The Artifact (30 page)

During the past week, the major networks had aired retrospectives on her career, a tribute to a dying, familiar contributor to the often-underlying reality of world events. Most television outlets had focused on her significant reportorial achievements over the years, minimizing their exploitation of her terminal disease, with the exception of NNC that dwelt on their exclusive still shot of Andrea on the sidewalk in front of her condominium, eyes closed, head canted toward her shoulder, looking for all the world like she was in the final stages of her illness. Unfortunately, news was news, and other stations reluctantly picked up and broadcast that image, displaying Andrea’s pitiable condition to viewers around the globe.

As Dr. Lawton had predicted, Andrea’s mind was still clear and active, but the muscles in her limbs were atrophying rapidly, her vocal cords becoming weaker by the day, her body tiring from the least effort. She could barely control the motorized wheelchair with the tiny drive stick and could not perform the normal everyday ablutions or use the toilet on her own. At the onset of this physical decline she had complained and ranted to Sammy at the cosmic injustice of this nightmare affliction on her previously healthy body, yet made a conscious attempt to eschew the persistent, unanswerable self-absorbed questions echoed by most victims of catastrophic physical limitations, inevitably creating alienation from the living until the eventual acceptance of their condition.

She had begun to believe that we were all conceived with some immutable gene or element that drove each of us to her or his pre-ordained destiny. Set upon that course in the womb, no other external or external force could alter our lives: there were no ‘what ifs’ or possible alternatives to what our mysterious live plan was predestined to fulfill. Fate.

Her thoughts moved to a brighter issue that developed when she called her condo that morning to retrieve her messages from her home answering machine. She had listened to and deleted half a dozen irrelevant calls before the voice of T.P. Viola came on the line. “I am devastated by your health problem, Andy. If there is anything Nancy and I can do, please give us a call. Hey, call anyway, will you? Home number is (201) 555-3534. Love ya.”

She had closed her cell phone and stared pensively out the bedroom window at the bank of snow the men had plowed behind a Dodge pickup and black Land Rover. Several minutes later, she pressed the little air horn that was supposed to mimic a rutting moose, which Sammy had bought in town, and Cassandra came in from kitchen.

“I hate that thing,” she whispered.

Cassandra smiled her concurrence. “Sammy tried to find a cannon but they were all out.”

Andrea had become aware that Cassandra and Callaghan shared some unspoken leadership of their ‘program,’ as they called it. She patted the side of her bed, and the striking, dusky-skinned woman sat.

Andy told her that any plan to communicate the document contents would require an experienced producer who would need to be fully informed of its contents. T.P. Viola was not only an ideal candidate for that task, but an extremely savvy all-media strategist who could probably make significant contributions to the presentation itself. Since time was critical, she wanted to bring T.P on immediately.

Cassandra listened to Andy’s hoarse suggestion without interruption, then asked several questions about Viola’s character, which seemed as important to her consideration of the man as his expertise. “I think you’re right. Let me talk to Clyde.”

Andrea wondered for the hundredth time about the AmerAsian twins and the various religious themes that seemed intertwined not only with them, but several other aspects of the artifact conundrum: Hannah’s departure from the artifact group with Palagi, Gerlach and Alvarez to preach against organized religion; Mitchell’s dementia that cast him in the role of a Catholic priest; her own conversations about God with Cassandra; the seminarian who assassinated Hannah; and the Shimon autobiography. Coincidence, or some critical undercurrent that she was missing? And what was the relationship between the twins and Callaghan?

In several discussions with Cassandra, Callaghan and Sammy over the past few days, Andrea had become aware that during the preceding eighteen months, the general had progressed from his original misgivings regarding their concealment of the artifact, to its most ardent guardian. As circumstances evolved, he had ultimately sacrificed his career. If caught in the talons of the government he had served and now disobeyed and deceived, he risked his freedom and possibly his life.

None of them, the general included, had realized the magnitude of the endeavor on which they had embarked. It was only his constant assurances to military superiors and suspicious government entities that had allowed him the time to bring the document to fruition, just as his public denial had kept reporters, criminal, Iraqi and other interested factions from locating the artifact and impeding its translation and validation.

Thin cirrus clouds moved across the Washington skyline as a pale winter sun cast dim shadows beneath the historic buildings and monuments of the nation’s capital. Paula sat in the passenger seat of her rental car bundled in a down parka and wool slacks against the biting cold of late afternoon, calling the neurosurgeon for the seventh time since Jerry had infiltrated the data banks of local hospitals to find the name of Andrea’s primary physician. She had barely contained her frustration at being put on hold, disconnected, and shunted from secretary to secretary of busy doctors. Long before she had found Lawson, she had given up all hope of speaking directly to the neurosurgeon himself, experiencing the same difficulty in reaching his nurse or anyone conversant with the condition or whereabouts of patient Andrea Madigan.

Although tracking down the Madigan woman might give her one surefire advantage over Harrington’s pursuit of Callaghan, it had not been working. If the handicapped newswoman was in fact tagging along with the retired general, her knowledge of Andrea’s cell phone number would enable her to determine her exact location through the loopt device as soon as her phone was turned on. Callaghan and associates would be smart enough not to use their phones, which Harrington was surely monitoring, but he could have overlooked Madigan’s. The problem was, until that very morning, the reporter had not made or received a call either. When she had, Paula’s GPS tracker showed that Andrea had activated her cell phone to listen to her messages on her home answering device. The call had been made from a location in the Berkshire Mountains of northwestern Massachusetts, outside the town of Rowe.

Paula wrote down the Lat/Lon coordinates before she disconnected and slammed the cell phone down on the passenger seat, feeling a thrill of excitement at the first real break she’d had in this exasperating case. She had the radio news station turned low to keep abreast of bulletins pertaining to the Preacher Lady’s murderer, then increased the volume when she heard the weather alert: a raging blizzard was advancing from the mid-west, currently inundating Ohio with eighteen inches of snow and moving up the northeast corridor toward Washington and New England.

She started the engine, pausing before pulling the rental car out of the parking space, considering the five hundred mile distance and forecast blizzard on her tail. She needed to get moving, but couldn’t waltz in on those perps alone: trained combat veterans more experienced and wary than any criminals. She picked up her cell again as she figured out how and where Jerry could meet her up there.

Seated across from Rand Duncan, whose hands were tightly clasped on the clean surface of the wide desk between them, Detective David Leonard gazed around the network executive’s corner office as Sergeant Paul Kramer continued interrogating their increasingly discomfited suspect.

‘The two free lance knee-breakers who tried to assault Miz Madigan claim they were hired by a small-time B & E perp goes by the name of Fingers Johnson,” Kramer repeated. “You have no knowledge of him or the thugs?”

“I haven’t had a clue to anything you’ve asked since you walked in here,” Duncan replied.

Detective Leonard pulled his scrutiny away from the bookshelves and wall photos, speaking for the first time since dropping unceremoniously into the partner chair his large frame could barely contain. “Johnson says he got the job from a woman. Upscale broad he never would a thought’d put a contract out, never mind find him inna neighborhood inna first place.”

“A vengeful wife threatening her husbands lover?” Rand suggested.

Leonard gave a slow shake of his head, his eyes attempting to meet Duncan’s darting glances. “Madigan ain’t diddling nobody. No boyfriend, regular date, sleepover, nada.”

“Well, I’m sorry, gentlemen,” Rand said, arms outstretched, palms up in a gesture of helplessness, “I don’t know how I can help you further.”

Kramer extracted a sheet of paper from the inside pocket of his suit coat, proffering it to Duncan across his desk.. “This here’s a police artist sketch from Johnson’s description of the woman who commissioned the hit.”

Rand hesitated before accepting the charcoal drawing of the full-face and profile of a woman who bore an amazing resemblance to Patty Zonfirelli, Duncan’s clandestine mistress.

* * * * * *

T.P. had been shocked at the weakness and slurring of Andrea’s voice when she had called, the first time he had heard her speak since she had displayed the insulting digit to Rand Duncan seven weeks ago, after her unauthorized on-air offer of a five hundred thousand dollar reward for information leading to the artifact. When he walked into the Rowe safe house, he was appalled at her wasting body wrapped in a wool blanket, slumped in her wheelchair, her features drawn, eyes dark, yet alert. During their initial meeting, Sammy described the situation and contents of the purloined amphora to the silent amazement of the ex-NNC news director, who took copious notes on a spiral steno pad.

That afternoon, Sammy wheeled Andrea into a book-lined study where T.P. sat near a low deal table and the warmth of a black, potbelly wood stove. He stood until his former NCC associates were settled with heavy porcelain mugs of coffee. T.P. embraced her again in silence with teary eyes before reclaiming his seat, making an obvious effort to compose himself as Andy sipped from the mug held by Sam, who touched a napkin to her lips compressed in determination.

“We can’t just stick a talking head in front of the camera with background music,” Andrea whispered.

“How about interspersing still shots of appropriate paintings by the old masters depicting first century biblical scenes,” Sammy suggested, “or drawings of whatever elements the document contains?”

“Maybe run a split screen of key copy highlights while the presenter is speaking?” Andrea offered.

“Clips from films tracing the life and times of the period,” Sammy said.
“Spartacus, ‘Ben Hur.”

Andy lifted her hand an inch off the arm of her wheelchair in a gesture to halt their random suggestions, looking at T.P., who had listened intently, but had made no recommendation since the discussion began. “What say you, oh, Mighty Media Guru?”

“Radio,” T.P. answered.

Neither Andy nor Sam spoke for several moments, both television pros staring at Viola, attempting to absorb the outrageous idea, which initially struck them as preposterous. Until Andrea’s eyes became animated and she smiled at the news director with affection. “How to go, T.P.! ‘Theater of the mind.’ Brilliant, absolutely brilliant!”

Sammy caught her excitement. “Let each person in the listening audience use their imagination to interpret the old guy’s story.”

“No hokey visuals or other distractions from the story content, nothing contrived,” Andy said, “no post-broadcast charges that we engaged in subtle editorializing.”

“Like radio’s heyday in the ‘30s and ‘40s’ with the whole family crowded around the set,” T.P. said, “everyone hushed, afraid to miss a single word.”

Sammy had been born well after television had supplanted radio as the country’s primary broadcast medium, but remembered his parents’ sentimental reminiscences of that ubiquitous medium. “People in cars pulling over to the side of the road to concentrate on live news, the Hindenburg disaster, Roosevelt’s declaration of war on Japan, the immortal words that December

7th would live as ‘a day of infamy, his fireside chats”

Viola tempered their enthusiasm. “Callaghan insists we get it to an international audience simultaneously. But it’s too long to put out all at once.”

“How do we send it in segments without tipping off where we are? What might be coming in subsequent episodes. Keep the press, religious groups and government from storming in here like cattle?”

They were all stumped until Sammy suggested satellite transmission. There were hundreds of radio relay satellites orbiting the earth at different altitudes that were designed to receive, amplify and redirect analog and digital signals with a wide band of carrier frequencies. Their best bet would be an MEO, or Medium Earth Orbit station that takes about six hours to circle the earth during which they are visible from any given point for a few hours. Sam would select a satellite with ‘bent pipe architecture’ designed exclusively to accept, process and redirect incoming signals back down to earth.

They could rent the special communications equipment and software in Hartford or Boston; pre-record the manuscript in two or three segments for uplink to a satellite passing overhead in the right time frame and orbit; then send the downlink codes, schedules, and sat designation to the radio networks and local stations via anonymous e-mail.