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"My school spirit has been bled out of me."
"Things that bad?"
"Figure it out. The President goes before the Canadian Parliament tomorrow afternoon. We're dead. No way in hell we'll come up with a treaty by then . . . even if one exists, which I doubt."
"What does Pitt think?" she asked. "About the train being someplace else besides buried in the river, I mean?"
"He's convinced it never reached the bridge."
"What do you believe?"
Giordino gazed expressionless down the road. Then he smiled. "I believe it's a waste of breath to argue with Pitt."
"Why, because he's stubborn?"
"No," Giordino answered. "Because he's usually right."
For hours Pitt had stared through binocular glasses at the photo blowups, his brain interpreting the detail in three dimension.
The zigzag rail fences separating pastures from bordering woodlands, the automo
biles and houses, a red-and-yellow hot-air balloon that made a colorful splash against the green landscape-they were all revealed in amazing clarity. Even an occasional railroad tie could be distinguished on the weed strewn track bed.
Time after time he retraced the almost arrow-straight line between the destroyed bridge and the outskirts of Albany's industrial section, his eyes straining to pick out a minute detail, the tiniest suggestion of an abandoned rail spur.
The secret stayed kept.
He finally gave in and was leaning back in a chair resting his eyes when Heidi and Giordino entered the De Soto's chartroom. Pitt stood tiredly and embraced her. "How's the leg?" he asked.
"On the mend, thank you."
They helped her to a chair. Giordino took her crutches and leaned them against a bulkhead. Then he set her briefcase on the deck beside her. "Al tells me you've drawn a blank," she said.
Pitt nodded. "Looks that way."
"I have some more bad news for you." He said nothing, waiting. "Brian Shaw knows everything," she said simply.
Pitt read the embarrassment in her eyes. "Everything covers a lot of territory."
She shook her head in frustration. "He stole the maps of the old rail line from the museum before I had a chance to study them."
"Do him damned little good unless he'd got a clue to their value."
"I think he's guessed," Heidi said softly.
Pitt sat thoughtful for a moment, rejecting any attempt at cross-examining Heidi. The damage was done.
How Shaw came to lay his hands on the key to the enigma no longer mattered. Incredibly, he felt a tinge of jealousy. And he couldn't help wondering what Heidi saw in the older man. "Then he's in the area."
"Probably sneaking around the countryside this minute," added Giordino.
Pitt looked at Heidi. "The maps may be worthless to him. Nothing resembling a rail spur shows on the aerial photos."
She picked up the briefcase, set it in her lap and opened the locks. "But there was a rail spur," she said.
"It used to cut off the main line at a place called Mondragon Hook Junction." The atmosphere in the chartroom suddenly galvanized.
Pitt said, "Where is that?"
