The Book of Spies

61

Athens, Greece
DAZZLING MORNING sunlight illuminated the quiet hotel room. As Judd slept, Eva lay back down on her bed, dressed again in her jeans and green shirt. Tense, she threw her arms above her head and stared out the window as a redtail hawk circled lazily against the blue sky. She'd had a restless night, awaking and drowsing, then awaking again, haunted by a sense she already knew where in The Book of Spies the librarian had likely written the Library of Gold's location--if she could just figure it out.
"How long have you been awake?"
She turned her head. Judd was staring at her, gray eyes sleepy, bleached hair messy. She studied him for any signs of fever.
"Not sure. An hour maybe. How are feeling?" She handed him aspirin, painkillers, and a glass of water.
"Much better. You've been thinking." He propped himself up on an elbow and took the medication.
"Yes. About where in Spies the librarian would've left a message. I've been going over everything Charles told me again and again, and what I remembered from his notebook. I know I'm close to the answer."
He was silent. "Too bad Charles didn't leave a different clue."
She frowned. "Say that again."
"Too bad Charles didn't leave a--"
"Different clue. That's it." She sat up excitedly. "I was looking for what we hadn't used before. Big mistake." She hurried to the big Book of Spies, which lay closed on the table.
"What are you talking about?" In his T-shirt and shorts, Judd pulled up a chair and sat beside her.
"The reason we shaved Charles's head was the story about Histiaeus and the slave messenger. So maybe it wasn't a clue just to check Charles's scalp; maybe it's where we're supposed to look inside Spies, too. I know I saw the story here somewhere."
She turned pages quickly. Finally, in the middle of the big book, she found the tale on a single page as ornate as the others, decorated with Persian and Greek soldiers along the outside margin. Black Cyrillic letters filled the rest of the space, the text block recounting the ancient narrative.
"I don't see anything unusual." Judd stared.
"Me neither. I'm going to translate the story quickly to myself." As she read, it was soon clear the recounting was much as Herodotus had chronicled it centuries before. Finished, she sat back.
"Nothing?"
She shook her head, then picked up the book. "I need light."
They sat on the side of her bed, where sunlight streamed through the window. Holding the book open on her lap, she leaned close. In her life as a curator she had learned an old adage was true--the devil was in the details. Now that she had an overview, she studied the spaces between the letters and words and the brushstrokes. When nothing struck her, she moved on to the paintings of soldiers.
She sat up straight. "I think I've found it. Look at these, Judd." She pointed to tiny letters beneath some of the colors.
He leaned close. "They're almost invisible."
"They're meant not to be noticed. They stand for the Latin words the artist who painted them was instructed to use to fill in the line drawings. This v means viridis, or green. So the robe on the slave is painted various shades of green. The r is for ruber, or red--the apples on that tree behind him. And of course the sky is a, azure, for blue."
He frowned, puzzled. "Then what do lat and long and the numbers with each mean?"
She grinned. "That's the same question I asked myself. In the first place, I've never known anything like three or four letters strung together to indicate a color on a manuscript page. In the second place, neither is a Latin word."
He grinned back. "Since we're looking for the location of the island, I'm guessing they're abbreviations. Add in the fact there are numbers--latitude and longitude."
"As Archimedes said, eureka!"
He grabbed his mobile and activated it. "This is where being online gets really useful. Read what you have to me, and we'll see whether we're right."
He lowered the mobile so she could watch the screen. As he tapped the keyboard, Google's world map appeared, shifted, then shifted again, shrinking to the south Aegean Sea.
His forehead knitted. "Nothing. No island. No atoll. Not even a pile of rocks."
She felt a chill. "Try again." She gave him the digits, one at a time.
He entered each carefully. Again the map zeroed in on empty sea. Her shoulders slumped. He tried other public domain maps. The only sound in the room was the clicking of the keyboard. But each map showed the same disheartening results.
They were silent.
"It doesn't make sense," she insisted. "The easiest, most direct explanation for the abbreviations and numbers in the book is they're meridian points. Even if those are old maps, they should show an island."
He stared at her. "Not true. By God, if I'm right, it's a real display of the power of the book club." Again he tapped the keyboard. "Because of terrorism, the government mandated Google and other online map services not show certain places in the world. Sometimes it was a government facility. Other times it was an 'area of interest' that was clandestine for one reason or another. Private companies doing defense work could ask the government to make spots off-limits, too."
"How could the book club get the government to hide their island?"
"An inside source, or maybe someone they bribed. Let's check this."
He called up the text message he had received yesterday from NSA, and they read the list of islands that had come close to fitting Robin's description.
"My God," Eva breathed as they stared. "One of the islands has the same coordinates as the book has."
Relieved excitement rushed through her. She flung her arms around Judd's neck, and he hugged her tight. Feeling the steady beat of his heart, his breath spicy against her ear, she lingered for a moment.
Then pushed away. "You'd better call Tucker."
The spymaster arrived in minutes, wearing the same rumpled chinos, button-down blue shirt, and sports jacket from the day before. Eva saw the lines on his face were deeper, and the large eyes behind his tortoiseshell glasses were red-rimmed from lack of sleep. But his light brown mustache and gray beard were neat, and he radiated hyper alertness.
"You've found it?" he said as he bolted the door behind him.
"Damn right she did." Judd pointed at Eva.
She smiled, pleased. "Took me a while, though."
They sat around the table, and she explained how they had discovered the answer.
"I'll get back in touch with NSA for the latest satellite photos and data about the island," Judd said brusquely. "Eva, is your laptop still working, or did it get doused when we were on the yacht?"
"It was in the main pocket of my satchel, so it's fine."
"Good. I'll forward what NSA sends to it."
"Does the island have a name?" Tucker asked.
"Just a number," Judd told him.
"Do it," Tucker ordered. "Now."