“Nice piece,” said Archie, peering in for a closer look. “I know someone who’ll take that off your hands if you want to shift it.”
“No, thanks,” said Tom, following Jennifer’s plane as it taxied out onto the runway, imagining her knuckles glowing white as they gripped the armrests in anticipation of takeoff. “I think I’ll hang onto this one.”
There was a silence and the airport throbbed around them, children screaming, baggage trolleys squeaking, phones ringing.
Archie coughed and straightened his tie.
“Actually, Tom, there’s another reason I’m here.”
“Here we go.” Tom rolled his eyes. “What have you done now?”
“Nothing. It’s just that I’ve had this great idea. You and me. Kirk and Connolly. In business together.” Tom sighed and began to walk toward the exit.
“Where are you going?” Archie ran after him. “Your skills and my connections, we’d be unstoppable. Think about it.”
“Archie, I’ve told you. No more jobs.”
“No, that’s my point. A proper business. All kosher and aboveboard. You know, buying stuff here, selling it there, helping people get stuff back. We could make a fortune. We could be the good guys for a change.”
“Archie,” said Tom as he threw his arm around his shoulders. “If you’re involved, how can we ever be the good guys?”
Archie stopped in his tracks, his expression pained.
“Oh, that hurts, mate. That really hurts.”
Tom laughed.
“Maybe a pint will help you get over it.”
“As long as it’s none of this foreign muck.”
EPILOGUE
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
“Please remove any metallic objects from your pockets. Keys, coins, mobile phone, glasses. Place them in the containers before stepping through the detector. Thank you.”
The noisy queue snaked back on itself several times, like the entrance to a ride at an amusement park. Most of the people in it — returning from their holidays, judging from the raw redness of their skin — chose to ignore the security guard until they were almost through the metal detector and X-ray machines, only then scrabbling to empty their pockets of any offending items.
It was this that marked the tall man out in particular. Not his immaculate black suit and dog collar amidst the sea of fluorescent T-shirts and sandals but the fact that well before the gate he had carefully separated all his metallic objects into one hand.
Not that the security guards noticed. The airport had only recently been given a new lease on life, plucked from obscurity by an enterprising low-cost airline and rechristened with the name of a large city thirty miles to the north of it. It was why he’d chosen it. The security was not as tight as at one of the major airports; the quality of the personnel not as high. He had done this before when he needed to slip out of a country unnoticed.
He smiled at the guard as he carefully deposited a small pile of loose change and some keys into one of the gray plastic containers placed at the end of the X-ray machines. Just enough to look normal. He then walked through the machine. It beeped loudly. As he knew it would.
“Any other metal objects on you, Father?” asked the guard in French as he directed the man back through the detector. He patted his pockets and shook his head.
“No,” he answered.
“Okay. Step back through the gate, please.” He did as he was told, but the machine beeped again.
“Please stand over here, Father. Move your legs apart a little. Thank you.” The guard ran a handheld scanner over his black suit. It screamed loudly as it passed over his gloved right hand.
“Can I see?” the guard said, pointing suspiciously.
“Oh, of course.” The man shook his head. “How foolish of me. After all this time I forget all about it.” He had thought this part through carefully. The key was to make it look like he’d been this way for years. It mustn’t seem a recent injury. They might be on the lookout for that.
“Forget what?”
“My hand,” he said, pulling off the glove and revealing a pink prosthetic hand attached to his arm. Some girls in the queue behind him tittered at the sight of it.
“I’m sorry, sir,” said the guard, blushing, clearly embarrassed for him by their laughter.
“No, not at all, it’s my fault,” he said. “It happens all the time. I should have remembered.”
“Thank you, Father. Sorry, Father. Where are you going?”
“Geneva.”
“Well, at least the plane should be leaving on time. We’ve had so many delays recently with all the extra security checks.”
“I’m in no hurry,” the man said, retrieving his coins and keys. “Believe me, I’ve got plenty to think about.”
“Have a pleasant flight.”
“Bless you. Bless you, my son,” said Cassius.
The security guard watched the one-handed man walk into the departure lounge.
Out of habit, he made the sign of the cross in the direction of his retreating back.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My thanks to Roy, Claire and Sarah Toft, Bruce Ritchie, David Sale, Jeremy Green, Jeremy Walton, George Hammon, Sean Corbett, Julian Simmons, Charlotte Cameron, Mark Gill, Samantha Axtell, Maria Barrett, Nico Schwartz, Florian Reinaud, and most especially of all Rod Gillett, for their invaluable insight, comments, suggestions, and help. The book is immeasurably better because of it.
Thank you to Alison Callahan, my wonderful editor, for her insight and belief and championing of this book and to Wayne Brookes at HarperCollins UK, for his unfaltering support and infectious enthusiasm.
Thank you, too, to my agents, George Lucas at InkWell Management, in New York, and Jonathan Lloyd and Euan Thorneycroft at Curtis Brown, in London, for plucking me from the depths of their in-tray, spotting the potential of my early drafts, and for believing in me.
For their assistance in researching this book, I would like to acknowledge the Smithsonian Institution (National Museum of American History and National Numismatic Collection), The U.S. Mint, The Department of the Treasury, U.S. Army Armor Center — Fort Knox, Christie’s, Sotheby’s, the Turkish Ministry of Tourism, and the French Ministry of Culture.
And finally, my boundless love and thanks to my parents, Ann and Bob, to my sister, Joanna, to my wife, Victoria, and to our beautiful new baby daughter, Amelia.
London, September 2004
About the Author
James Twining graduated from Oxford University with a degree in French literature. His first Tom Kirk adventure, The Double Eagle, was published with great success on both sides of the Atlantic. He lives in London with his wife and their two children.