From the Ashes (30 page)

Reclining on one hip, in one hand Prometheus held aloft a flame – his gift to the people gone awry. His other hand was outstretched and pointing to his left, Jon and Mara’s right. His brilliant golden skin gleamed in the floodlights, water splashing from the fountain around him and providing contrast to the fire he represented. Fire. Water. Opposing elements. Tension and conflict. Exposed for all to see, the true meaning obscured from all. The signs of the zodiac encircled the rock on which Prometheus was affixed, representing, perhaps, the relentless march of time, the inability to go back and change mistakes, the months and years that Rockefeller had to live with knowing what he had done, knowing about the pogroms the Nazis were enforcing against the Jews and other groups considered to be
Untermenschen,
sub-human. Pogroms that grew more horrifying and extensive by the week.

Fitting, Jon thought, that it should be a figure from classical mythology that should hide – and reveal – his involvement in Operation Phoenix, considering the classical origins of the phoenix mythos.

They kept their eyes fixed on the statue as they walked down the stairs to the Lower Plaza. The unfeeling, unchanging expression; the vacant, removed eyes – the countenance of Rockefeller’s kindred spirit and secret bearer betrayed no emotion of any kind, remaining in silent repose as he had for the past seventy years. To think that all this time, the secret, the way to dispel the lies and end the killing, had been right there under everyone’s nose. One of the most famous sites in all of Manhattan – pointing the way to the truth.

But pointing to
what
exactly?

Crossing the Lower Plaza, Jon and Mara walked through the cafe and came face to face with the statue. A faint mist from the fountain blew into Mara’s face and made her shiver. With the sun gone behind the distant horizon, the heat from the unseasonably warm day had begun to rapidly dissipate, and the hint of a chill already hung in the air. A sign of colder weather ahead.

The statue was obviously pointing – a postcard photograph could tell you that – but the object of his denotation was unclear. The pair agreed to split up and look around the area to try to ascertain where the giant bronze finger was pointing. Jon shuffled to his left, skirting the edge of the fountain, trying to line up his line of sight with Prometheus’ left arm. He was too far below the statue to see from the right angle. Climbing back up the stairs and around to the left side of the statue, this time from above, Jon looked down the length of the golden arm, from the fingertip to what lay beyond.

The street? The flags of the world that lined the pavilion? Had Rockefeller hidden it in another
country
^?
}
Jon scanned the flags that seemed to be in the general area of the statue’s indication: Mexico, Israel, Italy. Israel might make sense, seeing as the Holocaust – for which Rockefeller, in helping the Nazis come to power, must have felt at least partially responsible – was the main impetus for the creation of a Jewish state. But were these flags even here when Rockefeller commissioned Prometheus to be the guardian of truth? The State of Israel didn’t even exist until 1948, a decade after the Plaza was completed.

Jon shook his head. He was making it too complicated. Was it a window
beyond the
flags? Past the double row of flags, across the street, the stone and glass building whose windows looked down onto the plaza? Was that part of Rockefeller Center, too? Did some room in that building have special significance? How could Rockefeller ensure that it remained safe, especially if it were leased to some business or...

Stop,
he told himself. Too complicated again. Rockefeller wanted this to be found
someday,
by
someone.
Someone purposefully looking for it, looking for it in the right way, at the right time. He wouldn’t have hidden it in some obscure place that would be more likely found by building renovators ripping up floorboards and tearing through plastered walls than someone following
his
clue to absolve
his
guilt. It had to be some place more permanent, some place more important to him. A monument or something. Like the statue itself?

Jon looked to his right. Three generations of a cheery black family stood at the top of the steps leading down to the Lower Plaza, huddled in their winter coats and nestled together. A young Asian man took the family’s picture – two grandparents, four parents, and five kids. Another picture because one of the grandkids wasn’t looking at the camera. Then one of the men in the middle generation offered to take the Asian man’s photograph, who readily accepted and posed with his sprightly girlfriend, the couple clinging to each other, pointing behind them, visibly excited to be here. Jon couldn’t see their faces from where he was, but he knew that in each of those pictures, every subject wore a grin; these pictures would be shown to family and friends, shared and laughed at over the years as they relived their memories of the vacation they took to New York City, the vacation they got their picture taken at Rockefeller Center.

And that’s when it hit Jon. He was looking at it wrong. Beyond the symbolic road marker that Jon now knew it to be, it was also a world icon. It was a masterpiece, both in its aesthetic value and in its symbolism – double meaning though the symbolism did seem to have now. Maybe the statue didn’t point
directly
to the Dossiers. Maybe it just
pointed.
To its left. To...

Bingo.

Of course, he thought. Another symbol of blame removed, of guilt absolved, of wrongdoing forgiven. To the right of the statue, just beyond Prometheus’s outstretched arm, a hole – roughly two feet square – had been cut in the polished granite wall of the alcove housing the statue and fountain. A similar hole mirrored it on the other side of the statue, but no golden finger pointed to that one. The right-hand hole had three pieces of granite set within – one long vertical section and two shorter pieces on either side. Four smaller holes remained around the inlaid granite. The design formed was one of the most ubiquitous symbols in the Western world, and one that Rockefeller himself would have been quite familiar with: the Cross.

Jon called to Mara, who was presently below him, checking out the angle that he had checked out earlier, and beckoned her to his side. He pointed to the hole and the cross.

“There,” he said. “Behind the cross, in one of those holes.”

“You think so?” As soon as Mara spoke the words, the lights set inside of those holes turned on, the darkness or the hour having set off a preset timer for illuminating the statue.

Jon smiled at the uncanny timing of the lighting. “The cross symbolizes hope, redemption, salvation from our sins and wrongdoings, right? Absolution from our mistakes, no matter how grievous. And the golden dude seems to be pointing in that general direction.”

“Yeah, he does. One question though.” Mara indicated the crowd that filled the Plaza with a sweeping motion of her hand. “How exactly do we go about
getting
whatever’s inside with all these people around?”

Jon looked thoughtful for a moment, stroking the five o’clock stubble on his jaw.

“We don’t,” he finally answered. Mara looked surprised briefly before he clarified his statement.

“We come back when the people are gone. We come back tonight.”

Harrison Greer arrived in Manhattan at dusk. He could have flown or taken a train and not had to deal with the nightmare that was finding a parking spot in this city, but Greer had driven his black Lincoln Town Car instead. He didn’t trust taxis, the subways stank, and he always, always needed to be in control. In a city of more than eight million people from every belief system, every nationality, every culture known to man (and several that, surely, hadn’t yet been documented), there were far too many variables for Greer to rely on crowded public transit or on a cab driver who reeked of boiled lamb and body odor and only spoke three words of English. And of course, there was also the cargo that Greer carried in a secret compartment under the Lincoln’s back seat – his trusted sniper rifle, a scope, a pistol, plenty of ammunition for both weapons, and a black sweatsuit and ski mask. These would soon be used to artfully kill both Jonathan Rickner and Mara Ellison. And though he would enjoy destroying these traitors to the nation, what he would truly relish would be aided by the tool that he held in his hand.

At every stop light, he flicked the lighter – an old-fashioned silver one with a flip lid that had once belonged to his grandfather, Walton Greer, the first Director of the Division. On, off, on, off. The flame was beautiful, and it would help him to finally purge the country of her dark secret. How proper that it would be through flame that this stain would finally be purified. How ironic that the truth about Operation Phoenix would quite literally be reduced to ashes, never again to rise up and threaten them. And how fitting that it should be the lighter of Walton Greer, guided by the hand of his grandson, that would finally finish the mission started all those years ago.

Harrison Greer found a pay-by-the-day lot near Grand Central. After parking the car, he opened the secret compartment under the back seat, withdrew the pistol, loaded it, and placed it in his shoulder holster. You never knew what you might encounter in this city, and Greer wasn’t about to take any chances. Especially not with everything he’d ever worked for on the line. He had all the proper documentation for a concealed weapon, so he needn’t worry about some two-bit cop giving him lip about it. As always, he had all of his bases covered.

Closing and securing the compartment, he locked his car and left the lot with his small rolling suitcase in tow. After he checked into his usual room at the Grand Hyatt – the luxurious five-star hotel just next door to Grand Central Terminal – he headed back out into the city. He found himself walking north as though his feet had a mind of their own, which ultimately, he didn’t mind. As much as he hated not being in control of all the variables, there was something about this city – an energy, so to speak – that invigorated him.

Of course, this was also where the Operation had begun eighty years ago, when, in 1932, Stimson had met with Rockefeller just a mile or so north from where Greer now stood. This was where, in 1941, Rockefeller had denied Stimson’s demand for him to turn over his copy of the Dossiers commissioning Operation Phoenix. Just to the southeast was the site of the United Nations Headquarters, which, in 1947, had been purchased with a small fortune donated by Rockefeller in unspoken penitence for unwittingly visiting upon the world the worst atrocities and most devastating war it had ever seen. Ten years later, in 1957, just to the south of the UN Headquarters, the Brooklyn Bridge was where Blumhurst had had some sort of crisis of conscience and derailed Walton Greer’s plans. And here, today, Harrison Greer would finally finish that work. Truly this great city was inextricably tied to Operation Phoenix and its cover-up. How fitting that it would be here that the cover-up would finally be completed.

He had gotten another status report from Wilkins while on his way into the city. Apparently Rickner and Ellison had figured out something from what Wayne had given them. Clues of some sort left by Rockefeller. Clues that would eventually lead them – and Greer – to the final resting place of the Dossiers.

He had also gotten a curious phone call earlier that day from Ramirez. He was in New York as well. And although Greer secretly cursed himself for not thinking of using him as an asset in this way, he realized that the fear that Ramirez created in Jon and Mara was a definite advantage. That fear of impending death was lighting a fire under their butts that would have them not only afraid to trust anyone else – thus preventing any further information leaks – but would also make them move on toward Greer’s goals much more quickly. Although he felt fine right now, Greer knew from his father’s own battle with cancer that the sickness often gave no warning and offered no mercy. He had to finish this soon, and with both Ramirez and Wilkins moving their quarry closer to where he needed them to be, Greer had no doubt that this would all be over very, very soon.

Harrison Greer stopped short when he realized where his feet had taken him while he was lost in his thoughts: Rockefeller Plaza. The heart of the audacious Center that the self-righteous old tycoon had named after himself. He had thought that he knew better than Stimson, or indeed, the whole of the United States Government, in his refusal to give up the Dossiers. Hiding them away for later generations, leaving clues to their secret location; who did he think he was, a treasure-burying pirate? National security was on the line, and he’d refused to play along. And now, nearly a century later, the nation was still reaping the deadly consequences of his actions. As the loved ones of Michael Rickner could attest. And as the loved ones of Jonathan Rickner and Mara Ellison would soon be able to.

Greer stared out at the Plaza, at the families and friends dining in the terrace below, the tourists snapping photographs of the iconic site, the craze of New Yorkers shopping and wining and dining. All built on a lie. All built by a man who had done the unthinkable, and then been too conscience-stricken and cowardly to do what needed to be done after the fact. What his country had needed him to do. It was a wonder Greer’s grandfather hadn’t hauled Rockefeller himself in as a traitor. But then, when someone is an imminently public figure with more money than the government, arresting him on charges stemming from an explosive national secret was probably not an option. In truth, Stimson – and Walton Greer after him – probably had to walk a fine line between trying to reclaim the Dossiers and not antagonizing the tycoon to the point where his conscience would overwhelm his rational mind and opt to just spill it all to the press.

Greer glared across the Plaza at the entrance to the towering GE Building, one of the principle structures of Rockefeller Center.
Now it’s finally come to this,
he thought, mentally challenging the long-dead billionaire.
Your secret versus my plan. You’ve bested us for seventy years, you old bastard. But your time is finished. Your breach of conscience will no longer haunt the Division or the future of our great nation. It’s over, old man. Despite your best efforts, the Dossiers are as good as mine. You, Mr. Rockefeller, have already lost. And your final secret will soon be as dead as you are.