He stared at an exposed section for a moment, then put his face inches away and ran his fingers over the shiny surface. Using the large blade on his Swiss Army knife he poked at the rock and chipped off a thin piece about as big as his palm. He examined the material, then grinned and handed it to Zavala.

“Paint,” Zavala said with wonder. He ran his hand over the shiny area exposed by Austin's knife. “Sheetmetal and bolts. Someone went to a lot of trouble to keep this thing hidden.”

Austin took several steps back and raised his eyes to the top of the mound. “I remember Clarence Tinook saying something about an old blimp base. Maybe there's a dirigible hangar under this stuff.”

“That makes sense and goes with our theory that they used an existing base. The next question is how we get inside.”

“Try saying 'open sesame' and hope for the best.”

Zavala stood back and bellowed the famous command from Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. When nothing happened he tried again in Spanish, also to no avail.

“You know any more magic words?” he asked Austin.

“You just exhausted my entire repertoire,” Kurt said with a shrug.

They walked around behind the hangar. Sticking out of the permafrost were the foundations of several small buildings that could have been Quonset huts. A dump area revealed piles of rusty tin cans and broken glass, but no entrance to the mound presented itself.

It was Zavala who stumbled, literally, on the entrance.

Austin was walking several steps ahead of his partner when he heard a yell. He turned quickly. Joe had vanished as if the earth had swallowed him up. Confirming this possibility, Zavala's disembodied voice, swearing in the tongue of his ancestors, issued eerily from the ground. Austin carefully back tracked and found Zavala in a cellar hole that had been covered over by vegetation. Austin had walked right by the hole without seeing it.

“Are you okay?” Austin called out.

More mutterings. “Yeah, the brush that covered this damned hole cushioned my fall. C'mon down. There's a short set of stairs.”

Austin joined Zavala at the bottom of the hole, which was about eight feet deep. Joe was standing in front of a partially open door of heavily riveted steel.

“Don't tell me,” Austin grunted. “The unerring Zavala homing instinct.”

“What else?” Zavala said.

Austin pulled a small but powerful halogen light from his pack. The door noisily opened with some persuasion from his shoulder. He stepped inside with Zavala close behind. A blast of cold and fetid air hit them in the face as if they were standing in front of an air conditioner for a mausoleum. The beam of light showed a corridor whose concrete walls and ceiling were inadequate insulation against permafrost and seemed to amplify the cold. Pulling their jacket collars tight around their necks, they started along the corridor.

Several doors led off the main hallway of the underground bunker. Austin flashed his light inside the rooms. Rusty bed frames and mattresses rotting with decay testified to the use of one space as a bunkroom. Farther along was a kitchen and pantry. The last chamber was a communications room.