The Alarmists (22 page)

For now, he had things to consider. If one was able, one did not kill a man without coming to know what that death would cost those around him.

—

It took Brent longer to flag the colonel down than was normally the case, and when Richards broke away from Addison and approached the professor, Brent saw that regardless of the news he had to present to him, he did not have Richards’s full attention.

“How are you at haystack analysis?” Brent asked.

At Richards’s puzzled look, Brent said, “Miles Standish was a member of Plymouth Colony. He was a brutal military commander who slaughtered Indians any chance he got.” Seeing that the colonel had brought his attention to bear, Brent continued, “Granted, most of what I’ve read about Standish doesn’t have much bearing on our situation. He was responsible for the protection of the colony and used any means necessary to get that done.”

Brent paused to consult his notes.

“But what’s interesting is that in 1625, he was sent to London to negotiate with a group called the Merchant Adventurers. According to one written report, Standish gave a speech in front of the Merchant Adventurers in Newcastle. In fact, it was such a powerful speech that a number of them voted to cancel the colony’s debt immediately.”

“That’s all very interesting, Dr. Michaels,” Richards said, “but I hope you’re coming to the payoff soon.”

“I am, Colonel,” Brent assured him. “In his speech, Standish makes repeated references to the wealth of Solomon. He mentions it so often that it sounds like a buzzword for him.”

“The wealth of Solomon?” Richards repeated.

“So that got me to thinking and I plugged that into a search engine. And after going through about fifty pages of results, I found something interesting.”

“I’m listening.”

“I’m not sure how up you are on biblical history,” Brent said, “but according to legend, King Solomon was the richest man who ever lived. And according to some theologians, no one would ever have the wealth he amassed by the time of his death.” He could see he was losing Richards, so he cut to the heart of it. “So I searched for any speeches or addresses that used the phrase
the wealth of Solomon
. And while it took a while, I finally found a reference.”

“I admire the follow-through, Doctor, but I really need you to cut to the chase.”

“In 1998, a businessman by the name of Arthur Van Camp gave a commencement address at Stanford. The gist of it was how anyone who worked hard enough, who sacrificed, and who was smarter than their competitors had a chance to achieve incredible wealth. I read the whole thing; it’s a pretty good speech. But do you know what’s so interesting?”

The colonel didn’t respond to the rhetorical question, but Brent saw a glimmer of interest in his eyes.

“Arthur Van Camp is the same guy who runs Van Camp Enterprises,” Brent said.

The colonel frowned. “The TV guy?”

“The TV guy. But that’s not all. According to the SEC, Van Camp holds stock in almost a hundred different businesses, including a few weapons development firms.”

He stopped and aimed a mischievous smile at Richards.

“And I’ll give you one guess which way almost every single one of his stocks has gone over the last two years.”

Richards was silent for some time, and Brent saw the man working through the information he’d presented him. It was only a theory, so the professor couldn’t do anything beyond make his case and let the other man run with it.

“Does he have the resources?”

“More than enough,” Brent avowed. “In fact, I’d bet he has more money than two-thirds of the countries in the world.”

Brent knew his case was shaky, but he also understood that time was running out, and to this point, they had nothing on anyone else. Still, he had to allow the colonel to come to his own conclusions.

After what seemed a very long time, Richards nodded and said, “Run with it. But it would be helpful if we could get something more concrete than a fourteen-year-old commencement address.”

“Understood.”

The colonel started to walk away and then, as if having an afterthought, he half turned and called back to Brent, “And if you can do something to verify the picture we got via email, that would be helpful too.”

Then he was gone, leaving Brent with both a feeling of triumph and one of regret for the work ahead.

December 18, 2012, 5:43 P.M.

Van Camp could not recall a single occasion over the last twenty years when something outside of his influence was playing out on the world stage. Few situations were immune to the pull of money and a forceful guiding hand. Today, though, he found no shame in admitting that this thing he’d started a few years ago—this grand plan that stood to increase his personal wealth by a factor unparalleled in human history—had spiraled out of control. Perhaps it was his own hubris that had allowed it to happen. Regardless, all he could do now was plan for what the future might hold.

He’d begun consolidating some of his financial holdings, pulling what money he could into shelters that would withstand whatever the fateful day might unleash. He thought he had all of his ducks in a row, suspected that nothing could happen beyond the enrichment of his own accounts, but so much had happened beyond the scope of the plan that, at this point, there was simply no way to know for sure.

If only he could locate Alan.

By his accounting Van Camp had already amassed a fortune surpassing that of anyone else alive, although it would be months before his calculations were verified by those entities that corroborated such things. So in that sense Project: Night House had already succeeded. But only Van Camp, who understood the importance of fulfilling a childhood dream, knew that without the final push that would send governments flocking to purchase weapons and to lay hedges against the rising prices of agriculture, he would be remembered as but one rich man among many.

Alan had the detonator; there was no way to escape that. And after consulting with his tech staff, it had been determined that there was no way—at least in the time they had available—for Van Camp to find some other means to detonate the charges that occupied the shelf. Without the calving of the ice shelf—a project that was, ironically, Alan’s idea—the events of the last several years might as well have been for naught.

Every resource at his disposal was occupied with looking for the man, and if they found him, no amount of meritorious service would protect him from Van Camp’s anger.

For now, though, Van Camp had to leave Atlanta, at least until this business was concluded. There was no sense remaining there and allowing the army unit Alan had agitated to put the pieces together in time enough to pick him up—not before he had the chance to finish what he’d started.

—

They had gathered for a briefing from Brent, but the colonel exercised his authority to co-opt the first part of the meeting.

“I’m sure you’ve heard by now that Addison has projected the damage that calving Shackleton will cause,” Colonel Richards said, and a look around the table told him that was true. “I spoke with the Joint Chiefs . . .” He hesitated and then took a deep breath before continuing. “At this time, they’re not going to issue a warning.”

Brent’s eyes went as wide as those of everyone else.

“What are they thinking?” he asked.

“They’re thinking that it would be foolish to tell several million Chinese to make a run for the interior of the country,” Richards said. “Besides the logistics involved in organizing an evacuation of that size, they’d never get it done in time. And then there are the number of people who will lose their lives trying to get away from the coast.”

“But that’s nowhere near as many who will die if the tsunami hits and we don’t warn them.”

The colonel gave the professor a grim nod. “The problem is that there seems to be some doubt as to whether the artificial calving of an ice shelf is even possible. A few of their scientists-advisors, to be blunt, think we’re wrong.”

Brent looked across the table at Addison, watched the man’s face cloud at the suggestion that his figures were inaccurate. But the man didn’t argue his case. He knew the data was right, as did the others seated around the table.

Brent thought to continue the discussion, but Richards cut him off before he could start.

“Dr. Michaels, I let my superiors know that some madman was about to blow a million tons of ice to smithereens and that it would plunge the world into a panic the likes of which they’ve never seen. And do you know what their reaction was?” He paused to see if the professor might hazard a guess. When it was clear Brent would not, Richards said, “They all nodded and thanked me for my report. Then they said they’d study it.”

Anything Brent might have said after that would have been fruitless. He wouldn’t just be arguing with the colonel but with a group of nameless and faceless men and women with advisors who would most likely contradict any claim he might make.

“Our best hope of stopping this, gentlemen, is to find the person responsible.”

That was Brent’s cue. He stood and pressed a button on the projector remote.

“His name is Alan Canfield,” Brent began. “Arthur Van Camp promoted him to VP of Business Development three years ago.”

The man’s picture was projected on the wall next to the black-and-white photo that their unknown assistant had sent them.

The rest of the team—with the exception of Snyder, who was still verifying the stock records they’d received from the SEC—studied both photos, and Brent saw the doubt on their faces.

“I admit it’s hard to tell with how grainy the first picture is,” Brent said. “But I’m sure this is our Miles Standish.”

“What can you tell us about him?” the colonel asked.

Brent had enlisted Bradford to help him dig up information about Alan Canfield, so the professor turned the floor over to him.

“He’s the youngest vice-president in the history of Van Camp Enterprises. Married. No kids. His wife’s in the hospital.”

“What for?” Snyder asked.

“Attempted suicide,” Brent answered. “Apparently she almost got the job done, because the prognosis is severe brain damage—if she ever wakes up.”

Richards nodded. “What else?”

“His record’s clean as far as our federal friends are concerned,” Bradford continued. “But they did find something interesting. Not only is he the youngest VP in company history, he’s also the most traveled. He’s logged ninety-five business trips this year, and he has access to a lot more Van Camp cash than any other company employee in a similar position.”

“Do you have any itineraries?” Richards asked. “I’d be curious what that would look like plugged into your charts, Dr. Michaels.”

“I have a partial,” Bradford said. “Working on the rest. It can get more difficult to do that when the subject uses local carriers.”

“And we have a number of flights booked under the name Standish,” Brent added. “The passport photo, while similar to Canfield, isn’t him. But that’s not surprising. If you’re working with a fake passport, all you need is someone who looks enough like you so that if anyone questions it, you can just tell them you either lost or gained some weight.”

“Alright then,” Richards said. “We have a possible. Now, what do you have on Van Camp?”

“Well, for one thing his personal stock has spiked over the last eighteen months,” Bradford said. “The SEC pointed out a number of shell corporations that they’re pretty sure funnel directly back to him.”

“What kinds of companies would those be?”

“I’m glad you asked, Colonel,” Brent said with a smile. “It’s a pretty varied bunch, but some of the notables are weapons systems, handguns, canned goods, and wilderness supplies. The big one is weapons systems, most of them developed for and sold to the U.S. government.” He paused and fixed them all with a grin. “I guess that’s you guys.”

The implications of that hit everyone at about the same time.

“It almost seems as if a war with China would really help his bottom line,” Rawlings remarked.

Richards weighed that against the rest of the data and then looked at Brent and Bradford. “Anything else?”

“He lost his wife five years ago,” Brent said. “Cancer.”

“So could that have been his stressor?”

“No. I don’t think so, Colonel,” Brent said. “Something like this would have been in the planning stages for a long time. Long before his wife died.”

The rest of the team listened to the data that Brent and Bradford had compiled, and when they had finished, the professor saw Richards frown.

“The problem I’m having,” Richards said, “is that Van Camp is one of the wealthiest men alive. And if your stock projections are accurate, he might well be at the top of that list. For a billionaire to manipulate the world markets, and to threaten an untold number of people with death, solely to fatten his bank account seems like the province of a James Bond villain.”

Brent shrugged. “Well, maybe the world is filled with a lot more of those kinds of villains than we know. Most of them, though, don’t have this guy’s ability to pull off a grand scheme like this.”

Richards appeared to ponder that answer, tossing it around in his head. Then he met Brent’s eyes and said, “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

“Not entirely,” Brent agreed. “But right now it’s all we have to go on.”

After spending so much time with Richards’s team, Brent was beginning to understand its special dynamics and he saw the colonel’s appreciation for his position.

“So if you’re right,” Richards said, “Canfield is a footman for Van Camp.”

“I believe so. After all, Van Camp is the one who stands to gain here—not Canfield.”

“Besides,” Bradford added, “Canfield seems to have gone underground. From what we can tell, he cleaned out his bank account this morning and he hasn’t been to the office. No flights either. Not yet anyway.”

The colonel looked ready to ask a follow-up question when Snyder hurried into the room.

“Colonel, it looks like Van Camp is on the move,” he said. “His pilot just filed a flight plan to Eduardo Gomes.”

At Brent’s questioning look, Richards explained, “That’s the major airport in the state of Amazonas in Brazil.”

Bradford glanced down at his notes. “Van Camp has a home there.”

“When are they leaving?” the colonel asked Snyder.

“In a few hours. There’s no return flight scheduled.”

To Brent, the fact that their subjects had flown the coop—or were in the process of flying the coop—was more than coincidence. He was the first to break the silence that had settled over the room.

“He’s going there to wait things out,” he said.

“Right,” Richards said. “He doesn’t know what we’ve figured out.” The colonel paused, and in that space, Rawlings, after glancing around the room, jumped in.

“If we’re right about what they’re planning in Antarctica—and I’m pretty sure we are—then how come we can’t send someone to pick up Van Camp? Or at least go in and grab all his files and see what we can uncover?”

If Brent was any judge of facial expression or body language, he could see that his suggestion sat well with each member of the NIIU, although it seemed to run into a roadblock when it reached the colonel.

“It just doesn’t work that way,” Richards said. “Even with the drilling in Antarctica, all we have is a theory, and that’s not enough to go charging into the offices of a Fortune 500 company and grabbing anything we want. For one thing, we’re not even allowed to operate domestically.”

The colonel looked around the room as if gauging the effect of his words. Apparently what he saw was not what he’d hoped.

“And I can’t just turn this thing over to Homeland Security; they’ll laugh me out of their office.”

“So what do we do?” Brent asked, feeling the exasperation growing.

The colonel sat there for perhaps a full minute, his eyes unfocused, as if working through a plan in his mind. Everyone else in the room let him do it.

Finally, Richards said, “Snyder, I need everything you can give me about his home in Brazil. And see if you can get us clearance for a border crossing.”

He turned to Rawlings. “Get the plane ready for a trip south. Heavy armament.”

At the surprised looks aimed his way, Richards explained, “Since we can’t operate within our own borders, how about we remove that border from the equation?”

—

Brent was in the office he’d come to think of as his own, flipping through papers that he no longer needed to flip through, except that it gave him something to do. When the meeting ended, with all the team members going off to prepare for the trip to South America, the feeling of being a fifth wheel began to set in. Regardless of the fact that the threats he’d suffered granted him a stake in the outcome of this investigation, he had to face the fact that he’d done what he’d been hired to do. His presence from this point on was likely to be more of a hindrance than a help. In fact, he expected Colonel Richards to step into the office at any time, thank him for his help, and send him on his way.

It was as he was nursing that last thought that the colonel came in. Brent acknowledged the man with a half smile, and Richards took a seat, watching the professor sort papers that would likely wind up in the shredder once the NIIU closed the case file.

“Something on your mind?” Richards asked.

“A few things,” Brent said. “But the big one is my wondering when you folks are going to let me go.”

“Very astute of you, because that’s why I’m here.”