fifty-seven

“This is about stealing ancient junk from Cairo?” Bear said after Keys waxed and waned through memories about the war for over an hour. “You guys smuggled out a bunch of old Egyptian junk during World War II and you think somebody’s killing all of you over it?”

Keys sat in his chair. His eyes were distant—memories of life stories still difficult to put into words. He looked at Poor Nic, then at Bear, and his face strained trying to conceal his emotions. “Not junk, Braddock, antiquities—ancient Egyptian antiquities. Gold, jeweled relics, artifacts worth a fortune in the right hands. In today’s market, that ‘junk,’ as you call it, would be priceless—tens of millions at least.”

“Priceless?” Bear glanced at Poor Nic. “You buy that?”

“I do.” Nic folded his arms. “And Detective, stolen art and antiquities are like blood to sharks—there are those who deal exclusively in such transactions. After all, who would report the theft of already stolen goods? If word of these treasures got to the wrong places, the art and antiquities thieves would be in a feeding frenzy to get to them.”

Keys stood and went to a small safe in the corner of his office, buried under a pile of papers and an overcoat. He spun the dial a few times and opened the door, pulled out a round, heavy object, and handed it to Bear.

“See kid, I told you,” Ollie said from the doorway. “Look familiar?”

It was the stone-carved scarab outlined in gold with tiny gemstones identical to the one in William’s office. I reminded Bear of that fact.

“And you guys stole it?” Bear examined the scarab. “You’re kind of vague about that part, Keys. How about filling in the details.”

Keys sat back down and took a long breath. “I’m not proud of my involvement, Braddock, but what’s done is done. I told you, I was playin’ at the Kit Kat in Cairo—in ’44. I went over a couple years before to work the oil fields but I hated it. So, I got a gig banging the keys for the Brits in some of the clubs. Pay wasn’t as good but I wasn’t boiling in the sun and drinking crude all day, you know?”

Bear nodded.

“Anyway, I got in with Willy and a couple of his pals …”

“Cy Gray and Claude Holister,” Bear said.

“Yeah, yeah, that’s right.” Keys nodded. “How’d you know?”

“Investigating. Go on.”

Keys took down an old black-and-white photograph hanging on his wall behind his desk. It was of Gray, Holister, and William Mendelson when they were young men during the war. They were sitting outside at a café—I recognized it as the Shepheard Hotel—drinking from tall glasses and smiling for the camera.

“I took this.” He handed the photo to Poor Nic. “I started pallin’ around with those three. Then one day Willy tells me he’s in good with some Egyptian professor. This professor planned to come to the States for that university that was over there—American U—running from the war and all that. The professor wanted to arrange to privately move a few crates of his personal stash of artifacts and antiquities here ahead of time. The professor didn’t want the university or the Egyptian government knowing he was, well, helping himself to a few crates of the loot he’d found over the years.”

“Wait.” Bear held up a hand. “You’re telling me this professor asked you to smuggle his own archeology treasures out of the country?”

“Well, yes and no.” Keys leaned forward and smiled. “The stuff wasn’t really his, see. He found it all right—he was a big-shot archeologist. But the stuff belonged to American University and the Egyptians—mostly the Egyptians. But when the professor found out he was headin’ to the States, he wanted to keep a bunch of the loot for himself.”

Bear and Poor Nic sat in silence.

Keys continued. “Look, Braddock, the old guy stole from the university and museums—all them professors did. You know, early retirement and mementos and all that. He wanted us to help get it here without the university finding out. So we did.”

“How?” Bear asked.

“Willy and them were fliers, Braddock,” Keys said. “They flew them big C-54 Skymasters. You know how much cargo you can get on them things? And they had pals everywhere who would help. They were headed back Stateside, so they decided to bring some extra cargo back with them. The spoils of war. Everyone did it. They made the arrangements. It was easy.”

Bear looked over at Poor Nic, who caught his gaze and nodded. Bear said, “So, what happened when this professor came to claim his already stolen treasures?”

“That’s the thing.” Keys played out a strange, awkward smile. “He never did. I jumped a ride out of Cairo and came back with some university types about a month after Willy and the others left. It took me forever to get passage out of that hole. Anyway, Willy had moved the stuff back here already, to Virginia, and hid it in his father’s old vault …”

Bear leaned forward. “At the bank annex?”

“Yeah, that one.” Keys waited for Bear to nod before going on. “Anyway, when I got back, Willy had it all stashed. It stayed there until the war ended. Then, me, him, Claude, and Cy all got back together. Claude lived outside DC, and Cy, I think he settled somewhere south of here.”

Poor Nic raised a hand. “Keys, do get to the professor, if you please.”

“Like I said, he never showed up. Willy and I looked for him in DC—Claude helped too. Turns out that he got himself killed in Cairo and never made it out.”

Bear watched Keys with a skeptical look. “How fortunate for you guys, huh?”

“At first, yeah.” Keys’s smile turned into a vacant, distant stare. “We just let the stuff sit for a while—we figured better we better not touch it and see if anyone comes looking for it. We waited years. Then, Cy decided to test the waters and took a couple small pieces—an old dagger with some jewels on it and a couple other gold pieces—I don’t know much about it. Anyway, he sold them.”

I watched Keys’s face go ashen. “That’s what got Cy killed, Bear.”

Bear drew the same conclusion.

“You bet it did.” Keys poked a hole in the air with his finger. “Cy was found murdered outside DC. We weren’t sure it was all related; you know, DC has always been a dangerous place. And old Cy had a habit of finding trouble. So we laid low again. Years later, Claude Holister did the same thing—he tried to sell some of the loot. And you know what happened to him, I guess.”

“Suicide?” Bear asked.

“That was bullshit.” Keys sat back and watched Bear for a long time.

Bear asked, “Ever heard of Amphora Trading or Nomad Air Freight?”

“Yeah, why?” Keys’s face looked like he was constipated. “Nomad is the outfit that shipped all my replica Egyptian statues and art work for this club. They make the fake stuff over in Cairo—Willy put me onto them—almost identical to the real deals. My basement storage is full of that junk. He got those big ugly statues in his office from them. Why?”

“And Amphora?” Bear watched him as Keys’s constipation got worse.

“Yeah, them too.”

“Would you please explain to Detective Braddock, Keys?” Poor Nic wasn’t asking. “It is the key to all of this, after all.”

Keys’s eyes were red and teary. “Not quite a year ago, Willy got a call from American U asking about being stationed in Cairo during the war. It spooked him so he decided to give the stuff back. We wanted it gone for good, Braddock. He got back in touch with American University and told them he had the professor’s stuff. He played coy and didn’t let on any of us were involved—just that he knew where the stuff was and that he would help them recover it. I know they probably figured it all out. Then all this started.”

Ollie said, “Ask him about Operation Salaam, kid.”

I relayed the question to Bear.

“Operation Salaam?” Bear’s face twisted a little and Poor Nic glanced over at him. He covered with, “It was on some papers William left for Angela Tucker. What do you know about it, Keys?”

His eyes settled on nothing in the distance. “Salaam? That old German spy job from the war? Hell, I don’t know anything about it, ’cept lately it’s been real popular.”

“What do you mean?” Bear asked.

“You’re the third one askin’. First, Willy became obsessed with researching it a while back. It had something to do with the Germans sneaking around Cairo, I think. But hell, it all happened before we were all there.”

Bear asked, “When did William start researching Operation Salaam?”

“About eight months ago. Right after he was contacted by the University.”

I asked, “And what happened next?” just as Bear asked the same question.

Keys’s face flushed and his voice got dry and angry. “Then she showed up.”

“Who?” Bear asked.

“The granddaughter of that old professor from Cairo—the one that Willy knew. It was his loot, right? And she showed up. And when she did, all kinds of bad things started happening Bad things to all of us—Willy, Marshal, even Lee and me. Jesus, we knew we were in trouble. That’s why we asked Nicholas to help us out.” Keys looked over at Poor Nic and his face fell, defeated. “But it was too late. That professor’s granddaughter had already found us.”

“Who?” Bear asked leaning forward and demanding Key’s eyes. “Give me a damn name, Keys. Who’s behind all this?”

“Raina Iskandr.”