The Blood Gospel (Page 98)

Rasputin pulled what looked like a dirty dishcloth off a sculpture, like someone rummaging through a garage sale.

“Careful!” Erin touched the top of the exposed sculpture’s downturned head, ran a finger along an extended leg. “This is a Rodin. A dancer. It’s priceless.”

“Likely,” Rasputin agreed. The monk moved to a stack of leather-bound books, picking through them. Scraps of paper fluttered out of his hands to the ground.

Erin closed her eyes. She couldn’t watch, and she hated to think of the damage that had been done to the artifacts in the museum and to the historical record.

Rhun sifted through a crate. “Why do you believe this is the right room, Grigori?”

“The date.” Rasputin fingered a yellowed card affixed to the wall by a rusty nail. “This is one of the rooms where Russian forces, those returning in late May, warehoused the treasures plundered from Europe.”

“How many other rooms are there?” Jordan had finally booted up his detector and swept it from side to side.

“Several,” Rasputin said.

A piece of plaster fell from the ceiling, narrowly missing Erin’s head.

“Are they all this disorganized?” Her head throbbed in time to the flickering bulb.

“Many are worse.”

Sighing in defeat, she joined Rhun in his search.

It took them an hour to go through the first nest of rooms. Rasputin’s minions did not help. They stood out in the corridor and smoked. Smoking wasn’t doing the artifacts any favors either, but Erin supposed it was just another grain of sand in the hourglass marking the inevitable decay of these treasures.

Rasputin remained as gratingly cheerful as ever.

“One down, but more to come!” he announced, and led them down a damp corridor.

The next room, like the first, was crammed to the ceiling with a mishmash of useless and priceless objects, but here there was at least a theme—a martial or military one. Erin stared across the panoply of old Russian flags, piles of helmets, bayonets stacked up like cordwood, and what looked like a giant propeller stretching across the room.

The space was cavernous. They could search a lifetime in just this one room and never find something as small as a book.

Then Jordan’s machine beeped.

51

October 27, 7:18 P.M., MST

The Hermitage, Russia

Jordan whooped with delight.

Now we can get down to business—and soon, hopefully, get the hell out of here.

“Is the book here?” Erin hurried to his side, looking over his shoulder. Her breath brushed the back of his neck.

He had to step away. “Maybe. I don’t know. But at least it’s a positive reading. Something with a chemical signature equivalent to Nobel 808 is close. That’s what I picked up on that chunk of rock in your pocket.”

He swung the detector from side to side, almost bumping her. The sniffer led him to a tattered tapestry. He lifted it and it disintegrated under his finger, tearing apart with a quiet sigh.

This time Erin didn’t scold him. She stuck close to his side.

Jordan stepped past the tapestry, following each beep of the detector deeper into the room. It led him toward the giant propeller that rested atop a wooden crate in the center of the room.

“I think that’s from a MiG-3,” he said, stroking a hand along the smooth metal. “Only a few thousand were ever made, but they kicked butt in dogfights on the eastern front.”

“Is that what’s setting off your detector?” she asked.

“Noooo …” He slowly knelt, pointing the tip of the device forward. “Whatever is triggering the detector is underneath the propeller. Probably in that crate.”

“We will move the propeller,” Rhun said, nodding to Rasputin.

Jordan glanced over his shoulder at the other men. It would normally take six or seven guys to lift this steel monstrosity. But then again, there was nothing normal about the pair.

The two men crossed to either side of the giant propeller, each shouldering himself under one of the steel blades. At a silent signal, they both straightened, lifting the massive hunk of aeronautics with a groan of metal. From the strain on their faces, the weight was taxing even their strength.

Jordan wiggled under the blades, trusting them not to drop it on his head. He reached the exposed crate and stared into its straw-filled depths. His heart thudded into his throat.

Oh, God …

“Anything?” Erin called.

To either side of him, Rhun and Rasputin struggled with the sheer mass of steel. Overhead, the propeller began to shake in their weakening grips.

“Freeze!” Jordan yelled. “Nobody move!”

7:22 P.M.

Hearing the panic in the soldier’s heart as much as in his words, Rhun went dead still, as did Grigori. A fleeting fear passed through him with razored wings, cutting through his resolve: had the propeller crushed the book?

“What is it?” Erin asked. “Should I help you?”

“No!” The salty scent of fear wafted from him. “Stay where you are. And I mean everybody. Or we’ll all die.”

The soldier crawled backward away from the wall, his heart skittering.

Rhun waited, the propeller growing heavier in his hands.

Grigori gave him a mischievous grin. “Here we are, working side by side, one step from death, my droog. Just as in the olden days.”

Jordan slowly rose to his feet. “You can’t put the propeller back down. There’s an unexploded ordnance stored in that crate. The detector did what it was designed for. Unfortunately, it found a bomb, not a book.”

“Are you sure it’s a bomb?” Erin asked.

“It’s a Soviet antitank missile. And yes, I’m sure.”

As always, Erin kept arguing. “Maybe the book is under the missile—”

“If it is, I’m not getting it out.” Jordan pointed to the hall. “Sorry, guys, but I think you’re going to have to take that to the far side of the room. If so much as a pound of weight presses on that missile, we’re all dead.”

“Did you hear that, Rhun? We must be cautious.” Grigori gave a carefree laugh.

The sound took Rhun back decades. Grigori had been the most foolhardy member of the trio, unconcerned about the prospect of death—not for himself, not for others. His blithe bravery had saved Rhun’s life many times, but it had also endangered it.

“Should the two of you evacuate before we attempt to move it?” Rhun asked.

“It wouldn’t help,” Jordan said. “If that missile goes off, it’ll take out the building and half a city block around it.”