Andy McDermott - The Midas Legacy

‘No shit,’ Eddie growled.

‘It was you and your friend who made the first kill,’ said Axelos with disdain. ‘If you had let us leave with the Crucibles, no one would have died.’

‘Oh, please,’ snapped Nina. ‘The moment those assholes you hired realised the cave was full of gold, they decided they were going to kill us and take it. You were damn lucky they didn’t decide to kill you too.’

‘But you did cause the first death, did you not?’ Trakas asked.

‘In self-defence,’ Eddie insisted.

‘All wars start with a first shot, and the man who pulls the trigger is to blame. Yes, I used extreme means to get the Crucible. But they are needed in extreme times — and I have very good reasons. As soon as I learned you were going to Nepal to find the Midas Cave, I had to act quickly.’

‘You knew that?’ said Nina, surprised. ‘How?’

Lonmore was just as curious. ‘Yes — how could you possibly have known anything about the Midas Cave, or the Crucibles?’

Trakas chuckled. ‘Why, you told me, of course!’

‘Me?’ Lonmore gasped. ‘What? No, I didn’t!’ He glanced towards his companions as if trying to convince them. ‘Of course I didn’t!’

The grinning tycoon picked up one of the glasses before him and peered through it at his friend. ‘Ah, Spencer, you don’t even remember? Well, we were young, and you never could take your alcohol. But surely you remember the bar, down the little back street near the top of the mule track from the harbour in Santorini? It served a very good ouzo.’

Lonmore was about to say something else — then his face froze as a long-lost memory resurfaced. ‘The bar, yes. We went in there almost every night after the dives. But I didn’t…’ He trailed off, his expression now riven with uncertainty.

‘You did,’ said Trakas smugly. ‘You were drunk, my friend; very, very drunk! You told me about the Midas Legacy, your great cache of gold — and why you were in Greece. It was not to search for Atlantis, no? You were looking for a way to find the Midas Cave.’

‘Oh my God,’ whispered Lonmore, going pale. ‘I can’t have told you. I can’t ! I couldn’t have been that stupid…’

Trakas snorted in amusement. ‘I am not a mind-reader, Spencer. How else would I know? Ever since then, I have been very interested in you, and the others in the Legacy. As I became rich, I was able to use… certain means to observe what you were doing, even from Greece.’

The American was appalled. ‘You were spying on us?’

‘I am afraid so, yes. I used to use private detectives, but now there are people who can find out everything with just a computer. What you buy, where you travel, who you phone…’

‘Jesus.’ Lonmore slumped, both hands to his head. ‘All this time, and you were just using me to find the Midas Cave?’

‘I really have been your friend,’ Trakas insisted, almost hurt. ‘For years I did not believe it was even real. Yes, your families got their fortunes from somewhere, but a cave of gold in the Himalayas, left by people from Atlantis? It seemed like a fairy tale! But then,’ he gestured at Nina, ‘Dr Wilde found Atlantis. The legends were true. And if Atlantis was real, then so too was the Midas Cave — as was the story of Midas himself. The ruler with the golden touch — I can appreciate that. So then I took a whole new interest in the Legacy… especially when I learned that she was Olivia’s granddaughter.’

‘But if you knew that, you must have known I had no connection with her, or the Legacy,’ said Nina. ‘I didn’t even know she was still alive until last week!’

‘I knew her , though. I was sure she would some day use you to find the cave. And I was right. When I was told you were going to Nepal, I sent Axelos to follow you and obtain the Crucibles.’ He leaned towards her. ‘I am sorry that people were hurt, I really am. It was not what I wanted to happen.’

‘But it did happen,’ she shot back. ‘And you can split hairs all you want about who shot first, but if you hadn’t sent those mercenaries, nobody would have died. You are responsible.’

‘For all I knew, going into the cave would have killed you,’ said Trakas, his geniality fraying. ‘It is a natural nuclear reactor! Perhaps the monks themselves wanted to silence you by letting you go inside, hmm?’

Lonmore broke out of his self-tortured gloom, looking at the Greek in surprise. ‘Wait — how did you know about the reactor? I couldn’t have told you that in Santorini, because I didn’t know myself! It was Fenrir who figured it out, and that wasn’t until he had his doctorate… which was after the dive in Greece.’

Trakas smiled. ‘No, you did not tell me, Spencer. But you could say that without you, I would not have been able to find out.’ His amusement growing as he saw Lonmore’s confusion at his riddle, he spoke to Axelos. ‘Petros, please fetch my other guest.’

Axelos went back down the passage and knocked on a door. It opened, and someone else accompanied the Greek back to the lounge.

Neither Nina nor Eddie recognised the trendily and expensively dressed young man who entered. But the Lonmores reacted with open-mouthed shock. ‘What… what are you doing here?’ Lonmore spluttered.

The new arrival treated him to a contemptuous sneer, folding his arms defiantly across his chest. ‘What do you think? I want my share of the Midas Legacy… Dad .’

On the Pactolus ’s foredeck, a crewman named Velis squinted into the sun with growing suspicion at an approaching motor yacht. Augustine Trakas was both a rich man and someone who had accrued enemies, and kidnappings of either were far from unknown in Greece.

One of his shipmates had also spotted the craft, ahead off the port side. ‘Is it coming at us?’

‘It’ll be close.’ While the Pactolus had engines, at the moment it was using its sails alone to make around nine knots. The motor yacht was slightly faster, pounding through the waves on a course that would cut in front of the sailing vessel — or even intercept it. ‘I’ll warn the captain.’

He jogged aft, glancing through the lounge windows as he passed. His boss was engaged in what looked like a heated discussion with the visitors. Not wanting to interrupt, he continued on along one of the narrow side decks and entered a door to climb a ladder to the bridge at the front of the level above. Rouphos was at the wheel. ‘Captain! There’s a ship coming towards us.’

Rouphos nodded. ‘I’ve seen it. We’re to her starboard, so we should have the right of way, but…’ He regarded the cruiser warily, then made a decision. ‘Take the wheel — if she gets to one hundred metres without changing course, turn hard to port and start the engines to get us clear.’ The crewman nodded and stood at the controls. ‘I’ll go and warn Mr Trakas that we might—’

He stopped. The incoming cruiser was now less than two hundred metres away, but its pilot had apparently realised at last that the vessels were converging. It swung lazily to port, angling away from the yacht as it crossed its path.

Rouphos retook the wheel. ‘Bloody tourists,’ he complained.

‘I don’t like that it came so close,’ said Velis. ‘Especially when we’ve got these people aboard with Mr Trakas. Should we issue weapons?’

‘Not yet.’ Rouphos watched the ship as it pulled away. ‘It can’t do anything to us from there.’

The cruiser was indeed retreating from the Pactolus … but just before it crossed the yacht’s course, some of its passengers had dropped unseen into the sea from the far side of its superstructure.