The 13th Enumeration (7 page)

In 1884, William Frishmuth was requested to submit a bid for a copper, brass, or bronze capstone, plated with platinum, for the Washington Monument. Frishmuth had done other plating work for the monument, so Colonel Thomas Lincoln Casey of the Corps of Engineers sent over the request for the bid. Instead of proffering a bid based on the specifications of Colonel Casey, Frishmuth suggested an aluminum capstone be cast for a price of seventy-five dollars. Due to the difficult nature of refining aluminum at the time, it was approximately the same cost as silver. Colonel Casey agreed, and William Frishmuth, after some difficulty, cast the single largest piece of aluminum up to that point in history. After the capstone’s completion, Frishmuth, to the chagrin of Colonel Casey, loaned the capstone to Tiffany’s for a few days in order that members of the public might view the work. The capstone was placed on the ground, and the general public was allowed to step over it in order to say, “I stepped over the top of the Washington Monument.” After Frishmuth finally relinquished the capstone to Colonel Casey, he gave a bill for the work of $256.10. Colonel Casey was enraged to find the bill was $175 more than agreed upon. They finally settled on $225.

What had first sparked Darius’s interest in the story was Frishmuth’s commissioning of the 113
th
Regiment of the 12
th
Cavalry. Often, Darius had found that members of the Order used the language of symbols and symbolism to communicate information that most did not understand. Darius did not know, nor could he find, whether the 113
th
designation was just the natural order of numbering for the Frishmuth regiment or something more. In his mind, anyway, it was the casting of the capstone which told him there was more to the story than history recorded.

The capstone of the Washington Monument consisted of two parts. The main body of the capstone was thirty-three-hundred pounds and made of stone. The very tip was made of one hundred ounces of aluminum cast by Frishmuth. Having been a member of Freemasonry for many years, Darius understood the significance attached to the number thirty-three. To Darius’s knowledge, what had never been mentioned before in the context of the aluminum capstone was that aluminum’s atomic number was thirteen, and its Latin name meant
bitter salt.
Interestingly, the sum of a Fibonacci sequence up to thirteen was in fact thirty-three. Was it all just a strange coincidence, or was William Frishmuth a secret member of the Order? Or more likely, was William Frishmuth a genuine friend of Abraham Lincoln and his aluminum capstone a clever symbolic testimony to the “bitter salt” of the death of his friend, the president, at the hand of Southern Templar Masonry? On August 1, 1893, William Frishmuth was found dead of a “self-inflicted” gunshot wound to the head.

Darius closed the Frishmuth file with no more insights than the last time he had read it several years ago. Still his instincts told him there was something he was missing. Thirteen . . . a number that for centuries had inspired secrets and superstition.

Chapter 13

Dallas, Texas
             
The phone rang, startling Zane awake. He looked over at the clock on the wall and saw it was seven a.m. He rolled over, grabbed his cell phone, and in a groggy voice said, “Hello?”

Sam McKinney’s loud “Good morning, bro!” came pounding through his head.

“Good morning, Sam, how have you been?” Zane asked sleepily.

“Good—work has been good, and not much is new on my end. How about you? How was your trip to the Holy Land? Did you find the lost Templar treasure or the ark of the covenant?”

“No,” Zane replied, “I just practiced my shoveling and wheelbarrow skills.”

“Bro, if you want to just dig in the dirt, you can come over to my house anytime. I have tree holes that need to be dug. Who knows? You might even find some buried treasure.”

Zane laughed. “Speaking of buried treasure, Sam, how is that penny stock you said would make David and me wealthy some day?”

Zane never missed an opportunity to razz Sam about it. “What price did you buy that at again? Didn’t you say it was a steal at a penny a share? Sam,
last time I looked it was $.0002
cents a share. That two hundred dollars you begged David and me to invest is now worth four bucks. That doesn’t give me the warm and fuzzies, my friend. If my math is right, your investment of a thousand is now worth twenty bucks. Talk about buried treasure. This dog is in a hole so deep it would take an elevator to find it.”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Sam replied with a good-natured laugh—tinged with a note of embarrassment. He wasn’t about to tell Zane the stock price was now $.0001
2
. “You just don’t have enough faith, man. I’m telling you, this stock is going to surprise you someday.”

“Dude,” Zane laughed, “the only thing that will surprise me about this stock is if it is still trading in another year. How you ever talked David and me into each buying two hundred bucks worth of that dog I will never know.”

“I’m telling you I have a hunch about this one. The guy who started the company has got some real talent gathered around him, and he could not have attracted them unless he had something cooking.”

“Okay, bro,” Zane replied, “but don’t expect me to hold my breath.”

The good-natured banter out of the way, Sam asked, “Did you get to do any good climbing while you were over there?”

Zane laughed as his mind went back to Israel and his precarious climb up the cliff. “Yes, I had some really good climbs.”

“Well . . .?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Zane laughed.

“Try me.”

Zane smiled to himself. This was going to be fun. “Well, it happened like this
…
I was just out hiking, minding my own business, when I noticed an incredibly beautiful girl free soloing a 5.13 route. As I drew near, a rock fell and cut her leg. She was injured and in dire straits . . .”

Sam interrupted. “Let me guess. You free soloed up the rock, risking your life to save the damsel in distress. In an act of incredible heroism you saved her life, and she was eternally grateful.”

Zane replied with a hearty laugh. “Except for the last part, you got it just about right, bro.”

Sam laughed in turn. “Only in your dreams, Zane, only in your dreams.”

“Sam, my dreams of rescuing a fair lady seem a lot more real to me than your dream of riches from a penny stock.”

Sam replied in a more a serious tone, “The day I believe that fairy tale will be about the same time you break even on my little misadventure.”

They wrapped up their call with a promise to go climbing with David Johnson, their mutual best friend from high school days, soon. Fully awake now, Zane looked at the phone for a moment and then dialed his parents. His mother picked up on the fourth ring. Her clear, calm voice came over the phone, “Good morning, the Harrisons.”

“Good morning, Mom, how are you?”

“Zane!” she replied with happiness, relief, and love mixed in the single word. “How was your trip?”

He answered with an abbreviated—very abbreviated, without any mention of Rachael Neumann or risking his life—summary. “Can I talk to Dad?” he asked after a bit more small talk.

“Dad,” Zane said after his father’s manly voice came on the line, “I need some advice on a research paper I’m doing for my professor. The class is called Faith and Fact. Our professor has given everyone in the class an assignment to choose a prophecy in the Bible concerning the Messiah. We are to use reasonable forensic evidence to build a case for its fulfillment in Jesus. For my paper, I chose the prophecy of Daniel 9. As you know, most Christians believe that Jesus fulfilled this prophecy. Arguably, it’s the one prophecy in the Bible that gives specific, datable events which can be contextually connected to specific secular events and the coming of the Messiah in the first century.”

His father indicated that he was following, and Zane continued. “As most understand it today, the prophecy speaks to the second coming as well. Many consider it the most important prophecy concerning the Messiah in the Bible. Without going into great detail, here is my dilemma: as I know you are aware, the most widely accepted interpretation of this prophecy was most eloquently laid out by Sir Robert Anderson in his work
The Coming Prince.
There has been some modification to Anderson’s interpretation over the years, but by and large it’s the accepted view.”

He paused and decided to plunge on. “When doing my own research, I found that there was no contextual chronological foundation for this theory to be found in the Scripture. It’s a foundational prophecy concerning the Messiah, yet most scholars do not have a sound chronological foundation upon which to base it. My own research is undermining my belief in its fulfillment in Jesus Christ. How do you think I should proceed?”

After a few moments’ pause, his father replied, “Son, if what you say is true, and you have not shown me any evidence one way or the other, but assuming you got your facts straight and there are
real
serious questions about the
consensus
interpretation, you should pursue it until you have exhausted every avenue of evidence. Don’t be afraid of where the facts might lead. You know I am a firm believer in the accuracy of the Bible as long as it is understood within the context of its time, its people, and its place. Remember, a verse taken out of context can be twisted to fit any man’s motive, belief, or lifestyle, including yours. Some of the greatest human tragedies have been orchestrated in the name of religion. Follow this to wherever it may lead. You owe it to yourself. Don’t be intellectually lazy, son, but search it out to the best of your ability. I believe that if, as you say, the current interpretation does not meet a reasonable standard of truth, then you will find an even greater truth to replace it. There is a proverb I always think of when I am doing my own research: Proverbs 25:2:
‘It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.’”

Zane mulled the words over. “Thanks, Dad, I appreciate your advice. You’re right. I need to dig out the truth.”

“Son, you never have to fear the truth. It will set you free.”

Those words were still ringing in his ears when Zane put down the phone and with renewed resolve began to go over his research notes.

Chapter 14
 

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Gavin Matthews and Ralph
Scholz
sat in the control room of Darius’s fabrication facility on the outskirts of Dubai. The facility used state-of-the art robotic fabricators to put their machines together, minimizing the number of people who had access to the machines and the potential for theft of the technology.

“We have done the best we can do. I don’t see how the machines can be compromised right away,” Gavin was saying.

Ralph replied, “According to Dylan we need at least one year of operation without compromise in order to make this plan work. I am not too worried about it myself. Once they realize this is not some gimmick or scam we will all be incredibly wealthy, and it won’t take more than a few weeks to see our stock price rise dramatically.”

Gavin was quiet for a moment. “Do you really believe Darius’s motivation is altruistic in all this? Sometimes I get the feeling there is more involved here than what we’ve been told.”

Ralph chuckled. “Does it really matter if Darius has other motivations? We each have one billion shares of stock in our own names in our own accounts.”

“I guess not,” Gavin said. He laughed. “I would just like to think we’ll make a real difference in the world while we’re all getting filthy rich.”

Ralph, a serious look replacing the smile, answered, “Whatever you believe about Darius’s motivation, you have to admit he does not leave much to chance. Several years ago, about the time all those dead fish washed up on the beaches around here, he had me design dual control systems for the machines. He said he wanted a backup system in case the primary failed.”

“I had to rewrite the software to run that as well,” Gavin answered. “That was when he had me add the remote start-up to the secondary system. He said he wanted to be able to restart the machines from the control center in Dubai.”

“Did he ever explain to you why he had the auxiliary storage tanks incorporated into the backup system? I asked him why it was necessary, but he never gave me a direct answer. It seems to me that it’s unnecessarily redundant because both the primary and secondary controls can route through the primary storage tanks.”

“That never made sense to me either,” replied Gavin. “I’ve never seen him do anything without a reason, so I am sure there must be one. Anyway, that’s on the customer’s side of the design. They get the design blueprints, and you can bet they will follow them exactly, unnecessary storage tanks or not.”

Ralph laughed in agreement.

Gavin asked, “Do you think you will be able to keep up with demand once we go public?”

“No way. We have a thousand of the AES-100s and fifty of the AES-1000s completed and ready to ship. Once the world knows what these machines do, we will be selling thousands of them. Our factory can produce about ten of the AES-100s and one AES-1000 a day. I have already made designs for another facility which will increase our production by ten times, but it will cost one-and-a-half-billion dollars to build. I can have it in production four months from ground breaking. All we need is the money. Darius has used all of his money to get us to this point. Dylan has assured us that four weeks from going public with this technology, our stock price will be well north of ten dollars a share. At that point money will never be a problem for us again.”

They looked at each other and smiled, both of them thinking the same thought. One month was not too long to wait to be unbelievably wealthy.

* * *

They stood in Darius’s office looking into each other’s eyes. “This is the last time we will see each other for some time, brother,” Arash said.

Darius replied, “If everything goes according to plan, I will see you in October one year from now.”

“No one outside of Iran has ever seen me without a disguise, and only you know me as Arash. The blame for what we have planned for New York will fall directly on the leadership of Iran and its al-Qaeda connections. The harder they deny, the less the international community will believe them. At a minimum, sanctions will be imposed, and we can’t rule out direct military intervention if the events in New York cause a large loss of life. As a precaution, I will be minimizing my contact with the Anaj network. In the coming weeks I do not want any association with the events in New York. However remote, the American intelligence agencies may be able to figure out how we are communicating and trace it back to me. I will make sure Anaj traffic is directed to another part of the Iranian intelligence service not associated with me. I will still have access, but I will be more insulated from the repercussions should they somehow compromise the network.”

Darius nodded in agreement. “What about the Israeli network? I would like to be kept informed of their archeological efforts. You know this is of interest to me. How dangerous would it be to our goals if I monitored the intelligence from the network there?”

“It would be a risk, brother, but a manageable one if you use discretion,” Arash replied. “I will leave with you the contact information for the Ukrainian Internet company that uploads our encrypted files. My contact there does not know who we are, but he knows our procedures. When you send him your files, do not do so from any Internet connections associated with AES. I will contact him one last time and prepay his account with funds so that you will be able to use the network for the next twenty-four months. I can arrange for the Baker to send all intelligence to a new post-office box in Dubai. Are you familiar with the procedures to connect the flash drives to the new USB connectors?”

“Yes,” Darius replied with confidence. “I have seen you do it once before. I will be able to figure it out.”

“Very well then, brother. I will leave you the Ukrainian’s contact information as well as our Israeli field agent’s identification numbers. Once you have downloaded the files into the Anaj software, make sure you enter the lotto numbers first, then the agent’s identification number.”

Darius cut him off with slight irritation. “Brother, do not worry. I am familiar with your procedures.”

“Okay, okay,” Arash conceded begrudgingly. This was a foolish risk, but watching his brother the last few years, he knew Darius would try to keep contact with or without his blessing. At least this way there was some protection. He almost shook his head. A man soon to be worth a trillion dollars risking it for an interest in Israeli archeology. All in search of some secret which might or might not be real.

Looking directly at his brother and using a cold voice Darius had never heard, Arash said, “Just be careful—this is a big risk you take that affects us all. I will not bail you out if you get into trouble.”

Darius laughed in incredulity. “You bail me out? You will be lucky, brother, if you survive the anger of the Western world once they realize it was Iran who carried out the attack in New York. You had best worry about your own skin. I will worry about mine.”

Arash shrugged. Ever the same Darius. They were playing a dangerous game here, and any indiscretion on their part could bring down the whole house of cards. He had covered his tracks as best he could. No one in Dubai would ever recognize him once he took off his disguise. Darius was the only one who knew of his connection to the Iranian intelligence service or his part in the plan. By the time he communicated with his brother again, a year from now, the plan would be in its final stages. “If our efforts do not go according to plan and you are forced to move up the timetable, you can notify me at this e-mail account.” He handed over a note with “newpersian
13
@yahoo.com” scrawled on it. “If you have to leave early, just give me a time and I will be waiting for you.”

Darius smiled. “I doubt that will be necessary, brother, but it is a good idea. Will you be able to get the 235X back into your country without being detected?”

“I will have no problem,” Arash said as he lifted his briefcase. “I have diplomatic immunity in Dubai, and you know that no one in their right mind messes with the
MISIRI
in my country. Once things escalate in Iran, I will be giving them a taste of this.” He smiled, a thin-lipped smile that didn’t make him look more pleasant. “It is very fortunate that you were able to cover up the discovery of 235X. Had anyone connected the three miles of dead sea life with your uranium extraction experimentation, that would have been the end of it all.” It was no exaggeration—with the one liter of 235X Arash had in his briefcase, he would be able to decapitate the entire leadership of the Iranian government. Their deaths would be blamed on American or Israeli retaliation, and no one would ever know the difference. Once the Muslim fanatics were removed from power, he and his brother would be able to restore Hystaspes rule to the land of Persia and then the world.

“Yes, my brother,” Darius replied. “Nothing stands in our way now. We will restore the glory of the kingdom of Persia.”