Golden Relic (31 page)

"I'm so pleased you could make it," Maggie smiled. "Herc, this is my dear friend Pavel Mercier,
Pavel this is my new dear friend Hercules Rivers."

Sam lost control of the trolley as Pavel and Rivers shook hands, as men absolutely have to do
right then and there on the spot, across her and the luggage. "Can we do the male bonding thing
outside, please?" she asked, picking up the bag that had fallen off.

"Pavel Mercier?" Rivers said, once they got out into the carpark and he had stopped grinning like
an idiot at Maggie. "But I thought you were…"

"Dead? Not any more my boy," Pavel said. "I got bored, so I decided to visit a few friends."

"It's a long story," Sam said. "What's been happening here?"

"Not a lot actually," Rivers said, opening the back of his hatchback car and packing the bags
in.

"Prescott has been in a completely deranged state ever since you left. Rigby put me in charge,
thank you very much, of keeping the assistant director informed so that he wouldn't go off the rails
and call an international press conference to deny his own rumours of a sabotage plot." Rivers held
the front passenger door open for Maggie, and let Sam and Pavel fend for themselves in the back.

"Rigby in the meantime," he continued, "is gathering his evidence against Haddon Gould, who is
still his number one suspect, and Peter Gilchrist who is running a close second. Although the fact
the Andrew Barstoc disappeared for three days, and Enrico Vasquez just up and left the country threw
a serious spanner in his works. He now thinks you might be right about one or both of them being up
to something, but he's pressing on with Gould and Gilchrist anyway.

"That's all I know really," he said, pulling out of the parking spot and heading for the exit.
"I've actually been on sick leave for two days," he added, lifting his fringe to show Maggie the
wound on his head.

"Good heavens, what happened?" she asked.

"I had an altercation with a drunk who used my head to see how strong his pool cue was. My head
was stronger," Rivers laughed, "but it bled a lot more than his broken stick."

"If you're not on duty Rivers, perhaps you could drop me off at Jack's office," Sam suggested,
"and then take Maggie and Pavel, oh and my stuff I suppose, to their hotel."

"Well, well, well, if it isn't the world traveller home again, home again," Jack
boomed as Sam approached his office 40 minutes later. "So how was Egypt?"

"Egypt was just fine, Jack," Sam said dropping into the chair opposite his. "Peru was pretty good
too," she added.

"Peru," Jack repeated. "I see. No I don't. Let me guess, you found another cryptic note."

"Not so cryptic," Sam said. She pulled out the photo of Manco City 1962 and placed it on the
desk. "We found out why Professor Marsden was murdered, and why nearly everyone else in that
photograph has also met an unpleasant end in the last two years."

Rigby stared at the photo then eyed Sam warily. "I suppose you're going to tell me a story that
involves a mysterious relic and probably a curse of some kind," he said.

Sam raised her eyebrows in surprise.

"Oh god, you are aren't you?" Rigby said.

"What on earth made you say that?" Sam asked.

"This photo. It looks like a still from an Indiana Jones movie."

"Well, it's funny you should say that Jack, because…"

"Before you go telling me any bizarre fairytales, Sam, there's something you should know."

"What?"

"I've arrested someone for the murder of Professor Marsden."

"Who?"

"Haddon Gould. He confessed this morning. We've got him locked up downstairs." Rigby leant back
in his chair and smiled at Sam. "Reality is such a bitch, isn't it?"

For a man who had just confessed to and been arrested for murder, Haddon Gould
didn't look in the least bit guilty, or self-righteous, or worried about the consequences. In fact,
if anything, he looked like he'd just been paid a great compliment and was trying very hard not to
show how pleased he was.

Sam couldn't work out whether Gould was a cold-hearted bastard, a sociopath or just plain mad.
She watched him run his hand through his blonde hair and adjust the collar of his shirt. There was
no nervous tension in either gesture; the man was simply making sure he was presentable.

In Sam's experience most people, even witnesses and certainly suspects - whether guilty or
not - displayed a discernible and understandable amount of fear, trepidation or bravado when
facing two Homicide detectives across an official interview table. But not Haddon Gould.

There is something seriously wrong with this picture, Sam thought. She pressed the pause button
and rewound the interview tape. If Gould was a murderer, he was the strangest one Sam had ever come
across. He hadn't given even the slightest hint of an 'uh-oh I've been sprung, I'd better come
clean'. He had simply and calmly admitted to the murder of Professor Marsden.

"So, now what do you think?" Rigby asked from the doorway.

Sam pressed the pause button again. "I think you'll be laughed out of court, if it gets that
far."

"What's with you Sam? The man confessed."

Sam shrugged. "I think he was improvising," she said, pressing the play button.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"He didn't tell you anything, Jack. He just agreed with you," Sam said. "You watch his face."

"You really think I murdered Lloyd, don't you?" Gould gave a fascinated smile, as if the fact
that the police seriously regarded him as a suspect was an idea that appealed to him. He shifted
slightly in his seat and then lifted his shoulders. "Okay, I admit I did strike Lloyd."

"You hit him in the face?" Rigby asked, obviously taken aback by the sudden admission.

"Yes, I hit him in the face."

"And in the throat?" Rigby prompted.

"Probably," Gould said. "Heat of the moment, you know, I don't remember the specifics."

"But the poison wasn't heat of the moment, was it?"

"The poison," Gould repeated. He blinked several times but otherwise did not move a muscle. "The
poison was poetic justice," he said and smiled. "I think I would like a lawyer now please."

"It still sounds like a confession to me, Sam," Rigby stated.

"Jack, prior to this part of the interview you did not mention that Marsden had been struck or
poisoned. Now, most people - not that I think Gould fits into that category at all - but
most people would say 'yes I hit him, or I slapped or punched him' but Gould used my words from our
initial interview. I asked him, and I quote, 'did you strike the Professor?' Can you see what I'm
getting at here, Jack?"

"No, Sam, I can't."

"You fed him the lines, Jack. You said 'you hit him in the face', he agreed; you said 'and in the
throat', he agreed. But when you mentioned the poison, he repeated your words, as if it was a
question, took a second to process the information and then called it 'poetic justice'. What the
hell does that mean?"

"I don't know," Jack admitted. "You expect a sensible answer? The guy's obviously a loon."

"He is that," Sam agreed. "There was no fear, no remorse, no sense that he'd been caught out. The
man was flattered, Jack. Flattered that you thought he might have done what he's probably always
wanted to do. But I bet you a year's salary that he didn't."

"You're on," Rigby stated. "We've got motive, a confession and the ring we found in his
office."

"Which anyone could have planted," Sam said. "When is his lawyer expected?"

"Not until tomorrow morning, unfortunately. He was in Adelaide."

"May I sit in on the second interview?"

Rigby scowled at her. "I suppose. Yeah, why not. It might be interesting."

Maggie Tremaine laughed until she had tears running down her face. "You have got to
be kidding."

"That's pretty much what I said," Sam smiled. "Realistically, however, Jack can't ignore the
confession or the fact that the murder weapon was found in Gould's office."

Maggie shook her head. "Haddon is not a devious man, Sam. He's more your brawling, knock 'em down
and sit on 'em sort of bloke. His imagination only works when it's in paranoid mode and I doubt it
could have come up with the idea of using a poison ring to kill Lloyd. But if he killed him, he
wouldn't have left the weapon in his own office. Haddon might be a nutter but even he is not that
stupid."

"He seemed quite taken by the idea that he was the prime suspect. But why would he confess?"

"Maybe he's scoring one last point against Lloyd by helping the real murderer escape
justice."

"By going to jail himself?"

Maggie shrugged. "But he's not likely to is he? And he does so love to be the centre of
attention. We should talk to his wife Anna to see if we can find out why he hated Lloyd so
much."

The door to Maggie's suite opened just enough to allow Pavel to slip inside. He was still wearing
his Panama hat and a version of his happy tourist clothes but the man himself looked miserable.

"Terrible news. A whisky please, dear Maggie." He slumped onto the couch. "I have just spoken to
a friend in San Francisco who told me Barbara Stone died from a stroke in June of last year."

"Bloody hell," said Sam.

Maggie downed Pavel's whisky herself and then poured three glasses and handed them out.

Pavel waved his glass under his nose and inhaled deeply. "This is not fair. Poor Barbara, she
never had much happiness in her life. But my friend said she'd just started a new business in Venice
Beach, one of those New Age shops, and she had fallen in love. She was happy, and then this bastard
that we are hunting kills her. And for what? For gold? I will make him pay when we catch him."

Sam knew it was pointless to comment on Pavel's last statement so she decided to change the
subject. "I called into my office after I'd seen Jack and asked my partner Ben to do a background
check on Enrico Vasquez who, by the way, allegedly returned to Peru to visit his poor sick mother.

"Ben has also been running the surveillance on Barstoc, and he said that during the three days
that our friend Andy 'disappeared' he was in Sydney doing business with a couple of antique dealers.
These 'business associates' apparently just scrape through on the right side of legitimate but only,
Ben says, because nothing has ever been proven against them."

"What sort of antiques?" Maggie asked.

"I don't know. I didn't think to ask," Sam said, checking her watch. It was 5.30 pm. "I intend to
interview Barstoc again tomorrow, however, so I'll add that question to my list, right under the one
about why he was pretending to be a crime fiction buff in Cairo."

"Phineas, ever the show pony, is throwing a pre-Conference party in the hotel from eight
tonight," Maggie said, raising her eyebrows. "Why not join me and get Barstoc in a corner
somewhere?"

"Good idea," Sam said. "Speaking of the Conference, I also spoke to Prescott and asked him to
check for any late registrations. It seems news of the mysterious Henri Schliemann's discovery may
have resulted in as many as 15 last-minute delegates - including one Pablo Escobar."

"I knew
he
wouldn't be able to resist," Maggie smiled. "I think he lost his purpose in
life when the Tahuantinsuyu Bracelet was stolen in Paris. When he sees the Hand he'll have a whole
new cause."

"If he doesn't already know all about it," Sam reminded her. "Your friend Louis Ducruet is also
on the list," Sam said, pulling a piece of paper from her jacket pocket and handing it to
Maggie.

"Yes, I have spoken with Louis," Pavel said. "He went home to Montreal from Istanbul to collect
the middle finger, and he arrives here tonight. He will come straight to my room where we will
rehearse our little performance for the official welcoming reception tomorrow night."

"Did you ask if he'd been approached by someone from the Life and Death show or by anyone else
about the Hand?" Sam asked.

"I did. And he said no, not that he was aware of."

"I've been thinking about the show's itinerary," Sam said. "It started in New York, then headed
west to San Francisco, north to Anchorage and east to London, bypassing Montreal all together.
Wouldn't it have been economically sensible to do Montreal after New York, seeing it's just over the
border, rather than after New Zealand at the very end of the tour?"

"Montreal may not have been able to host the exhibition at that time," Maggie explained.

"It is more likely that the tour date had to coincide with Louis being in Montreal," Pavel said.
"He has been working in Turkey since mid 1996. But it was common knowledge even then that he was
taking a permanent University post in Montreal when Dan Geiger retires at the end of this year."

"Well," Sam announced, getting to her feet. "I'm going home to shower and change into something
that hasn't been squashed into a backpack for two weeks. I will meet you here at 7.45."

"Good idea," Maggie said. "But Sam, whatever you do, don't get tempted to have a quick nap to
combat the jetlag. I did that once and didn't wake up for two days."

Two hours later, semi-refreshed but fighting an overwhelming tiredness, Sam was
taking the lift back up to Maggie's suite when her mobile rang.

"Hey, Sammy," Ben Muldoon said.

"Hey yourself. By the way, I didn't want to mention this in the office earlier Ben, but I have to
say that you were looking positively radiant, which happens to be an adjective I never thought could
be applied to a guy, especially you."

"Please don't make fun of me, Sam," Ben requested.

"I'm not Ben. I'm very happy that you're happy. You are still happy, I gather."

"Oh I am. I am," he laughed. "We'll all have dinner soon, okay? But I'm in a rush right now, so
let me fill you in. First of all, if Enrico Vasquez is a spy, agent or cop then his cover is way
deep. I couldn't find anything on him that's not relevant to his job as a curator. Mind you I
couldn't get any info at all on what he was doing from 1980 to 1983. That could mean he was telling
the truth, and he was at spy school or something, or he just dropped out of circulation to harass
tourists like you.