The Tombs fa-4 Page 8

  Sam said, “Get the key.”

  Tibor gave the man the order in Hungarian, but the man shrugged and said something. János patted him down. “He doesn’t have it.” He ran to the desk near the door and rifled the drawers. He found a second padlock with a key in it, ran back with it, and Sam tried the key in the first padlock. It didn’t fit.

  Sam said, “Tell him to take his uniform and boots off.” He added, “You strip down too, Albrecht.”

  The two men obeyed, and Sam said, “Albrecht, step back and get behind something solid. Everybody else, do the same. When I shoot the padlock, the clock starts running. We have to move quickly. We dress Albrecht like us and lock this guy up in his place. Then we move fast to the van and get out of here. If anybody we meet aims a weapon, shoot first.”

  The others got behind some wooden crates. Remi took the dog with her and covered his ears with her hands.

  There was a loud bang as Sam shot the lock off the cage. Everyone began to move quickly. János pushed the guard into the cage and sat him on the bed. Albrecht came out and put on the uniform. As Albrecht was tying his shoes, Tibor put the guard’s gun belt around him and clicked the buckle. Sam used the second lock to secure the cage.

  Everyone trotted to the door. As Remi was about to open it, the buzzer sounded loudly and made her jump. Zoltán began to growl, but she whispered to him and he went quiet.

  “Our two friends must be back,” said Sam. “We’ve got to let them in.”

  Tibor stepped to the side of the door where the guard had pressed a button to open the cage before. He read the label, then nodded. The others all moved to the sides, backs to the wall, with guns drawn. Tibor pressed the button to buzz the guards in while Remi swung the door open.

  The two men stepped inside, each carrying two paper cups of coffee, their rifles slung across their backs. As soon as they were in, Sam and János were beside them, holding pistols to their heads.

  Tibor snapped some orders, and the men set down their coffee cups, set their rifles on the floor, stepped away, and lay down on their stomachs. János removed the handcuffs from the leather cases on their belts and handcuffed them to two steel girders that served to support the roof.

  Remi and the dog went out, with Sam right behind. Albrecht followed, and then Tibor and János, carrying the two AK-47 rifles. When Sam looked at them questioningly, Tibor whispered, “Would you rather we had them or they did?”

  They moved quickly, in loose formation, along the drive between the rows of buildings toward the spot where they had left their van.

  There was the sound of a truck moving along the roadway on the far side of the buildings to their left and then a second truck coming along the paved surface outside the tall chain-link fence. They stopped in front of a building for a moment, using its bulk to hide from the truck moving along the fence. Sam and Remi moved to the corner of the building to see that it passed. The vehicle was a stake truck with about fifteen men inside, on two benches along either side, all in gray guard uniforms and holding AK-47 rifles, muzzle upward, between their knees.

  When the truck had moved away along the outer perimeter, Sam moved close to the others. “So much for going over the fence.”

  Suddenly there was the sound of running feet somewhere to their left beyond the next row of buildings. Sam, Remi, and Zoltán began to run ahead toward the gate, and the others moved up with them. “We’ve got to keep from being boxed in,” Sam said. “Stay ahead of them.”

  The group ran harder until they reached the double-fenced building with the warnings about Contagious Disease Research. Sam said to Tibor, “Go over one row and see if you can keep those guys from flanking us. I’ll give them something else to think about.”

  He waited until the others were around the next row of buildings and out of sight. Then he ran up to the Contagious Disease building and threw his body against the gate in the fence. There was a loud ringing alarm and a louder electronic siren. The red lights above the gate flashed, and a set of floodlights came on, illuminating the outside of the building. Sam ran along the drive on their original route.

  Ahead of him, a group of six security men from the next buildings ran into the long drive. One of them raised a rifle to his shoulder, and Sam sidestepped behind the corner of the closest building and pulled out his pistol. He reached around the corner, exposing just his gun arm and one eye, and fired five shots into the group, saw two men go down, then three others begin to drag them to safety. The last man laid down covering fire with the AK-47, spraying the area where Sam had been with bullets. Sam was already running around the building to the next paved drive.

  Squads of men were moving along the buildings to get to the Contagious Disease building. The stake truck that had brought the guards waited fifty yards ahead of Sam. He ran up behind it, dashed along the left side, and flung open the door, pointing his pistol in the driver’s face. He dragged the man out and pulled his sidearm from its holster. He knocked him to the ground, used the handcuffs on his belt to subdue him, then took his place behind the wheel.

  Sam shifted the truck into first gear, turned left, then right, and saw Zoltán and Remi, János, Tibor, and Albrecht sprinting along the pavement. He shifted into second, gained a little speed, and then saw Tibor become aware of him. Tibor turned to face the truck and began to swing his rifle around. Sam switched his lights on and off, slowed, and waved his left arm wildly out the window. “It’s me!” he yelled. “Get in!”

  Remi was at Tibor’s side in a second and Tibor lowered the rifle. The four ran hard to get to the truck as Sam drove to meet them. He stopped, and they clambered up onto the flatbed. He drove ahead.

  Zoltán ran back and forth behind the truck, whimpering for Remi. The truck was too high for him to jump up. There was the sound of Remi pounding on the cab roof. “Stop, Sam!”

  He stopped. Remi jumped down, ran around the truck, opened the passenger door, and stood on the step. She called, “Up, Zoltán!” The big dog ran and jumped up onto the truck seat, Remi spun herself around and sat, then slammed the door shut. “Hit it!” she said. She took out her pistol and rolled down her window as the truck gained speed.

  Sam drove along the paved road between the buildings. They were now moving up the center of the complex, with rows on each side. A platoon of men ran out into the road ahead of them, knelt, and prepared to fire, but Sam switched on the headlights, and Tibor and János, standing up in the flatbed behind the cab, opened fire. They hit one of the men, and the others ran for cover.

  Sam said, “We’ve got to crash the gate. Tell them to get ready.”

  Remi got up on the seat, hung her torso out the window, and shouted to them: “We’ve got to crash the gate!”

  Tibor and János stood, leaning forward on the cab, replaced the magazines on their rifles, and looked ahead. Remi held her pistol in both hands, also watching ahead.

  Sam lifted his pistol from his belt with his left hand. “I’m going to go through as fast as I can. It would be best if we could make the guards keep their heads down until we’re out of their effective range.”

  “Good plan . . . as plans go,” she said.

  “I know you’re the only pistol champion we have, but I’d rather they not see enough of you to hit. You’re also the only wife I have . . .”

  “You’re so sweet.”

  “. . . at the moment.”

  Zoltán looked at each of them in turn, not sure what to think.

  Sam reached the last corner, slowed to make the turn, and drove past the van they had brought there. As they passed, two men hiding in the back of the van flung the rear door open. Sam, Remi, and the others were too far away to hit before the men jumped to the ground, pulled out pistols, and fired wildly in their direction.

  “If one of us had opened that door, we’d be dead,” said Remi.

  Sam shifted from third to fourth as he drove for the gate. The two men on duty had closed the chain-link barrier, and now there were five or six others standing in front t
o guard the exit. To Sam it looked as though they were overconfident, assuming that nobody would actually try to crash the gate, so they were not really ready. Their rifles were slung across their backs, and they had done nothing to reinforce the barrier, even though they had another stake truck parked beside the gate.

  “Slight change of plan,” said Sam. He switched on the high-beam headlights. “Tell the guys to get down.”

  “Get down!” she shouted.

  The three men lay flat on the truck bed, the brothers facing the sides with their rifles ready, Albrecht, in the middle, facing backward.

  Sam kept adding speed as he approached. When he and Remi were twenty-five yards out, Remi held her right elbow with her left hand and fired, dropping the man in the guard kiosk, then fired several rounds at the riflemen, who were unslinging their firearms. Sam fired eight shots into their midst, but he was not the shot with a pistol that Remi was and all he was sure he accomplished was to increase the men’s impulse to dive for cover.

  Sam adjusted his course slightly, held the steering wheel steady, and passed just three feet to the right of the parked truck, missed the gate, and plowed into the chain-link fence. The fence was so high that as the cab ran straight into the mesh, it passed under the crossbar where the razor wire was coiled. The truck pushed a forty-foot section of the mesh ahead of it until the bottom links caught on the ground, the mesh was pulled flat, and the truck drove over it.

  The guards fired their weapons on full auto but just managed to spray the kiosk, the parked stake truck as Sam passed behind it, and most of the nearby buildings. As soon as Sam’s truck was outside the fence and gaining distance, he steered it over the bumpy ground onto the road again. Albrecht and the Lazar brothers opened fire at the guards at the gate, pouring such a steady stream of bullets in their direction that not one of them dared to lift his head above whatever cover he was hiding behind.

  Sam drove hard out the driveway. He slowed only enough to make the turn to the road, then sped up again. After a few minutes, Tibor rapped on the cab roof and leaned close to yell to Sam, “Let me drive now! We can’t take this truck into the city. I know where to go.”

  Sam stopped the truck, climbed up onto the truck bed, and let Tibor take his place. He drove no slower than Sam had, but before they reached the outskirts of Szeged he went down a narrow back road, took several turns that Sam couldn’t even see, and arrived at the big garage where he had taken them earlier.

  He pulled the truck into the garage, and the others all climbed down. Zoltán jumped from the cab to the ground and then sat calmly.

  Albrecht said, “I thank you all sincerely. If you hadn’t risked your lives, I would have lost mine. I’m sure of it. I owe my life to you.”

  “We had better do what we can to keep from being caught,” Remi said. “I must have seen five men hit tonight. Some of them could be dead.”

  Sam said, “What about the van? Can they trace it?”

  “It was borrowed.”

  “From who?”

  “From a parking lot,” Tibor said.

  Sam called out, “Everyone change back into normal clothes in the shop.”

  They took turns washing powder residue and dust from face, hands, and arms, and came out in street clothes and shoes. Albrecht put on clothes that Tibor lent him. Sam said, “Can we dump the truck in the river? I know it’s bad for the fish, but it could wash off any fingerprints.”

  Tibor said, “János can drive it. We’ll pick him up and drop you three at your hotel.”

  Remi, Sam, and Albrecht sat in the backseat of Tibor’s cab, and Zoltán lay across their laps. They followed the stolen truck until János turned off the road to a wooded hillside above the river. He set the truck in gear, let out the clutch, jumped out, and watched the truck’s momentum carry it forward a couple of yards, then over the crest of the hill. It picked up speed, went off an escarpment, and knifed into the river. It rolled onto its side, then took on water through the cab windows and disappeared.

  János ran to the cab, opened the passenger door, and sat beside his brother. The cab moved off. The next stop was at the dog-trainer cousin’s house. Remi got out with Zoltán and opened the gate so they could go into the enclosure. There were a few tentative barks as dogs awoke to the unfamiliar sights and smells of new people, then recognized Zoltán and quieted down. Remi knelt, held the big dog’s face to hers, and whispered something.

  When she came back to the car, Sam asked, “What did you say?”

  “I told him I would probably never see him again, but that I would always remember what a good brave dog he is and that I love him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “‘Do you want me to bite that silly man before you go?’ He loves me too.”

  Sam said, “I guess he and I are both jealous.”

  The cab pulled away, and Tibor drove them to the City Center Hotel. As they got out, Sam said, “Here, Tibor. I wrote this before we left.” Sam handed him a check. “Take it to the Credit Suisse bank in the next day or two. They’ll call our banker in the United States to verify it, but it will be in your account right away.”

  “Are you leaving Hungary?”

  “Not yet. But I thought that if something happens to us, it will be better if you have this now.”

  Tibor shrugged. “Thanks.” He put it in his coat without looking at it. “One more thing. Complain about your hotel room. Make them move you to a different one.”

  “I was just about to do that,” said Sam. “I’ll call you in a day or two.” He watched the cab pull away.

  While Tibor drove away from the hotel, he pulled out Sam’s check and handed it to János. “I can’t read it and drive too. What does it say?”

  “Pay to the order of Tibor Lazar one hundred thousand dollars. It sounds like a lot of forints.”

  “It is,” Tibor said, his eyes wide.

  Sam, Remi, and Albrecht Fischer stepped to the front door of the hotel, but Albrecht stopped Sam from opening the door so no one would overhear. “The man who kidnapped me, that madman Arpad Bako. He thinks that what we’re after is the tomb of Attila the Hun.”

  “It figures, I suppose. It’s one of the great treasures that has never turned up,” said Remi.

  “And probably never will,” said Albrecht.

  Sam shrugged. “At least we’re not getting kidnapped and shot at for pocket change.” He pulled the door open and ushered the others inside. But he turned and took one last look at the street outside, paying special attention to the dark and secret places where a man could hide.

  SZEGED, HUNGARY

  SAM, REMI, AND ALBRECHT SAT IN THE LIVING ROOM OF their new suite on the top floor of the hotel, all showered, wearing clean clothes and finishing their room service meal of fresh bread, soft körözött cheese, and kolbász sausages. They had a bottle of Balaton Barrique 1991 Hungarian merlot.

  “I lied, of course,” said Albrecht. “I wasn’t going to tell some glorified gangster about one of the most important discoveries in decades.” He shook his head. “To be honest, I haven’t figured out what it is I’ve found. I had no time to do much analysis or consult with colleagues before Bako’s thugs kidnapped me.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That I had been looking for signs of the Roman occupation force in this district. I carried conviction because, wherever I go in Europe, I’m alert to signs of Roman garrisons. Wherever they camped, they always dug in, and the structure of the place is virtually the same from England to Syria. This was Pannonia, a Roman possession until the Huns arrived.”

  “And that satisfied him?” Remi asked.

  “He’s a madman and nothing satisfies madness. He wants Attila the Hun’s burial goods. The man thinks he’s an heir of Attila the Hun. If he’s not a literal descendant, he’s certainly a spiritual one, and what he’s searching for is a big thing here. In Hungary, people still name boys Attila. And here we are on the southern plain, where Attila made his stronghold.”

  Remi
said, “I may not be remembering clearly, but isn’t the treasure supposed to be the coffins themselves?”

  “Yes, that’s part of it,” said Albrecht. “Supposedly there’s an iron casket, and inside it a silver one, and inside it one made of solid gold. But they were supposed to be filled with the jeweled crowns and weapons and ornaments that belonged to all the kings and nobles and bishops that Attila defeated. That would make quite a pile.”

  “The story sounds like quite a pile,” said Sam. “A pile of—”

  “Sam!” said Remi.

  “Sam’s probably right,” said Albrecht. “The only contemporary account we have of Attila’s death is from Priscus, the Eastern Roman Empire’s ambassador to the Huns. He describes the mourning and funeral, but mentions no treasure. The treasure is first described by Jordanes eighty years later. He was from one of the barbarian groups, possibly the Ostrogoths. People have searched for the treasure for fifteen hundred years and found nothing.”

  Albrecht sat in silence for a moment. “But Arpad Bako is not going to be put off or discouraged by odds or reason. He’s convinced he’s destined to find Attila’s tomb. And he’s obsessed with stopping anyone else from finding it.”

  “Let’s step back and look at this from his perspective,” said Remi. “Is there any chance at all that what you found might relate to the tomb in some way?”

  “I’ve just begun, but I doubt it,” said Albrecht. “It’s true that the carbon date of the remains is around 450 C.E. and Attila died in 453. And a battle here at the center of the Huns’ territory may well have had to do with his death. What happened after the death of Attila was chaos. His three sons all had their own factions, and Attila’s generals had their own kingdoms and armies. There could have been unrecorded battles among any of them.” He shrugged. “All I can say for sure so far is that these casualties were not Romans. They didn’t have the Romans’ superb armor, nor did they carry the gladius, the short, wide-bladed stabbing sword, or the scuta, the big shield that Roman soldiers put together to form a wall against an enemy charge.”