Order of the Black Sun Box Set 6

by Preston William Child

  “Oh, oh, sorry. This is Joanne Earle. Doubt you'll remember me,” the woman said. “I was an undergrad at…”

  “No way! Jo, I remember you!” Nina exclaimed. “We did our PhD in Modern History together, right?”

  “That's right!” Joanne cheered. “That was me. Listen, I believe you are a lecturer and freelance historical adviser.”

  “Aye,” Nina affirmed. “I’m based in Oban and Edinburgh. Where are you now?”

  A brief moment of silence passed before Joanne replied in a hushed tone. “Listen, Nina. I can't really talk now, but is there any way you can get to Labrador, Canada anytime soon?”

  “How soon?” Nina asked, keeping an eye on Sylvia outside while getting her coat and shouldering her bag.

  “Um, the first chance you get?” Joanne requested. “I am not sure of this, but that is why I need you to come and clarify it for me. I believe I have found a very valuable piece of history while on a school field trip here. This could be huge or it could be nothing, but I need an expert's opinion, and I cannot take the risk of e-mailing a picture of what I found.”

  Nina was hooked. “Jo, what is it you think you found?”

  “It could be nothing, as I said,” Joanne whispered. “But it might be a piece from the Treasure.”

  Nina's interest was arrested. “Which treasure?”

  Joanne whispered, “The Treasure of Alexander the Great.”

  8

  Beware of the Camel's Nose

  Two hours later, two hours after the fateful call had been placed to Dr. Nina Gould's home phone, a dark figure exited a large vehicle only two houses down from her residence. It was time to scoop her up and Beck was ready to get it done swiftly and with as little commotion as possible. In his gloved right hand he held a bottle of chloroform, clutched tightly as he watched Nina park her car. It was dark and foggy, perfectly set for what he was planning.

  The private investigator in him now stepped aside for the covert enforcer, and as Nina stepped onto her porch, fumbling with her keys, he moved quickly through the hazy ghost of the street light in front of her house. Waves of mist clouded his stealing shape as he turned onto the walk and crept up, hastening so that she would not leave him locked out once she’d entered. Beck had to move faster, resorting to a crouching jog as she opened the door.

  Rapidly his footfalls sped up to make it in time. Surely she would notice her assailant and no doubt scream if she saw him in the bright porch light before he could seize her. Thanks to the weather conditions of the evening, Beck could not fail to apprehend Dr. Gould before she knew what hit her. But this was no average woman he was trying to capture. Unlike previous missions, where his targets were to be seized alive, and mostly, unharmed, Beck did not realize that such an apparently harmless lady could be so alert to her surroundings.

  Feeling something amiss, she turned to survey the path that led from the car to the porch, finding his large silhouette right there, much as the priest towered in black on the very same porch in the very same way. Beck was met with a taser, shoved hard into his inner thigh.

  “Oh, for fuck's sake!” he groaned just before the voltage was pushed through him. As he lost control of his bladder, the electrical surge of the device ripped through his nervous system and shut down any muscular function he thought he had.

  What she did not know, however, was that her stalker had been trained by Special Forces and was not particularly susceptible to the perils of most weapons unless they involved some sort of explosive. He collapsed from the momentary disruption in his brain, but he was far from knocked out. Unlike an untrained man, he would soon again wake…and he promptly did. Beck mumbled a torrent of curses as he strained to recover in as little time possible. On his knees, groping his thigh, Karsten's private investigator moaned under the veil of floating fog that traversed the yard and the eerie house's stoop.

  Inside the dark house he could hear the din of panic ensue. In fact, he could trace her movements by the noise she was making. Beck smiled. “Not so easy, hey, sweetheart? Now you have just pissed me off.” He stumbled to his feet and disappeared off the side of the porch to make his way to the side of the old nine-bedroom house.

  Since he’d discovered where Nina lived, Beck had been doing his homework on every corner and niche of the building so that he could stalk better, track better and sweep her off comfortably. Frankly, he probably knew Nina's house better than she did. Still fighting off the hideous numbing sensations in his skin and his disabled motor skills, Beck knew he had to get to Nina before she could call for help. He had already cut her home phone line, so he slipped around the back where there used to be a makeshift trapdoor used by the previous owner, the reputed warlock, who had actually been actually just an experimenting physicist.

  Gaining entry through the rotten wood of the hidden door, Beck quietly stalked up the steps of the basement and used his lock pick tools to dislodge the padlock stay. Every few seconds he stood still, listening to her movements in the darkness.

  “You can keep the lights off, darling,” he whispered as he propped up the kitchen trapdoor. “I don't need any lights to navigate your little maze.” Beck's heart had jumped once before when she sent electricity through him, but now his rapid heart rate was caused by his defiant quarry, rousing his rage by the audacity she displayed. He did not mind a challenge, but being pained in this way humiliated him and that elevated Nina Gould to a higher punishment scale in his book of rules.

  Adamant on delivering her reprimand with some physical infliction, Beck raced to the bottom of the corridor where he could hear her trying to dial from her cell phone. The light of the screen betrayed her position and in no time Jonathan Beck had caught up with her, grabbing the phone from her hand. Swiftly he followed up with a self-rewarding punch to her pretty face, catching her limp body before she could hit the floor.

  “And dressed for the occasion too,” he grinned as he pulled the hood of her sweat suit over her head to avoid identification when he carried her out. He endeavored the arduous task of searching for her bag, but ultimately realized that it was probably still in the lobby at the front door where she must have dropped it to the floor after retrieving her phone.

  And Beck was correct. Her bag was lying on the wooden floor a few inches from the front door. With her body dangling over his shoulder he quickly picked up the strewn contents and lightly booted the hissing cat out of the way before leaving the house as dark and quiet as it had looked through his binoculars.

  9

  Purdue's Itch

  LOCAL ACADEMIC ABDUCTED – the second page headline read in the Glasgow Post three days later. Similar tags were seen in local newspapers around Edinburgh and the northern areas, as well as one or two features in smaller print at the bottom of online news report websites. Oddly enough, the news of Dr. Gould's abduction garnered almost no coverage, based on the confusion surrounding her reported disappearance. Be that as it may, Nina's kidnapping did not escape the keen eyes of Purdue. It could not, because in his current status he had to watch the press carefully to remain undetected, to know where to move and when to lie low.

  He was deeply upset by the report, but for the first time in his life, his stature and wealth could not aid him in obtaining the necessary information he needed to solve his predicaments. As a matter of fact, it was the first time Purdue had felt what it was like to have no friends, not to exist to anyone, to be cut off from the world, to have a name that was both redundant and powerless.

  “Sam Cleave, please,” he said in a low tone over the phone he’d begged from the bartender in Queens, New York, the latest seat of his vigil. Paranoia was something Dave Purdue had never before had to deal with. After the life of privilege he’d been born into, accented by his scientific genius and charm, he would never have imagined that he could possibly suffer the demons of anxiety. “Could I leave him an urgent message, please? Tell him that Mr. Hoffa called on him and that he can reach me at...”

  The bartender pretended not to li
sten to the tall, lean man with the crappy accent, but he could not help but eavesdrop. When Purdue hung up the call and thanked him, the porky Italian chuckled and leaned on the bar. He whispered, “So, is your name Jimmy by any chance?” followed by a roaring laugh that gradually died down when he bent over to replace the telephone.

  “Another gin and tonic, please Gino,” Purdue sighed. “God, why did I have to pick America?”

  “Because it's the best place on earth, man! Everything is bigger in the United States, baby!” Gino hollered, evoking a rowdy roar of agreement from the men in the bar.

  “What, like your asses? My God, I have never seen people eat so much crap in my entire life. How do you not seize up and drop dead from a heart attack with all this junk food you all live on?” Purdue jested, puffing up to gesture how full he felt just from watching them eat.

  “Hey, we're Italian, Mr. Hoffa. Eating good is our culture, but those mooks out at Mickey Dee's? They don't know what food is!” the bartender exclaimed happily.

  Purdue had to laugh at the man's jovial explanation, even though he was exhausted from fatigue and concern about Nina. He had no idea how to find out if the reports were true, and if so, how to investigate without blowing his own cover. That was what he needed Sam for. He only hoped that Sam would get his message before it was too late. On the other hand, traveling back to the British Isles now would be too risky for Purdue to undertake, lest he be recognized and arrested. He could deal with being apprehended by the authorities, but that would mar his attempts at saving Nina from God knows who had her.

  Deep down inside, he naturally had an inkling that the Order of the Black Sun was involved, but he just did not know how. Perhaps it was his recurring tribulation at their hands throughout recent years that prompted this notion, but perhaps it was true. They could have been more tenacious than he’d estimated. Purdue had elected to hide in plain sight too, just like the man who took Nina. In the bustling insanity of a metropolis his presence would be inconspicuous and his face simply one in a molten ocean of features. If there was any place on this planet where individuality was challenged, it would be New York.

  Yet his choice of location had now distanced him even further from Nina and at the worst time, and Purdue construed this as a terrible error on his part. Refusing to let the write-up go, he paid the bartender and waved the patrons goodbye with a promise of returning some time. Out into the madness of the New York day he stepped, immediately swept off by the droves of bodies who coalesced continuously as they all went about their lives in the city.

  Countless times Purdue had tried Nina's cell number as well as her home phone, without any success. It only proved that the rumors were indeed true and it drove him crazy to know that he was helpless, unless he wished to be found out. Eventually, by the time Purdue entered the small room he was renting, he began to contemplate the alternative. Weighing up the possibilities became an incessant thought, if only to sate his need to do something constructive.

  Without his usual stimuli and adventure, Purdue felt his soul wilting. No science, no physics or technology surrounded him now, nothing that could challenge his mind and advance his knowledge. An emotional death blow to any man of his intellect and zeal. He had secured a telephone line for Sam to reach him here for the time being, but it was taking too long. Sam was taking too long. Purdue was growing more restless, his decision swaying dangerously close to electing the action he most feared – to pack up and travel back to Scotland, to Oban.

  By 9 p.m. he still hadn’t heard from Sam. Purdue saw it as a sign. Briskly he packed what little luggage he had, slung his high-end laptop bag over his shoulder, and paid up the rest of the week.

  “But where are you going?” asked Miss Warecki, the Good Samaritan who’d leased him one of her rooms. She was fond of the charming Scot, even as mysterious as he conducted himself.

  “I’m so sorry, Miss Warecki, but something unexpected transpired that I was not prepared for in the least. Regrettably I am pressed for time, so I am forced to flee your coup, as it were.” He smiled, trying to sound calm while a storm of panic roared just beneathe the surface.

  “That really is a pity,” she replied coyly. She was quite taken with him, but she was mature enough not to exhibit her disappointment. “We really enjoyed having you here.”

  “Likewise, I enjoyed staying here. I just wish I didn’t have to run so soon,” he replied, slipping her a roll of bills that would cover the next two weeks of what would have been his stay.

  “Oh no, I couldn't take that,” she frowned sincerely. “We had no contract, remember? You were supposed to be but a house guest, as you requested.”

  “I know what our arrangement was, Miss Warecki, but please do me a favor and pretend that I’m still here as your house guest, alright? As far as you’re concerned, I’m still visiting and my absence will be explained by things like gym, shopping, sight-seeing, and the old favorite – I’m in the shower,” he winked playfully, noticing that Miss Warecki was sharp enough to catch his drift. “And that is why I have to pay for the rest of my stay here.”

  “Of course,” she agreed seriously. “Shall I use one of these explanations on Mr. Kilt when he calls back tonight?”

  “No, thank you. You can just tell him that I’m on my way home and will get in touch with him once I’ve arrived there. Thank you so much for your wonderful hospitality.” As she took the money, Purdue lifted his suitcase to leave.

  “David?” she called after him.

  “Yes?” he asked, stopping briefly at the door, his white hair stirred by the cool night wind outside.

  “If you ever decide to come back to Queens, you are welcome to visit us again.” She smiled kindly. “For real.”

  With Sam's help, Purdue had managed to procure enough cash funds from his accounts before MI6 took control of his estate and started tracking his credit card transactions as a precautionary measure until his body was found. Also, because of the latter matter, Purdue's attorneys had not proceeded with the necessary appeals for MI6 to rescind their control of his estate and had subsequently filed a dispute with the high commission. It was a long and tedious application that was better functioning once Purdue had been declared officially deceased by the court.

  Although only two people in the world knew beyond a doubt that David Purdue was still alive and kicking, the Black Sun disbelieved the reports of his demise just as well. Joseph Karsten, for one, was convinced that the smart explorer was fooling the world with his exquisite subterfuge, waiting for his chosen moment to resurface.

  But Karsten did not want to wait until this happened. He wished to put an end to the opposition from their former Renatus – or high leader of the Order – and kill him while the world believed him dead anyway. And he craved the credit for the deed. It was a case of double jeopardy, in Karsten's mind. If he murdered the insolent Purdue within the following weeks, chances were that he would not be arrested if caught. After all, nobody can kill a man who is already dead.

  Purdue used cash for all his transactions, using large bills to avoid having to carry thick wads of paper money around. With his previous dealings in less than legal terms, he had obtained one or two counterfeit passports, one of which he was utilizing for his current charade. Hastily he hailed a yellow cab and headed to JFK, en route to where he was vexed by a detour his cabby was forced to take due to a hellish traffic jam stretching all the way from Grand Central Parkway and York College.

  “Please, I have to get to the airport as soon as possible,” Purdue urged his cab driver, only because the Middle Eastern looking man was singing along with traditional music as if he had all night to get to his destination.

  “Is okay, sir. We get there when I turn,” the cabby smiled through cracked lips and a wicked white set of choppers.

  “When you turn…” Purdue moaned, throwing up his hands and falling back in his seat. “Of course, when you turn.”

  “Yes, as soon as we get to Hillside Avenue, I turn!” the cabby shouted gl
eefully over the incessant whining of what sounded like a hybrid female-peacock on his radio speakers.

  “Okay, alright, you do that,” Purdue pretended to know what the man was talking about.

  But to his surprise the cabby did exactly that, turning onto a road which had virtually no traffic, at least not in the fiendish volumes that had previously been perturbing Purdue's journey to the JFK Airport. They reached the airport in under seven minutes after that, earning the caterwauling driver a good tip.

  Purdue booked a flight to Dublin, dodging the spies at Heathrow and Glasgow he knew would be on high alert.

  God, I could have really used the Babylonian Mask right now, Purdue thought to himself as he watched the colorful lights of the city night go by. That particular artifact could adapt to the face of another individual and give its wearer the power to be passed off as someone else. It would certainly have been highly beneficial on this trip. But for now he had to get to Dublin with his own face.

  And from there he would be forced to slow his trip considerably, travelling by boat past the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea to evade detection. By water he would head northward until he reached the port of Campbeltown, from which Purdue planned to rent a car to drive up the A83 to Oban, which would take him just short of three hours.

  He had to take the chance, even if he arrived in Nina's hometown to find her watching TV on her couch. The risk was worth knowing for sure that she was safe, even if it meant that he strolled into danger for it. If only his genius could lend to intuition, Purdue would know that he was doing just that.

  10

  Jonathan Beck, meet Sylvia Beach

  Maria Winslet was beside herself. Pacing up and down, she gnawed nervously at her thumb nail and her blue eyes stayed glued to the floor. She was worried about her partner, Jonathan Beck. He had just received a push call from Joseph Karsten, one of his highest paying, and most nefarious, clients. The Austrian was asking for a progress report on the delivery of Dr. Nina Gould, a call Beck had been eagerly awaiting until he removed his captive's hoodie and found that he’d kidnapped the wrong person.