The Shroud of Heaven (12 page)

“Don’t you?” Kismet’s voice held a tone of accusation. He was trying to regain control of the situation by putting the curator back on the defensive. “He uncovered a wealth of artifacts from the Babylonian dynasty. I can’t believe such an important discovery would have gone unnoticed.”

Hussein rattled off the Arabic equivalent, then turned to Kismet before the older man could reply. “Please sir, you must understand. What you are asking… It would be like asking you if you know Joe from New York.”

Kismet’s stare never left Aziz. The other man continued to squirm uncomfortably as he uttered another denial.

“I don’t believe you.” Kismet understood enough that he did not need to wait for an interpretation before pressing his argument. “I think you know exactly who I am talking about, and what he discovered. I think you’ve been illegally selling other artifacts from that same dig. And I think you had better start telling us everything you know about Samir Al-Azir and what he found at Babylon.”

The accusation hung in the air like a static charge as Hussein reluctantly converted the demand into his native language. Before Aziz could reply however, a trilling noise broke the silence. Mildly startled, Kismet turned to Chiron, but the Frenchman only shrugged. It was Aziz who eventually responded to the electronic tone, drawing from his breast pocket a familiar-looking object: a Qualcomm portable telephone handset. He opened the oblong device and began speaking in a low voice. After a brief exchange, he rose and excused himself via Hussein.

As Aziz stepped across the threshold of the conference room, Kismet turned his attention to the young translator. It was evident to Kismet that Aziz was concealing information, but Hussein seemed truly in the dark respecting his superior’s activities. “Where did you learn English?”

After a moment of distrustful incomprehension, the young man smiled. “Oxford. I studied abroad in my youth.”

Kismet smiled at the implication that Hussein had somehow left his immaturity behind during his instructional years. “You speak it very well. How long have you been working with Mr. Aziz?”

“I have been at the museum for three years, but not exclusively with Mr. Aziz. I translate for many among the staff and assist visiting dignitaries, such as your honored selves.”

Kismet nodded slowly. It was doubtful that Hussein would be privy to any dark secrets. Men like Aziz rarely entrusted such matters to their subordinates. He decided to try a different tack. “I wasn’t aware that phone service had been restored.”

Hussein raised an eyebrow, then cast a glance over his shoulder toward the exit where he had last seen Aziz. “It has in some places. But that phone does not require a local connection.”

“It’s a satellite phone, isn’t it?” Kismet already knew the answer. The unusual antenna configuration of the Qualcomm GSP1600 marked it as a device designed to do more than simply interface with the local cellular network. In an age where most cell phones were miniaturized to the point that they might easily be concealed in a closed hand, the bulky handset and long antenna extension had given Aziz’s phone away as a receiver capable of picking up transmissions beamed to the Globalstar satellite network. With a sat-phone, you could take a call from almost anywhere in the world. “That’s a pretty expensive piece of hardware.”

Hussein immediately went on the defensive. “We maintain a large repository of knowledge about the ancient world. Our patrons in Europe want us to be able to share information with universities and scientists around the world. When the threat of war began to loom, they arranged for this technology to be put at our disposal.”

Kismet nodded slowly. “And there’s been a lot of communication since?”

“Many scholars are concerned about the looting and damage to priceless antiquities. They call to express their support for our efforts to restore the collection.”

“Then we are all working toward the same goal,” intoned Chiron.

For once, Kismet was grateful to the older man for his saccharine observation. He had no desire to keep Hussein on guard. If anything, he needed the young translator in a more cooperative frame of mind. “Have you been to any of the major dig sites?”

The young man remained wary. “I have been to all of them.”

“I spent some time in the ruins of Ur, Tall al Muqayyar.”

“Near An Nasiriyah. Yes, I have been there.”

“This is a wonderful country to live in if you are a lover of history,” Chiron remarked. His expression of vague disinterest belied the conviction in his tone, but the sentiment was evidently something the young assistant curator could grasp. Hussein broke into a broad smile.

“It’s all here,” he answered, an enthusiastic boy discovering the world for the first time and eager to share. “The birthplace of civilization, the oldest forms of writing, the oldest laws. The father of all faiths, Ibraim, was born here and his descendants—the twelve tribes of Arabia—remain to this day. Alexander the Great walked here, as did the Christian Saint Peter. History begins here.”

“You’ve barely scratched the surface, my boy. God himself has walked here. In the oldest writings, His presence is felt. The Garden of Eden was here, at the headwaters of the river Euphrates.”

“Yes!” Hussein clapped his hands together emphatically. “And He spoke to Ibraim and called him out of Chaldea. Exactly. No matter what your faith, you cannot escape the fact that God has made His will known in this place.”

Kismet glanced at Chiron, trying to determine if the sudden oration on the religious significance of the region was part of some broader plan to gain the younger man’s trust. If it was, the Frenchman hid it well.

“I wonder what’s keeping Aziz?” he ventured, looking for a way to put the conversation back on track. Hussein started to rise, eager to be of service, but Kismet forestalled him. “No, I’ll go. I wouldn’t mind a chance to stretch my legs. I’ll yell if I get lost.”

He moved past the long table toward the doorway Aziz had exited through. As he turned the knob, he listened for the sound of the man’s voice. “Mr. Aziz?”

The door opened into an office half the size of the conference room. It was difficult to say what purpose the room had served prior to the chaos following the war. Now it was an impromptu storeroom cluttered with paper and boxes. Another doorway on the opposite wall exited the room and Kismet picked his way carefully though the litter, intent on locating their reluctant host.

The next room appeared to be a gallery set aside for seasonal exhibits, but like the storeroom, it now housed only rubble. Piles of broken statuary and brick were heaped in the corner, while empty display cases with smashed-out glass windows lined both long walls. At the far end of the hall, Kismet saw Aziz talking animatedly to a shorter individual dressed in the long garments of a Bedouin. The man’s face was almost completely covered by a swath of fabric from his turban.

Kismet stopped short, mildly embarrassed at the interruption. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were—”

Both men turned abruptly at the sound of his voice. Aziz wore a guilty expression, as if caught in an indiscreet moment, but the robed figure showed no such hesitancy. He thrust a hand into the folds of his garment and whipped out a long, tubular object. In the instant of time it took Kismet to recognize that it was a pistol, outfitted with a sound and flash suppressor, the man aimed and fired.

Aziz took two rounds in the chest at close range before Kismet could raise a hand in protest. The groan that escaped from the curator’s lips as he sank to his knees was far louder than the noise of the fatal shots. Then, a third shot bored a red cavity, no thicker than a pencil, in the center of Aziz’s forehead to silence him forever.

Kismet’s initial shock wore off in the instant the killer administered the
coup de grace
. He threw himself sideways, ducking behind the solid base of a shattered display case, and thrust a hand into the nylon pack belted around his waist. The small pack was designed around a breakaway holster, secured with Velcro, which contained his Glock 19 semi-automatic handgun. He ripped it free of its stays and balled his fist around the grip as he chambered a round. His finger tightened on the trigger. With his left hand steadying the barrel, he rolled into the open, bringing the gun to bear on the place where he had seen the assassin a moment before, dreading the inevitable return fire.

The hall was empty.

He caught a glimpse of the killer’s loose robes, fluttering through the doorway like a bird taking to flight, and decisively gave chase. After crossing the hall, he vaulted over the still-twitching form of Aziz, and was just in time to see the assassin’s back disappear into a gallery to his right. With the pistol outstretched before him, he gave chase.

The gallery into which he ran seemed to abruptly transition him four millennia into the past. The room was like a darkened chamber in an ancient temple keep. One wall was devoted entirely to a sculpted alabaster relief featuring figures with curly, square-cut beards. Even in the mere seconds in which Kismet had to identify the objects in the gallery, he had no difficulty recognizing the signature of the Akkadian civilization, the second great culture to arise in Mesopotamia.

Yet here too, the hand of war had dealt a blow. Many of the artifacts had been vandalized, smashed by looters with no rational motive. Kismet had read news reports concerning one noteworthy sculpture, a bronze bust of the great Akkadian king Sargon, that had been taken by an opportunist hoping to score a small fortune in the international antiquities trade. Though the head had been recovered, it would be some time before such a valuable relic would again be displayed openly. Hundreds of other pieces—cuneiform tablets dating back to the time of Hammurabi, alabaster lions and gryphons, bronze artworks from the dawn of metallurgy—were now likewise secreted away from public view.

He caught sight of the robed figure dashing through the middle of the gallery, intent on reaching the far exit. He was gaining on the man, his longer strides closing the distance, but the assassin held the advantage of knowing where he was going. If Kismet lost visual contact, even for a moment, the pursuit would be over. He raised the gun, sighting down the barrel on the fleeing killer. “Stop!”

The assassin did not look back, but the shouted warning triggered a spontaneous response. He dove forward, making a fluid transition into a somersault that momentarily removed him from Kismet’s sight picture. As the man came up, he pivoted on his leading foot, turning away from the headlong course toward the far end of the course.

Kismet’s finger tightened on the trigger, but he could not bring himself to fire. The adrenaline surging through his veins was not quite strong enough to override a deep-seated inhibition against causing inadvertent harm to innocents. He knew well the limitation of his ability with the firearm—he was out of practice. Although the basic knowledge of how to shoot was something never quite forgotten, it was a skill that lost its edge over time, and it had been a long time since he had fired the weapon, even on a shooting range. Using the anti-tank rocket the day before had been simple by comparison; the AT-4 was a sledgehammer compared to the nine-millimeter projectiles from the Glock, which would require near surgical precision to be effective. He might have scored a hit on the darting figure, but it seemed just as likely that his round would go astray, striking and further damaging one of the Old Babylonian artifacts, or worse, wounding an unsuspecting museum worker. The escaping assassin, while never realizing that he was not nearly in as much danger as he might have believed, took advantage of Kismet’s internal struggle to widen the gap between them, and slipped out of the Akkadian gallery.

Recognizing that the gun would only be a liability in his chase, he jammed the weapon back into the waist pack as he ran through the hall and put on a burst of speed as soon as it was secure. There had been no hesitation in his decision to chase after the killer; it had been an immediate reaction to what he had witnessed. Yet now, as his brain went into overdrive, he began to see the ultimate goal of his pursuit. The killer had silenced Aziz, locking away whatever knowledge the curator possessed that might have aided Kismet in his search for answers. That pre-emptive strike might forever throw him from the path if he failed to bring the assassin to heel.

Another corner separated the relics of Old Babylonia and Akkad from the earliest civilization in the region, and perhaps the world: Sumeria. With his hands now free and his purpose set, Kismet sprinted through a maze of displays featuring potsherds and clay tablets, restored to their proper place by virtue of being relatively valueless.

The assassin, never once looking back, seemed to hesitate as if uncertain about which route of egress to follow. Only as his pursuer’s footsteps became audible did he think to take evasive action, but the opportunity to escape had already passed. Kismet dove forward, arms extended, and tackled the fleeing killer.

Both men tumbled uncontrollably, caroming between the upright display cases. Kismet folded his arms around the assassin’s legs, immobilizing him, but in the corner of his eye, he saw one of the openly presented relics tremble with the force of impact. A female figurine, arms raised to balance a large water container on her head, wobbled like a bowling pin atop a squarish pylon directly above where the two combatants lay sprawled.

Kismet breathed a curse as he realized what he would have to do. Releasing the grip of his right arm, he thrust his hand up and snatched the sculpture away from the inevitable attraction of gravity. Even as his hand closed protectively around the statue’s legs, the assassin seized the advantage. He flexed his knee, then drove his leg straight out like a piston, solidly connecting with the side of Kismet’s head.

A haze of bright blue momentarily eclipsed his view of the world. He felt the killer squirming out of his weakened grasp and made a belated but vain attempt to redouble his efforts. As gently as possible, he laid the figurine aside and brought his hands up defensively. Kismet knew he could physically overpower the smaller man, but his foe still possessed a gun and had showed no hesitation in dispatching Aziz. His ears were ringing from the first blow and through a haze of stars, he could just make out the other man, rising to his feet, legs spread in a defensive stance.