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Chapters (48)
  1. COVER PAGE
  2. TITLE PAGE
  3. EPIGRAPH
  4. PRAISE
  5. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  6. MAP
  7. PROLOGUE
  8. CHAPTER ONE
  9. CHAPTER TWO
  10. CHAPTER THREE
  11. CHAPTER FOUR
  12. CHAPTER FIVE
  13. CHAPTER SIX
  14. CHAPTER SEVEN
  15. CHAPTER EIGHT
  16. CHAPTER NINE
  17. CHAPTER TEN
  18. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  19. CHAPTER TWELVE
  20. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  21. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  22. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  23. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  24. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  25. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  26. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  46. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  47. COPYRIGHT PAGE
  48. What’s next onyour reading list?

Duncan stopped pacing and turned on him. His face was growing red with a gathering fury, as if he were going to attack Condley right where he sat. Despite himself, Condley squirmed on the couch. He respected Wayne Duncan more than anyone on earth, and he knew that at some level the feeling was mutual. Fighting Duncan would be interesting, he thought, but also pretty depressing.

And then the general started to laugh. He walked to the couch and slapped Condley on the shoulder, an act of forgiveness. “I needed to hear somebody tell me that,” he said. “That’s why I had them go get you. You’re right. The truth is its own liberation. We tell it straight. Let the bow-ties in the Pentagon sort it out.”

Condley wasn’t laughing, though. He was thinking about what Duncan had just said about him, because it also was the truth. He’d been a shit magnet for thirty years. He had a nose for it, and it wasn’t ever going to stop.

“So what about Pepper, Skipper?”

“What about him?”

“Do you still give a damn or not?”

General Duncan stood above him, looking down and shaking his head with a mix of admiration and dread. “What’s on your mind, Condley?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“All right,” said the general. “All right, all right. Look, I’m not your boss on this. And running down turncoats isn’t in your job description anyway.”

“It would give me great pleasure to find him, though.”

General Duncan shook his head and smiled. Part of his smile was admiration, and part of it was whimsical, even nostalgic. “I think I just created a monster.”

“No, sir,” said Condley. “You did that in l969.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER EIGHT

“We have a problem,” growled a visibly irritated Hanson Muir as Condley walked into his office at the CILHI headquarters.

Muir’s office reminded Condley of an ill-kept attic in a very old house. The rotund professor sat like a lost child behind a huge oak desk that was covered with a mass of unorganized papers. In fact, his entire office was littered with papers. Professional periodicals were piled like plates in several corners of the room, having been collected over the years but never shelved. Newspaper editions that had run favorite articles were stacked near one chair. The chair itself was littered with copies of other articles. The professor’s shelves were cluttered as well, a disorganized array of fossils, rocks, old pieces of wood, Asian cultural souvenirs, and dozens of pictures, mostly of his family and of himself on various digs.

And besides that, he was wearing a trippy, multicolored luau shirt. “What tourist from Indiana did you have to mug so you could steal that shirt, Professor?” asked Condley, taking a seat on top of the copied pages.

“My wife bought it for me. It was an anniversary present.”

“Does she hate you that much?”