The Lost Labyrinth

II

'The golden fleece?' asked Nadya. 'Are you crazy?'

'I wish,' said Knox. He filled her in on Petitier and the seal-stones he'd found, then gave her a precis of the fleece's history, its connections to Eleusis and Crete.

When he was done, Nadya looked stunned. 'You think it really exists?'

'It's possible. Would it have an impact on the election?'

She gave a dry laugh. 'Are you kidding? We Georgians are incredibly proud of our heritage; and we're superstitious too, especially in times of uncertainty. If Nergadze brings the fleece back to Georgia, and it's the real thing, he'll be a national hero, he'll walk the election.' She shook her head, as though the prospect was too dreadful to bear.

'That bad, huh?'

'He's a drug-smuggler. He's an arms dealer.'

'So why's that your problem?'

'It's my job,' she sighed. 'I'm a journalist, a political journalist. Or a blogger, I'd guess you'd call me.'

'There's money in that?' asked Knox, surprised.

'Not exactly. But it's a good way to build your profile; and there's certainly money in having a profile. Besides, it's not like I live on caviar and champagne.'

'And you're here doing a piece on the Nergadzes?'

'Sort of.' She stared out the window for a few moments, considering what to tell him. A butcher was trimming fat from the carcass of a slaughtered lamb with practised strokes of a knife so long it looked more like a sword. 'I was at a Nergadze press conference a week or so ago,' she said finally. 'Ilya was announcing some new policy for the fiftieth time. Go to a few of these things, you soon realise all the interesting stuff happens off stage. There was a man leaning against the back wall. He was obviously a Nergadze. You recognise the look after a while. But I hadn't seen him before, which was odd, because the whole family have been out campaigning relentlessly.'

'Maybe he was a cousin,' suggested Knox.

'Not from the deference with which people treated him. But, anyway, I was curious enough to follow when he left. He was driven to the private jet terminal at Tbilisi International Airport, then got on Nergadze's plane. I called a contact in airport operations. The manifest showed only one passenger: Mikhail Nergadze. I'd never even heard of him. I tracked down his birth certificate: he's Sandro Nergadze's son, which makes him Ilya's grandson. All Sandro's boys went to the same school outside Gori. I had a friend check their records. Mikhail was there until he was fourteen, then he was suddenly sent away to an English public school.'

'So?'

'It just seemed strange, that's all. I checked the local newspapers on a hunch. Two days before Mikhail was sent abroad, a twelve-year-old girl was abducted from a nearby orphanage.'

'That's pretty thin,' said Knox.

'I contacted his English school, claiming Mikhail had applied for a job with me, and I was checking his references. He stayed there less than a year, and only two terms at his next school. I joined one of those school networking sites, asked if anyone remembered him. No one would tell me much. They sounded scared of him, even after all these years.'

Sokratis pulled in sharply at that moment, tyres screeching against the kerb. 'Your Metro station,' said Sokratis, reaching back to open Knox's door. 'Now get out.'

'One more minute.'

'No. Out. Now.'

'Be quiet,' Nadya told him, running short of patience. She turned back to Knox. 'No one was sure why Mikhail had left either of his English schools, though there were all kinds of ugly rumours. He pretty much vanished after that, except for a couple of Internet hits of him doing rich kid stuff in Cyprus, jet-set parties and nightclub openings, that kind of thing. I asked my guy in airport operations to let me know if and when Mikhail came back, but the next time he called it was to let me know that the Nergadze plane was about to set off for Athens again, carrying four Nergadze staff. I figured something big had to be going down. I couldn't get here before them, so I contacted our brave Greek friend here through his website, and asked him to pick up their trail.'

'That's it!' scowled Sokratis, as though aware he was being insulted. 'Get out.'

Knox stepped out onto the pavement, but held the door open. 'You want to meet up again later?' he asked. 'I reckon we could help each other.'

'Not tonight,' said Nadya. 'Too much to do.'

'How about breakfast, then?'

'Sure.' She pulled out her diary. 'Where?'

Knox didn't trust Sokratis an inch. He took Nadya's diary and wrote down the name of a Plaka cafe, scribbled directions to it. 'Eight thirty?' he suggested.

'See you then,' she agreed.

'One last thing,' he said. 'Why are you really so interested in this guy?'

'I just told you. I'm a journalist.'

'Balls. No one does what you've been doing just because a man was leaning against a wall.'

She gave a little snort; her gaze drifted past his shoulder, fixing on memories. 'I recognised him,' she admitted. 'The moment I saw him, I knew I'd seen him before.'

'When?' asked Knox.

Her gaze returned from the far distance; somehow she found a smile. 'On the night my husband was murdered,' she said.