“I don’t know this bazillion, but you are welcome.” She smiled and walked out.
Amy and Dan attacked the food. In mere minutes, the plates were clean and they were sitting, stuffed, with cups of hot chocolate. The food and sleep had helped. They were raring to go. But where?
“We’ve only got three days left,” Amy said.
“And counting.”
Amy spread out the paper she’d taken from the auction house. She ran her fingers over the names. “A professor, a socialite, an art dealer, a guy with a private library. Just what you’d expect. And they all have money. So why would one of them steal it?”
“And why would it stay hidden?” Dan asked. “It’s been eighty years. Why hasn’t someone found it? Why hasn’t someone tried to sell it? It doesn’t make sense.”
Amy frowned. “Attleboro has probably researched these names already.” She reached for the computer. In a moment they saw Evan’s concerned face. Sinead was right at his shoulder.
“McIntyre told us that he brought you to a safe house,” Evan said. “I’m glad you got to crash. We have some background information. Are you ready?”
“Ready,” Amy said.
“Let’s see … Marcel Maubert and Reginald Tawnley both died during the war. But this is interesting – the German professor with all the dough? He became a big guy in the Nazi party. He killed himself – or maybe someone killed him – after the Allies took Berlin in 1945. And Jane Sperling – she was a socialite – her father was Max Sperling, who had a chain of department stores in the Midwest. She was also a medieval scholar – studied at the University of Chicago and then went to Germany. We’re betting that she knew Hummel, because she studied in Heidelberg at the university there.”
“Heidelberg,” Amy said. “Wasn’t that where the family who owned the de Virga was from?”
“That’s right. Interesting coincidence, isn’t it?”
“What happened to Jane Sperling?”
“She moved to London. During the war she worked for the War Department as a secretary. Later, after the war, she married a GI in Maine. Led a quiet life.”
“So there’s not much there,” Dan said.
“We’ll turn up something,” Sinead said. “We just have to keep digging.”
“Have we heard anything from Vesper One?” Dan asked.
“Nothing,” Evan said. “As far as we know everyone is still okay.”
They were silent for a moment. Remembering faces. Remembering how far Vesper One was willing to go.
“Well,” Amy said. “Let’s get moving.”
Dan hung up the phone. Amy bent over the paper, her finger moving back and forth over the names.
She looked up at him. “We’re on the wrong track.”
“I didn’t know we had a track.”
“We keep focusing on the map itself. We should be thinking about the world around the map. What was going on in Europe at the time? What did all those names have in common?”
“They were all rich,” Dan said.
“The war,” Amy said. “It was 1932. World War Two was still years away. But the world was gearing up for it. The Nazis were coming to power in Germany.”
She accessed a search engine on the computer. Dan looked over her shoulder. “What are you looking for?”
“No idea,” she murmured. “But sometimes you have to go fishing.”
He saw her type in Jane Sperling, then start to scroll through material. “Interesting,” she said. “Jane Sperling was Jewish. Did she know her teacher was a Nazi? Hang on.” She tapped a few more words into the computer and then turned back to Dan. “Just what I thought. The Nazis took over the government in 1933. Jewish students were pressured to leave universities as early as 1932. Eventually, the Nazis expelled Jewish students from every university in Germany.”
“I didn’t know that part,” Dan said. “Those guys were nasty dudes.”
Amy looked up. “Why was she at the same auction as her Nazi professor? Coincidence? I just don’t buy it.”
He tried to follow Amy’s logic. He’d learned about World War II and the Nazis in school, had read books about it. But to put himself in the heads of the people who actually lived the horror of it – that was harder. Amy had a gift for it.
“She was a young girl alone – she was only nineteen,” Amy continued. “You can bet her parents wanted her to come home. Germany was turning into a scary place for Jews. But she stayed. She stayed, Dan!” Amy smacked the pillow next to her. “She had courage. So, maybe she knew that her Nazi professor was coming to bid on a famous historical document. The family who owned the de Virga was Jewish. Maybe she was trying to protect it!”
“So why didn’t she just buy it? She was rich.”
“Maybe she was planning to. That’s why she came to Lucerne – to outbid Hummel and the others. But somebody got to it first,” Amy said.
“Hummel?”
Amy’s fingers flew as she typed an e-mail. “I’m asking the Attleboro group to research Hummel. Then we’ll dig a little deeper into Jane Sperling. I just have a feeling these two are connected somehow.”
Dan knew better than to argue with Amy’s feelings.
“Look, research isn’t my strong suit,” he said. “How about I go out and gather some more supplies for us?”
Amy waved a hand. She was already gone, lost in the 1930s and the lives of people she’d never meet.
“Back in an hour,” Dan said.
He had already done a quick search on the train, using his smartphone. He knew he didn’t have much time. He’d managed to gather seven ingredients in Italy. If he could find a few here in Basel – three, at least – he’d have one-quarter of the serum ingredients. And some ingredients he could save for last, things he could pick up easily at any grocery store: salt, mint, honey … those would be easy.
He blended in like a tourist in his jeans and jacket and baseball cap. He stopped in a pharmacy and in five minutes flat had left with a small bottle of iodine.
Amy would be furious – and concerned – if she knew he was assembling the serum. She was afraid of it. She would never allow him to take it. She would say it would change him – possibly kill him.
What she didn’t understand was that he didn’t care.
The darkness was just … there. Sometimes it scared him. Sometimes it made him angry. An anger he didn’t know he was capable of, something bottomless. Seeing Nellie wounded and scared had seared him. Just days ago he’d held a dying girl in his arms, a stranger who had trusted Vesper One.
Amy didn’t realize that you had to fight with everything you had. Not just your nerve and your courage, but the secret, hard, dark places inside you.
He plugged the next address into his GPS. He had found a place, a chemistry supply company willing to sell mercury and phosphorus. He hopped on a tram and took it to the outskirts of the city, an industrial area with warehouses and office buildings.
He found the address and rang the bell on the steel door. A moment later the door opened. A man, probably in his twenties, peered out and asked him something in German.
“Guten morgen,” Dan growled.
“Oh, you’re American. And a Yankees fan.”
Dan touched the bill on his cap nervously. “I’m the one who contacted you about the …”
“Yes. Come in.”
He was led into a small office. The man held up a glass vial. Dan saw the molten mercury.
“Toxic,” the man said. “You know this? You must be careful how you handle it.”
“I know,” Dan said. “You wouldn’t have liquid gold, would you?”
“Colloidal gold? Yes … how much would you need?”
“Quarter ounce should do it.”
The transaction was completed in minutes. Dan shifted as he counted out the bills. He could feel the man’s eyes on him.
“So. You must be a New Yorker,” the man said. “I love New York. The Lion King – excellent show!”
Dan turned to go.
“I don’t think I caught your name,” the man said.
“I didn’t throw it,” Dan said.
He left the place and walked quickly back to the tram stop. On the way, he tossed the Yankees cap into the trash can. Too many questions. The guy was probably harmless. But he couldn’t take a chance.