The reader let out a soft, welcoming chime, followed by a metallic snick as the lock disengaged.
“Open it just an inch before the lock reengages,” Sam said, backing away and laying the guard down. “Be right back.” He dragged the guard back out the first door, then returned.
“See anything?” Sam asked.
Remi eased the door open another inch, pressed her eye to the gap for a few seconds, then pulled back and whispered, “No cameras that I can see.”
“Let’s go.”
Remi opened the door and they stepped through. The room was circular, with gray-painted walls and navy blue carpet. Pot lights in the ceiling cast pools of light on the floor. Directly ahead of them, at the ten o’clock and two o’clock positions on a clock face, were two card reader doors. They each took a door, Sam left, Remi right, and checked for wires. They found none.
Repeating their earlier swipe/thumb process, they first checked the left-hand door. Inside was a small landing and a set of steps that descended fifteen feet to a burgundy-carpeted corridor lit by soft baseboard lights.
They checked the right-hand door. “It’s a square alcove, about ten by ten feet,” Remi whispered, pulling it open an inch. “Straight ahead is another door—a latch but no lock that I can see. The wall to the right is glass from waist height to the ceiling. On the other side is what looks like a control room—a couple computer workstations and a radio console. There’s another door, behind the workstations.”
“Lights?”
“Dark except for the glow of the computer monitors.”
“Cameras?”
She peeked again, this time dropping into a crouch and craning her neck. She pulled back again and nodded. “Only one that I can see—a blinking green light near the ceiling in the right-hand corner.”
“Is it fixed?”
“No, rotating.”
“Good for us, bad for them.”
“How so?”
“In a space that small they should have gone with a fixed camera and a fish-eye lens. No blind spots to hide in. Watch it, count how long it takes to make a complete pan.”
She did so. “Four seconds.”
Sam frowned. “Not a lot of time. You have a preference?”
“No.”
“Let’s go left first.”
They dragged the guard through the door, dropped him on the landing, then descended the steps, hunched over so they could scan the corridor ahead. They saw no blinking green camera lights. They kept going.
After thirty feet the corridor ended at an oaken door bearing a gold plaque embossed in Cyrillic lettering. While neither of them read Russian, the style of the plaque suggested its context: PRIVATE. KEEP OUT. The knob, too, was gold. Sam tried it. Unlocked. He swung it open.
Another circular room, this one thirty feet in diameter and pan eled in polished and center-cut burled walnut. The floor was covered in what looked to be a handwoven Turkish rug.
“That’s a Dosemealti,” Remi whispered.
“Pardon me?”
“The rug. It’s a Dosemealti—they’re woven by Yoruk nomads. Extremely rare and extremely expensive. I read an article about them last month. In every square yard of that thing are almost two hundred thousand hand-stitched knots.”
“Impressive.”
“Yes, but something tells me it’s not the prize of this room.”
“No kidding.”
Spaced every few feet along the curved walls were gleaming glass cases, each containing yet another piece of militaria displayed on a marble pedestal. The room was dark save a single halogen lamp mounted inside each case. Unlike the Sword Room, however, the decor here made it clear this collection was for Bondaruk’s eyes only. Any remaining doubt about this was quashed by the high-backed leather chair sitting in the exact center of the room.
“It has a distinctly thronelike feel, doesn’t it?” Sam asked.
“Exactly what I was thinking.”
They split up, each strolling along a wall, studying each piece in turn. “Here’s something called a gerron,” Sam said over his shoulder, stopping before a case displaying a tall, oval shield made of wicker and leather. “Used by Persian troops.”
“I’ve got a Persian sword over here,” Remi replied from across the room. “An akinakes, it’s called. It was carried by Persian Immortals of the Achaemenid Dynasty.”
“Looks like we have a theme going. I’ve got a sagaris over here. A Persian battle-ax—also from the Achaemenid Dynasty.”
They continued their tour, each reading aloud from the placards as they went. Shields, spears, daggers, long bows . . . all from the ancient Persian Achaemenid Dynasty of Xerxes I.
“I think someone’s got a fetish,” Remi said as they met back near the door.
“I agree,” Sam replied. “Unless I miss my guess, we may have just found the Bondaruk skeleton we’ve been looking for.”
“Maybe, but that begs the question: What does any of this have to do with Napoleon’s Lost Cellar?”
They made their way back to the blue-carpeted rotunda. Remi crouched by the right-hand door, pulled it open, and took another peek. “Nothing’s changed.”
“Okay, here’s what we’re going to do,” Sam said, then quickly explained. “Once I go in, if the camera stops panning, close the door and find a place to hide. It might mean they’ve seen something and guards are on the way.”
“What about you?”
“You worry about you. I’ll be right on your heels.”
They switched places at the door. Sam waited until the camera had panned fully to the right, then dropped to his belly and slithered through the door. He rolled right until his back touched the wall, then crawled along it to the next door.
Now he could hear the faint whirring of the camera’s pivot motor. Remi, once again kneeling beside the door, tapped the floor twice with her fingernaiclass="underline" Camera away. Slowly, Sam turned his head until he could see through the glass. He checked the ceiling and walls above the computer workstations for cameras; he saw none. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the camera panning back toward him. Remi tapped her fingernail once—Camera coming—and he ducked down.
Five seconds passed. Remi tapped twice. Sam reached up and tried the doorknob. It was unlocked. He rolled left and got to his knees, careful to keep his head below the glass. He waited until Remi gave him the all-clear double tap again, then turned the knob, pushed open the door, crawled through, and shut it behind him. Three seconds later he was standing pressed against the wall below the camera. He gave her a thumbs-up. Fifteen seconds later she was through both doors and standing beside him.
The control room was twice as big as the alcove. Under the half-glass wall was a long white melamine desk holding two computer towers and twenty-four-inch LCD displays. Fifteen feet down the wall against which they stood was the other door.
Sam tapped his ear, pointed to the camera, then to himself: Might have microphone; will check. Remi nodded her understanding.
Synchronizing his movements with the camera’s panning, Sam ducked first left, then right, rising up on his tiptoes so he could get a clear view of the camera.
“No sound,” he told Remi. “I’ll check the door. You say go.”
They waited, watching the camera pivot above their heads.
“Go.”
Sam slid left down the wall, checked the doorknob, found it unlocked, then slid back. “Our luck is holding,” he said.
“That’s what makes me nervous.”
The camera’s panning speed didn’t leave them enough time to open the next door, peek through, then either pull back or keep going.
“We’ll have to take our chances and risk it,” Sam said.
“I know.”