Without that evidence he would never have believed the legend. But without the Ionian Texts it revealed nothing. The texts, recently found by Sir Richard Eden, his great rival, had proven without a doubt that the legend was real and that the vault was true and could be located.
Zaugg had never doubted. And others were equally keen to find the truth. There were people in the world beside him who dedicated their lives to finding the truth. There had even been attempts to steal the document handed down to him by his father, but the punishment he meted out to the thieves was not in exact alignment with the Swiss judicial code.
But now the Ionian Texts were found and translated, he would be able to locate the vault of Poseidon and take control of the ultimate power on earth.
“So what shall we do, Herr Zaugg?” asked the woman. “Are you prepared to take responsibility for what this discovery will do to the world, or are you going to guard it for more enlightened generations?”
“I am confident Richard Eden will not release the details of his discovery to the press and the matter will not be spoken of again. I trust you know me well enough by now to know how reckless it would be to defy me. The world will know of this soon enough and at a time of my choosing.”
A murmur of concern rippled around the warm room, but another withering look from Zaugg brought about an immediate change of heart.
“This is the right choice,” said the historian.
“I concur,” said the geologist.
“I still think the world should be told now,” said the archaeologist. “This changes everything! If the legends turn out to be true — and in the light of this discovery I see no further reason to doubt them — we’re talking about something very dangerous indeed — the whole of human history will be rewritten. We are playing with fire.”
“You think I have made the wrong decision?” Zaugg said, suddenly darkly serious.
The archaeologist fell silent for a moment. He looked at the carpet, and then spoke up. “Of course not, sir. It’s just that…”
“Excellent,” snapped Zaugg. “Then we are all agreed. A discovery like this is too explosive for the average man or woman on the street. They are occupied with the mundane, with the humdrum. We must not burden them with such a heavy load. This is why Sir Richard Eden will not go to his superiors about this — that really would be suicide — or should I say genocide?”
A low rumble of grim, forced laughter emanated from the small group.
Zaugg got up from his chair and walked silently to the window wall. It was almost totally dark now, and as he stared through the glass he no longer saw the little town below his mountain estate, but his own reflection — old, proud, scared.
“The legend says they were buried together…” he said quietly. His voice was thinner now, almost a whisper, as if his mind was drifting to some other place where he would much rather be. “If the Ionian Texts give us what I expect them to, then we will soon be in possesson of the vault of Poseidon and its terrifying secrets.” He sighed and closed his eyes. He raised his wrinkled hands and placed them gently on the glass in front of him. “We will change the course of the entire world… and my destiny.”
He breathed in deeply and let the air out in a slow, restful exhalation. He was calm again, happy, expectant. No, the world was not ready for such a thing, but he was.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Hello, again,” said Sir Richard Eden. The English politician was sitting behind an old, worn desk in the study of his townhouse just a few streets from the British Museum. His crisp white shirt was still covered in blood from the earlier attack, and his face seemed to have aged several years in the short time since Hawke had last seen him.
Through the window they could still hear the sounds of the sirens as the emergency services dealt with the aftershock back at the museum. Eden rubbed his shoulder and winced before speaking: “Apparently you’ve already met, but please allow me formally to introduce you to Lea Donovan — she’s the head of my personal security.”
He gestured to Lea who was now standing beside his desk. She had changed and was now dressed in a black sweater and tight blue jeans, and her blonde hair was tied back less formally. They shook hands again.
“No disrespect, but maybe you should change your head of security?” Hawke said.
“What is that supposed to mean?” Lea asked sharply.
“Sir Richard nearly got killed today, is what I mean.”
“You were the one supposed to be running security at the museum. If you’d done your job properly the shooter wouldn’t have even been inside the building.”
“And if you’d briefed me about Sir Richard’s psychotic enemies I might have run tighter security.”
“If you must know,” Eden said, “Lea didn’t know anything like this could happen.”
“And what did happen?” Hawke asked.
Eden seemed torn between a reluctance to speak and the urge to request their help. For a long time he was silent, staring at the middle distance outside his window. “I’m not sure how much I can tell you,” he said, turning to Lea. “Even you.”
Hawke and Lea shared a concerned glance. “You’re going to have to tell us more than that, Richard,” Lea said.
“Bloody right you are,” Hawke said flatly. “A woman you claim you know walks into the British Museum in broad daylight in the middle of a major exhibition, rambles incoherently about the ultimate power of Greek gods and gets shot dead right in front of the cream of the crop. I think you owe us an explanation.”
Eden stared at both of them for a few moments before speaking. “Yes, I did know the woman — that much is perfectly true. Her name was Lucy Fleetwood and she was an academic working here in London.”
“An academic?”
“That’s right. She was a professor of ancient languages just up the road at University College London.”
“And how did you know her?” Lea asked. “You should have told me about this.”
“She was working for me.”
“If you want us to help you, we need the whole story, Richard,” said Hawke. “Spit it out.”
Eden fixed his eyes on Hawke and seemed to acquiesce.
“Of course. As you may know, I run a highly covert section of the intelligence services, but my lifelong passion is archaeology. A few weeks ago my team found something potentially of very great value to the archaeological world — and perhaps to the wider world as well. I’m talking about the Ionian Texts.” He looked at them hoping to see a flicker of recognition, but neither showed any.
“What’s the significance of these texts?” Hawke asked.
“Until recently most people simply refused to believe they existed, and dismissed them as a fanciful legend and nothing more. A few of us, however, never stopped believing that one day they would be found. I have spent my life searching for them.”
“Yeah, but..” Hawke was growing impatient. “What’s their significance?”
Again, Eden’s face was a tortured mix of reticence and desperation. Finally he spoke: “They are supposed to refer to the location of the vault of Poseidon.”
“The what?” Hawke’s voice was sceptical.
Lea’s eyes narrowed with doubt as she looked at her boss.
“It’s like a tomb,” continued Eden reluctantly, “only it’s supposed to contain not only the sarcophagus of Poseidon but also an enormous hoard of treasure, both his personal wealth but also that offered to him as a tribute by his worshippers.”
“Sorry?” asked Hawke, perplexed. “I might not have had the best education in the world but even I know Poseidon was a god. How does a god have a tomb?”
This time the fight on Eden’s face between reluctance and desperation for help went the other way: “There are some things I just cannot explain to you at this time about the nature of the tomb and its contents, and you’ll just have to live with it.”
Hawke was used to being cut-off — it was part of life in the marines, but he realized that this was different. “Come off it, Richard.”
Eden sighed. “You were a very accomplished Special Forces soldier for many years and you served on a great deal of top secret missions. We both know you would not have been aware of the strategic significance of many of them, and we both know you were able to work with that. You can consider this the same thing.”
Hawke was hoping to hate Sir Richard Eden, but already the old man was making it difficult for him. He appreciated frank, honest talk, and it looked like Eden did too. “I can live with that — for now, at least.”
“Good. I was impressed with how you handled yourself today, with the exception of that little stunt with the tour bus — we’ve already had the Japanese Embassy on the phone to the Home Office by the way, so thanks for that — and if you want to see your little jaunt it was recorded by dozens of tourists and it’s all over YouTube.”
“It was my only play…”
Eden sighed. “And as for the destruction of a police helicopter over the Thames in broad daylight, let’s just say Prime Minister’s Question Time is going to be a bloody nightmare this week.”
“Like I said, we had no choice.”
“If you say so, but either way I need someone I can trust to get to the bottom of this. I’ve known you all your life, Lea, and I trust you totally. Hawke — I’ve run a check on you and you seem like a solid type. I’m sure the two of you can work together on this.”
“As one door closes…” Hawke muttered.
“We don’t have much to go on,” Eden said, “but thanks to the quick-thinking of Professor Fleetwood we do have something — both her translation regarding the ultimate power being buried in some kind of kingdom, and also her reference to New York and the amphorae.”
“Which isn't much, let’s face it,” Hawke said. “And oh yeah — what the hell is an amphorae?”
“What the hell are amphorae — it’s plural. They’re vases.”
“Vases?” Lea asked.
“Ancient Greek vases.”
“That’s still not what I would call a lot to go on.”
“But it’s a start,” Eden said coolly, regaining a little of his infamous composure. “The Ionian Texts are supposed to confirm not only the existence of the vault but also its location. According to legend, a daring raid was made on the tomb thousands of years ago by unknown forces.”
Hawke was starting to wonder what the old man was smoking, but kept his thoughts to himself.
“Afterwards the keeper of the vault — a worshipper of Poseidon whose name was lost to history, but we know he was a potter and we refer to him as the Vienna Painter — hid all traces of its location.”
“Why?”
“It’s possible that the tomb could guard one of the greatest secrets known to man.”
“And what would that be?” Hawke asked, eyes fixed on Eden.
“For now, that will have to remain classified.”
“Oh, come on…”
Eden was not moved. “The potter left only one small inscription to reveal the tomb, and according to legend he hid it inside a vase. We thought the Ionian Texts would confirm this and it looks like they have, at least if Professor Fleetwood was right.”
Lea nodded. “So that’s where we need to start. Finding these inscriptions.”
“And I suggest you get moving. Professor Fleetwood’s killers are clearly very serious about getting their hands on the vault and everything in it, and I just can’t let that happen.”
“Do you have any idea who’s behind this?” said Hawke.
Eden nodded. “A few days ago a man named Hugo Zaugg was released from a prison in Zurich where he had been serving a two year sentence for perjury and perverting the course of justice during a famous tax evasion trial in Switzerland.”
“Sounds like a charmer,” said Lea.
“He is a recluse and the world knows very little about him, except for the fact he has practically limitless wealth, very powerful connections in international agencies like the IMF, and also…”
“And what?” Hawke asked, sensing yet more reluctance on Eden’s part.
“His father was Otto Zaugg.”
Hawke shrugged. “Never heard of him.”
“Unsurprising, but you would have had you lived in Greece during the Axis occupation in World War Two. He was a ruthless SS tank commander and went on to be a very high-ranking member of the Nazi Party before fleeing to Switzerland at the end of the war where he lived out his life in search of…”
“Let me guess — the vault of Poseidon?”
“Exactly.”
Hawke studied Eden’s lined face. “But what interest would a man like that have in an archaeological find? Sounds like a mystery to me.”
Eden looked away from his desk. “Quite, yes.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to tell me something?” Hawke said.
“Only that if it really is Zaugg behind this then watch out. He has extensive contact with the European underworld and among his associates are these two men.”
Eden swivelled the computer monitor on his desk and showed Hawke and Lea grainy black and white photos of two men taken from a distance. “The man you see coming out of the gambling den is Kaspar Vetsch. He’s a dangerous psychotic with no fewer than three European arrest warrants out on him. His speciality is torturing people for information and he's been known to work for Zaugg.”
“He looks like a proper psycho,” Hawke said.
“Creeps me out,” said Lea, sincerely hoping their paths would never cross, but knowing if they did that he would come off worse.
“The other man — the one climbing into the back of the cab in this picture here is Heinrich Baumann, former Kommando Spezialkräfte — the German Special Forces. A sergeant with a lot of experience and a penchant for killing people in amazingly original ways.”
“He looks even worse than Vetsch,” said Lea.
“He has one eye?” Hawke asked.
Eden nodded. “Lost the other in a knife fight in Mexico City. The attractive metal hand is courtesy of a machete-wielding people trafficker in Budapest. We know more about these two than we do about Zaugg himself, so that’s the only briefing I can give you at this time.”
“I’ve had worse,” Hawke said.
Eden rose from his desk. “When you arrive in New York, you’re going to have to work fast. I’ve already asked a contact in MI5 if they’ve heard any chatter regarding any of this, but they’ve drawn a blank so whoever it is knows how to dodge the security services. That tells me they’re powerful, rich and clever, which makes a formidable enemy. My money’s on Zaugg.”
“The bigger they are, the harder they fall,” Hawke said.
Lea looked at him. “Maybe not this time.”
“She’s right — don't get cocky or you’ll get dead,” Eden said bluntly. “We don’t know who they are, but we do know they’ve killed an innocent woman, stolen the Ionian Texts and their translations, and are probably already on their way to New York to search for the vase.”