The Black Sun Conspiracy

Chapter Forty-One

Sam and Nina followed Professor Lehmann through the revolving doors, into the opulent lobby of the Savoy Hotel, past the reception desk towards a small office, discreetly tucked away beyond the plush couches and highly polished tables. The porter wheeling the crate attempted to stop him, to steer him towards the receptionists or the concierge’s desk, but Lehmann was having none of it.

“I assure you, my good man, I know where I am going. The concierge, I see is not at his desk, and we must speak to him on urgent, private business. Please locate him at once. We shall wait here.”

“Certainly, Sir.” The porter looked a little confused, but he knew better than to argue. He pointed to the crate. “Shall I send this up to your room?”

“Leave it here with us,” said Lehmann. He offered no explanation for their determination to keep the mysterious package with them. Leaning heavily on his cane, he sank down onto an overstuffed sofa and crossed his legs. “And please — send someone over so that we can order some tea.”

Taking their cue from Lehmann, Sam and Nina sat down too. A discreet signal from the porter sent a waiter scurrying across the checkered floor to take their order. Somehow, between the porter’s departure and the waiter’s arrival Professor Lehmann’s ideas about what they should be drinking altered somewhat. The order that came out of his mouth was not for tea at all, but for three large gin and tonics. ‘He definitely seems to know Nina well,’ Sam thought.

He looked around at his elegant surroundings. He had not seen these intricate friezes, the warm wood paneling, the chic pendant lamps for a long time. Places like the Savoy had always been a little too upmarket for Sam’s tastes, but he had fond memories of crashing a party with Trish. A book launch, as he recalled, for some author whom neither of them had heard of, but Trish had a friend who was photographing the event and smuggled them in. They had taken full advantage of the free-flowing champagne and sneaked back out with Sam’s pockets and Trish’s bag stuffed with stolen canapés. ‘I know you’re supposed to grow out of doing that kind of thing once you get past your student years,’ he thought, grinning at the memory, ‘but we couldn’t resist. We brought out the worst in each other.’

“You said that you were instructed to give a particular name when you deposit the painting,” said Professor Lehmann. “What name was it, again?”

Despite being sure that she had memorized the instructions, Nina checked the cards again. “Maria de Beck,” she replied.

Lehmann gave a short, staccato laugh. “Whoever devised this scheme has a sense of humor, and indeed of history.”

“And we’ve to make sure that it gets put in the Gaunt Box.”

“Indeed?” he raised his thick white eyebrows. “And do you have any idea of the significance of that name?”

Sam watched Nina expectantly. She looked at him to see if he knew, but he shook his head. She shook hers in reply. “I’m afraid I don’t,” she said.

“You will have heard of John of Gaunt, presumably?”

“Of course,” said Nina. “I studied the Plantagenêts for a while during my undergrad degree, though I’m more familiar with the earlier ones. He was the son of Edward III, the third son if I recall correctly. His mother was… Philippa of Hainault, I think? The name Gaunt was a corruption of Ghent, where he was born.”

“Ghent again,” Sam remarked.

“Ghent again. Apparently he took a lot of stick because he was supposedly a bastard — the son of a Ghent butcher. He used to go into violent rages when people teased him about it. And he… oh.” She trailed off. Sam could see the moment of realization written upon her face. “His seat was the Savoy Palace, wasn’t it?” She looked to Professor Lehmann, who nodded his confirmation. “And he lost it during an uprising — the Peasants’ Revolt? Yes, that’s about right. It was razed to the ground.”

“It was,” said Lehmann. “And a hospital for the needy built in its place some years later, and then eventually this fine establishment in which we find ourselves now. Until the early eighteenth century, the land upon which the Savoy Palace stood — land which forms its own jurisdiction, independent of the County of Middlesex — belonged to the same people.”

“The Order?” Sam guessed.

“Indeed. It had been passed through high-ranking members of the English branch of the Order, and the sale that took place in the 1700s included a condition that any property built here would always accommodate members in need of shelter. I spent my first few weeks in England in this lovely place under that very arrangement, though I doubt the hotel’s staff or even its owners are aware of it. All they know is that a suite is kept under a name that changes every so often so that it appears to change hands. At present, it seems, that name is Maria de Beck. I would imagine that the present Renata, whoever she may be, goes by that name whenever she is in England and in residence here.”

Sam tried to picture the tall, statuesque blonde he only knew as Renata in these surroundings. It was not difficult. Like the fiercely intelligent Nazi prodigy, Lita Røderic, whom they had hopefully dispatched of for good in Valhalla, Renata’s confident, almost arrogant stride and expensive taste in clothes would not be out of place here. She would descend these stairs with her head held high, looking as if she belonged. There would be none of the misgivings that Sam always experienced in places like this.

Renata would feel at home.

She would not watch out of the corner of her eye for the porter or the concierge approaching to ask her to leave. Not that Sam had ever actually been asked to leave — even on the occasions when he had gate-crashed in fancy places, he had always had an instinct for when to get out. But he had always felt that it might happen, and that it would only be fair if it did.

At last the concierge arrived, a short, stout man in a black suit with a small badge on his lapel in the shape of two crossed keys. His name was Mr. Barrington, and he was bubbling over with apologies for keeping them waiting. Although he had never seen Sam or Nina before and Professor Lehmann has not stayed in the hotel since the 1940s, at the mention of Maria de Beck he treated them as if they were the most treasured, most honored, most respected guests that the hotel had ever had.

He ushered them into the secluded office. It was not marked Concierge, in fact it almost faded into the background completely. This was a place for business that was not to be interrupted by requests for taxi bookings, table reservations or tickets to the opera. It was oddly sparse after the lavish lobby, with pale walls, a plain desk and chair, some filing cabinets against the wall and a few shelves full of folders and ledgers. The porter wheeled the cart in. The brass still shimmered in the dim light, making it look out of place.

“That will be all, thank you,” Barrington said to the porter and sent him on his way. “Now, how may I help you?”

Sam and Nina stood back and allowed Professor Lehmann to do the talking. Although they all knew the words to say, Lehmann was clearly the one accustomed to dealing with such situations and they were both glad to be spared yet another conversation in which they were left feeling their way through, always in the hopes of saying the necessary word to stay alive.

Nina looked exhausted, Sam noticed. They had spent so much time in each other’s company that he had barely noticed her drawn face, her cheekbones more prominent than they had been before, dark shadows beneath her eyes. He tried not to let this remind him of her ordeal and of how she had looked during their hunt through the Walhalla in Bavaria, where she was gradually eaten away by Lita’s insidious poison. In his mind’s eye she had always been the woman he had met that day at the Braxfield Tower — still slim, but not as gaunt as she looked now, with glossy dark hair and pretty, pointed features shaped into the expression of annoyance that he had come to know so well. He wondered whether a similar change had come over him. How much of a toll had all of this taken on him? ‘Well, with any luck things will calm down soon,’ he thought. ‘We might not be able to escape from the Order, but at least we might be able to win ourselves some breathing space. Once Renata has her painting and they’re assured of our loyalty, we can play along until we’ve recovered enough to think about how we’re going to get out of all this permanently.’ The thought that Professor Lehmann had apparently been searching for a way out for most of his life without ever finding one crossed Sam’s mind, but he forced himself not to think about it. ‘We’ll find a way.’ Sam promised himself. ‘Between the two of us, somehow, we will find a way.’

Realizing that he had tuned out, Sam quickly resumed concentrating on the conversation taking place in front of him. The concierge was nodding vigorously, promising to lead them straight away to the hotel’s safe deposit boxes where they could witness him placing the crate in the Gaunt Box personally.

“The boxes used by our normal guests are close to the reception area,” Barrington said, “but for our more regular visitors, those with whom we have a special relationship, there is a more exclusive area to which only a few select members of staff have access. If you would be so kind as to follow me…”

Rather than taking them back out through the lobby, he led then into a little corridor that ran down behind his office. A pair of double doors waited at the end of the corridor, and at the touch of a button they opened to reveal an elevator with plush seats inside. Sam’s stomach flipped as it began a sharp descent, plunging down into the bowels of the building.

When the lift reached its destination it came to a halt, but the doors did not open, not until Barrington had pressed his palm to a brass panel and allowed his retinas to be scanned. He summoned each of them in turn to speak their names into the concealed microphone at the top of the panel and let their palm scans be taken. “I am afraid I can’t admit you any other way,” he said. “The doors will only open once every person in the lift is accounted for.”

Sam was the last to speak, enunciating his name clearly into the microphone. The doors slid open, and they stepped into the stark white room beyond.