own age. He was armed with the same weapons as Leon: a small shield and a wooden sword. He crept forward quietly, hoping he wouldn’t be heard until after his first blow had landed. But it wasn’t a sound that gave him away, it was his shadow. Leon spotted it on the rocky ground and immediately turned toward his opponent.
Two boys, both aged twelve, each hoping to bludgeon his peer.
Their shields came together with a mighty clash, followed by the sweep of their swords. Leon blocked his opponent’s strike with the corner of his shield, and the reverberation forced the boy back on his heels. Using his body weight and momentum, Leon knocked the boy to the ground. Instinctively, the boy raised his shield to protect his face, so Leon aimed lower. He slammed the broad edge of his sword against the boy’s chest.
The maneuver was a kill strike, one that guaranteed Leon’s victory.
Disappointed, the defeated boy scrambled up from the ground and hustled to the edge of the ring, where one of his instructors was waiting for him. The teacher grabbed a whip from one of the youngsters and used it on the twelve-year-old’s back. Several lashes later, he pulled the boy aside and showed him what he had done wrong. It was a lesson he wouldn’t soon forget.
Meanwhile, Leon had a final challenge to overcome, which would be the most difficult one of all. He would face off against an older boy. Someone unarmed but physically superior in every way. He would be quicker and stronger and outweigh Leon by several pounds.
This battle would determine Leon’s fate.
Leon glanced over his shoulder and spotted his opponent the moment he stepped into the ring. He was the biggest boy in the
And Leon would be ready.
He adjusted his stance, just as he had been taught to do, and waited for his opening. The large youth waited until he was five feet away, then lowered his shoulder and charged forward like an angry bull. Leon held firm for as long as possible, trying to remember the techniques his father had shown him long before his formal training had begun.
At the last possible second, Leon dived to the ground, using his shield to help him spring back to his feet behind the older boy. Then, while his opponent whirled back around, Leon cocked his sword and thrust it forward with every ounce of strength he had. The sound of wood meeting skull was unlike any sound he had ever heard before. There was a loud crack, followed by an echo that he didn’t think was possible from the human head. A heartbeat later, the teenager dropped to both of his knees with a solid thump yet somehow remained upright. He swayed back and forth as though he was going to fall, as if a single gust of wind would knock him over.
And Leon just stood there, sword in hand, watching his opponent teeter.
It was an act of weakness that could not be tolerated.
Leon’s enraged father pushed his way through the ring of kids. With a mighty wallop, he smacked his son across the face. The boy fell to the ground, spitting blood. He remained there for several seconds, which was a few seconds too long in the eyes of his father. Bubbling with rage, he grabbed Leon by the neck and yanked him to his feet. Then he shoved Leon toward the large teenager, who was still reeling from the earlier blow.
His father screamed, “There is
Leon nodded, picked up his sword, and did what Spartans were expected to do.
He finished the job without mercy.
33
After breakfast they moved to the living room, where they would be more comfortable. Each of them sat in the same spot as the night before. Payne and Jones were on the couch, and Allison was on a chair. Once again, she held a pillow in her lap.
Payne said, “In my experience, it’s much easier to solve a problem when you’re emotionally detached from the situation. It allows you to consider options that would otherwise be difficult. Part of our training as soldiers was to acquire that skill. We learned how to compartmentalize our emotions in the harshest of environments. We learned how to analyze data calmly despite the threat of death. Without that ability, we wouldn’t have been able to function.”
“Makes sense,” said Allison, as she tucked her feet underneath her.
“As you mentioned, you’ve spent the past two days racking your brain, trying to figure out why Richard was killed, yet you haven’t made any progress. If I had to guess, I’d say that has more to do with your emotional state than your knowledge of the situation.”
“Maybe,” she conceded. “I’ve been a little preoccupied.”
Payne leaned forward and smiled, hoping to connect with Allison. “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to ask you some questions about your time in Russia. We’ll try to sort through all your answers and come up with a logical explanation for Richard’s death.”
Allison nodded. She wanted to solve the mystery as quickly as possible.
Payne began. “You mentioned that Richard was fascinated with Ancient Greece. What does that have to do with Saint Petersburg?”
“How much do you know about archaeology?”
“I know a little,” Payne said, thinking back to their recent missions in Italy and Saudi Arabia. “But not as much as D.J. He’s something of a history buff.”
“No, I’m not,” Jones argued. “I’m just naturally smart. I remember things that dumb people forget. . . . Remember, Jon?”
Payne smirked but didn’t dignify the insult with one of his own.
Allison glanced at Jones. “What do you know about Heinrich Schliemann?”
Jones smiled at the mere mention of his name. “That guy was a character and a half.”
She laughed at his remark like it was an inside joke-which, in this case, it was. Because Payne had no idea who Schliemann was or what he had to do with anything.
“Time-out,” said Payne as he signaled for one. “Who is Heinrich Schliemann?”
Jones answered. “He was a German businessman who hated his day job and decided he would much rather be a famous archaeologist. The guy had no formal training, but he took all his money and went searching for Greek treasures. Amazingly, he hit the jackpot on more than one occasion, finding the lost cities of Troy and Mycenae and a number of other sites.”
“And?” Payne asked.
Allison jumped in. “Rivals hated him for it. Since he lacked formal training, he didn’t know how to preserve a site or catalogue the artifacts. He was more interested in finding treasure and being famous than anything else. For every piece of gold he discovered, he ruined ten pieces of historical evidence that would have helped scholars understand these ancient cities. Newspapers praised him for his frequent discoveries. The public adored him for his golden treasures. But historians hated him, because they knew what he was destroying.”
“Not only that,” Jones added, “he lied more often than a politician. People never knew what was real and what was bullshit.”
“True,” Allison admitted. “But that was part of his charm. He lied about his methods. He lied about his treasures. He even lied in his own diary. He used to glue rewritten pages in his journals to change the facts of his life, so he would seem more important after he died. He talked about dining with presidents and surviving famous disasters, and none of it really happened. After a while, he started to believe his own stories, which made it even funnier. No one knew what he would do or say next. But people were captivated by his adventures.”
Jones laughed. “Like I said, he was a character and a half.”
“That’s one of the reasons I chose Schliemann as the focus of my thesis. I thought the modern world should learn more about him.”
“I’d love to read it when you’re done. That guy was a classic.”
She smiled at Jones. “I refer to him as the P. T. Barnum of archaeology. In my opinion, he brought fun and entertainment to a field that used to be bone-dry. Pardon the pun.”
“Not a bad comparison,” Jones admitted. “They lived about the same time, right?”
“They actually died four months apart. Schliemann in 1890. Barnum in 1891.”
