact, she wasn’t exactly sure why she was calling.

  “My name is Kathleen Sainsbury,” she began nervously. “My parents were Daniel and Rebecca Talbot.”

  “You don’t say?” Eskridge replied, with obvious recognition.

  “I recently met a man named Dr. Hakeem Abdul Sargon. Do you know him?”

  There was a pause. “You mean . . .”

  “Yes. Dr. Al-Fulani. Dr. Sargon. Whatever his name is.”

  “Sure . . . I knew him. But it’s been a long time.”

  “Well, he gave me something that he said was very important. Something from Tell-Fara. Are you familiar with Tell-Fara?”

  “Yes,” Eskridge said after a short pause.

  “I think I need your help understanding some things.”

  “Okay.”

  “Can we meet?”

  To Kathleen’s surprise, Eskridge seemed as eager to meet her as she was to meet him. “When were you thinking?” he asked.

  “How about tonight?” Kathleen suggested.

  “Tonight?” Eskridge seemed a bit surprised. “Are you in Boston?”

  “No, but I can be.”

  “Tonight would be fine.”

  According to Google, the Oriental Institute Museum was located at 15 Chauncy Street in Cambridge, six blocks from the Harvard campus. As the cab pulled up to that address, however, Kathleen double-checked her Google Maps printout and peered doubtfully through the car window.

  “Is this the Oriental Institute Museum?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, lady,” said the driver curtly. “This is Fifteen Chauncy Street, like you asked.”

  It was a historic-looking three-story brick house, nicely maintained with taupe trim and dark green ivy creeping up the façade. A black wrought-iron fence enclosed the entire property. It was certainly a beautiful house. Kathleen could easily imagine a Harvard professor or a successful doctor or lawyer living in it. But it didn’t look like a museum. It looked more like a private residence.

  The house was almost entirely dark except for a single window on the second floor, which emanated a pale yellow glow through white curtains.

  Kathleen paid the cab driver forty-five dollars and asked him to wait a few minutes until she was sure someone was there.

  “It’s extra for waiting,” said the driver. “Fifty ce
nts per minute.”

  Kathleen rolled her eyes and handed him a ten-dollar bill. “Will that cover a few minutes?”

  “Sure, I’ll wait.”

  Kathleen opened the creaky wrought-iron gate and walked to the front entrance of the house. A sign next to the door indicated that it was, indeed, the Oriental Institute Museum, and that it was open on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, from 10:00 A.M. to 3:30 P.M. Not a very popular museum, Kathleen surmised.

  There was no doorbell, so Kathleen knocked on the door—three loud raps with the brass knocker. She waited half a minute and then knocked again.

  “Coming!” said a distant voice from inside the museum.

  A few seconds later, the door rattled and opened, and a rotund, barrel-chested man stood in the doorway. “Ms. Sainsbury?” he asked in a husky voice.

  “Dr. Eskridge?”

  The man nodded affirmatively, and Kathleen turned and waved off the cab driver. The Chevy Caprice sped away.

  “Come on in,” Eskridge said. He was a bull of a man—over six feet tall with a bulky, substantial presence. His tan, leathery face was punctuated—oddly—with a snow white handlebar moustache that drooped down past the corners of his mouth. His head was bald and shiny. Kathleen had deduced from his résumé that he was at least seventy years old, but he certainly didn’t look it. He had the vigor and presence of a much younger man. Seeing him in person, Kathleen had the feeling that Eskridge had been a force to be reckoned with in his younger days, and perhaps he still was. Behind a pair of silver wire-rimmed glasses, his eyes were intense—a peculiar shade of pale blue.

  “Sorry about the dark,” he said. “The lights are on timers. They turn off automatically after eight P.M.” He flipped a switch and the entry hall lit up with a warm, yellow glow from an overhead chandelier.

  Not like a museum at all, Kathleen thought. “Thanks for staying late to see me,” she said.

  “No trouble at all. Actually, I live here.”

  “You do?”

  “Second and third floors are mine. First floor’s the museum.”

  “Oh, I didn’t realize that. The woman at the Institute said you were a docent of some sort.”

  “I am. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. If people come by, I let them in, give them tours, answer questions. Whatever they want. The rest of the time, I just live here.”

  Kathleen detected an accent. “You from Minnesota?”

  “Yah, you betcha,” said Eskridge with a quick smile that was barely discernable beneath his moustache. Only his cheeks and the deep creases around his eyes gave it away.

  “Truth is,” he continued, “we don’t get many visitors. A half dozen a week, maybe. The occasional grad student or a visiting professor. A few history buffs here and there. But it’s mainly quiet.”

  “So, it’s just you here?”

  “Yep. People from the Institute drop by every once in a while to help out, especially if we’re expecting a high-profile visitor. But it’s usually just me.”

  “Kind of lonely, isn’t it?” Kathleen looked around at the sparsely furnished entry hall. The rooms beyond were still dark.

  “Not for me. I kind of like it. Besides, the Institute was gonna shut this museum down a few years ago and sell the building back to the university. They only agreed to keep it open because I volunteered to operate it three days a week without pay. And also because I help keep costs down.”

  “The lights?”

  Eskridge smiled and winked. “I also do all the maintenance around here.”

  Kathleen was starting to like this guy.

  “I know the day I quit, they’ll shut this place down faster than a Minnesota heat wave, donate everything in the collection, and sell the house to the university. Official word is, the university wants to turn it into faculty housing. Truth is, the dean of Undergraduate Admissions—Cecil Greenberg—has had his eye on this house for years. I told him myself, though, it’ll be over my dead body.” Eskridge laughed heartily. “And that’s probably just how it’ll be.”

  “That’s a terrible thought.”

  “Not really,” said Eskridge with a chuckle. “That son of a bitch Greenberg’s gonna be waiting a long time. ’Cause I don’t plan on dying anytime soon.”

  Kathleen believed that. Eskridge was built like a Sherman tank. On a hunch, she asked, “You built the museum’s collection yourself, didn’t you?”

  “A lot of it. My students, too. It was the culmination of a lot of work by a lot of people.” He paused and glanced around. “Would you like a tour?”

  “Sure.”

  As Kathleen followed Dr. Eskridge into the adjacent room, she had the strangest feeling that he’d been waiting for her. Not just tonight . . . but for a long time. A vague sense of guilt came over her—like she should have come here a long time ago. And, in an odd way, she felt like her parents were in this museum, too. In spirit. And they, too, had been expecting her—waiting for her to finally come and visit. She regretted now that it had taken this long.

  Eskridge flipped a switch and the white fluorescent lights in the next room flickered and came on.

  The room was small, with creaky wooden floors and yellow walls. Two glass display cases sat atop wooden tables in the middle of the room. Three smaller glass cases were mounted on the walls, curio style, along with various engravings and photographs. Not exactly a world-class museum, Kathleen thought to herself.

  They stopped in front of the first glass display case, which contained a dozen or so small cylindrical objects.

  “These are seal stones,” Eskridge explained, “from Mesopotamia. The ones on the left are from about eight hundred BC. I found them on my very first expedition to Iran in 1961.”

  Kathleen inspected them closely. They looked like tiny rolling pins, each intricately carved with a design. Behind each seal stone was an ink print showing what the relief design looked like when it was rolled out. The designs depicted men with swords, galloping horses, rearing lions, and fantastic winged beasts.

  “These would have been rolled across clay before it was fired to form an identifiable seal or symbol—a sign of ownership or affiliation.”

  “They’re beautiful.”

  “The others in this case, and those in the next case over, were found by students of mine over the years.”

  Kathleen nodded.

  The next room had a similar layout, with two large A-frame display cases in the center and several wall-mounted cases along the perimeter.

  “Everything in this room is from Egypt,” Eskridge said with a subdued flourish. “I spent two years there, in sixty-one and sixty-two, excavating three different tombs in the Valley of the Kings. Of course, they’d pretty much been picked clean by looters, although we still managed to find a few important artifacts there.”

  “Did you find any mummies?” Kathleen asked, a bit bashfully.

  “Mummies?” Eskridge laughed. “No, I’m afraid not. I’m sure they’d been there at one time. But, like I said, those tombs had been robbed so many times over the centuries that barely anything remained. See these photographs?” He pointed to a series of enlarged black-and-white photos on the wall behind the display cases. They depicted hieroglyphic writing, presumably from the tombs. “According to those hieroglyphs, one of the tombs belonged to a king named Kyhan, who reigned for forty-two years in the Sixteenth Dynasty, around 1550 BC.”

  Kathleen nodded politely.

  “Anyway, at one time, there was almost certainly a sarcophagus with his mummified remains, not to mention funerary vessels and tools, furniture, weapons, jewelry, and more. But all of that was long gone by the time we got there, probably stolen centuries ago. We did manage to unearth a few things, though.” He pointed to the first display case, which contained a menagerie of broken pottery pieces, spear tips, and two tiny, onyx statuettes depicting women with absurdly exaggerated breasts and buttocks.

  Fertility charms, Kathleen guessed.

  “In this other case are artifacts from Alexandria, Egyp
t. I led summer expeditions there with grad students in seventy-one, seventy-two, seventy-four, and seventy-five.”

  Kathleen peered into the glass case, which housed a ragtag collection of coins, cups, daggers, pellets, tools, and a badly dented helmet—all of them pocked, pitted, and generally lackluster in appearance.

  “These are from the time of the Roman annexation of Alexandria, around 80 BC.—during the reign of Ptolemy Alexander the Second. Most of these items were found under water in the port of Alexandria. Now that was some dirty diving, let me tell ya.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  Eskridge let out a hearty belly laugh. “Hardest part was dodging the damned freighters coming in and out of the harbor. I’ll tell ya—they didn’t give a rat’s ass about our little diving flags!”

  “Sounds dangerous.”

  “The Russians were the worst. Those bastards would sooner run you over than be late for a port call or a shot of vodka.”

  Kathleen nodded and smiled, as if she knew all about that particular trait of Russian freighter captains.

  “But, I tell ya, it was fun back then. Real archeology. Nobody does stuff like that anymore. The schools today aren’t willing to take any risks. Nobody will cough up funding, anyway. And frankly, we just don’t get the same type of students these days. There’s no romance left in archeology. No sense of adventure.”

  “A bygone era, I guess,” said Kathleen, still inspecting the artifacts in the glass case.

  “Now your parents—”

  Kathleen snapped her head up and met Eskridge’s gaze.

  “They were the last of a breed. They had that fire—that passion for what they were doing.” His voice trailed off. “Come on, let me show you something.”

  Kathleen followed Eskridge through a series of rooms like the first two until, finally, he flicked a light switch and revealed a room that was much larger than the others, and very different in appearance. Unlike the previous rooms, this space was packed with display cases—eight in all—and adorned with gleaming and interesting objects all along the walls. The artifacts in this room were perceptibly different than those in the others—larger, more stunning, almost . . . pristine. Gold and silver details jumped out and glimmered in the overhead light. Without a doubt, this was the heart of the museum’s collection.