Mystery of the Amber Room

Chapter 14

At the German Consulate, Sam and Nina were put in touch with Berlin's British Embassy. They had found out that Purdue had had an appointment with Ben Carrington and the late Gabi Holtzer a few days before, but that was all they knew.

They had to go home as it was closing time for the day, but at least they had enough to follow up on. This was Sam Cleave’s strong suit. As a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, he knew exactly how to go about obtaining the information they needed without throwing rocks in the quiet pond.

“Wonder why he had to see this Gabi woman,” Nina mentioned as she stuffed her mouth with biscuits. She was going to have them with her hot chocolate, but she was starving, and the kettle just took too long.

“I am going to check just that as soon as I get my laptop on,” Sam replied, slinging his bag onto the couch before taking his luggage to the laundry room. “Make me some hot chocolate too, please!”

“Sure thing,” she smiled, wiping the crumbs from her mouth. In the temporary solitude of the kitchen, Nina could not help but recall the frightening episode aboard the flight home. If she could find a way to anticipate Sam's episodes, it would be a great help, reducing the potential for disaster next time when they might not be as lucky to have a doctor around. What if it happened while they were alone?

‘What if it happens while we have sex?’ Nina pondered, assessing the terrifying, yet hilarious, possibilities. ‘Just imagine what he could do if he channeled that energy through something other than his palm?' She started to giggle at the funny images in her mind. ‘It would justify screaming ‘Oh God!’ wouldn’t it?’ With all manner of awkward scenarios in her head, Nina could not contain her laughter. She knew it was anything but a laughing matter, but it simply evoked some unorthodox ideas in the historian, and she found some comic relief.

“What's so funny?” Sam smiled as he entered the kitchen for his cup of ambrosia.

Nina shook her head to dismiss it, but she was shaking with laughter, snorting between giggle fits.

“Nothing,” she chuckled. “Just some cartoon in my head about a lightning rod. Forget it.”

“Okay,” he grinned. He loved it when Nina laughed. Not only did she have a musical chortle that people found infectious, but she was usually a bit high strung and temperamental. It had sadly become rare to see her laugh this heartily.

Sam positioned his laptop so he could plug it into his landline router for faster broadband speed than through his wireless device.

“I should have let Purdue make me one of his wireless modems after all,” he muttered. “Those things are precognitive.”

“Do you have any more biscuits?” she called from his kitchen while he could hear her opening and closing cupboard doors all over the place in her search.

“No, but my neighbor made me some chocolate-chip and oatmeal cookies. Check them, but I'm sure they are still good. Look in the jar on the fridge,” he instructed.

“Got ‘em! Ta!”

Sam opened the search for Gabi Holtzer and immediately found something that made him very suspicious.

“Nina! You won't believe this,” he exclaimed as his eyes scanned the countless news reports and articles on the death of the German ministerial spokeswoman. “This woman was working for the German government, dealing with those killings a while back. Remember those assassinations in Berlin and Hamburg and a few other locations just before we went on holiday?”

“Aye, vaguely. So what about her?” Nina asked as she perched on the sofa arm rest with her cup and a cookie.

“She met Purdue at the British High Commission in Berlin, and get this: on the day she reportedly committed suicide,” he stressed the last two words in his bewilderment. “It was the same day Purdue met this Carrington bloke.”

“That was the last time somebody saw him,” Nina remarked. “So Purdue goes missing on the same day he meets a woman who kills herself shortly after. It reeks of conspiracy, doesn't it?”

“Apparently, the only participant of the meeting who is not dead or missing is Ben Carrington,” Sam added up. He looked at a picture of the Brit on the screen to memorize his face. “I would like a word with you, son.”

“I take it we are going south tomorrow,” Nina assumed.

“Aye, once we have paid Wrichtishousis a visit, that is,” Sam said. “It won’t hurt to make sure that he has not returned home yet.”

“I've called his cell over and over. It's turned off, no voice box, no nothing,” she reiterated.

“What was this deceased woman’s involvement with Purdue?” Sam asked.

“The pilot said that Purdue wanted to know why his flight to Copenhagen was denied entry. Since she was a German government rep, she was invited to the British Embassy to discuss why it happened,” Nina conveyed. “But that was all the captain knew. That was the last contact they had, so the flight crew is still in Berlin.”

“Jesus. I must admit that I am beginning to get a very bad feeling about this,” Sam conceded.

“Finally, you admit it,” she answered. “You mentioned something while you had that seizure, Sam. And that something spells definite shit storm material.”

“What?” he asked.

She took a bite of another cookie. “Black Sun.”

A dark scowl fell on Sam’s face as his eyes stared floorwards. “Fucking hell, I forgot that part,” he said softly. “I remember now.”

“Where did you see it?” she asked bluntly, aware of the horrible nature of the sigil and its power to turn conversations into ugly reminiscences.

“At the bottom of the well,” he revealed. “I was thinking. Maybe I should see Dr. Helberg about this vision. He will know how to interpret it.”

“While you are at it, ask him for his clinical opinion on the cataracts induced by the visions. I bet that is a new development he won't be able to explain,” she said firmly.

“You have no faith in psychology, do you?” Sam sighed.

“No, Sam, I don't. There is no way that a defined set of behavioral patterns can suffice to uniformly diagnose different people,” she argued. “He knows less about psychology than you do. His knowledge comes from studies and some other old farts' theories, and you keep trusting in his not-so-successful attempts at formulating his own theories.”

“How could I possibly know more than he does?” he snapped back at her.

“Because you are living it, you idiot! You are experiencing these phenomena while he can only speculate. Until he has felt and heard and seen it the way you do, there is no fucking way that he could even begin to comprehend what we are dealing with!” Nina barked. She was so frustrated with him and his naive trust in Dr. Helberg.

“And what is it, in your qualified opinion, that we are dealing with, sweetheart?” he asked sarcastically. “Is it something from one of your ancient history books? Oh yes, a god. Now I remember! That, you could believe.”

“Helberg is a shrink! All he knows is what a bunch of psychotic fuckwits exhibited in some study based on circumstances nowhere near the level of bizarre that you have experienced, my darling! Wake the hell up! Whatever is wrong with you is not just psychosomatic. There is something external controlling your visions. Something intelligent is manipulating your cerebral cortex,” she presented her point.

“Because it talks through me?” he smiled sardonically. “Note that everything it says represents things I already know, things that are already in my subconscious.”

“Then explain the thermal anomaly,” she retorted rapidly, leaving Sam momentarily stumped.

“My brain apparently controls my body temperature too. Same thing,” he countered without showing his uncertainty.

Nina laughed mockingly. “Your body temperature — I don't care how hot you might think you are, Playboy — cannot reach the thermal properties of a lightning bolt. And that is precisely what the doctor in Bali picked up, remember? Your eyes conducted so much concentrated electricity that ‘your head should have exploded', remember?”

Sam had no comeback.

“And another thing,” she continued her verbal victory, “Hypnosis is said to induce increased levels of fluctuating electrical activity within certain neurons of the brain, genius! Whatever is hypnotizing you is pushing an impossible amount of electrical power through you, Sam. Do you not see that what is happening to you is categorically outside the boundaries of mere psychology?”

“What do you suggest, then?” he shouted. “A shaman? Electroshock therapy? Paintball? A colonoscopy?”

“Oh Jesus!” she rolled her eyes. “There is no talking to you. You know what? Deal with this shit yourself. Go and see that quack and let him probe your brain a little more until you are as clueless as he is. It shouldn’t be a long trip for you!”

With that, she stormed out of the room and slammed the door. Had she had her car there she would have driven straight home to Oban, but she was stranded for the night. Sam knew better than to mess with Nina when she was pissed off, so he spent the night on the couch.

The annoying ringtone of her phone woke Nina the next morning. She was coming out of a deep, dreamless sleep that had been way too short and sat up in bed. Somewhere in her purse, her phone was ringing, but she could not find it on time to answer.

“Alright, alright, dammit,” she mumbled through the cotton wool of her waking mind. Fumbling madly through make-up and keys and deodorant she finally got a grip on her cellphone, but the call had already ended.

Nina frowned when she checked the clock. It was already 11.30 a.m., and Sam had let her sleep in.

“Great. Vexing me already today,” she cussed Sam out in his absence. “You better overslept yourself.” When she exited the room, she realized that Sam was gone. Heading for the kettle, she checked the screen of her phone. Her eyes could barely focus yet, but still, she was sure she did not know the number. She hit redial.

“Dr. Helberg’s office,” the receptionist answered.

‘Oh my God,’ Nina thought. ‘He went there.’ But she kept her cool just in case she was mistaken. “Hello, this is Dr. Gould. I just received a call from this number?”

“Dr. Gould?” the lady repeated excitedly. “Yes! Yes, we were trying to contact you. It's about Mr. Cleave. Is it possible…?”

“Is he alright?” Nina exclaimed.

“Could you come into our offices…?”

“I asked you a question!” Nina snapped. “Please just tell me if he is alright first!”

“We…we d-don't know, Dr. Gould,” the lady replied hesitantly.

“What the bloody hell does that mean?” Nina fumed, her rage fueled by worry for Sam’s condition. She heard a commotion in the background.

“Well, ma'am, he appears to be… um… levitating.”