The call ended.
“Elder Rowan sounded defeated,” he said, his voice not much above a whisper. “I have to say, I echo his feeling. We’ve been at this for several years. But only in the past few months has the goal come into sight. It’s been a long hard struggle to get this far.”
“I’m sorry I lost the watch.”
“It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I should have anticipated problems and been ready to act. I could have sent my associates with you.”
“They would have been in the way. I’m the one who didn’t see it coming.”
Josepe let out a long exhale. “How about this? No more talk of defeatism tonight. Let’s have dinner somewhere.”
She was not in the mood, role or no role.
“I’m pretty jet-lagged. Would you mind if I just went to sleep?”
STEPHANIE HAD SET UP A MAKESHIFT HEADQUARTERS INSIDE her room at the Mandarin Oriental, her laptop connected to the Magellan Billet’s secured server, her phone on ready. She’d brought with her Katie Bishop, who was in an adjacent room combing through Madison’s secret notes, harvesting every piece of relevant information that she could. The young woman was bright and articulate and had apparently taken a shine to Luke Daniels. On the cab ride over from the White House there’d been lots of questions on that subject.
And now they had the watch.
Luke and Cotton had been successful.
She stared at her screen and the video feed from Luke’s laptop in Des Moines. Katie had consulted the appropriate websites and talked with a curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, who’d explained how the first Lincoln watch had been opened.
Really simple.
The back screwed off, right-to-left, counterclockwise, exposing its inner workings. The only trick would be to loosen the threads from corrosion, since they hadn’t seen any action in a long time. A few gentle taps in the right places was what worked the first time.
Which had all been passed on to Iowa.
MALONE LIFTED THE WATCH FROM THE DESKTOP. HE AND LUKE had obtained a room in a downtown hotel away from where Salazar was staying, a video link established to Stephanie in DC.
He admired the timepiece, which was in excellent condition.
“Let’s try and not destroy it,” Stephanie said from the screen.
He smirked her way. “Is that directed at me?”
“You do have a tendency to harm things.”
“At least it’s not a World Heritage Site.”
From past experience, those seemed his favorite targets.
The encounter with Cassiopeia weighed heavy on his mind. They had a problem, and no amount of talking was going to make for an easy fix. He’d done exactly what she asked him not to do, and there’d be consequences.
He handed the timepiece to Luke. “You do the honors.”
Luke gripped the watch and tried to loosen the back plate. Stephanie’s instructions had said it could be difficult, and it was.
Three more attempts produced no results.
“It won’t turn,” Luke said.
They tried a few gentle taps to its side, as recommended, but still nothing. He recalled years ago that he’d liked a particular brand of citrus salad, oranges and grapefruit, peeled, packed in water, and sold inside a plastic screw-top container. The lid was always tough to get off the first time. Finally one day he discovered the secret: Don’t grip it so hard. In his frustration he tended to squeeze the plastic so tight that it would not unscrew. So he gently grasped the watch’s edges, holding just tight enough that his fingers wouldn’t slip.
He turned, feeling resistance from the tiny threads.
Another try and movement.
Slight.
But enough.
He regripped, kept his touch light, and freed the back plate.
He laid the watch down, and Luke pointed the laptop’s camera at the exposed gears and springs. Stephanie had forwarded an image of the inside of Lincoln’s other watch when it had been opened at the Smithsonian, and he expected to see the same array of etchings on the inner structure.
But there was nothing.
He and Luke seemed to have the thought at the same time.
So he nodded to the younger man.
Luke flipped over the back plate.
ROWAN SAT IN THE SILENCE OF AN EMPTY SEALING ROOM. PEOPLE had come to the celestial room, and he was not in the mood for company, so he’d left. He wondered how many marriages had been performed here. He recalled his own, inside a sealing room at the Salt Lake temple. Bride and groom kneeling, facing each other over the altar, their families seated behind them on either side. Both held hands and pronounced a covenant to be faithful with each other, and to God, and to keep His commandments. To be sealed in Jesus’ name, by priesthood authority in a temple, was to be joined for all eternity—not just “till death do they part.” Here, as in most sealing rooms, mirrors placed on the walls allowed the couple to symbolically see themselves through their many reflections, together for all eternity.