The Sword of the Templars (7 page)

“I’ve got a three-room apartment in New York that I’m barely ever in. You live at the Point. We’re the only heirs. I don’t have any room for half that stuff.”

“Ditto.”

“Why not an auction?”

“Sounds good to me,” said Holliday, although he hated the idea of having to sort through his uncle’s possessions; history was one thing, but personal history was a different thing altogether. He wondered if they should quietly tell Miss Branch that she was welcome to a memento from the house if she wanted it. Maybe better to let sleeping dogs lie.

“Buy me one of those chocolate martinis in the lounge for dessert, and then we’ll go back to the house and start figuring out what we want to keep and what we want to let go. How’s that?”

“Deal,” agreed Holliday. Two of the frothy, too-sweet cocktails and a long-necked Heineken later they headed back to Hart Street, a few blocks away on the other side of Canadaway Creek.

It was almost fully dark by the time they turned off Forest Place and steered into the short cul-de-sac. Lights were on in the few houses on the tree-lined street, and a soft breeze was blowing, taking some of the edge off the early-summer heat.

“I love that smell,” murmured Peggy happily as they left her rental car at the curb. “Somebody’s burning leaves.”

That wasn’t right.

“In July?” Holliday said. They reached the stone wall in front of Uncle Henry’s house and turned up the walk.

Peggy squinted ahead into the gloom.

“What’s that in . . .”

The concussion from the explosion lifted them both off their feet, throwing them backward onto the ground, flaming debris and broken glass blossoming into the air as they fell. Holliday rolled with it, holding his arms up across his face. He got to his hands and knees just in time to see the giant fireball swallowing up the entire front of the house in an all-consuming whirlwind. A moment later Peggy groggily began struggling to her feet.

“Down!” Holliday yelled. Concussion, then blast, then fire: the first axiom of the thermochemistry of explosives. He lurched forward and bowled Peggy off her feet, tumbling them downward as the firestorm roared briefly overhead.

Out of the corner of his eye Holliday caught a flicker of shadowy motion and turned his head to follow it—a figure, hunched, carrying something, racing away from the house, heading through the trees. Peggy must have seen the man, as well.

“Get him!”

“Are you all right?”

“Yes! Yes! Just get him!”

Holliday scrambled to his feet again and ran forward, skirting the angry fire spitting out of the burning house in long fiery tongues. The blazing heat was already beginning to shrivel the young leaves on the surrounding trees. A bank of rosebushes planted on the protective flank of the old house burst into flames; the first early-summer flush of blooms turned to black ash in an instant. The upstairs windows began to explode like gunshots, and the first searching fingers of fire crept out through the tinder-dry shingles of the roof.

The shadow figure appeared again, outlined in the light. The figure turned, and for a split second Holliday had a glimpse of a startled face, pale and narrow, some sort of hood or cowl disguising the rest of his head. The eyes were wide and glistening. Then the man turned away, running hard toward the creek.

For a moment Holliday thought that the man might have a boat in the water, but at this time of the year the creek was too low for that, and besides, where would he go? The creek wound its way through the town and into the suburbs, finally emptying into Lake Erie; not the smartest escape route. Could he have a car waiting at one of the bridges along the route? It seemed too elaborate.

The man fell; Holliday heard the dull explosive grunt as he hit the earth. He picked himself up, but Holliday had gained valuable ground. For the first time he saw what the man was carrying: Uncle Henry’s sword, still in its ghoulish silken shroud. Burn down a house to cover his crime? Crazy. What was going on?

Broadbent the lawyer?

No; this man was tall and lean, legs pounding like a long-distance runner. Broadbent was built like a Tele-tubby. The purple one, Tinky-Winky or whatever the hell his name was. The one with the purse.

“Stop!” Holliday yelled, feeling like an idiot even as the word burst out of his mouth. The man was a thief and an arsonist; why would he stop? Holliday sprinted after his quarry, one eye on the ground in front of him looking for obstacles, the other on the runner.

He was breathing hard now, but he forced himself to go even faster. The thief had stolen Uncle Henry’s sword and burnt down a house full of memories—Holliday’s memories, the best ones from a childhood where they were few and far between. In the distance Holliday heard sirens.

The man fell again, tripping on a branch, almost losing the sword, and Holliday gained a few more yards. He twisted around one of the willows at the embankment and then jumped down onto the narrow strip of stony beach below. Holliday was hard behind him, close enough to see the reflective swoosh on the heel of the runner’s New Balance shoes.

The fugitive splashed into the water, pushing himself toward the opposite bank. The creek was no more than two feet deep at the foot of Uncle Henry’s property, but the rocks were slippery, covered with weed and algae. The man slipped, regained his balance, then slipped again. The breath was tearing out of Holliday’s lungs in angry gasps, but he was gaining. He slammed into the water. Ten, maybe fifteen feet away now, so close he could hear the other man’s ragged breathing as well as his own.

The running thief reached the far bank of the creek. There were only two ways to go. To the left, the bank was shallower, and led up to the football field where the Fredonia Hillbillies played. The right side was steep and wooded. He’d go left. Holliday swung that way, trying to cut him off. The runner reached the far bank then turned suddenly, throwing the silk pennant to one side and brandishing the sword.

Holliday pulled up short, arching back from the swinging blade. The man was no swordsman, but thirty inches of sharpened steel was daunting in anybody’s hand. He caught a better glimpse of his antagonist; not as young as he’d first thought, maybe late thirties, clean shaven, hair hidden under the hood of a black sweatshirt.

Ducking under the swing, Holliday lunged forward, shoulder dropping, and caught the thief in the chest, knocking him backward, half up the embankment. The thief swung the sword again, the blade slashing toward his head in a whistling arc. Holliday threw himself to one side as the sword came close to decapitating him.

The man turned, tossing the sword away, and scrambled up the bank, using both hands to haul himself upward. Holliday lunged again, managing to grip his attacker’s ankle. The man kicked back furiously, this time connecting, catching Holliday in the chin. Holliday fell away, stunned, then tumbled back down the embankment. By the time he got to his feet again the man who’d burned down Uncle Henry’s house and tried to steal the mysterious sword had vanished into the night.

Doc Holliday and Peggy Blackstock showed up at the Main Street offices of Broadbent, Broadbent, Hammersmith, and Howe at nine the following morning after spending a few brief hours sleeping in adjoining rooms at the White Inn. They’d watched as the Fredonia Volunteer Fire Department desperately tried to quench the flames consuming Uncle Henry’s house, but in the end all they could really do was contain the blaze and keep it from spreading to other houses on the street. By three o’clock in the morning the old Queen Anne mansion was nothing more than cinders and ashes.

According to the fire chief, a man named Hoskins, admittedly no expert, the fire was almost certainly arson, originating at the gas stove in the kitchen of the house. To the chief it looked as though someone had blown out the pilot lights, switched the gas on full, and left some sort of timing device attached to a small initiating device, perhaps something as simple as a cardboard tube filled with match heads.

There was no way of telling if the arson was professional or amateur; you could find out anything on the Internet these days, including detailed instructions on how to build a time bomb or burn down a building.

“Miss Blackstock, Colonel Holliday,” said Broadbent, standing up behind his desk as they were ushered into the lawyer’s office by his secretary. “Nice to see you again. So soon.” He didn’t look pleased at all. He extended his hand across the desk. Peggy and Holliday ignored it. “What can I do for you today?”

My uncle’s house burned down last night.”

They sat down; so did Broadbent.

“Yes,” said the lawyer, affecting a solemn tone. He sounded like an undertaker. “A terrible thing.”

“The fire chief thinks it was arson,” said Holliday.

“Really?” Broadbent said. “Do you have some sort of experience with that kind of thing?”

“Somebody burned down my uncle’s house last night, then ran away. I almost caught him.”

“Really?”

“Really.” Holliday paused. “He was stealing something from the house.”

“What would that be?”

“You know exactly what he was stealing,” said Holliday.

“I do?”

“A sword, Mr. Broadbent. The sword you were so interested in yesterday.”

“So it really does exist then?”

“You know it does.”

“What exactly are you inferring?” Broadbent asked mildly.

“I’m not inferring anything,” snapped Holliday. “I’m telling you straight out: you hired someone to steal the sword and burn down my uncle’s house.”

“I wouldn’t go around saying that sort of thing in public,” the lawyer advised. “You might find yourself staring a lawsuit in the face.”

“So you’re denying it?” Peggy asked angrily.

Broadbent smiled.

“Of course I’m denying it, Miss Blackstock. I’d be a fool not to, even if by some bizarre stretch of the imagination your allegation had any substance or foundation, which it does not.” The lawyer turned to Holliday. “Besides, Colonel, as we are both aware, you have no proof.”

“You were asking about the sword yesterday.”

“Piffle,” said Broadbent, flicking the fingers of one hand into the air. “Coincidence.”

“My uncle found the sword in 1945. He kept his possession of it a secret for more than sixty years. Why would he do that?”

“I have no idea,” answered Broadbent.

“And your father never mentioned it to you.”

“No. As I mentioned to you yesterday, I only discovered its existence when I reviewed the notes my father had made in your uncle’s file when I took over his practice.”

“Why would your father have kept the sword’s existence a secret?”

“I have no idea,” said Broadbent, sighing. “I only know it was very important to him.”

“Yet he never made any attempt to get it back.”

“No. Perhaps he didn’t know that your uncle still had the sword in his possession.”

“He could have asked.”

“Apparently he didn’t, or at least I have no knowledge that he did.”

“You said your father was with my uncle when the sword was found.”

“That’s right.”

“Are you saying he has some degree of ownership?”

“Your uncle stole it from him.”

“So you decided to steal it back?”

“Don’t be silly.”

“What was your father doing at Berchtesgaden?”

“He was a major in the Third Infantry Division, ‘Rock of the Marne.’ He was an adjutant to Major General John W. O’Daniel, the commanding officer.”

“My uncle wasn’t in the Third Division,” argued Holliday. “He wasn’t in the military at all.”

“No,” replied Broadbent. “His cover portrayed him as a civilian consultant to the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives Branch. In actual fact he was a spook, a member of Donovan’s Office of Strategic Services, the precursor to the CIA.” Broadbent paused. “Presumably he was more interested in protecting or discovering sources of intelligence than he was in recovering stolen artwork.”

“You seem to know a great deal about my uncle.”

“I made it my business to.”

“Why?”

“For one thing he was my father’s client.”

“I don’t get this,” said Peggy. “If my grandfather stole the sword from your father, why would Grandpa have made your father his lawyer?”

“They were friends,” said Broadbent. “From what I understand they had a great deal of shared history.”

“I never heard him mentioned in any other context except being Uncle Henry’s lawyer,” said Holliday. “There was nothing in his correspondence that would lead me to believe that they were friends either.”

“Then I guess you didn’t know your uncle very well,” replied Broadbent with a shrug. “The fact remains that you have something in your possession that rightfully belongs to my family.”

“Prove it,” said Holliday, standing. Peggy followed suit. Broadbent remained in his chair.

“You could make this very simple,” said the lawyer, sighing again. “You could simply sell the sword to me; it can’t have anything but a monetary value to you anyway. It would mean a great deal to my father.”

“I thought he was non compos mentis,” said Peggy. “Alzheimer’s. What would he care?”

“It would mean a great deal to me,” said Broadbent.

“That’s the whole point,” said Holliday, smiling down at the lawyer. “I want to find out exactly
why
it would mean so much to you. Why you’d burn down somebody’s house to get it.” He turned on his heel and left Broadbent’s office, Peggy right behind him.

They went back to the White Inn and ordered breakfast. Holliday had Eggbeaters and dry toast. Peggy had blueberry waffles topped with whipped cream, bacon, and home fries. They both drank coffee.

Holliday watched her eat, awed by the young woman’s capacity for food.

“You never gain an ounce, do you?”

“Nope,” she answered, putting a piece of bacon slice atop a square of syrup-soaked waffle.

“I hate you,” said Holliday fondly.

“I’m your niece,” answered Peggy blithely, popping the food into her mouth and chewing happily. “You’re not allowed to hate me; it’s against the rules.”

“You’re actually my second cousin once removed. They have different rules for that.”