Spartan Gold

“Do it. Any breathing room you can buy us will help.”

“The question is whether they’ll be able to find him. Given his background, he’s not going to make it easy for them.”

Three hours later Rube had called back: The DCPJ had put out a bulletin for Kholkov, but he wouldn’t know anything more for a few hours, if then. The French, Rube told them, were cagey about sharing information.

“I don’t suppose you know a French version of Guido the Shoe maker-slash-Arms Dealer?”

“Sam, the French are rabid about their gun laws; you don’t want to get caught with an unregistered one. But, I do know a guy named Maurice. . . .”

He gave Sam the phone number and they hung up.

Now Remi pulled up her jacket collar against the chill and huddled closer to Sam beneath the umbrella. “I don’t see anyone else.”

“Me neither. Shall we?”

With one last look around they stepped from the alley and started down the sidewalk.

Using the rudimentary tradecraft skills Sam had picked up at Camp Perry, they strolled the streets north of the harbor for an hour, doubling back on their path, stepping abruptly into cafés and then out the back door, and generally watching for any signs of pursuit. Satisfied they were alone, they hailed a cab and directed the driver to take them to Rue Loge on the Vieux Port.

As promised by the rental company’s manager, at a slip in the northwest corner of the harbor they found waiting for them a gray eighteen-foot Mistral. Though essentially a motor whaleboat with a glassed-in pilothouse barely bigger than a phone booth, it was wide-beamed and sported a reliable and quiet Lombardi engine. It would, they hoped, serve their purposes.

Using the key the manager had messengered over, Sam undid the padlocked hawser and the lines while Remi started the engine. He jumped aboard and she throttled up, pointing the bow toward the mouth of the harbor.

Ten minutes later the breakwater appeared off the bow. Astern the lights of Marseille, hazy in the rain, reflected off the rippled surface of the water. Working to keep up with the droplets streaming down the pilothouse windscreen, the single windshield wiper thumped softly.

Beside Remi at the wheel, Sam said, “I’ve been thinking about what Kholkov said.” He saw her expression and quickly said, “Not about his offer—about what Bondaruk’s interest is in whatever-it-is. He said it was a legacy. We know he’s deadly serious about it, so maybe the answer’s in his family history.”

“Good point,” Remi said, taking a buoy down the Mistral’s port side. “We’ll turn Selma loose on it. You’re not, are you—having second thoughts, I mean?”

“Only as far as you’re concerned.”

Remi smiled in the darkness, her face dimly lit by the helm console’s green lighting. “We’ve been through worse.”

“Such as?”

“Well, for starters there was that time in Senegal when you insulted that shaman—”

“Forget I asked.”

Thirty minutes later Île d’If appeared, a white lump rising from the dark ocean a half mile off the bow. The château had closed at five thirty and aside from a lone navigation beacon pulsing red against the night sky, the island was completely dark.

“Doesn’t look as welcoming at night, does it?” Remi asked.

“Not even close.”

In preparation for their after-hours tour, they’d used Google Earth to scrutinize the island for hidden mooring spots that would shield them from not only Kholkov, should he and his men happen to follow, but also the Marseille harbor patrol. They’d found a promising spot on the island’s seaward side.

Now Remi eased the Mistral to port. They spent a half hour circumnavigating the island, looking for other boats or signs of life. Seeing nothing, they came about and proceeded along the northern shoreline. Ahead, the château’s westernmost turret, the largest of the three, came into view above the battlement. Remi steered into the cove below it, throttled down, and let the Mistral glide to a stop at the base of the wall. Aside from a rain-churned surface, the water was flat calm here. Sam dropped anchor and used the boat hook to pull the Mistral closer to the rocks. Remi jumped over and followed, stern line in hand. He jammed the line beneath a basketball-sized rock.

Hand in hand they picked their way along the wall, hopping from rain-slick boulder to rain-slick boulder until they reached a particularly tall one they’d spotted on the satellite shots. Sam climbed atop it, positioned himself below a notch in the battlements used by archers, then leaped up and grabbed the wall’s i

“Thank God for bad architecture,” he said.

If not for the fort’s backward-facing fortifications, they would have needed an extension ladder to accomplish what they’d just done.

“Don’t see anyone,” Remi said. “You?”

Sam shook his head. In their research they’d found no mention of the island employing after-hours guards, but to be safe, they would proceed as if there were.

With Remi in the lead, they crept forward along the curved wall of the turret to where it met the straight western wall and followed this to the end. Beside them, the stone, having been warmed by the sun all day then soaked by the rain, smelled like chalk. Remi peeked around the corner.

“Clear,” she whispered.

In Sam’s pocket, the Iridium vibrated. He pulled it out and answered, keeping his voice a whisper. It was Rube: “Bad news, Sam. The DCPJ can’t find Kholkov or his buddies. They know he entered the country on his own passport, but none of the hotels or rental car agencies have any record of him.”

“Switched to a false passport,” Sam guessed.

“Probably so. Bottom line, he’s still out there. Be careful.”

“Thanks, Rube. We’ll be in touch.”

Sam hung up and gave Remi the news. “We’re not any worse off than we were before. Shall we?”

“Absolutely.”

They continued along the southern wall and around the next turret to the château’s side entrance, an arched breezeway that led into the courtyard.

“Freeze,” Sam whispered. “Very slowly, crouch down.” Together they dropped to their knees.

“What?” Remi whispered.

“Directly ahead of us.”

A hundred yards away across the plaza stood two red-roofed outbuildings. The left-hand one, shaped like a truncated J, abutted the wall along the island’s northern shoreline. Under the eaves they could see four windows, black rectangles in the gloom. They waited, staying perfectly still for a minute, and then two. After three minutes, Remi whispered, “You saw something?”

“I thought so. Guess I was wrong. Come on.”

“Stop,” she rasped. “You weren’t wrong. There, at the far corner.”

Sam looked where Remi had indicated. It took a moment for his eyes to pick it out, but there was no mistake. Barely visible in the darkness was the white oval of a man’s face.

CHAPTER 31

They watched the face for a full minute; the man was all but a statue, occasionally rotating his head to scan behind and to the sides, but otherwise still.

“A guard?” Remi ventured.

“Maybe. But would a lazy guard trying to stay out of the rain stand that still? He’d be shifting or smoking or fidgeting.” Moving with exaggerated slowness, Sam reached inside his rain jacket and pulled out a Nikon monocular. He aimed it toward the outbuilding and focused on the man’s face. “Doesn’t look like any of Kholkov’s men we’ve seen.”

“If it is them, how did they get here? We didn’t see any boats.”