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“A rare element called byzanium”

“Never heard of it”

“It’s radioactive, like radium, once it’s refined out of its natural ore Only a thih to run any real tests, but enough to leave scientists speculating about its potential”

Bell h Polish by birth, worked in Paris alongside her husband and was the world’s foremost authority on radium He asked, “Valuable?”

“To call it the most precious substance on the planet is probably not an understateed at 2067 An ounce of byzanium is estimated at about one-point-four million”

“Dollars?”

“Dollars” Patmore paused when Bell whistled his shock “And Joshua Hayes Brewster found the o to take a position with the Société des Mines de Lorraine, working under contract for the Tsar of Russia to open a lead o last July, he was returning to the city of Archangel on the north coast of Siberia aboard a coastal stearound on the upper island of Novaya Zemlya

“They were stuck on that hellhole for athat time, Brewster did what prospectors always do in a new place—he crisscrossed the island looking for interesting ht his attention, so he took soed to turn over any and all geologic specimens There were others from the Société aboard the stea, so he ot as their due However, just like any good prospector, Brewster saved one for himself

“Back in the States, fully twothe Taimyr Peninsula, he contacted the US director of the Société to see what had happened to the minerals he’d found on Novaya Zemlya He was told the samples orthless and had been tossed out”

“He didn’t believe them, did he?” Bell asked

“Not for a second He trusted his instincts He gave the saist there, as well as another with the Natural History Museuured out the sa on a find worth half a billion dollars”

“Do the French knohere it was?”

“No Brewster never told them What he did do is tell an old friend at the War Department”

“You?”

“My boss in Arive them the money tofunds would announce to the world that there was so valuable on a desolate Russian island This had to be hush-hush, and it had to be the French who bankrolled the expedition By this point, the Société had sent teams back to Novaya Zemlya, with no luck If they wanted a piece of the action, they needed Brewster