by Alex Archer
At precisely twelve, Magdelaine opened the door to her office and greeted him with a smile. “Jean-Baptiste, how pleasant to see you.”
Laframboise put on his best smile. His wealth didn’t impress her. Magdelaine had a number of wealthy clients, and she had considerable wealth of her own. Clients not only paid her steep prices, but they also befriended her, often giving her investment tips that had proven to be lucrative. Laframboise had done background checks on the woman.
“Magdelaine, you look positively radiant.” Laframboise took her proffered hand and kissed the back of it.
“Flatterer.” Her full, plump lips tweaked in a smile.
“But no, love, I’m only speaking the truth. As you do.” Just as Laframboise was about to release her hand, he felt an electric tingle in his hand that coursed up his arm to his heart.
That had never before happened.
Magdelaine’s smile faltered for just a moment and something flashed in her eyes. “You’ve brought me something to look at, haven’t you?”
“I have.”
“And it’s very important to you.”
“Yes.” Laframboise released her hand and turned back to the man holding the case. He gestured and the man came over at once with the case.
Campra never moved.
Laframboise held the case up for inspection. Magdelaine hesitated, then ran her hands over it.
“This is very powerful. Very dangerous.” She looked at him. “But you already know this, don’t you?”
“No.” Laframboise gave her a smile he didn’t truly feel. “That’s why I brought it to you. To learn.”
Magdelaine stepped back inside her office. “Bring it inside. Let’s have a look at it.”
28
Laframboise followed Magdelaine into her private office. The room was understated, darkened by the heavy drapes pulled against the noonday sun, and furnished in heavy wooden pieces that were more than a hundred years old. The broad desk was clear of everything except a black velvet spread.
“Put it here.” Magdelaine gestured to the desk as she walked around behind it. She sat as Laframboise placed the case on one of the two chairs in front of the desk and opened it.
Gently, he lifted the dragon lantern from the foam padding and placed it on the black velvet. The dragon sat there, frozen in bronze and roosting on its wooden platform. Laframboise sat in the other chair and gazed at the fortune-teller.
“What is this?” Magdelaine studied the lantern but she made no move to touch it.
“It’s called a magic lantern.”
“Why?” Magdelaine’s voice had taken on a dreamy quality, like she was half in the physical world and half somewhere else.
Laframboise was impressed. He’d seen her like this before, but she had never gone into a trance state so quickly. “It’s an old magician’s trick. A device used to project images to scare people. Illusionists used these before the digital age of holograms.”
“This one—” Magdelaine’s voice was almost a whisper “—is very old.”
“Yes.”
“Very dangerous.”
“How so?”
“People have killed for this.” Her dark eyes focused on him for a moment. “You have killed for this.”
Laframboise didn’t deny the charges, but neither did he admit to them. He trusted Magdelaine implicitly, but he knew that the police sometimes bugged her office while she underwent an investigation. As far as he knew, she wasn’t currently under suspicion. But he didn’t take chances.
Magdelaine shifted her attention back to the lantern. “You betrayed a man for this lantern.”
Laframboise squirmed in the seat. He had known that Magdelaine would undoubtedly ferret that out, but it was the price of finding out more about the lantern. He remained silent. She didn’t judge. Probably a lot of her business involved those who weren’t good people.
“This man was very powerful. Very dangerous. You have made a mistake there.”
He curbed a sharp retort. He didn’t like being told about his mistakes or what he should do. “Tell me about the lantern. I want to know the secrets it holds. I know all I need to about its current history.”
“Of course.” Magdelaine placed both her hands on the desk, palms turned upright, but she still made no effort to touch the lantern. She certainly seemed wary of it. She was more tense than he could remember ever seeing her. Her eyes grew darker and looked through him. “This object belonged to a family. It was an heirloom, something they regarded very highly. It was taken from them, but not without their knowledge.”
Laframboise considered that. He’d believed the lantern stolen by Anton Dutilleaux when he’d left Shanghai.
Magdelaine frowned. “There is something missing.” She cocked her head to one side. “Something that was in the lantern.”
“Something was concealed in the lantern?” He wasn’t supposed to ask questions that might shape Magdelaine’s efforts or lead her astray. As she had explained her work, the connection she made to people, things and events was tenuous at best.
She shook her head and frowned. She closed her eyes for a moment. “Something valuable was hidden in the lantern. A fortune. A treasure.”
Laframboise’s heart beat faster and he had to restrain himself from moving. “Where is the treasure? What is it?”
Eyes still closed, Magdelaine shook her head. “You cannot demand. You know that.”
Restraining his anger and impatience, Laframboise nodded. Magdelaine had been a favorite of his, and her glimpses into his future had nearly always been helpful.
Magdelaine took in a deep breath and let it out again. “One of the contents of the lanterns was hope. I feel that emotion very strongly. It was hope for the future, hope for an escape. It promised an end to very bad circumstances.”
“For the man who owned this lantern?”
“Yes. But there were several who have owned this lantern. The bad circumstances belonged to the original owner. He made his life harder by choosing to take the treasure. But the hope he had then echoes still within this lantern.”
He said nothing, but he was seething inside. He couldn’t sell hope. There was no method of weighing or measuring it. He stifled a growl of frustration.
“The lantern was a doorway to another world.”
Those words checked Laframboise’s anger and he was certain he felt a cool breeze pass over his face. That told him he was in the presence of real magic, the kind Magdelaine had always brought. Once she had told him about an investigation by the Sûreté that could have gotten him in a lot of trouble, or possibly in prison for several years, in time for him to prevent it.
Magdelaine raised her hand before her, eyes still shut, as though she was reaching for a door. “I can feel the door, and I can feel those who are just on the other side.” She lowered her hand and placed it once more beside the lantern.
Another chill passed through Laframboise. Part of the legend that surrounded the lantern was that Anton Dutilleaux had been killed by a vengeful ghost. Laframboise had accepted the fact that the lantern might be haunted.
Magdelaine opened her eyes and focused on him. “Taking this lantern was a very bad thing, Jean-Baptiste.”
“Not if it leads me to treasure.”
Darkness clouded Magdelaine’s face. “You will never see the treasure.”
The chill returned, and this time it was almost cold enough to turn Laframboise’s blood to ice. “Why?”
“Because this lantern is going to get you killed.”
Frozen by her words, Laframboise was slow to react when a section of the wall slid open behind Magdelaine. From the hollow, two Asian men dressed in black stepped into the room. They held machine pistols equipped with laser sights.
The ruby dots centered on his chest.
A third man stepped from the recess, as well, and this one Laframboise could put a name to. “Zhang.”
Zhang was Puyi-Jin’s right-hand man. Although only in his early thirties, Zhang had kil
led dozens of men and steadily climbed to a position of prominence. There was even a story that when his predecessor turned and agreed to immunity in England in exchange for his testimony, Zhang had gotten himself sent to the same holding facility to kill him. And got away.
“Good afternoon, M. Laframboise.” Zhang spoke French without an inflection. He was of medium height and compact; wearing black clothing and a long leather duster. To most observers, he didn’t look like a dangerous man. His face was filled with hard planes, and his short-cropped hair was black. A scar ran across his chin and a wispy mustache drew a line over his mouth. He held no weapon in his hands.
Magdelaine stood up from the desk and retreated against the room’s back wall. “You promised me that there would be no bloodshed in this place.”
Zhang’s hard eyes never left Laframboise. “That promise is contingent on the behavior of your guest.”
Laframboise turned to Magdelaine, hurt and confused. He thought of how the treasure the lantern hid was almost within his grasp. “You betrayed me?”
Magdelaine didn’t answer.
“You betrayed me? Me? After all these years?” Laframboise couldn’t believe it.
Zhang stood there complacently, his hands clasped.
Tears leaked down Magdelaine’s cheeks. “I was given no choice. They knew you would come here to ask about the lantern.”
“You could have warned me.”
“I have warned you. What you do in this room, how you act now, will determine whether you live or die. Choose to live, Jean-Baptiste. What is on the other side will be very dark and cold for you. You must atone for what you have done in this life.”
“My boss is being very generous today, M. Laframboise.” Zhang spoke flatly, as if he didn’t care about anything Laframboise said or did. “In spite of your treachery and deceit, he is willing to let you live. All you have to do is walk away.”
Laframboise cursed the man, but he made no move to reach for a weapon. The laser sights remained unwavering.
Zhang didn’t appear to take the abuse personally. Until his boss told him to kill, he wouldn’t. And even when he did, the bloodshed would be impersonal.
Angry and trapped, Laframboise rested his hands on his thighs, touching the key chain in his pants pocket. Gently, he pressed the panic button, sending a silent command to Gilbert Campra in the outer room.
Laframboise fixed his gaze on Magdelaine. “You shouldn’t have betrayed me, Magdelaine. That wasn’t wise of you.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t have a choice. And the warning I gave you is true—the lantern will get you killed.”
Zhang gave a command in Chinese. One of the men stepped forward and seized the lantern. Taking the padded case, the man placed the object inside and shut it. Laframboise had to restrain himself from lunging for the lantern.
“In the future, M. Laframboise, my boss will not be so generous.” Zhang stared at Laframboise.
“Tell him that I was being generous, too. I only took the lantern. I didn’t take his life. Now things have changed.”
A smile touched Zhang’s mouth, but there was no warmth in his expression. “I will tell him that. I hope that once I do, we will see each other again. Soon.” He nodded at the man with the lantern.
Holding the lantern under one arm, the man stepped up into the recessed area behind the desk. Laframboise tried to peer into the darkness, but couldn’t. There had to be a passage. He assumed it led into the room behind Magdelaine’s office.
Zhang turned to follow.
At that moment, the office door burst open and Campra took cover to one side. He brought up his H&K MP5 outfitted with a sound suppressor. The machine pistol chugged to life.
29
“Guys, we have a problem.”
In the stairwell just outside the door leading to the sixth floor, Annja came to a halt and looked at Fiona. The other woman drew her pistol from the folds of her jacket. Annja reached for the sword and felt it in her fingers but didn’t pull it into the stairwell.
“What problem, Heimdall?” Fiona peered through the wire mesh window that looked into the hallway.
Annja leaned in beside her. Only a short distance away, a lone guard stood at the entrance to Magdelaine de Brosses’s suite. Heimdall had told them about the man. The two other guards and Laframboise had to be inside.
“The psychic woman has just called the police.” Heimdall’s voice sounded more urgent. “I took the liberty of tapping her phone lines as a precaution.”
Annja was impressed. This was way past television host skill sets.
“Why did she call the police?”
“There’s some trouble in the office.”
“What trouble?”
“I’m looking… . The psychic rents the room behind her office, as well.”
Fiona glanced at Annja. “A bolt hole.”
“Yes.” Heimdall sounded more strained. “I’m checking through the security footage… . Late last night, a group of Chinese men entered that office. They haven’t come out.”
Fiona nodded. “Then we have to assume we aren’t the only ones who know about Magdelaine de Brosses’s second room. Can you identify the men?”
“I’ve downloaded images of them, but I don’t have access to those kinds of databases. I’m limited to situations like these. I never cared to get into anything heavier.”
“Understood. I have a chap who can take care of the identification. Just keep those images.”
At that moment, the sharp cracks of gunfire sounded from inside the office. The guard drew his weapon and charged.
“Well, that’s a sure indication that things have gone awry. The second room is just around the way?”
“Yes.”
Fiona opened the door and raced into the hallway. “Since our quarry hasn’t come back through this door, let’s assume he—or someone—is going to come through the other one.” She started running toward the intersection of hallways only a short distance ahead of her. Her feet made no sound on the plush carpet. Annja kept pace.
* * *
LAFRAMBOISE PUSHED HIMSELF up from his chair and snapped his right wrist, then twisted. Immediately a small, heavy-caliber Semmerling XLM derringer popped into his hand.
The weapon was almost a museum piece and hard to acquire. Once Laframboise had heard of the weapon, he’d had to have it. Chambered in .45 ACP and semiautomatic, the pistol was deadly in close quarters.
It was also painful to shoot. He squeezed the trigger and immediately felt like someone had struck his hand with a baseball bat. No matter how much time he’d spent at the target range, his grip and his reaction to the recoil couldn’t prevent it. Shooting the pistol hurt.
But it also gave him a chance to get back the lantern. The bullet struck Zhang high on the left shoulder and staggered the man, knocking him to the ground. Laframboise fired again but he’d hurried his shot. The bullet gouged the wood surrounding the hidden door and tore a white scar across the varnished surface.
With only three rounds left, Laframboise turned his attention to the man carrying the lantern. He aimed low, starting at the man’s knees and letting the pistol rise naturally on the successive recoils. He fired the three remaining rounds in a thunderous roll.
The heavy-caliber bullets tore the man’s legs out from beneath him and left him flattened on the ground, the lantern on top of him.
Partially deaf from the detonations in the enclosed room, Laframboise shoved the pistol back up his sleeve and locked it into place. Then he reached for the pistol at his hip.
Campra had already killed the other Chinese gangster. Blood splashed the wall behind the man and soaked the bullet holes. Magdelaine had shrunk down in the corner and was trying to wrap her arms over her head and hide herself. She was screaming, and Laframboise couldn’t help but wonder what she might have seen in her immediate future.
“Gilbert, be careful of the lantern.”
Campra nodded.
Holding his pistol before him in bot
h hands, Laframboise took one step to the side to get around the desk. He intended to finish killing Zhang if the man wasn’t dead.
Instead, Zhang seemed to return to life. The Chinese killer jerked and rolled over. In that brief second, Laframboise saw there was no blood on the man’s back and knew that Zhang must have been wearing body armor. A pistol appeared in Zhang’s hand as if by magic.
“Look out!” Campra brought up the machine pistol. Before he could fire, Zhang fired three rounds into him, knocking him back. The H&K flew from his hands.
Laframboise brought his pistol to bear and fired two shots. He didn’t think either of them hit his target, and then he was looking down the barrel of Zhang’s weapon.
Cursing, Laframboise threw himself backward and down, seeking shelter as a bullet cut the wind near his ear. He took cover behind the desk. The wood vibrated as Zhang continued firing. The rounds cored through in a couple places, but most of them were stopped.
Magdelaine wailed and shrieked in the sudden silence. She was shaking uncontrollably now.
Laframboise cursed her silently. Even without psychic powers, she should have been able to see what was going to happen. Thinking that Zhang had cycled his weapon dry, Laframboise rose from behind the desk with his pistol gripped in both hands.
Zhang wasn’t there. Neither was the lantern case. Only the wounded man remained, and he was trying desperately to escape by crawling away. Mercilessly, Laframboise shot the man through the head from behind. By the time the corpse collapsed, Laframboise was already moving toward Campra.
Blood matted Campra’s left shoulder. Bullets had made holes in his jacket, and there was a tear on the right side where a round had ricocheted and tore through the coat. Campra wore body armor, as well. As Laframboise watched, the man finally managed to draw a deep breath. Then he rolled over, cursed and reached for the machine pistol.
“Did you get him?” Campra rose to his feet, dropped the empty magazine and fed another one into the weapon.
“Zhang? No. He’s gone, and he’s got my lantern.”