“Possibly. But the Eskimos and North American Indians recounted legends of great shaggy creatures. In 1993, the skeletons of dwarf mammoths were found on Wrangel Island, between Siberia and Alaska, not far from here. Their bones were dated between seven thousand and thirty-seven hundred years ago, which means mammoths roamed the earth well past Paleolithic times, when men were building Stonehenge and the Pyramids.”

Schroeder chuckled and said, “You'd like to explore further, wouldn't you?”

“I wouldn't want to waste an opportunity like this sitting around and twiddling our thumbs. Maybe we'll come across some well-preserved specimens.”

“I don't think preparing to repel a gang of desperate cutthroats qualifies as twiddling our thumbs, but I shouldn't be surprised. Once, when you were a child, I read you Alice in Wonderland. Not long after, I found you out in the yard trying to squeeze your head down a rabbit hole. You said you wished you had some tonic that would shrink you, like Alice.”

“It must have been your fault for reading me such stories.”

“Well, now it seems we have little choice,” he said wearily. He picked up his pack and limped toward the opening. “Down the rabbit hole we go.”

NUMA 6 - Polar Shift

26

THE CHESTNUT STALLION GALLOPED across the verdant Virginia countryside as if it were racing neck and neck in the Kentucky Derby. Jordan Gant crouched in the saddle like an overgrown jockey and whipped his crop repeatedly on his mount's haunches. The horse had been running a punishing pace. Its eyes rolled, its sleek coat was shiny with sweat and its tongue hung from its mouth. Still, Gant showed no mercy. It was not so much cruelty, which would have assumed emotion on his part, but rather the disregard he held for anything that came under his control.

Gant crossed meadows and pastures, and rode along the edge of a driveway bordered by poplar trees until he came to a sprawling country house. He headed to a stable area near the house, and allowed the exhausted animal to come to a trot, then a walk and finally to a halt. Gant slid easily out of the saddle, took a towel from a waiting groom and carelessly tossed him the reins. The horse was limping as it was led away.

Gant strode up a stone walkway toward the front door. He was dressed for polo in a black short-sleeved shirt and jodhpurs. Gant had a muscular, athletic physique, and he would have worn his clothes well even if they weren't custom-tailored. He whipped his knee-high boots of cordovan leather with his crop as he walked, as if his arm had a mind of its own. The massive wooden front door opened at Gant's approach, and he stepped into an enormous foyer with a fountain bubbling in the center. Gant handed his gloves and towel to the cadaverous butler who had opened the door.

The butler said, “Your guest has arrived, sir. He's waiting in the library.”