Templar 09 - Secret of the Templars

by Christopher, Paul

  Holliday toed the door open even more and stepped inside, the automatic pistol raised in his hand. He found himself facing a tall man who was either Indian or Pakistani. His hair was slicked back with oil and he wore large mirrored sunglasses. He had a mailing tube slung over his left shoulder and an old MAB Model D in his right hand. The man’s first and only shot splintered the doorframe.

  Holliday fired back, hitting the other man in the meat of his upper arm. The man dropped the old semiautomatic, then charged forward, bullying his way past both Holliday and Lazarus and bolting down the stairs.

  “Follow him!” Holliday yelled, tossing the Walther toward Lazarus. The Interpol agent deftly caught the weapon and headed after the fleeing man.

  Holliday closed the door and stepped forward, going through a series of rooms until he reached Devaux’s compact laboratory. Devaux was on the floor, shot once in the belly and once in the upper chest. He was still breathing.

  Holliday went back into the sitting room, found a pillow and returned to Devaux. He placed the pillow under the dying man’s head and knelt down beside him.

  “Who was it?” Holliday asked.

  “He took the scroll.”

  “Who took the scroll?”

  “I don’t know, never saw him before,” Devaux mumbled, his breath coming hard now.

  “Was it your friend in Mumbai?” Holliday asked, remembering the letter they had taken from the Bingham Gallery.

  “No. The scroll belonged to him.”

  “What’s his name?” Holliday asked.

  “Raman,” said Devaux. “Kota Raman.” He took one heaving breath and then Holliday watched as the life drained out of his eyes. He used his finger and thumb to close them and then stood up.

  Holliday stared down at Devaux’s light table. The man with the oily hair and sunglasses had been a thug. Without bothering to lift the Plexiglas off the table, he’d simply torn off the scroll, leaving the four unrolled pages behind. He’d clearly purchased the mailing tube beforehand to stuff the scroll into it.

  Holliday looked around the laboratory. There were digital photographs, ultraviolet photographs and X-ray plates everywhere, all concentrating on the exposed pages of the script. The only thing that Holliday knew for sure was that the writing was Aramaic. In fact, he’d seen almost the exact same setup in Rafi’s laboratory in Jerusalem. He looked around and saw several flat leather portfolios. He picked the largest and began carefully putting all the photographs and X-rays into it. That left only the four pages of the scroll under the Plexiglas, which he knew he could not remove or transport, so he simply left it where it was.

  There were no filing cabinets or any addresses that Holliday could see. There was, however, a laptop computer. Holliday took it, put it into the portfolio, zipped the container up and left the laboratory.

  He returned to the Meurice, first stripping off the DHL uniform in a narrow alley beside the bar.

  He met up with Lazarus almost three hours later. “Where the hell have you been?” Holliday asked. “I was starting to get worried.”

  “Our man in the sunglasses led me on a long chase,” Lazarus explained. “His first stop was a pharmacy. He was obviously buying something to dress his wound with. After that, he went down to a Métro station, where he went into the men’s room. Five minutes later he was out again and I think he knew he was being tailed. We went all over the city until he finally went down into an RER station and took an express train to Charles de Gaulle. I managed to board it as well. I lost him in all those plastic tubes and escalators, but I checked the departures board and discovered there was only one flight leaving for Mumbai. I could see him through the glass into the security lounge and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. The flight took off an hour and a half later. I waved my Interpol ID around at the Air India desk and they finally gave me the man’s name. His passport identified him as Ranjit Dhaliwal.”

  * * *

  Rusty Smart sat alone in the Arlington safe house brooding. Elliot Foster, the Ghost Squad’s man in Paris, had recently contacted him via coded e-mail. The scroll they had been bidding on had been stolen and Devaux was dead. Somehow Holliday had become involved along the way. The last time Holliday had been spotted was in New York and now here he was booked into the Hôtel Meurice in Paris under the name of a German tourist. Also with him now was the Interpol agent Peter Lazarus.

  According to Foster’s contact at Interpol, Lazarus was a loner and prone to disappearing for weeks at a time before reappearing with a vanished piece of art and a grin on his face. That morning Lazarus and Holliday had booked a direct flight to Mumbai and by now they were almost certainly on their way. The son of a bitch Holliday was as relentless as an avenging angel sent down from the heavens to destroy him and the ghostly empire it had taken him so long to build.

  Smart knew that he had only two choices now: either collapse the empire he had built and make a run for it, or try one last time to save it.

  Russell J. Smart thought briefly about taking his own life but shook off the thought as quickly as it had come. He stared down at the Yale ring on his right hand. Beneath it he knew there was engraved a small pirate’s skull and bones. He rubbed the ring with a finger of his other hand. “Bonesmen forever,” he whispered to himself, and then began to cry.

  He couldn’t fail. It simply wasn’t an option—no matter how you looked at it.

  18

  Holliday and Lazarus arrived at the Grand Sarovar after an hour’s drive through the stupefying, slightly nauseating atmosphere and traffic. By all appearances every single human being smoked. So did a thousand chimneys from a thousand factories, working relentlessly to mass-produce consumer goods for pennies that would magically turn to dollars as soon as they hit the shelves in Walmart and a hundred other companies that took advantage of India’s incredibly low labor costs and the country’s willingness to let its people toil under appalling working conditions.

  The Grand Sarovar was a salute to Mumbai’s new prosperity, a towering modern building, slightly cantilevered on the upper floors and bathed in spotlights that would force any occupant to close its curtains tightly if you wanted to get a good night’s sleep. They walked into the lobby looking ragged from the ten-hour flight and inappropriately dressed for arrival in the fetid air of the Indian city. Both men needed a shave and shower at the very least.

  The man behind the counter wore a turban, had a marvelously sculpted mustache and carried the unsurprising name “Raj” on the breast pocket of his uniform. He looked at Holliday and Lazarus skeptically, but his skepticism turned to utter obsequiousness when he saw Holliday’s black American Express card.

  “I’d like a two-bedroom suite,” said Holliday.

  “Absolutely and immediately, sir. We will provide you with our most wonderful executive suites, one beside the other, to provide you with the two-bedroom accommodation which you require. There is an adjoining door and every possible amenity the hotel can provide for you within seconds of your request. Is that good enough, most excellent sir?”

  “I guess it’ll do,” Holliday said blandly.

  Raj snapped his fingers and out of nowhere three tiny Goanese bellhops appeared. Not one of them was over five feet tall and they looked slightly absurd in their ornate uniforms. There was no way of figuring out how old they were, but from their seamed faces and weary eyes they could easily be in their fifties or sixties.

  “Nikel, Paullu and Pedro would be most happy to carry your bags, sir,” said Raj, smiling so broadly his white teeth glowed and the tips of his mustache almost reached to his cheekbones.

  “Thanks, but that won’t be necessary,” Holliday said, indicating their two overnight bags and the portfolio full of material from Devaux’s laboratory.

  “Nikel, Paullu and Pedro would be most upset if you do not let them take your bags, excellent sirs. It is their only source of income.”

&nbs
p; Lazarus looked appalled. “You don’t pay these people a wage?”

  “Certainly not, sirs,” said Raj with a slight note of disdain in his voice. “They pay us for the jobs. It is a great honor for one of their people to be chosen to work at this grand hotel.”

  The tips, of course, thought Lazarus. They handed one piece of luggage to each of the three bellhops.

  Raj handed Holliday and Lazarus two key cards each and then said in an imperious voice, “Suites 1109 and 1108.”

  The bellhops scuttled off ahead of them, and they all rode the elevator happily up to the eleventh floor. There was slight confusion as to which person was occupying which suite, but they finally got it all sorted out and the men tipped each of the bellhops lavishly. The three Goans took the American dollars, their eyes almost popping from their heads, and bowed their way out of the room.

  “The world turned upside down,” said Lazarus. “A hotel where the employees pay the employers.”

  “I think we may find the whole country is that way,” Holliday replied.

  * * *

  They had spent most of their time on the flight from Paris going over the possible ways to approach the man named Kota Raman and had decided that the direct approach was most probably the best.

  “So how do we do that?” Lazarus had said as they flew over the Indian Ocean.

  “He’s a big-time criminal in a giant city. That means he probably controls everything from gambling to whorehouses to the black market.”

  “Which of those do we start with?” Lazarus had asked.

  “I was going to ask you the same question,” Holliday had said.

  “I’ve only been to a casino once. I’ve never been to a brothel. So I guess it better be the black market. It’s more my cup of tea anyway.”

  The next morning they shrugged off what they could of the jet lag and returned to the lobby to find Raj the Sikh still on duty.

  “Do you remember us?” Holliday asked.

  “Most definitely, excellent sir. I must say that my bellhops and I were most grateful for your esteemed generosity.”

  “Dear Lord,” said Lazarus. “Do you take a kickback from the bellhops?”

  “Of course, sir,” said Raj. “It is necessary for them to retain their employment. It is all part of the system, sir.”

  “Where do I find the black market for ivory?” Holliday asked bluntly.

  “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  “Black market. Ivory,” repeated Holliday.

  “I have no idea what you are talking about, sir. I am merely a humble night manager.”

  “If I understand this system of yours, this should do something to change your mind.” Holliday took out his wallet and placed a single hundred-dollar bill on the marble counter. It disappeared in the blink of an eye.

  “Well?” Holliday said.

  “Bakshi’s Antiquities on Mutton Street in the bazaar. Would you like a cab, sir? They all know the way.”

  “Sure.”

  “I shall fetch one immediately.”

  The old black-and-yellow taxicab was a knockoff of a 1962 Peugeot, decorated with pompoms, decals, curlicues, swastikas and artificial flowers glued to the roof above the door posts and the windshield.

  Reaching Mutton Street and turning into it was like trying to swim upriver in a current of honking cars and wandering merchants festooned in wristwatches, long bolts of cloth and anything else that could be pinned, hung or draped around necks or arms. Tuk-tuks raced in all directions, chased by scooters and 50cc motorcycles. Cymbals clanged, horns honked, people pitched their wares in loud voices and once more smoke stood like soup above them in the thick humid air.

  Eventually forcing its way to the sidewalk, the old cab pulled up in front of a shop with the name “Bakshi’s Antiquities” written in faded paint on an old board. Above the shop, like everywhere else on the street, grotesque apartment blocks hung over everything. Here and there banners had been strung across the street bearing inscrutable messages and in the middle distance a train groaned its way across an overpass. Holliday paid the driver with a fistful of bills and he and Lazarus exited onto the crowded sidewalk. The air was redolent with spices and cigarette smoke.

  They pushed through a dozen people yelling and thrusting their goods in front of them and finally reached the door of Bakshi’s.

  They went inside, slammed the door shut and stood for a moment enjoying the relative quiet and semidarkness.

  “It’s the Old Curiosity Shop,” whispered Lazarus, eyes wide as he gazed around the small room, its every shelf, counter and display case bearing strange treasures from another age and another world. Rattan chairs of indeterminate age hung from hooks on the ceiling, along with lanterns, incense burners, three brass monkeys dangling from chains. There were books, boxes of wood and ivory, figurines carved in jade, Buddhas in various sizes and made from various materials, from weathered sandalwood and brass to copper and stone, and one small one looked as though it might have been made of gold. There were Victorian mirrors, piles of rugs, one complete Bombay regiment Sepoy uniform draped on a mannequin. At the back of the store a very old man, his long white hair tied in a rough quoit at the back of his head and wearing a long white silk sherwani and thin linen trousers, sat on a high stool watching them.

  Holliday and Lazarus stepped carefully down an aisle of treasures and approached him.

  “May I help you?” the old man said, his hands coming together in the classic prayerful greeting. His face was kind and gentle. His dark eyes glittered intelligently from behind a pair of gold-rim spectacles that might easily have been an item for sale in his store.

  “We’re interested in ivory,” said Lazarus.

  “I have an old chess set from the early 1800s you might be interested in,” said the man.

  “You are Mr. Bakshi, I suppose.” Lazarus smiled.

  “I am, sir.” The old man nodded.

  “Well, sir, we’re interested in more ivory than a chess set.”

  “I think I may have a piece of scrimshaw done on a whale’s tooth by a seaman from a royal West Indian merchant ship from the same period as the chess set,” said Bakshi.

  “Larger than a whale’s tooth, I think, Mr. Bakshi.”

  Bakshi continued staring at them pleasantly, but Holliday saw the old man’s right hand drifting under the counter.

  “Gentlemen, I fear you are saying less than you mean to say.”

  “You’d be right,” said Lazarus.

  “Then perhaps you’d tell me exactly what you are looking for.”

  “Well, if we’re going to be exact,” said Lazarus, “let’s say we want exactly sixty kilos of ivory—or even more, if you have access to it.”

  “Trafficking in ivory of that quantity is both expensive and illegal.”

  “How expensive?”

  “Approximately three thousand per kilo, American currency.”

  “So sixty kilos would cost me a hundred and eighty thousand dollars?” Lazarus said.

  “It would cost you that or slightly more if I had it to sell, but, being a law-abiding citizen, I don’t deal in such exotic or illegal sales.”

  “We heard that you did,” said Holliday, keeping his eye on the man’s right arm as it inched forward under the counter.

  “And who did you hear this lie from?” Bakshi asked quietly.

  “A friend of yours,” said Lazarus.

  “And what friend would that be?” asked Bakshi.

  “A close one,” said Holliday. “His name is Kota Raman.”

  The man’s right arm jerked forward under the counter. Holliday had been ready for the move and reached over, gripping the man’s thin wrist as it reappeared. The hand below the wrist held a massive and very old Webley service revolver. Had he managed to fire it, the .455 caliber cartridge would have blown a hole in him the size of a
golf ball. Holliday used his free hand to pry the weapon out of the old man’s grip.

  “Now, now,” said Lazarus, staring at the huge pistol. “There’s no need for violence.”

  Holliday slipped the pistol into the pocket of his jacket. He’d noticed that the weapon was an original 1888 model, which made it even older than Bakshi.

  “We’re not really looking for ivory, Mr. Bakshi,” said Holliday. “We’re looking for Kota Raman. Perhaps you could tell us where to find him.”

  Bakshi, somewhat deflated, sank down on his stool again. He sighed. “I know of no such man.”

  “Of course you do,” said Lazarus. “If you didn’t know him, why did you pull that great ugly thing out from under the counter at the mere mention of his name?”

  Bakshi carefully took off his spectacles and placed them on the counter, his hand shaking. He took a linen handkerchief from the breast pocket of his long coat and polished the lenses of the glasses, buying time to assemble his thoughts. Finally he replaced the spectacles and the handkerchief back where they belonged and spoke. “I know of the man,” he said. “He is not someone to be taken lightly.”

  “All we want to know is where to find him.”

  “I’m afraid I cannot tell you,” said Bakshi. “It is worth my life and the life of my family to give you that information.”

  “Put it this way,” said Lazarus brightly. “Whether you tell us or not, we will eventually find Mr. Raman, and when we do, we’ll tell him that it was you who led us to him and he’ll kill you and your family anyway. So why not tell us now and save ourselves all a great deal of time and effort?”

  “If I tell you,” said Bakshi wearily, “will you give me your promise that you will not tell him that it was me who told you?”