Gary Braver - Elixir

They led Brett inside. The interior was dark and raw, and much colder than outside. They could see no signs of recent disturbance. The ring of stones of their old fire was still in place.

As if in some old pirate tale, they had a hand-sketched map pinpointing the location. Because the soil was full of large rocks, it had taken Roger hours to bury the two polyvinyl chests. But it would be easier coming out.

Using an army shovel and hand pick, he and Brett dug while Laura made a fire with some newspaper and kindling. The smoke curled up but did not fill the place because further inside was a natural vent that acted as a chimney. It was also Laura and Jenny's secret escape hatch.

It took them maybe half an hour to clear the containers, each constructed of rugged polyvinyl and sealed with stainless-steel locks. They were intact, and still sealed.

For the first time in nine years Roger used the key. The lock gave easily. And he snapped open the first container.

The large jar still sat in the plastic foam mold-and still full. Remarkably, the seal of the box had kept out all moisture so that the original Darby Pharmaceuticals label was as crisp as the day it went under. The container was the original motherlode from the production lab and once destined to be subdivided into hundreds of glass vials and ampules for freezer storage.

Roger held it up to the light.

"How much is that good for?" Brett asked.

"For one man, about a thousand years."

Brett's face lit up. He pressed his face toward the container. "Wow!" he said. "A thousand years from now people would be living like in Star Trek I bet, flying around to other planets and stuff. There probably wouldn't even be any cars. People would just teleport themselves around." He lowered the pitch of his voice.

"'Beam me to Brian's house, Scotty.' Awesome! Probably wouldn't even have to go to school, just plug your head into some kind of machine and you'd know everything."

Laura sat on a stone breaking twigs and tossing them onto the fire. She said nothing, but Roger could feel her uneasiness as Brett's mind reeled at the possibilities.

Roger snapped open the second container.

The entire collection of Elixir notes he had consolidated into four thick folders. Buried with them and bound in plastic was $120,000 in fifties and hundreds. Survival money in case it got to that.

Brett looked at the money. "Cool."

While Roger thumbed through the notes, Brett wandered off to explore the cave with his flashlight.

For several minutes they sat silently as Roger let himself roll back through the years when he had pursued Nature to her hiding place, as Laura had said. How when the ink on these pages was still wet he had believed without doubt in the lightness of that pursuit.

He glanced up from the pages only to find Laura staring at him across the fire. In the capering light, she looked so far away, but he could make out the sadness in her eyes. She made a flat smile but said nothing.

In the dark Roger heard Brett poking around. He checked his watch. Maybe it was time to get it over with, he thought. He had given the police and media five hours, but Albany was only three hours by car, and, of course, they'd arrive early. They were probably beginning to assemble while they sat here. He glanced down at the Elixir notes for the last time. On the open page was a funny little cartoon he had drawn of Methuselah in a muscle-man pose. It was dated December 13, 1986. His sixty-sixth month, and Wendy's forty-second birthday.

He closed the notes. "What do you say?"

"I guess," Laura replied. But she didn't make a move to leave. She reached her hand across the fire for his. "Sorry," she said.

Her hand felt warm. He gave it a squeeze, then began to close the containers.

"That won't be necessary."

Laura gasped. The voice came from behind them.

Three men had appeared from nowhere, one holding a light on them, the other two, raised weapons.

The older man dropped the beam onto the glass container. "You saved us a great deal of difficulty." He spoke in a lilting French accent.

The others said nothing but trained their weapons on Roger.

"Who are you?" Laura said.

They didn't look like religious fanatics. Nor police. One of the gunmen, a guy about fifty with slick salt-and-pepper hair, was dressed in an expensive fur-collared black leather jacket.

"Doesn't matter who we are," he said in unaccented English.

"What's important," the Frenchman continued, "is who you are and what's in your little treasure chest which we will unburden you of, thank you very much."

Roger started to move away with the bottle, but the American jammed the barrel of his gun into Laura's ear. Roger went for his gun, but the second gunman jabbed his pistol to the top of Roger's head.

The Frenchman removed the pistol from Roger's hand and passed it to the American. "No silly heroics please," he said, and gently he took the jar from Roger's hand. He smiled charmingly. "So, this is what all the noise is about." He peered into the clear liquid. "Half the mortal world would love to have this in its veins, the other half in the sewers."

While he talked, Laura flashed Roger a look and tipped her head toward the cave's interior.

Brett.

He was deep in the cave, and for some reason the men did not seem to know.

But if he heard the voices, he'd come stumbling out.

Roger made a silent prayer that he'd sense the danger and find the chimney vent. Just follow the trail of smoke, and keep his light low.

The Frenchman raised the torch to their faces. "I must say it is very exciting to see you in person. Very. You are world-famous. And so well preserved. Quelle merveille! I feel like Ponce de León."

"What do you want?" Roger asked. He tried to speak loud enough for Brett to hear.

Don't come, his mind screamed. Get out.

"What do I want? You have to ask? I want what you have in this jar."

"You followed us," Roger said.

The Frenchmen frowned at the statement. "We didn't have to. But we found your car."

The men had emerged from the entrance, Roger thought, which meant that they had not been hiding in wait for them. So they did not know about Brett.

"How did you find us?" Laura asked, picking up on Roger's cue. They would stall for Brett to catch what was going on and get away.

The Frenchman cradled the jar in one arm and with the other and pulled something out of his back pocket.

He smiled broadly. "I read your book." In his hand was the paperback edition of If I Should Die.

Like a schoolteacher, he opened the book to a page mark. "'Ceren Evadas.' It's where your 'plucky' little sleuth hides in the end from the villains. Ceren Evadas-the make-believe little hideaway that she and her sister invented when they were children-safe haven from the bad guys, yes? And where she takes off to at the end. Andrea's Cave. It took me some time to figure it out then find it, but even cave hunters have websites.

"Then we cross-checked your ISBN number with the Library of Congress and learned that your maiden name was Whitehead and that you were born in Albany, New York. Our guess was that you had another childhood home up here, but we found no records. But the big clue was that you put your cave in Black Eagle Lake, Ohio. That confused us at first because there is no Black Eagle Lake, Ohio. Nor did it make sense to have a summer home in Ohio while living in Albany. Then we discovered a Black Eagle Lake, New York, and an Andrea's Cave. And voila! The two lines cross-and here you are.

"A good thing the police aren't better readers."

Neither his cultured manner nor accent diminished the primitive menace of the man. As he spoke, he kept licking his upper lip like an animal, finding chilling amusement in how he had cornered them.