He wasn’t looking in her direction, so she felt safe ignoring his command. All she needed was a few more seconds, anyway….

“I’m warning you! Show yourself now and save us both a lot of grief.”

She grabbed the handle on the edge of the chest and pulled.

The chest shifted a little but it didn’t come free.

“Last time!” the ranger called out.

She planted her feet against the wall of the grave and used them as leverage, pulling harder. She could feel her shoulder muscles straining, could feel the earth’s grip loosening…and with a sudden release the chest came free of the earth that had imprisoned it for so long.

Annja fell over backward as the resistance was released. As if fate was determined to prevent her from succeeding in her task, the metal side of the chest struck the blade of her shovel as she toppled over. The sound of metal striking metal rang out over the cemetery in the crisp night air.

The ranger had had enough. He drew his revolver and waved it back and forth in front of him, uncertain precisely where to point it but certain now that he wasn’t alone. The light from his flashlight arced out in her direction.

Annja pulled the chest close to her side and kept her head down for the moment, waiting for the light to move on. When it swept away in the other direction, she boosted herself out of the hole and rolled over flat on her stomach so she was facing toward the ranger, covering the chest with her body.

The light came back toward her a moment later, just as she expected. She tucked her face into the crook of her arm to keep the light from reflecting off her skin and then held as still as possible. The urge to get the heck out of there while she still could was strong, especially when the light danced across the place where she was hiding, but she fought it off, mentally ordering herself not to move. That would only attract attention; if she stayed where she was, chances were good that her dark clothing would help her blend into the landscape and she’d go unnoticed.

The light stopped a few inches to her left and stayed there so long that Annja began to think that her foot was sticking out, in plain sight, and that the ranger was just playing with her. Her heart began to pound in her chest and a thin trickle of sweat rolled down the side of her face despite the cool night air. She tensed, preparing to face off against the ranger should that prove necessary, knowing she couldn’t let herself be caught at this stage of the game.

A rustling sound came from her left, about halfway between her position and that of the ranger. It was easily loud enough for him to hear it as well and Annja watched as his light shifted directly toward it.

Is someone else out here? she wondered.

The sound came again and she could see the ranger growing more agitated by the moment. The muzzle of the gun jerked back and forth, seeking a target.

Then two things happened simultaneously.

The ranger’s light fell on the white-tailed deer that had come down into the cemetery to graze. It was standing just a headstone or two away from where Annja was doing her best to squeeze herself down into the earth to keep from being seen. The ranger’s light caused the creature to bolt, and the ranger, seeing the deer’s big eyes staring back at him out of the darkness, pulled the trigger of his revolver in surprise.

The deer leaped over the grave Annja had spent the past few hours digging and disappeared into the darkness.

The bullet bounced off a nearby headstone and embedded itself in the earth near Annja’s face.

It happened so fast she didn’t even have time to flinch.

“Stupid deer!” the ranger shouted after the already departed animal. “You’re lucky you didn’t get shot!”

That, at least, was a sentiment that Annja could heartily agree with.

She remained where she was as the ranger flung a few more choice words in the direction the deer had run and then got himself under control. Once he had calmed down, he climbed back astride his horse and rode off, leaving Annja alone with the dead.

She waited a few minutes to be certain, but when the ranger didn’t return she climbed slowly to her feet, picked up the chest and fled as quickly as caution allowed.

37

Annja drove straight back to her motel. She parked her car out of sight between a pair of oversize pickup trucks at the back of the lot and then carried the chest up to her room.

The light in the bathroom was brighter than that in the bedroom, so she took the chest in there and set it on the counter next to the sink. There was still a thin patina of dirt covering the outside of the chest so she grabbed a washcloth from the towel rack and used it to clear as much of it off as possible.

It wasn’t anything to look at, really. It was just a simple metal box with a circular indentation in the lid. Aside from that there weren’t any other markings or decorations of any kind.

Functionalwas the word that came to mind.

After all the time it had spent in the earth, she hoped it still remained that way, as well.

She took the Jeffersonian Key out of her pocket and, with more than a bit of trepidation, placed it into the indentation on the lid.

With a deep breath and a silent prayer to whoever might be listening, Annja placed a finger against the center of the star and pushed down on the disk.

There was an audible clickand a previously unseen seam opened up along the outline of the disk. Then she heard the whir and ticking of a clockwork mechanism and the disk sank half an inch into the top of the chest.

Taking hold of the eight-pointed star that sat atop the disk, Annja put her ear next to the box and slowly began to turn the star to the right, like a safecracker listening for the correct number on the dial. She was afraid she would miss it and there was no telling what would happen if she did. She’d encountered her fair share of reliquaries and other storage devices in the past that had been rigged to cause damage to their contents should the opening sequence not be performed correctly. She’d seen them all—everything from acid baths to sudden bursts of flame. It wouldn’t do Garin any good for her to have come this far only to screw it up at the last minute.

She needn’t have worried, however. The minute the dial had been turned the right distance, it clicked loudly into place. Annja pulled back at the sound and watched as the top third of the box extended outward in all directions, the pieces twisting and turning in individual squares like the parts of a Rubik’s Cube. The ticking came again and then the parts rapidly reassembled themselves until the top of a cylinder with the same circumference as the key jutted out of the upper third of the device.

Annja’s pulse was pounding in her ears as she reached out and turned the key back in the other direction, just as she would if dialing the combination on her locker at the gym.

The star spun in the other direction, all the way around past the first location once, twice, and then, as the main point of the star came around to true north for the third time, there was another click. Just as before, the box underwent a strange mechanical transformation, rearranging itself into the center section of the cylinder. One more turn of the dial, this time back in the original direction, another surge of activity, and Annja was left with a vertical cylinder about the size of a cookie jar, with the eight-pointed star as a lid. The letters CSAstretched down the front of the cylinder in faded red paint.

“All right, Parker,” she said to the container. “You’ve led me on a merry chase, now it’s time to give up the ghost and tell me what you did with that treasure.”

She tugged the lid free and looked inside.