The policeman escorted her from the building and past the barricade. She thanked him and walked home in a daze, crossing streets without looking either way, a near-suicidal move in Paris. She paid no attention to the screech of brakes, the cacophony of blaring horns and the shouted curses.
Her full-blown panic attack had subsided by the time she turned the corner of the narrow street to where her apartment was located. She wondered if she had done the right thing not telling Inspector Dubois that her office had been searched. In her mind she could see the inspector thinking that this crazy paranoid woman must go on the list of suspects.
Skye lived in a nineteenth-century, mansard-roofed house in Mouffetard, on the fringes of the Quartier Latin. She enjoyed the busy neighborhood, with its shops and restaurants and street jazz musicians. The old town house had been turned into three apartments. Skye's was on the third floor and her wrought-iron balcony gave her a view of the street life and the ubiquitous Parisian chimney pots. She sprinted up the stairs. Relief washed over her as she opened the door. She felt safe back in her apartment, but the feeling of security lasted only until she walked into the living room. She couldn't believe the sight that greeted her.
The room looked as if a bomb had gone off. Chair and sofa cushions were strewn about the floor. Her coffee table was swept clear of magazines. Books had been pulled from their shelves and thrown about haphazardly. The kitchen was even worse. Cabinets were wide open and the floor was covered with broken glass and dishes. Moving like a sleepwalker, she went into the bedroom. Drawers had been yanked from their dressers and their contents dumped everywhere. The bed covers and sheets had been yanked off the bed and the mattress sliced open, spilling out the stuffing.
She went back into the living room and gazed at the mess. She was shivering with anger at the violation of her privacy. She felt as if she had been raped. The anger gave way to fear as she realized that the person who wrecked her apartment might still be in there. She hadn't checked the bathroom. She grabbed a poker from the fireplace, and with her eyes glued to the bathroom door, she began to back out of the apartment.
The floor creaked behind her.
She whirled and raised the poker over her head.
"Hul-lo," Kurt Austin said, his coral-colored eyes wide in surprise.
Skye almost fainted. She dropped the poker by her side. "I'm sorry," she said.
"I should apologize for creeping up on you. The door was open, so I stepped inside." He noticed Skye's ashen face. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine now that you're here."
Austin surveyed the living room. "I didn't know you had tornadoes in Paris."
"I think the person who killed Renaud did this."
"Renaud? Not the man who was trapped under the glacier with you?"
"Yes. He was shot to death in his office."
Austin's jaw hardened. "Have you checked the other rooms?"
"Every one except the bathroom. I haven't dared look in the closets."
Austin took the poker from her hand. "Insurance," he said.
He went into the bathroom and came out a minute later.
"Do you smoke?" Austin said.
"Not for many years. Why?"
"You were right to worry." He produced a cigarette butt. "I found a pile of these in the bathtub. Someone was waiting for you to come home."
Skye shuddered. "Why did he leave?"
"Whatever the reason, it was lucky for you that he did. Tell me about Renaud."
They cleared off the sofa and Skye recounted the details of her visit to the university office building. "Am I crazy connecting this disaster and the search of my office to Renaud's murder?"
"You'd be crazy not to make the connection. Is there anything missing from your apartment?"
She looked around the living room and shook her head. "It's impossible to tell." Her eye fell on the telephone answering machine.
"Strange," she said. "When I left the apartment, there were only two messages on the machine. Now there are four." "One is from me. I called as soon as I got into Paris." "Someone must have listened to the last two messages, because the light isn't blinking."
Austin hit the play button and heard his recorded voice saying that he couldn't reach her at her office, and was going to drop by her apartment on the chance she might be between home and work. He hit the play button again. Darnay's voice came on.
"Skye. It's Charles. I was wondering if I could take the helmet with me to my villa. It's proving more challenging than I anticipated."
"Dear God," she said, her face waxen. "Whoever was waiting for me must have heard the message." "Who is Charles?" Austin said.
"A friend. He is a dealer in rare arms and armor. I left the helmet with him to examine. Wait " She salvaged her address book from a pile of papers and looked under the Ds. A page was torn out. She showed the book to Austin. "Whoever was here has tracked down Darnay."
"Try to warn him."
She picked up the telephone, dialed a number and listened for several moments. "No one is answering. What should we do?" "The smart thing would be to call the police." She frowned. "Charles wouldn't like that. He operates his business on the fringes of the law and sometimes beyond that. He'd never forgive me if the police descended on his place and started poking around."
"What if his life depended on it?"
"He didn't answer the phone. Maybe he's not even there. Maybe we're worrying for nothing."
Austin was less optimistic, but he didn't want to waste precious time in a fruitless argument. "How far is the shop from here?"
"On the Right Bank. Ten minutes by taxi."
"I've got a car outside. We'll do it in five."
They ran for the stairs.
THE A N TIQU E SHOP window was dark and the door was locked. Skye produced one of the few keys Darnay had entrusted to outsiders, and opened the door. A line of light seeped out from under the office curtains.
Austin cautiously pushed the curtain aside. The bizarre scene that greeted him looked like an exhibition in a wax museum. A kneeling gray-haired man had his chin resting on a wooden shipping container, like a condemned man with his head on the chopping block. His hair was disheveled; he was bound hand and foot, his mouth gagged with duct tape.
A big man stood over him like an executioner, leaning on a long two-handed broadsword, a black mask covering the upper part of his face. The executioner looked up and smiled at Austin. He pulled the mask off, threw it aside and raised the sword over Darnay's neck. The light gleamed wickedly on the double-edged blade.
"Please stay," he said in a voice that was surprisingly high-pitched for his size. "Your friend here would simply lose his head if you left."
Skye dug her fingers into Austin's arm, but he hardly noticed. Austin remembered the descriptions he had heard and knew that he was looking at the fake reporter who had flooded the glacial tunnel.
"Why would we leave?" Austin said nonchalantly. "We just got here."
The dough-faced man smiled, but his sword remained poised over Darnay's neck.
"This man has been very foolish," he said. He glanced at a shelf lined with old helmets. "He refuses to tell me which of these head pots is the one I'm looking for."
Darnay's stubbornness had probably saved his life, Austin thought. The old man must have known he'd be killed as soon as his assailant got what he came for.
"I'm sure any one of them would fit you," Austin said helpfully. The man ignored the suggestion and fastened his gaze on Skye. "You'll tell me, won't you? You're the expert on these things." "You killed Renaud, didn't you?" Skye said. "Don't shed any tears for Renaud. He told me where to find you," the man said. The sword elevated a few inches. "Show me the helmet you removed from the glacier and I'll let you all go."
Not lively, Austin thought. Once Renaud's killer had the helmet, he would dispatch all three of them. Austin decided to make a move even though it meant gambling with Darnay's life. He'd been eyeing a battle-ax on a wall a few feet away. He stepped over and snatched the weapon off its hooks.
"I'd suggest you put that sword down," he said, his voice low and cool.
"Would you like me to put it down on Monsieur Darnay's neck?" "You could do that," Austin said, his eyes locked on the man's face so there would be no miscalculation. "But then your fat bald head would be rolling on the floor next to his."
He hefted the ax for emphasis. The weapon was primitive but fearsome. The carbon steel head was elongated and designed so it could be used as a spear. A spike stuck out from behind the ax head like the sharp beak of a stork. Metal lange lets extended from the ax head to protect the hardwood shaft.
The man pondered Austin's taunt. He knew from the uncompromising tone of Austin's voice that if he killed Darnay or Skye, he'd be a dead man. He would have to take care of Austin first, and then deal with the others. Austin had anticipated the move, actually welcomed it. In his experience, big men sometimes underestimated lesser human beings.
The man took a step toward Austin, raised the sword high and quickly brought it down in a blurry arc. Austin was unprepared for the move and realized it was he who had underestimated his opponent. Despite his large physical bulk, the man moved with feline quickness. Austin's reflexes took hold before his mind had time to process the metallic blur. His arms came up, holding the ax levelly in front of him.
The sword blade clanged against the ax shaft's protective sheathing. Shards of pain stabbed Austin's arms from the shock of the powerful blow and the blade stopped mere inches above his head, but he pushed the sword off, slid his hand down the shaft and swung the ax like a Louisville Slugger. It was an aggressive move fueled in part by the urgent need to defend his life. There was another reason; he simply didn't like this guy.
The deadly ax blade would have eviscerated the big man had he not seen the windup and leaned back at the waist. Austin was learning the hard way that there was more to medieval arm-to-arm combat than sheer muscle. The weight of the ax head whipped him around like a centrifuge. He spun in a full circle before he was able to check his swing.
Doughboy was driven back by the unexpected ferocity of the attack, but he recovered quickly. Seeing that Austin's wild swing had thrown him off balance, he changed tactics. He held the sword straight out in front of him and lunged.
It was a clever move. The sword point only needed to penetrate Austin's defense by a few inches to kill him. Austin sucked his chest in and sprang back, turning his side to his attacker. He evaded the
main thrust, which slipped past the upraised ax, but the sword tip punched a hole in his shirt and drew blood. Austin whacked the sword aside and responded with a jabbing attack of his own.
Austin was starting to get the feel of the ax. The weapon was the M-16 rifle of its day. With it, an infantryman could hook a knight off his horse, hack through his armor and stab him to death. The long shaft gave Austin an edge and he found that short swings and jabs were the deadliest way to use the weapon.
Doughboy was learning as well. He slashed ineffectively at the sharp tip as he backed up in the face of Austin's resolute advance. He stopped with his back to the table that was piled high with helmets. Unable to retreat farther, he brought his sword up in preparation for a slashing counterattack. Austin beat him to the punch with a sudden forward lunge. The big man backed into the table and the helmets clattered to the floor.
Doughboy tripped over a helmet before regaining his footing. He roared like a wounded lion and came at Austin, slashing from every direction with wild swings that were practically impossible to anticipate. Sweat dripped into Austin's eyes, blurring his vision, and he retreated under the fierceness of the attack until he had his back to the wall.
Seeing that Austin could go no farther, Doughboy snarled in triumph and raised his sword, preparing to bring it down in a swing that used every muscle at his command. Austin saw the blow coming and knew he'd never be able to stop it with the ax or get in a swing of his own.
He went on the offensive. Holding the ax high, he surged forward and with astraight-armed thrust that drove the leveled shaft into Doughboy's Adam's apple, hit him broadside across the throat. The man's eyes bulged and he let out astrangled grunt.
Austin had checked the attack, but the move had put him in a vulnerable position. Doughboy was gasping for breath, but the fat around his thick neck had kept his windpipe from being crushed completely. He removed his left hand from the sword hilt and grabbed onto the ax shaft. Austin tried to jam the shaft into the man's throat again. When that didn't work, he jerked the weapon back, but the man had a lock grip on the shaft and wouldn't let go.
Austin lifted his knee and drove it into the man's crotch, but his opponent only grunted. He must have testicles of iron, Austin thought, and he used his two-handed leverage and attempted to twist the ax handle out of the man's hand. That ploy ended when Doughboy dropped the sword completely and grabbed onto the shaft with his right hand. They were like two boys fighting over a baseball bat, but the loser in this deadly game would go home in a casket.
Doughboy's superior strength and weight began to tell. His hands were on the outside of the shaft where he had the advantage of leverage as well. His manic grin changed to a feral croak of triumph and he twisted the ax out of Austin's hand.
Austin glanced around. There were weapons all over the workshop, but none within ready reach. Doughboy smiled and began to advance. Austin backed up until he was up against a wall and could go no farther. Doughboy smiled and raised the ax for a swing that would cleave Austin in two.
Seeing that the man's midsection was temporarily exposed, Austin used his powerful legs to drive his head into the man's gut with battering ram force. The man let out a sound like a squeezed bellows and the ax dropped from his hands.
Austin came out of his bounce with legs spread apart, ready to drive his fists into the doughy face. Austin's head butt had clearly hurt Doughboy. His pale face was even pastier than normal and he was gasping for breath.
He must have decided that whatever the pleasures of slicing and dicing Austin, dead was dead. He reached under his jacket and his hand came out filled with a pistol with a silencer mounted on the barrel. Austin braced himself for the impact of a bullet at close range. But the man's smile faded, to be replaced by a look of perplexity. A feathered stick had appeared like magic and was protruding from his right shoulder. The gun fell from his fingers.
Austin turned and saw Skye holding a crossbow. She had fitted another shaft to the weapon and was frantically winding back the bow string. Doughboy's eyes went to Austin, who was scrambling for the fallen gun, then back to Skye. He opened his mouth and bellowed. Stopping only to snatch a helmet from the pile of those littering the floor, he lurched toward the shop door and tore the curtain aside in his haste to escape.