The Sacred Vault

with before.’

‘How long have you been with Interpol?’ Nina asked.

‘About three years. I used to be a detective with the Delhi police - finding art thieves was my speciality, and since a lot of cases involved international trafficking it made sense to transfer to Interpol when the opportunity arose.’

‘Sounds like a cool job,’ said Eddie. ‘Travel, busting bad guys, recovering stolen treasures . . .’

‘It has its moments - though I don’t think it compares to what you do.’ He noticed the display case. ‘Is that the Egyptian artefact?’

‘You know about it?’ Nina asked, slightly surprised that he was aware of the small purple figurine.

‘Yes - the Egyptians asked to check Interpol’s database to see if it matched anything stolen or recovered. It didn’t, so I suppose they then gave it to the IHA in the hope that you’d be able to identify it.’

‘No luck so far,’ Nina admitted. ‘But we’ll keep on trying - at least until the Egyptians get fed up with waiting and ask for it back!’

The three shared a small laugh, then Jindal gathered up his documents. ‘Thank you for your help, Dr Wilde. And Mr Chase, I’ll call you as soon as I confirm the flight.’ He said his goodbyes to the couple, then departed.

‘Better go home and pack my toothbrush,’ said Eddie.

‘Do you think you’ll be able to get this Fernandez to talk?’ Nina asked.

A cat-like grin. ‘If they give me five minutes with just me, him and something sharp.’

‘I doubt Interpol would approve . . . but in this case, I wouldn’t be opposed.’ She carefully nestled the Codex into the padding inside a large steel case and closed it. ‘But until we actually find out who’s behind the robberies, we need to keep this safe. Can you carry it for me?’

‘Half the time I think you only married me to have someone to lug heavy objects about,’ Eddie said in jocular complaint as he picked up the box - whereupon his tone became genuine. ‘Ow! Bloody hell.’

‘Are you okay?’

‘Yeah, fine.’ He put a hand to his ribs. ‘Bit of a twinge, that’s all.’

‘There are some painkillers in my desk.’

‘No, I’m okay,’ he insisted. ‘Just that my side feels like someone’s sandpapered it.’

‘It looked like it, too. Sure you’re all right? I can get someone else to take it to the vault.’

‘Nah, I’ve got it.’ He hoisted the case again. ‘Although I bet librarians were bloody glad when someone got the idea to make books out of paper rather than metal.’

They took an elevator down to the Secretariat Building’s lowest basement level. Most of the floor was occupied by a data centre, computer servers handling the terabytes of information flowing through the UN, but their destination involved a more physical form of storage.

A familiar face was at the entrance. ‘Hey, Lola,’ said Nina, seeing her assistant chatting to one of the guards at the security station, a tall young Haitian called Henri Vernio.

‘Oh! Nina, hi.’ Lola blushed, as if she had been caught in the act; Nina wondered if she was dating the man. She indicated a little trolley stacked with folders. ‘I was just getting these for you.’

‘Thanks,’ said Nina, teasingly adding: ‘No rush.’

‘I was, ah, on my way back upstairs anyway,’ Lola said, giving the disappointed guard a quick goodbye before scurrying off with the trolley.

Nina smiled, then turned to the other guard, Lou Jablonsky, an overweight Brooklynite ex-cop. ‘We’re putting the Talonor Codex back in the vault.’

‘Sure thing, Dr Wilde,’ said Jablonsky. He began to enter their details into his computer. ‘Hey, Eddie. You okay? Lola told us you got pretty banged up in Frisco.’

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ Eddie replied. ‘Except it looks like someone used a cheese grater on my arse.’

Jablonsky grinned. ‘Some weirdos pay good money for that. Okay, if you’ll follow me . . .’

The high-security vault was only one part of the secure archive; most of the space was occupied by labyrinthine ranks of lockers and filing drawers, with a reading area in one corner where researchers could examine classified material without the extra bureaucratic hassle required to remove it from the room. Cameras on the ceiling watched every square foot of the climate-controlled chamber. The entrance to the vault itself was a large stainless steel door in direct line of sight of the security station. Jablonsky inserted a keycard into a slot on the door and looked back at Vernio, who put a card of his own into another reader and entered a command on the computer.

A warbling alarm warned anyone near the vault to stand back as the thick door unlocked and swung slowly open. Nina waited until Jablonsky gave her a nod, then went inside, Eddie carrying the case in after her. The interior was a cramped circular room, the wall lined with more steel-doored lockers of various sizes. A computer terminal was set into a small pedestal-like desk at the centre, the screen displaying the combined weights to the gram of the visitors and what they carried: the floor around it was pressure sensitive, another security system to ensure nothing was smuggled out. ‘Christ,’ Eddie said, looking up at the ventilation grille in the ceiling. ‘It’s always so bloody cold in here.’

‘It’s nice in the summer, though,’ Nina reminded him. She sat at the desk and entered her security code. A panel on the desktop lit up, and she placed her right hand flat on it. A brighter line of light moved down the panel’s length - a palmprint scanner. A red LED above the handle of one of the largest lockers turned green.

Eddie slid the case inside, then closed the door. The LED went back to red. ‘Okay, sorted.’ Jablonsky, who had been watching from the entrance, waited until the visitors left the vault, then removed his card. More warning trills, and the door closed. Eddie gave the barrier a satisfied look. ‘Let’s see anyone break into that.’

‘Hopefully nobody’ll be trying,’ said Nina as they returned to the security station and signed out. ‘Well, if you’re jetting off to France, I think I’ll take some work home for the evening. See if I can figure out anything else from those translations.’

‘And people say you don’t know how to live it up.’

Nina narrowed her eyes. ‘Who says that?’

‘Not me,’ he replied quickly.

They entered the lift. Eddie reached up to push the button for the IHA’s floor - and barely held in a pained grunt. He rolled his shoulder, trying to knead out the stab of pain in one of the muscles. ‘Fuck.’

‘Are you really sure you’re all right?’ Nina asked. ‘If you don’t feel up to travelling—’

‘Course I’m up to it,’ he said sharply. ‘It’s not like I’m crippled. I’ve had worse.’

‘And are you sure you don’t want any painkillers?’

Eddie hesitated before replying. ‘Yeah, I’m fine. More or less.’ He gingerly touched a particularly sore spot on his backside. ‘Might need an extra cushion for the flight, though.’

7

France

‘Has he said anything?’ Nina asked.

‘Not so far,’ Eddie told her. They were on opposite ends of a transatlantic call, she at the United Nations in New York, he in Jindal’s office at Interpol’s headquarters in Lyon. He was tired, from both a day spent working with the investigators and jetlag, but hopefully the prisoner he was about to see would be more exhausted - and therefore likely to let something slip in the next round of questioning. ‘Kit’s going to let me watch the next interrogation in a few minutes.’

‘Kit?’

‘Jindal. Short for Ankit.’

Her voice became teasing. ‘Oh, you’re on first-name terms already? That’s so sweet!’

‘We were on an eight-hour flight, and you know me, I can’t keep my gob shut for eight minutes. Anyway, I’ll be watching from behind the glass, just like in a cop show. They’re going to try to make a deal so he’ll give up whoever hired him - we’ll see what he says.’

‘A deal. God.’ Anger entered her voice. ‘I wish there were some other way.’