Clive Cussler - Lost City

"Ah, Skye!" Darnay was clearly glad to hear her voice. "How are you, my dear? How is your work going? Is it true that you were in the Alps?"

"Yes. That's why I'm calling. I came across an old helmet during my expedition. It's quite extraordinary and I'd like you to look at it. It has me stumped."

"What about your wonderful computer?" Darnay teased. Darnay and Skye had had friendly arguments over the technological tools she used. He felt empirical experience gained through constant handling of artifacts was more valuable than browsing any database. She countered that the computer saved her valuable time. "Nothing is wrong with my computer," she said with mock indignation. "I've looked through every book in my library as well. I can't find an exact match."

"I'm very surprised." Darnay was acquainted with Skye's reference library and knew it was one of the best he had ever seen. "Well, I'd love to look at it. Come over now if you'd like." "Bien. I'll be right along."

She wrapped the helmet in a pillowcase, then put it in a shopping bag from Au Printemps and headed out for the nearest Metro station. Darnay's shop was on the Right Bank, down a narrow street next to a boulangerie that sent out mouthwatering aromas of baking bread. Printed in small gilt letters on the shop's door was the word ANTI-QUITES. In the window was an odd, dust-covered assortment of powder horns, flintlock pistols and a few rusty swords. It was not a display that would entice anyone into the shop, which was Darnay's intention. The door bell tinkled as she entered the shop. The dingy interior was dark and narrow, and empty except for a rusty suit of armor and some flyspecked cabinets holding a few poor replicas of antique daggers. A velvet curtain at the rear of the shop parted, and a wiry man dressed in black emerged from the widening ribbon of light. He cast a furtive glance at Skye, brushed by as silently as a shadow and left the shop, quietly shutting the door behind him.

Another man stepped out of the back room. He was short, and in his seventies, and resembled the old film actor Claude Rains. He was impeccably attired in a dark blue suit and stylish red silk tie, but would have projected an air of elegance if he had been in a workman's smock. His dark eyes sparkled with intelligence. His hair and thin mustache were silver-gray and he was smoking a Gauloises in a cigarette holder, which he removed from his lips so he could kiss Skye on both cheeks.

"That was fast," he said with a smile. "This helmet of yours must be a very important find."

She returned the kisses. "That's for you to tell me. Who's that man who just left?"

"He is one of my, er, suppliers."

"He looks like a sneak thief."

An alarmed expression crossed Darnay's face. Then he laughed. "Of course. That's what he is."

Darnay flipped the sign on his door to CLOSED, and then led her past the curtain to his office. In stark contrast to the worn-at-the-heels seediness of his showroom, the office-workshop was well lit by track lights and the desk and work space were of contemporary design. The walls were hung with weapons, but most of them were inferior items that he sold to less knowledgeable collectors. His top-grade inventory he kept safe in a warehouse.

Although he teased Skye about her reliance on technology, he did business mostly through the Internet, and a glossy catalog, mailed to an exclusive list of buyers, that was hungrily awaited by dealers and collectors worldwide.

Skye had first sought Darnay out for advice in spotting forgeries. She soon learned that his knowledge of old arms and armor surpassed that of some academics, including herself. They had become good friends, although it became apparent that he dealt in the shadowy world of illegal antiquities. In short, he was a crook, but a classy one. "Let's see what you have, my dear." He pointed to a brightly lit table that was used to photograph objects for the catalog.

Skye removed the helmet from the bag and set it on the table, then pulled off the pillowcase with a flourish.

Darnay gazed with reverence at the object. Then he walked

around the table, puffing on his cigarette, bending low, with his face inches from the metal. After going through the dip-and-stand routine, he picked the helmet up, hefted the weight, held it high and then put it on his head. Wearing the helmet, he walked over to a cabinet and pulled out a bottle of Grand Marnier.

"Brandy?" he offered.

Skye laughed at the sight and shook her head. "Well, what do you think?"

"Extraordinaire." He put the helmet back on the table and poured himself a brandy. "Where did you get this lovely objet dart?" "It was frozen into Le Dormeur glacier." "A glacier? Even more extraordinary."

"That's not half the story. It was found near a body that was embedded in the ice. The body may have been in the glacier less than a hundred years. The man probably parachuted from a plane whose wreckage was found in the nearby lake."

Darnay poked his forefinger through the hole in the helmet. "And this?"

"I think it's a bullet hole."

The antiquities dealer didn't seem surprised. "Then this Ice Man could have been wearing the helmet?" "Possibly."

"It's not a failed proof mark

"I don't think so. Look at the hardness of that steel. Musket balls would have bounced off the metal like peas. The hole was made by a more modern firearm."

"So we have a man flying over a glacier wearing an old helmet, shot with modern weapons." She shrugged. "It seems so." Darnay sipped his brandy. "Fascinating, but it all makes little sense.

"Nothing about this whole affair makes sense."

She settled into a chair and told Darnay about Renaud's summons to the cave and her harrowing rescue. Darnay listened with furrowed brow.

"Thank God you're safe! This Kurt Austin is an homme formidable Handsome, too, I suppose."

"Very much so." She felt herself blushing.

"I owe him my gratitude. I have always thought of you as a daughter, Skye. I would have been devastated if anything had happened to you."

"Well, nothing did, thanks to Mr. Austin and his colleague Joe Zavala." She gestured at the helmet. "Well?"

"I believe it's older than it looks. As you say, the steel is extraordinary. The metal used in its manufacture may very well have been forged in the stars. The fact that this is the only one of its kind that I have ever seen, and that you found no reference to it in your library, leads me to think it might have been a prototype"

"If the features were so innovative, why weren't these ideas picked up sooner?"

"You know the nature of arms and men. Good sense does not always prevail over intransigence. The Polish insisted on using horse cavalry against armored panzer divisions. Billy Mitchell had an uphill fight convincing the army hierarchy of the value of aerial bombardment. Maybe someone looked at this and said the old equipment was preferable to the untested."

"Any thoughts on the eagle motif I saw here and on the plane?"

"Yes, but none of them are scientific."

"I'd be interested to hear them anyhow. And perhaps I'll take that offer of brandy."

Darnay poured another snifter and they tapped glasses. "I'd say the eagle represents the joining together, an alliance of some sort, of three

different groups into one. Epluribus unum. "Out of many, one." It was not an easy arrangement. The eagle seems to be pulling itself apart, yet it must hang together or die. The weapons it is clutching in its claws would lead me to believe that this alliance has something to do with war."

"Not bad for an unscientific guess."

He smiled. "If we only knew who your Ice Man was." He glanced at his watch. "Excuse me, Skye, but I have a conference call with a dealer in London and a buyer in the United States. Would you mind if I kept this piece here for a few hours so I could study it further?"