Blood Pact (McGarvey) (32 page)

Al-Rashid held his silence. The woman was worked up.

“In fact the contents of that ship belonged to Spain, if for nothing else than its historical value. Yet we got nothing.”

“Except for the cannon.”

“You came looking for answers.”

“Yes,” al-Rashid said. “Petain told me that the diary had been stolen but that it would be of no use to anyone because it was in code.”

Dr. Vergilio was suddenly very interested though she tried to hide it. “Did you find the diary?”

“After I learned of Petain’s death, I backed off. But when his wife and child were murdered my curiosity began to get the better of me. So I came here to find out if you could tell me anything about the diary or about its code. I thought that perhaps with my investigative journalism background and your archaeological resources here at the Archives we might make a good partnership.”

“And you would share the treasure with Spain?”

“Urban legend,” al-Rashid reminded her. “In fact I’m not a treasure hunter, I’m looking for a good story to tell.”

“I’m sorry that you came all this way, Señor Harris,” Dr. Vergilio said, getting to her feet. “There were journals from many Spanish military expeditions to the New World, of course. Most of them are here in the Archives. But none of them were ever written in a cipher or any sort—most of them were written in Spanish, and some written by priests or monks in Latin. Of those many of the originals are in the Vatican’s library.”

Al-Rashid remained seated. “I’m sure that what I have come looking for is in the Vatican’s archives, but those collections are closed to someone like me. From what I understand a priest managed to join an expedition to New Mexico, and the diary he kept—in code—was stolen by the Voltaires before he could return to Rome.”

“And you came to tell me that it was stolen from the Voltaires?”

“Yes.”

Dr. Vergilio held out her hand. “Give me your passport.”

Al-Rashid handed it over, and the woman went to the door and gave it to the tour guide. “Find out who this man is, please, before you return to your group,” she said, and she came back to her desk. “Are you an intelligence officer with New Scotland Yard or MI6?”

“Just a writer onto what I think might become a good story. Murders, intrigue between the Vatican, the Spanish government, almost certainly the U.S. government, and some sort of secret society that I’m assuming was either began by or at least named after the philosopher Voltaire.” Al-Rashid shrugged depreciatingly. “And throw in a secret diary written in a mysterious code and an ancient treasure buried somewhere, and I can’t miss.”

“The treasure is a myth.”

“One that someone is willing to kill for.”

“People have been killed for a lot less.”

The tour guide was back in under a minute. “One hundred twenty thousand hits on Google,” she said, handing the passport back to al-Rashid. “Mr. Harris shows up on the third page in a Wikipedia article, which describes him as a minor British novelist, six books to his credit, most notably one published three years ago under the title
Trouble in Paradise
. Formerly a journalist with the BBC, and before that with Reuters. Oxford. Parents deceased, no wife or children.”

“Thanks, Louisa, but no more strays, please.”

“I’ll try.”

When the young woman was gone, Dr. Vergilio gave al-Rashid an appraising look. Her attitude had changed. “You have my attention, Señor Harris, what exactly is it that you want?”

“The diary, for starts.”

“I haven’t the faintest idea where it is.”

“Petain told me that it had been in a bank vault in Bern. He suggested that I start there.”

“And did you?”

“No, I wanted to talk to you first. If the diary is in a code, I suspect that the cipher may be somewhere here, but hidden.”

“It’s not here, I’ve already told you.”

Al-Rashid suppressed a smile. She believed enough in the treasure stories and the diary that she had already searched the archives. “Maybe it’s in some of the documents from that military expedition. Could be in plain sight, unrecognizable for what it was without the diary in hand.”

“Or it could be in the Vatican’s archives, which is more likely.”

Al-Rashid shrugged. “In which case I’d have to try Rome. But for now I’m betting that if I can come up with the diary, we’ll find the cipher key here.”

Dr. Vergilio’s eyes widened. “Do you already have it?” She was excited.

“No. But I have the name of a man in Bern. I think he might be a good lead, but as I said I wanted to come here first to see if we could make a deal. You and I working together.” He laughed. “You can have the gold—I’d take a finder’s fee—but what I’m after is the story.”

Dr. Vergilio laughed too. “I don’t believe a word you’ve said, but in actuality I have nothing to lose. Bring the diary here, and we’ll see if we can find the cipher key if one exists.”

FIFTY-NINE

As soon as the Gulfstream had taken off from Washington National Airport and reached its cruising altitude of thirty-five thousand feet above the Atlantic, Otto powered up his laptop and connected via a National Reconnaissance Office satellite to his mainframe at the CIA. He’d worked through the night and when McGarvey woke from a couple of hours of sleep he was grinning.

“I think I came up with a lead on the guy who may have swiped the diary from the bank in Bern, and then did his thing in Paris just a few days ago. But it gets even better, and you’re not going to believe how.”

The attendant brought McGarvey a cup of coffee. “I’m told that you wanted a little brandy in it, sir,” she said.

“You needed a pick-me-up,” Otto said after the attendant went forward. “This guy—if it’s our man—goes by the name of Bernard Montessier and lives somewhere in Marseilles. He runs a small international legal affairs consulting firm with only a secretary.”

“How in the hell did you come up with that?”

“Tedious but simple. It’s what my little darlings back home are so good at,” Otto said.

His little darlings, as he called them, were his specially designed search engines that piggybacked on thousands of computers—most of them government or university mainframes—without leaving any traces. Multiplexing to vastly increase the speed and scope of his search algorithms, he could scan millions of terabytes per second of information, from nearly an unlimited number of sources simultaneously.

“I looked at everyone who had traveled by air or train to Bern in the past two weeks, and compared those names with arrivals by air or train to Paris over the same period. I also took a look at rental car records on the off chance that he might have landed elsewhere and driven across borders.”

“And you came up with Montessier?”

“Actually I came up with a hundred twenty-seven names, half of which I dumped because of their ages. But then I went looking for little anomalies. The odd bits that seemed not to fit any sort of a pattern.”

“And?”

“Bernard Montessier. You’ll never guess where this guy has been during that time, and going back three years—all I could come up with in only a few hours. Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. All the dates match. He flies from Marsellies to Jeddah, then from there to Bern, and from there back to Marseilles and then Jeddah again, and to Paris just three days ago.”

“Any background?”

“No. Wherever he lands no one by that name shows up in any hotel registries—at least not at the bigger hotels where he would most likely stay. When he travels it’s always first class.”

“He’s either staying with someone in those cities, or he’s using a work name,” McGarvey said.

“But there’s the kicker. After Paris he showed up yesterday in Seville. Now there’s no way in hell that can be a coincidence. Bern for the diary, Paris for the Voltaires, and Seville for the archives.”

“He got the diary and now he’s looking for the cipher key.”

“Bingo. But in the meantime he runs home to Mama in Jeddah for orders.”

“Does the Company have any assets on the ground there? Someone who might have heard something? Maybe mention of someone flitting in and out? Meeting with someone?”

“Operators like that, if Montessier is our guy, don’t come cheap. So whoever he’s working for in Jeddah most likely belongs to the Royal family. I can check our NOC list.”

“See what you can find without alerting Marty,” McGarvey said. “I’m going to warn María to watch her step in case you’re right about Montessier.”

“I have a passport photo you can send to her, if she’s not already in the air.”

María had been set to leave for Seville about this time to meet with Dr. Vergilio to pave the way before McGarvey went to talk to her. There was no telling what his reception would be, especially if the CNI got wind that he was in the country.

He tried her cell phone but it was only accepting voice mail, so he called Louise, who answered on the fourth ring.

“Are you guys in Malta yet?” she asked.

“About an hour out,” McGarvey told her. “Has our guest already left?”

“Dropped her off at the airport a couple of hours ago, but I waited to make sure she got through security okay.”

She was traveling under her DI work name of Ines Delgado. Otto had checked before they left, and had found no flags on her Spanish passport.

“I tried to reach her cell phone, but she must have turned it off.”

“Trouble?”

“Possibly. Call the airport in Madrid and have her paged. Tell her to call you. I’m sending you the passport photo of Bernard Montessier, who Otto thinks might be the guy who swiped the diary from Bern, and who might have been involved with the murders in Paris. He showed up in Seville yesterday.”

“Peachy,” Louise said. “Bern, Paris, and now Seville. Can’t be a coincidence.”

“No.”

“Send me the picture. If she doesn’t answer the page she’ll turn her phone back on sooner or later. Maybe once she gets through customs in Madrid.”

“Where is she staying in Madrid?”

“She wouldn’t tell me.”

“You’ve done your part, Louise. Now it’s time for you to hunker down, maybe go down to the Farm to be with Audie.”

“Here in town Marty doesn’t know how to get to me. I’m going to stay put in case someone else interesting happens to show up.”

“Watch yourself.”

“Take care of Otto for me,” she said.

“Will do,” McGarvey said. “I’m sending you the photo.”

When it went through he broke the connection and looked up. The attendant was at the head of the aisle, looking at him. She was smiling pleasantly.

“Would you like another cup of coffee, sir? Or perhaps something to eat?”

“How soon to Malta?”

“Fifty-five minutes.”

“I’ll wait.”

Otto turned his computer around so that McGarvey could see the screen. A photo of a large, hulking man with long curly hair and a thick salt-and-pepper beard filled half the screen, while the other half displayed details about his background. At the present he was the only NOC in Jeddah—most of the others were in Riyadh. He was posing as an engineer for the Swedish firm Andresen Pumps, specializing in “fluid solutions for oil and water.” His name was Bren Halberstrom, and he’d been in place for six years.

“Do we have contact information?”

“Yeah, but it could be dicey for him if someone is paying attention, which is a real possibility. The Saudi intel people are pretty good.”

McGarvey didn’t want to put the man’s life at risk for no good reason, yet people had died. “Anything in his file about recalling him?”

“He’s made three requests in the last eighteen months to call it quits.”

“It’s time for Mr. Halberstrom to come home,” McGarvey said, and he dialed the man’s sat phone number.

SIXTY

Al-Rashid sat drinking coffee and reading the English language
International Herald-Tribune
at a small sidewalk café just up the street from the Alcazar fortress and within sight of the Archives. He was dressed in an open collar white polo shirt, jeans, and a black blazer.

Last night the streets downtown had been filled with a mob of people angry about Spain’s latest austerity measures. The riot police had come in and beaten back the crowd with batons and tear gas, and the people had fought back with Molotov cocktails, bricks, and in at least two instances with guns. The story, along with similar protests in Greece, had made the front page because two police officers and four protesters had been seriously hurt. Dozens of others had been arrested.

This morning the area still smelled like gasoline and the sharper, irritating odor of phenacyl chloride, the major component in the tear gas the police used last night. Workmen were still on the streets cleaning up debris, and others were installing window glass, though many merchants had decided to board up their windows. The
Tribune
was reporting that further rioting was likely in the coming days.

A sharp unease had settled over the city, and this morning even the desk clerks at the upscale Gran Melia Colon hotel seemed gloomy though they tried to hide it.

“Are you checking out, Señor Harris?”

“Not at all. I’ve worked in Baghdad, Kabul, and Tripoli, so I understand violence. But last night the crowd was foolish.”

“But then it is a matter of money. Pardon me, but it is the common family man who has the most to lose, and he does not understand the government’s claim that we are a nearly bankrupt nation, despite our palaces and museums and—”

“History?” al-Rashid suggested. He didn’t know why he was going on with the silly man because he’d always found stupidity to be boring.

“Precision!”

“Actually I’ve come to rent a car for the next several days. Will you arrange it?”

“Certainly. Do you have a model in mind?”

“Maybe a little sports car. Something fast. I’m going out in the country to see the sights.”

“It will be here within the hour. I’ll just need to see your driving license and passport, of course.”

Al-Rashid handed them over, and after an excellent breakfast of croissants and cheese, he’d picked up the dark blue BMW Z4 convertible in front, and had driven back to the Centro area downtown where he’d gotten lucky with a parking spot just around the corner from the Archives.