The walls of the twelve-sided room were painted a deep blue-black, like the great wheel of the night sky, and on each door there was a constellation picked out in bright golden stars. The sky wasn’t real, however, but astrological. “I would suggest that Father Ivanov use his GPS to find us south, the door to Octanis.”
The priest went and stood in the center of the room. He took out his GPS unit and switched on its compass function. He turned slowly until he faced the side of the room that had been on their left when they reached the bottom of the stairway. “That way.” He pointed. “That is south.”
“The constellations Castor and Pollux, the twins, or Gemini, and Alpha Cancri, the claw of Cancer,” Genrikhovich said. “Which shall we choose?”
“I wouldn’t choose either,” said Holliday.
“And why not, Colonel? Do you have some knowledge of alchemy and the works of Basilius Valentinus?”
“Never heard of the man until a minute ago, but I do know that in astrology the poles are counterintuitive- north is south and south is north.”
“You hardly seem the type to believe in astrology, Colonel.”
“I’m not, but my cousin Peggy is always telling me that it’s Mercury in retrograde, or my aspect is wonky or something, and I managed to pick up a few things over the years-the north-south transposition was one of them.”
“So we’re supposed to believe your cousin then?” Genrikhovich sneered.
Holliday finally reached his boiling point. “I don’t care what you do anymore, you arrogant Russian jerk; frankly I’m sick and tired of you and your lies and your bullshit. If it weren’t for Brother Rodrigues I wouldn’t be here, and you’d be the last person I’d be here with.”
“One thing more,” said Holliday, still fuming. “I don’t know a hell of a lot about alchemy, but I know lots about history, and as I recall Ivan the Terrible was famous for his dungeons and his torture chambers. I wouldn’t be so quick to go through
“What are you talking about?”
“You never heard of the story ‘The Lady or the Tiger’?”
“No.”
“You’ll find out. Think Indiana Jones,” said Holliday.
“Ignore him,” said Genrikhovich to Ivanov. “We’ll go through the Gemini door.”
The priest looked briefly in Holliday’s direction, a faint light of uncertainty visible in his eyes. Then he turned away and stepped toward the door with the Gemini constellation on it. The door had a simple old-fashioned wrought-iron latch, which Ivanov pressed down. He pulled open the door and stepped through, Genrikhovich following a few steps behind him.
Eddie turned to Holliday. “What should we do,
“Follow,” said Holliday. “Just keep back a little.” The two men went after Genrikhovich through the Gemini door.
The first thing Holliday noticed was that instead of being made of dressed stone, like the walls and the arched ceiling overhead, the floor of the passageway they found themselves in was made of a firm layer of fine, almost powdery sand. Other than that the corridor was featureless, the beams from their miner’s lamps lighting up a second door about a hundred feet ahead. The design on the farther door was unmistakable: the gold double- headed imperial eagle of the original duchy of Moscow adopted by Ivan the Terrible when he became Russia’s first czar.
“Why sand?” Holliday wondered aloud.
Genrikhovich half turned, the sneer back on his thin face. “Taurus is an earth sign, Colonel, or didn’t your cousin tell you that?” The Russian turned away and hurried after Father Ivanov. Holliday heard a faint clicking and stopped dead. He’d heard a sound like that before-a makeshift pressure trigger hidden along a path in the A Shau Valley on the Laos-South Vietnam border. He’d never forgotten the sound, because a split second later the grunt walking point thirty feet ahead had been flayed into hamburger from the knees down by a makeshift claymore. It was like something out of a
“Stand perfectly still.” He looked ahead. Ivanov was twenty feet from the far door when he suddenly stopped and stared down at his feet. A hissing sound filled the air. Bubbles began appearing in the sand, racing back over the floor to where Genrikhovich stood transfixed. Holliday took three steps forward and grabbed the Russian’s collar and yanked him backward. Ahead of them Ivanov screamed. He was up to his thighs and sinking deeper with each passing second.
“My God!” Genrikhovich moaned. “What is it?”
Ivanov screamed again, arching his back and twisting back and forth, vainly trying to release himself. It only made things worse. It was incredibly fast. Within twenty seconds the sand had risen to the level of his shoulders, and a few seconds after that his head went below the surface and he disappeared. The hissing sound and the bubbles continued for another half minute and then there was silence.
“Help him!” Genrikhovich yelled, staring horrified at the spot where the priest had vanished.
“Too late-he’s gone,” said Holliday.
Genrikhovich turned and looked at Holliday, dumbfounded. “What happened to him?” the Russian whispered.
“I wondered about the sand,” murmured Holliday. “I knew it wasn’t right.”
“What are you talking about?” Genrikhovich snapped.
“You can find it naturally in the Qattara Depression in the Libyan Desert and in some places in the Sahara. It’s liquefied sand. Somewhere behind these walls there’s a piston that pushed air up through the sand, giving it the properties of a liquid. Stop the air and the sand becomes solid again. He could be twenty feet down, for all we know.” He shook his head and gave the Russian a cold look. “You were right, Genrikhovich: Taurus is an earth sign, and the earth just swallowed your friend Father Ivanov whole.” He turned away in disgust. “Come on, Eddie; we’re getting the hell out of here once and for all.”
“I don’t think so, Colonel,” the Russian said quietly.
“Who’s going to stop me?” Holliday said, turning angrily.
“I am,” said Genrikhovich, the pearl-handled Tokarev semiautomatic pistol held in his fist aimed in the general direction of Holliday’s belly.
35
“Nice weapon,” said Holliday. “Looks like a presentation piece.” He seriously doubted that any pistol made during the Soviet era came stocked with pearl grips.
“Yes, Khrushchev gave it to my father, along with the Order of Lenin and his Hero of the Soviet Union medal in 1962.” Genrikhovich sneered. “That and a postage stamp twenty years after his death was just about all he received for his good works. My mother and I lived from hand to mouth on the few rubles he gave us.”
“I thought your father was a curator at the Hermitage?” Holliday said.
“My father was probably the most famous and successful KGB agent the Soviet Union ever had,” said the Russian. “And they treated him like dirt.” Genrikhovich smiled thinly. “Since you are a historian I’m surprised that you don’t recognize the name, Colonel Holliday.”
“In 1962 I was a kid and chasing girls,” said Holliday. “I wasn’t paying much attention to what was going on in Moscow except for the Cuban Missile Crisis.”
“And if I mentioned a certain U-two spy plane pilot shot down over Soviet territory whose name was Francis Gary Powers?”
Holliday stared at the thin, long-nosed Russian with the wire eyeglasses. Suddenly his memory kicked in and he had it. “My God!” he said softly. “Your father was Rudolf Abel, the atom-bomb spy.”
“That was the alias he used when he was arrested after being betrayed by his assistant, the traitor Reino
