Jack held up his hand. ‘Later. Now that you know what we think about the Death Mask Murders and who committed them, you will understand my next question.’
‘Go on,’ prompted Silvanus.
‘We want to find out who was behind all these bizarre, staged killings, and why. Let’s assume for the moment that Spiridon 4 did in fact commit at least some of the more recent murders, as we believe they did, they would have done so as hired guns for someone else, who paid a small fortune for their services. The question is who, and why. If you can help us with this, we are in a position to offer you something valuable in return.’
‘Something puzzles me,’ said Silvanus. ‘Why are you so interested in all this?’
‘That’s my business.’
‘As for offering us something of value,’ continued Silvanus, ‘my brother and I will spend most likely twenty years in here before we are then extradited to the US to face trial on other serious matters, which, if we are convicted, will keep us in jail for the rest of our lives. Surely you see our dilemma. What could someone like you, therefore, possibly offer us that would be of some value in our situation? Hypothetically speaking, of course.’
Jack stared at Silvanus for some time, collecting his thoughts. He realised that the meeting had reached the pointy end, and everything depended on how he answered the question.
‘You have summed up your own situation accurately. There is very little we can offer you in here, except for a few small privileges, like internet access and the like. The real benefit, which is far more valuable, is somewhere else.’
Silvanus waved his hand dismissively. ‘More riddles.’
‘Not really. It’s actually quite simple. What I can offer you concerns your families,’ said Jack quietly.
Silvanus sat up as if stung by a hot needle from behind. Both Silvanus and Aladdin were married with families. According to Grimaldi, both families were currently under investigation, their assets frozen and under threat of confiscation as possible proceeds of crime, which if successful, would leave them destitute and in disgrace.
‘Go on,’ prompted Silvanus.
‘If you can help us identify who was behind all these murders and financed them, then we can offer you a deal.’
‘What kind of deal?’
‘A negotiated settlement of the pending proceedings concerning your families. A settlement that would at least leave your families with something to live on, and get on with their lives without facing certain ruin. Interested?’
‘What guarantees are you able to give us? Should we be able to help you, that is?’
‘Only my word.’
‘You are joking, surely.’
‘No. I’m deadly serious. This is a matter of judgement and trust. This is the only chance you have. Once we walk away from here, the deal is off the table and we’ll never come back. Your call.’
Silvanus looked at Aladdin. ‘I have to talk to my brother, in private.’
‘No problem,’ said Jack and stood up. ‘We’ll wait outside, but remember, the train only stops at this station briefly. Once it leaves, it will never return. Please consider that.’ Jack stopped at the door and turned around. ‘Which one of you is the clown in the video, I wonder? Is it you, Silvanus, or perhaps you, Aladdin? I suppose we’ll never know, will we?’ said Jack, and followed the prison guard outside.
22
O’Hara’s alpine fortress, Obersalzberg: 26 October
O’Hara looked at the encrypted text message sent to him by one of the prison officers in his pay at the Fleury-Mérogis Prison, and smiled. It was a brief report about the visitors Landru had recently received. He’s on the move. Excellent, thought O’Hara, it’s time, and turned off his computer. Then he walked over to the large window and watched the morning sun light up the stunning mountain panorama, rising out of the mist like the opening scene of a Wagnerian opera heralding epic drama and bloodshed.
Feeling energised, he took his private lift down three storeys to the underground basement of the complex, where part of an abandoned WWII bunker had been converted into a large, secret, fortified network of chambers, where O’Hara kept his dark web server and stored his most precious encrypted records and prototypes of his lucrative computer games. This was also the place where he conducted his private conference calls and sent encrypted messages to his operatives in various parts of the world. It was O’Hara’s private domain, his sanctuary, accessible only by his most trusted assistants and technicians, mainly when work was needed on the priceless, unique server, and only with his express permission. The security access code was changed regularly and was only known to a privileged few.
O’Hara glanced at his watch. There were still a few minutes before the conference call he had arranged the day before. Enough time to have another brief look at the precious documents and artefacts he had painstakingly collected over the years. These items were the clues left behind over several centuries, his ‘footprints of destiny’ as he liked to call them that would ultimately, he firmly believed, lead him to the elusive treasure that had been taunting him for decades and had become a consuming obsession. O’Hara knew he was finally getting close, but he also knew that the last step was always the hardest.
This was further complicated by the fact that Spiridon 4, the hit squad he had used for years and relied on for his most important and sensitive assignments, was no more. What this meant was that a new solution had to be found quickly, and that was always risky and a challenge. The imminent conference call was all about that.
O’Hara punched the security code into the pad on the door that opened a steel cabinet. A wave of excitement washed over him as soon as his eyes fell on the precious objects arranged on glass shelves in chronological order, like pages of a children’s story book. Each object told part of a story that had begun in 1533 and was still going strong, its ultimate outcome uncertain. The first item was a copy of The Navarro Chronicles – Landru’s paper that had started it all. The next item was the intriguing Morales khipu, which had unlocked many secrets and cost Gerhard Blumenthal his life in Berlin.
Bohdan Petrinko, a broad-shouldered, muscular man in his forties wearing army fatigues, sat in a dimly lit room on the first floor of the Cossack House in the heart of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital. The Cossack House was the main recruitment centre for Azov, a far-right Ukrainian militant group that had played a major part in defending Ukraine against Russian military aggression. For the past two years, Petrinko – a veteran resistance fighter – had worked as a senior Azov recruiter operating a vast network of global contacts stretching from Canada to New Zealand, offering far-right extremists military training and combat experience. This was how he had come to the attention of the Mafia in Florence, who were always on the lookout for mercenary hitmen with military experience, addicted to violence and danger, and motivated by greed and access to easy money.
Nervously drumming the tips of his fingers against the armrest of his chair, Petrinko kept staring at this watch; it was almost time. If the man he had heard so much about did call, this could be the opportunity he had been waiting for. It was time to once again get out of Ukraine, change direction, and make some money.
At seven am precisely, his mobile rang. Petrinko reached for his phone on the table and answered it.
‘Riccardo Giordano told me a lot about you,’ said O’Hara without introducing himself. ‘He speaks very highly of you and that’s the reason we are talking right now.’
‘I understand,’ said Petrinko, eager to prove himself and grateful for another chance after the recent embarrassing blunder in Venice that had killed Lorenza da Baggio instead of the intended target.
‘I have very specific needs—’
‘What kind of needs?’ interrupted Petrinko impatiently. The phone call wasn’t going quite as he had expected.
‘I need someone devoid of fear and without scruples of any kind, who is prepared to follow precise instructions to the letter, and that includes killing without hesitation. No
questions asked. Are you such a man, Mr Petrinko?’
‘If Riccardo Giordano has recommended me, you have your answer, surely, Mr …?’
‘My name is unimportant. We’ll never meet.’
‘Understood.’
‘Is that a problem?’
‘No.’
‘Tell me about yourself.’
‘I’d rather not. My past is unimportant. What counts here is the present.’
O’Hara chuckled. He liked the answer. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Then let’s turn to the present and leave the past in the shadows.’
‘Let’s do that.’
‘Something small to begin with, but important. Surveillance.’
‘Fine by me.’
‘That could quickly escalate without notice?’
‘No problem.’
‘When can you start?’
‘Right now.’
‘Is France a problem?’
‘No.’
‘All your instructions will come from me, over the phone. Clear?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘So, please listen carefully.’
‘I am.’
Satisfied, O’Hara put down the phone and looked pensively at the open steel cabinet. One item, the most important one, was still missing, but he was certain that Landru had worked out what it was and, if it did exist, where to find it. Cracking the cipher had made that clear. He was also certain that Landru – a driven man just like himself – was designing a plan right now, and reaching out to the very people who could help him make it work. And if this was indeed the case, O’Hara wanted to make sure he was right there next to him every step of the way. With Spiridon 4 no longer involved, making that a reality was a challenge, and O’Hara was hoping that in Petrinko he had found the right man to help him achieve it.
O’Hara reached for what he considered to be the most important item in his collection after The Navarro Chronicles and the Morales khipu. It was an exquisite scrimshaw whale tooth – not full size, but a miniature one. The tip of the tooth had been sawn off and made into an amulet that could be worn around the neck. If only this could talk, he thought, letting his mind drift, what amazing stories it could tell. O’Hara closed his eyes and ran his fingertips along the tiny, heart-shaped map engraved on the smooth surface of the ivory, hoping that very soon he would be able to finally unlock its secrets.
23
On the San Cristobal: 23 June 1664
Father Morales stood on the pitching deck of the San Cristobal, a large Spanish galleon, and took a deep breath. He shielded his eyes with his hand from the blinding sun as he watched the billowing sails of the huge ship leaving the port of Portobelo on the east coast of Panama, with its precious cargo.
Because the cargo consisted almost exclusively of silver mined from the legendary Cerro Rico Mountain high up in the Andes near the mining town of Potosi, the San Cristobal had been provided a special escort – a Spanish man-of-war – to protect it from pirates on its way to Havana. There, it would reprovision and join the Flota de Indias, the Spanish treasure fleet specifically designed by admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés to transport precious cargo safely back to Spain. The fleet assembled twice a year in Havana Harbor and travelled to Seville in convoy to avoid the ever-circling pirates always on the lookout for vulnerable stragglers, or ships separated by storms from the safety of a fleet protected by patrolling warships.
Morales had waited a long time for this opportunity: a safe passage back to Spain to keep his bargain with the king.
‘We made it, Father,’ said Navarro, feeling safe for the first time since leaving Lima. The cumbersome trip across the isthmus by mule train had been particularly arduous and dangerous. It had been the most vulnerable part of their journey so far.
Morales looked at Navarro and nodded. ‘We couldn’t have made it without you.’
Navarro had been invaluable. Not only did he speak the native language, he was also able to read the khipu and interpret its subtle messages linked to the landscape. All this had finally allowed them to locate the Ruminahui treasure five years earlier, hidden in a cave deep in the remote mountain wilderness. But finding the treasure and transporting it back to Quito had been the easy part.
‘Can you believe it has taken us almost five years to reach this point?’ said Morales.
‘Greed and lust for gold make monsters out of men.’
‘How right you are.’
Rumours that the legendary Inca treasure hidden in the mountains by Atahualpa’s general had been found and was on its way back to Lima spread like wildfire through Peru, sending shivers of excitement and speculation through the colony. Every tavern, every boarding house was abuzz with wild stories of unimaginable wealth, there for the taking if one had the courage and resolve, and knew where to look. The few by-now exhausted soldiers protecting the porters struggling under the weight of the gold had been attacked several times even before reaching Quito. After suffering heavy losses, the expedition managed to limp into Quito and the relative safety and protection of the Church.
It was only because of the bravery and ingenuity of the Jesuits that the treasure hadn’t been lost. The Jesuits used their network of trusted supporters to secretly transfer the gold to Lima by sea, where it was hidden for several years in an underground chamber next to the dead buried below the church, until the rumours died down and the corrupt officials, cutthroats and brigands lost interest, and it was considered safe to transfer the treasure to Spain.
Joining the mule train across the Isthmus of Panama with a huge silver delivery had been a stroke of genius. It had provided the cover needed to transport the gold from Lima to Panama by ship, and from there by mule train and porters across the isthmus to Portobelo.
Only Captain Diego de Medina knew that the legendary Ruminahui treasure, consisting of several tonnes of solid gold, was on board and was travelling back to Spain as part of an annual silver shipment from the Potosi mines. This made the cargo on his ship the most valuable in more than a century and explained why a man-of-war, a powerful frigate with hundreds of sailors and one hundred and twenty-four guns, was escorting the galleon to Havana under sealed orders from up high: the admiral.
Normally, the galleon would carry sugar, spices, tobacco, silk and pearls in addition to timber and agricultural goods, but not on this occasion. This time, the cargo consisted almost exclusively of silver and the secret Inca treasure, under the protection of the king himself.
Medina walked up to the two Jesuits and bowed. ‘Gentlemen, we can relax,’ he said and pointed to the impressive man-of-war sailing a short distance behind them. ‘Apart from our own guns, we have the firepower of one of the best-equipped warships in the fleet, under the command of one of the most respected captains in the land, protecting us. There isn’t a pirate in the Caribbean who would dare attack us, and once we rendezvous with the treasure fleet in Havana, we will have even more protection.’
‘Have you ever encountered pirates on your journeys, Captain?’ asked Navarro.
‘I have. They are the scourge of the Caribbean and never far away. One has to be always vigilant. They are excellent sailors and usually very well equipped. Fast ships. Being able to outsail other vessels is their main advantage. Apart from that, they are daring, ruthless and desperate. When you know that the end of a rope is waiting for you should you ever be caught, you will fight to the death, and they do. Trust me, I’ve seen it.’
‘We must be grateful for our escort then,’ said Morales, looking pensively across to the impressive man-of-war travelling under full sail. ‘Very reassuring.’
Medina nodded.
‘We are indebted to you, Captain,’ said Navarro. ‘We feel safe and in good hands. I have no doubt that the dangerous part of our journey is behind us. And besides, our best protection is the cover of secrecy. As long as no-one knows what travels with us in those trunks, we are surely safe.’
‘Quite so,’ said Medina. ‘I would be both honoured and delighted if you would jo
in me for supper in my cabin this evening, gentlemen. I have some splendid wine from my family’s vineyards.’
‘Where are they?’ asked Navarro.
‘Near Zaragoza.’
‘Mazuelo grapes?’
‘You know your wine, Father. Yes, we cultivate this ancient variety on our estates. Actually, it originated in our area around the ninth century and spread from there throughout Western Europe all the way to North Africa.’
‘Says it all,’ observed Morales. ‘A toast to a safe journey would be most appropriate; wouldn’t you say, Captain?’
‘Quite so. Until tonight then, gentlemen. Duty calls, I must go.’
For a while, Morales and Navarro watched in silence as the sun sank slowly into the calm sea like a blood-red fireball, casting long shadows across the deck as the ship changed course and headed north-east towards Cuba.
For some reason he couldn’t quite explain, Navarro felt uneasy and saw this as an ominous sign of things to come.
24
‘Mad Dog’ Regan. Near Havana: 23 June 1664
Captain ‘Mad Dog’ Regan stood on the quarterdeck of The Templars Revenge, a brigantine he had captured from the British during a daring mutiny two years earlier, and surveyed his domain. Arms crossed behind his back, his sturdy, buckled shoes firmly planted on the slippery timbers of the pitching deck, he watched the keelhauling about to start.
A flamboyant dresser, aware that appearances mattered – especially in front of a crew like the one assembled on deck to watch the punishment – Regan took great care with his attire. Looking impressive in his embroidered, red-velvet dress coat, tricorn hat complete with ostrich feather, gold-fringed sash, and a heavy leather bandolier with several brace of loaded pistols, he looked more like a prosperous merchant prince of the high seas than one of the most feared and ruthless buccaneers roaming the Caribbean for plunder.
The Death Mask Murders Page 15
