The Magic Circle by Katherine Neville (13 inch ebook reader .TXT) 📗

out of the fog again as it approached the pass. Up there the road would fork, giving a choice of several routes heading into Jackson. So at the first turnout sign that appeared, almost invisible in the swirling mist, I cut my wheels and pulled off the road. Then I turned off my engine and cracked open my window a bit to listen.

Less than a minute later the government car swept by. I could hear the engine and see its outline, dark silver through the mist, but that was all. I waited a full five minutes before starting again on my way.

The road was clear over the pass, so I had a brief respite enabling me to think. I wondered what this manuscript was that had fallen into my hands, why everybody wanted it, and how it was that it had come to be written in runes. It surely wasn’t any correspondence belonging to Granny Pandora or my nefarious aunt Zoe. Nor did these pages resemble mementos of any of those great and famous legends with whom they’d reportedly trafficked throughout their long lives. And though the Celtic language itself might be thousands of years old, the document on the seat beside me wasn’t even beginning to yellow: it seemed to be written in pretty fresh ink. It was quite possible, I knew, that Sam had written in a rune code himself, trying to transcribe key elements of the original, and possibly more dangerous, documents—and maybe also to give a clue where the real ones were located, in case something happened to him.

It didn’t make sense why Sam “had to get rid of” the manuscript. If his death was faked, if everyone on the planet knew I was about to inherit the goods, if journalists knew enough to demand a press conference and ask for exclusive rights, and if even my own landlord was set to spy on me, then this whole situation had been designed to flush someone out of the woodwork: someone who wanted the real manuscript for whatever reason. And I was the bait.

I also now understood exactly what it was I must do: I had to hide this document in such a difficult place that no one but me—including Sam—could find it. And I knew precisely where that was going to be.

It was lucky I’d brought my skis.

At Jackson Hole I pulled into the parking lot facing the Grand Tetons—or “big tits,” as French trappers had dubbed these showgirl-breasted mountain peaks pointing at the sky. I stuffed the manuscript into one of my dog-eared canvas knapsacks from the back, grabbed my silvery moonsuit and parka and the thermal socks and gloves I always kept there, and went inside the lodge to the powder room to transform myself into the Snow Queen. Then I bought a cup of coffee, got some change at the cafeteria, and made the de rigueur long distance call to the Pod to explain my absence on this, my first full day back at work. I wanted to be sure he hadn’t gone ballistic when, after our slight unpleasantness yesterday, I’d failed to show up this morning at the office.

“Behn, where are you?” he said as soon as his secretary put me through.

“Last night I suddenly realized that I needed to collect some data out here at the western site, where I’m phoning from,” I lied.

The nuclear site at Arco out in the high desert, where the government’s fifty-two experimental reactors were located, was a three-hour drive in the opposite direction, past town and the post office I’d so hastily quitted. But the Pod’s next words made my lie seem absurdly unnecessary.

“I’ve had Maxfield beating the bushes for you since he first came in this morning. Wolf Hauser unexpectedly came back to town and dropped in here quite early. He was overjoyed to hear you’d be joining his project and wanted to meet you at once, since he was about to depart again on out-of-town business. We phoned you at home, but you’d already left. So I had Maxfield dash over to try to catch you at the post office—”

“The—post office?” I interjected, in what I hoped was a casual tone, though my ears were ringing and my head had started pounding again. Why on earth the post office? I pulled my psychological cards close to the chest to take a peek: Was the Pod in on this, too? I was beginning to trust no one, a prescription that hardly seemed the antidote to paranoia. But he was still speaking.

“After you left work yesterday I got a call from someone representing the Washington Post,” he explained. “She said she’d been trying to reach you for several days about some valuable papers she learned at a press conference were en route to you; that the Post urgently wanted to speak with you about acquiring them. I said I’d be sure to have you phone her today.

“Then when Hauser came through in such a rush this morning, it occurred to me that you might be over picking up mail—especially if you were expecting important documents. So I sent Maxfield at once. But when he found you—well, he’s told me the most astounding tale of your behavior.”

I knew what was coming next: how I drove off with some of Olivier’s body parts still attached to my car, and nearly glued the rest of him to the pavement. I looked like a fool, and worse. Yet though this seemed straightforward enough, there were a few things dangling here. For instance, whether it was the Pod’s idea or Olivier’s to try to pick up that package. But I could think of no way to ask, without letting the Pod know that the parcel was now actually in my possession.

“All this trouble just because I missed Dr. Hauser again,” I told him apologetically. “Well, it couldn’t be helped. I was in a big hurry too, so I didn’t realize Olivier was standing so close to my car. Tell