The Templar Legion

20

The Krone restaurant and bar was exactly as Euhler had described it, lots of glass and gleaming marble behind a classic facade of white half-timbered buildings on a white half-timbered street where even the cobblestone appeared to have been polished recently.

Lenny Euhler had changed out of his suit and was now wearing a pair of tight blue jeans, penny loafers and a pale blue roll-neck sweater. The eyeglasses had gone from black to bright red. He was sitting at the bar drinking a mojito and trying to look bored. There was already an empty glass beside him and a chewed lime wedge.

Saint-Sylvestre sat down beside the banker and gave the man his best smile. Euhler seemed relieved, as though he’d been thinking that he’d allowed his supposedly secret sexuality to interfere with business and consequently had lost a half-billion-dollar deal for having offended Saint-Sylvestre by showing his true colors. Saint-Sylvestre added to poor Euhler’s relief by putting a hand on his shoulder and squeezing lightly. Fat and bone. No muscle. The banker’s eyes filled with tears of reassurance.

“Lenny! Been waiting long?”

“Just a few minutes, my dear Tarik,” he said, gesturing toward the empty glass. “I’ve gotten a little ahead of you, I’m afraid, but good tables are frightfully hard to get here at this hour, so I thought I’d get here early and cross the maitre d’s palm.”

“Don’t worry, Lenny; I can assure you that I’ll catch up.”

A bartender stopped and asked him what he wanted and Saint-Sylvestre ordered a margarita. “To keep in the festive mood.” He smiled.

“Excellent.” Lenny beamed.

After ten minutes of banker’s talk of interest rates and the global performance of one stock or another, their table was announced and they went into the restaurant, all crisp white linen and gleaming silver. Euhler had sauteed scallops on a mesclun salad to start and Saint-Sylvestre had the requisite steak tartare with a bright yellow egg yolk perched on the top. This was followed by tandoori chicken breast with wasabi for Euhler and a simple whitefish with almond butter for Saint-Sylvestre, trying to recover from the scoop of bloody ground sirloin with its single yellow egg-yolk eye. All of this was washed down with several bottles of Castanar Riserva Barrique 2005, a Swiss red that was surprisingly drinkable.

As the meal progressed, Saint-Sylvestre sipping his wine while Euhler gulped his, the conversation went from the general to the specific, slowly but surely honing in on the potential for mineral investment in Africa, led in that direction by Saint-Sylvestre’s gentle prodding. Given that he’d found Euhler’s business card in the same anonymously owned flat as Sir James Matheson and Francois Nagoupande, it seemed likely that Matheson was arranging some mineral licensing agreement with Nagoupande in return for giving the newly created brigadier general Kukuanaland’s and Kolingba’s heads on the same platter.

The coincidence of Kukuanaland’s coup and a sudden mineral find by Matheson would be a little hard for the world press to swallow, not to mention a crown investigating committee into Matheson’s business practices being established just down the street at Westminster, so the mining magnate had to be using Euhler’s services to distance himself from both the coup and the mineral find. The question was, How?

After a third bottle of wine and a two-octave rise in Euhler’s voice, Saint-Sylvestre suggested that they return to the banker’s apartment for the promised nightcap. Euhler was pleased as punch and insisted on walking through the cobblestone streets down toward the Aar River, for which the town was named.

According to Lenny, Aarau was located in something called the “golden triangle” of Zurich, Bern and Basel, making it one of the fastest-growing municipalities in the country. It also offered great prospects for people wishing to invest their money. Saint-Sylvestre made it quite clear that the investors he represented were interested in natural resources generally and gold, silver and platinum specifically. They were, according to Saint-Sylvestre, extremely practical people. Lenny gave him a melodramatic wink and squeezed his arm tighter. “I may have just the thing for you, Tarik, my dear.”

Euhler’s apartment turned out to be an ultramodern white concrete ziggurat overlooking the river and the foothills of the Jura Mountains. It was quite lavish for a pied-a-terre, with two bedrooms, two full bathrooms, one en suite, a living room, a dining room and a home office. Saint-Sylvestre was pleased to notice that there were no obvious security cameras, which was a bonus; he’d definitely been recorded at the bank, but only as one of a number of calls.

“Do much work at home?” Saint-Sylvestre asked mildly, peeking into the room. The computer was a top-end Acer Veriton with a landing pad for a number of specialty bank peripherals, including a real-time stock exchange ticker. The furniture was all steel and black and leather and the only decoration on the wall was a seventy-inch TV tuned to some digitized program that showed a waterfall in a forest somewhere. The same thing appeared as a screen shot on the computer. Saint-Sylvestre noted that one drawer of the desk was actually a small safe, complete with a digital combination lock.

“Sometimes.” Lenny nodded, leaning into the room behind Saint-Sylvestre, making sure their hips touched agreeably. “I have a direct link with the computer at the bank, so I can sometimes get a jump on my colleagues, especially as far as currency trading and precious metals are concerned.” It was interesting that the alcoholic slur seemed to leave the man’s voice when he talked about money.

“Presumably your password isn’t something as easy as your date of birth.” Saint-Sylvestre smiled. “I’d hate to think my clients’ funds were so insecure.”

“No cause to worry.” Lenny smiled, leading him away from the home office to the living room. “As big as the Jura Mountains,” he said, waving dramatically toward the view out his living room window.

Saint-Sylvestre let the obscure comment pass and followed Lenny into the living room. Lenny was clearly not a complex man when it came to decor. The living room was as white and leather and steel as the home office was black. On the wall above the gas fireplace was a large framed panoramic photograph of a series of mountain peaks.

“You are a climber?” Saint-Sylvestre asked.

“I was as a boy. I was president of the climbers’ club and the photographers’ club at my boarding school for three years running.” He pointed to the panoramic photograph. “That is called the Jura Ridgeway; you hike all the mountains of the Jura. It takes about two and a half weeks. I have some very fond memories of that time.” Saint-Sylvestre could see tears well up in the drunken man’s eyes and wondered if the banker hadn’t lost his virginity to some strapping schoolmate in hiking boots and leather shorts. He stood up and went to examine the panorama. All the heights and longitudes and latitudes of each mountain were neatly inked in. Mont Tendre appeared to be the tallest. He went back to his seat on the couch.

“Which school was that?” Saint-Sylvestre asked.

“St. Georges in Montreux,” said the banker. “I was sent there by my father for the English. A great number of the bank’s clients are from England.”

“That must explain it, then.” Saint-Sylvestre nodded. “It was an English friend of mine who suggested Gesler Bank.”

“Might I ask who?”

“I’d rather not betray any confidences.” Saint-Sylvestre shrugged, sitting on the big white couch, playing coy. “Let me just say that he is presently in negotiation with another African client of mine.”

“Isn’t that interesting,” said Euhler, getting up and going to a wet bar to the left of the gas fireplace. “I’ve just opened an account for such a man.” Euhler brought Saint-Sylvestre back a mojito. Saint-Sylvestre took a sip. Very heavy on the rum.

“Perhaps he knows more than you think,” said Saint-Sylvestre, slurring his speech a little.

“Oh, and just what do you mean by that, my dear Tarik?” Euhler’s eyes had darkened and he was definitely on alert, which was exactly what Saint-Sylvestre wanted. He learned many years ago that the art of interrogation relied on two things: not letting the subject know he or she was being interrogated and letting the subject ask the right questions, not the interrogator. A subject thinking he was in a position of power was a subject who would often pour his heart out to you without knowing he was doing so.

“Nothing, nothing,” mumbled Saint-Sylvestre, trying to act embarrassed and sleepy. He slid across the couch until their thighs touched. Euhler ran a knuckle down Saint-Sylvestre’s clean-shaven cheek. Saint-Silvestre resisted a shudder and closed his eyes.

“Oh, come now, we’re friends,” cooed Euhler. “If I am correct we may even have the same client’s interests in mind.”

“Francois Nagoupande,” said Saint-Sylvestre, jigging the bait on the end of the line. “His name is Francois Nagoupande.”

“And what does he think he knows?”

“He thinks he knows that Matheson Resource Industries is trying to cheat him out of his fair share of. .”

“Of what, Tarik?” Euhler said, his voice urgent. And it wasn’t the urgency that came from hoping that a secret hadn’t been spilled. It was the urgency of greed. Euhler smelled something going on and he wanted a nibble at the cheese. The first thing that came to Saint-Sylvestre’s mind was gold or silver, or perhaps even platinum or even diamonds-all four had been found in the Central African Republic over the years but never in any real quantity or quality.

The diamonds had been small and alluvial, washed down from the great basins of the Nile sources, and none of the precious metals had ever been found in amounts large enough to justify the cost of development or extraction. Certainly not enough to justify a military coup and putting a buffoon and puppet like Nagoupande on Kolingba’s throne. So what was going on?

“Of what?” Euhler repeated, a harsh edge in his voice now.

“Je ne sais pas,” mumbled Saint-Sylvestre sleepily, reverting to sloppy French. “Too tired to think. Maybe un petit somme, a little nap; then I’ll tell you what Nagoupande said. Just a little nap first, Lenny, please.”

Euhler was looking frantic. “This is important, Tarik, my dear friend. There are millions to be made here. For us over and above what we make for our clients. You must wake up.”

“Give me a reason, my little Swiss friend.”

“I’ll show you,” said Euhler. He left the room and came back a few moments later carrying something that looked like a stock certificate. He put it down on the glass-and-steel surface of the coffee table in front of the big white couch.

It was a stock certificate, bright orange and ornately engraved with an angelic figure with sweeping drapery seated on a rough slab of granite, looking back over her shoulder at a raised escutcheon that said, “Silver Brand Mining Company Limited.” According to the information under the escutcheon there was ten million dollars’ capitalization from ten million shares at a dollar each. The certificate had been sold to its owner on December 6, 1919. The registry was from British Columbia, Canada, and the place of registration had been Vancouver, British Columbia.

“Je ne comprends. .” said Saint-Sylvestre, keeping up the sleepy mumbling ruse. “I don’t understand.”

“This company exists,” said Euhler. “My client wishes me to see its majority owners and purchase their extant shares. They own seven of the ten million shares, while my client now owns virtually all of the rest. The company shares are worth nothing now. Only ten to twelve cents per share on the Vancouver Stock Exchange. My client will pay the owners fifty cents per share, half of the face value. He’s not doing it himself, of course; he’s using a proxy-me. The owners are two elderly sisters. They will receive two-point-five million dollars each for their shares. They think they have won the lottery, yes? Betty and Margaret Brocklebank. They already have the check; it only needs my signature and endorsement. They are twins, retired and living alone in Vancouver. I have only to have them sign the proxies over to me. They have already agreed.”

“I still don’t understand,” said Saint-Sylvestre. “What does this have to do with Nagoupande?”

“The shares must go onto the open market all over the world. We will announce a gold strike somewhere in British Columbia. The shares will rise and they will be purchased quickly as the price goes up. The gold find will turn out to be false and the stocks will fall, at which point my client will buy them for lower than the price they were when they went on the market. Nagoupande will by then have been installed as head of state of Kukuanaland and whatever mineral is located there will be announced as being owned by Silver Brand Mining, a Canadian corporation. Any questions will take them to the directors of Silver Brand, who are all employees of Gesler Bank, but not actual shareholders in Silver Brand Mining. My client is safely hidden, yes? All we have to do is purchase enough shares at the fifty-cent margin to go along for the ride, as the Americans say.”

“I would need some time to consult with my Cuban friends,” said Saint-Sylvestre. “When do you sign over the proxy?”

“Nagoupande is to be installed as head of state on the thirty-first of this month. My client wishes to have the proxy in hand a week before that. I leave the day after tomorrow.”

Saint-Sylvestre checked his watch. “A week from tomorrow, then.”

“I suppose.” Euhler reached out and stroked Saint-Sylvestre’s cheek again. “Like another drink, Tarik? To celebrate our auspicious meeting?”

“The bathroom first, I’m afraid.” Saint-Sylvestre smiled.

“There are two; you’re welcome to use the en suite in my bedroom if you like.”

“That might be fun,” said Saint-Sylvestre. “Perhaps we could have our drinks in there.”

“Wonderful.” Euhler beamed. “It’s just to the left. I’ll mix.”

“And I’ll pee,” said Saint-Sylvestre.

Euhler giggled brightly and headed for the bar. Saint-Sylvestre went through Euhler’s bedroom-black satin sheets, a pedestal BeoSound 9000 audio center and a long, low chest of drawers. There was a modern headboard that also served as a bookcase. Saint-Sylvestre looked-mostly poetry and literary criticism. A lot of Garcia Lorca, which stood to reason. He went into the adjoining bathroom.

The bathroom had a tub, a walk-in shower enclosure and a single, hand-painted porcelain sink. A flat-screen TV was mounted above the sink so you could watch the morning news or the stock ticker while you brushed your teeth. In the medicine cabinet he found hair darkener, an electric razor-Braun, of course-and a selection of pills, mostly for pain, allergies and sleep. There was also a box of a dozen Viagra. Saint-Sylvestre quickly checked through the painkillers and the sleeping pills: ten-milligram Percocet, Opana, the trade name for oxymorphone, which was even stronger than the Percocet; Seconal and phenobarbital for sleep; and even a selection of anxiety depressants, like Ativan, diazepam and even Zanaflex.

Euhler seemed to use the Ativan most of all and the prescription was almost out, so Saint-Sylvestre used the three-quarters-empty plastic bottle to load up with a random selection of all the other drugs, making sure he had big doses of the Opana and the phenobarbital. He snapped the lid on and then flushed the toilet.

Closing his eyes for a moment, he thought things through, then undid the top three buttons of his shirt and stepped back into the bedroom. Euhler was seated on the bed in light blue boxer shorts and knee-length black socks. He had a drink in each hand and also an erection. There was some bland music like Vangelis filling the room through the multiple B amp;O speakers.

“There you are,” tootled the banker.

“Here I am,” replied Saint-Sylvestre. He sat down beside the banker on the bed and Euhler handed him a drink. Saint-Sylvestre put his own drink on the bedside table. “Put your drink down and I’ll give you one of my patented shoulder rubs,” said Saint-Sylvestre. “You look just a little tense. Nervous.”

Euhler laughed weakly. “I usually am in these sorts of. . situations. A massage right now would be lovely.” He handed his drink to Saint-Sylvestre, who put it down beside his own.

Saint-Sylvestre shuffled around on the bed so he was directly behind the banker, his strong black legs hanging over the bed, bracketing Euhler’s. “No need to be nervous, Lenny.”

The man still smelled of too much aftershave. Saint-Sylvestre leaned forward, pressing his back against Euhler’s, gripping the shoulders skillfully and kneading them as Euhler groaned out his pleasure. Saint-Sylvestre tightened his thighs, pushing forward a little more, and the banker moaned. Finally the secret policeman wrapped one arm around the banker’s neck, gripping his wrist with his free hand, and as he squeezed his own thighs between Euhler’s he pushed forward even more.

“This feels like something an osteopath or a chiropractor might do.” Euhler grunted. He didn’t sound terribly pleased.

“Something like,” agreed Saint-Sylvestre, expanding his lungs and chest.

“Not very romantic, really,” said Euhler, a small note of complaint in his voice.

“No, I suppose not,” said Saint-Sylvestre. He was glad Euhler had the drugs. He could have done it with his bare hands but this was so much cleaner, and if any suspicions were eventually raised they would all lead to dead ends. The policeman steadily increased the pressure of his biceps below Euhler’s left ear and the pressure of his forearm under the right ear. He then pushed his forehead into the back of Euhler’s skull, the conflicting and tightening pressures cutting off all blood to the brain through the carotid arteries and the jugular veins. It took about three seconds in the full sleeper hold to put Euhler into unconsciousness and another twenty-second count to make sure he’d stay out for a minute or two. Five minutes in the hold could turn him into a vegetable, or worse, kill him.

Saint-Sylvestre leaned back then, bringing Euhler’s body upright. With his right hand still wrapped around the man’s neck he reached into the back pocket of his trousers and took out a pair of latex surgical gloves. It took a few seconds to get the gloves on and then he got down to work. He reached into the front pocket of his trousers and took out the pill bottle, snapping off the lid and letting it fall onto the floor.

With Euhler still held upright Saint-Sylvestre began feeding the pills from the bottle into his mouth and washing them down with the fresh mojito on the bedside table, lightly stroking the banker’s neck to make sure the pills and the liquor stayed down. When he’d emptied the bottle of pills he wiped the bottle on his shirt, then let it drop to the floor beside the bed. He shifted out from behind the banker’s half-dressed body and stood up, stretching. Euhler was snoring heavily. Saint-Sylvestre surveyed the room, then went through the routine he’d previously assembled in his mind.

First he did up his own shirt, then stripped off the rest of Euhler’s clothes, leaving him naked, sprawled across the black satin bedspread. Saint-Sylvestre then pulled the coverlet down, tugging it under Euhler’s body and leaving it in a black puddle on the floor at the end of the bed. The policeman then arranged a pile of satin-covered pillows against the headboard and dragged Euhler’s flaccid body up the bed until it lay propped half-upright against the pile. Euhler’s snoring now had a choking, dangerous edge and there were pauses in his breathing followed by deep gasping sounds. The drugs were taking him further into unconsciousness. Saint-Sylvestre glanced at the books on the shelf above Euhler’s head and opened one at random. It was called Spokesmen by somebody named Thomas Whipple. He saw what he needed, smiled and tore out the last stanza at the bottom of the page. It was a poem by the American Carl Sandburg-“Death Snips Proud Men”-and seemed fitting enough.

The policeman stuffed the ragged bit of paper into Euhler’s palm and closed his fist over it. He left the book on the bed, then left Euhler and the bedroom, returning to the living room and then the home office. He sat down at the computer keyboard and pressed a random key. The waterfall animation disappeared and there was a dark blue screen and a line of text that said, Password, please, with a flashing cursor below it.

He found a pencil and a little pad of paper in the desk drawer and went into the living room. He stood in front of Euhler’s prize photograph and jotted down both Mont Tendre’s height-1,679 meters-and the coordinates below it-46°35’41”N 6°18’36”E.

He removed the extraneous material and came up with a string of numbers-167946354161836-which he then entered on the keyboard. The screen cleared again and took him to a directory, which he proceeded to copy onto a dozen CD-ROMs he found in a box in the desk.

He switched off the computer, then stared down at the digital combination lock on the desk safe. On the off chance it would work he entered 1679-the height of Mont Tendre. Nothing happened. He tried the reverse, 9761, and the door clicked open. There was a passport, several dozen Krugerrands, and a respectable stack of high-denomination euros.

The only other thing in the safe was a bundle of letters and photographs, tied up in a predictable red ribbon. The pictures were pornographic and the letters were as well; even though Saint-Sylvestre’s German was mediocre he could figure out what Ich mochte Sie saugen and lassen Sie uns wie Tiere bumsen meant.

In the pictures Lenny appeared to be the submissive while his young, blond and very muscular friend was the dominant. The letters were all headed, mein su?er liebster Liebling Lenny, and signed, Ihr liebevolles baby, Lutzie. Love letters from one man to another. He went back into the living room and did some housekeeping, emptying glasses and putting them in the dishwasher as well as removing any other signs that Euhler had entertained a guest that night.

He returned to the bedroom and saw that Euhler had both vomited and lost control of his bowels. Either his heart had slowed to a stop under the effects of the multiple drugs or he had suffocated on his own vomit. One way or another, the banker was dead. Saint-Sylvestre dropped the letters and the ribbon on the floor beside the bed, leaving the impression that reading them had been Euhler’s last act before ripping his maudlin little epigraph from the book collection, then downing the pills with his mojito-party boy to the end.

It all looked authentic enough and there was no reason to suspect foul play. An aging homosexual took his own life knowing that things were never going to get any better than they’d been with Ihr liebevolles baby, Lutzie. If Lutzie was very unlucky the police would track him down and ask a few questions, but that would almost certainly be the end of it.

Satisfied, Saint-Sylvestre used his cell phone to look up flights from Zurich to Vancouver. He found a Swissair flight out of Zurich to Paris in an hour and a half, and a red-eye Air Canada flight that would get him to Vancouver at seven in the morning, Pacific time.

He picked up the old stock certificate off the coffee table, folded it and put it into the inside pocket of his jacket. He took one last look around, Euhler out of his thoughts, his mind now thinking about twin sisters in an old folks’ home halfway around the world. He left the apartment, closing the door softly behind him.