‘I’m just not getting through to you, am I? Unless we deliver a week today, we’re both dead men. Period.’ Although his voice sounded casual, Archie’s eyes were burning brightly. ‘There’s a rumour about that Cassius is hard up, that he lost everything in some deal. So he won’t let it slide, won’t take no excuses. And if I can find you, then he certainly can. If we’re going to sort this, we’re going to have to do it together. I’m sorry, Tom, but this ain’t just my problem. It’s our problem.’

TWELVE

Fort Knox, Kentucky20th July – 10:05am

A black Ford Explorer had picked Jennifer up from her apartment that morning and driven her to Reagan Washington National, where, in one of the side hangars, a tan Cessna Citation Ultra had been prepped and was waiting for her. Corbett clearly did not kid around when it came to getting things done.

The jet had looked brand new, and apart from the pilot and lone cabin attendant, she was the only passenger. Sinking back into the soft leather seats, she had stretched her legs right out into the narrow aisle, basking in the cabin lights. Twenty minutes later and the plane was arrowing through the clear Washington sky.

Flying had always made her slightly nervous. Once a plane she was on had hit an air pocket and dropped almost five thousand feet. As if they’d hit a glass wall in the sky and slid down it. Takeoff and landing were the worst and she unconsciously alternated between gripping the arm rests and bracing herself for possible impact against the seat in front of her, depending on what stage of the journey they were at. This time though, tired from the early start, she had found herself falling into a deep sleep until the gentle bump of the undercarriage coming down shook her awake.

Blinking, she turned her head to the window. The elliptical porthole framed a quilt work of differently coloured fields, each one bounded by a dark line of trees. A single, cotton thin strip of blacktop ran in an unbroken line right to left and disappeared in both directions into a shimmering heat haze. Lonely farmsteads and barns stood marooned in the flat landscape like small wooden islands. Then, as the plane dropped lower, a low-slung galvanised fence on the military airbase’s outer perimeter surged up to meet her.

‘Welcome to Kentucky, Agent Browne.’ Jennifer stepped down off the steps that had concertinaed out of the jet’s gleaming fuselage and shook the hand of the man waiting to greet her. ‘I hope you had a pleasant flight. I’m Lieutenant Sheppard. I’m to escort you to the Depository.’

‘Thank you,’ she answered, unable to mask her smile. It was quite an outfit. Pink plaid trousers, white polo shirt and yellow sun visor all competed for her attention. Beneath the visor the man’s face was creased into a broad grin as he pumped her hand up and down enthusiastically.

Although Jennifer was mindful never to form opinions of people too quickly, a trait she had inherited from her mother who maintained that time was the only reliable lens through which to view someone’s true character, she instinctively liked Sheppard. He had a breezy, cheerful confidence and an uncomplicated and genuine manner that his gaudy wardrobe reinforced rather than undermined.

Sheppard looked down at himself and then flashed her a guilty smile, brown eyes twinkling in his smooth, sun-tanned face.

‘I’m real sorry about the clothes, Ma’am. I was just heading out for a round when I got word to come and meet you here. I didn’t have time to change.’ Jennifer nodded back, her tone understanding.

‘That’s quite all right, Lieutenant. I appreciate you taking me over. Is it far?’

‘No, ma’am. Not in this baby.’ He pointed to a white golf cart, his clubs firmly strapped to the back.

‘In that?’ She looked at him questioningly as they walked over to it.

‘In this.’ He swung himself into the driver’s seat and then reaching up, fixed a red light to the roof. ‘I had a buddy in the Corps of Engineers make a few alterations. You into cars?’

‘I used to fix up and race Mustangs with my dad if that counts,’ she replied with a smile.

‘Hey – then maybe you should drive,’ Sheppard suggested eagerly, sliding across to the passenger side. ‘Then you can tell me how you think this baby handles.’

‘Sure.’ She shrugged and slipped in behind the wheel, turning the key in the ignition. ‘You holding on?’

‘Hell yeah.’

As well as being the site of the US Bullion Depository, Fort Knox is also the tank capital of the United States, its 109,050 acres home to 32,000 men and women of the US Army Armor and Cavalry which has its headquarters there. It was not long, therefore, before they were speeding past barrack buildings, mess halls, training blocks and groups of soldiers running in tight formation, their chanted cadences blending with each other to form a muscular, sweaty symphony.

Her foot flat to the floor, Jennifer slalomed through the troops and the buildings, the red light flashing, oncoming vehicles sounding their horns as Sheppard called out the directions, his hand fiercely gripping the grab handle to stop himself from sliding across the shiny white vinyl seat as she dived in and out of the traffic. She sensed he was enjoying the ride.

Ahead of them, the granite-clad shape of the Depository loomed closer. From a distance, Jennifer thought that it seemed fairly ordinary; not much bigger than a small office block really, like one of those low-rise bank buildings you get in local malls. But as she drew closer she saw that it had, in fact, the squat solidity of a small white mountain.

Set in a wide compound, it was a two storey building, the upper storey smaller than the lower one, its roof slightly tiered like the first few steps of a ziggurat. Steel-framed windows had been evenly set into the walls of both storeys like embrasures in a castle wall. The only access came through a single gate in the fifteen-foot high steel fence that encircled the compound, itself flanked by two armoured sentry boxes. Once inside, a service road with neatly cut grass verges on each side ringed the building, which had four concrete bunkers surgically grafted onto each of its corners. A lone lawnmower patrolled the outer verge, its engine buzzing.

‘It was built in 1936 and the first gold shipments arrived in 1937.’ Sheppard shouted over the whine of the cart’s electric motor, angrily gesticulating soldiers scattering in front of them like ninepins. Jennifer nodded. She couldn’t imagine it having ever actually been built. It seemed to have been there forever, as if it had erupted out of the solid bedrock millions of years ago and then been shaped and polished by tens of thousands of years of sun and rain and frost.

‘Usage peaked in 1941 when it held about 650 million ounces,’ he continued. ‘Course these days, the main reserves are held at the Federal Reserve in New York, about five stories down. You should go and check it out sometime. I’m told the security there makes this place look like Disneyland.’

She slowed the cart as it approached the gate and then accelerated hard again as they were waved through. The sentries saluted Sheppard, their arms juddering to a rigid halt at the side of their head, their hands stiff, thumb tucked in, seemingly unfazed by his clothes and the sight of Jennifer at the wheel of the careering golf cart.

Up close, the building was even more formidable. The sheer mass of its granite walls seemed to weigh down on everything around it – a dark, dense, oppressive energy that compressed and squeezed and stifled. Jennifer found herself strangely conscious of the sound of her own breathing, of the sheer effort of moving, as if underwater.

Surveillance cameras, positioned high on the granite walls like glass eyes on white steel stalks, covered every inch of the building’s walls. Twin floodlights perched atop black poles gazed out at the surrounding compound on all four sides. A huge Stars and Stripes snapped in the wind outside the main entrance. The golden seal of the Treasury Department carved into the lintel glinted like a small sun.

‘Stop here,’ Sheppard shouted. Jennifer immediately threw the cart into a tight skid, the tyres biting the tarmac as it slowed to a stop.

‘Wow,’ Sheppard breathed. ‘I think you just set a new record.’

‘It sure is quick.’ She jumped out and tossed the keys over to him. ‘What did you do? Change the gearing?’

‘Trade secret.’ Sheppard smiled. ‘What d’ya think of the handling?’

‘Slight understeer. You want to tighten up the front left suspension.’

‘I’ll do that.’ He winked at her. ‘Come on. Rigby will be waiting and boy does he hate that.’

Turning on his heel, Sheppard disappeared through the Depository’s massive black doorway into the cold marbled darkness of the building.

THIRTEEN

10:27am

As Sheppard had predicted, the Officer in Charge, Captain Rigby, was standing in the large entrance atrium ready to greet her. He gave her a brief handshake and what looked to Jennifer like a forced smile as Sheppard introduced them.

He was tall, perhaps six foot four, his uniform immaculate, his hair clipped short, his eyes bristling with well-drilled efficiency. From his snatched glances, Jennifer could tell that he was struggling to reconcile Sheppard’s garish golfing outfit with his well-ordered world. She decided to keep it short and businesslike, sensing that anything else would fail to show up on Rigby’s internal radar.

‘Thank you very much for agreeing to see me today, Captain.’

‘That’s quite all right, Agent Browne,’ he said stiffly. ‘We all have a job to do.’ The way his pale eyes narrowed a fraction over his thin nose and high cut cheekbones suggested what he was really thinking. That he thought this was a waste of time. That he didn’t want her or any other federal pains in the asses anywhere near his facility, asking him questions, disrupting his routine, marking his polished floor with their gumshoes. He just wanted her out, ASAP. That suited her just fine.

‘Have you received the instructions from Washington?’

He nodded.

‘Yes, they came through this morning. As requested we have left the items in situ.’

‘Good. Then before we go down, I wonder whether you could answer a couple of questions.’

‘What sort of questions?’ Rigby’s tone was immediately suspicious.

‘Any questions I choose to ask, Captain,’ Jennifer answered firmly.

‘This is a classified installation,’ Rigby countered forcefully. ‘If you think I’m just going to reveal sensitive intel without specific authorisation, then I suggest you get back on your plane, Agent Browne.’

‘And if you think I’m going to leave here without everything I want, I suggest you take another look at your orders, Captain.’ Jennifer’s voice was hard and her eyes flashed defiance. Normally, she would have preferred to use reason rather than raising her voice, but in Rigby’s case she sensed he had been conditioned not to react to anything else. ‘They specify full and unconditional cooperation with the FBI for the duration of our investigation, including disclosing relevant security procedures. If you’ve got a problem with that, then I suggest we step into your office right now and call your and my superiors in Washington. I think we both know what the answer would be.’

There was an awkward silence, punctured only by the rasping of the studs on Sheppard’s golf shoes against the marble floor as he nervously shifted his weight onto his other foot. Rigby had gone a deep shade of red and he seemed to be rolling something around between his thumb and forefinger, the tips of both fingers white from squeezing so hard. Jennifer, lips pressed together, returned his glare until, eventually, he managed a grimace that she assumed approximated to a smile.

‘Very well,’ he conceded, his voice slightly strangled.

‘I have no intention of prying, Captain,’ Jennifer said, adopting a more conciliatory tone now that she had made her point. ‘Just a bit of background about the installation to go into my report. For instance, is this a military or a Federal installation?’

‘Oh,’ Rigby sounded relieved, although there was still an unmistakeably impatient edge to his voice. ‘A bit of both. The buildings are on an army base so they have some responsibility for the security and defence of the facility. But it is run by the US Treasury and staffed by officers from the Mint Police. There are twenty-six of us in all.’

Jennifer frowned.

‘Buildings? I only see one building.’

‘No.’ Rigby shook his head firmly. ‘It’s two buildings. The one that you see around you now is just a single story outer shell built from granite and lined with concrete. But the vault itself is an entirely separate building on two levels built from steel plates, I-beams and cylinders, all encased in reinforced concrete.’

‘So how do you get in?’

‘Through a twenty-ton steel door.’

Jennifer nodded, satisfied.

‘Okay. Then let’s get started.’

‘Yes ma’am.’

He set off, with Jennifer next to him and Sheppard bringing up the rear. She soon saw what he had meant about the two buildings. The atrium led to a corridor running left and right that encircled the vault with offices and storerooms giving off its outer edge. It was a narrow, constricted space and Jennifer recognised the same ruthless anonymity she had witnessed in other Federal installations, the Bureau included. She was glad when they emerged, having turned right and then followed the corridor round until they were on the other side of the building, into another large space.

Here, the large steel shutters that had been set into the outer granite wall and the loading bays and ramps suggested that this was where bullion and supplies were moved in and out. Opposite the shutter, built into the vault wall, was the gleaming steel bulk of the vault door.

‘No single person has the combination to the vault,’ Rigby continued. ‘Instead three separate combinations are required, each held by different members of my team.’

As he spoke he approached a console to the right of the door. Beyond a plate glass window to the side of them that looked onto the atrium, Jennifer saw another two men step towards similar consoles. Ten seconds later there was a series of loud clunks as the restraining bolts retracted. With a steady mechanical drone the massive door began to swing back towards them, steel pistons gleaming and hissing like a steam train.

‘It’s certainly an impressive set-up.’

At these words, Rigby came as close to smiling as she imagined he had ever done in his life and she sensed that their earlier disagreement had temporarily, at least, vanished from his mind.

‘Ma’am, I’m proud to say this installation is more secure than most of our missile silos. We’re in the middle of a fully manned Army base. We have our own power plant, water system and strategic food reserves. We have twenty-four seven, three hundred and sixty degree surveillance. Nothing gets in or out of here that isn’t meant to.’

They stepped inside the vault and walked along a narrow metal platform to the elevator that took them with a low-pitched whine down to the basement vault floor. Rigby held the gate open for them. Jennifer looked slowly around her.

The room was like a massive warehouse, consisting of two floors built around the central space in which they were now standing. Each floor was divided into compartments with thick steel bars separating and enclosing the top of each compartment, so that they looked like a series of huge cages. Within each compartment, stacked from floor to ceiling, were thousands upon thousands of gold bars. It took her a few seconds to realise that she was unconsciously holding her breath; fearful, perhaps, that the sound of her breathing might rouse the slumbering dragon who must surely be guarding such a fairy-tale treasure.

‘Impressive, isn’t it?’ Sheppard winked. ‘It still hits me right here every time I see it.’ He clutched a clenched fist to his chest as Jennifer nodded silently. The gold was everywhere she looked, glowing and alive, a huge dull mass pulsing rhythmically in the flicker of the lights like the beat of a powerful heart.

‘We have small shipments going in and out of the facility all the time,’ Rigby cut into her thoughts, pointing at three large silver containers standing in the middle of the room, each about four foot long, two feet wide and three feet high with the US Treasury seal emblazoned across the front. ‘This is what the bullion is transported in. These are due to go out this afternoon.’

‘Right.’ She nodded, smiling. Complimenting his facility seemed to have transformed Rigby into the very model of inter-agency cooperation.

‘But the items you requested to see are over here.’ He led her towards a compartment on the far left of the room. As she drew closer, she could see that it seemed a little less full than the other cages and contained boxes and briefcases and files.

‘As you can see,’ said Rigby, holding up a large metal tag that was fixed to the door of the compartment, ‘each of the thirty four compartments is sealed. When any seal is broken, the compartment’s contents are re-inventoried and resealed by the US Mint.’

He snapped the seal off and reaching into his pocket for a key, unlocked the cage and stepped in. He emerged a few moments later holding a thin aluminium briefcase that he held out to Jennifer with a nod.

‘I believe that this is what you came for.’

‘I’ll open it down here.’

‘As you wish.’

Rigby carried the case over to one of the containers and placed it down flat on its side, its catches facing Jennifer. She reached forward and flicked the catches open, the noise echoing through the room like rifle shots. Imperceptibly, Sheppard and Rigby moved around to stand either side of her.

She opened the case, only to find another smaller box, about 8 inches long and 6 inches wide, inside it. It was covered in dark blue velvet that had worn away around the corners, leaving them bald and frayed. The top had been stamped with the gold seal of the US Treasury, now faded and dull.

Jennifer gently removed the box from the case and pressed the small gold catch that released the lid, her throat suddenly dry and tight. The lid snapped up, revealing an interior lined in creamy white silk that had been fashioned to snugly house five large coins, two along the top, three along the bottom.

But the box was empty.

FOURTEEN

Amsterdam, Holland

21st July – 4:40pm

Cindy and Pete Roscoe were enjoying themselves. London had been impressive, Paris beautiful, but Amsterdam was fun. The coffee shops, the girls in the windows, the canals. It was as different from Tulsa, Oklahoma as it was possible to be. Hell, the concierge at their hotel had even tried to sell them some pot. They’d both pretended to be shocked but secretly they were pleased. It had made their trip seem somehow more authentic.

Amsterdam was also a special place for Cindy, whose grandparents had fled from Holland in the 1930s. She had endured an emotional visit to Anne Frank’s house the day before.

‘That poor sweet girl,’ she had sobbed into Pete’s strong arms, her mascara dissolving into spidery streaks across her face as the other tourists thronged around them.

Today was their last day and after a fortnight of trekking round museums and across cites, they had agreed that a relaxing guided tour around the canals was the perfect way to round off their trip before the long flight home. Ten minutes in, clad in matching Dallas Cowboys jackets with the open-topped canal boat slicing through the city and the tour guide pointing out the various sights, they knew that it had been a great idea.

Cindy, as usual, was armed with a guidebook of biblical proportions, a parting gift from her emotional mother at the airport that she now believed to be the gospel on all things European. Such was her faith in its pronouncements that she had developed an annoying habit of matching any guide’s commentary to that of her book and then whispering to Pete if they got something wrong, or even worse, omitted some crucial fact.

Pete, meanwhile, had mastered a knack of nodding and making the appropriate noises while only half listening to his wife. His priority, instead, was to capture as much of their trip as possible on film. So while Cindy had her nose buried in a book, Pete had his eye firmly glued to the viewfinder of the tiny digital video camera that nestled in his broad hands.

He had even developed his own dizzying cinematic style, his camera swooping up and down buildings, or suddenly panning in or out, the image uncertain and jumpy. This time, as they went under a bridge, Pete attempted a particularly ambitious shot, zooming out from the detail at the top of a building down to a wide angle shot of the canal. He then tracked slowly across, until he had framed the rows of seats ahead of him and the tour guide standing right at the front of the canal boat. He smiled. She was cute.

Suddenly, something at the edge of the viewfinder caught his eye. An ex-cop, Pete had learnt to recognise when things did not look quite right and instinctively he moved the camera to the right so that the tour guide’s face now only took up half the screen.

It was not the agitated man with the tanned face and the shaved head in the phone box just before the next bridge who looked out of place, but rather the two men in dark suits that had just stepped out of the large black Range Rover and were walking towards him. There was a repressed energy in their walk, an assured confidence in their manner that reminded Pete of a dog walking at the very limit of its leash, tugging on its owner’s arm. These two were about to cut themselves loose.

He zoomed in on the phone box, past the tour guide’s face, just as the man in it saw the two approaching figures. The phone instantly fell out of his hand and his head jerked from side to side, as he weighed his options. But Pete could see that he’d noticed them too late. Hemmed in by the phone box on one side and the men on the other, he clearly had nowhere to go.

As the two men approached him, their backs came together like heavy black curtains, blocking Pete’s view. He kept the camera trained on them, hardly daring to blink in case he missed something. Suddenly their shoulders parted and Pete got a glimpse of the man, his eyes wide with terror, a hand pressed over his mouth to stifle his screams. An arm was raised and a long serrated blade flashed in the sun, hovering for a few seconds, its shiny surface silhouetted against the cobalt sky, before swooping down and diving into the man’s chest. He collapsed, lifeless.

The boat was almost level with the two men now and Pete widened his shot as they hunched over the body and went through his pockets. But just then, at the very moment that he was going to get slightly ahead of them and catch their actual faces, the boat went under a low brick bridge and they were lost from view. When Pete emerged the other side, his camera poised, the two men and the car were gone.

‘Holy shit. D’ya see that?’ Pete whispered to his wife, his mouth dry with fear and excitement. He kept the camera trained on the receding image of the corpse that lay slumped in the embrace of the phone box’s shadow.

‘Oh I know honey, isn’t it bad?’ Cindy said shaking her head disapprovingly. Her hooped earrings bounced merrily against her orange cheeks. ‘That was where Van Gogh used to live and she didn’t say a thing!’

PART II

Plate sin with goldAnd the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks;Arm it in rags, a pigmy’s straw doth pierce it.

William Shakespeare – King Lear (Act IV, Sc. vi)

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