Eagle of Darkness
Spaxley raised a finger. "Get through to Endermann in Râs Banâs. If that woman is serious about going to Cairo, I want him to meet her at the airport."
Chapter 55
The Lodge, Institute of Egyptologists, England
"YOU'VE GOT to do it." Sam turned away slowly from the window. His head felt heavy from getting no sleep. "Look, Dr. Wynne, just call the press here and make a simple statement. Tell them there's a serious problem with the prophecy, and the latest part of it is unreliable. They'll listen to you."
Gresley Wynne shook his head. "Young man, you are asking too much of me. Do you seriously expect me to stand before the world and confess to being a charlatan?"
"No I don't, Dr. Wynne, because you're not a charlatan." Panya took hold of the Egyptologist's hand. The show of compassion made Sam feel drawn to the young woman. She added, "No one's going to blame you if you tell the truth."
"International affairs are not a job for me, Mrs. Pulaski. We must call in the authorities."
"No!" Sam's shout of panic made Panya jump. "Maybe it's the authorities who are behind this." He returned to the window. Rapid blue flashes from the remaining fire engine lit the bare branches of the trees. He turned to Panya. "If Dr. Wynne won't cooperate, we'll hold our own press conference. Straight away. Once what we know is public knowledge, we'll be safe."
Dr. Wynne looked up at Sam. "Very well, let me make a fool of myself. My reputation can hardly be degraded further by an admission of deception."
"We might as well get everyone here," said Sam. "I'll phone the local hotel. That's where most of the reporters are staying. They'll be fast asleep, but I bet I could get them all here within the hour. I'll go outside and tell anyone who's hanging around." He looked at Panya. "Is it okay if we use this room?"
"Use the room," said Panya, "but not the phone. Someone's got a tap on it. Have you got a mobile?"
"Not any more. It was in my car outside the Institute. I'll pop down to the phone box by the main road. I've got plenty of change." He slipped his jacket on. "Cheer up. Dr. Wynne, you always wanted to be famous."
The elderly Egyptologist began to shake. "I feel..." He sat down heavily. "It is two o'clock in the morning. I would like to rest first."
"Use my bed," said Panya.
Sam looked at her quickly. Twenty-four hours ago such an offer would have been unthinkable.
The old man nodded. "I ... I need to sleep."
"In that case, we'll have the press conference here in an hour," said Sam. "Have a good sleep. We'll wake you when we're ready."
*
Cheltenham, England
THE IMITATION wood fire did little more than make a sound of roaring gas. Spaxley yawned, shook his head and spoke on the phone to the leader of Endermann's mercenaries.
"Just go through it all again." He glanced at Withington, but the GCHQ man was occupied with his electronic kit, monitoring all calls to the Cardinal's hotel in Cairo. "I still don't know why you tried to kill the reporter Tolley."
"He'd put a tap on the Institute's phone line."
"Have you...?"
"It's okay, we've recovered his recorder, complete with your voice."
"Thanks," said Spaxley. At least Endermann wasn't about to dump him in the brown stuff. "But why did you plant the new prophecy on him?"
"It's Endermann's operation, not yours, Admiral." The man on the phone sounded as though he had little time for retired personnel.
Spaxley sighed. "What the hell was the woman and her pilot friend doing in there? You might have killed them too."
"We did what we were paid for."
"With Denby Rawlins?"
"We thought he was Dr. Wynne."
Spaxley stayed silent. He could see now that giving the revised prophecy to Tolley was a clever move. News-hungry rivals would eagerly devour anything found by an accredited reporter. It was unfortunate that the old professor had been alive to retrieve it when Tolley fell out of the window.
"Are you still there, Admiral?"
"Yes, I'm listening."
"I've left one of my team outside the Institute, to keep an eye on things. He's just reported signs of activity. The young man from the Lodge is going into the phone box down the road."
"Tell your man to keep out of sight," warned Spaxley. "You and your team have done enough damage." He replaced the phone and turned to Withington. "Get a trace on that public phone box. You've already got the number."
The small speaker in Withington's console started to ring. The local hotel answered. Sam Bolt asked the desk clerk to wake all the reporters staying there and tell them he was holding a press conference at the Institute Lodge in sixty minutes. Spaxley sensed that Bolt was about to blow the lid off the cookie jar. The cookies in the jar were rotten, and the ex-airline pilot obviously knew it. In just over an hour the world would know it too.
"Go along to Stephan's room and wake him. I want our ex-KGB man at the Institute before the press briefing ends. He can be there in ninety minutes. Someone has to present the facts. I've got a full set of handouts prepared. Olsen's clay cylinder is in a box in my hotel closet. Stephan can show it to the press. Now let's move it. Every minute counts."
Chapter 56
The Lodge, Institute of Egyptologists, England
"WHERE'S Dr. Wynne?" the woman from the Daily Express demanded, for the tenth time.
"Dr. Wynne will be here soon to answer questions," said Sam. He found the air stifling and hard to breathe. Far more people had jammed themselves into Panya's living room than he'd expected. "He's still suffering from shock. He's here in the bedroom, and he'll be joining us soon."
A voice from the back of the room called out. "How would the professor respond to the suggestion that the fire was an easy way out of failure?"
Sam felt his enthusiasm give way to anger. Up to now the session had been going fairly well. He'd managed to maintain control of the briefing, his experience with irate airline passengers proving helpful. "Dr. Wynne had nothing to gain by the fire," he retorted. "He's lost his Institute and he's lost his reputation. Why aren't you interested in the possibility of the prophecy being manipulated by an outside force? That's why I got you here."
"Black magic?"
"A government agency," Sam snapped back. "Dr. Wynne thinks the prophecy has been tampered with. He'll be here soon to tell you himself. It looks like the events in Egypt are being arranged to fit the prophecy. Or perhaps the prophecy is being arranged to fit what's happening in Egypt. I think we're all confused." Sam wished he'd not started to ramble. He needed to sleep.
A roar of laughter carried through the room. Panya pushed her way to the front. "Dr. Wynne will be with you in a few minutes," she called out, surprisingly loudly for such a slim figure. "Now you must excuse us for a moment." She took Sam by the arm and lowered her voice. "We have something to discuss."
"What's happened?" asked Sam as they stepped out into the freezing garden.
"I've got my passport in my room. Have you got yours with you?"
He tapped his jacket pocket. It was still there from his trip to Berlin. "Are we running away?"
"Only to Cairo. We're going to see Michael Fitz."
Sam shook his head. "Count me out. I've already done enough for your Cardinal."
"Not yet, you haven't."
He refused to let himself get caught up in Panya's excitement. "If you're going to Cairo, you're traveling on your own." He nodded towards the Lodge. "I've got that lot in there to see to."
"I need your help, Sam." Again the large, appealing eyes.
"I'll give you a bit of advice. Someone could be monitoring bookings to Cairo from all the major UK airports, so get a ticket as far as Rome or Naples and book a flight to Egypt when you land."
"Malta," said Panya. "And you're coming with me. And we don't need to book a flight from there. I know for a fact that Cardinal Fitz has a Vatican jet on standby in Malta for the Unity group."
"And they'll let you use it?"
"Leave
it to me to arrange. I do have some influence."
"I can never tell when you're joking." He noticed Panya's hurt looks and realized he'd misjudged her standing in the Unity group. "You're serious."
"Deadly serious."
"I don't need all this drama," he protested.
"But you'll help?" Panya's eyes widened pleadingly.
"Perhaps. I have a friend who works for Air Malta. I'll phone her on the way to Gatwick airport and see if she can get us tickets."
"Her? What sort of friend?"
He smiled to himself. Panya Pulaski was jealous. "Wait here. I'm going to tell everyone to help themselves to coffee and tea in your kitchen. They could do with a break."
"And I'll make sure Dr. Wynne is getting up. If we're quick we can leave before anyone realizes we're missing,"
They returned to the stuffy atmosphere in the Lodge. Sam gave what he thought was a rather confusing statement about things being made clearer soon, and went with Panya to the small kitchen.
"That's the press taken care of," he said. "I just hope there's enough coffee to go round. All we need now is a secure phone. We'll stop at a service area on the way."
"Father Patrick," said Panya suddenly. "I can call at the manse and ring Cairo to let Michael Fitz know what's happening."
"Father Patrick?"
"We'll be going past his door. Well, almost. His church is only a few miles from Gatwick. You'll have to stay in the car."
"You think I'd let you down?"
"I think Father Patrick would ask too many questions about us being together in the early hours of the morning, me being a young widow." She smiled briefly at Sam. "But he'll let me use his phone for a long distance call if I look at him with begging eyes."
Once again Sam was aware of Panya's eyes, large and dark, almost as large as the lenses in her slim wire-framed glasses.
"I'll get us that Papal jet, and that's a promise." Panya looked at the press vehicles jamming the drive. "I can't get my car out from behind this lot. We could take Bill Tolley's. He's left it in the road outside, and his keys are on my hall table." She hesitated. "Or would that be wrong?"
"Bill's in hospital. I'm sure he won't mind." Sam grinned. "I'll get the keys. You stay here."
Panya put her arms round him and rested her head on his shoulder. Her body felt warm in the night air. "What we're doing is important."
He let Panya rest his head for a little longer before giving her a kiss on the cheek, the first kiss he had given anyone since Sally had run off with the money. It was a strange sensation, especially as it stirred up and identified an attraction deeper than any he had known for many years. "There's only one thing that's important to me: getting my children back. Be quick and fetch your passport."
A car pulled up and a man ran past them into the Lodge without hesitating. Probably a reporter who had only just heard about the press briefing.
Chapter 57
The Lodge, Institute of Egyptologists, England
AT THREE in the morning, smoke still drifted across the grounds, smoke heavy with a stench of burning plastic. Stephan looked uneasily at the reporters huddled together in the housekeeper's living room, drinking coffee.
"Gentlemen, ladies, quiet please."
He attempted to smile. He'd watched other people deal with the press, but it wasn't so simple in practice. And he felt exhausted after his fast drive here in the dark.
"The housekeeper and her friend were suffering from shock," he said loudly, in what he hoped was good English. He needed to be understood without interruption. "They will have told you a lot of ridiculous things. They had inhaled unpleasant fumes in the tragic house fire." He looked at a man at the back who had now interrupted, demanding to know where they had gone. "They are ... well, as you can see, they are not here. Dr. Wynne has asked me to take over this briefing, and perhaps undo some of the chaos that was inadvertently caused by people who know nothing about the Institute."
"I thought the professor was on his way."
Stephan looked at the man at the back of the room, his heart suddenly racing. Yes, where the hell was Dr. Wynne?
"Can we print any of this?" The questioner changed the subject conveniently.
"You can print it word for word." Stephan raised a hand. "No more interruptions, please. I'll start at the beginning, and you can forget everything you have heard so far. I have a most interesting object here." He reached into a box under the table and raised the clay cylinder amid a volley of electronic flash. "This is where these events started."
He paused to look around the room before continuing. He knew most of the details, but to be on the safe side he referred to Spaxley's notes. "The German ambassador in Cairo came across this cylinder in nineteen forty, and was intrigued by the Egyptian text. He described it as prophetic, and gave it to Adolf Hitler. Taken at face value it says..." He looked quickly at the notes again. "It says that the Man of Power in the West will come to rule the nations of the world. The Nations of the North, the East and the South will bow down before him."
"It could be a fake."
"Not so. It was authenticated by the Berlin Museum. I have the certificate of authentication right here. Hitler had so much faith in the prophetic wording on it that he started his North Africa campaign early. Now you may all be wondering why I have drawn your attention to this cylinder. You see, the Institute has been involved in advanced code breaking. Documents you will be issued to you before you leave, showing how this has been done."
"Can we see all the workings?" asked a science correspondent.
Stephan raised a hand. "No interruptions, please. Important events are unfolding in the Middle Fast. Egypt is in turmoil while we speak. The Institute believes that the nuclear explosion was foretold. I have the full prophecy in this binder."
Gresley Wynne suddenly appeared at the door. Where on earth had he come from? "That's not..."
No one else in the room seemed to notice the bleary-eyed Egyptologist starting to protest. They were all fascinated by the clay cylinder. Dr. Wynne stood for a moment, his mouth open, then he turned to go.
"It seems that Hitler got it wrong," Stephan continued, unwilling to leave the platform. "The Institute believes that the title 'Man of Power in the West' is the wording needed to crack the code, and has no meaning as such."
"Where are the couple who started this briefing, before you got here?"
Stephan sighed. They were back to that again. He needed to move on. "As I said when I got here, you must totally forget what you heard earlier, gentlemen, ladies. The woman who spoke is nothing more than the housekeeper at the Institute, and the man with her is her lover. They had no authority to speak at this briefing, because they know nothing about the prophecy. What I am telling you now is the truth."
That caused a moment of silence. Hopefully that was a good sign.
"What about the eagle?"
"A missile, gentlemen. Yes, that is definitely one of the latest predictions." Where the hell had Gresley Wynne gone? That man could cause serious damage to the prophecy if he reappeared at the wrong moment.
"Like Iraqi Scuds?"
"Iraqi, Iranian, Libyan. Most likely Israeli." He waited until he was sure that the reporters had taken it in. "But the Institute of Egyptologists is not in business to make political statements. What is going to happen, is going to happen. That is how the Institute looks at the prophecy."
"Another nuclear explosion?" someone else asked, ignoring the directive not to interrupt.
"The Institute doesn't rule out another nuclear blast." Stephan realized the interruption had played into his hands. "We all know what happened south of Cairo. The arrival of the Eagle of Darkness is prophesied, followed by a time of chaos."
"You are serious I suppose?" The young reporter probably wanted his hopes confirmed. This was likely to be the first real war he'd cover on a professional basis.
"See it and believe: that's what we say at the Institute. The Institute of Egyptologists can only publish what it d
iscovers. You must judge how well we have done our work when the time comes."
"You say our work. Are you on the Institute staff?"
He was prepared for that one. "I am here to speak on behalf of Dr. Wynne."
"Can Dr. Wynne do any more work, now the place has burnt down?"
"The computers and their programs are beyond repair. This red binder contains the last printout that was ever made of the prophecy. It is fuller than the one we issued you with earlier." He stopped, expecting another interruption from Gresley Wynne, but the man had not returned. "I'm going to hand out copies now. I have sufficient for all of you."
It was with relief that Stephan realized that the crowd in the room were swallowing the lie, just as the German Führer had done in 1940. The cylinder contained a powerful message for the gullible. He looked around the room at the responsive faces.
As soon as he'd handed out the papers he had to find Dr. Gresley Wynne.
Chapter 58
Surrey, England
PANYA CAME out of Father Patrick's manse after forty-five minutes, just as it was getting light. Sam was starting to feel sleepy. He'd done his share of the work from a phone in the street outside. Paula was not on duty at Air Malta this early, but he had managed to get two seats on a charter plane to Malta that was leaving in ... he looked at his watch ... less than two hours. They'd have to get a move on if they were to catch it.
From the expression on Panya's face he found it impossible to judge if she had been successful or not. "Well?"
"It's sort of good news." she said, shutting the car door and putting on her seatbelt.
"And?"
"The Vatican plane is a Dornier three-two-eight. Do you know what that is?"
"I did a bit of charter work with one two years ago. It's an executive jet."
"The plane is still in Malta. But..."
"Yes?"
"The pilot says he won't fly to Cairo. He's worried about being target practice for the Egyptian air force."
"That's it then. There's not much point in going to Gatwick."
"Now comes the good. It's okay for you to fly it."
He laughed out loud. "How could I fly it?"
"You've just said you've flown one before. You have a pilot's license."
"Well, yes, but it's not as simple..."
"Have you got your license with you or not?"
He felt for his wallet. "Yes."
"Is it up to date?"