'It is, but you know how it is with the Templars. It's like archaeological porn, it's virtually academic suicide to be interested in them. It's gotten to the point where no one wants it known that they take the subject seriously. Too many crackpots obsessed with all kinds of conspiracy theories about their history. You know what Umberto Eco said, right?'
'No.'
' 'A sure sign of a lunatic is that sooner or later, he brings up the Templars.' '
'I'm struggling to take that as a compliment here.'
'Look, I'm on your side on this. They're eminently worthy of academic research.' Edmondson shrugged. 'But like I said, I haven't heard from Vance in years. Last I know he was at Columbia, but, if I were you, I'd go for Simmons. I can hook you up with him pretty easily.'
'Okay, great.' Tess smiled.
A nurse popped her head around the door. 'Tests. Five minutes.'
'Wonderful,' Clive groaned.
'Will you let me know?' Tess asked.
'You bet. And when I'm out of here, how about I buy you dinner and you can tell me how it's panning out?'
She remembered the last time she'd had dinner with Edmondson. In Egypt, after they'd dived together on a Phoenician shipwreck off Alexandria. He'd got drunk on arak, made a halfhearted pass, which she had gently rebuffed, and then he'd fallen asleep in the restaurant.
'Sure,' she said, thinking that she had lots of time in which to come up with excuses and then felt guilty at her unkind thought.
Chapter 13
L ucien Boussard paced cautiously across the floor of his gallery. He reached the window and peered out from behind a fake ormolu clock. He stayed there for several minutes, thinking hard.
Part of his brain registered that the clock was in need of cleaning and he carried it back to the table and stood it on the newspaper.
The one with the pictures of the Met raid, staring up at him.
He ran his finger over the photographs, smoothing the newspaper's folds.
There's no way I'm getting involved in this.
But he couldn't simply do nothing. Gus would kill him for doing nothing just as easily as he would kill him for doing something wrong.
There was only one way out and he'd already been thinking about it while Gus was standing there in his gallery threatening him. Turning Gus in, especially knowing what he had done at the museum, was dangerous. But given Gus's swordplay outside the museum, Lucien felt reasonably sure he would be safe. There was no way the big man would be coming out of prison to take revenge on him one day. If they didn't change the law and give him the needle, Gus was looking at life without parole. Had to be.
Just as important, Lucien had problems of his own. He had a cop on his back. A relentless salopard who'd been after him for years and was showing no signs of going away or even easing off. All because of a goddamn Dogon statuette from Mali that turned out to be more recent than Lucien had said it was and that was, consequently, worth a fraction of what he'd sold it for. Its septuagenarian buyer had, luckily for Lucien, died of a heart attack before the lawyers got their act together. Lucien had wormed his way out of a very tight spot, but Detective Steve Buchinski didn't let go of it. It was almost like a personal crusade. Lucien had tried feeding the cop a few tips, but they hadn't been enough. Nothing would ever be enough.
But this was different. Feed him Gus Waldron and maybe, just maybe, the leech would let go.
He looked at his watch. It was half past one.
Sliding open a drawer, Lucien rummaged through a box of cards until he found the one he wanted.
Then he reached for the phone and dialed.
Chapter 14
Poised outside the heavy, paneled door to a fifth-floor apartment on Central Park West, the leader of the FBI tactical unit held up one hand, all fingers splayed, and glanced at his team. His number two reached out a cautious arm and waited. On the opposite side of the hallway, another man brought a pump-action shotgun up to his shoulder. The fourth man in the team flicked the safety off a stun grenade. The remaining pair who completed the unit gently eased the safety catches on their Heckler & Koch MP5 machine guns.
'Go!'
The agent nearest the door rapped firmly with his fist and yelled, 'FBI. Open up!'
The reaction was virtually instantaneous. Gunshots ripped out through the door, spitting splinters of teak across the hallway.
The FBI shotgunner returned the compliment, racking his weapon in a blur of action, blasting away until he had torn several head-sized holes through the door panel. Even with the earplugs she wore, Amelia Gaines felt the jarring shock waves in the confined space.
More shots erupted from inside, splintering the door jambs and punching through the plasterboards across the hallway. The fourth man moved forward, flicking the stun grenade through the opening blown in the door. Then the shotgun took out the rest of the central door panel and moments later the two men with the H&Ks were inside.
A momentary pause. Echoing silence. A single shot. Another pause. A voice called out, 'Clear!'
More 'Clears' followed. Then a casual voice said, 'Okay, party's over.'
Amelia followed the others into the apartment. It made the word 'plush' sound cheap. Everything about it reeked of money. But as Amelia and the unit leader checked the place out, it quickly became apparent that this particular reek was of drugs.
The occupants, four men, were swiftly identified as Colombian drug traffickers. One of them had a serious gunshot wound in his upper body. Elsewhere in the apartment, they found a small hoard of drugs, a pile of cash, and enough leads to keep the DEA happy for months.
The tip-off, an anonymous phone call, had spoken of money to burn, weapons, and several men speaking in a foreign language. All of that was right. But none of it had anything to do with the museum raid.
Another disappointment.
It wouldn't be the last.
Disheartened, Amelia looked around the apartment as the other Colombians were handcuffed and led out. She compared this place with her own apartment. Hers was pretty nice. Tasteful, classy, if she said so herself. But this one was simply stunning. It had everything, including a great view of the park. As she looked around, she decided that overstated opulence was not her style and she didn't envy any of it. Except maybe the view.
She stood at the window for a moment, looking down into the park. She could see two people riding horses along a track. Even at this range, she could see that both the riders were women. One of them was having trouble; her horse looked to be high-spirited or maybe it had been spooked by the two Rollerblading youths gliding by.
Amelia took another look around the apartment, then left it to the tactical unit leader to wrap things up, and headed for the office to deliver her somber report to Reilly.
***
Reilly had been busy scheduling a succession of low-key visits to mosques and other gathering points for the city's Muslims. After a brief preliminary discussion with Jansson on the politics of this side of die investigation, Reilly had decided that these visits would all be exactly that. Simple visits, by no more than two agents or cops, one of whom was, as often as possible, Muslim. Not the merest hint of them being raids. Cooperation was what they sought and, mostly, cooperation was what they got.
Computers at the FBI offices at Federal Plaza had been spilling out data nonstop, adding to the rising tidal wave of information coming in from the NYPD, Immigration, and Homeland Security.
Databases that had mushroomed after Oklahoma City were awash with names of homegrown radicals and extremists; those following 9/11 were overflowing with names of Muslims of many nationalities. Reilly knew that
