“In math, a proof is an argument that shows the undeniable truth of a theory,” Hailey continued. “Revere’s bells were experiments. The Liberty Bell, his true, final bell, was his proof; what he was trying to do was indeed possible. But the Liberty Bell didn’t make that golden box. Something, or someone, else did.”

“Revere’s philosopher’s stone—” Nick started.

“It’s still out there.”

Nick’s hand closed over the bullets. Then he looked at her in a way she hadn’t seen before. Maybe it was because they had come so close, or because he’d seen the unthinkable, if only for a moment. But something had definitely changed. Before, he’d told her that everyone was in this to get paid. For the first time for Nick, she believed, that was no longer true.

“This isn’t over,” he said.

Hailey retrieved her backpack and slid past him. Considering they’d just climbed the State House itself, getting out of the courtyard and over the fence surrounding the front facade of the building wouldn’t be difficult. But beyond that—Hailey wasn’t yet sure.

Even so, as she led Nick down the stone steps toward the fence, Beacon Street, and the Boston Common beyond, she realized she was smiling. She and Nick had just witnessed something earth-shattering, and incredibly powerful; a mechanism that, however briefly, could transform lead into gold. But they also had evidence—the box in her backpack—that somewhere, there was something even more powerful and permanent waiting for them. Paul Revere had started this journey more than two hundred years ago, but now Hailey felt certain she was hot on his trail.

“I thought the Liberty Bell was the solution to Revere’s puzzle,” she said, as they moved. “The culmination of his work. But I was wrong.”

The bell wasn’t the solution to the puzzle.

It was only the first piece.

Epilogue

Epilogue

Five miles away, Curt Anderson limped deliberately down the long private dock toward the figure standing at the far end, backlit by the sun rising up from beyond the harbor. Curt’s right leg throbbed with pain as the dock swayed with the water that crashed and cavorted against the wooden pylons holding it up, but Curt refused to acknowledge the pain, his long, taut muscles reacting instinctively to keep his balance perfect, his motion pure. Along with the leg, which might very well have been broken, two of his ribs were undoubtedly bruised. Every breath was a challenge, but Curt knew, in this moment, that his wounds were irrelevant. Given time, they would heal. In this moment, the fact that he had failed was much more of an existential threat; so despite the pain, he didn’t walk so much as glide, his joints perfectly tuned to overcome the damage by a near lifetime of physical training.