Constantinople (Istanbul)
Topkapi Palace Museum
Present day
Istanbul was the location and the Topkapi the stage. The gala event had been billed as the biggest charity auction of the century. It was expected to draw the attention of the world’s greatest art collectors. Also in attendance would be the cream of the world’s most powerful people, from ambassadors and the diplomatic corps to royalty and other illustrious figures of the international political scene. And there were others with vested interests.
The world’s media was in full attendance, on site days before the auction. The eyes of the world were on Istanbul and the Topkapi.
Elli had sent to the city and the former palace of the Ottoman Sultans members of the Order of Vlachernae ahead of the scheduled viewings. She wanted to monitor the build-up to the auction. If it had not been a charity auction she wouldn’t be present. She was one of the world’s greatest collectors, after all. The mere mention of her name drove up prices. Her presence at an auction drew too much attention and drove prices up even more.
But her presence at this particular auction was intended to ruffle a few feathers, even if it would have the effect to put the Ruinands on their guard. Her spies had told her that they recognised Ruinands, including a certain Ducesa, under a not very successful disguise, milling about during the series of viewings. That to Elli was a strong sign that there was more than some truth in the tip, courtesy of Mystras.
The stolen Likureian icon should be one of the objects up for auction. But which one was it? The viewings came and went and the day of the auction arrived and Elli was surprised that there was no attempted theft of any part of the collection. Surely, the Ruinands would have planned to steal the item before the auction. It would have been easier, would it not?
The main hall was brimming to the beams with people. Their conversations rose as a jumbled murmur to the ceiling, deafening and scaring the silent tiny unseen inhabitants of this revered space that had witnessed, God knows, what secrets.
Enter stage left, a glamorous woman, cocky, posing and gliding like a peacock, shaking her lovely feathers begging for attention, and all eyes in the hall turned to her. The crowd involuntarily slipped slowly away like a unified beast, moving as one, like the parting of the waves of the Red Sea, opening a corridor to ease her progress.
Walking a few paces ahead was one of her aides, opening a route for her mistress. Her mistress added a touch of higher class to the proceedings and itched to be heard, as well as to be seen, to be admired for her mellifluous voice as well as for her presence. The impression was one of wonder and jaw-dropping involuntary reverence.
She dispensed grace and elegance and “hellos” and “how do you dos” and “darlings” and air kisses and cheek brushes in a soft delicate warm voice. The aide took her task very seriously and was bent on achieving it.
‘Excuse me, excuse me, coming through.’
A shrilly voice, definitely not that of an angel, travelled from the right and there suddenly appeared, resplendent in all her magnificence, a stick-thin woman who could have graced the cover of any magazine, and could fit in it with inches to spare and demanding considerable magnification to become visible to the naked eye.
Eager to share her curiosity and a few tit bits of gossip, she drew to the side of a like-minded creature and uncanny look-alike, which was not surprising as they both belonged to a charmed and exclusive circle of high fashion and high off-the-scale maintenance. She began to chat to her companion in hushed conspiratorial tones. The stick thin woman instantly became the subject of several conversations in the room.
‘Who on earth was that? I don’t think I’ve seen her before, although there is something familiar about her. Can you shed any light?’
‘Oh, that’s La Ducesa de Mori Astir. You know, the widow of the former French ambassador to the Court of St James and the fourth richest man in France. She’s of course loaded. By passing away he did her the biggest favour, you know, because she really deeply despised him. He popped it only four years after they got married and there were no kids from any of his former three marriages, so she got the lot. And of course she collected from her own previous five marriages very respectable sums, hoarding it all, too much for her to make a dent even with all her spending. And her habit I hear is notorious and deeply ingrained, impossible to shake off, but of course it is unnecessary to do so. Who would want to give up such an exquisite habit or addiction? “Money troubles” is definitely not part of her vocabulary.’
‘What’s she doing these days? Surely she doesn’t need to work. Shopping her way through all her millions out of boredom no doubt, but not making much headway as you have so eloquently put it?’
‘Oh, she is solely in the pursuit of fun and she has, surprisingly, become an avid and very serious art collector and a very knowledgeable one at that. She gives lectures, you know.’
‘Collector, ha! Hoarder you mean. That woman has no taste, absolutely none, none whatsoever. She doesn’t know the first thing about it. She wouldn’t know the difference between Art Nouveau and Art Deco or Regency and Georgian, if it hit her on the head.’
Aristo and Katerina were accompanying Elli in a show of charitable force. They were enjoying the event, but were on high alert for anything unusual which would be difficult to detect as the tension and excitement in the room was palpable and rising.
Aristo’s brother, Vasilis, looking very tall and distinguished in his perfectly-and-expensively-tailored suit was quietly talking to a well-known art collector. Aristo could feel Vasilis was up to something, mischief was an irresistible drug for him, and he made an instant decision to watch him closely.
In the meantime, Aristo and Katerina circulated and mingled with the crowd, and as expected at these events, greeted old friends and acquaintances, business rivals and allies and stroke conversations about inconsequential matters and, of course, art and particularly the auction itself.
Aristo stole another glance at Vasilis and his companion. The art collector was gesturing wildly, appearing to be explaining something to Vasilis who was listening attentively, and, either found or pretended to find difficult to understand, which infuriated and tested the patience of the art collector whose gestures became increasingly intense, his flailing arms slicing through the air and sent flying to all directions, like a wind indicator gone insane.
The collector’s pale face was becoming worryingly animated and turning a gradual beetroot red. He appeared close to imploding. He was clearly extremely distressed. Aristo was intrigued. If only he was a dandruff speck on that suit.
Aristo swallowed hard, but a faint smile of amusement coloured his face. Vasilis was up to his usual games, entertaining himself and relishing the discomfort and confusion his antics caused in others. Childhood memories, long dormant, rushed in and Aristo remembered when they used to come to blows as kids because of Vasilis’ irresistible pull to play pranks and to tease.
Vasilis’ teasing and pranks were built to last, causing the maximum effect and bringing people to the end of their tether, to the point of almost bursting with the impulse to strangle him. That was until Aristo got the hang of Vasilis’ mischievous nature. In all honesty, back then, Aristo was not much better himself, and he still had not rid himself of the vestiges of plain naughtiness, disguised as adult eccentricity.
As Aristo was thinking about this, his eyes wandered and settled on the far side of the hall, on a mismatched couple deep in conversation. The man was short and squatty and a monocle graced one eye like a glorified reverse-engineered eye-patch. When the man turned, that one huge eye was disconcerting. How quaint, Aristo thought. 19 ^th century, you have an escapee. Come and claim your own.
Next to the man, standing at a seemingly impossible over six-foot tall, was a woman dressed in a sari, decked in jewels, and, even from this distance, Aristo could tell they were all very real and very valuable indeed. She exuded a peculiarly intense aura, a mixture of arrogance and raw sexual energy. Despite the distance separating them, Aristo sensed unease and a feeling of dread.
He was intrigued by that woman. He was rooted to the spot studying her. His feet started to move involuntarily, taking him towards her, entirely trapped by her guiles and dragged into her clutches. Everything was slowly darkening with only her the only light in the room. It was as if Aristo could not see anyone or anything but her.
She unexpectedly turned and fixed Aristo with a painfully piercing interrogating stare, at the same time charming and full of hatred, a femme fatale. Her stare achieved what Aristo’s will could not and stopped him in his tracks. She continued her discussion without a hitch. But her mouth formed a kiss. Was she mocking Aristo or was she warning him? Aristo did not know what to make of it.
Soon he would have his answer, as suddenly her face appeared in front of him, almost touching his. Unless Aristo was mistaken her action was a threat. He looked in the direction of where she stood and she was still there talking to her companion as if nothing was happening.
Could she, in some way, be at two places at the same time? Aristo suddenly felt as if legions of fiery lassos were smacking him on the face and giving him, he didn’t know what degree burns, if that was possible.
‘I will crush you in battle. I hope you will be ready and at least put up a good fight, for my entertainment you understand. I like a good challenge.’
‘I’ll be ready.’ Aristo said, defiant as always, and made a gesture as if dismissing a fly. ‘It’s a date. I look forward to it.’
Aristo tried to calm himself. He closed his eyes and breathed hard, taking long deep mouthfuls of air. The darkness and the dizziness began to subside and he was back in the hall again. He wondered how long he had been in that strange trance.
He surreptitiously looked around, surveying the hall to see, with relief, no change, no panic, nobody staring at him. He realised that he had only been in that state for only a fraction of a second that seemed like an eternity.
Katerina had witnessed it all, but decided not to interfere and break whatever spell Aristo was temporarily under. She felt the tense moment and feared unpredictable consequences if she had cut the brain duel short.
‘Aristo, who is she?’
‘She is the Madame Marcquesa de Parmalanski, leader of the Ruinands.’
The Madame Marcquesa leaned closer to her companion to compensate for the height difference, her voice hushed, barely a whisper.
‘I have acquired a strange device, a cube from a member of the Order of Vlachernae. I want to know how it works. I could not power it up. I’ve tried everything I could think of, but it persistently remains a lifeless lump of crystal. I want to know how members of the Order travel in time and whether this cube is the key. And I want to know what kind of fuel it uses, because whatever it is, it’s nothing I or our specialists have seen before. Any ideas?’
‘Have you tried taking it to the wise men of the Tower?’
‘Those old hacks? Well, no, you know I don’t trust them enough to throw them. They spend their time poring over those ancient texts of theirs. They know nothing of the outside world or progress. They are dangerous recluses, charlatans, not worthy of reverence let alone any measure of respect. How they continue to hold sway over us is beyond me.’
A fellow Ruinand woman, companion in the ‘league of fine dark warriors’, standing just a few inches behind the Madame Marcquesa and very acute of hearing, flinched at her insolence. How careless and arrogant she is, the Ruinand woman thought. She should be struck down incurring as she did the wrath of the gods.
If only the sari-woman’s power was not so terrifying, she would have been chewed and unceremoniously spat out, the lurch. The Ruinand woman pondered this image and smiled to herself. The Madame Marcquesa’s companion continued his gentle interrogation to sate his curiosity.
‘Tell me, how do you know this icon is the real thing?’
‘Well, this icon has been handed down through my family for almost a hundred years.’
‘How did you get it?’
‘From a certain Malenca Pasha. Perhaps you’ve heard of him?’ The Madame Marcquesa raised her eyebrows in an elegant challenge.
‘The name is vaguely familiar.’
‘For an avid pupil of history and politics you surprise me.’ The Madame Marcquesa could not resist testing her companion’s short temper.
Her companion read through her teasing ruse and did not rise to the challenge. ‘You were telling me about the icon’s authenticity.’
‘Yes, indeed. I was not absolutely sure. That’s why I had to have the other icon stolen from the Metropolitan. I had to know without any shadow of a doubt before I put my plan into action. And for that the real icon is the key. A dangling carrot, if you like, to trap my enemies. If they fall in my honey-trap then that would end this drawn-out war once and for all, in my favour.’
‘So which icon is the one up for auction?’
‘The real one of course.’
‘But why did you put the real icon up for auction? Aren’t you worried of losing it? Or are you going to pay for something that you had already? Either you are very smart or very stupid.’
‘Only you would be allowed to speak to me like that, father.’ Her irony almost formed icy particles in the air between them. ‘If anyone else dared they would have paid with their lives. That was a joke. What do you take me for? Naivety is not part of my vocabulary. But Elli Symitzis with all her power has no way of knowing that at first glance. There is a person who would know, but he has not been seen for years and nobody knows where he is.’ Her companion knew better than to ask and he kept his own counsel. Wise man. ‘I want to see who will bid for it, how far they will go. That will indicate who knows its true value. I do not plan to bid, no.
‘But whoever gets it will not have it for long, trust me. That icon will not leave this place in the winner’s hands. I have arranged a unique show for the benefit of all these honourable hypocrites of benefactors. Vultures, the lot of them. Taketh with one hand and giveth with the other. Ruthless in accumulating money and spending it. So generous in giving it away.’
Her companion saw the irony in her quoted principles, but said nothing. Obviously she was forgetting that one who is not without sin should not cast the first stone.
Everything was caught on camera of course as part of the extreme security measures and it would make interesting viewing for some people later on.
However, as walls were supposed to have ears, so it was that journalists were circling like discreet vultures ready to pounce, hoping to get snippets of gossip for their scandalous columns that crave to be the first to break great stories, forever seeking the big breakthrough, the highly potent high density seed or subject of a juicy scandal, “I’ objet du scandale”, the explosion of such a news object having the consequences of the equivalent effect of a “Big Bang”, they hope, always hope.
One of those paparazzi would inadvertently witness and overhear something that at the time would seem insignificant, but that would later come close to costing him his life and have seismic ramifications.
Against his colleagues’ and his editor’s advice he wrote an article about these extraordinary things he overheard from the conversations in the hall. But nobody believed him. He was ridiculed by colleagues, rivals and the public alike. He ended his days in a mental asylum.
‘Dear guests, please take your seats. The auction is about to begin. Firstly, I want to thank all of you who have very generously donated objects for today’s auction.’
The cornerstone and star of the auction was the Roswell Collection that led a bright spark at Malenks, the famous auction house, to use it to attract other valuable objects and organise one of the biggest events ever to take place in an auction room. Hushed silence fell on the hall.
Katerina turned to Aristo. ‘Aristo, will your mother be bidding?
‘No. But we will soon see who will.’
‘Lot 114, the icon of the birth of Christ, with a depiction of Jesus entering the Church of Ayia Sophia, a rare depiction indeed, never before or since painted. The icon is rumoured to have been hanging on the walls of the Imperial Palace of Vlachernae in Constantinople and had been missing since the looting of the city by the fourth crusade in 1204 A.D. It is believed to have ended up in Venice in the Doge’s Palace next to his throne. There is considerable interest in this item. We are starting the bid at eighty thousand US dollars. Do I hear…?’
The bid price rose to two hundred and fifty thousand… then three hundred thousand… three hundred and fifty thousand… before the gavel came down. An assistant whispered in the auctioneer’s ear.
‘Sold to La Ducesa de Mori Astir for six hundred thousand US dollars. Congratulations. I must confess that the price has exceeded our wildest expectations.’
La Ducesa smiled an enigmatic triumphant smile. Her biggest competitor in this bidding war was a rival Italian art collector who had successfully outbid her numerous times in the past. She was glad to have achieved a one up on him and given him a taste of his own medicine.
Her weakness of winning made her forget her mission, the reason she was there. It didn’t go through her mind at the time, but her ultimate mistress would be furious when she found out about this serious mishap, caused by having her instructions ignored.
Suddenly the alarm went off. The security measures were triggered and the steel rails came down trapping everybody inside the hall. The lights went off and all was dark apart from a series of red lights circling the hall just below the ceiling. There were screams and panic. Guests running for the exits suddenly had their escape routes barred by the security rails that blocked any hope of salvation.
When after a few harrowing minutes the lights came back on, everybody breathed a sigh of relief that became a wave that travelled around the room with lightning speed, taking a life of its own, its power and intensity magnified by the enclosed space and the abnormally high temperatures caused by fear and tension.
The smell of fear and human sweat was a vicious assault on the nostrils. If predators had been around, they would have fallen on those present like a pack of wolves finding its Shangri-La after a long multi-year search.
A scream echoed around the room and pierced what little vestige was left of the eardrum membrane of those attending. Everybody present turned as one, like frightened animals, a direct fixed stare with the power to cause the explosion of what was there. The reinforced glass encasing the icon was empty.
In the underbelly of the museum, footsteps echoed along the dimly lit corridors, but all above ground were oblivious to them. And the footsteps were further distancing themselves from their pursuers — members of the Ruinands and of the Order of Vlachernae and the security guards of the museum and others with vested interests.
Aristo was in pursuit even before the security bars lifted and the exits opened. As if half expecting it, he looked at the glass case at the exact moment that the would-be thief started to make his move on the icon. Aristo immediately knew what the would-be thief was planning.
Aristo caught the purposeful movement and he saw the cold gaze fixed on the would-be thief’s target. Aristo began to make his way towards the icon in an attempt to intercept the would-be thief, but he was much further away than the would-be thief was and the crowded hall slowed Aristo’s progress. Aristo was becoming frustrated that he wouldn’t be able to stop the thief in time, but he would damn well try. Aristo’s determined progress was rudely interrupted.
The alarm sounded and the lights went out. He momentarily lost sight of the thief. But Aristo’s eyes adjusted quickly to the gloom and with a stroke of luck he saw the thief disappear down a secret passage.
The thief certainly knew his way around the palace. His intimate knowledge of the secret passages seemed to match Aristo’s. Aristo’s lead over the other pursuers was considerable. He had to get to the thief before the thief reached the colonnaded hall and disappeared into the ether. Aristo had to retrieve the icon before it was spirited out. They had to know whether it was the real one.
The Topkapi was neutral territory for both the Order of Vlachernae and the Ruinands and any unusual powers had no effect here whatsoever. Manual combat would have to be the order of the day. Aristo went down a shortcut hoping to intercept the thief. But he reached a dead end, which strangely was not supposed to be there.
The icon was smuggled out through secret passages under the palace known only to the Order of Vlachernae. Aristo was surprised that the thief was privy to those secret passages too. Now there was no doubt that there was a traitor inside the Order, and that Aristo had been beaten by that traitor.
The traitor’s stamp was all over the theft. The thief had been thoroughly briefed. The whole act had been planned meticulously, its execution a masterclass in merciless precision.
The Ducesa could feel shaking, as if it was an earth-quake. She panicked. It was not a good sign, especially after what happened only a few minutes ago. She was shocked. How could someone fool her like that, her, the master of her craft, the undeniable pinnacle of female power, beauty, charm, craftiness and deviousness?
She then realised that there was no tremor. It was her phone that was set on vibrating alert. She rummaged through her bag and found it. She saw the caller’s identity. Elli. A violent shudder ran the entire length of her body and clogged her brain with no way out, almost giving her a stroke.
‘Hello.’
She was frightfully posh and normally flaunted it. But not now, not to this person. Her arrogance deserted her. Her tone was one of submission to a power greater than hers.
‘I hear you have failed me.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Sorry’s not good enough. I only asked you to do one simple thing; bid to drive up the price to see who’s desperate enough for that item and you could not even do that. I said I wouldn’t mind if you ended up with the icon yourself. That’s the occupational hazard of taking part in a bid with specific instructions like that. You were going really well and then you suddenly stopped. Why? Did you get distracted somehow? And as if that was not enough, you suddenly sprang back to life with a killer bid.
‘Haven’t I taught you about the virtue of patience? An auction is like poker in some respects. You need to keep your cool and your nerve and an inscrutable face and keep others guessing about your true intentions and interest, whether genuine or not. You have to learn when appropriate to control this obsession of yours to win at all costs.’ Elli paused. ‘But never mind. It’s done now. Just get out of there.’
‘But my cover has not been blown.’
‘No, but it may not be safe.
‘You know who did it, don’t you?’
‘I have my suspicions.’
‘Was it someone on your orders? Covering both eventualities, aren’t you?’
‘No. I have to go. We will talk soon.’
‘You never cease to amaze me, Elli.’ But Elli had already hung up.