The Lincoln Myth (Cotton Malone 9)

“How about you don’t worry about the president of the United States. And that’s what he is. He’s the commander in chief. Our boss. He’s ordered us to do a job, and that’s what we’re going to do.”

Luke saluted. “Yes, ma’am.”

He was impossible, just like Cotton once was.

“And you know I meant no disrespect,” he said. “But you’re not a Daniels, so you don’t know what I know.”

“Don’t be so sure about that.”

Never would she mention the turmoil that she and Danny Daniels had been through together. That was not this youngster’s business. A part of her understood Luke’s bitterness. The president could be a hard man. She’d seen that firsthand. But he was not made of stone, and she’d seen that, too. Right now, though, she was the one in the crosshairs. She’d told Luke to not get caught, but the same advice applied to her.

She turned to leave. “I’ve emailed you particulars on the security at Montpelier, which isn’t all that much. It’ll be a nearly moonless night, so you should be able to get in and out with no problem.”

“Where will you be?”

She grabbed the front doorknob. “No place good.”

THIRTY-FOUR

SALZBURG

MALONE KNEW THEY WERE COMING. HE’D ACTUALLY BE disappointed if they didn’t. He’d purposefully chosen to descend from the castle with Salazar and Cassiopeia, and immediately spotted the two young men waiting for their boss. Cassiopeia’s little show at the cashier’s desk had—he hoped—been for Salazar’s benefit. Nice touch, actually. Her anger had appeared genuine, her defense of Salazar entirely reasonable under the circumstances.

He walked at a leisurely pace down the inclined cobbled street, into an open square behind the cathedral, risking no surreptitious glances over his shoulder. The night was chilly, the sky cloudy and devoid of celestial glory. The shops were all closed, their fronts tightly shuttered with iron grilles. He picked once more through his many threads of recollection about these narrow streets. Most were pedestrian-only, connected by winding paths built under the close-packed houses that served as shortcuts from one block to another. He spotted one of the passageways ahead and decided to avoid it.

He passed the cathedral and crossed the domplatz. He’d once visited the Christmas market held here every year. How long ago was that? Eight years? Nine? No, more like ten. His life had changed immeasurably since then. Never had he dreamed of being divorced, living in Europe, and owning an old-book shop.

And being in love?

He hated even admitting that to himself.

He glanced up at the cathedral, parts of it reminiscent of St. Peter’s in Rome. The archbishop’s former residence, its 17th-century façade tinted green and white and gold, blocked the path ahead. The Residenzplatz, from which he’d called Stephanie earlier, spread out before the building, the lighted fountain still splashing water.

He needed privacy.

And darkness.

A location occurred to him.

He turned left and kept walking.

SALAZAR TRIED TO CONCENTRATE ON CASSIOPEIA, BUT HIS thoughts kept returning to Cotton Malone.

The insolent gentile.

Malone reminded him of other arrogant foes who, in the 1840s, terrorized Saints with unchecked vengeance. And the government? Both state and federal had sat by and allowed the mayhem to happen, eventually joining the fray on the side of the mobocrats.

“What did you mean,” he asked Cassiopeia, “when you told Malone he’d be sorry for what he did?”

“I’m not without abilities, Josepe. I can cause that man many problems.”

“He works for the American government.”

She shrugged. “I have reach there, too.”

“I didn’t realize you had such wrath inside you.”

“Everyone does, when challenged. And that’s what that man has done. He challenged you, which means he’s challenged me.”

“Dissenters,” the angel said in his head, “must be trodden underfoot, until their bowels gush out.”

That they must.

“I’m so glad to have you here with me,” he said to Cassiopeia.

They continued to walk beside each other, finding Getreidegasse and turning back toward the Goldener Hirsch, which sat at the far end. He’d come a long way in the eleven years since he and Cassiopeia had last been together. Both personally and professionally. Thankfully he’d met Elder Rowan, who’d encouraged the recreation of the Danites. Rowan had told him that Charles R. Snow himself had sanctioned the move but, as in the beginning, there could be no direct link. His job was to safeguard the church, even at the expense of himself. A difficult task, for sure, but a necessary one.

“It is the will of God that those things be so.”

The angel had just repeated what Joseph Smith had said when he first visited a Danite meeting. Intentionally, the prophet had not been told the extent of the group’s mission, only that they were organized to protect the Saints. From the beginning there were those who spoke with Heavenly Father, as Prophet Charles now did. Those who administered and implemented the revelations, as Elder Rowan and his eleven brethren did. And those who protected and defended all that they held dear, as he and his Danites did.

Cotton Malone threatened that.

This gentile had come for a fight? Okay. That he would receive.

He and Cassiopeia arrived at the hotel.

“I will leave you here,” he said to her. “I have some church business that must be handled before we leave. But I will see you in the morning, at breakfast.”

“All right. Have a good evening.”

He walked away.

“Josepe,” she said to him.

He turned back.

“I meant what I said. Malone now has two enemies.”

MALONE ENTERED ST. PETER’S GRAVEYARD, A CHRISTIAN burial site founded only a few years after Christ’s crucifixion. The oldest parts were the caves hewn into the rock face, and a hundred feet above them were strangely labeled catacombs. Centuries ago the monks of St. Peter’s lived there, in seclusion, the isolated perch their hermitage. The ancient Benedictine monastery remained—towers, offices, storehouses, a church and refectory, all grouped behind a fortified wall encasing both the cemetery and the Gothic St. Margaret’s Chapel.

The scene was a bit surreal, more like a garden than a cemetery, the colorful flowers adorning the elaborate graves muted in the darkness. He’d visited before and always thought of the von Trapps as they fled to freedom through here in The Sound of Music, though their escapades all happened on a sound stage. Many of Salzburg’s wealthiest families lay buried in the outer Baroque porticoes. What made the place unique was that the graves were not owned but rented. Fail to pay the yearly fee and the body is moved. He’d always wondered how many evictions had actually occurred, since each plot was always lovingly tended, decorated with candles, fir branches, and fresh blooms.

His minders had stayed back and unsuccessfully tried to be inconspicuous. Maybe they wanted him to know they were coming. If so, they were clearly amateurs. Never give yourself away by signaling your intentions.

He needed both hands free, so he laid the wooden box at the base of one of the markers, among a cluster of pansies. Then he hustled ahead, toward St. Margaret’s Chapel, its entrance doors closed and iron-barred. He rounded a corner and pressed himself against the rough stone, spying back toward the entrance. There were two ways into the cemetery. The one he’d just utilized and another a couple of hundred feet ahead of him, down a paved path that paralleled the rock face. All of the monastery buildings were pitch dark, only a few incandescent fixtures attached to the outer porticoes breaking the blackness.

One of the men entered through the gate to his right.

He smiled.

A little dividing and conquering? One at a time?

Okay.

To draw the man his way, he bent down, retrieved a few pebbles, and tossed them toward one of the iron grilles that protec

ted the porticoes.

He saw the shadow react and head his way.

Another tossed pebble ensured the decision.

The Danite would have to come right past the edge of the chapel, where he waited, darkness making any danger invisible.

He heard footsteps.

Approaching.

The shadow cleared the chapel wall, staring ahead, toward the porticoes, surely wondering where his target could be. He lunged, wrapped an arm around the man’s neck, and tightened, cutting off air. A few seconds of pressure, then he released his grip, spun the man around, and slammed his elbow up and into the chin. The combination of blows staggered the Danite. A kick to the face sent the body sprawling to the ground.

He searched the man’s clothes and found a pistol.

The other threat would not be far behind so he doubled around the chapel, rounding its rear and heading for the porticoes that lined the outer wall. A tiled pavement fronted them that kept his steps silent. He came to the end and picked his way through the hard-packed earth, back toward the entrance that both he and the first Danite had used, keeping down, using the tall markers as cover. The terrain inside the compact cemetery was inclined, rising to the chapel at the center.

He spotted the second pursuer.

On the pavement, heading up the incline, through the graves.

He kept his steps light and closed the gap.

Forty feet.

He passed where he’d left the wooden box and reached down and retrieved it.