Boyd Morrison - The Midas Code

“Your parents must be proud. They still in Iowa?”

“They’ve passed away. They were both smokers. Cancer got them.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s just me and my sister now. She was in law school. Is in law school, dammit.”

Tyler gave her knee a squeeze. Just a small gesture of sympathy, but she appreciated it.

His phone pinged. “Probably Grant,” he said, but when he looked at the screen, his expression became grim.

“What?” she asked.

“It’s Orr. He says to check my email.”

After a few taps, he leaned in closer and expanded a video on the screen. Stacy heard some words, but she couldn’t make them out.

Tyler angled the phone so that Stacy could see it and restarted the video. The opening frame was centered on a newspaper with today’s date. Then it receded until she could see a man in a black ski mask standing next to another man sitting in a chair. The seated man appeared to be in his late fifties or early sixties and was dressed in a suit. His wrists and ankles were cuffed, but he didn’t look injured. In fact, he looked incredibly fit, and not just for his age. He was blindfolded, but his strong jaw and short brown hair left little doubt that she was looking at Tyler’s father.

A voice in the video said, “Name.” The picture changed slightly, as if it had been edited. The seated man then confirmed her suspicions.

“Sherman Locke,” he said with a sonorous baritone, reminiscent of Tyler’s voice but deepened with age.

The proof-of-life video abruptly ended. Stacy closed her eyes and saw in her mind a replay of a similar video she’d received this morning of Carol bound and unconscious.

She shook it off and looked up at Tyler expecting to see rage. To her amazement, he was smiling.

“That son of a bitch,” he said with a chuckle. “Something tells me he’s not going down without a fight.”

T yler could tell Orr was no fool by the spot he’d picked for the rendezvous. Only fifteen minutes remained until the Wednesday-afternoon baseball game started, and a crowd of fans massed outside the southwest entrance to the stadium waiting to get in to see the hometown Mariners take on the Angels. Street vendors barked “Programs!” every few seconds, and the sweet smell of kettle corn drifted over them. The worst of the rain had passed, but the roof of the steel-and-brick Safeco Field was closed to shield the fans from the occasional drizzle.

On a normal day, the trip from the ferry dock to the stadium would take just a minute, but the stop-and-go traffic extended the drive by a factor of fifteen. By the time Tyler parked the Viper in the garage, it was 12:30. He bought a couple of hot dogs and some drinks from a street vendor to eat while he and Stacy waited. Neither of them was particularly hungry, but Tyler had learned in the Army that you had to keep up your strength even more than usual in stressful situations.

“So what’s Orr look like?” Stacy asked between bites. “Dark hair,” he said. “Naturally tan. Brown eyes. A little shorter than I am. Roman nose broken and not put back together right. Missing the tip of his left pinkie. Not the prettiest guy to look at.”

“Can’t wait to meet him.”

Twenty minutes went by. They leaned against the wall next to the ticket window, Stacy looking in one direction, Tyler in the other. Twice Stacy pointed out someone that fit the description, but neither of them was Orr.

Right on time, Tyler saw Orr approach from around the corner. He looked just as Tyler remembered, wearing a bulky Mariners jacket and cap, with a backpack slung over his shoulder. His hands were in his pockets. He fit right in with the fans still streaming past.

No one was with him. He came to a stop just out of arm’s reach. They appraised each other for a few moments. Tyler fought the urge to strangle the life out of his smug eyes.

“We came alone,” Tyler said.

“I know,” Orr said with a grin. “I’ve been watching. You really shouldn’t wolf down your food like that.” His eyes went to Stacy. “You look even hotter in person.”

“Screw you,” Stacy said.

“Don’t I wish.”

“How about we make a deal?” Tyler said. “You release my father and Stacy’s sister right now, and I won’t kill you.”

“I’m going to have to pass on that fine offer.”

“Or maybe we’ll make a swap.” Tyler nodded to two patrol officers working the intersection. “I bet those policemen over there would give me a hand.”

Orr waggled a finger at him. “You know I wouldn’t have come here without thinking of that. Remember that binary explosive? I’ve got about ten pounds of it under this jacket and a trigger in my other pocket. What happened to that truck could happen here if you try something stupid.”

Stacy gasped and glanced at the crowds of families around her. “You wouldn’t.”

“Honey, you have no idea what I’d do.”

“I agree with her,” Tyler said. “If I put as much planning as you did into this operation, I wouldn’t literally blow it like this.”

Orr pursed his lips. “I don’t know you very well, Locke, but I can already see what your weakness is.”

“Oh yeah? What’s that?”

“You think everyone has to be as sensible and logical as you are.”

“And you’re not?”

“The brave do what they can. The desperate do what they must. The crazy do what you least expect. Where do you think I fit in?”

Tyler mulled that over. Orr seemed to be smart, sane, and rational, but he did want them to find something as outlandish as the Midas Touch. Tyler really didn’t know what was coming next, and the hand still in Orr’s pocket made him nervous, so he had no choice but to continue the status quo.

“Okay,” Tyler said. “We’re just going to talk. You said you had proof that the Midas Touch exists?” Tyler couldn’t wait to see what constituted proof in Orr’s mind.

“I do,” Orr said. “But first I have to tell you a story.”

“A story?” Stacy said. “We know the Midas story.”

“That’s not the story I’m going to tell.”

“My point is that you’re sending us on a wild-goose chase,” Stacy said. “The Midas Touch doesn’t exist.”

“I beg to differ,” Orr said, “and I’ll tell you why. Because I’ve seen it in action.”

Tyler couldn’t suppress a guffaw. “You’ve seen the Midas Touch? You mean, you actually met the old king himself?”

“In a way, yes.”

“How?”

Orr heaved the backpack off his shoulder and lowered it slowly to the ground. By the way it sagged, Tyler guessed it was carrying one item the size of a loaf of bread.

“When I was nine years old,” Orr said, “my parents took me on a trip to Italy. Naples. The homeland, if you couldn’t guess by looking at me. While I was there, I spent a lot of time roaming the streets with a girl named Gia. It was when we were exploring the tunnels that we found it.”

“The tunnels?” Tyler asked.

“Naples is built on volcanic tuff. The Greeks, who founded the city, discovered that the tuff was very easy to carve into. They tunneled into it for building material, but they soon realized that they could dig cisterns and link them to aqueducts carrying water from nearby aquifers and lakes. There are miles of ancient tunnels snaking under Naples, many of which have never been fully explored.”

“And that’s where you found Midas?” Stacy asked, the contempt in her voice apparent.

Orr nodded, a fire in his eyes. “I’ll never forget it as long as I live. We found a chamber made entirely of gold, including a solid-gold cube in the center that was six feet on each side. And on top of this cube rested the golden statue of a girl. She was entirely intact except that she was missing one hand.”