There were two choices: one, should he turn the treasure in to the authorities? There was no doubt that if he did so, his fame would be great. He could see it in all the scholarly journals, every historical or archaeological publication: Professor Arne Nordberg, the man who discovered the long-lost Schliemann treasure! It could and probably would mean advancement. At the very least it would mean, it had to mean, the publication of a paper on how and where the treasure had been located. He would bring in the history of the treasure, a history of the Schliemanns, Heinrich and Sophie. No university press in the world would turn that paper down!
On the other hand, selflessness was fine, but here he would be with a fortune in his hands, if only he had the slightest idea as to how to exploit the situation. How on earth could he make a decent sum of money from his possession of the treasure? Assuming, of course, he managed to get his hands on it — but the thought of not getting his hands on it was just too terrible to consider, so he put it out of his mind. No, he would get the treasure one way or another. But what then? As far as he knew there had never been any reward offered for the recovery of the collection. Nobody had ever considered it lost, merely taken a bit illegally by the Russians and hidden away all these years. Possibly if he were to contact someone in the Russian Embassy? But if the Russians had managed to lose the treasure, if someone had managed to steal it from them, letting them know he had it could be suicidal.
And one could scarcely put an advertisement in the newspapers saying that one had the treasure for sale, could one? Obviously, one could not. Still, there simply had to be some way to get at least a portion of the great value of the treasure. With the amount of money he was considering — an amount that made his head spin just thinking about it — he tried to picture all the things he could do, all the places he could go, all the girls he could have. The thought of the pleasures that could be purchased with unlimited funds brought a twinge to his loins, but he put the sensuous thoughts aside for the time. First he had to get his hands on the treasure.
His palms were damp with sweat where they gripped the steering wheel, holding it as if to sustain himself. He pressed harder on the accelerator, hurrying to Gedser, forcing himself not to think of the bottle in the bag beside him.
It was late afternoon when Nordberg finally arrived at the Christensen home. He had hesitated several times before finally stopping at the post office as being the least noticeable place at which to ask directions. Knud Christensen was fixing a harness in the barn when Nordberg pulled into the driveway, turned off his noisy engine, and climbed out. The sound of the ancient car’s asthmatic wheezing brought Christensen to the doorway. He frowned and walked down to greet his unexpected guest.
“Professor Nordberg? But, I thought—”
Nordberg shrugged a bit self-deprecatingly.
“I found it was impossible for me to break my appointment for Saturday,” he said lightly. “A faculty tea, and I’m expected to address them, you know. And I’m busy every other day for the next several weeks. But since I had made a sort of promise to you” — he smiled — “and since it was a nice day for a drive, I thought—” He allowed the words to slide into silence. Fortunately for him, it did happen to be a nice day, although he had not noticed it until then.
“Good! Good!” Christensen said, pleased at the professor’s presence. It would save him from four more days of wondering at the possible value of his find. It did not occur to him to be suspicious in any way of this erudite man, a relative, even though a distant one. Knud Christensen was not by nature a suspicious person. He tilted his head in the direction of the house. “It’s — the things — are in there.”
He led the way, knowing the neighbors would think it strange for him to be having a guest who boasted a car, even an old one, but also knowing that a visit from a relative could easily be explained, especially after the tragedy he had suffered. Inside the house, the curtains drawn, Knud lit a lamp and dragged the heavy steel case from the closet. He reached in, fishing out the four packages, and carefully unwrapped them, placing their contents down in small piles. He then looked up at the professor anxiously.
“Well? What do you think?”
Nordberg could scarcely keep his hands from trembling as he reached for a small gold cup and brought it up to his eyes for closer inspection. He pursed his lips in his most professional manner, studying the cup with ill-concealed disinterest. Inside he was chortling, for he was positive he was actually looking at the missing Schliemann treasure; the night before, in Schliemann’s own book Ilios, he had seen that same cup in illustration. But there was no indication of his feelings in his expression of disdain. He put the cup down and picked up a necklace, sure as he did so that the quadrangular beads would be seventy in number, just as Schliemann had described it. The Schliemann treasure! And he had it in his hands, practically! He would have liked to ask the clod for more details as to how he had managed to come on the treasure, although with the collection in his hands he now knew he would never turn it over to any authorities for the puerile purpose of mere academic credit. It was worth a fortune, tons of money, mountains of money! He tossed the necklace down carelessly and with a final sigh made a sort of sweeping motion with one hand, a gesture that took in the entire collection, obviously condemning it to oblivion.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and actually managed to look a trifle chagrined. You should have been an actor, he said to himself, and drew his lips into a grimace of pity. “But it’s what I was afraid of. You see” — his voice took on the tones of confidentiality — “after you left yesterday, I had the pieces you brought me checked by our engineering laboratory. And discovered what I suspected, that they were an alloy of tin and white metal. The cheapest sort of costume jewelry, the sort of things servants buy in the cheap bazaars. And not particularly good examples of even that. I had hoped that some of the stuff you had here might be of better quality, but it all appears to be the same sort of... of—” He hesitated and then shrugged delicately, hating to hurt the other man’s feelings. “Well, to be frank, junk.”
Knud’s face had been slowly falling during this recitation. Although he had feared such a report, especially after his visit to Copenhagen the previous day, his disappointment was still visible. He looked at the pieces piled on the floor and shook his head disconsolately, not knowing what to say.
“I know,” Nordberg went on sympathetically. “I can understand how you feel. I’m disappointed too.” He looked at Christensen with what he hoped was a look of compassion. “Tell me — ah — cousin, what do you plan to do with this... this... these things?” His hand indicated the piles of pieces on the floor.
Knud raised his shoulders and tried to smile. “I have no idea. Try to sell them to the local bazaar, I suppose. Or for scrap.” He stared at the pieces, wondering what insane motive had driven him to dive for them. And to sacrifice a good anchor for them. “I don’t know. I honestly don’t. Maybe donate them to the church for their next raffle. They ought to be worth something.”
“Not very much, I’m afraid,” Nordberg said, and frowned as he considered the problem. A possible solution seemed to occur to him. “I can make a suggestion, if you should be interested. I have a collection of curiosities, of junk, if you will. Things without value, such as these. Conversation pieces, you know. If you would be interested in selling them to me, they might be amusing to some of my friends—” He hurriedly raised a hand. “I couldn’t pay very much, of course, but then the stuff isn’t worth very much, if anything. But I’m sure it would be more than the church would ever get trying to raffle such things off. Or more than you could get from the local bazaar...”