A King's Ransom

she said. “Jane Sperling was Jewish. Did she know her teacher was a Nazi? Hang on.” She tapped a few more words into the computer and then turned back to Dan. “Just what I thought. The Nazis took over the government in 1933. Jewish students were pressured to leave universities as early as 1932. Eventually, the Nazis expelled Jewish students from every university in Germany.”

“I didn’t know that part,” Dan said. “Those guys were nasty dudes.”

Amy looked up. “Why was she at the same auction as her Nazi professor? Coincidence? I just don’t buy it.”

He tried to follow Amy’s logic. He’d learned about World War II and the Nazis in school, had read books about it. But to put himself in the heads of the people who actually lived the horror of it – that was harder. Amy had a gift for it.

“She was a young girl alone – she was only nineteen,” Amy continued. “You can bet her parents wanted her to come home. Germany was turning into a scary place for Jews. But she stayed. She stayed, Dan!” Amy smacked the pillow next to her. “She had courage. So, maybe she knew that her Nazi professor was coming to bid on a famous historical document. The family who owned the de Virga was Jewish. Maybe she was trying to protect it!”

“So why didn’t she just buy it? She was rich.”

“Maybe she was planning to. That’s why she came to Lucerne – to outbid Hummel and the others. But somebody got to it first,” Amy said.

“Hummel?”

Amy’s fingers flew as she typed an e-mail. “I’m asking the Attleboro group to research Hummel. Then we’ll dig a little deeper into Jane Sperling. I just have a feeling these two are connected somehow.”

Dan knew better than to argue with Amy’s feelings.

“Look, research isn’t my strong suit,” he said. “How about I go out and gather some more supplies for us?”

Amy waved a hand. She was already gone, lost in the 1930s and the lives of people she’d never meet.

“Back in an hour,” Dan said.

He had already done a quick search on the train, using his smartphone. He knew he didn’t have much time. He’d managed to gather seven ingredients in Italy. If he could find a few here in Basel – three, at least – he’d have one-quarter of the serum ingredients. And some ingredients he could save for last, things he could pick up easily at any grocery store: salt, mint, honey … those would be easy.

He blended in like a tourist in his jeans and jacket and baseball cap. He stopped in a pharmacy and in five minutes flat had left with a small bottle of iodine.

Amy would be furious – and concerned – if she knew he was assembling the serum. She was afraid of it. She would never allow him to take it. She would say it would change him – possibly kill him.

What she didn’t understand was that he didn’t care.

The darkness was just … there. Sometimes it scared him. Sometimes it made him angry. An anger he didn’t know he was capable of, something bottomless. Seeing Nellie wounded and scared had seared him. Just days ago he’d held a dying girl in his arms, a stranger who had trusted Vesper One.

Amy didn’t realize that you had to fight with everything you had. Not just your nerve and your courage, but the secret, hard, dark places inside you.

He plugged the next address into his GPS. He had found a place, a chemistry supply company willing to sell mercury and phosphorus. He hopped on a tram and took it to the outskirts of the city, an industrial area with warehouses and office buildings.

He found the address and rang the bell on the steel door. A moment later the door opened. A man, probably in his twenties, peered out and asked him something in German.

“Guten morgen,” Dan growled.

“Oh, you’re American. And a Yankees fan.”

Dan touched the bill on his cap nervously. “I’m the one who contacted you about the …”

“Yes. Come in.”

He was led into a small office. The man held up a glass vial. Dan saw the molten mercury.

“Toxic,” the man said. “You know this? You must be careful how you handle it.”

“I know,” Dan said. “You wouldn’t have liquid gold, would you?”

“Colloidal gold? Yes … how much would you need?”

“Quarter ounce should do it.”

The transaction was completed in minutes. Dan shifted as he counted out the bills. He could feel the man’s eyes on him.

“So. You must be a New Yorker,” the man said. “I love New York. The Lion King – excellent show!”

Dan turned to go.

“I don’t think I caught your name,” the man said.

“I didn’t throw it,” Dan said.

He left the place and walked quickly back to the tram stop. On the way, he tossed the Yankees cap into the trash can. Too many questions. The guy was probably harmless. But he couldn’t take a chance.

Vesper Two read the text message and smiled.

Dan Cahill had made several interesting purchases while in Basel. Sending out that alert to all chemical supply houses had been a brilliant stroke. Amazing what the promise of a little money could do. If someone comes asking to buy odd items, please let us know. We will make it worth your while.

So, just as Vesper Two had thought. He was collecting the Clues, thirty-nine ingredients for the serum.

The serum could change everything. And the only one who had the formula was Dan Cahill.

Vesper One didn’t have to know just yet. He wasn’t convinced that Dan could be turned. Not yet. He didn’t realize completely that the ties of blood could work in their favor.

Not yet. But soon.

Amy leaned back and rubbed her eyes. She had window after window of research stacked on her computer. She’d spoken to Evan and Ian and Sinead. They’d thrown theories at each other, random facts, odd bits, wild guesses, hoping something would stick. Nothing did.

“Talk to me, Jane,” she said aloud. “You were a rich girl, used to comfort. London was being bombed. Why did you stay? Why did you stay in Germany so long in the thirties? Who are you?”

She typed in Jane Sperling and World War II and scrolled through the results. She clicked on a page called Down Easterner, a small-town paper in Angel Harbor, Maine. Amy quickly scanned the article, an obituary for Jane Sperling. She had died at age ninety-two. The obituary documented her early life, her studies at the University of Chicago, and then the war years.

“Yes, I stayed in London during the Blitz. Oh, heavens, I was never heroic. Just a secretary for the OSS – I translated documents and things from German to English. Because I’d lived in Germany before the war. I never look back. The things I did are done now. All down the drain.”

“OSS,” Amy muttered. She did a quick word search. The Office of Strategic Services was the spying arm of the American government during the war!

Amy clicked back to the research Evan and Ian had sent. Professor Hummel had turned out to be one superbad Nazi. He’d risen to major and had been involved in a group called the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, which, as Evan put it, was quite a mouthful for “dirty despicable thieves.” They were also known as the ERR, Hitler’s special group that stole art and artifacts and property from Jewish families. The artworks were shipped to Paris and stored at a museum called the Jeu de Paume. There, the art was cataloged, inventoried, and crated, then sent to Germany. Hundreds of thousands of looted treasures from world-famous artists: Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Van Gogh. Hummel was a high-ranking officer in charge, valuable because of his knowledge of medieval art.

“So, Herr Hummel,” Amy murmured, “you were a thief.”

Near the end of the war, as the Allies began bombing German cities, the Nazis got nervous. They moved the art