“Maybe,” Quentin said. “Or maybe whoever hid it didn’t have to worry about keeping it out of reach like at those other places.”
“Right,” Kate said. “Because the polar bears would eat anyone looking for it. I did mention the part about them being outside all night, right?”
“I found this one old postcard of the exhibit,” Lewis said. He brought up a rough black-and-white drawing on his laptop, then switched back and forth between the drawing and a modern photograph. “The drawing is from the 1890s, and I don’t see a waterfall here. It was definitely added later, so it’s possible that this was the gift added to the exhibit.”
“It’s a place to start,” Nick said. “Let’s see that map of the whole zoo.”
Jake spread out a map of the zoo on the desk.
“There’s a service entrance down here on the southern gate,” Nick said. “It’s the most wooded section of the zoo. Working our way north, there’s a large tree about fifty yards west of the polar bears, next to the zebra pen. Someone can climb that tree and watch out for any security doing their overnight rounds.”
“Jake’s the best climber,” Quentin said. “He should take that lookout.”
“And I’ll go into the exhibit with Quentin,” Kate said.
“Let’s make one thing clear,” Jake said. “I am not going to be the man sitting in a tree, watching his daughter get mauled by a polar bear.”
“I’ll go,” Nick said. “It’ll be a good chance for some more quality father-and-son time.”
“Being eaten together,” Quentin said. “I think that qualifies.”
“If Jake is in this tree to the west,” Nick said, “Kate can be our eyes on the east side.” He pointed to the reptile house. “There has to be a way onto the roof.”
Jake nodded. “We’ll have our comms on, like last time. As far as the rules of engagement go—”
“They’ll be the same,” Nick said. “No innocents hurt. Period. That includes people and polar bears.”
“We’re still close to a new moon tonight. No sense waiting.”
Everyone in the room nodded. Nobody said another word, because there was nothing else left to say. As soon as the sun went down and the zoo was empty, Nick Fox and his father had a date with the polar bears.
* * *
After dinner, Jake slipped away from the group and went outside to hail a taxi. Kate caught up with him and asked him where he was going.
“Nick and Quentin need to save their energy for tonight,” Jake said. “I’m going out to get some more supplies.”
“I’m coming with you,” she said.
Jake asked the driver to take them to the nearest gun store. They ended up in a shop in Kagraner Platz, a modest little place by American gun shop standards. It carried mostly hunting equipment, some decent rifles but not many handguns.
“We can’t buy guns here,” Kate said. “We’re not citizens.”
“I know,” Jake said as he picked up two canisters of pepper spray. “But if they need a few extra seconds, these might help.”
He took the canisters to the counter. “Do you have anything bigger?”
The man at the register had his glasses hanging from his neck, halfway down his ugly sweater vest. He put on the glasses and looked Jake and Kate up and down like they’d just landed a spaceship and walked into his store.
“I do not speak English,” the man said, in perfect English.
“Just these two, then,” Jake said, sliding the canisters toward him. He counted out the right number of euro coins and plunked them on the glass.
The man shook his head. “I cannot sell to you.”
“I’m pretty sure you can, friend.” Jake dropped a few more euros on the glass.
“Nein.”
“Ja.” A few more euros.
“Nein!”
Jake emptied his pockets and put every euro he was carrying on the glass. “Do you want my daughter here to post a bad Yelp review?”
The man brushed the euros into his hand, opened up his till, and threw them inside. “Good day,” he said.
“And good day to you,” Jake said, taking the two canisters and walking out the door.
The man kept scowling as he came around the counter to help another customer. But the other customer was a young man with so many tattoos, you could barely make out the red star on his neck, and he had just taken a picture of Jake and Kate with his phone. He waved the shop owner away, went outside to watch the taxi pull out into traffic, and started texting on his phone.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Just after midnight, Nick, Kate, Quentin, and Jake approached the southern wall of the zoo. There was a large gate for service vehicles to pass through. Quentin quickly worked the padlock, snapped it open, quietly removed the chain, and pushed one side of the gate slightly open.
After they had all passed through the gate, Quentin replaced the chain and padlock, but left the shackle unlatched. They moved through the mini-farm, with all of the animals tucked away for the night, passed under a canopy of trees, and crossed over a bridge. Some of the zoo’s pathway lights were on, most off. Just enough for the night security to do their rounds.
Kate veered to the east, toward the reptile house. Jake went west to find the tall tree near the penguins. Nick and Quentin stayed huddled behind the bat house for the moment. They would make their next move after receiving the all-clear from Kate and Jake.
Jake reached the tree and looked in all directions. There was nothing to hear but the faint white noise from the waterfall in the polar bear exhibit. No living things, animal or human, were moving. He put on his gloves and shimmied up the tree to the first large branch. The climbing was monkey-easy the rest of the way to the top. He settled in, checking every point on the compass.
“In position,” he said into his comm. “All clear.”
Kate was behind the reptile house, where she found a dumpster from which she could reach just high enough to grab hold of the gutter. She pulled herself all the way up and moved across the roof to the front.
“In position,” she said. “All clear on this side.”
Nick gave his father a quick nod, and then they were in motion.
“There they are,” Nick whispered as they approached the polar bear exhibit. A mound of gray-white fur lay motionless on the lower level of rocks. “I’m sure Baby Bear is tucked in there with Mamma.”
“Maybe they’ll both stay asleep,” Quentin said.
“Here’s hoping. You know any polar bear lullabies?”
“Looks like we’re going in from the top,” Quentin said, nodding to the upper platform.
“We’ll go down those steps,” Jake said, indicating the rough stairway carved into the rocks. “Stay to the right, approach that waterfall from the opposite side.”
The two men went around to find the rear access door to the exhibit. A set of metal stairs ran up the back of the rocks, protected by a cage with a roof. Nick worked the lock and had it open within a minute. They pushed the door open and climbed the stairs to the upper platform. They both rolled themselves over the railing, dropping the few feet to the upper rocks. They were now officially in polar bear territory.