The Elizabethan Secret (Lang Reilly Series Book 9) (18 page)

41.

The Varsity

65 North Avenue

Atlanta

Two Hours Later

The telephone call, the real telephone call, not the one invented by Sara to shake Lang loose from Brian, had come only minutes after the young man’s departure.

“Professor Wildstein on three,” Sara had announced, adding, “It’s that guy you consulted at Tech.”

Lang punched the appropriate button on his phone, frowning. Of course he knew who Wildstein was. Had he become so forgetful Sara felt she needed to remind him?

“Mr. Reilly, Adam Wildstein,” the professor said needlessly. “I was wondering if you have time to drop by. I have something for you I think you might find quite interesting.”

“You found the whatchamacallit, the thing that was stolen from your office?”

“Er no, not quite. But I have a strong idea what its purpose was.”

“I’m on the way,” Lang had responded.

“Perhaps it would be best if we met off campus, what with the burglary . . .”

“The Varsity in thirty minutes?”

“Reschedule everything on for this afternoon,” Lange had tossed over a shoulder as he headed out the door.

He stopped, door still in hand. “I don’t have any judicial conferences, right?”

Once again the cocked eyebrow from his secretary. “No, but you have two meetings with potentially paying clients, one looking at possible mail- and bank-fraud charges, the other about to be indicted on multiple embezzlement counts.”

“Reschedule. Never hurts the fee negotiations when the client thinks you might be too busy to take their case.”

And then he was gone.

Had Lang not known the way, he could have followed the fragrance of fried onions from a mile away. The Varsity was just across the I75-85 Downtown Connector from the Tech campus. It was Atlanta’s oldest and the world’s largest drive-in fast food establishment. Since 1928, the place had been serving hot dogs, hamburgers, and the like. In Lang’s opinion, the Varsity chilidogs had no peer. Judging by the place’s longevity, a number of Atlantans and Tech students agreed.

Eschewing the 1950’s style curb service, Lang parked and went in. He inhaled the aroma. Whether it was natural reflex or reaction to Gurt’s strictly healthy diet, he could swear he was salivating.

He spotted Wildstein in one of six lines before chest high counters, behind which white-capped servers shouted, “Whattalyahave?” and filled trays with a speed only years of experience could provide.

Clientele ranged from jeans- and shirt-clad students to uniformed service techs with plumbing or electrical company logos on their uniforms, to helmeted construction workers, to suited professionals. The Varsity was a microcosm of democracy.   

Lang had two chilidogs all the way (mustard, chili, and onions), fried (onion) rings and a Coke. He successfully resisted the temptation to add a fried apple or peach pie. It took him a minute or two to relocate Wildstein in one of the four rooms where rows of school desk-type chairs were arranged in front of a TV set tuned to the three major networks and one of the cable news channels.

He sat next to the professor whose tray held a chili steak (hamburger), a pile of strings (French fries) and a Varsity Orange, the original carbonated orange drink.

A generic TV blonde was on the screen, cheerfully narrating the latest death toll from a suicide bomb in . . . where? Afghanistan? Pakistan? One of the Stans, Lang was certain from burka-clad women surrounding the smoldering rubble in the background. The scene could be current or several years old. It had been playing out for what seemed an eternity. 

The two ate in silence for a few minutes before the blonde was replaced with a handsome young man who displayed the perfection of the orthodontist’s art and an expression far too grave to be taken seriously. 

Lang asked, “Well?”  

Wildstein used a paper napkin to staunch a dribble of grease, the Varsity’s main product. “Remember I told you the pin on the dial stopped moving at precisely 7:55 pm and began again at 7:00 am?”

Lang dumped an onion ring into his mouth, nodding. “I recall something like that, yes.”

On the TV screen, the Russian President was speaking, although the room was too noisy to hear what he was saying. Not that it mattered.

Choose one: denial Russian troops were the ones involved in another land grab, the United States was behind the crash of the Russian economy, America’s unreasonableness was the reason Russia could not sign the newest nuclear arms limitation treaty, all of the above.  
         

The professor said, “That day, the thing quit a minute later, began two minutes earlier the next day.”

Lang’s expression must have given away the fact he was totally baffled.             

“We are post-spring equinox. At this latitude, the time the sun is above the horizon increases roughly three minutes a day, not interpolating for tidal acceleration, which is only fractional seconds.”

Lang’s half-eaten chili dog stopped in midair. “Are you saying that instrument somehow reacts to the sun?”

“I’m guessing not to the sun itself but to the sun’s magnetic field. Magnetic or energy fields of atoms, ions and molecules form ascertainable lines which can be measured, the Zeeman Effect.”

Lang knew better than to let an academic stray off subject: A train off track if slightly less destructive. He held up a silencing hand. “Precisely how does this thing react to the sun?”

Wildstein, open mouthed, blinked twice in puzzlement. Then, “I’m not sure but its cycles of operation paralleling dawn to sunset couldn’t be coincidental.”

Now one of the post-civil rights leaders occupied the TV screen, animatedly addressing a crowd carrying signs far too professional-looking to be spontaneous. Lang was too far away to read them but he was fairly certain they were not commending anything.

Sometimes he wondered why he bothered watching the news at all.

Lang put down the chili dog, unconsciously wiping the brown drippings from his finger tips with another paper napkin. “OK, let’s go at it this way: Of what possible use could such an instrument be?”

This time the professor had a definite answer. “In Dee’s time, latitude was reasonably easy to ascertain. Longitude, though, was mostly educated guess work. Hence, navigation, particularly at sea,  was almost as much luck as skill. Since the sun’s position in the sky on any day was known . . .”

Another raised hand. “People in the sixteenth century had progressed to that point?”

“People in pre-history had advanced that far and farther. Look at Stonehenge where the rising sun of spring and fall equinox and summer and winter solstice shines through specific orifices. Same for any number of other henges as well as Central and South American aboriginal structures.”

The chili dog was forgotten. “Just how did the thing work?”

“I’m guessing, but if the object were placed so a needle pointed to the sun, the markings would give other directions.”

“But a compass would do that.”

The professor shook his head, his lunch also cooling. “Not necessarily. As you no doubt know, a compass points to magnetic north, as opposed to true north, the terrestrial north pole. The farther north one travels, the greater the angle of disparity is likely to be. If one were in the Arctic Circle, south would be the  only compass direction.”

Lang thought for a moment. “What about navigation today? I mean, with navigation satellites, who would still need the Dee device?”

“Anyone operating in the Arctic or the Antarctic. At either pole, the angle with most satellites is so acute as to be frequently unreliable. Plus the thing would work only as long as the sun was above the horizon, whether it was visible or not. You can imagine the type of foul weather that frequents the polar regions.”

Lang noticed a woman two seats over on the same row, some sort of medical professional, judging by the blue scrubs. Emory midtown was within walking distance.

Perhaps Brian’s paranoia was contagious, perhaps the woman really could hear the TV better with her head cocked toward Lang and the professor, perhaps she caught enough snatches of the conversation to make tuning in interesting.

Lang put a finger to his lips, a gesture the professor and  possible eavesdropper could not help but see. She scowled as she drained the last of the contents of a paper cup, stood, and placed her tray on the return rack. Shrouded in indignation, she stalked out of the room.

Dr. Wildstein watched her departure. “You think . . .?”

Lang shook his head, no. “What we were talking about was apparently more interesting than the news, but let’s finish our conversation later.”                                                                   

42.

Law Offices of Langford Reilly

45 Minutes Later

Sara handed Lang a fistful of pink call-back slips as he passed her desk.

A quick glance showed a request for confirmation of his agreement to speak at a continuing legal-education seminar in September. For an hour’s presentation, he would get the full-year’s requisite credit without having to attend the stiflingly boring and surprisingly uninformative sessions that were more window dressing for the public than educational for attendees.

A call from the Fulton County District Attorney himself. Since Lang had no cases pending in the county at the moment, it required little imagination to guess what that was about, what with the DA up for reelection this fall. Lang slid behind his desk, pondering a system in which the man he had opposed in court so often and most likely would again saw nothing improper in seeking money from his adversaries. The man was known to keep lists. Those lawyers who failed to contribute would be likely to try, rather than settle, cases in the future. Lang privately decried what he saw as legalized extortion but he would send a check. He owed future clients the best representation he could provide.

The rest of the return calls were made in a few minutes, allowing Lang time to Google a number of subjects. Within an hour he had learned of the existence of The Arctic Council, established by the 1996 Ottawa Declaration. The organization included Canada, The United States, Denmark (representing Greenland and the Faroe Islands), Finland, Iceland, Russia, and Sweden, those countries bordering the Arctic Circle. “Observing States,” those with no vote, included South Korea but not their northern neighbor.

The Council’s stated purpose was agreement on environmental issues affecting the polar region.

The alliance was interesting for several reasons. Foremost, Russia historically regarded the environment as something to be ignored at best, raped at worst, not preserved. The failure to follow safety precautions at Chernobyl, the diversion of rivers that  had reduced the Aral Sea to ten percent of its former size, severe industrial pollution of the country’s major rivers. The list went on and on.

If Russia was a member of the Arctic Council, it wasn’t to save the polar bear but to make sure it exploited as much of the region’s mineral wealth as it could while keeping watch on the other members.

That might explain the Russians’ interest in what Lang had come to think of as the Dee object, assuming they knew of its purpose, a conjecture at best.

North Korea’s interest, though, made no sense. As far as Google knew, the secretive dictatorship had shown no attention to either pole. A country that could not feed its people had more urgent matters at home on which to direct its efforts and limited resources.              

So, why were they pursuing the thing?

According to Wildstein, the Dee object might have had value to the Elizabethan Sea Dogs but its usefulness in today’s world seemed to be limited to the Arctic and Antarctic, neither of which was an area to which The Peoples’ Democratic Republic of Korea had paid any attention. That fact made Lang believe the North Koreans knew only that the Russians wanted it and assumed it had some military value.

Lang pushed his chair back from the desk and stared at the ceiling. Jeez, the Russians and North Koreans squabbling like two kids in a sandbox over an object, the purpose of which was known to neither. Were the stakes not deadly, the game would be comical.

The thought brought him slamming forward in his desk chair.

Deadly!

Jesus! He should have warned the professor!

“Sara, use the call back feature to contact Wildstein, the professor at Tech,” Lang said toward the open door. “I need to speak to him ASAP!

“You need not shout, Lang,” she responded, annoyed. “I’m not deaf. Not yet, anyway.”

“I wasn’t . . .”

He shut his mouth, all too aware of the futility of arguing with his secretary.

He wouldn’t have had time to, anyway.

“Dr. Wildstein.”

“Er, yes, Doctor. I was following up on our conversation at lunch.”

How do you explain to someone that you may well have put their life in jeopardy?

Unperturbed, the professor plowed ahead, an interrupted lecture resumed. “What I was going to say was that there is no explanation in today’s science as to just how this man Dee might have used, captured, if you will, the sun’s magnetic field by this device. But then today’s science still doesn’t know the cause of gravity, how the earth was formed, etcetera.”

Equating himself with “today’s science?”

But Lang said, “Actually, I wasn’t calling to finish our conversation as much as I was to warn you.”

“Warn? Of what?”

“Professor, take my word for it, that John Dee instrument, whatever, could be dangerous.”

Pause. Lang sensed incredulity.

“Dangerous? How so?”

Lang told him, adding, “It was worth stealing to somebody. It might be worth killing for to someone who is unaware you no longer have it.”

“But as far as we know, neither the North Koreans nor the Russians have a clue as to the thing’s purpose,” Wildstein protested.

“That didn’t stop either from trying to make sure I didn’t get home from Croatia.”

“You could have told me the thing involved certain risks.”

“Had I known, I never would have bought it.”

“Small comfort! Just what do you suggest I do?”

“It’s the only comfort I have to offer. Do you own a gun?”

Lang might as well have inquired about sexual relations with the professor’s mother. “Civilized people do not own firearms, Mr. Reilly,” he huffed. “That is why we have a police force.”

No, that is why “civilized people” are victimized at twice the rate of barbaric gun owners.

But Lang said, “I’d suggest you get one and learn how to use it. Or take a prolonged leave of absence.”

The professor had more to say, a lot more but Lang felt he had fulfilled whatever obligation he might have had. He feigned another call and rang off.