The Devil's Breath Read Online Free PDF

underground layers of rocks … like a honeycomb of rocks. All those nooks and crannies contain fossil water. Water can be more precious than diamondsout there, and if your dad found any subterranean rivers or these deep deposits it could cause Mr. Chang a huge headache.”
    “Then that’s why Dad got his notes to you. If this Shaka Chang is as powerful as you say, then maybe he thought Dad might have sent something to me. That’s why they tried to kill me. That’s why someone searched my room.”
    Farentino shook his head. “It’s possible. But we have no idea what they could have been looking for. Do we?”
    “No,” Max said.
    Farentino looked at Max, probing his eyes with his own. “Max, did your father leave any kind of clue, any message, anything at all to tell you what he found out there? Anything?”
    Max scanned the information in his brain. If he had doubts or suspicions, or if there was anything he had not yet uncovered, then he should tell Farentino. So why didn’t he? Something told him to keep his thoughts to himself. Trust no one. Not even Farentino? No one. Not yet.
    Max almost squirmed at his complete lack of trust, but these were extraordinary circumstances. “Angelo, Dad might still be alive. And if there’s a chance of that, then I’m going to help find him.”
    Farentino raised his eyes in silent prayer. “Yes, I was afraid of that.”
    Max shuffled the pictures of Shaka Chang. One of them slid out from under the others. It was an aerial photo of a fort in the wilderness in what looked to be Africa. Behind the fort was a massive lake or swamp. The boulder-strewn ground to the front was softened by an open plain. Thewhole place seemed formidable—well, that made sense, it was a fort, after all.
    Farentino fingered the photograph. “That is Shaka Chang’s headquarters in Africa. He has private accommodations there. That line you can see in the desert is an airstrip; the river and lake are crocodile-infested. No one goes in, or comes out for that matter, unless Shaka Chang says so.”
    Max felt a sense of evil about the place. “It looks really menacing.”
    “Yes. Namibia used to be called German South-West Africa. It was their territory. The fort was built before the First World War.”
    “Does it have a name?” Max asked.
    Farentino went quiet for a moment. There were stories about that place that chilled the blood. “They call it Skeleton Rock,” he answered quietly.
    Max watched Farentino’s face for a moment. It was as if his eyes were the portals to his secret thoughts. Max’s intuition was correct. The man was nodding, almost imperceptibly, to himself. He had reached a decision.
    “Max. There are matters I must discuss with you. There are things you should know about your father.”
    An hour later, heavy with the burden of what he had just learned, Max used the credit card that his father had promised was secure to book a flight. There was a direct flight by Air Namibia from Gatwick, but if the people following him expected him to try to reach his father, theywould be watching that flight. Finally Max had one last favor to ask of Farentino, and it was not going to be an easy one, but his father’s friend pulled it off in record time.
    They drove to the airport as darkness was falling. Max sat quietly. There were no more questions to be asked. Farentino had explained his mother’s death and passed on the burden of secrecy that surrounded his father’s work. It made Max even more determined to find his father.
    Max promised Farentino that he would stay in touch as best he could, but warned him that any information he sent would be through a third party and would carry a webmaster’s name— Magician .
    Farentino berated himself loudly for letting Max out of his safekeeping. His only consolation was Max’s assurance that he’d have gone anyway; at least this way Farentino knew about it and would be in London whenever Max needed help.
    At Heathrow’s Terminal 3 Farentino