Silhouette in Scarlet - Elizabeth Peters [59]
‘But if you had a gun,’ Max said softly. ‘A thirty-eight, fully loaded? Picture it. You and Mr Jonsson, locked in one of the upstairs rooms. We could not reach you from the window, but you could see us leave – and you could shoot to kill if anyone tried to enter by the door.’
Talk about your seductive pictures. What’s more, some odd sixth sense told me he was sincere – not planning any nasty little tricks like setting fire to the house. Watching the play of emotions on my face, Max sidled up to the desk and lowered himself into a chair. ‘I will consider any reasonable suggestion,’ he murmured. ‘Only help me to find the treasure.’
‘I don’t know where it is,’ I wailed.
‘But you are the possessor of expert knowledge, training, that might give me a clue.’ His voice changed. It held a note of purely human curiosity. ‘How the devil did Smythe trick you into joining him in this? Your reputation is excellent, and now that I have met you I find it impossible to believe you wanted to swindle Mr Jonsson.’
‘It’s too complicated to explain,’ I said mournfully. ‘But you’re right – he did trick me, the bastard.’
‘He will be punished. For that and other injudicious acts.’
‘I don’t suppose you’d include him in your amnesty offer.’
‘No. Why should you care? You owe him nothing; he is responsible for your present plight.’
‘How true.’
‘Are you in love with him?’
‘No. None of your business.’
‘I take a fatherly interest.’
I gaped at him. He went on seriously. ‘He is not a proper associate for a lady of your worth. You will be better off without him. Mr Hasseltine, now – there is a fine man, young and healthy. What are your feelings for him?’
My head was spinning. I couldn’t believe I was getting advice on affairs of the heart from a leader of organized crime. Uncle Maxie’s Love Column . . .
‘Now, look here, Max,’ I said. ‘Not that I don’t appreciate your interest – but let’s get back to basics, okay? Your deal has its attractive points, and I’d be strongly tempted to take you up on it, except for one detail.’
‘Your professional conscience?’
‘Well . . . I hate what you’re planning to do. My training and my moral senses are howling with outrage. But there isn’t one artefact in existence that I’d place above a human life. Especially mine.’
‘Then what is the difficulty?’
He still sounded like kindly old Uncle Maxie, weary but patient I waved my arms wildly. ‘Max, I don’t have the information! Georg is the archaeologist; I’ve just enough background to think he may be right in his assessment of the site. There may have been a fifth-century house here, with all the attendant features – outbuildings, a defensive wall, maybe a cemetery. If the graves weren’t robbed in antiquity, they might contain all kinds of goodies – like the chalice. It’s equally possible that the chalice was one object in a cache of treasures buried by the owner in time of war for safekeeping. If you had a couple of trained scholars on the spot, with the necessary equipment, they could plot the site and locate the cemetery. But there’s no way on earth anybody could pinpoint the location of a cache. Where would you bury your savings, if you were in the ancient owner’s position? In the farmyard? Under the living-room floor? In the pigsty? Damn it, Max, even if we had a complete plan of the house and outbuildings, we still wouldn’t have a clue. It’s hopeless. Why don’t you give up and go home?’
Elbow on the table, chin propped on his hand, Max listened attentively to my peroration.
‘I am tempted to tell you why,’ he said when I finished talking, breathless and flushed. ‘Better still, I am tempted to show you. Wait here.’
Naturally I waited. I couldn’t take my eyes off the mutilated silhouette. The tear was like a ragged wound.
Max was back in a few minutes, carrying a manila envelope. He opened it and handed me the contents.
They were colour photographs, eight-by-ten in size. Six of them – sides, top, and bottom. The object was shaped like a little house, with the roof sloping up to a richly ornamented ridgepole – a doll’s house, about a foot long. But