The Labyrinth Makers (12 page)

'That's really what all the fuss is about. He was just a nobody then, doing what he was told. But he's very far from being a nobody now.'

'And what was he doing–when he was a nobody?'

'He was a soldier. One of the very few who made it all the way from Stalingrad to Berlin. But before that he was an archaeologist, and there's only one thing that would interest him in G Tower.'

'G Tower?'

'That was where he was working after the Russians took the city. It was an anti-aircraft fort as big as a city block. A fort and a hospital and an air raid shelter. And a treasure house.'

'…
Coins, tapestries and sculpture were recovered, but not the Schliemann Collection. All the Staatliche has now of Troy is a pathetic handful of minor objects
.

'And what makes the tragedy absolute, Dr Audley, is that but for England's stupidity the collection need never have gone to Berlin in the first place. Schliemann offered everything to the British Museum — as a gift. And Winter Jones turned him down … He turned him down because there was no room for it!'

Fate had been cruel to the treasure of Troy. The Russians and the French had bid high for it. The Greeks, having overlooked it in one sack, claimed it by right of Homer. But all three nations had combined to help
Schliemann resist Turkey's demand for the restoration of her property, each in the hope of receiving it as a reward.

And the British turned it down as an inconvenience!

'The irony of it, Dr Audley, is that it would have been safe in every museum except the one which acquired it…'

So the Germans got it, only to lose it to the Russians, who in turn lost it (in Sir Kenneth's considered view) to some grubby black marketeer who melted it down for its simple gold value.

King Priam's gold. Hecuba's crown, and rings for Helen's fingers. The drinking cup of Paris and the weapons of Hector.

'Of course it didn't really come from Homer's Troy: it was a thousand years older than that. But that is beside the point, Dr Audley. It was beautiful and it was beyond price.'

Someone else had said that already: little Morrison, that very afternoon–echoing Steerforth.

Audley looked across the table at Steerforth's daughter, the offspring of a man who might well have pulled off one of the great art thefts of history. She presented a picture of dejection, and he sympathised with her: it was hardly a distinction for a respectable chemistry mistress.

'Cheer up, Faith! I could be wrong.'

She regarded him unhopefully.

'You don't think you are wrong, though, do you?'

'I could be. In a way I shall be surprised if it is the Schliemann treasure Panin's after. Up to now I'd discounted the possibility of mere loot–it shouldn't interest the Russians as much as this. And it certainly shouldn't interest a man like our Russian. He's got far bigger matters to attend to than a heap of golden trinkets stolen from a museum.'

She shook her head at him. 'You really don't understand what you've been saying, David, do you? It's just a heap of golden trinkets to you! I suppose you've never read about what Schliemann discovered.'

She didn't wait for him to answer.

'I know you know about Schliemann. Everyone knows it–it's a good capitalist legend. Inside every banker there's a romantic archaeologist! And one in the eye for all the experts who said Troy was a fable!'

She thought for a moment, before speaking.

'When I was a little girl I read a book which described your heap of trinkets. I can't remember all the details now, but I do remember one bit about the jewellery.

'There was a golden diadem, David, one of a pair. All gold wire and little rings and leaves and tiny ornaments. There were over 16,000 pieces in it. And that was just one item in the hoard. Just one item! And there were
thousands
of golden objects. Earrings and rings and bracelets and buttons and cups and ornaments.'

She paused. 'Nowadays people don't take Schliemann very seriously–he dug up the wrong Troy, and everything he dug up he thought was part of Homer, when it wasn't at all.

'I expect the real Trojan war was just a squalid little squabble over trade and taxes–not at all like Homer's war either. Nothing like the legend at all. But the legend was glorious and heroic and the treasure he found fitted it perfectly, so in one way he wasn't wrong at all. And if your Russian archaeologist is half a real man–if he's got any heart at all–he'd never rest while there was a chance of giving it all back to the world.'

She shrugged helplessly. 'And that's what my father stole–and it's not just loot, David. It's not just stealing from someone: it's stealing from the whole world. It's–it's a crime against humanity.'

Her sudden anger astonished him almost as much as her unaccountable knowledge. Scientists, even female ones, were in his experience neither so vehement nor so well-informed on classical art.

And now she was pacing up and down the kitchen.

'My gallant father! The bastard!'

He felt bound to check her, to defend the unfortunate man, whatever he'd done.

'Hold on there, Faith. We still don't know that he took it. And if he did, we don't know that he realised what he was taking. It was just loot to him–stolen gold for the taking. And he wasn't the only one who reckoned there was something owing to him for services rendered!'

She turned on him.

'Didn't know? Didn't know! Oh, David–he knew! He knew all too bloody well! He knew because I know–doesn't it surprise you that I know so much about Troy?'

Again she didn't wait to be asked, but stormed furiously on: 'I know because I inherited a big, beautiful book from him all about Heinrich Schliemann and his wonderful discovery of Troy. And I loved that book because it was his–I've read it a dozen times. When I was little I even wanted to be an archaeologist because of it–that's a laugh now, isn't it!

'I found all his books in the attic when I was little. Mostly he had rotten taste–pulpy thrillers with a bit of pornography that I didn't understand, printed abroad. And a set of unread Dickens.

'But there was this one beautiful book that I adored. To me
that
was his real book. And it was, wasn't it! He must have bought it to find out just exactly what he'd got his dirty hands on.'

She stopped, and looked at him in anguish.

'Clever David!' she said bitterly. 'You guessed right, didn't you? And now you've got the one extra little bit of evidence you need from the villain's daughter. But you did try to soften the blow, you really did. And that was kind of you.'

He pitied her. She must have known subconsciously the moment he had mentioned Troy, and then had blundered on until her conscious mind had picked up its own warning signals. It was a cruel way to come to the truth.

And what made it worse was that he still couldn't blame Steerforth in his heart. It
had
been just loot to him. But to her it would always be the unforgivable crime because it had betrayed childhood love and admiration, however she tried to rationalise it.

'Never mind,' he said 'We'll set the record straight: we'll get it back.'

The geese awoke Audley from an uneasy, confused dream. Yet he knew as he woke that it had not been a dream really, for he had never been completely asleep. It had come from the no-man's-land between thought and sleep, a mere jumble of the day's undigested experiences.

He remembered that he had been reading Ceram's
Gods, Graves and Scholars
, which had been the only thing on his shelves which mentioned Schliemann and Troy in any detail. And Ceram's words had fed his tired mind with images–images of the original panic-stricken burial of the treasure, which had been so hasty that the keys were still in the mouldered locks of the boxes; images of the Schliemanns working feverishly and secretly to hack their prize out of the deep trench in the mound at Hissarlik, with the wreckage of six later Troys and three thousand years poised above them.

And images of Steerforth working no less feverishly to hide that prize …

And then he had thought irrelevantly of the animals in Berlin zoo, caged not far from the treasure, with the Russian shells bursting about them. Had the Berliners eaten their elephants in the end, like the Parisians in 1870?

It was the beginning of a half-nightmare, which switched back to the trench at Hissarlik. But as he looked down into it, it became the wooden staircase in Morrison's shop. No treasure for Morrison …

Then his mind registered the shrieking of Mrs Clark's geese.

At first he thought it was morning, until he saw the moonlight streaming in through his open windows. The damned birds had woken him once before in the night, protesting at some prowling cat or fox, and there was no stopping them once they had started. All one could do was to shut out as much of the noise as possible.

He reached out for the light switch, only to discover that it no longer seemed to work. He fumbled for his spectacles and shuffled towards the window, cursing under his breath.

He stopped dead a yard from the window, shocked totally awake: someone was crossing a moonlit patch of lawn just beyond the cobbles.

He blinked and drew to one side of the window, covering the lower part of his face with the dark sleeve of his pyjamas–white faces showed up even in darkened windows. The figure, moving delicately across the grass, disappeared into the shadow beside the barn. Ten seconds passed like an age, and then two more shadows crossed the moonlit patch from the driveway entrance to the safety of the barn's shadow.

The geese still cackled angrily and Audley felt his heart thump against his chest. Three was too many for him. He had no gun in the house–he had never needed or desired a gun. Faith was asleep just down the passage. If mere burglary was the intention–God! He hadn't even put the Panin file in the safe. But if it was burglary he might frighten them off by switching on the lights.

But the light hadn't worked, he remembered with a pang of panic. And if it wasn't burglary … he saw Morrison again, in unnaturally sharp focus, at the bottom of the stairs.
This sort of thing just doesn't happen
! They'd got no reason –but he didn't know what reason they'd got.

I mustn't think–I must act, he told himself savagely. If you can't fight, run away. If you can't run away–hide!

He whipped his dressing gown from the bed, stuffed the torch from his bedside drawer into his pocket and sprinted down the passage.

She was lying on her side, snoring very softly, one white shoulder picked out by the moonlight. He shook the shoulder urgently.

'Faith! Wake up–and be quiet!' he whispered.

She moaned, and then came to life, startled.

Before she could speak he put the palm of his hand to her mouth.

'We've got visitors,' he hissed as clearly and quietly as he was able. 'Three visitors. We're not going to wait to find out what they want … we're going to hide … if you understand what I'm saying — nod.'

She nodded, wide-eyed.

'Hide your clothes, smooth down your bed–and I'll meet you outside your room in half a minute!'

She nodded again.

He slipped out of her room and raced down the passage again to his study, blessing the day he had chosen to transfer it to the first floor. Pausing only to grab his brief-case he flew back to his bedroom, hurriedly bundled his clothes into a drawer, and pulled up the bedspread.

Faith was waiting for him, pale in the moonlight and hugging her dressing gown round her. She followed him obediently as he made his way to the deeply-recessed window at the head of the stairs.

Audley handed her the brief-case and the torch. Very gently he released the heavy iron catches which held back the shutters and closed out the moonlight. Then he took the left-hand catch and began to turn it anti-clockwise.

Oh God, he prayed, it's always worked before–let it work now!

He gritted his teeth and pulled. Very slowly, and with the smallest subdued rumble, the whole section of the wall between the window and the carved oak newel post which ran from floor to ceiling began to pivot outwards. Behind it was a second wall of smooth stone, broken only by a narrow aperture set low down in the outer corner.

'In you go,' he whispered. 'Crawl along for about ten feet and you'll come to some stone stairs. Wait there–and mind your head!'

She stood irresolutely, looking from him to the pitch-black hole.

'Where does it go?' she whispered back urgently.

'For God's sake, don't argue–remember Morrison!'

Reluctantly she bent down and wriggled into the aperture, shining the torch ahead of her. For a moment Audley stood in the darkness, straining his ears. The geese had temporarily run out of abuse, and the silence was thick and heavy. Then from somewhere below him, inside the house, there was a muffled click.

Audley pulled the wall almost shut and eased himself backwards into the hole. Mercifully it was always easier to shut than to open. He reached up and felt for the iron ring on the inner face, and then fumbled for the locking bar. They could turn the iron catch until domesday now.

Awkwardly he crawled backwards along the cold, dusty stone floor until he was able to lift his head and turn round at the foot of the flight of stone steps. Faith was sitting hunched about halfway up.

She shone the torch into his eyes.

'David, I'm not going a step further until you tell me where the hell we are.'

'We're perfectly safe now.'

'I don't care how safe we are. Where are we? What is this–place?'

'It's a priest's hole.'

'A priest's hole?' She shone the torch around her. Cobwebs and dust and rough stone.

'Go on up the stairs. But mind your head until you get to the top. There's a room there.'

At the top of the steps they emerged into a tiny room, barely big enough for the polythene-covered mattress which was its sole contents, apart from a pickaxe and a battered pewter candlestick with a new candle in it and a box of matches beside it. The room was doorless and windowless, but there was a faint draught of air from two small pigeon holes. It was dry, but cold.