by Alan Baxter
But what if all this was paranoia? Maybe Hargrave really just wanted a simple life and was trying to protect himself from the chaos of a police investigation. She really didn’t want to deal with the police, didn’t need that complication. Who knew what might happen then? She also worried that her Asian features might complicate any dealings with American law enforcement. Stories were all over the news lately and she didn’t like any of them. Perhaps she’d be fine, especially with her English accent, but she didn’t want to find out.
Either way, whether Hargrave was playing her or really about to call the police, it wouldn’t go well for her. And where was Crowley? She needed to get away, get back on Lily’s trail.
She gasped in surprise as the door banged open and Hargrave stood there, eyes dark with anger. It had only been a few minutes, five at most.
“Right, I’m not playing anymore.” Hargrave strode forward, planted his hands on the desk and loomed over her. “Where is the jar you stole?”
“I told you, I didn’t…”
“Did you sell it? Who bought it? Was it Gray or Bell? What do they want with it?”
Rose gaped, the machine gun questions making it hard to think.
“What does the mark on the bottom mean?” Hargrave was yelling now, leaning forward, spittle flying from his lips. “Do Gray or Bell know the meanings?”
Rose was overwhelmed by the intensity of the questions, but something hovered in her hindbrain. Something familiar. A memory sparked, the capstone from Denver Airport flashed into her mind. Gray and Bell were the surnames of the Grand Masters listed either side of the set square and compass Masonic logo. She could see the words clear as day in her mind’s eye.
Claude W Gray Snr, Grand Master and Benjamin H Bell Jnr, Grandmaster.
Her eyes widened at the memory and Hargrave barked a sound of triumph.
“I knew it! The bastards! What are they up to?” Hargrave’s hands trembled with rage. He pulled open a drawer on his side of the small desk, grabbed out a notepad and tape dispenser.
Rose watched, puzzled and frightened, as he tore pages from the notepad and taped them over the small window in the door. Puzzlement turned to deeper fear as he locked the door again and turned back to her. He reached into the drawer once more and drew out a box cutter, used his thumb to slip the blade out. It glittered in the overhead fluorescent light.
Rose tried to lean back, but the chair blocked her as Hargrave leaned over the table and moved the blade in a slow figure eight in front of her face. “From this moment on, I’ll accept nothing but the truth from you. No more games, no more stories. Spill it.”
Something in his eyes left Rose in no doubt that he would gladly cut her. She was out of options. “All right! All right. I’ll tell you everything.”
Hargrave relaxed a little, but remained wary. The blade stayed threateningly between them.
Rose took a deep breath, swallowed, tried to think straight. “It’s connected to the airport here.”
Hargrave scoffed. “Well, yes, that much is obvious.”
Rose racked her brain, tried to figure any connections that might be convincing. She remembered Mike and his wild conspiracy theories about the strange and disturbing murals. Theories which, in fact, appeared less wild by the minute. The image of the small cart inscribed on the floor came to mind. The letters AU AG. “They’re having trouble with the formula,” Rose said suddenly, her mouth dry, heart hammering.
“That was no formula on the bottom of the jar,” Hargrave said. “No more games!”
“I don’t know what it was, or even if that’s why they wanted it.”
Hargrave’s eyes narrowed. He shook his head, stood up from the table as he thought, his eyes drifting up to the ceiling momentarily.
It was the chance Rose had been waiting for. Hoping for. She sprang to her feet, grabbed the upright of the chair she was cuffed to, and whipped it up and around. It smashed into Hargrave’s head with a sickening crack, the vibration feeding back into her hand, shocking her wrist. Hargrave grunted in pain, blood flooded one side of his face as he dropped to one knee. He put out a hand to steady himself, struck out blindly with the box cutter in the other. But Rose was already moving around the small table. She hefted the chair high and brought it crashing down on him once more. It slammed across the back of his head and his shoulders, the wood splintering and splitting in half a dozen places. Hargrave collapsed like a sack of rocks, blood trickling onto the pale floor tiles. As Rose bashed the chair against the floor, finishing the cracks, someone tried to open the door from outside, found it locked. Rose freed herself from the chair, the cuffs hanging loose from her wrist as whoever was outside began hammering on the door, calling Hargrave’s name. Rose looked around, eyes wild, and realized she was trapped.
Chapter 32
Denver Museum of Nature and Science
The banging continued, heavy thuds against the door. Rose stood with her feet planted wide apart, looked left and right. She felt like a caged animal, impotent and scared. The man’s voice outside yelling for Hargraves rose from concerned to desperate.
“Open the door! Let me in now! Hey!” More crashes sounded in the room outside, like the man was trying to kick the door in. The wood flexed and bulged, the frame creaked as wood began to give way.
Rose crouched, grabbed the box cutter from the fallen Hargraves. He groaned and shifted on the floor and she realized she was relieved to see that. She had feared she might have killed him, though he deserved no less for threatening her with a blade. She stood again, box cutter raised and prepared to defend herself. Then the man outside yelled again, but this time he sounded concerned. She caught the distinctive sound of fist meeting flesh and the door banged once more as something heavy hit and slid down.
Rose strained to hear, then Crowley’s voice came through the wood. “Rose? You in there?”
She shot forward and unlocked the door, pulled it wide. A security guard, groaning through bleeding lips, fell into the room and she hopped back. Then she rushed forward and gathered Crowley in a fierce hug.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” he said.
She went to step over the unconscious security guard, but paused, rummaged through his pockets. She found a set of keys and tried several before one fit the handcuff lock. With a sigh of relief she cast the manacles aside and they hurried out.
“I couldn’t tell where you’d gone,” Crowley said as they jogged along. “I asked one of the staff and she looked contrite, cast a glance this way. Next thing I know, I see that guard hammering on the door and I figured only you could be at the center of that kind of drama.”
Rose let out a laugh, partly relief. “I thought I was in serious trouble. He was going to cut me.”
“Why?”
“Turns out Lily stole something from here. I’ll explain later. But there’s a replica.” She ran for the exhibit but two burly museum guards stepped out in the corridor ahead of them and sneered. Rose skidded to a halt.
Crowley grabbed her arm and hauled her back. “Let’s just get out of here.”
Sirens sounded in the distance, getting unmistakably closer.
“That’s not good,” Crowley said. “They’ll pull up out front and that means we can’t get to our rental car.”
“So what do we do?”
“Well, I’m not in any mood to try to explain things to the police. Let’s find an emergency exit and leave the car behind.”
“Oh, man,” Rose said. “We’re never going to able to rent another car anywhere in the world the way we’re going.”
Crowley led them around a corner and they saw a fire exit at the end of a short corridor. They ran to it and looked out the window nearby.
“This is the back of the building,” Crowley said. “Good.”
He hit the bar across the door and it burst open, the claxon of fire alarms bursting out immediately. They were only on the first floor and hammered down the stairs, found another door at the bottom and ran out into a light rain
being carried on a cool breeze. Rose had never been happier to be outside.
“Which way?”
Crowley pointed and they ran. They rounded the building and found themselves in a wide green park. Down a short slope and across a cement path, and Crowley pointed again. “Head for those trees, I guess.”
The grass was slippery from the rain, but not treacherous. As they headed towards the trees, Rose caught the echoes of distant shouts and the sirens sounded as though they were right behind. Past the trees a narrow cement path wound off across the park and they followed it, feet slapping.
Someone behind yelled, “There they are!” and Crowley cursed loudly.
They redoubled their pace and emerged into a narrow road. Dozens of cars were parked nose to the curb on their side. Opposite lay a rough footpath, then a high, thick hedge.
“Stay with me, don’t pause!” Crowley said and Rose wondered what harebrained scheme had come to him. Before she had time to consider it much more, he ran to the hedge and crouched, fingers laced together. “Up and over!”
She gave him a frustrated look, but didn’t dare stop. In two strides she reached him, put one foot in his hands and he boosted her up and over. She crashed into the top of the hedge, felt a solid wall somewhere inside it, but didn’t stop to investigate. Ignoring the spikes and scratches, she rolled over and dropped down the other side among thick trees. As she turned to look, Crowley himself came flying over the top like some crazed ninja. How he had gained such momentum she couldn’t even guess, but it made her smile.
“They went over the top!” someone yelled.
Another voice shouted, “Then follow them!”
Crowley gritted his teeth. “Run!”
They dove between the trees, jumped a low ditch and then both skidded to a halt, eyes and mouths wide. An enormous elephant stood before them, looking almost as surprised as they were.
“What the hell..?” Crowley muttered.
Then Rose remembered the map she’d looked at to guide them to the museum. “Er, Jake? We’ve just jumped straight into Denver Zoo.”
“I guess we should be thankful we didn’t land in the lion enclosure.”
Rose took a deep breath. “Let’s go. Move nice and slow.”
Crowley took her advice, sidestepping away. “I know rhinos and hippos are bad news, but how dangerous are elephants?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. And I don’t want to find out.”
Crashing sounded through the trees behind them and a voice shouted, “Freeze!”
“Leg it!” Crowley said, and they bolted.
A gunshot rang out, bark burst off the tree by Rose’s ear, but her cry was drowned out by the sudden and deafening bellow of the elephant. The ground shook as it charged. Rose risked a glance over her shoulder and saw two men, neither police nor museum security guards. But they had bigger problems to worry about as the enraged beast barreled at them and raised both front legs in attack. The men each rolled in opposite directions and the elephants huge, round feet slammed into the ground where they had been moments before.
Then Rose rounded a tree and lost sight of the confrontation.
“We must remember to send Dumbo there a thank you card,” Crowley said. “Here, up you go!”
They had emerged into a wide sandy area with gray stone walls along one side. Beyond the wall was a building with large glass windows and a sloping roof. To the other side, a large muddy-edged pool of murky water and beyond that a crowd of wide-eyed tourists. Crowley was pointing to the rocky wall.
Again he boosted her up, then scrambled up behind. They ran along, clambered up the next section of wall, higher than the previous part. That brought them within almost reaching distance of the sloping metal roof of the building behind. Not waiting for Crowley to lift her again, not needing his help, Rose ran and jumped. She caught the edge of the roof, hauled herself up, and turned to check Crowley was still with her.
He was smiling as he dragged himself onto the slippery sloping metal. “Impressive! Now watch your step, this wet roof is deadly.”
She couldn’t argue with that. They cautiously made their way along it, away from the elephant enclosure. They still heard the enraged creature trumpeting in fury; several others in the wide open space and two in the water had turned to look. The beasts all began lumbering towards the cries of their friend and Rose spared a thought for the two suited goons. She hoped they would be smart enough to go back the way they had come and not shoot the innocent creatures. Then again, bets were still odds on favorite for the elephants, this many against two men with pistols. And who were those guys anyway? Associates of Hargrave, she presumed. And with that she lost all sympathy for them, given they had shot at her and Hargrave had threatened to cut her. She hoped they were both stomped to death under giant elephant feet. Some natural justice meted out.
“This way,” Crowley said. He had found a drainpipe and they shimmied down.
Rose was glad to have her feet back on solid ground, on the public paths of the zoo. They jogged along, quickly making space between themselves and the enclosure.
“Let’s hope no one recognizes us,” Crowley said. “We’d better just find our way out.”
They hurried past rhinos and hippos and saw the large buildings of the main entrance up ahead. They joined a group of people all heading for the exit and Rose was about to allow herself a sigh of relief when she saw a group of at least five or six policemen come running up on the other side of the gates. She ducked back, Crowley beside her.
“So damn close!” she said.
Crowley pursed his lips, thinking. Then he said, “They’re not after me, I don’t think. Which means they’re just looking for a woman of Asian appearance, right?”
“I guess, unless those security guards at the museum or the goons in suits have radioed them. Those guys saw us running together.”
Crowley looked left and right, then smiled. “This way.”
“Where are we going?”
“These places never let you leave without passing through at least one gift shop. Follow me.”
A few minutes later, and several dollars lighter, Crowley and Rose emerged from the zoo gift shop in entirely new outfits. Changing in a café toilet had been easy enough, but the choices had left them both looking faintly ridiculous. Crowley wore oversized khaki shorts and a jacket with about a thousand small pockets in it. He looked like a parody of Steve Irwin. He had an I Heart Denver trucker cap on, pulled low over his eyes. Thanks to slightly misguided efforts at multiculturalism, Rose wore a bright red and green sari and had a silk scarf emblazoned with parrots pulled over her head and around her face like a niqab. It was an insulting pastiche of cultural appropriation, but it left little of her to be recognized.
They waited for a sizeable group of people to come along, then heard a man in a tour guide jacket calling, “Bus leaves in ten minutes!”
A dozen or so people jumped up from a couple of café tables they had pushed together and headed for the exit. Crowley and Rose fell in behind them and a few minutes later they were past the police and hurrying along East 23rd Avenue toward downtown Denver. When they were well clear of the zoo, they allowed themselves a laugh.
“Let’s find a hotel and catch our breath,” Crowley said.
Chapter 33
Red Lion Inn & Suites, outside Denver
Crowley and Rose slipped into a McDonald’s and changed back into their regular outfits once they were a good distance from the zoo, but they kept the disguises in case they needed another incognito exit.
“I’m really not sure how incognito we were back there,” Rose said with a laugh.
“True, but we didn’t look like us.” Crowley looked at the menus above the busy serving area. “This stuff is barely food, but I’m hungry. Let’s take a moment.”
They ordered burgers and fries, and tall cups of over-processed post-mix cola, and sat at a corner table. They had their back to the wall and could see both entrances to the restaurant. Cr
owley was pleased to have a chance to rest and eat, to catch their breath, but they needed more than a few minutes. Fatigue dragged on him again. Rose put on a brave face, but she had to be as tired as he was. As he ate, he poked around on his phone and found a simple but suitable looking motel about ten miles from the Denver city center.
When they’d finished their meals, they hailed a cab and had him drive them out to the Red Lion Inn & Suites. It was a brick building in two-tone orange and white brick. It had a restaurant, good-sized, clean rooms, gym and pool. Way more than they needed. But it felt entirely anonymous and that helped to ease Crowley’s anxieties.
“I think maybe we should get a shared room,” he said. At Rose’s raised eyebrow, he added. “If these people are after us, especially given how easily they killed that guy at the airport, I don’t like the idea of us separating.”
“Fair enough,” Rose said. “Let’s get a twin.”
Crowley pursed his lips. He wanted to push, to suggest a queen bed, but knew it would be foolish. He booked the room and they locked the door behind them.
“I need a shower,” Rose said, and headed straight to the bathroom.
When she emerged, fully dressed again, she slumped down on her bed, stared at the ceiling. “So what now?”
Crowley had been thinking about that. “I wish we knew what Lily learned from that canopic jar she stole.”
“Or what she plans to bargain for with it.”
Crowley hadn’t thought of that. “Interesting. You think she’s trying to set up a trade for something else? This Anubis Key maybe?”
Rose shrugged into her pillow. “No idea, but maybe. Or perhaps the jar itself is a clue about the Key.” She glanced at Crowley, her eyes heavy with concern. “Honestly, it’s our only clue, right?”
“I guess so.”
