“He’s a pampered fool,” Gutierrez said, without prompting. “He may have inherited the greater share of the family wealth, but his sister got the brains. It will be a pity if we have to kill her.”
Hodges felt like he had to say something. “You’re taking over?”
“That’s right. That’s how I prefer to operate. The only way to ensure a task is done right is to do it yourself.” He cracked a smile. “Relax. I’m not angry about your failure in Costa Rica. Well, not very angry. You had to make a difficult decision. Not killing Ophelia Doerner was probably the right call.”
That had only been one consideration for Hodges. The fact that Ophelia’s men might have shot down the second helicopter before they could get close enough to sink the yacht had been a much more persuasive factor, but Hodges decided it was best not to bring that up.
“This way,” Gutierrez continued, “if a situation like this arises again, you won’t have to make a judgment call. I’ll be there to do it for you.”
“You’ll order her to be killed?”
Gutierrez expression was as hard and cold as ice. “It’s an Alpha event. We aren’t playing games here.”
Another electronic tone sounded and the billionaire glanced at his cell phone. “Ah. Laertes made good on his promise. Ophelia Doerner is on her way to Delphi, Greece. And so are we.”
SIXTEEN
Because he was a seasoned world traveler — as a SEAL, he had some experience with grabbing sleep whenever a chance presented itself — Professor rarely suffered from jet lag. The Gulfstream had arrived in Athens after dusk, and they had continued on to Delphi by car, a journey of more than seventy miles, arriving at nine p.m., which was early by local standards, but too late to accomplish anything useful. So, he had retired to his hotel room and promptly fallen asleep.
He awoke with the sun, hit the tiny bathroom to take care of the obligatory “three S’s,” and dressed in the tastefully expensive attire provided by the hotel concierge. He was just getting ready to head down to the hotel lounge for breakfast when a knock came at the door.
He opened it to find Ophelia, likewise looking refreshed and, he had to admit, rather lovely. She wore a sea green raw silk halter-top sun-dress and less make-up than he would have expected.
“I have a surprise for you,” she said, producing a large gift box tied with a blue ribbon.
“And here I didn’t get you anything,” he said, with mock-guiltiness, accepting the box and giving the ribbon a tug.
“Maybe you’ll find just the right thing at the sanctuary,” she replied with a mischievous grin.
Inside the box, he found a hat — his hat — cleaned, blocked and restored to near-perfect condition. “Wow. Thank you.”
“It’s your lucky talisman,” she said. “Now our success is guaranteed.”
He chuckled. “Well, I don’t know about that. This was a long shot to begin with, and even if we find what we’re looking for, all it’s really going to tell us is that we were right.”
“Oh, don’t be such a pessimist.”
“Sounds like something Jade might say,” he muttered. He felt bad that Jade wasn’t here, but when Jade got an idea in her head, there was no reasoning with her.
If Ophelia heard his comment, she gave no indication. “Now, let’s see about some food. They do a traditional Greek breakfast here. I love the galatopita, but they also make an omelet with graviera and siglino that is spectacular.”
He took the culinary recommendations in stride, but as he headed out the door behind her, the significance of what she had said hit home. “You’ve been here before.”
“Several times.” She looked at him thoughtfully as they descended the stairs to the hotel restaurant. “I thought you knew. I’m very serious about this. I was coming to Delphi long before I ever met Paul. Of all the stories, all the myths and legends, this is the one that has always held the most promise.”
He waited until they were seated, with demitasse cups of sweet Greek coffee set before them, to ask what she meant by that.
“You must know something of the history of Delphi. There is something special about this place.” She took a sip of her coffee. “I’m sure you’ve heard the rational explanations for the prophecies given by the oracle.”
He nodded. “The oracle, a woman who was always called Pythia, supposedly inhaled vapors rising from a crevice under the Temple of Apollo and chewed bay leaves to enter a trance. It was up to the priests of the sanctuary to interpret her ramblings, which they did in a way so vague they could never be wrong, and which usually pleased the supplicant enough to offer a large gift to the temple. One of the most notorious was the prophecy given to Croesus. He was told that if he went to war with the Persians, he would destroy a great empire. He took that as advice to launch a war, which he lost, and when he confronted the oracle, he was told that the great empire he had destroyed was his own.”
She smiled patiently. “Yes, anyone who’s studied the oracle knows that one, but do you know the rest? How Croesus tested the oracle? Or the oracle’s prophecy that his kingdom would last until the Medes put a mule on the throne?”
Professor was not about to let Ophelia show him up. He searched his memory for more information about the Ionian king whose legendary wealth was remembered even into modern times. “Croesus was defeated by Cyrus, half-Mede, half-Persian. Mule could be interpreted to mean ‘half-blood.’”
Ophelia nodded. “The oracle Pythia endured here for more nearly a thousand years, and more than five hundred prophetic pronouncements have been discovered. Some of them are, as you say, open to interpretation, but many of them are quite specific and startlingly accurate, particularly those that involve world events on a grand scale. It’s easy for us to play the skeptic, but do you believe the oracle’s prestige and reputation for infallibility, could have lasted that long if she were just spouting fortune cookie prophecies?”
Professor shrugged. “As a scientist, I have to follow the principle of parsimony. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary explanations. I can’t discount what I’ve seen in the last few days, but I’m not going to let down my guard and start believing everything.”
Ophelia reached out and clasped his hand. “Maybe today, you’ll see something that will change your mind.”
With his “lucky talisman” atop his head, Professor followed Ophelia along a trail that led out of the modern city of Delphi, across the evergreen-dotted slopes of Mount Parnassus, with a spectacular view of the azure waters of Kólpos Itéas and the Gulf of Corinth. Every now and then, he would catch a glimpse of Ophelia’s security detail, but the men seemed to have learned a thing or two since Costa Rica, and for the most part, remained inconspicuous.
The half-mile walk ended with a steep descent that led past the ruins of a theatre and the site of the Sanctuary of Apollo, where the Oracle at Delphi had delivered her prophecies. They passed by the Castalian Spring, where both the devotees and visitors to Delphi would ritually bathe themselves before approaching the oracle, and eventually arrived at the Athenian treasury, built to commemorate the Battle of Marathon. In ancient times, there had been several such storehouses on the site, but most had fallen into ruin. The Athenian treasury, a blocky structure of cut stone that looked a lot like a cross between a bank vault and a Greek temple, was as much a masterpiece of modern restoration techniques as it was ancient architecture.