Today

Washington, D.C.

The Knight knew his history. And his destiny. In fact, no one studied those morecarefully than the Knight.

Rolling a butterscotch candy around his tongue, he pulled the trigger at exactly10:11 p.m.

The gun—an antique pistol—let out a puff of blue-gray smoke, sendinga spray of meat and blood across the wooden pews of St. John's Church, thehistoric building that sat directly across the street from the White House.

"Y-You shot me ..." the rector cried, clutching the back of hisshoulder—his collarbone felt shattered—as he reeled sideways andstumbled down the main aisle.

The blood wouldn't stop. But the Knight's gun hadn't delivered a killshot. Atthe last minute, the rector, who'd been in charge of St. John's for nearly adecade, had moved.

The Knight just stood there, waiting for him to fall. The stark white plastermask he wore ensured that his victim couldn't get a good look at his face. Butthe rector still had his strength.

Sliding his gun back in his pocket, the Knight moved calmly, almost serenelydown the aisle, toward the ornate altar.

"Help! Someone ... please! Someone help me!" the rector, asixty-year-old man with rosy cheeks, gasped as he ran, looking back at thefrozen white mask, like a death mask, that followed him.

There was a reason the Knight had picked a church, especially this church,dubbed "the Church of the Presidents" because every President since JamesMadison had worshiped here.

It was the same with the homemade tattoo on the web of skin between his ownthumb and pointer-finger. The Knight had finished the tattoo last night, usingwhite ink since it was invisible to the naked eye. It took five needles, whichhe bundled together and dipped in ink, and four hours in total, puncturing hisskin over and over, wiping away the blood.

The only break he took was right after he had finished the first part—theinitials. Then, from his pocket, he had pulled out a yellowed deck of playingcards, thumbing past the hearts, clubs, and diamonds, stopping on ...Spades.

In the dictionary, spades were defined as shovels. But when the four suits ofcards were introduced centuries ago, each one had its own cryptic meaning. Thespade wasn't a tool to dig with. It was the point of a lance.

The weapon of a knight.

"I need help! Please ... anyone!" the rector screamed, scramblingfrantically and making a sharp right through the double doors and down the longhallway that led out of the sanctuary.

The Knight's pace was perfectly steady as he followed the curved hallway backtoward the church offices. His breath puffed evenly against the white plastermask.

Up ahead, from around the corner, he heard a faint beep-beep-boop of acell phone. The rector was trying to call 911.

But like his hero, who had done this so long ago, the Knight left nothing tochance. The plastic gray device in his pocket was the size of a cell phone, andcould kill any cell signal in a fifty-yard radius. Cell jammers were illegal inthe United States. But they cost less than $200 on a UK website.

Around the corner, where the main church offices began, there was a dull thud ofa shoulder hitting wood: the rector realizing that the doorknob had been removedfrom the front door. Then the loud thunderclap of an office door slamming shut.The rector was hiding now, in one of the offices.

In the distance, the faint sound of police sirens was getting louder. No way wasthe rector able to call 911, but even if he was, the maze had nothing but deadends left.

Looking right, then left, the Knight checked the antique parlor rooms that thechurch now used for AA meetings and for the "Date Night" services they held forlocal singles. This side of the building, known as the Parish House, was nearlyas old as the church itself, but not nearly as well kept up. Throughout the mainfloor, every one of the tall cherry office doors was open. Except one.

With a sharp twist of the oval brass doorknob, the Knight shoved the large dooropen. The sirens were definitely getting louder. In the far left corner, by thebookcase, the rector was crying, still trying to pry open the room's onlywindow, which the Knight had nailed shut hours earlier.

Moving closer, the Knight glided past a glass case, never glancing at itsbeautiful collection of fifty antique crosses mounted on red velvet.

"You can't do this! God will never forgive you!" the rector pleaded.

The Knight stepped toward him, taking hold of the rector's shattered shoulder.Under the mask, he rolled a butterscotch candy around his tongue. From his belt,he pulled out a knife.

One side of his blade had the words "Land of the Free/Home of the Brave," etchedin acid, while the other side was etched with "Liberty/Independence." Just likethe one his hero had over a century ago.

Taking a final breath that gave him a sense of weightlessness, he clenched hisbutterscotch candy in the vise of his back teeth.

"W-Why're you doing this?" the rector pleaded as the sirens grew deafening.

"Isn't it obvious?" The Knight raised his knife and plunged it straight into therector's throat. The butterscotch candy cracked in half. "I'm getting ready forthe President of the United States."

There are stories no one knows. Hidden stories.

I love those stories. And since I work in the National Archives, I find thosestories for a living. But at 7:30 in the morning, as the elevator doors slideopen and I scan the quiet fourth-floor hallway, I'm starting to realize thatsome of those stories are even more hidden than I thought.

"Nothing?" Tot asks, waiting for me outside our office. The way he's rolling hisfinger into his overgrown beard, he knows the answer.

"Less than nothing," I confirm, holding a file folder in my gloved open palmsand double-checking to make sure we're alone.

Aristotle "Tot" Westman is my mentor here at the Archives, and the one whotaught me that the best archivists are the ones who never stop searching. Atseventy-two years old, he's had plenty of practice.

He's also the one who invited me into the Culper Ring.

The Ring was started by George Washington.

I know. I had the same reaction. But yes, that George Washington.

Two hundred years ago, back during the Revolutionary War, Washington built hisown private spy ring. Not only did it help him win the war, but it helpedprotect the Presidency. The Ring still exists today, and now I'm a part of it.

"Beecher, you knew he wasn't gonna make it easy."

"I'm not asking for easy; I'm looking for possible. It's likethere's nothing to find."

"There's always something to find. I promise."

"Yeah, you've been making that promise for two months now," I say, referring tohow long it's been since Tot and I started coming in at 7 a.m.—before anyof the other archivists show up—privately digging through everypresidential file we can find.

"What'd you expect? That you can look under P and find everything you need forEvil President?" Tot challenges.

"Actually, Evil President would be filed under E."

"Not if it's his first name. Though it does depend on the record group,"Tot clarifies, hoping the bad joke will lighten the mood. It doesn't. "The pointis, Beecher, we know the hard part: We know what Wallace and Palmiotti did; weknow how they did it; and when they were done with their baseball bat and razor-sharpcar keys, we even know they put a young man into a permanent coma and lefthim to die. Now all we have to do is prove it. I'm thinking we should startpicking up the pace."

As Tot says the words, he runs his fingertips down the metal strands of his bolotie, which he doesn't realize is as socially extinct as the Scottsdale boutiquewhere he bought it back in 1994. The thing is, I know Tot. And I know that tone.

"Why'd you just say we need to pick up the pace?" I ask.

At first, Tot stays quiet, rechecking the hallway.

"Tot, if you know something ..."

"One of our guys," he begins, using that phrase he saves for when he's talkingabout other members of the Culper Ring. "One of them spoke to someone in theSecret Service, asking what they knew about you. And y'know what the guy in theService said? Nothing. Not a sound. You know what that means, Beecher?"

"It means they're worried about me."

"No. It means the President already knows how this ends. All he's doing now isworking on his cover story."

Letting the words sink in, Tot again rechecks the hallway. I tell myself theproof is still in the Archives ... somewhere ... in some file. It's no smallhaystack.

The National Archives is the storehouse for the most important items in the U.S.government, from the original Declaration of Independence to Jackie Kennedy'sbloody pink dress ... from Reagan's original "Evil Empire" speech to thetracking maps we used to catch and kill bin Laden. Over ten billion pagesstrong, we house and catalog every vital file, record, and report that'sproduced by the government.

As I always say, that means we're a building full of secrets—especiallyfor sitting Presidents, since we store everything from their grade school reportcards, to their yearbooks, to, the theory goes, old forgotten medical recordsthat might prove what President Wallace really did that night twenty-six yearsago.

"Have you thought about ordering his marathon files?" Tot asks.

"Already did. That's what came this morning."

For two months now, we've sifted through every puzzle piece of PresidentWallace's medical history, from back in college when he was in ROTC, to thephysical exam he took when his daughter was born and he bought his firstinsurance policy, to the X-rays that were taken back when he was just a governorand he ran the Marine Marathon despite having a hairline fracture in his foot.That fracture brought Wallace national attention as a politician who neverquits. We were hoping it'd bring us something even better. Yet like everymedical document related to the President, everything comes back empty, empty,empty.

"He can't hide it all, Beecher."

"Tell that to FDR's medical records," I reply. Tot doesn't argue. Back in 1945,forty-eight hours after Franklin Delano Roosevelt died, his medical records werestolen and destroyed. No one's found them since.

"So if Wallace's marathon X-rays were a bust, what's that?" Tot asks,pointing to the file folder that I'm still holding in my open palm.

"Just something I pulled from our Civil War records. A letter from AbrahamLincoln's son talking about his years in the White House." Tot knows that whenI'm nervous, I like to read old history. But he also knows that nothing makes memore nervous than the most complex history of all: family history.

"Your mom called while you were down there, didn't she?" Tot asks.

I nod. After my mom's heart surgery, I asked her to call me every morning to letme know she was okay. My father died when I was three. Mom is all I've got left.But as always, it wasn't my mom who called. It was my sister Sharon, who liveswith and takes care of her. Every two weeks, I send part of my check home, butit's Sharon who does the real work.

"Mom okay?" Tot asks.

"Same as always."

"Then it's time to focus on the problem you can actually deal with," Tot says,motioning toward the main door to our office and reminding me that whateverPresident Wallace is planning, that's where the real damage will be done. But aswe step inside and I spot two men in suits standing outside my cubicle, I'mstarting to think that the President's even further along than we thought.

"Beecher White?" the taller of the two asks, though the way his dark eyes lockon me, he has the answer. He's got a narrow face; his partner has a wide onethat he tries to offset with a neatly trimmed goatee. Neither looks happy. Orfriendly.

"That's me; I'm Beecher. And you are ...?" I ask, though neither of themanswers. As Tot limps and ducks into his own cubicle, I see that both myvisitors are wearing gold lapel pins with a familiar five-pointed star. SecretService.

I glance over at Tot, who smells the same rat I do.

"You mind answering a few questions?" the agent with the narrow face asks as heflashes his badge, which says Edward Harris. Before I can answer, he adds, "Youalways at work this early, Mr. White?"

I have no idea where the bear trap is, but I already feel its springstightening. Last time I saw President Wallace, I told him I'd do everything inmy power to find the evidence to prove what he and his dead friend Palmiottidid. In return, the most powerful man in the world leaned forward on his bigmahogany desk in the West Wing and told me, as if it were an absolute fact, thathe would personally erase me from existence. So when two Secret Service agentsare asking me questions before eight in the morning, I know that whatever theywant, I'm in for some pain.

"I like getting in at seven," I tell the agent, though from the look on his faceit isn't news to him. I make a quick mental note of every staffer and guarddownstairs who saw me hunting through presidential records and might've tippedthem off. "I didn't realize coming to work early was a problem."

"No problem," Agent Harris says evenly. "And what time do you usually get home?Specifically, what time did you get home last night?"

"Just past eight," I say. "If you don't believe me, ask Tot. He drove me homeand dropped me off." Still standing by the door with the priceless Robert ToddLincoln letter in my hands, I motion to Tot's cubicle.

"I appreciate that. Tot dropped you off. That means he doesn't know where youwere between eight last night and about six this morning, correct?" the agentwith the goatee asks, though it no longer sounds like a question.

It's the first time I notice that neither of these guys has the hand mics or earbuds that you see on the Secret Service agents around the President. These twodon't do protection. They're investigators. Still, the Service's mission is toprotect the President. In the Culper Ring, we protect the Presidency. It's not asmall distinction.

"Were you with anyone else last night, Beecher?" Agent Harris jumps in.

From his cubicle, Tot shoots me a look. The bear trap is about to snap shut.

"Do you always wear gloves at work?" Agent Harris adds, motioning to the whitecotton gloves.

"Only when I'm handling old documents," I say as I open the file folder and showthem the mottled brown Robert Todd Lincoln letter that's still in my open palms."If you don't mind ..."

They step away from my cubicle, but not by much.

As I squeeze inside and carefully place the Lincoln letter on my desk, I noticethe odd slant of my keyboard and how one of my piles of paper is slightly askew.They've already gone through my stuff.

"And do you take those gloves home with you?" Agent Harris asks.

"I'm sorry," I say, "but are you accusing me of something?"

They exchange glances.

"Beecher, do you know someone named Ozzie Andrews?" Agent Harris finally asks.

"Who?"

"Just tell me if you know him. Ozzie Andrews."

"With a name as silly as Ozzie, I'd remember if I knew him."

"So you never met him? Never heard the name?"

"What're you really asking?"

"They found a body," Agent Harris says. "A pastor in a church downtown was foundmurdered last night around 10 p.m. Throat slit."

"That's horrible."

"It is. Fortunately for us, just as the D.C. Police got there, they nabbed asuspect. Named Ozzie. He was strolling out the back of the church right afterthe murder. And when they went through Ozzie's pockets, this killer had yourname and phone number in his wallet."

"What? That's ridiculous."

"So you don't know anything about this murder?"

"Of course not!"

There's a long pause.

"Beecher, how would you describe your opinion of President Orson Wallace?" AgentHarris interrupts.

"Excuse me?"

"We're not asking your political views. It's just, with St. John's Church beingso close to the White House ... you understand. We need to ask."

I turn to Tot, who doesn't just smell the rat anymore; now we see it. Two monthsago, as the President buried his best friend, he swore he'd also bury me. Ithought it'd come in the middle of the night with a ski mask. But I forgot whoI'm dealing with. Tot said the President already had the bull's-eye on myforehead, then suddenly two Secret Service guys show up? This is Wallace's realrevenge: Tie me to a murder, send in the Service, and keep your manicured handsclean as they snap my mugshot.

"Where is this Ozzie guy now?" I ask. "I'd like to know who he is."

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize suspects get to make their own demands."

"So now I'm a suspect? Fine, then let me face my accuser. Is he still in jail?"

For the first time, both agents go silent.