“I want to find out what he knows, Adriano. You can deal with him later. I promise.”

Adriano closed his eyes and worked the thick fingers of his hands.

“Later,” he said, as if he were cherishing the very word.

NUMA 7 - The Navigator

Chapter 18

PROFESSOR PIETER DEVRIES WAS turning the Jefferson file over in his mind as he waited in a reception area at the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. He had read every line and found no inconsistencies.

The receptionist picked up the buzzing intercom phone and exchanged a few words with the person on the other end.

“Mr. Evans will see you now, Professor DeVries,” she said with a smile. “Third door on the right.”

“Thank you.” DeVries slipped his reading material into a file case, tucked it under his arm, and walked down the hallway. He knocked lightly, then opened the door and stepped into an office. A tall, long-jawed man in his late thirties was waiting to greet him with a hand shake.

“Good morning, Professor DeVries. My name is Joshua Evans. I’m an analyst with the bureau. Have a seat.”

DeVries sat down and said, “Thanks for seeing me.”

Evans settled his lanky frame behind a desk whose clinical orderliness suggested a compulsive personality. “It’s not every day that I get a visit from the NSA,” Evans said. “You folks usually keep to yourselves. What brings you to over to Foggy Bottom?”

“As I explained on the phone, I’m a code breaker with the agency. I’ve come across information that might be of interest to your bureau. I came directly to State rather than go through NSA channels. This is a matter of some delicacy.”

“You’ve got my interest,” Evans said.

The professor opened his file case and handed over the folder that held copies of the original Jefferson material and the deciphered version. He gave Evans a capsule account of the file and how he had acquired it.

“Quite a story,” Evans said with a lightness of tone that suggested he’d been listening to a Mother Goose tale. He eyed the professor’s baggy tweed suit and Vandyke beard. “I’m still not clear why you brought it to Near Eastern Affairs.”

The professor spread his hands apart. “Phoenicia was in the geographical area that is the responsibility of your bureau.”

“Phoenicia,” Evans said with a wan smile.

“That’s right. It was one of the greatest seafaring empires of all time. It spread from its original home to the shores of Spain and beyond the Pillars of Hercules.”

Evans sat back and clasped his hands behind his head. “That may be so, Dr. DeVries, but Phoenicia longer exists.”

“I understand that, but the descendents of the Phoenicians still inhabit the countries of Lebanon and Syria.”

“Unlike those two countries, Phoenicia was not a member of the United Nations, the last I knew,” Evans said with an indulgent chuckle.