James Acton 01 - The Protocol (13 page)

In 1996 the BBC had done a documentary on the skulls, bringing several of them to England for scientific study. The Triarii had managed to replace the London and Smithsonian skulls with fakes before they were shipped so only one genuine skull was tested. The resulting embarrassment had forced the British Museum to remove the skull from display. Unbeknownst to them, the skulls had been switched back to the real ones in transit so the ones they were hiding were indeed real.

“A bullet was definitely dodged there,” agreed a woman to his right responsible for the Paris skull. “We’ve always relied on the holders of the skulls to either jealously guard their secret or be considered barmy. Now we have a professor in London with the final missing skull, far too close to another genuine skull, and we don’t know what his intentions or that of his accomplice are.”

“We should take immediate action to remove the British Museum skull,” said another. “Since it’s my responsibility to protect, I’ll put my plan in action to have it removed, tonight. Agreed?”

There were nods around the table then all looked at the Proconsul. He shook his head. “Not yet. Let’s wait and see what our centurii find out.”

“Yes, Proconsul.”

Institute of Archaeology, University College London, Gordon Square, London

Acton entered the lobby of the Institute of Archaeology at the University College London campus and walked up to one of the students milling about.

“Can you tell me where Professor Laura Palmer is?”

“Yes, sir, she’s lecturing right now, I believe. Room two-twelve, up those stairs, to the right.”

Acton thanked the young man then headed toward the stairs and quickly found room 212. He looked through the window and was taken aback when he saw her, realizing she was much more attractive than she had appeared in the desert. She was holding up an old earthenware jar with a slender, alabaster arm partially revealed by a cardigan that had slipped up to her elbow. He followed the arm to her hand and noticed with a satisfaction that surprised him at a time like this that there was no ring on
the
finger.

Finally he tore his gaze away to look at the jar. It looked Babylonian, about 2000 BC.
Impressive.
He knocked on the door.

She looked over and saw him through the window. An immediate light of recognition showed on her face. She rushed over, opened the door, and stepped into the hall.

“Professor Acton, I’ve been on pins and needles waiting for you!” she gushed.

“You received the package?”

“Yes, this morning,” she replied. “I was gobsmacked to receive something from you. I had just finished reading your article on surviving Incan culture in Archaeology magazine last week. And the spread they did on you in National Geographic, last year, when you were on the Yucatan peninsula, is still one of my favorites. When your pracel arrived I was so excited, but then when I read your note not to open it until you arrived…I was gutted!”

Slightly embarrassed but also flattered, Acton lowered his voice. “I need your help.”

“You need
my
help?” she asked. “I’d be happy to, but first I must introduce you to the class.” She started to turn back toward them, but he grabbed her arm. Startled, she swung around and stared at him.

“Nobody can know I was here. I need to show you what was in that package. Is there a place we can talk?”

“Yes, my office. But what is this about? I’m in the middle of a lecture.”

He leaned over and whispered in her ear. “I found another skull.”

“Class dismissed, I’ll see you all next week!” she yelled through the open classroom door as she grabbed his arm and rushed him toward her office in another wing of the building.

Chevy Chase, Maryland

George Guthrie shook his head. “I can’t believe it. Lesley Darbinger?” He sat in a high-back leather chair in his den. The two detectives sat across from him.

“Yes, sir,” said Wheeler. “We both got the definite impression that he was holding out on us. That and the fact that your son worked for him and was carrying a coffee-stained folder into a supply room, then was later seen with a matching folder that didn’t have coffee on it, leads us to believe that he stumbled onto something he shouldn’t have.”

“How?”

“He must have switched envelopes and seen what was inside when doing so,” explained Schultz. “We think that this switch was discovered and they had him eliminated.”

Guthrie sank back into his chair. “Where was the file heading?”

“It looks like the President’s office.”

“Do you have any proof?”

Wheeler shook his head. “No, and I’m not sure how we can get any. If this were indeed something sanctioned from within the White House, you can bet they’ve covered their tracks.”

Guthrie nodded. “So, my son’s killer may go free.” He clenched his fists and slammed both of them into the arms of the chair he was sitting in. Taking a deep breath, he reigned in his anger. “Okay, I’m going to make some calls. If Darbinger did this, I’m sure Stew didn’t know. I’ll see if I can get in touch with him. If all else fails, I’ll call in some cards and have a damned Senate investigation into the matter convened. I won’t stop until we get to the bottom of this.” He stood and motioned the two detectives toward the door. “I’ll call you as soon as I have something for you.”

“Thank you, sir,” replied Wheeler.

He and Schultz headed out the door and toward their car. Just as they reached it Wheeler realized he had forgotten to ask Guthrie something. He tossed the keys to Schultz. “You drive, I need to ask Guthrie about how Billy got hired in the first place.”

“How’s that important?”

“I want to know if it was general knowledge whose son he was.” He headed back to the door as Schultz climbed in the driver’s seat and turned the key. The car turned over a few times, but didn’t start.

Wheeler heard this and spun around as he yelled, “No!”

Schultz didn’t have time to react to the warning before he turned the key again. This time the car started. The resulting explosion sent Wheeler flying back toward the entrance of Guthrie’s house. Shrapnel from the gutted car flew everywhere, including a small piece that sliced Wheeler’s arm.

He picked himself up just as Guthrie ran out of the house.

“Are you okay?” he asked, as he grabbed Wheeler to steady him.

“Justin!” cried Wheeler at the now roaring fire that was his partner of seven years. He fell down onto a porch bench. By now several of Guthrie’s staff were running toward the scene. Wheeler looked up at Guthrie. “They have to pay.”

“And they will.”

The Ritz, 150 Piccadilly, London

Serge toweled himself off in front of the window as he looked out at the London skyline. The view was magnificent and he was starting to think switching hotels was not such a bad thing. He tossed the towel over his shoulder and was about to head back to the bathroom when he heard a knock at the door. “Who ees eet?” he asked. He had ordered a massage to unwind from his experience with the Americain, but was told she wouldn’t arrive for hours.

“Room service, sir,” replied the muffled voice.

“But I did not ordare anyting,” Serge replied, pulling on a bathrobe.

“It’s champagne, sir, complements of the hotel.”

Ahhhh, excellent!
He unlocked the door and, just as he began to turn the knob, the door was pushed open from the other side. He was knocked to the floor as two men rushed in. One quickly closed the door and locked it while the other stuffed a rag in his mouth before he could protest. They then bound his hands and feet with plastic ties. In less than a minute he was bound and gagged, sitting in a chair, terrified as he watched the men search his room.

One of the men stood in front of him, staring through his sunglasses before ripping the gag from Serge’s mouth. “Where is Acton?”

“What? What are you talking about? What ees an Ac-ton?” asked Serge, trembling in his chair, desperately trying not to urinate.

“Don’t bugger about, mate,” replied the man. “We saw you meet him at the airport and get in a taxi together. Now where is he?”

“That stoopeed Americain from the aeroport?” he asked, incredulously. “I’ve never met eem before today!”

“Bollocks!” The man removed his sunglasses and leaned in toward Serge. “I guess we do this the
hard
way.”

Serge pissed himself.
Merde.

Professor Palmer’s Office, University College London, Gordon Square, London

Acton followed Professor Palmer into her office and closed the door behind them, locking it. He pulled down the blind to cover the door's window then they both closed the horizontal blinds on the other windows. He looked around for any other exits or windows passersby could see through as she went to a filing cabinet, unlocked it and lifted a box out. Satisfied, he joined her at the large oak desk that occupied the back of her office.

“Show me!” she said, her voice quivering with excitement as she placed the package on her desk and pushed it toward him.

He unlocked the case and carefully unwrapped the skull. She cooed in awe as he held it up in the light. “It’s billiant!” He hadn’t had time to look at it closely since he’d been on the ship and nodded in agreement. It was beautiful in an almost eerie way. Completely translucent, it was life-size. It was heavy, a solid piece of crystal that took both hands to hold.

“The jaw’s moveable.” He moved the fingers that supported it to demonstrate to Laura. As he turned the skull, light from the room shimmered and reflected off it, sending a kaleidoscope of patterns onto the walls and ceilings, surrounding them much like a prism. The skull itself had a myriad of strange lines within it, giving it a vein-like appearance, whereas the facial structure and jaw were perfectly clear. It was as if the sculptor had wanted to give the appearance of a brain, of intelligence. The veins in the crystal distorted objects on the other side like an eerily beautiful fun-house mirror. The hollowed out eyes and grinning face made him shiver.

“Where did you find it?” she asked as he handed it to her.

“At a dig in the Andes in Peru.”

She ran her expert fingers over the smooth cranium. Acton knew she was trying to feel the telltale marks of a carver’s tool, and equally knew she would find none. She adjusted a desk lamp to get more light and continued her inspection as he related the story of the dig in the mountains.

“They were ancient Incan ruins, a fairly large community from what we had unearthed so far. Everything was pretty routine, but fascinating nonetheless.” He sat down in one of the guest chairs as she examined the skull. “The first unusual thing we found was evidence of thirteenth century European nobility.”

She looked up from the skull. “What? That’s impossible! That area wasn’t discovered until early sixteenth century!”

“I know, that’s what didn’t make sense, but there was no doubt about it. First we found clothing and some trinkets that clearly dated from that era. If it weren’t for the clothing I could have believed that the other items were just heirlooms that some Spaniard had left, but nobody in sixteenth century Spain would wear thirteenth century British garb.”

Palmer sat in her leather chair, apparently momentarily distracted from the skull. “How could this be? We’ve known for years now that Columbus wasn’t the first to discover America. The Vikings had discovered Newfoundland five hundred years before.”

“And we know that European fisherman for at least a couple of hundred years fished the Grand Banks in secret, not wanting people to know where they got their easy catches from,” added Acton.

“But we’ve never had evidence that Europeans had gone to South America, certainly not Pacific coast South America.”

“I know, which is why I thought maybe this was some fluke, some shipwreck or something that had washed up on shore and they found the items and brought them back to their city,” explained Acton. “But then we found the skeleton.”

London, England, 1212 AD

Richard surveyed the curious scene in front of him. The four walls of what was once the council’s strongest and most secure building were flattened, but all outward, as if some great force from within had knocked them all down as it tried to escape. The night sky was filled with smoke as fires still burned in the distance, but this particular area had been so devastated that not much remained to burn. As he looked about him it became evident that whatever had caused this disaster had originated here hours earlier.

He had been in the council chambers, the celebration of the skull’s arrival still going strong, when word had come of the strange noise it emitted when placed on a pedestal with its companions. He had thought little of it when their most learned scholars were dispatched to investigate. Minutes after this report the explosion had occurred.

The skulls in their charge had already been recovered and taken to their backup location under heavy guard. He had ordered them kept separate upon their arrival at their new location in case their union had somehow caused the terrible event. At first he couldn’t believe it, but seeing how the walls had been knocked down as if from within, and the skulls had remained untouched in the center of the chamber, he realized it must somehow be.

He shook his head and spun on his heel, heading to a meeting with the surviving members of the council. The memories of his fallen wife and daughter’s screams were still fresh in his mind. He knew what must be done, but it would be hard to convince the others.

Triarii Headquarters, London, England

“He knows nothing, sir,” said the voice over the speaker. “The professor apparently approached him in the bathroom and ingratiated himself upon Mr. Savard.”

“Could he be lying?” asked the British Museum member.

“No, miss, I’m quite certain he isn’t lying. As soon as I threatened him he urinated himself and told us everything. He even switched hotels to avoid him.”

“Very well, keep us posted,” said the Proconsul as he hit the button, cutting off the conversation. “I’m not convinced there is malevolence here.”