The Last Patriot

“With triple-sash and floor-to-ceiling windows, as well as a sixteen-foot-long skylight in the center of the house, every space was flooded with light. And though the idea was to create a simple, informal country retreat, the entire home, right down to its kitchen, was a state of the art masterpiece.”

The fact that Poplar Forest was closed on Mondays wouldn’t have stopped Harvath from finding a way to get inside, but Susan Ferguson had called Poplar Forest’s director, Jonathan Moss, who agreed to drive over from Roanoke and meet the men there.

Turning right off Bateman Bridge Road at the entrance of Poplar Forest, Harvath followed the long driveway for a mile before it ended near the front of the house. Theirs was the only vehicle there.

“Looks like we’re here first,” stated Nichols. “Should we take a look around?”

The three men climbed out of the SUV, briefly stretched, and then began walking. As they circled the main house and the newly reconstructed service wing, the professor shared the handful of additional modern details he knew about Poplar Forest. In particular, he described how it had been rapidly degrading until 1983, when a nonprofit corporation was formed to buy it and the surrounding five hundred acres. Over the next twenty-five years the corporation painstakingly researched and restored the estate to its original condition.

After fifteen minutes of sightseeing, they heard a car door slam shut. Poplar Forest’s director had arrived. With Nichols and Ozbek right behind him, Harvath turned and headed back to where they had parked.

Jonathan Moss was the skinniest person Harvath had ever seen. Standing about five-foot-eleven, with dark hair and a pronounced Adams apple, the man looked to be about fifty and reminded Harvath of Washington Irving’s Ichabod Crane.

Moss gathered packets of information from the trunk of his car, slammed the lid, and walked up to the north portico where Anthony Nichols introduced himself and facilitated the rest of the introductions.

After shaking hands, Moss passed a packet of Poplar Forest information to each of his visitors. “I hope your trip doesn’t turn out to be a waste of time,” he remarked as he led the men toward the pine front doors, which had been painted to replicate the color and grain of mahogany, just as in Jefferson’s day. “As I understand was explained to you, much of the house was destroyed by fire in the 1800s. I think we’ve done an exceptional restoration job, but I don’t know how much help that is going to be to you. All of the original woodwork was burned, including the mantelpieces.”

Moss opened the doors and once everyone was inside, he had his guests follow him down the narrow entry corridor to the dining room at the center of the house.

Harvath looked up at the light slicing through the pitched glass panes of the skylight. The entablature depicted bucrania and a variety of human faces, but didn’t look like their architectural renderings.

The professor produced the documents and set them on the table for Moss to study. As he did, Nichols ran through the same questions they had addressed with Susan Ferguson back at Monticello.

“I don’t know what to tell you about the gears,” said Moss. “We have a few mechanical items here that Jefferson designed such as the polygraph for making copies of the letters he wrote, but nothing with an extensive gear system like this.”

“Any Islamic instruments like clocks or other mechanical items from the Arab world?” asked Nichols.

The director shook his head. “Nope.”

Moss continued to answer in the negative on questions about Lieutenant O’Bannon, al-Jazari, and anything having to do with the First Barbary War.

Just as Paul Gilbertson, the docent from Monticello had done, Moss suggested that there could be some answer in Jefferson’s voluminous correspondence of more than twenty thousand letters written during his lifetime.

Nichols had already wrung Jefferson’s correspondence dry. He also had access to items Moss had never and would never see. If there was an answer to be found, it was here. It had to be. “What about the architectural sketches?”

Moss positioned the page in front of himself and after studying it a moment stated, “Susan said one of her docents believed this was a schematic for part of a fireplace mantel, correct?”

“Correct.”

“During our restoration, we restored fourteen of the fifteen brick fireplaces themselves.”

“Why not the fifteenth?”

“It was the only one that didn’t need it.”

“Where is it?” asked Harvath.

Moss held up the Jefferson architectural drawing and replied. “In the same room whose entablature depicted ox skulls and the Roman goddess of wisdom and learning, Minerva.” Pointing to the door in front of them, he said, “The parlor.”

CHAPTER 81

As Moss led them into the space that had served as Jefferson’s parlor, as well as his library and study, the first thing Harvath noticed were the ox skulls and depictions of Minerva around the edge of the ceiling.