Steve Berry - The Admiral's Mark

He shook his friend’s hand and thanked him again.

“No problem, mon. I glad you come. We solve everything.”

Not quite everything, but enough.

He handed Dubois $500. “Fix that engine, okay?”

“Ah, mon. This be too much. Way too much.”

“It’s all I have or I’d give you more.”

They said their goodbyes and he entered the terminal, checking in for his flight.

Matt Schwartz waited for him just before the security checkpoint.

“I didn’t think you’d let me leave without saying goodbye,” he told the Israeli.

“Did you find the page?”

He nodded.

“I thought you might. We wondered why you went back out on the boat.”

“What happened to Simon?”

“Went straight to the airport and is long gone.”

“Probably thinking that I had help in the citadelle .”

“That was the idea. Can I have the page?”

“I assume you’re not going to let me leave with it?”

“Payment for the favor I did you with Dubois.”

He reached into his back pocket and removed the curled page, still in its plastic bag. He’d broken the bottle to free it. The sheet was filled with nineteen lines of writing in faded black ink, along with the mark of the Admiral, just as Simon had described.

“Can we at least be provided with a copy?” he asked.

“I don’t suppose you would take my word that none of this is important to anything related to America.”

“It’s not my nature.”

“Then that copy you made on the way here should alleviate all of your government’s fears.”

He assumed Schwartz knew they’d stopped at the hotel on the way to the airport.

He handed the page over and said, “Any idea what this is? I speak several languages, but I can’t read it. Simon said it was Old Castilian.”

The Israeli shrugged. “Our people will translate it, as I’m sure will yours.”

“Simon killed a man for it.”

“I know. Which makes us all wonder. But people higher up than me will deal with this now.”

He understood. “Being at the bottom of the pile does come with disadvantages.”

Schwartz smiled. “I like you, Malone. Maybe we’ll see each other again.”

“Maybe so.”

The Israeli gestured with the bag. “Something tells me we’ve not seen, or heard, the last of Zachariah Simon.”

He agreed.

“All we can hope,” Schwartz said, “is that next time he’s someone else’s problem.”

“You got that right.”

And he headed for home.

About the Author

Steve Berryis the New York Times bestselling author of The Columbus Affair, The Jefferson Key, The Emperor’s Tomb, The Paris Vendetta, The Charlemagne Pursuit, The Venetian Betrayal, The Alexandria Link, The Templar Legacy, The Third Secret, The Romanov Prophecy, The Amber Room , and the short stories “The Balkan Escape” and “The Devil’s Gold.” His books have been translated into forty languages and sold in fifty-one countries. He lives in the historic city of St. Augustine, Florida. He and his wife, Elizabeth, have founded History Matters, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving our heritage. To learn more about Steve Berry and the foundation, visit www.steveberry.org.

Read on for an excerpt from

THE

COLUMBUS

AFFAIR

by

STEVE BERRY

Published by Ballantine Books

ONE

TOM SAGAN GRIPPED THE GUN. HE’D THOUGHT about this moment for the past year, debating the pros and cons, finally deciding that one pro out-weighed all cons.

He simply did not want to live any longer.

He’d once been an investigative reporter for the Los Angeles Times , knocking down a high six-figure salary, his byline generating one front-page, above-the-fold story after another. He’d worked all over the world—Sarajevo, Beirut, Jerusalem, Beijing, Belgrade, Moscow. His confidential files had been filled with sources who’d willingly fed him leads, knowing that he’d protect them at all costs. He’d once proved that when he spent eleven days in a D.C. jail for refusing to reveal his source on a story about a corrupt Pennsylvania congressman.

The congressman went to prison.

Sagan received his third Pulitzer nomination.

There were twenty-one awarded categories. One was for distinguished investigative reporting by an individual or team, reported as a single newspaper article or a series. Winners received a certificate, $10,000, and the ability to add three precious words—Pulitzer Prize winner—to their name.

He won his.

But they took it back.

Which seemed the story of his life.

Everything had been taken back.

His career, his reputation, his credibility, even his self-respect. In the end he came to see himself as a failure in each of his roles—reporter, husband, father, son. A few weeks ago he’d charted that spiral on a pad, identifying that it all started when he was twenty-five, fresh out of the University of Florida, top third in his class, with a journalism degree.

And his father disowned him.

Abiram Sagan had been unrelenting. “We all make choices. Good. Bad. Indifferent. You’re a grown man and made yours. Now I have to make mine.”

And that he had.

On that same pad he’d jotted down the highs and lows that came after. His rise from a news assistant to staff reporter to senior international correspondent. The awards. Accolades. The respect from his peers. How had one observer described his style? Wideranging and prescient reporting conducted at great personal risk .

Then, his divorce.

The estrangement from his only child. Poor investment decisions. Even poorer life decisions.

Finally, his firing.

Eight years ago.

And since then—nothing.

Most of his friends had abandoned him, but that was as much his fault as theirs. As his depression deepened, he’d withdrawn into himself. Amazingly, he hadn’t turned to alcohol or drugs, but neither had ever appealed to him. Self-pity was his intoxicant.

He stared around at the house’s interior. He’d decided to die here, in his parents’ home. Fitting, in some morbid way. Thick layers of dust and a musty smell evidenced the three years the rooms had sat empty. He’d kept the utilities on, paid the meager taxes, and had the lawn tended just enough so the neighbors wouldn’t complain. Earlier, he’d noticed that the sprawling mulberry tree out front needed trimming and the picket fence painting. But he’d long ignored both chores, as he had the entire interior of the house, keeping it exactly as he’d found it, visiting only a few times.

He hated it here.

Too many ghosts.

He walked the rooms, conjuring a few childhood memories. In the kitchen he could still see jars of his mother’s fruit and jam that once lined the windowsill. He should write a note, explain himself, blame somebody or something. But to whom? And for what? Nobody would believe him if he told them the truth.

And would anyone care when he was gone?

Certainly not his daughter. He’d not spoken to her in two years. His literary agent? Maybe. She’d made a lot of money off him. Ghostwriting novels paid bigtime. What had one critic said at the time of his downfall? Sagan seems to have a promising career ahead of him writing fiction .

Asshole.

But he’d actually taken the advice.

He wondered—how does one explain taking his own life? It’s, by definition, an irrational act, which, by definition, defies rational explanation. Hopefully, somebody would bury him. He had plenty of money in the bank, more than enough for a respectable funeral.