“Oh you do know what a metaphor is, good. Anyway, in other words, as time passed the absolute certainty that she was a real goddess — breathing, and walking on earth — was slowly diminished in gradations until today we see her as a myth. Shit! I’m really good at researching this ancient Greek stuff.”
“A myth like Jesus, you mean?” Hawke said, ignoring the hubris.
“Many high-profile atheists believe Jesus was a real man who walked the earth, even if they dispute he was the son of god. Why is it possible for so many of us to accept Jesus was really on earth, and also a god, but not for us to believe that the ancient gods of earlier cultures were also real, and had a physical presence here on earth?”
“Because there’s no evidence of it.”
“In the last few minutes I’ve been to more than one website which claims there is solid evidence of it.”
“You mean tin foil hat websites?”
“Not necessarily, no.”
“So why has no one ever heard of this evidence then?” Hawke asked.
“I’d imagine there aren’t many people willing to risk their careers for the truth. It’s probably almost impossible to prove, I’d bet. Either the cultures in question are so old they have turned to dust, or the authorities work hard to suppress the truth in order to keep control of the current narrative.”
“You mean the history we all know?” Hawke asked.
“The history you think you know, yes,” Ryan said with a smile.
Hawke turned to Lea. “I know you said this guy was a bit of conspiracy theorist but you never said he was a total nutcase.”
“Excuse me,” Ryan objected, “but evidence of antediluvian civilizations is probably out there for those who care to look. The scientific community regard some believers as conspiracy nuts and maybe that’s their loss — or perhaps their discrediting of those people is more than a simple dismissal of the unlikely — we may never know.”
Hawke thought things through for a second. He felt like his mind was melting. “So where do we find this Vase of Poseidon?”
“The Met,” Ryan said.
Under the pretext of grabbing a coke from the vending machine, Hawke took a walk and put a call through to Nightingale. He was still concerned about whatever it was Sir Richard Eden was keeping from him.
“It’s this trident that’s bothering me,’ he said to her. “What can you tell me about that?”
Nightingale worked fast and was soon hacking through secret government documents. “The legend says that the trident was pretty much the most powerful weapon possessed by any god. Apparently it had some kind of power that enabled Poseidon to cause earthquakes and tsunamis at his command anywhere in the world at any time… but there’s some other stuff in here about the contents of the vault.”
“And?”
“And it’s blocked.”
“I thought you hacked it?”
“Sure did, but this is a PDF of a scanned letter, and someone’s blocked out a few lines with a black pen. Whatever it is, they don’t want anyone to know about it. I guess that explains why Langley is keeping an eye on this.”
“Langley believes this crap?”
“Joe, the US Government is heavily invested in the esoteric — MK Ultra, teleportation experiments, telepathy experiments, you name it. If they thought there was even the slightest possibility that something like the trident really existed, believe me, they would want it.”
“This just gets worse.”
“As for the stuff that’s blacked out… who knows? Back when I worked for them there was even a rumor they took the Ark of the Covenant from the Nazis way back in World War Two and hid it in a giant storage facility, but none of us ever bought that one — some things are just too ridiculous to believe, you know?”
“Yeah, that is ridiculous.” Hawke’s mind raced with ideas. “So let me get this straight — you’re saying that Poseidon’s trident really exists and is a weapon of mass destruction and that a Swiss megalomaniac is trying to get his hands on it and that there’s stuff even worse than that because it’s blacked out?”
“Pretty much.”
At times like this, he missed the Special Forces. Life seemed somehow simpler back then. Less nuance and more black and white back in the old SBS.
The SBS were the Royal Navy’s equivalent to the British Army’s SAS, just as highly trained but much less comfortable in the public eye. Not being as well-known as the SAS didn’t bother the men in this elite unit — it was a small band of soldiers of less than two hundred, and they lived by their motto: By Strength and Guile.
They were especially proud of the fact they had the only Victoria Cross in the Special Forces, won in 1945 by Anders Lassen who led a daring attack in the north of Italy at the end of the war.
But recently, the section had suffered a hammering to their reputation after a failed attempt to rescue hostages held by jihadi terrorists in Nigeria. Some had argued the SAS should have been used, but Hawke knew the situation would have been the same whoever was handling it. He had served in M Squadron, the Maritime Counter Terrorism sub-unit, and life there was unpredictable and dangerous.
But that was then and this was now. Like it or not.
Hawke thanked Nightingale and returned to the room. He put the cokes on the table. Ryan had packed up the MacBook and was flicking through the TV channels.
“We didn’t pay for the porn option, sorry Rupert,” Hawke said.
“Very funny.”
“Listen,” Lea said, rubbing her temples. “I’m going to grab a quick shower before we head over to the museum.”
Hawke thought the two of them looked like they had been arguing.
“Do you need any help?” Ryan said, cockily.
“Those days are over, Ryan. You stay here with Joe and work on this.”
Hawke watched Lea pull out her hair-tie and close the door behind her.
CHAPTER SIX
Lea closed the door of her room and turned on the shower. Steam filled the bathroom as she took off her clothes and wrapped herself in a towel.
She hadn’t stopped since the shooter had killed Lucy Fleetwood back at the British Museum, and since then she’d been on a chase across London in a bus of terrified tourists and up the Thames on a speedboat. Avoiding talking to Ryan by pretending to be asleep for a few hours on the flight to New York was the last straw, and all she wanted to do now was relax for a while and freshen up.
She stepped into the steamy bathroom and dropped the towel from around her naked body to the floor. She felt the warm steam on her body, and while part of her knew it was good to be actually doing something besides guarding the old man, another part of her wished she was back in her flat in London just watching television and drinking wine.
Inside the shower she tried to wind down, but her mind raced with the events of the last few hours. She hadn’t seen Ryan for several months and had wondered if maybe he might have changed, but as soon as she saw him she knew he was the same person she had divorced, and with good reason. Was it the perils of marrying someone younger, she wondered, or had it really been all her fault?
As for the other guy — she had no idea what to make of him. He seemed to walk the walk, but between the jokes and the bravado she recognized the type from her days in the Irish Army. No, she wouldn’t go there, either. “Why is my life such a damned mess?” she whispered to herself, gently taking the shower gel from the shelf.
The soap ran through her hair and down her face. She closed her eyes tight to stop the suds from getting in and stinging, and that was when she thought she heard the hotel room door open and click shut again. Did she lock the door? Securing a room was an old habit, but she was just so out of shape these days, not to mention exhausted.