Napoleon's Gold: A Jack Starling Adventure

by Guy Roberts

  ‘If I didn’t see it, I wouldn’t have believed it.’ The Commodore blew out his cheeks and looked down. Brice sat at the head of the table with a glowering frown on his face.

  ‘You let her get away,’ Brice stared at Highgrove with a flat look of resentment on his face. Highgrove looked down at the table feeling chagrined. She had arrived back in the COBRA office in a storm of frustration at having been outwitted by the mysterious blonde and the subsequent debriefings and reviews had only sharpened her frustration. Now, at the final briefing of the day, Brice himself had demanded to watch the footage, clutching at any information he could find about David Starling’s murder. As usual, Sir Johnathon was sitting quietly at his side, this time dressed incongruously in black tie, his elegant tuxedo a sharp contrast to the wrinkle-shirted bulk of Anthony Brice.

  ‘She did everything that could be asked,’ Sir Johnathon pointed out.

  Brice snorted dismissively. ‘If she had stayed by the door, then that woman would have been arrested.’

  ‘Or would have escaped through one of the many emergency exits of the Library,’ Sir Johnathon chided gently.

  ‘Or not,’ Brice glared at him. ‘Highgrove was supposed to search through Starling’s papers, not start a cat fight with a bloody acrobat.’

  Highgrove’s face darked but she remained silent.

  ‘I hope any one of us would have done the same.’ Sir Johnathon spoke with his usual mildness, but somehow the words hung in the air over the table like a warning. Brice glowered at the words, swaying backwards and forwards in his chair like a great bull preparing to gore a tiny and precocious matador.

  ‘Well…’ Brice controlled his anger with a visible effort. ‘Who is that woman and what was she doing looking through David Starling’s private papers? Did she take anything?’

  ‘We haven’t been able to identify her yet.’ Highgrove spoke up for the first time, her voice strictly professional despite her inner rage. ‘We don’t know what was in the room when she arrived, so we can’t tell what is missing… but from the video footage, she wasn’t carrying anything extra when she left. The papers in David’s office had been searched through, but more than that we don’t know.’

  ‘And what were the papers?’ Brice eyed Highgrove aggressively as everyone in the room cringed inwardly. The detailed report of Highgrove’s investigation had been sent to Brice the moment it was finished. Brice had read through the briefing on his iPad already and clearly knew the details. His interrogation was nothing more than a calculated humiliation.

  ‘The papers related to David Starling’s academic research on Napoleonic France.’

  ‘Nothing on Russia?’

  ‘No sir.’

  ‘Or on Jack Starling?’

  ‘No sir.’

  Brice let the silence stretch out for an excruciating moment.

  ‘Well… I think you’d better find out who she is, because she’s not Napoleon, she’s not Jack Starling, but she was going through the private papers of a murdered British citizen… if all else fails, go through the passport photos of any Russians that have entered the country in the last six months and see if you can find her there.’ Brice looked at Highgrove for a moment longer then gestured at her to leave the table and return to her computer station.

  Brice settled back into his chair, feeling the dynamic of the room return to the slow grinding process of sifting endless data.

  He spared another glare for Highgrove’s back. That woman in the Library must have been a Russian agent… we could have had this whole thing wrapped up by now. He pursed his lips for a moment. Perhaps I’m being hard on her… at least she had a go, after all. There was a muted silence around the table. Nothing new had occurred that had not already been reviewed and discussed in depth. Eventually Sir Johnathon broke the silence, nodding to the faces around the table and pushing his chair back with finality.

  ‘Well, ladies, gentlemen, I must love you and leave you.’

  ‘Where are you off to?’ Brice glared at him.

  ‘I am going to a party,’ Sir Johnathon looked at him curiously, then waved a hand over his tuxedo. His lips twitched with a touch of humour. ‘Why else would I be dressed to kill?’

  2145 hrs 15 June 2015, Apsley House, London.

  GR 51.503379, -0.151931

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Jack shook his head, looking up at the oil paintings hanging from every wall. ‘How can all these paintings prove the gold exists?’

  Cleo smiled and pointed around her. ‘All this wealth, Jack. It shows the gold existed in the first place. The French had sticky fingers – they lost the paintings, but they kept the gold. So much of it that even Napoleon kept it secret.’

  ‘What happened?’

  Cleo took a deep breath. ‘From what David had researched, it seems that by 1812 Napoleon was beginning to worry about his empire. That’s why he ordered the gold to be hidden in Bordeaux.’

  ‘Not Paris?’ Jack frowned.

  ‘Not Paris,’ Cleo grinned conspiratorially. Jack found himself entranced by her story telling. ‘By 1812 Napoleon could see the situation was turning, especially after the destruction of the Grand Armée in Russia that winter.’

  ‘That’s when Tchaikovsky wrote the 1812 Overture?’ Jack tried to make an intelligent contribution.

  ‘Um,’ Cleo paused for a moment, ‘he wrote that in 1880, but yes, it was about the invasion of 1812.’

  ‘Right.’ Jack was feeling slightly outgunned by Cleo’s knowledge. ‘So why didn’t Napoleon use the gold to protect himself when he returned from Russia?’

  ‘Well, it was an option,’ Cleo nodded, ‘but Napoleon could see the tides were turning. The gold was carried from Vitoria in June 1813. Within eight months Paris had fallen and the Empire was in exile. Why waste such a stockpile of gold on a lost cause, when it could be saved for his return?’

  ‘His return?’ Jack’s forehead creased. ‘You mean he already expected he’d have to abdicate?’

  ‘It was a master stroke,’ Cleo nodded. ‘Look at France in 1814. They’re surrounded by enemies, exhausted by two decades of war. Napoleon knows that if he stays and fights then he’s doomed… but if he runs, he might have a chance to win it all back later on. So he abdicates and is exiled to the Isle of Elba, twelve miles off the Italian Coast. Twelve months pass. Everything turns out as he predicted. The rest of Europe have disbanded their armies, the new French King, Louis XVIII, is incredibly unpopular and France’s soldiers had regained their strength and are sitting around remembering the good old days. All Napoleon has to do now is sail back to France and pick up where he left off – and Napoleon knew the gold would be far more useful at such a moment.’

  ‘So what happened?’ Jack was riveted at this fresh interpretation of the Emperor’s designs.

  ‘Well,’ Cleo shrugged, ‘he was right, up to a point. The people of France accepted Napoleon as Emperor once more and he marched a new army northward to meet the British and Prussians who were massing against him. That’s when he ordered the gold to be dug up and delivered to him as he marched – enough gold to make new European allies and pay his soldiers. It was all going to plan except for one thing.’

  Jack smiled. ‘Which was?’

  Cleo grinned. ‘The Duke of Wellington. He defeated Napoleon, found the gold and ordered it be hidden away, lest any of the powers of Europe find the gold and start war once more. The four officers took the wagons laden with the gold and vanished into war-torn Europe. Six months later they returned to the Duke’s side and pretended the gold had never existed. And so it was for almost two hundred years – until David discovered the real story two months ago.’

  Jack’s reply was interrupted by the banging of a loud gong and he suddenly realised how closely together they had been standing. The man on the podium waved a hand at the applause that began to fill the room.

  Cleo suddenly turned and stared at Jack intently. ‘It’s speech time. If you know where the clue is, now is the time to find it. If you’re ever go
ing to trust me, then start now.’ Jack looked into her green eyes for a long moment.

  She squeezed his forearm gently. ‘David trusted me,’ she reminded him. It was enough. Jack nodded, grabbed her hand and slipped back through the crowds toward the staircase circling the massive statue of Napoleon. Behind them, the first words of the speech began and the two of them were able to quickly wind their way back to the staircase proper. Everyone at the party had moved upstairs for the speech and the chamber had a strange silence and intimacy despite the overpowering presence of the Napoleonic statue. Jack paused at the base of the staircase and listened for a moment. It sounded as though the speeches would be going on for quite some time.

  ‘You promise to help me find the gold, right?’ Jack stared at Cleo intently, a finger pointing at her warningly. ‘You won’t back out, or stab me in the back?’

  She wrapped his hand in both of hers and returned his gaze openly. ‘I promise.’

  Jack sighed. It would have to do. Right now time was of the essence – and he only had to show her one part of the poem at least. He pulled out the page of David’s text from his pocket and showed her the stanza. She quickly read it aloud.

  ‘Coarse ogre you, oh European Bane

  In war and bloodshed wrote your name

  Though gilded Nike thou hold tight,

  You could not rule, who ruled by might

  All vaulted power comes to naught,

  It was alone your sole support.’

  She raised an eyebrow. ‘This is the poem?’

  Jack nodded.

  ‘Well,’ she ran a hand through her hair and frowned at the script. ‘It certainly shows David’s public school education.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She shrugged. ‘Oh, just the syntax of it – ‘Coarse ogre you, oh European Bane’ – it’s all ‘tumpty tumpty tumpty tum.’ Iambic pentameter. The sort of thing Shakespeare did.’

  ‘Oh.’ Jack was nonplussed. He had not paid attention to Shakespeare at school. ‘Well,’ he continued, ‘I’ve figured it out. Can you?’

  ‘Can I?’ she grinned at him belligerently, then looked down at the writing once again. ‘Coarse ogre you, oh European Bane – clearly Napoleon, the Corsican Tyrant. In war and bloodshed wrote your name – again, that’s certainly Napoleon. Though gilded Nike thou hold tight,’

  She looked across to Jack for a moment, stumped.

  ‘Our father brought us to Apsley House when we were very young,’ Jack explained. ‘David was fascinated by this statue. Its full name is ‘Napoleon as Mars the Peacemaker.’ He wordlessly reached up and tapped one finger against the bronze figurine held in the statue’s right hand. The figurine was a foot high, showing a woman in a flowing dress, arms held upward in celebration, a pair of wings arching backward from her shoulders.

  ‘That’s Mars,’ he explained.

  Cleo grinned, catching on in an instant. ‘And Mars is the Roman name for Nike, the goddess of victory, being held tight in Napoleon’s hand.’

  Jack nodded encouragingly. ‘Keep going.’

  ‘You could not rule, who ruled by might.’ Cleo thought for a moment. ‘Well, he couldn’t maintain power through sheer force alone. But that doesn’t help us. ‘All vaulted power comes to naught, it was alone your sole support.’ She frowned and cast another eye over the statue. ‘Well… I’m not sure about that… Did you look under the heel, like with the Wellington Statue?’ Before Jack could answer she had ducked her head down to the base of the statue and peered at it minutely. Jack sighed heavily and waited for her to resurface. Cleo popped her head up on the other side of the statue and smoothed a stray lock of hair back into place.

  ‘Ok, so there’s nothing on the base.’ Her eyes narrowed suddenly and she took a predatory step toward him. ‘You know where it is, don’t you? Don’t tell me!’

  Jack grinned despite himself. Rather than demand the answer, she was clearly trying to figure it out for herself.

  ‘All vaulted power comes to naught, it was alone your sole support…’ She spoke the words slowly, concentrating on each word in turn. Jack waited. Her eyes narrowed for a moment and then opened wide. ‘No!’ she exclaimed in surprise. ‘It can’t be!’

  Jack felt his jaw drop as she reached for the fig leaf hanging from the centre of the statue.

  ‘Cleo!’ Jack gave a strangled yelp and smacked away her outstretched hand.

  ‘What?’ Cleo frowned in response. ‘It was alone his sole support – look, that fig leaf is the only thing he’s wearing, it’s got to be under there!’

  Jack shut his eyes for a moment and shook his head. ‘No… it’s not the statue – it’s what’s underneath!’

  Cleo frowned, then screwed her eyes up in embarrassment as she realised her mistake. ‘Vaulted power, sole support – of course! A statue this size must have something underneath to stop it from crashing through the floors!’

  Jack grinned. He had done his research on the building earlier that day and had suspected all along that what he was looking for was in the basement. Now it was his turn to show off. ‘When the statue was brought here in 1817 they had to reinforce the basement to ensure the statue wouldn’t simply crash through.’

  Cleo’s eyes were shining with excitement. ‘So you do have a brain after all!’ she exclaimed with a smile and grabbed his hand. ‘Jack Starling, to the basement, take me!’

  He grinned and led her toward the entrance chambers then turned left toward a nondescript side door that revealed a flight of stairs running downward.

  The basement room was full of service staff, all grabbing a few moments to relax during the speeches. Most were leaning against more display cabinets showing off historical documents about the original Duke. It seemed the entire basement area had been sacrificed to catering.

  ‘Sorry guys, the party’s upstairs.’ A waiter came forward with a look of surprise on his face.

  ‘Don’t mind us, we’re just having a domestic,’ Cleo replied with cheeky brazenness, but it was enough to make the man grin and back away, hands raised, throwing a sympathetic look at Jack as he retreated. Cleo confidently led the way deeper into the basement, pushing through into a room filled with racks of chilled hors d'oeuvres waiting to be heated and delivered to the partygoers upstairs. Other than that, the room seemed empty.

  ‘Listen,’ Jack spoke swiftly, ‘can you stop insinuating to people that we’re a couple.’

  ‘Why?’ Cleo raised an eyebrow suggestively. ‘Do you have something against New Zealanders?’

  ‘I prefer Australians.’ Jack replied, trying to make his voice as cold as possible before a smile broke out.

  A sudden shuffling ahead of them stilled Cleo’s reply. Jack pushed Cleo behind him protectively and stepped forward, his tall frame stalking past the trays of food, while Cleo travelled in his wake like a ghost, her stiletto heels absolutely silent. A heavily overweight man was huffing and puffing around a central pillar of the basement, the ends of his untucked white shirt clearly on display under his tuxedo.

  ‘Looking for something?’ Jack confronted him with a stern look on his face. The man looked up, showing a pig-like face surrounded by a fuzz of patchy black beard. ‘O mój Boże!’ The man swore in surprise, lurching upright and fumbling one hand at his armpit. A moment later the man was pulling a heavy black pistol toward Jack’s head. Jack’s military training took over and he knocked the man’s hand to one side, closed forward and delivered a savage haymaker to the man that left him on the ground in a senseless heap. Jack swept up the pistol from the ground and looked around the room. They were alone. He checked the pistol’s magazine then slipped it into a pocket. ‘M1935 Beretta’ he explained to Cleo. ‘Not strong, but very reliable.’

  ‘Do you know him?’ Cleo gestured at the prostrate gunman. ‘COBRA?’

  Jack shook his head. ‘COBRA has better resources than a bloke like him,’ Jack looked down at the comatose man thoughtfully. ‘I’d bet he’s one of Deschamps men.’

  ‘I think you’d win
that bet.’ Cleo agreed. She knelt down and searched through the man’s pockets. One held a paperclip stuffed with banknotes, which she quickly slipped into her evening bag. Another pocket held two sheets of paper stapled together. She passed it up to Jack without comment. Jack unfolded the paper carefully, then felt a shiver of cold run up his spine. The first page was a photocopy of his passport. The second was of a photocopy of a ripped up page of writing, whose individual pieces had been pieced back together like a jigsaw puzzle. Many of the pieces were burnt and many of the words had been scratched out and replaced with others, but what was left was clearly a version of the same stanza that Jack and Cleo had been reading only minutes before.

  ‘How did they get this?’ Jack asked, deeply unsettled.

  Cleo studied it for a moment, equally mystified.

  ‘It looks burnt.’

  Jack remembered the faint smell of burning that had greeted him in David’s study. His brother must have been trying to burn these drafts of the poem when Deschamps’ men had entered the house.

  He scanned it nervously. If Deschamps had a photocopy of David’s poem then the Frenchman might already be far ahead of them both. Jack frowned, thinking carefully. It seemed that Deschamps’ thug had managed to find the statue, but nothing more than that. It was impossible to tell how much of the rest of the poem was in the Frenchman’s possession – Deschamps might know the whole poem, or just this part. Either way, Jack decided, it was best to proceed as quickly as possible. He looked down and was impressed to see that Cleo had taken the man’s shoelaces and used them to lash his wrists behind his back.

  ‘Did he have anything else on him?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Cleo shook her head. ‘Let’s take him through there.’ She pointed to the farthest corner of the cellar, where a nondescript door was flush against one wall. ‘You carry him.’ By the time Jack had both hands under the man’s armpits and dragged him to the doorway Cleo had it unlocked and was slipping a set of lock picks back into her bag. Jack dragged the bound man into the room and left him slumped in the corner before returning to where Cleo was examining the pillar.