Once again as before, Arthur and I are together only once a day at dinner in the dining hall. No words are spoken; we eat in silence. Anything I know I learn from others. I know that Lamorak, who betrayed his King by having sex with me, will not be allowed to rest in peace within the walls of Camelot after all. Merlin convinced Arthur it must not happen. Thanks to the words of this cunning magician, my husband’s heart was hardened and he issued new orders. Lamorak’s body and his sarcophagus are banned from this castle.
25 September
An entourage left the castle this morning. I watched from my bedroom window in the tower where I have lived since I was banished from my husband’s bedroom. There were horsemen accompanying two heavy carts, each drawn by stout horses. The first cart bore a sarcophagus of thick stone, its lid inscribed with a carving of a knight in helmet and holding a staff. The other cart carried a wooden coffin inside which lies my Lamorak.
I am told they are taking him two miles from here to the small abbey near Avalon’s eastern shore. His sarcophagus will be placed there.
I pray that he rests in peace forever.
——
Edward closed the diary. The two enemies, bound together by an incredible discovery, sat in silence for a few minutes, each lost in his own thoughts. At last Roberto spoke. He asked how much of the final diary remained to be translated. Edward said there wasn’t much left. He’d looked briefly and noted other people wrote the last two pages. The handwriting was totally different than the Queen’s. The next-to-last page was in Welsh like the rest of the book, but the final page was in old English.
Edward didn’t reveal one important thing – he knew who authored both pages. Although he hadn’t translated the last pages yet, he’d read the writers’ names. And these were fascinating too. They only added to the intrigue. He still didn’t know the story’s ending, but he had ideas simply because he knew the final author’s name. He had forced himself to wait – to finish the diaries in order and not skip forward. There wasn’t much left to translate now and he wanted to read it in order.
He would reveal everything only after his translation was completely finished. One had to be careful about wrapping things up. Once Roberto didn’t need his services any longer, Edward was certain something bad might happen to him. He had some planning to do before he would tell his partner the end of the story.
The men went over what they’d learned so far. In 500 AD Lamorak was buried at Camelot, now Glastonbury, in what was later called the Lady Abbey. Now it was downstairs.
According to the administrator of the Glastonbury Trust, Arthur and Guinevere were also buried in the Lady Abbey underneath Lamorak’s sarcophagus. In 1191 monks discovered the bones of the monarchs and kept them on display until 1278. At that point the story got murky. There was no mention of Lamorak after 1191, so that was an unsolved piece of the puzzle. Another was the final burial site for Arthur and Guinevere. A marker at Glastonbury Abbey showed where they were reinterred in 1278, but the trust administrator confided that it was likely they’d been buried elsewhere, that location eventually forgotten.
They still didn’t know why Lamorak’s corpse was here in London. The movement of his body obviously occurred centuries after Guinevere’s death, so it was unlikely her own diaries would reveal anything. Except for those last two pages of her diary, written by others. That was Edward’s little secret for now.
Sometime long ago the sarcophagus had been relocated to the crypt below the bookshop. That was a fact. The only thing left was to solve the mystery of how and why it had been moved.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Edward tossed and turned all night long. The person who revealed Guinevere’s diaries would achieve instant fame and fortune beyond his wildest dreams. Surprisingly, the reclusive bookseller eagerly anticipated the public acclaim and recognition that would soon be his. Finding the sarcophagus of a Knight of the Round Table was unprecedented. But this was real, it was Edward’s and his alone.
He’d made several errors. It had been a mistake to bury those two bodies in the crypt. At the time it seemed like a good idea, but now Edward had to do something about Curtis Pemberly and the young shop assistant. They had to move out so the archaeologists could move in. And he couldn’t handle it alone.
He’d made a mistake bringing Roberto Maas into his confidence, and now he had to do even more. He had to tell Roberto his darkest secrets. He’d also made a mistake in Moscow – Roberto might know now that he was the burqa-clad woman. Regardless, he had to move ahead.
Like himself, he knew Roberto had two personas, one public and one shadowy. He didn’t know exactly what the man was up to, but he was determined to find out. Striking at him first – hitting him without his retaliating – would be tricky, but Edward was a clever man, smarter than anyone. Because he had two personas too. He had Dr. Jekyll and that other one.
By the time he fell asleep, a plan was developing. He had to have help with the bodies; in exchange he’d keep Roberto fed with information from the diaries. Shortly he’d take care of Roberto, aka Slava, permanently.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
Something in the financials still wasn’t right. Every Friday when he printed the voluminous report, Roberto immediately shredded the prior week’s copy. But he’d held on to the one with the errors for three weeks so far, looking at first one page, then another. Something bothered him and he was frustrated he couldn’t figure it out. It wasn’t the other little errors he’d found. Those could have happened to anyone, although Roberto couldn’t remember even a small mistake before. Philippe was very thorough and prided himself on accuracy. Understandably he didn’t personally prepare all the numbers – a couple of accounting people crunched the data and created the spreadsheets. But Philippe compiled it, reviewed it himself and vouched for its accuracy. It was his baby and his responsibility. Roberto frequently asked probing questions and Philippe had always been right on top of everything. He had never missed a beat. Until now.
Something was different. At the moment it was simply a feeling, but he’d learned to trust his gut. This morning he sat in his hotel room, poring over the old report once again. His eyes were tired – he was ready to give up and admit his feelings were wrong – when he saw it.
Two hundred thousand dollars.
There was no discrepancy here like the small issues earlier. This one was a routine payment for real estate services, one of a dozen more posted here and there – so ordinary it could be easily overlooked. He finally picked this one out only because he didn’t recognize the name of the project associated with the payment – Parmenter. He flipped to the last section of the report that contained an index of the real estate his trust owned. The list had three columns per page for six pages, showing every property in his worldwide portfolio. The offsetting entry for the two hundred thousand dollars would be in the Parmenter account. But that name didn’t appear in the index. No wonder he hadn’t recognized it. There wasn’t a property named Parmenter.
The weekly summary was simply that – a summary – so he sent a brief email to Christian Braud, the man in his accounting department who created these entries. He asked for a detailed accounting on Parmenter, including its income and expenses. That would show him everything tied to this particular project.
His requests were always top priority at the office in Lucerne. When the boss asked, people responded quickly. Roberto waited – if the man was at his desk, he should have an answer in five minutes. It was a simple matter of emailing an Excel spreadsheet back to Roberto.
But the spreadsheet didn’t come.
Roberto grabbed his phone, putting aside the doubt creeping into his mind. He called the accountant’s direct line.
“Mr. Lepescu’s office.”
What? Roberto hesitated for a moment.
“Hello?”
“Elise, this is Roberto Maas.”
Her voice was perky and bright. “Good morning, Mr. Maas. How may I help you?”
“I was trying to reac
h Christian Braud in accounting. I thought I dialed his number, but perhaps I made a mistake. Can you transfer me to him?”
“Certainly, sir. One moment.”
He heard a couple of rings, then an answer. “Mr. Lepescu’s office.”
“Elise, it’s me again.”
“That’s odd. For some reason Christian’s calls are auto-forwarding to Mr. Lepescu’s line. I’ll check into it and have him call you back. In the meantime do you need to speak with Mr. Lepescu?”
Roberto declined and asked that the accountant call as soon as possible.
Five minutes later his phone rang. He glanced at the name on his phone. It was Philippe.
“Good morning. I didn’t expect to hear from you. I’m waiting for a call from the accounting people.”
Lepescu responded smoothly, “Is there something I can help you with?”
Suddenly alarms clanged in Roberto’s brain.
“I want to speak to Christian. Is he there?”
“He’s not, actually. He, uh … he resigned this morning. Something about going back to finish his education. He’ll be missed, but we’ll replace him easily, I’m sure. I’d be glad to help…”
Philippe’s words came fast and clipped. He was nervous as hell.
“What’s Parmenter?”
Philippe paused for a moment. He replied shakily, “Parmenter? I’m not sure. Is it a name?”
“I’m referring to a real estate project in the financial report.”
“Must be a small one. I don’t recall it. Are you looking at this week’s report?”
“I’m looking at the report from three weeks ago – the one that had the small discrepancies I asked you about.”
“Right. Give me a few minutes to look this up and I’ll call you back.”
“One more question while I have you, Philippe. When a lower-level accounting employee resigns, do you always have his phone calls routed to your desk?”
“Of course not.” Philippe’s laugh sounded forced, unnatural. “That’s some kind of mistake by the IT people. I’ll get that corrected. I’ll call you back shortly.”
Shit.
Philippe walked to a bar discreetly hidden behind a wall panel ten feet from his desk. He poured a brandy and tossed it down.
After his explanation of the small errors, Philippe had relaxed. He waited two more weeks to be sure Roberto didn’t catch this big mistake. If he had, Philippe was ready. He’d created a fake Parmenter realty account for an obscure property in Jordan the trust had owned for years. The money was all still here, everything was fine. Just another little error someone had made.
And until last week that would have worked, because the money actually was still in-house and Philippe was prepared to explain away the error. But he’d decided enough time had passed. Roberto had surely shredded the old financials by now – he’d received three more weekly updates and he never kept an older one. Last Friday Philippe had confidently transferred the two hundred thousand dollars to his personal offshore account.
And he’d brazenly done it again yesterday. Another two hundred thousand was gone this week. He had to undo that transfer fast. He had two days to make that happen before the next financial report went to Roberto. Worse, he had to explain the first two hundred thousand dollars – the Parmenter transaction – fast. And he had no idea how he’d do it.
While Philippe fretted in his office, Roberto made another call.
“Celia,” he said to the young lady who sat next to Christian in the accounting room at the office, “this is Roberto Maas.”
“Good morning, sir! How may I help?”
“Is Christian there?”
“He’s out this week, Mr. Maas. He’s in Austria skiing with friends. He’ll return on Monday. Is there something I can assist with?”
“I had a minor question for him, nothing that can’t wait. Thanks for your help.”
The call ended. Roberto had to go to Switzerland. Immediately. This morning.
A half hour later he was in a cab, briefcase in hand. He’d left Edward a voicemail that he was making a quick day trip to the office. Edward’s glance at TrickTracker confirmed that was exactly where Roberto was going.
When Philippe returned Roberto’s call, he had no idea his boss was in Swissair’s departure lounge.
“Sorry it’s taken me so long to respond. The Parmenter thing is a bit of a mystery. I see the entry you mentioned, but I can’t find it listed in the projects spreadsheet. I don’t want to think anyone downstairs is at fault” – he was referring to the accounting department – “so before I answer, I need a little more time to look into this.”
Roberto told his partner to take his time. It made no difference now what Philippe said. Roberto would be there in three hours to find out for himself what was going on.
Philippe was a man of habit. Every day at one he took his lunch, usually in the same quiet, expensive restaurant he and Roberto had visited a few weeks back. Roberto timed his arrival when Philippe would be at lunch. He used his access card to enter the building, went directly to the office he shared with his partner, and greeted Elise.
“I’m surprised to see you, Mr. Maas! When we spoke this morning I didn’t realize you were coming today. I’m sorry Mr. Lepescu’s at lunch; shall I ring his mobile and let him know you’re here?”
“No, don’t do that. There’s no need to disturb his meal. I’ll see him when he returns.”
Roberto closed the door and sat down not at his own desk but at Philippe’s. He shuffled through papers, an appointment book, then the desk drawers. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he’d know when he found it.
And there it was. Two wire transfer confirmation slips lay in the back of the middle desk drawer. Two hundred thousand dollars wired to a numbered account in the Seychelles last Friday and an identical transfer to the same account yesterday.
He leaned back in the chair, deflated. He hated this – in his varied, exciting life he’d never dealt with embezzlement – moreover by a friend, a trusted associate, a partner. He’d made Philippe a wealthy man by including him in deal after deal. And the man repaid his generosity by stealing?
He was still staring at the two confirmations, hardly able to believe it, when the office door burst open.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
“What the hell?” Philippe abruptly stopped halfway across the room when he saw Roberto sitting behind his desk.
“My thoughts exactly. Come on over and sit down, Philippe. It appears we have some things to talk about.”
Roberto had been betrayed and he made no attempt to hide it. He spoke quietly, more in sadness than in anger, his words echoing how he felt inside. Philippe sat across from Roberto, who was in Philippe’s chair behind the desk.
“What’s going on? I just spoke with you a few hours ago. Why are you here–”
Roberto interrupted. “I need some answers.” He pulled out his smartphone, flipped to voice memos, hit record and put the phone on the desk in front of him. Their conversation would be recorded.
Philippe suddenly became aggressive. He stood and shouted, “Are you spying on me? Going through my desk? Maybe there is something we need to talk about, partner!”
Roberto merely held up the two slips of paper. “Where did this money go, partner? You took the first two hundred because I failed to notice it. Did you decide yesterday it was safe to take more? I have no bank accounts in the Seychelles. Whose account did four hundred grand go in – yours, I presume?”
Philippe glanced away. He was trapped and had to think quickly. He’d spent ninety minutes over lunch unsuccessfully trying to come up with a plausible explanation for the original Parmenter money. Suddenly he was caught – confronted with the two thefts he’d committed. He had no time, no explanation, nothing. It was over.
Resigned to his fate, Philippe straightened in his chair and decided to control the situation if he could. “Right. It went into my account. You’ve never been my partner. You’ve been the boss
and I’ve been your little errand boy. That’s become more and more obvious lately. I do all the work while you play archaeologist in London. I make everything happen. I keep my hand on the rudder. If it weren’t for me, you’d have far less wealth than you do. I deserve more. I deserve it and I decided to take it.”
During the two-hour plane trip, Roberto had determined what he’d do if the worst were true. The time for anger and accusations was over. He spoke calmly. “I want to tell you what’s going to happen next. I’m going to call the police and you’re going to sit here until they come. If you choose not to do that, I’ll ask the security guard downstairs to detain you.” He picked up the desk phone’s receiver.
The man sitting across the desk from Roberto had only one remaining card to play. It might work, it might not. There was absolutely nothing to lose now.
“Put the phone down, Juan Carlos.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
Roberto paused with his hand on the receiver.
“What did you say?”
“I said put the phone down, Juan Carlos. You’re not calling anyone.”
Roberto put the receiver back into its cradle. “My, my, Philippe. What have you been up to? Is there anything you haven’t poked your dirty little nose into?”
“I have information. Not only do I know about Juan Carlos, but I know about Slava Sergenko too.”
Roberto snapped to attention. No one knew about Slava Sergenko. Suddenly his calm, resigned tone of voice turned to unrestrained fury.
“You’re on very dangerous ground, my friend. Where did you hear that name? Tell me now or I’ll…” He stood so quickly his chair flew backwards and banged into a credenza. “You damned bastard! You have no idea…” He came fast around the desk.
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