“The information stays only with you?”
“Of course.”
“We honestly can’t tell you much more. Samuel believed the Book of Nahum revealed the location of plunder seized in the seventh century B.C. during one of King Ashurbanipal’s military campaigns into what is now the region of Anatolia, in Turkey. He discovered this when he came across an Assyrian inscription, an account of booty Ashurbanipal took and hid somewhere in Assyria.”
That was possible, I suppose. It was commonplace for Assyrian records to list in great detail the spoils they’d taken after successful battles. “What was it?”
“We don’t know. Samuel wouldn’t tell us. He only hinted at something. He said the treasure was connected to an ancient witch and a famous legend that had a supernatural element—something beyond normal human experience.”
“Was it a Greek legend or Middle Eastern? Did it have anything to do with transforming base metals into gold?”
Tomas shrugged his shoulders. “I have no idea. The engraving has explicit signs that don’t exist in the biblical scriptures. Without it, we don’t have the text Samuel was working with.”
“And the American dealer who’s after it, is he aware of this?”
“Samuel thought the dealer knew at least that much. The value of the engraving goes beyond the intrinsic. He believed Nahum intended it to be a guide to the location of Ashurbanipal’s plunder. Since Hanna Jaffrey has made herself scarce, I’m assuming she was the conduit for the information to the dealer.”
My mind swirled with this new information. Had Ashurbanipal seized a motherlode of precious objects? The engraving itself had to be worth at least twenty million. If it led to plunder taken by an Assyrian king, the value would be incalculable. And yet Tomas’s story, especially when he couldn’t give anything more than a vague description, hardly seemed credible.
Tomas could see the skeptical look on my face. “The Anatolian states were rich in gold, silver, and precious stones, and they had superb craftsmen. It’s quite possible the king found a gold mine of artifacts.”
“Ashurbanipal’s son was king when Nineveh was sacked, right?” I asked him.
Tomas nodded yes.
“When it was clear to the king that he’d lost the battle, he gathered all his precious objects, his queen, and his concubines and had his retainers build a massive funeral pyre and set it on fire. All his possessions burned with him.”
Tomas’s scowl practically reached down to his knees. “That’s just a fairy tale. There’s never been any proof.”
“But you’re asking me to believe there’s still some treasure trove out there? What is it? Let me guess—the Queen of Sheba’s lost jewels?”
“You’re the one who wanted to know. Now I’m telling you and you heap scorn on me.”
Ari, the peacemaker, stepped in, worried that our fragile accord was splitting apart. “You can’t be sure of that, Tomas.”
“Give me some credit.” Tomas flung words at him with an implicit criticism of me. “I’m the only one here with any real knowledge of Mesopotamian culture, I might add.”
I raised my hand. “All right, point taken. But you’re asking us to believe it has remained hidden all this time? That’s absurd.”
“There are twelve thousand archaeological sites in Iraq,” Tomas snapped back at me. “Those are just the registered sites. Many haven’t even been explored yet.”
Laurel and Ari exchanged glances as the conversation grew more heated. Finally she took my hand. “You’re both arguing about phantoms. When you have the engraving, it will likely all become clear. Anyhow, I’m dead on my feet. I want to turn in now.”
Downstairs, I used most of the credit left on my Visa to book rooms for Laurel and me for two nights.
“Come in for a drink?” Laurel asked me as I walked her to her door. “I don’t feel like sitting in a lonely room by myself.”
“Sure. Why not?” I flopped on the bed while she went to the bar and got two miniature bottles of Scotch. “Straight’s fine,” I said. She handed me my glass and sat down beside me.
I took out my phone and started removing the battery cover.
“What are you doing?”
“How did that guy dressed up like a jester find us?” I said. “It was no coincidence—I’ve tried to be careful.”
“They must have some kind of surveillance on us.”
“I’m not going to spend the rest of my life being hunted by those lunatics.” I slid out the battery and looked into the compartment. “Damn. This looks okay. I thought Eris might have slipped some kind of tracking device into it.”
She sipped her drink quietly for a few minutes. Just as the silence was beginning to get awkward, she said, “You might as well get undressed.”
Although it seemed a somewhat cold approach, the speedy transformation from small talk to open invitation broke some kind of record. I happily complied and took my shirt off.
“Turn your back to me.”
She obviously felt modest about nudity, so I turned around. “If you prefer the lights off I’m fine with that.”
“No, that’s okay.” She ran her hands under my jaw and down my neck. I took one of her hands and kissed it gently. She murmured something I didn’t catch and coyly pulled it away. This did nothing to deter my lust. I could feel myself getting harder than a rock. She moved her fingers to the base of my skull. The tense network of muscles in my neck and upper back surrendered. For the first time in a long while, I relaxed.
I leaned back a little. Strands of her long brown hair brushed my shoulders. She ran her hands down my back, caressing it with her fingers. Better to let her be the pursuer. After all, things had progressed very well without me pushing anything.
Her next words had the same effect as a sudden plunge into freezing water. “There’s something implanted underneath your skin in the middle of your back where you’d be least likely to see it. Eris probably inserted it when you were unconscious. We need to take it out.”
I’m not sure what was more of a downer: realizing Laurel’s finger work was not a prelude to sex, or having missed the fact that this thing had been stuck into my back.
“With all the injuries your body has suffered lately, I guess you didn’t notice that one little spot of pain.”
I sat on the toilet seat while she used tweezers and scissors from her manicure case to pry it out. A pinprick or two and it was over. She deposited a small object that looked like a grain of rice into my hand.
“Just flush it down the toilet and then it’s done,” she said.
I got some tissue and carefully wrapped the device inside.
Sticking it into my pants pocket, I walked into the bedroom and put my shirt back on.
Laurel stood in the bathroom doorway, a worried look on her face. “Aren’t you going to get rid of it?”
“No,” I said. “I have a better idea.”
Sixteen
The evening sky, a low gray canopy of clouds, trapped the heat and made the city feel like a compression chamber. The atmosphere cried out for release—an explosion of thunder and a deluge of rain. Drivers yakked away on cellphones, cool as ice cubes in their frosty interiors while pedestrians wilted. With the number of people milling about, it was almost impossible to spot my pursuers, but I was sure they’d be keeping their eye on me. My first stop would be Corinne Carter’s.
Corinne, raised in Harlem, had made a permanent move south; she’d been part of our inner circle at Columbia. She was the only one who’d ever gotten away with calling me Johnnie. At school, she’d been the centrifugal force that held us all together. When someone crashed after a major bender, she was there. If a
