Sacred Stone

AL-KHALIFA TWISTED THE throttle and took the BMW to seventy miles an hour on the snow-covered road. Passing three turnoffs, they crossed over a hill and were out of sight of Reykjavik. Watching the side of the road carefully, he located a trail where he had packed down the snow yesterday with a rented snowmobile. He turned onto the narrow strip of packed snow and drove over another small hill. A fjord with a thin crust of ice extended almost to the base of the hill. Suddenly, civilization seemed far away.

There, on a pad of packed snow, a Kawasaki helicopter was waiting.

HORNSBY SLOWED THE SUV as they passed the first turnoff and glanced at the snow for tracks. Finding none, he stepped on the gas and checked the next. Slowing to check the side roads was killing time, but Hornsby and Crabtree had no other choice.

The BMW motorcycle was nowhere to be seen.

AL-KHALIFA PLACED THE blindfolded emir in the passenger seat of the Kawasaki then locked the door from the outside with a key. He had removed the inside latch from the passenger side and now the emir had no way out. Walking around to the front of the helicopter, he climbed into the pilot’s seat and slid the key into the ignition. As he waited while the igniters warmed, he stared over at his prisoner.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked.

The emir, still blindfolded with mouth taped shut, simply nodded.

“Good,” Al-Khalifa said, “then it’s time to take a little trip.”

Twisting the key, he waited until the turbines had reached proper thrust. Then he pulled up on the collective and lifted the Kawasaki from the snow. Once the helicopter was ten feet off the ground he eased the cyclic forward. The Kawasaki moved forward, passed through ground effect as it rose in the air, then headed out to sea. Keeping the helicopter low over the terrain to blend in with the mountains, Al-Khalifa looked backward toward Reykjavik.

“THE TRACKS END here,” Hornsby said, staring down at the snow through the open door of the SUV.

Crabtree was glancing out the side window.

“There,” she said, pointing. “There’s a packed trail.”

Hornsby stared at the thin trail. “The snow’s too soft. We’ll just get stuck.”

After calling the Oregon,which quickly dispatched George Adams in the Corporation’s Robinson helicopter, Hornsby and Crabtree started hiking along the packed trail. They found the BMW motorcycle ten minutes later. By the time Adams flew overhead they had figured out what had happened. They called him on the radio.

“We have a blast patch from a rotor blast,” Hornsby reported.

“I’ll keep an eye out for another chopper,” Adams said.

Adams flew as far from Reykjavik as he could before fuel ran low, but he saw no other helicopters. The emir had simply vanished, as if plucked from the earth by a giant hand.

14

CABRILLO DROVE THROUGHthe darkness with the lights atop the Thiokol cutting a dim path through the sea of white. Five hours and fifty miles north of Kulusuk, he was finally settling into a groove. The sounds from the snowcat, which at first seemed chaotic and indistinctive, were now taking form. He could feel the pulses from the engine, the roar from the treads, and the groaning from the chassis, and he used the noises to gauge his progress. The sound and the vibrations signaled to him when the snowcat was climbing. The squeal from the treads indicated the type of surface he was crossing.

Cabrillo was becoming one with the machine.

Twenty minutes earlier, Cabrillo had first steered onto the massive ice cap that covered most of Greenland. Now, by using Campbell’s maps and detailed notes, he was guiding the Thiokol through a series of ice-covered valleys. If all continued according to plan, he would reach Mount Forel at about breakfast time in Iceland. Then he’d snatch the meteorite, load it aboard the snowcat, then cruise back to Kulusuk and have the Oregon’s helicopter pick him and the orb up. In a few days they’d have their fee and it would all be over and done with.

At least that was the plan—in and out and home.

CABRILLO FELT THE front end lighten and jammed the levers in reverse just in time. The Thiokol stopped dead in her tracks then quickly roared backward. Since leaving Kulusuk, the trip had gone smoothly. Still, the unforgiving wilderness rarely allowed such easy passage and, had Cabrillo not stopped and backed up, in a few more seconds he and the Thiokol would have been at the bottom of a wide crevasse in the ice.

Once he had reversed a safe distance away, Cabrillo slipped on his parka and climbed from the cab. Reaching up and adjusting the lights, he walked forward and stared into the abyss. The thick wall of the glacier glowed blue and green in the lights.

Staring across the rift, he estimated the gap at twelve feet. There was no way to estimate how far down the crack went before it narrowed and closed. He tightened the hood of his parka against the howling wind. A few feet more and the snowcat would have tipped into the crevasse and downward until the crack narrowed and it was pi

Shuddering from the realization, Cabrillo walked back and climbed into the cab of the Thiokol and stared at the clock. The time was now 5 A.M., but it was still as dark as it had been all evening. He glanced at the map, then took his divider and measured the distance to Mount Forel. Thirty miles and three hours of travel time left. Reaching for the satellite phone, he dialed Campbell. Surprisingly the phone rang only once.

“Yep,” Campbell said in a clear voice.

“I just about ran into a crevasse.”

“Give me your GPS numbers,” Campbell said.

Cabrillo read them off and waited while Campbell consulted his map in Kulusuk.

“Looks like you took a wrong turn about a mile back,” Campbell told him, “and went left instead of right. You’re up against Nunuk Glacier. Backtrack and skirt the edge of the glacier. That will take you over a small rise and down into the lowland. From there you could see Forel if it was clear and not pitch-black outside.”

“You sure?” Cabrillo asked.

“Positive. I’ve been up the canyon you’re in before—it’s a dead end.”

“Back about a mile and turn left,” Cabrillo reiterated.

“That would be a right turn to you,” Campbell said quickly, “you’ve changed directions.”

“Then I follow the edge of the glacier?”

“Yes, but right now, while you’re stopped, I want you to climb out and adjust the light on the driver’s side sideways. That way, once you reach the edge of the glacier, the light will illuminate the edge. The reflection will look like jade or sapphires—just glance occasionally to the side to check your progress. Once the edge of the glacier recedes you’ll crest a ridge and start down again. That will signal that you’re free of Nunuk Glacier. Then you’ll have a straight shot up the side of Mount Forel. It’s steep but the old Thiokol can make it—I’ve done it before.”

“Thanks,” Cabrillo said. “Are you going to be able to make it a few hours more if I need you? Keeping it on the straight and narrow?”

“I’m just sipping enough to get by,” Campbell said. “I’ll be here if you need me.”

“Good,” Cabrillo said as he shut the telephone off.

Climbing from the cab again, he reached up to the roof of the Thiokol and adjusted the light to the side. Then he climbed back in, shifted into first, and spun the snowcat 180 degrees on her tracks. Driving slowly, he found the edge of the glacier a few yards away and started following along.