The Relic Hunters

CHAPTER THIRTY TWO

Back inside the room and Jeff went immediately to one of the side walls. There, amid a cluster of six-by-fours hung a golden-framed depiction of Adam Weishaupt standing, poker-faced, outside the very building they now occupied.

Cassidy stared at it. “Crap, Jeffro. It’s shit. Just this guy stood outside this building. Spartacus in 1776, right?”

“But it isn’t just that,” Jeff said, squinting. “Look closer. There’s an anomaly.”

Bodie crowded in too, leaving Jemma to watch the room. A closer look revealed a small amount of writing — the name of the university across the top of the building.

“Except it’s the wrong name,” Jeff said happily. “Whatever this building is and was called, whatever it has been through the centuries I can categorically assure you it was never called The Grand Lodge of All England.”

“And this was donated by our friendly archaeologist?” Cassidy asked.

“I can’t confirm that for a certainty. The records, if they exist, will be obscured. He didn’t want anyone tracking him down. But yes, it was ‘something new’ around the time he visited. And the only new item to be donated specifically to this room since 1887.”

Bodie read the line without emotion. “The Grand Lodge of All England. So we’re to believe that’s the next waypoint?”

“I think so,” Jeff exhaled. “And a rather unique way of hiding it, I think.”

“Still,” Jemma said. “Not easy to take at face value considering all that’s at risk.”

“There’s nothing else,” Jeff said with a touch of exasperation. “How long have we been here? Hours. Nothing else in this room is out of place, nor is it wrong or donated at the right time. The odds are good.”

“Kid’s right.” Bodie decided. “And we can’t hang around here forever. If we scarper now the Hoods will never know we were here.”

The team started to move. Jeff hung back a little and Jemma tried to tug him along.

“You’re thieves,” Jeff said. “Are you really gonna leave this here for the Illuminati to find?”

Bodie opened the door. “They might not figure it out,” he said. “And I’d take a special kind of pleasure in seeing it hang there for the next hundred years. Also, it hardly matters to them. They know where the Statue is. Thievery, my friend, is sometimes only the art of deception. They may think we’ve done something to that room and miss the vital clue in all their frustration.” He grinned. “Perfect.”

Outside the room, they traversed the narrow corridor and made their way around to the front of the museum. Heidi and Cross were nowhere in sight, but the path outside was clear and the parking area was only two minutes away. Armed with their new knowledge, the team made their way outside.

Heidi broke cover first, waving her arms urgently and running straight for them.

Bodie stopped, staring.

Cross came next, ducking out from behind a low hedge and crab-walking his way over.

“Hoods,” Heidi breathed. “All over the cars. Looking for us, I guess.”

“How do you know they’re Hoods?” Cassidy asked, trying to see over the hedges and to the car park.

“I’m guessing,” Heidi admitted. “But they’re armed. They number over a dozen and they’re checking plates and vehicles. It’s just a matter of time before they come inside.”

“Shit,” Bodie said looking around. “Just Hoods?” he asked suddenly. “Or do we have any hierarchy out there?”

The CIA agent bobbed her head. “I see what you’re thinking, but I can’t say. Didn’t see anyone apart from young, confident, capable men with weapons exposed.”

Cassidy stared then blinked. “And you want to run away? ’Kinell, girl. Sounds like Hollywood all over again.”

“Guns, girl. Their guns.”

“Ah.”

“We need another way out,” Bodie said. “The Hoods clearly don’t know we’re in here. All we need is…”

He spun, heading back toward the door.

The team stared after him. “What?”

He beckoned for them to follow him, not raising his voice. If the Hoods were checking the parking area they would be turning their attention toward the museum next. He estimated they had a minute, no more.

“Where are we going?” Heidi demanded, running at his shoulder.

Bodie entered the museum once more, slowed and walked briskly to the right. The door to the interior stood open, tourists milling about.

“Guy?” Cassidy asked.

He didn’t stop, just walked straight through, not wanting to take the time to explain. Every second was precious. Without turning around he said, “Cross. Check our rear.”

“Already on it, boss. No sign of ’em yet.”

Good; that gives us…

“Shit, here they come.”

Bollocks.

Bodie sped up to a fast walk, turned a corner and spied the museum guide. “Hey,” he said. “Hey, there must be another way out of here, right?”

The guide stared through his thick lenses, eyes blinking and magnified. “Than the exit? Umm, no.”

Heidi had already caught on. “Don’t give us that. There must be another way.”

“Well, yes, we have fire exits,” the guide said. “Alarmed, of course. And leading back to the front which,” he made a point of staring over their shoulders, “I assume you wish to avoid?”

The man didn’t look scared, just bored. Bodie felt the seconds counting down. The Hoods would be approaching the entrance.

“CIA it,” he said to Heidi.

The agent knew what he meant, took out her badge and shoved it into the guide’s face. “We need your help.”

An expression of interest crossed the man’s face. “This day gets better and better,” he said. “But the information is accurate. You can’t get away from the museum without circling around to the front. Unless you can climb an eight-foot-high chain link fence with ease.”

Bodie refrained from revealing that was exactly what his team were trained to do. Jeff would struggle, and perhaps Heidi.

“This is a museum, once an old university,” he said. “Don’t tell me you don’t have a basement. And to be fair, we know who Adam Weishaupt was, the secrets he kept. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a private way out of here.”

The guide looked from Heidi’s badge to Bodie and then down the corridor toward the front entrance. He would surely know a CIA identification meant nothing here, but he was also blessed with a good quantity of common sense, which helped him gauge the situation with an open honesty.

“We’re in trouble, yes?”

Bodie nodded. “Everyone. If they find us.”

The guide made a swift decision and led them away, toward the rear of the building. They passed Weishaupt’s room and entered the one next door. The guide closed the door behind them and turned.

“It was found over a hundred years ago, but it has no value. Just a dusty old tunnel so the museum forgot about it. Guides and guards need to know for obvious reasons but—” he shrugged “—no one else.”

Cassidy stared at the oak paneling. “Where?”

“Here.”

The guide motioned at a heavy bookcase. Cassidy was the first to it, getting a good grip and shuffling the bottom edges away from the wall. Bodie squeezed into the back and helped push it clear.

“Gonna be a bit obvious when they check the room,” Cross said critically, eyeing the angled bookcase.

“Well, sorry,” Cassidy said. “I left my secret-passage-bookcase-tugging-hook at home.”

Gunn shook his head. “Bit daft of you.”

“Move,” Bodie said. “Priority is to get out of the museum. We’ll worry about pursuit later.”

“I can cover the passage,” the guide said. “It is my job, after all.”

Heidi looked worried. “I don’t want to leave you with them. Believe me when I say: they’re evil little bastards.”

“They wouldn’t kill everyone in the museum,” the guide said with huge naivety.

Heidi clammed up. Bodie shoved Cross, Jemma and Gunn into the passage. “Your biggest asset here is your inexperience,” he said. “Use it. You never saw us.”

They filed into the narrow passage, leaving the guide to ease the bookcase back into place. Bodie closed the door behind them by the light of Heidi’s small flashlight. Cross was already leading the way.

“No talking,” Bodie said. “In case it travels or the walls are thin.”

They moved steadily, carefully, not unused to creeping around in the dark through secret byways. There were times in the past when Bodie had done more tunnel-creeping than your average rat. Cross took it steady, either by design or necessity, but it didn’t matter. There was only one way. And that way led down.

Handholds helped steady them. Cross soon held up a hand which Bodie saw in the shifting beam of the flashlight. A sense of constricted space came over them as they paused, the walls a snug fit to their shoulders and the ceiling inches above their heads. The passage was rough-hewn, merely a fast means of moving about unseen.

For Bodie and his team it felt like home.

Cross found the handle and twisted, opening the door. They filed out to find themselves inside a dark and dusty basement, three meters high and approximately ten wide. Cobwebs covered every corner and hung from the ceiling. On the floor lay half a dozen chests and cases, all closed, all untouched for many years.

Heidi paused as Cross started to cross the floor. “You think these chests may be connected to Weishaupt? The Illuminati? If they are—”

“No time for that.” Bodie hurried her along. “We don’t know where we’ll come out yet.”

“Just wait a moment,” Heidi said a bit indignantly. “I’m in charge—”

“Not the point,” Cassidy said. “Different mission. Send someone else.”

Bodie had been taught time and time again to stick exclusively with the operation you had planned. Diversions led to mistakes and capture.

“And to be fair,” Cross said, his voice echoing a little in the space. “You induced us into this op for a reason. For our expertise.”

“Induced?” Cassidy repeated. “Are we pregnant?”

“Goaded. Exhorted. Forced.”

Heidi let it go. “C’mon, forced? Really?”

Cross reached the other side and another door. This one creaked open, years-old dust and debris falling from the hinges and the edges. Cross stepped back, coughing. Cassidy patted his back.

“Want me to go in front, Granddad?”

“I’m… good,” Cross hacked.

Another passage, this one leading up at an angle that strained their calf muscles. Jemma made a comment about the Illuminati being fit and lean, and Cross seconded it. Soon though they reached another door and everyone smelled the change in the air.

Fresh on the other side.

Cross cracked it open, held it steady. The team crowded at his back, drawing weapons and taking a moment to allow their eyes to adjust to the glimmer of daylight that shone through. Cross then allowed the door to open further and they saw they were inside a mound of earth, a mossy overhang hiding the entrance.

“Still inside the museum grounds?” Jemma asked.

“Just outside,” Cross said. “I see no fence through the overhang.”

“No Hoods?”

“We’ll see, go slow,” Bodie said.

“There were an awful lot back there,” Gunn said. “And since the original Hood came here, it must be an important place.”

Heidi nodded, crouching down beside Bodie. “Yeah, probably a second or third in the ranking. We want the big HQ, otherwise it’s all for nothing.”

“Snake. Head. Chop.” Cassidy mimed the action.

“Shush now,” Cross whispered moving ahead.

Cassidy sent him a glare, not liking the order, but said nothing, clearly seeing his point. Bodie watched as Cross surveyed the terrain and then turned back.

“All good,” he said. “The museum’s behind this big mound. We appear to be in some kind of wasteland. Any thoughts on transport?”

“If we get away without being seen at all,” Heidi said. “That puts us a step ahead. Do that first, and then we’ll see about getting across to England.”

Bodie took the news without much pleasure. It had been a long time since he’d visited the home country. The last he heard, there was a warrant out for his arrest. For all their arrests. “Any idea where we’re going?” he asked.