The stairs ended at another closed door. When John eased it open I started; the voices sounded as if they were only a few feet away. They were. The room to our left was the kitchen. I could smell cooking and hear pots and dishes rattling.
John went the other way, moving as soundlessly as if he too were barefoot. I hadn’t been in this part of the house and I had no idea where we were or where we were going, so I stayed close on his heels. When he opened the next door I did know where we were, and that encouraging old adage about the frying pan and the fire came back to me. Ahead was the main hall of the house, lighted like a stage by the hanging brass chandelier and a dozen sconces. The open archway to my right led to the parlour. Lights blazed from that room as well; in another forty minutes, give or take five minutes, Larry and his ‘guests’ would be entering it. On my left was the staircase. I’d have preferred to stay in the illusory safety of the shadows cast by that massive structure, but John didn’t pause. He walked unconcernedly past the foot of the stairs and entered the corridor that led to the library and Larry’s study.
Apparently he had been right about the household schedule. We met no one. When we reached the study John’s fingers pressed a switch and prodded a button, both concealed in the carving of the frame, before he turned the knob. So, I thought, this wasn’t the first time he had enjoyed Larry’s hospitality. He was one of the world’s most efficient snoops, but even he coudn’t have discovered so many usefal details in two days.
It was at this point that John’s theories failed. I suppose it was something of a compliment to me that Larry had taken the precaution of stationing a guard in his study. Or, to look at it another way, it was something of an insult. Had he really believed I’d be foolhardy enough to return? Well, he had been right. And if I had been looking for evidence of guilt, this was where I’d have looked first.
The guard was the man I had known as Sweet. He was eating his supper off a tray, and he must have assumed his visitors were members of the household, familiar with the security system. That moment of misapprehension, brief though it was, saved our necks. Dropping his fork, he reached for his shoulder holster, but he was too slow. John had him covered.
‘Get his gun,’ John said. ‘Go round behind him. Far around, if you’ll forgive me for pointing out the obvious.’
Sweet’s expression didn’t live up to the nom de guerre he had chosen. His eyes, unblinking as those of a reptile, followed me as I sidled to one side, giving him a wide berth. I was not looking forward to coming within arm’s reach of him but I didn’t have to. As soon as I had reached a point at which Sweet had to turn his head to follow my progress John hit him, not with the gun, but with his left fist.
‘I didn’t know you were ambidextrous,’ I said, removing my Girl Scout neckerchief and winding it around Sweet’s wrists.
‘I’m not. Bloody hell! That hurt.’
‘Stop complaining and help me. I need some rope.’
‘Sorry, I’m fresh out.’ Removing his belt, he used it to bind Sweet’s ankles.
‘We need a gag. Where’s that nice, clean white handkerchief a proper gent always carries?’
‘Never mind the gag.’ John went to the fireplace and began running his hands over the panelling next to it. ‘What time is it?’
‘Seven twenty-five.’
‘Not much time. I hope to God I haven’t forgotten . . . Ah. That’s done it.’
A section of the panelling slid aside under the pressure of his hands. I could see lights behind it; they must have come on automatically when the door was opened. ‘Go ahead,’ he said. ‘I’ll fetch the unwanted baggage.’
‘Larry’s quite a romantic, isn’t he?’ I remarked, starting down the stairs the open panel had disclosed. ‘Secret passages all over the place.’
‘There’s a good and sufficient practical reason for this bit of romanticism.’ John followed me, towing ‘Sweet’ by his feet. I am as a rule a tenderhearted person but I did not wince when I heard his head bounce from step to step.
There was no door at the bottom of the stairs. They opened directly into a large windowless room.
No wonder I hadn’t been impressed with Larry’s collection of antiquities. Here was the real collection – his own private collection, hidden away from all eyes but his. The room was softly lit and carpeted. The air was cool, the temperature and humidity carefully controlled to preserve the exhibits. They stood along the walls and rested in velvet-lined cases. The cases were open, so he could touch and fondle to his heart’s content.
My eyes moved in dazed disbelief from one masterpiece to another. The lovely little statuette of Tetisheri in the British Museum was a fake, all right. The original was here. So was the Nefertiti bust – not the painted bust in Berlin, but the other, even more beautiful, that was – was supposed to be – in the Cairo Museum.
Had I been mistaken about Larry’s ultimate intent after all? The contents of this room represented the greatest art theft in history. Getting them out of the museum and into this room was only half the battle. He was in the process of finishing the job – getting his pieces out of Egypt. Packed in among his household effects, they would pass through customs without a hitch. No one would be boorish enough to inspect the possessions of the great philanthropist, the man who had just presented Egypt with a multimillion-dollar institute. Wasn’t this enough for Larry?
No. My original reasoning still held, tenuous and unsupported though it was. The convenient breakdown of the Queen of the Nile, the violent death of the new director of the institute, only a few hours after he had found a sympathetic and notoriously inquisitive listener in me, the precise timing of Larry’s permanent departure from Egypt, his bizarre obsession . . . The collection I saw before me was a convincing demonstration of that obsession. Almost every object in the room depicted, or had belonged to, a queen or princess.
Many of the cases were empty, their contents already transferred to the wooden packing boxes that spoiled the neatness of the room. But there was lots left. A small head of an Amarna princess, a diadem of twisted golden wire set with tiny turquoise flowers . . .
John heard me gasp. ‘I wondered if you’d spot that,’ he said, dragging Sweet into a corner and turning one of the empty boxes over on top of him.
The diadem bad been buried with a princess of the Middle Kingdom. I’d found a sketch of it in the workshop of the goldsmith who had been producing fake jewels for the gang in Rome. The original had been in the Cairo Museum, not the Metropolitan, as I had ignorantly supposed at the time. Obviously it wasn’t there now.
‘You . . .’ I began. ‘You . . . You started this that long ago?’
‘This sort of collection takes a while to build up,’ John said coolly. He joined me and studied the lovely thing with obvious appreciation. Then he shook his head regretfully. ‘Too large and too fragile. This will do the trick just as well, I expect.’
The object he shoved carelessly into his pocket was a pectoral, its complex design dominated by a huge scab of lapis lazuli. It had belonged to Tutankhamon.
John took my limp hand and led me up the stairs.
‘Time?’ he asked, closing the sliding panel.
‘Uh . . . seven-forty.’
‘We may as well get into position, then.’
‘Do you know what Max has planned?’
‘I’ve an inkling, yes. Don’t tell me you haven’t anticipated his intentions. You’re the one who is supposed to be in charge of this rescue.’
I snarled at him. The sight of that incredible collection – a good deal of which had probably come to Larry via John – had made me remember what he was, and the sight of him, bright-eyed and cheerful and higher than a kite in a March gale, didn’t relieve my apprehensions any. I had had more than a nodding acquaintance with amphetamines and other useful drugs during my days as a grad student. Sooner or later he would crash, and to judge by the immediate effects it would be a long hard fall. Some of the cuts were still bleeding. The bright splashes of red looked like flowers against the rusty stains.