The Trojan Icon (Ethan Gage Adventures Book 8)

by William Dietrich

  “Apologies at my presumption.” He looked unhappy.

  “As I’ve explained before, discretion and privacy remain a necessity,” Elizabeth said. “This visit, like my others, will go unrecorded.”

  “Yes, tsarina.”

  We passed by an office and then guardroom where the door had been shut on the soldiers inside to keep them from gawking. Next was a massive wooden door leading to the treasury. The colonel unlocked this, handed Elizabeth a ring of heavy keys, gave me a lantern, and hesitated. “May I again offer assistance?”

  “Shut the door behind us.”

  Its boom made us jump.

  We were in a barren cell, looking ahead at a succession of grilled iron gates. Each marked a treasure room roofed by one of the brick domes, reminding me of the succession of chambers in Catherine’s palace. The storehouses were dark, their windows bricked. I lifted the lantern. The building felt like a tomb.

  Elizabeth smiled like a conspirator. “Thanks for helping shed him. It’s quite enchanting to see these treasures and much more fun without Karlinsky hovering like a bat. He regards the repository as his.” She unlocked the first gate. “It’s even more enchanting to be, for one moment, alone.”

  “I don’t count as a companion, tsarina?”

  “You don’t count because you’re tolerable. Despite my commands Karlinsky spies, makes mental notes, and acts as impatient as a man in an embroidery shop. Besides, you were never here. Understood?”

  I nodded.

  The chambers beyond were like Ali Baba’s cave.

  Weighty crowns. Jeweled scepters. Ermine robes. Sparkling tiaras. Ornate clocks. Golden swords. Inlaid boxes. Gem-encrusted rings. A mechanical peacock. Any single item would set an ordinary person for life. They gleamed like toys at Christmas, or the sacred candles in the Orthodox cathedrals. Many had been gifts from other monarchs or ambassadors. Some were spoils of war. Precious treasures are captured light, drops of the sun, and these shone with soulful fire. They were usually shut away in the dark unless brought out for a coronation or funeral. I felt privileged, but uncertain why I was here.

  We passed through five rooms, unlocking each gate and then relocking it behind us. “The colonel will not come upon us unawares,” Elizabeth said.

  The sixth room held Persian and Turkish items. I paused to admire their intricate Islamic designs in onyx and alabaster. Fabulous carpets were rolled and stacked like logs. Ancient gold jewelry from long-lost empires, crudely heavy, dated to gods as old as Egypt’s. The accumulated wealth throbbed with time. And there the treasury ended, except for a final solid door. I wondered which Zoroastrian prize Elizabeth wanted me to examine.

  But she was fitting a key in the last lock. “The treasury stores both items of antiquity and those used for ceremonial occasions,” Elizabeth explained. “It has bullion to ballast our currency, valuables to trade for weapons, and jewels to dazzle queens. This is the fruit of conquest, gifts, and taxation from a million estates and businesses.”

  “A Prussian told us your country is an ocean of soil.”

  “Von Bonin?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then these are the shells upon that ocean’s beach. But that’s not what I want to show you. This last room is where objects are taken preparatory for use, so that they can be removed without organizers snooping on the rest of the treasures. Come see what that Prussian, a dog sent to fetch by his masters, most covets.” She unlocked the final door, its thick wood banded by iron. The entry squealed as if rarely opened.

  The chamber beyond was almost bare.

  The exception was an oval stone table that occupied the room’s center like an altar. It looked like a mummification slab from Egypt, or a tabernacle for the Grail. On top lay two medieval broad swords, dark and plain except for gilded hilts. There was no cloth, no case, and no decoration. The brick dome was blank overhead. The only light was from my lantern.

  “Go ahead, take a look.”

  I examined the weapons. Their steel was pitted and their edges nicked. They were clearly antique, but not particularly decorative. The swords seemed of little value compared to the hoard we’d just passed through. I glanced around. The gloomy brick walls were plain and impenetrable. The temperature was frigid.

  “These look like prisoners in a cell,” I said. “Or quarantined, as if diseased. Why are they alone?”

  “To await removal,” Elizabeth said. “If icons are the window into the soul of Russia, these represent Poland. My friend Adam Czartoryski calls them the most precious relics of his nation. Yet he dare not go near, lest he confirm his sympathies and give ammunition to his enemies. For the same reason I didn’t bring your husband here, and instead made up a story about silly women studying ancient jewelry. There’s an advantage to being female; Karlinsky has promised to be quiet about my visits because he believes them frivolous. I told him the tsar fears me a profligate spender constantly searching for new inspirations, which merely confirmed prejudices the colonel already had. Such secrecy might last just long enough.”

  “Long enough for what?” The cell was very oppressive, making me think of the prison nearby.

  “For your husband to liberate these.”

  When you accept charity such as an apartment and servant, payment must always come due. My heart began to thump. “Tsarina?”

  “You may call me Elizabeth, Astiza, because we must be the closest of friends. Partners. Sisters. What you see here are the Grunwald Swords, the soul of Poland. In 1410, at Grunwald Field, the grand master of Germany’s Teutonic Knights sent these swords as a challenge to King Vladislaus II of Poland. The Poles won the ensuring battle, helped by early artillery serviced by Chinese monks. The Poles kept the swords as spoils of victory, using them in coronation ceremonies ever since. The Germans have smarted from the defeat for the same four centuries. When Poland was partitioned in 1794, Catherine the Great took the swords to Russia. And now Russia, seeking an ally that happens to loathe Poland, has promised the swords to Prussia in return for partnership against Napoleon. Von Bonin is here to collect them.”

  “He has only one hand and one eye.”

  “He’s deadly with that prosthesis. I’ve heard that when he duels—which is often—he proposes that his opponent fight with one arm tied and one eye blindfolded, to make it fair. They foolishly agree. But if he begins to lose the battle with his left hand he raises the stump of his right, and shoots and slashes. It’s little more than murder.”

  “The Prussian showed us the blade during the reception at Catherine Palace. It juts out like a snake’s tongue.”

  “Lothar is a boastful lout. I tried to persuade the tsar against granting him these swords, but I’ve no influence. Alexander is desperate to drag Prussia into war in order to prolong the fight against Napoleon. But Adam thinks that if the swords were to disappear first, the Germans might suspect Russia of going back on its word. The pact might be broken. Czartoryski favors peace with France and so do I. Too many brave Russians were cut down at Austerlitz. And war will be a disaster for my own German homeland, which I predict will be colonized by France. It’s women who have the sense to bring peace, Astiza. Peace for your child Horus. Peace for my coming baby. A theft of these swords is best for Russia, best for Germany, and best for us. With peace, Bonaparte might persuade Alexander into reconstituting Poland as a buffer state.”

  “Adam Czartoryski’s dream.”

  “And Prussia’s nightmare. So these swords in Von Bonin’s hands mean turmoil, while their disappearance gives a chance for reconciliation and restoration. Besides, they belong to Poland. My Adam’s idea is to seize them and secrete them until his nation rises again.”

  My Adam. One wondered, of course, why this former German princess was prepared to foil her husband to serve the foreign minister. “You still love Czartoryski,” I ventured. “Despite Captain Okhotnikov.”

  “Captain Alexis gives me
pleasure. Adam inflames my heart. Isn’t it amazing how easy it is to forget debts, and how difficult to forget old lovers? It’s awkward now that he’s foreign minister, but feelings don’t conveniently disappear. So I offered to recruit you. Have I succeeded?”

  “Tsarina—Elizabeth—I don’t see how Ethan can steal these. They’re buried in a treasury in the biggest fortress in St. Petersburg, surrounded by a thousand men, with no way in but a succession of locked doors.”

  “Yes. And yet your husband has a reputation for finding his way into all kinds of improbable places with the help of his ingenious wife. Perhaps you can work your magic and he his science. Will you at least ask him?”

  No good could come of this, yet how could I deny our benefactress? And how I longed for a home! “If you insist.”

  “You have three days. On the fourth, the Prussians intend to transfer the swords to Berlin.”

  “Three days!”

  “The swords must vanish. No one must attach their disappearance to you or me.”

  Once more I felt we were in a black underground river, reaching for a last gasp of air. “And if we fail?”

  “If by some miracle you aren’t killed or arrested, you’ll have to flee Russia. So it’s high risk, but high reward as well.” She took my cold hands in hers again. “If you succeed, I promise that Adam will find a way to persuade the tsar to reward Ethan Gage for his military advice.”

  “Reward him how?”

  “By giving you a palace in which you can finally raise your son in peace and safety.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Harry

  It’s too cold where we live now, but I get to play with a boy named Ivan. And I get to help Papa.

  This city is better than the dark place where Mama and I had to stay in the bad days. We killed the bad people, and then we came here.

  When I play with Ivan I don’t think about the smelly place. We play soldiers or wooden animals, or sometimes we go outside in the snow. I like snow. Ivan lives in our building and there is a courtyard where we build forts and snowmen until the horses trample and poop too much. Sometimes Papa helps, and then Mama makes hot milk with sugar when we come inside. Ivan doesn’t speak French or English, but he’s taught me Russian words. Snow sounds like sneg.

  Sometimes I have bad dreams, so Papa moved my bed next to theirs. My old room is where I help him with his inventions.

  The inventions smell again. Grownups do stinky things.

  Papa is very smart. He said he learned everything there is to know from an old man named Ben Franklin, who is dead. But Mama may be even smarter because she reads books all the time. I can already read many words. My parents say that if I keep reading I can learn everything there is to know in the world. And they say that if the inventions work, we might live in a palace.

  I wouldn’t like to move away from Ivan.

  They also say winter will end and it will get warmer, but every day in Russia seems colder to me.

  I had to promise not to tell Ivan about our inventions, but here is what we did.

  Papa showed me rubber, which is dark and soft. We put this in turpentine, and I liked that smell. The rubber slowly melted and disappeared. Then Mama used the muddy turpentine to paint silk. She said we are making a balloon.

  Papa also built a big copper hat with a tube that curled out the top. Then he poured smelly acid over old metal, which made fumes. The hat collected the fumes, but we still had to open the window. Snow blew in while Papa used a pump to fill brown jugs.

  Mama said it was that big word she likes, alchemy.

  Papa said it was science.

  Mama said they were the same.

  Papa said they weren’t.

  Then they kissed.

  Then he made a machine he said could produce invisible lightning. I’m scared of storms, but Papa said this is a tame storm, like a pet. I got to crank the handle. Some wires led to a bar of metal.

  “Now comes the magic, Harry,” Papa said. “We’ve made a magnet.”

  He held the metal bar over loose nails and they jumped to it like fleas.

  I wanted to show Ivan. Papa said I couldn’t.

  “Not until summer,” Mama said.

  Mama and Papa are very smart. But I don’t know if summer will ever come.

  CHAPTER 6

  I hope that Count Stanislaus Podlowski, who fell afoul of mad Tsar Paul and died in the tsar’s island prison, is looking down to appreciate his role in the cause of Polish independence. Prison deaths require a steady stream of plain wooden coffins to be shipped to the Peter and Paul Fortress, and Czartoryski and I used the count’s demise as a way to transfer our strange supplies. I didn’t know the late nobleman, but apparently Podlowski had spoken too openly about Poland and been jailed for his opinion. Cold, disease, and confinement had done the rest.

  Now we’d make his sacrifice meaningful.

  The patriot’s widow was required to pay for her husband’s casket, as a tax on treason. So she eagerly gave foreign minister Czartoryski permission to use the box for our secret cause. I disguised myself as a Russian laborer, brought along sullen house-servant Gregor to help lift and interpret, filled the coffin with what I needed for my adventure, and fell in with a sleigh convoy delivering eight of the caskets to the prison. It was foggy and the desultory procession took no particular note of us since everyone was busy using ropes, pulleys, and profane grumbling to slide the sledges down to the Neva and across the river to the brooding fort. Then chanting serfs carried the coffins through the Nevsky Gate. Bored sentries offered no help.

  Gregor and I stacked the casket marked for Podlowski near the fortress cathedral, at a spot where brief last rites would be recited for the latest dead criminals. The deliveries created a knot of confusion as peasants, priests, soldiers, and bureaucrats mingled for the delivery. I ducked behind the mint, draped a cassock over my clothes, and came back to pay off my servant. I’d given Gregor one extra ruble to reward this special labor, and now gave him another to ensure his silence. I hardly needed to spend it since the truculent servant rarely spoke, but it was a trivial expense from my newly fat purse. Conspiracy comes cheap in Russia.

  He grunted what might have been thanks and trudged away to re-cross the frozen river, glowering at all creation.

  Disguised as a priest, I edged the other direction and darted briefly inside the cathedral for some necessary mischief. Then I hid in the privy of the cathedral garden, unused in winter when few worshippers visit. It was a two-hole bench uncomfortably sheened with ice, so I consoled myself with the palace I’d soon win. Count Ethan! I recited as I waited. Prince Gage! Life often pokes me with the little end of the horn, as they say, but from descent in Bohemia I’d ascend in Russia, and at some point take my title back to America.

  My countrymen positively fawn over nobility, now that we don’t have any. I’d study pretension and dress up my wife.

  I listened to the wind blow snow off the Baltic and periodically shifted, so as to not be permanently frozen to my throne. Soon enough it would be dark at this latitude, and I’d set to work.

  Mine was a reckless, perilous, intricate, inventive, and risky plan, and thus typical of the ones I come up with. I must not only commit a noble crime, but also prevent any investigation of said crime by vanishing. Success required a conjunction of weather, time, and science worthy of an astronomer, plus no small amount of luck. If I failed I’d probably be imprisoned. Then tortured. And finally either shot, beheaded, or hanged; I wasn’t sure of the Russian custom.

  All for antique cutlery! And I had to retrieve the swords tonight, because Lothar Von Bonin was scheduled to take them to Prussia in two days. It was word of his planned retrieval and departure that forced our own scheme in hasty motion. The swords must be well away from St. Petersburg before anyone noticed them missing.

  “The transfer is a state secret so the loss won
’t be announced,” Czartoryski assured me. “Success will prove God is on Poland’s side.”

  “This is more what the devil would come up with, but I’ll take miracles from either party.”

  Our St. Petersburg apartment had become a makeshift laboratory, my wife the collaborating scientist, and my son a sorcerer’s apprentice. The lad is as clever as his mama, and while he’s seen more of the world’s underbelly than I’d prefer it has made him a precocious adventurer. Like any boy, Harry ordinarily just wants to play and read, but he’s proud to help Papa and is cursed with his parents’ curiosity. More than once, with some guilt and a great deal of self-justification, I’ve pressed him into risky tasks. He’s big enough to be brave, old enough to follow instructions, and small enough to squirm into tight places. Wretched lad! He’ll make a fine treasure hunter one day.

  Harry was waiting for me right now. It was imperative he not be jailed, so my strictest instruction was that he stay in his hiding place only until full morning and then, if I didn’t appear as promised, sneak back home.

  Which meant that my operation had to advance as inexorably as a lighted fuse.

  The Peter and Paul Cathedral closed at dusk. I peeked out. Doors were locked by black-clad Orthodox priests who marched back to their fortress rectory like a procession of bulky crows. I froze in my privy an additional hour, to make sure no one lingered or returned, and then crept to a church window overlooking the marble tombs inside. I hauled up the sash I’d unlatched in my brief visit hours before. I crawled through, locked the window, turned, and confirmed I had the church to myself. Pale light sifted from the snowy gloom outside.

  The cathedral was a baroque masterpiece, with enough gold, marble, porphyry, jasper, serpentine, onyx, alabaster, and crystal to make anyone a Christian. A soaring ceiling promised Heaven to the stark royal tombs below, each marble sarcophagus badged with a horizontal bronze Orthodox cross. I shivered at the magnificence, crossed myself just in case, and then lifted a bar on a side door, cracking it to peer for sentries. They were all in shelter. I scampered out, burrowed in the snow to my coffin and its supplies, and left the container empty for poor Count Podlowski. By dawn, wind and fresh flakes would cover my disturbance.