The Invisible City (A Tom Wagner Adventure Book 3)

by M. C. Roberts

  “What did you mean when you said you did not know? What is it?” Cloutard asked in surprise.

  “It’s made of wood, I know that much, and very beautifully crafted. It’s like a box, but there’s no lid, no opening, no lock,” Arthur explained as he climbed into the yellow, egg-shaped taxi. “Come on, get in.”

  “Into that?” Cloutard shook his head as he stared at the tiny three-wheeled buggy, but he finally climbed inside.

  “The perfect vehicle for disappearing in Havana,” Arthur said. He turned to the driver and handed him a twenty-dollar bill. “Fábrica de Tabaco Partagas.”

  31

  Kremlin concert hall, Nizhny Novgorod

  Several of the president’s bodyguards had rapidly tackled the hapless man and, despite his loud protests, had dragged him out of the hall. Hellen looked at Tom in shock.

  “If that’s true, we need to hurry. If an earthquake messes up our plans just before we find Kitezh, I’m going to be very unhappy.”

  Tom smiled. He liked it when Hellen’s passion was stirred. That same spark in her eyes was what had attracted him to her when they had first met, during the Habsburg affair in Vienna. She had been through quite a lot since then, but it had only stoked the fire inside her. Tom could hardly conceal how powerfully attracted to this side of her he was.

  “Sure. If it’s true. We should have a chat with Grillery what’s-his-name and see if his story checks out.”

  Hellen smiled. “‘Grillery what’s-his-name’ is Sir Hillary Graves. He’s a famous seismologist.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  After the guests vacated the stage, the main doors were opened and the public poured inside. The musicians took their places, and the bells that traditionally announced the start of the concert rang out. The governor, the Patriarch, and the president with his security detail had already disappeared behind the curtains.

  “Okay. Let’s try and talk to Sir Hillary after the concert. I want to have another word with that Welsh guy, too. I don’t like the looks of him,” Tom said, feeling inside the pocket of his tuxedo for their tickets. They still had to find their seats. “What are we about to suffer through?”

  Hellen waved the program booklet. “A real rarity, but it fits incredibly well. The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh. It’s an opera by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.”

  “Seriously? There’s an opera about it?”

  Hellen nodded, unable to hide her smile. She knew how much Tom hated this kind of thing.

  “I don’t even want to ask, but . . . how long is this going to take? Roughly?” He wobbled his hand in the air.

  “About three and a half hours.”

  “Umm . . . three and a half hours? In Russian?”

  “You can do it,” Hellen said, patting him encouragingly on the shoulder.

  “Remind me to call in a favor from the Patriarch. Three and a half hours of Russian yowling. That’s got to be a human rights violation.”

  They found their seats and the hall fell silent. Then the governor, the Patriarch and the Russian president returned to the stage. The concert hall erupted in whistling and applause.

  “I think they’re going to reveal the cross to the public,” Hellen whispered as the Patriarch began to speak.

  “Or maybe they’re announcing last week’s lotto numbers,” Tom said.

  Tom noted that Father Fjodor, who rarely left the Patriarch’s side, was not with him on stage. Tom turned and scanned the hall in time to see the Patriarch’s secretary exiting through one of the side doors. Hellen also noticed his departure. They exchanged a frown.

  “Why would the secretary be leaving now?” Hellen asked.

  “And why is that bald guy who’s sitting with the Welshman and Qadir staring at his watch the whole time?” Tom pointed to where the Welshman sat two rows ahead of them.

  “Тихо!” hissed an old lady from the row behind Tom and Hellen.

  “I have no idea what that means,” Tom whispered, “but I think it’s a friendly reminder to pipe down when the dictator speaks.”

  The Russian president had already launched into a speech. The Patriarch handed him the case that held the cross.

  “Everyone seems kind of on edge,” Tom whispered as he looked around.

  “Yes. They hang on every word he says.”

  The president had taken the cross out of its case and now held it up proudly for the audience to see. The applause was deafening.

  “Kitezh is a big deal for these people,” Hellen said. “Almost as big as . . .”

  “As the job your mother gave us?” Tom said, finishing her sentence for her. “The one we put on ice for this?” He knew exactly what she was thinking.

  “Yes. What Mother showed us is beyond compare. What a sensation for the entire world it would be if we—”

  Just then, in the middle of the president’s passionate speech, the lights went out and the concert hall was plunged into darkness.

  32

  Fábrica de Tabaco Partagas, Havana

  The moped taxi pulled up in front of the chestnut-and-cream-colored Fábrica de Tabaco Partagas, situated in an out-of-the-way corner of the Cuban capital, and Cloutard and Arthur climbed out.

  “May I ask what we are here for? Provisions?” Cloutard joked as they entered the 175-year-old cigar factory. Immediately to the right was the showroom. Farther back was an atrium with stairs that led up to the production halls, where men and women sat and rolled cigars by hand, day in and day out. These days, evil tongues would call the traditional factory a sweatshop.

  In front of the salesroom were wooden benches where a few old men sat and talked in loud voices and puffed on their Havanas. Arthur nodded to one of them, who pointed toward the showroom, and Cloutard followed him inside. They walked straight past the cabinets and shelves filled with the best cigars in the world. At a bar, a handful of tourist slurped mojitos and talked cigars. In a back corner, beside the cash register, was a door labeled “VIP.” This was Arthur’s destination. When he was close to the cashier, he smiled in greeting, but the old woman abruptly jumped to her feet, pushed past him, and ran straight to Cloutard with her arms in the air.

  “Señor Cloutard! We haven’t seen you for so long. Cómo está?” Arthur was astonished to see the old woman kiss Cloutard on both cheeks in greeting.

  “I am well, thank you. Maria, isn’t it?”

  “Si señor,” she said, beaming at Cloutard, and she embraced him again. “What can I do for you? The usual?”

  Taken aback, Cloutard smiled sheepishly and pointed to Arthur. “We are actually here for him.”

  She turned to Arthur. “Arthur, chico malo, you never told me that you knew François Cloutard,” she said, slapping Arthur’s rear as if he were a naughty boy. Arthur shrugged and smiled apologetically.

  “He is a friend of my grandson. Is your husband here?” Arthur asked the big-hearted woman.

  “He’s in the back with some friends. Go right in.”

  Arthur put his arm around Cloutard and guided him toward the VIP room. Cloutard turned back to Maria and said, “Now that I am here, I would take a small box.” Maria smiled and nodded.

  “Arthur!” cried Ernesto, Maria’s husband, followed by a surprised, “And Señor Cloutard?” The door to the VIP room closed behind them. A gray haze hung in the air and an incomparable aroma filled their noses. Ernesto was on his feet and shook both men’s hands vigorously. “Un momento, por favor,” he said. He turned to his four friends, each sitting in a comfortable armchair and enjoying a cigar and a glass of rum, and said, “Vamonos. These are important customers.” Ernesto’s friends grumbled, but they got to their feet and moved toward the door.

  Cloutard eyes swept over the countless photographs adorning the walls all around. Politicians, diplomats, crooks and celebrities were immortalized in the pictures, among them Jack Nicholson, Whoopie Goldberg and Gérard Depardieu, to name just a few. Even Hemingway had once been a guest at the cigar bar.

  “Good times,
” Cloutard said nostalgically, and he pointed to one photo in particular. Arthur followed his pointing finger and his eyes widened: Cloutard sat surrounded by soldiers, with none other than Fidel Castro himself at his side. Each of them had a cigar in his mouth and a glass of rum in his hand.

  When Ernesto, a chubby man with a thick black moustache, had successfully shooed his friends out of the room, he returned to his newly arrived guests. “I need the casket,” said Arthur without hesitation.

  Ernesto’s smile vanished and he nodded. He went to a corner of the room and pressed on a wooden slat, and a section of wood paneling slid to one side to reveal a secret door. Ernesto opened the narrow door and ducked through it to the room behind, which contained an ancient elevator. Arthur and Cloutard followed. With all three men squeezed into the tiny room, Ernesto closed the wood panel again, and pulled the elevator’s accordion gate open. Cloutard’s excitement was growing by the second.

  “This is really just something neat that we show our VIPs,” Ernesto said when he saw Cloutard’s enthusiasm. “We only use it when we show important guests around. You know, they look exactly like you did just now.” He smiled and pulled the steel gate closed. The cabin gave a jolt and began to rise.

  “Why didn’t you ever show the elevator to me?” Cloutard asked in surprise.

  “We only discovered it recently when we were doing renovations. Someone bricked it up years ago,” Ernesto explained.

  They left the elevator at the production level. The torcedores—the men and women who rolled the cigars—sat at antique wooden tables, hidden behind presses and piles of tobacco leaves. This was where they carried out their monotonous work. At the end of the room sat an old woman who read to the torcedores from a book while they worked, keeping them entertained. Salsa music seeped quietly from speakers around the room.

  The three men crossed the large room. Beside the cargo elevator was the shift supervisor’s office, and in one corner of the office stood an almost prehistoric safe, almost six feet tall. Ernesto opened the steel monster and took out a box that, at first glance, might have been mistaken for an ornate humidor. He handed it to Arthur.

  “Where else would you keep a box like this?” Arthur said with a smile. “Thank you, my friend,” he added, and the three men left the office. They went to the top of the stairs leading down, but suddenly heard a commotion and screams from the bottom of the atrium. They went to the railing and stared down in disbelief.

  “Merde,” Cloutard muttered.

  33

  Kremlin concert hall, Nizhny Novgorod

  The only light came from a half dozen exit signs suspended above doorways on each side of the hall. The signs flickered dimly; it was clear that the batteries hadn’t been tested in far too long. Frightened cries could be heard, and Tom had the feeling that something was going on. There were people on their feet, moving toward the stage. From his jacket pocket, Tom pulled the small SureFire flashlight he always carried with him. He switched it on.

  “Finally, a reason for carrying this thing around all the time,” he said to Hellen as the beam of light cut through the darkness. He saw immediately that the bald guy and two more of Brice’s men had run up onto the stage. The Russian president had been whisked away by his security detail and was already halfway to the nearest exit. The cross was lying on the stage.

  “They’re going for the cross!” Tom shouted. He fought his way along the row of seats toward the central aisle.

  The bald man—“Cueball” now for Tom—pushed the Patriarch over, picked up the cross and ran from the stage. Tom had reached the central aisle, but many of the concertgoers were on their feet and heading for the exits. Tom had his hands full just fighting against the stream of bodies. There was no way through. He saw that Cueball was pushing his way toward one of the side doors on the right. Just then the lights came back on, and Tom saw that most of the seats between him and the side door were empty.

  He vaulted over the first row of seats and was automatically reminded of his high school gym class as he swung himself left and right over the rows. He reached the exit seconds later and ran down a corridor outside the hall. At the end, Cueball was just turning a corner. Tom raced after him and jerked open the door through which the man had disappeared. He found himself in another large hall, where preparations for the banquet set to follow the opera were underway. Waiters were setting places at the tables and getting everything set up for the ceremonial dinner. They looked up as first the bald man, then moments later Tom raced across the hall toward the kitchen.

  The automatic door to the kitchen opened whenever anyone approached it and stayed open for several seconds afterward. Tom saw the man collide with one of the kitchen hands, who was mopping the floor. They both went down with a crash, and the air filled with a stream of curses in Russian. Tom seized his chance, and as the man, dripping wet, got up again, Tom threw himself on him.

  But his adversary was faster. As he got to his feet, he grabbed the mop and swung it hard at Tom’s head. Tom ducked under it and grabbed the kitchen hand’s bucket as he straightened, swinging it straight up. The bottom of the iron bucket smashed into Cueball’s chin, but the expected reaction did not follow. The man still stood as solid as a rock in front of Tom. He snorted with contempt and grabbed a frying pan. Holding it by the end of its long handle, he swung the pan at high speed at Tom’s head. Tom was able to block it with his left arm just in time, but it only softened the impact a little. The force of the blow sent him staggering to the right, where he crashed onto a pile of plates that slipped to the floor and smashed into thousands of pieces. Cueball took advantage of Tom’s fall. He turned and ran for the back door.

  Tom picked himself up, snatched up a kitchen knife and threw it after the fleeing figure. The knife slashed the man’s upper arm, opening a deep wound, before burying itself in the door frame. The man let out a yell and stopped—unfortunately for Tom, right beside a knife block. He turned, and with incredible skill and speed, snatched the various knives out of the block and hurled them at Tom. Tom saw only one escape—he dived head first over the open flames of a massive stove. The knives whistled past and clanged against the pots hanging above it. Then silence. Tom looked out from behind the stove. The kitchen was empty. The staff had fled and Cueball had disappeared.

  Tom took off at a run, leaving the kitchen behind. Seconds later found himself at the back entrance of the concert hall. He saw Cueball running toward the main gate of the Kremlin.

  You’re not getting away from me, buddy, Tom thought, and he took off in pursuit. He dodged through the crowds that filled the kremlin grounds, there to see the fireworks that were the grand finale of the 800th anniversary celebrations. The people of Nizhny Novgorod were not going to miss a show like that. Cueball was not as nimble as Tom and kept crashing into bystanders. Tom was gaining on him rapidly.

  But the bald guy had now spotted him, and he changed direction and ran into the Demetrievskaya Tower. He raced up the stairs leading to the broad walkway that topped the wall all the way around the kremlin. Reaching the top of the stairs, Tom saw the man ahead of him, running along the wall. There were no people up here, but Tom still had to deal with obstacles. The walkway was a construction zone—or a garbage dump. Sacks, construction tools, scaffolding and junk were already slowing Cueball down. This was Tom’s chance. He had to catch the man and get the cross back, or they would come up, literally, empty-handed.

  Cueball stumbled over a fallen ladder and Tom finally caught up with him. He leaped at him, bringing his fist crashing down on the man’s skull. Cueball toppled backward, landing on sacks filled with rubble. Tom could smell victory, but he suddenly heard a rumbling noise. He could not tell where it came from. The sound grew louder. Cueball looked up at Tom, his eyes wide—he didn’t know what was happening either. Tom realized what it was just before it hit, but he had no time to get to safety. Suddenly, the ground began to tremble and the wall began to crack underneath them.

  An earthquake! Sir Hillary
was right, Tom thought, looking around desperately for a handhold. But it was too late. A gap opened under his right foot. Tom lost his balance and fell. His right shoulder hit the stone floor hard, and he grimaced in pain. The gap widened, threatening to swallow him. He scrabbled for something, anything he could hold onto and managed to get a grip on part of the workmen’s scaffolding. That gave him stability, but only for a second. He fell, and the steel scaffolding came down after him.

  34

  Fábrica de Tabaco Partagas, Havana

  “Up there!” one of the thugs shouted to his partner, and fired his pistol twice. The two killers they had shaken off earlier with the help of Cloutard’s friend were suddenly inside the factory and were already on their way upstairs. Tourists and customers fled in all directions.

  “How did they find us?” Arthur said in surprise.

  He went for his revolver, but Cloutard stopped him. “It is two guns against one. Besides, there are too many innocent people here who could get hurt.”

  “You don’t happen to have any real secret passages out of here, do you?” Arthur asked. Ernesto shook his head.

  “Back to the elevator,” Cloutard whispered, and all three ran for the antique machine that had carried them up. Cloutard and Arthur climbed inside, but to their surprise Ernesto closed the elevator gate from the outside after pushing the button to send it down.

  “Trust me. I have an idea,” he said, and he turned back into the room with the torcedores. He took off his jacket and shirt and threw them into a corner. Now in only his undershirt, he rubbed grime onto his face and hands. He signaled to his employees to stay calm and keep working. Then he sat at a free table and began to roll a cigar. A moment later, the two killers charged around the corner, pistols drawn.