The Atlantis Code

by Charles Brokaw

  “We don’t have time to shop,” Natasha said.

  Reluctantly, Leslie returned the purse.

  “Where are we supposed to meet your friend?” Natasha asked.

  “It’s not far,” Lourds replied.

  An hour later, Lourds stood nursing a cup of Turkish coffee in front of a shop advertising American jeans for sale. Leslie had immediately dismissed them as knockoffs. Lourds wouldn’t have known. Gary passed the time filming bits and pieces of different shops, and even had Leslie doing lead-ins and closings for a proposal they were going to do for the BBC.

  “Are you certain your friend is still going to be here?” Natasha asked in Russian.

  “Josef said he would be here,” Lourds replied in English. He didn’t want Leslie and Gary to feel shut out of the conversation.

  Another uncomfortable minute passed. It slowly stretched into five more.

  Natasha moved to stand in front of Lourds. For an instant he thought she was going to take umbrage with him over their situation, but her attention was focused on a young man who was approaching them. Her hand was in her coat pocket.

  There was no doubt about the young man’s destination. He stopped a few feet away. Both his hands were in his pockets. Lourds knew what the young man had his hands on. The man’s eyes never left Natasha’s, and Lourds figured that was because the man had assessed her as the most dangerous among them.

  “Professor Lourds.” The young man’s English was impeccable.

  “Yes.”

  “Josef Danilovic sent me.”

  “Do you have any proof?” Natasha demanded.

  The young man grinned and shrugged. “This isn’t a place for proving things. Nor is it a place for police. I come to offer you a way out of the city. It’s your choice whether you follow me.”

  Lourds’s phone rang. He answered it. The battery charge was almost exhausted. “Hello.”

  “Thomas,” Danilovic greeted in a jovial voice that betrayed a little tension.

  “Hello, Josef. I think we’ve just met your intermediary.”

  “His name is Viktor,” Danilovic said. “You can trust him.”

  Lourds knew the young man was expecting the call. Viktor remained totally relaxed. Natasha hadn’t let her guard down.

  “Perhaps you could describe him,” Lourds suggested. “We tend toward a little paranoia at this end these days.”

  “Certainly. These are very paranoid times.” Danilovic provided a good description.

  “Thank you, Josef. I hope to see you soon.” Lourds ended the call.

  “Is this him?” Natasha asked.

  “Yes. Josef described him. Including what he was wearing.”

  Viktor grinned again. “Of course, I could have an associate who’s holding a gun to your friend’s head. I mean, if you want to follow your paranoid tendencies. But if you do, I doubt you’ll ever leave this marketplace.”

  Lourds gathered his backpack and slung it over one shoulder. “Let’s go.”

  “You’ve outdone yourself this time, old friend,” Lourds congratulated. He referred to the table laden with food that sat in the large dining room of Danilovic’s home. Lourds had been there on several occasions as a guest and was used to the opulence with which Danilovic furnished his home.

  An ornate dining room table and chairs that could have graced a royal’s home occupied the center of the room. The walls were covered with paintings while vases and other collectibles filled in the gaps.

  Danilovic waved the compliment away. He was a small fastidious man with a thin mustache. He wore his expensive suit with confidence and pride.

  “I figured if I were going to affect an escape from Moscow for you, then it should be one of great style, yes?” Danilovic’s wide smile revealed a gap between his teeth. He held his forefinger and thumb a small distance apart. “And, perhaps, with just a hint of danger.”

  “I’ll take a pass on the danger if you don’t mind,” Lourds said ruefully. “In my opinion, we’ve had quite enough of it for the last few days.”

  The table even had name cards to designate the seating arrangement. Lourds and Danilovic occupied the ends. With no real surprise, Lourds noted that Danilovic positioned the two women at his end of the table.

  White-bloused servers poured wine; then the chef came out to announce the menu. Despite the tension on the faces of everyone at the table, Lourds saw that all of them listened to the chef raptly.

  “I thought perhaps a French cuisine might be in order,” the chef said. “We will begin with a nice salad, boeuf bourguignon, a nice beef stewed in red wine, escargots de bourgogne, with parsley butter, fondue bourguignonne, gougère, and pochouse, which is one of my specialties.” He clicked his heels and returned to the kitchen.

  “I don’t know what he said,” Gary told them, “but it sounded great.”

  “Auguste is an excellent chef,” Danilovic replied. “I borrowed him from one of the restaurants for the evening.”

  “You didn’t have to go to all this trouble,” Lourds protested.

  “I know,” Danilovic said. “For you, you would have been satisfied with a sandwich and a beer. But for the ladies—” He glanced at Natasha and Leslie. “—them I was most eager to impress.”

  “I’m duly impressed,” Leslie said.

  “Thank you, my dear.” Danilovic picked up her hand and kissed it.

  You old ham, Lourds thought, even as he couldn’t help but smile at his friend’s antics. Danilovic was one of the most social men Lourds knew. He enjoyed putting on a show and being at the center of it.

  Dinner followed in short order. A zesty, crisp salad followed by the beef soup, then escargots baked in their shells. Gary balked at the snails and wouldn’t eat them. Lourds thought the parsley butter was the best he’d ever had and sent word back to the chef.

  The fondue had pieces of beef that rounded out the flavor and made it even more tasty. The gougère were cheese balls rolled in choux pastry. But the crowning achievement was the pochouse, fish stewed in red wine.

  Desert was a strawberry-and-mascarpone-cream tart that melted in the mouth.

  Later, they gathered in Danilovic’s den in front of a fire that staved off the outside chill of the night. Lourds and Danilovic fired up cigars, and both were surprised when Natasha agreed to smoke one as well. They drank brandy from large glasses.

  “You don’t know these men who are pursuing you?” Danilovic asked.

  Lourds shook his head. “I think I recognized some of them from Alexandria.”

  “So you think they are on the same trail as you?”

  “It’s the only answer.” Lourds had settled into a deep easy chair that he found entirely too comfortable. “There’s no reason for them to be interested in me.”

  Danilovic leaned forward and patted Lourds on the knee. “I’ve always found you interesting, my dear professor.”

  “You’re drunk,” Lourds accused.

  “Perhaps a little.” Danilovic looked at Leslie. “But perhaps it was not you, my friend. Perhaps it was our television star.”

  “I’m no star,” Leslie said. “And I don’t know anything about history or language or artifacts.”

  “You know that they all go together,” Danilovic said. “Most people don’t know that.” He tapped ash into an ashtray as he gazed at her speculatively. “Yet you found the bell in Alexandria.”

  “That was quite by accident.”

  Danilovic shrugged. “I tend to be a man of faith, dear lady, though I am in a profession that some might feel descried that. These other men, the ones who pursue you, were already looking for this bell—or at least something similar—otherwise, they wouldn’t have come for it.”

  “We can figure out who is chasing you,” Natasha stated quietly. “By identifying them, by knowing more about why they want the instruments, we know more about the instruments themselves.”

  Danilovic smiled beatifically. “Yes. You see, my friend, whenever I sell a piece that has come into my possession, I h
ave to know who I’m getting it from, who I’m selling it to, and enough about the item to know what makes it valuable to both. Why are you so interested in these items?”

  “Because of the language,” Lourds answered immediately.

  “That’s your value, but few people would be interested in a dead language that might take years to unravel.”

  “I don’t think it will take that long,” Lourds said. “If I can figure out what the instruments pertain to, I should be able to make an educated guess and back that up with facts.”

  Danilovic patted Lourds on the shoulder. “I’m sure that you will. However, the materials those instruments are made of are basically worthless. Not gold or silver. Not encrusted with gems. Plain things. With secrets written on them.”

  “But the people who swiped those instruments already know what’s written on them,” Gary said. He leaned forward excitedly. “At least, they know whatever’s supposed to be written on them. Like a treasure map or something.”

  Lourds considered that. “The people who took the instruments know what they’re looking for. They just don’t have what’s written on the instruments.”

  “So where did their knowledge come from?” Leslie asked.

  “That’s one of the questions you should be asking,” Danilovic said. “By asking that, you’ve already narrowed the field of who might be chasing you.”

  “And why are they still after us?” Gary asked.

  “For two reasons,” Natasha announced quietly. “One is that they’re afraid Professor Lourds will crack the language and possibly expose the secrets they’re protecting. And the other is that Professor Lourds has been, by luck or by design, in touch with two of the instruments they’re searching for.”

  “We’re going to have to be off to Leipzig as quickly as we can, old friend,” Lourds said to Danilovic.

  “And quit my hospitality so soon?” Danilovic looked surprised.

  “If it were for any other reason—”

  Danilovic held up a hand and smiled. “I take no slight. I understand your pressing need. The matter has already been arranged. Viktor will take you to a ship in the morning that I’ve secured passage on for you.”

  “Thank you,” Lourds said.

  “For tonight, we should enjoy what’s left of this fine brandy and talk of old times.”

  CHAPTER

  12

  ILLICHIVSK MARITIME TRADE PORT

  ODESSA OBLAST, UKRAINE

  AUGUST 24, 2009

  W

  here are you, Natasha?” Ivan Chernovsky sounded calm, but Natasha knew from long association that the man was anything but that.

  “In Illichivsk.” Natasha didn’t lie. She thought perhaps he would recognize her lies as easily as she recognized his.

  The port area was jammed with business and trade. Twelve miles southwest of Odessa proper and the second largest warmwater seaport in the oblast, Illichivsk sprang up around the port as the home of the Black Sea Shipping Company. Ships of all sizes sat anchored at the docks or moved slowly through the waters. Longshoremen moved freight onto and off the cargo ships.

  “What are you doing there?” Chernovsky asked.

  “I’m looking for my sister’s murderer. I called hoping you could help me.”

  “Forensics found an old bullet in the man’s body,” Chernovsky said. “Evidently he’d been shot at some point and hadn’t had access to a medical facility. The wound eventually healed, but the bullet remained.”

  “You identified the bullet the way we did when we worked the Karpov murder,” Natasha said.

  “Yes. The bullet belonged to the weapon we took off a Mafiya enforcer,” Chernovsky continued. “Once the bullet was identified, I went to see this man.”

  Natasha kept her gaze roving. Leslie had returned to Lourds and Gary. But another man stood only a few meters away.

  The man was slovenly. He wore a cap pulled low over his eyes and a checked lightweight jacket. A casual observer might have mistaken him for a dockworker. Natasha noted the good boots the man wore and knew he wasn’t used to working on the dock, even though he’d dressed for it. Chernovsky had taught her to watch people’s shoes. They often changed their clothing before or after an illegal activity, but they seldom changed their shoes.

  Standing against a container awaiting loading, the man occasionally nodded to other dockhands and sipped from a Styrofoam cup. He also spoke on a cell phone. Not many of the longshoremen could afford or carry a cell phone.

  “This man identified the dead man as part of a crew that attempted to steal a load of illegal Iraqi antiques that came in during the American war. I talked with some of the street dealers that traffic in such things. I also flashed the dead man’s picture. His name was Yuri Kartsev.”

  “His name means nothing to me.” Natasha knew Chernovsky was waiting for a response.

  “Perhaps it might to the professor.”

  “I’ll ask him.” She also knew that was Chernovsky’s way of confirming they were still traveling together.

  “This Kartsev was known to work with a man named—” Pages rustled as Chernovsky checked his notes. “—Gallardo. Patrizio Gallardo.”

  “I don’t know that name either.”

  “Well, that name comes with a history.” Chernovsky took a deep breath.

  The man watching Lourds and his group put his phone back into his pocket and lit a cigarette. Natasha’s stomach unclenched a little at that. Whoever he was waiting for wasn’t yet in the area.

  Natasha watched the watcher but spoke quickly to Chernovsky. “I know you want to keep me hanging on as long as you can, Ivan. If I were in your shoes, I’d do the same thing. The problem is that we are exposed. And I think that the men chasing us are closing in even as we speak. So perhaps you could tell me what you know.”

  Chernovsky hesitated. Natasha suspected their supervisor might even be listening to the phone call.

  “Patrizio Gallardo is a very bad man, Natasha,” Chernovsky said. “He’s a thief and a killer. Not a man to trust.”

  “Does he work for himself or someone else?”

  “Both. He does piecework. He specializes in illegal antique acquisitions.”

  “Who does he work for?”

  “He owes no allegiance that I have discovered yet. I will keep looking.”

  “Please,” Natasha said. “I will be in touch again as I am able.”

  “Where should I next expect you to call from?”

  “I will let you know. We’re going to be moving a lot. Thank you, Ivan.”

  “Keep yourself safe, Natasha. I would see you home again soon.”

  Natasha cradled the phone and headed across the street. It was time to do something about the watcher.

  Patrizio Gallardo bulled through the port as he folded and pocketed his cell phone. He picked up the pace as he spotted the freighter, Winding Star, lying at anchorage about three hundred meters away.

  According to his informant’s report, Lourds and his party were nearby.

  Four of his men walked with him. All of them had weapons tucked beneath their coats.

  A police car pulled into the street beside Gallardo. Two uniformed policemen sat up front. A man in plainclothes sat in the back.

  Gallardo’s personal radar for policemen jangled. Instinctively, he turned toward a side street. They’d left a hell of a mess in Moscow, and he had to wonder if it was coming back to haunt him.

  Brakes squeaked out on the street. A motor changed pitch.

  “The police car is coming after us,” one of the men said.

  “Break off,” Gallardo directed. “Cover me if they pick me up.” He kept walking, but he listened intently as the tires of the approaching car crunched across loose gravel.

  A voice addressed Gallardo in Russian. He ignored it. A lot of the sailors who came to the port didn’t speak Russian.

  “Sir,” a man called out in English this time.

  Gallardo continued without pause. Some sailors didn’t speak English.r />
  Car doors opened. Footsteps ran after him.

  Calmly, Gallardo reached through the opening in his coat pocket for the 9 mm pistol holstered on his hip. If the police were looking for him, they weren’t just going to ask him a few questions.

  A hand fell onto Gallardo’s shoulder.

  “Sir,” the policeman said.

  Gallardo stopped suddenly and turned. The movement caught the policeman off guard. Gallardo had his pistol against the policeman’s stomach before the man knew what was going on. Holding his left hand behind the man’s head so he could use him as a shield, Gallardo fired three times in quick succession. He would have fired at least one more time, but the pistol’s action jammed on the folds of the coat.

  The harsh cracks of the pistol filled the alley.

  The policeman staggered and slumped against Gallardo. The young man’s features went wide with shock.

  The plainclothes inspector and the policeman tried to get out of the car with their weapons drawn. DiBenedetto walked up behind the police inspector almost casually, put a pistol to the back of the man’s head, and blew his brains out.

  Realizing the danger he was in, the driver tried to turn around. DiBenedetto shot the policeman in the face twice and kicked him to the ground.

  When Gallardo pushed the dead man away from him, the corpse hit the ground. A rectangle of plastic on the man’s left sleeve caught Gallardo’s eyes. He knelt for a closer look.

  The rectangle contained a photograph of him. It was the same kind of setup they’d used to get the Russian professor.

  “Patrizio,” DiBenedetto called. He held up the plainclothes inspector’s arm. Blood covered much of it, but the plastic rectangle was visible.

  They knew who he was.

  The cold realization twisted in Gallardo’s stomach. He didn’t know how they had identified him. He’d been careful most of his life, but the police had jailed him a couple of times.