The alarm woke her early the next morning and she didn’t waste any time. She showered, dressed and was out the door inside of ten minutes. She walked back across the street to the airport and took the shuttle bus over to the rental car facility, where she picked up the car she’d neglected to get the night before.

She got on the highway and headed south. Antietam was less than seventy miles away and, with the traffic headed into the city instead of out, she made good time on the road. It was just after eight-thirty when she drove into the town of Sharpsburg, population 692. The battle had been fought near Antietam Creek, hence the name, and the majority of the land on which the battle had taken place was now part of Antietam National Battlefield.

She drove around town for a few minutes, wanting the park to be open for a while before she arrived so she wouldn’t appear too eager to any of the employees. The last thing she wanted was to arouse suspicion. If her hunch was correct, she was going to need her anonymity later, so it was better to be overprotective now than risk not having it when she needed it.

She parked in the parking lot outside the visitor center and then spent a few minutes just standing outside, staring off into the distance. It was hard to look out on these grassy fields and rolling hills and realize that one of the bloodiest battles ever fought on U.S. soil took place here. Annja closed her eyes, listening, and slowly the sounds of the conflict fell over her—the neighing of the horses, the cries of the men, the crack of the muskets and the boom of the cannons. The shouts of the Yankees in those hard Northern accents were eclipsed by the ululating cry that was the famed Rebel yell.

A hand gripped her shoulder, pulling her out of her reverie.

“You all right, miss?” a kindly voice asked, and Annja opened her eyes to find an elderly park ranger standing at her elbow. “You seemed to be lost there for a moment.”

“Oh, yes,” she replied, smiling genuinely for the first time in days. “I was just trying to imagine what it would have been like.”

He glanced out over the field and the same wistful look that Annja was certain was in her own eyes crept into his. She realized she had found a kindred spirit. The ranger knew what she was talking about; she didn’t need to specify that she’d been trying to imagine what it would have been like on the day of the battle.

“Hell on earth, I suspect, miss—hell on earth.”

That was as good a description as any, she supposed.

He shook himself, as if clearing away the vision, and turned back to her with a smile. “Charlie Connolly,” he said, extending his hand.

She shook. “Annja Creed.”

“I thought I recognized you. Planning on doing a show on the ghosts of Antietam?”

The question caught her off guard and the only thing she could think to say in response was to ask, “You’ve got ghosts?”

“Even if we didn’t, would that stop that show of yours?” he asked, and then laughed aloud at his wittiness.

Annja had to admit that he had her there.

After laughing with him for a moment, Annja asked, “Can you tell me where I can find a listing of all the graves in the park?”

“Looking for someone in particular or just doing research?” he wanted to know, once he stopped chuckling and had wiped the tears of merriment out of his eyes.

“Does it make a difference?”

He shrugged. “If you’re looking for general information, I can probably help you out myself, but if you’re looking for a certain grave, you’ll have to use the computers in the main wing of the visitor’s center.

He took a map out of his back pocket, opened it so Annja could see the small jumble of buildings at the west entrance and then circled one of them with a felt-tip pen he took out of his pocket.

“That there’s the visitor’s center and it should have what you need.”

Annja thanked him for his kindness and headed in that direction.

The visitor’s center was a granite-fronted single-story steel-and-glass building. Inside were historical exhibits, a theater, a series of public computers for learning more about the site and a park store. Annja paid for a half hour of time on the computer and went right to work.

The records system was straightforward and easy to use. All she had to do was put the soldier’s name into the system and it would tell her if, indeed, he was buried at the park and what section and row his marker could be found in if he were.

Eager to get on with finding the treasure, Annja typed William Parker, Captaininto the search field.

The machine clanked and whirred for a second and then spit out a reply.

No information found.

That’s strange, she thought.

She tried again, this time typing slowly and being certain she’d spelled things correctly.

Still nothing.

She tried without the captain. And finally another time with the last name first, followed by the first name.

The computer just didn’t want to take it.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” she said to herself.

The clue instructed her to find Parker’s doppelgänger’s grave. That seemed straightforward enough. A doppelgänger was a German word that meant, literally, body double. A mystical creature that looked precisely like the original and had a tendency to try and take over the other’s life.

Obviously mystical creatures didn’t exist, which meant the word needed to be read in a more realistic sense. To Annja’s way of thought, that meant someone with the same name.

But she’d been through the database a couple of times and there wasn’t anyone buried in Antietam National Cemetery with the name William Parker. There was a Corey Parker, and a Parker Blue, but no William Parker.

She didn’t understand. The grave should be here!

Unless you’re in the wrong place.

The thought loomed up suddenly from the depths of her mind, but once it had surfaced she couldn’t dismiss it as easily as it had arrived.

Was that it? Had she chosen the wrong place?

Annja sat back and mentally reviewed the choices she’d made to arrive at this particular place over some other. She felt like her reasoning was sound. Antietam had been a major turning point for Lee and for the South, as well. Some historians even called it the beginning of the end. Never again would Lee’s precious Army of Northern Virginia invade Union soil. Never again would Lee have the chance to disrupt the organization of the North on such a grand scale. By failing at Antietam, Lee had determined the final course of the war. It had just taken a few more years for that course to play out.

So what had she missed?

She took a moment and wrote out the clue on the piece of scrap paper she had in front of her.

The minute she did so, she saw her mistake.

In deciding that Antietam was the right place, she’d skipped an entire line of the verse.

“‘Where the Peacock freely roamed…’” she said softly.

What the hell does that mean?

It had to be significant; it wouldn’t be there otherwise.

She got up from her seat and wandered over to the information desk, where the fussy secretary had been replaced by the kind old park ranger who’d asked over her welfare earlier.

Seeing her, he asked, “Find what you was lookin’ for, miss?”

“Not quite. Does the name ‘the Peacock’ mean anything to you?”

He laughed, “You mean other than the name of the bar I used to frequent in Bangkok during the war?”

Annja smiled. “While I’d love to hear your reminiscences, and it sounds like a fascinating place, I was thinking more in direct relation to the Civil War.”

He nodded. “I reckon you’re talking about General Stuart, then.”

“Stuart?” She was familiar with most of the war’s central figures, and while she recognized the name, she couldn’t put a finger on who he was or why he might have been called the Peacock.