The Billionaire’s Curse (10 page)

“After the sad death of Geraldine Archer, I believe the sole director of the Archer Foundation is standing in the doorway.” Ruby pointed to Gerald, who was watching with a look of wonder. “And while the prime minister can’t get in, I’m sure the person who pays the professor’s salary might be able to buy five minutes of his valuable time.” Ruby leaned closer and whispered to the woman, “I guess he probably pays your wages, too.”

The woman looked at Gerald, then back at Ruby. She glanced at a copy of the morning paper on her desk, which had a large photograph of Gerald on the front page. She cleared her throat.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She edged out from behind the desk and scurried to the door through which the professor had disappeared. She closed her eyes, summoning strength, then tapped on the wooden doorframe.

A thunderous roar blasted back.

“What in the blinking blue blazes do you want? I am not to be disturbed!”

The woman swallowed tightly and opened the door just wide enough to poke her head through.

Gerald couldn’t make out what the woman was saying but within seconds Professor McElderry’s enormous frame filled the doorway.

“Gerald Wilkins?” he asked.

Gerald held his hand up timidly.

“Why didn’t you say so? Come in!”

Gerald, Sam, and Ruby squeezed past Professor McElderry and found themselves in what could have passed for a war zone. There was stuff everywhere. Great towers of paper were stacked on every surface. If the place was a bomb site, then the desk was ground zero. Old teacups nestled atop leather-bound volumes. Great sheaves of notes and pencil sketches spilled across the surface like water overflowing from a bath. A bookcase behind the desk was stuffed with statuettes and carvings, shoved in at all angles on the shelves, but, curiously, not a single book. The books were piled on the floor next to the stuffed head of some sort of antelope.

They found some chairs and sat down among the carnage.

The professor pushed his way through the debris and went to settle behind his desk. McElderry had barely sat down when he leaped up, cursing to himself, and removed a tortoise from his chair.

“Found this little chap on the slopes of Parnassos,” he said, moving it out of the way.

“Is it alive?” Gerald asked.

“Alive? Course it’s alive,” the professor said. “Smell something awful if it was dead.” He looked around for a place to put the tortoise and eventually decided on the pile of books closest to the antelope. The tortoise stuck out its head and peered around, then withdrew inside its shell.

“Can’t say the same for this fellow,” the professor said, pointing at the stuffed head. “Bagged that one in India twenty years ago. Bit moth-eaten now but still has its uses. Here, watch.” He picked up a battered hat from behind a rubbish bin and flung it across the room. The hat sailed well clear of the antlers and careened into a tower of folders and old shoe boxes, sending the lot tumbling onto Sam.

“You get the idea,” the professor muttered. “Now, you’re Geraldine’s nephew, are you?” He studied Gerald from beneath a canopy of shaggy red eyebrows.

“Uh, great-nephew.”

“Not come here to cut off my funding, have you?”

“No,” Gerald said quickly.

“Well, that’s a relief,” the professor said. “Couldn’t do what we do without the Archer Foundation’s cash. In that case, what do you want?”

Gerald mustered some courage and wriggled upright in the chair. “Um…Geraldine left me a note saying that you might be able to help me.”

The professor appeared surprised.

“Help you? From what I read it doesn’t look like you need much help from anyone. A tick over twenty billion quid, wasn’t it?”

Gerald flushed. He was still getting used to the idea of being a billionaire.

“Look, Professor Mackelberry,” Sam piped in, shoving the last of the shoe boxes from his lap onto the floor, “Gerald’s great-aunt reckons she was murdered because of the diamond that was on display here at the museum. And she said you might know something about it.”

The professor swung away from Gerald and locked his gaze onto Sam like a gun turret turning on a battleship.

“Geraldine reckons she was murdered, does she?” McElderry said.

“That’s right,” Sam said.

“And how does a dead woman—God rest her soul—tell you she’s been murdered? Pop by for a chat, did she?”

“Um, no. She wrote a letter, actually.”

“A letter! And how was it delivered, may I ask? Through the ghost post?”

“Well, I—”

“I expect she has a bit of spare time to be writing nice little notes now, her being dead and all.”

Sam shifted in is chair. “No, no. You misunderstood. She wrote it before she was killed.”

“Yes, that would be more traditional. And predicting her own demise, was she?”

“Well, yes.”

“At the hands of the same person who nicked my diamond?”

“Um…I guess.”

“From my recollection the diamond was stolen the day before Geraldine Archer passed away. Are you suggesting that a master criminal who has just flogged the world’s most valuable gem from under the nose of a policeman, rather than fleeing the country, wakes up the next day and pops down the road to snuff out an old lady for no personal gain and every risk of capture by the police? Is that what you’re saying?”

Sam paused. “Um, yes. That is what I’m saying.”

Professor McElderry motioned for Sam to lean in closer.

“You know something, son?” he asked.

“What?” Sam said.

“I think you might possibly be the stupidest boy in the world.”

The tortoise sitting on top of the stack of books poked its head out.

McElderry stood up and pushed his way around to Gerald.

“Listen, Gerald, I admired your great-aunt. She was a very generous supporter of our work and she had a genuine love for science and discovery. About a year ago the opportunity came up to bring the Noor Jehan diamond out here to be the centerpiece of an India exhibition. It was a coup for the museum to get it. But the insurance cost was ruinous. Your great-aunt offered to pay for the lot. A remarkable woman.”

“What’s so great about this diamond?” Gerald said.

McElderry let out a ripe snort.

“Noor Jehan—it means ‘the light of the world.’ It’s the largest flawless diamond ever discovered. It’s the big sister to the Koh-i-Noor diamond in the British crown jewels. That one-hundred-million–pound value everyone’s talking about? It’s meaningless—there are collectors out there who would write a check for that without blinking. It hadn’t left India for seventeen hundred years and now it’s been stolen. I’ve got the insurance company breathing down my neck, the prime minister’s worried about relations with India, and the gem’s owner is due to arrive any moment. He’s not going to be blowing me kisses.”

McElderry placed an arm around Gerald and led him toward the reception area.

“It is a great tragedy that Geraldine passed away. But she was old. And I hate to say it, the last few times I spoke with her she didn’t seem altogether there. You know, a bit batty. Maybe she was imagining things. It can happen. But linking her death to the theft of the diamond? Nonsense.”

Gerald stopped as they reached the door.

“One more thing, professor,” he said. “This diamond, is there some sort of casket that goes with it?”

McElderry looked at Gerald.

“There have been tales over the centuries that Noor Jehan was once stored in a fancy box, but I’ve never seen any evidence of it. Why do you ask?”

“Just curious,” Gerald said, rubbing his still-tender shoulder. “Thanks anyway.”

Gerald was out in the corridor before he realized that Sam and Ruby weren’t with him. He was about to go back when two things happened. First, a roar from behind the door confirmed that the twins were still inside. And secondly, three people emerged from the elevator at the end of the corridor. A tall and elegantly dressed man led the way, limping slightly on a wooden walking stick. His short silver hair was combed neatly with a gun-barrel part on the side, suggesting an early life in the military or, at the very least, boarding school. His back was ramrod straight, though he did tilt a bit to the right on account of the limp. He was followed by a plump, middle-aged Indian man in a bottle-green suit, his neck swelling at the collar and his face a deep shade of purple. Gerald guessed from his expression of bottomless anger that this was the owner of the missing diamond. With them was a girl, perhaps two years older than Gerald. She wore a sari, the same bottle green as the plump man’s suit. Her dark hair was pulled into a single thick braid that reached well down her back. The girl glanced at Gerald, revealing dark almond eyes and a beautiful face, but she looked away, tilting her slightly upturned nose even higher, as if she’d just passed a dodgy fish shop.

The door behind Gerald opened and Sam and Ruby bundled out into the corridor, followed by a blustering Professor McElderry.

“Damned cheek. Going through my papers!”

Sam stood defiantly and held up his index finger, which bore a livid red mark.

“I was not,” he said. “Your stupid turtle bit me. Look!”

“It’s a tortoise, you twit,” McElderry said, looming over Sam. “Better than a guard dog, he is. He knows when someone’s up to no good.”

“Pity he wasn’t guarding your precious diamond then, isn’t it!”

McElderry’s awninglike eyebrows shot up and he opened his mouth to speak when the silver-haired man stepped forward.

“Knox, I hope we haven’t arrived at an awkward time?” It was a voice of quiet authority.

McElderry looked up and was startled to find three new faces in the corridor, each one staring at him.

“Sir Mason,” he said, withdrawing his raised fist. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Hardly a surprise, Knox, I’m sure,” the tall man said. “You remember Mr. Gupta?”

The plump man elbowed past Sam and barreled up to the professor. His head came up to McElderry’s hairy chin but he didn’t appear at all intimidated.

“Remember me? He’ll rue the day he met me if I don’t get my diamond back!”

McElderry’s whiskers bristled.

“That diamond was under the protection of the Metropolitan Police, and I’ll be blowed if I’m going to take blame for any—”

The silver-haired man coughed into his hand.

“Perhaps, Knox, this conversation would be best held inside your office?”

The professor and Mr. Gupta eyed each other. McElderry mumbled something and opened the door.

Mr. Gupta motioned to the girl, who had been standing sullenly to one side.

“Come along, Alisha,” he said. “This concerns you as much as anyone.” The girl glided past Gerald without sparing him a glance, jasmine-laced fragrance wafting after her. The silver-haired man went to follow his companions when his eyes came to rest on Gerald.

“I think I know you,” the man said.

Gerald looked up, surprised, and shook his head. “Um, I don’t think so.”

“You’re Gerald Wilkins. I was at your great-aunt’s funeral. Mason Green, chairman of the Museum Trust.”

He shook Gerald’s hand in a firm grip. Gerald thought maybe he did recognize the man from the church hall.

“I’m sorry about this unpleasantness,” Green said, nodding toward McElderry’s office. “Touchy business, this diamond thing. Mr. Gupta and his daughter have been on a plane all night to get here from Delhi and he’s not in the best of humor.”

“So I see,” Gerald said.

“Once all this is sorted, I’d like to have a chat with you. I knew Geraldine very well and I think it most appropriate that we become acquainted.” He reached into his suit pocket and took out a business card. “Give me a call and let’s have lunch, shall we?”

Gerald looked at the card in his hand. It said simply: Sir Mason Green GCMG, with a London telephone number.

“Um, sure,” Gerald said. “Thanks very much.”

“Not at all, Gerald. The pleasure is all mine. Now, I best get inside and make sure those two remain gentlemen.”

He swung the door closed behind him.

“Watch out for the turtle!” Sam called out as the door pulled to.

“W
ell, you’re mixing with the muckety-mucks, aren’t you?”

Gerald, Sam, and Ruby made their way down the broad marble staircase to the museum ground floor, leaving Professor McElderry and Mr. Gupta to argue in peace.

“You know who just invited you to lunch?” Ruby said.

“Nope,” Gerald replied. “Some bloke from the Museum Trust?”

Ruby laughed. “That’s Sir Mason Green, dopey. He’s one of the richest men in Britain. He’s in the papers all the time, doing charity stuff. He’s worth squillions.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. “He’s almost as rich as you.”

Gerald blushed and tried to change the subject. “So, were you looking through the professor’s stuff?” he asked Sam.

“Course I was,” Sam said. “Couldn’t help it, could I? Half of his office landed in my lap.”

“While you and Mackleberry were outside we managed to find one thing of interest,” Ruby said. “Look.”

She pulled a crumpled piece of paper from her pocket and handed it to Gerald. He flattened it out to reveal a rough pencil sketch of a rectangular box, decorated on the sides with a pattern of suns and moons. In a barely legible scrawl under the drawing was written:
Sketch of Noor Jehan casket copied from papyrus believed originally from Library of Alexandria (c200 AD).

Gerald studied the drawing, trying to divine some meaning from the pencil lines on the paper.

“It was on top of his desk,” Ruby said. “Seems it might be top of mind for the professor, as well as for your skinny mate.”

Gerald ran a hand across his forehead. “Why would the professor say he didn’t know anything about a diamond casket when this was sitting on his desk?”

“Dunno,” Sam said. “But I don’t fancy going back and asking him.”

They reached the Great Court and stepped into the vast space under the glass roof.

“Now what?” Ruby asked.

“Beats me,” Gerald said. “We’re no closer to finding out anything about Geraldine or the diamond. Professor McElderry was no use at all.”

“Look,” Sam piped up. “They’re taking down the police tape.”

Across the Great Court they saw Constable Lethbridge rolling up the tape outside the Reading Room.

“Wanna take a look inside?” Ruby asked. She didn’t have to wait for a response. In no time, they were across the floor and through the open doorway. Just inside, Gerald pulled up short and the others bustled into the back of him.

“Far out,” Gerald exhaled.

The sheer expanse of the Reading Room took their breath away. It opened up in an enormous circle around them, three stories lined with volume upon volume of books of all sizes—hundreds of thousands of them. Two sets of narrow balconies ringed the insides like ribs, providing access to the upper levels. Above them, light streamed through a bank of arched windows that lined the base of a huge pale blue and gold dome.

Fifty yards away, on the opposite side of the hall, was the Dumpster that Gerald had seen earlier.

“Come on,” Gerald said. “Let’s have a look.”

They crossed the room and found that the Dumpster was filled with broken bits of plaster, including a long section that looked like an elephant’s trunk.

“I guess this was where the thief was hiding, then,” Gerald said.

“…and I still can’t find my elephant.”

Sam raised his eyebrows and looked at Gerald.

“Did you say something about an elephant?” he asked.

Gerald shook his head. “No. I thought you did.”

“…a fifteenth-century statue of Ganesha gone without a trace. Must have weighed a ton and a half.”

The disembodied voice seemed to come out of the air around them. Sam wriggled a finger in his ear. “There it is again,” he said. “Something about a statue—”

“Shhh!” Ruby hissed. “Look!”

She pointed across the room. There, standing in a group, was Professor McElderry, Mr. Gupta, his daughter, Constable Lethbridge, and another policeman, who looked like he might be Lethbridge’s boss. He was a fair bit older than the constable, and the gray of his short-cropped hair matched his moustache.

“It’s the professor,” she whispered to Gerald and Sam. “It’s him we can hear.”

“How can we?” Sam said. “He’s miles away.”

“The sound must be bouncing off the domed ceiling and coming down here,” Gerald said. “You know, like a satellite dish. How cool is that?”

“Shushhh!” Ruby hissed again. “If we can hear them, they can probably hear us. Listen.”

The three huddled their heads in tight and listened hard.

“…you think the thief was hiding inside the replica statue for at least a day before the robbery, Inspector Parrott?”

“That’s Mr. Gupta’s voice,” Sam said. Ruby’s sharp elbow into his rib cage produced a muffled grunt and persuaded Sam to keep his thoughts to himself.

“Yes, that’s right, Mr. Gupta,” the inspector said. “We’re dealing with a professional gang. To smuggle a fake statue into the Reading Room and remove the original was a feat in itself. To have overpowered one of our finest men here in Constable Lethbridge, well, that must have taken immense strength and planning.”

Gerald popped his head up. Even from across the other side of the room he could tell that Mr. Gupta was less than convinced by the inspector’s description of Constable Lethbridge.

“Is it not true that this policeman was found with his trousers around his ankles and a bunch of flowers up his—”

“Mr. Gupta!” Inspector Parrott interrupted, “I can assure you the Metropolitan Police Service is doing all it can to retrieve your diamond. We have a number of very promising leads and we’ll keep Sir Mason posted on any breakthrough.”

“That’s all very well,” Gupta said. “But the fact is this man was the last person to be with my diamond. So far the only evidence we have about a supposed thief is the constable’s word for it. How do we know he didn’t break the statue and take the diamond himself?”

“We have every faith in Constable Lethbridge and his story,” Inspector Parrott said. “Not to put too fine a point on it, the state in which we found the constable required the involvement of at least one other person. It’s just not possible to do that type of injury to yourself. We tried to replicate it in the forensics lab and the results were”—the inspector let out an involuntary shudder—“not pretty. Don’t worry. We’ll find your diamond. No reputable collector will go near it.”

Gupta scoffed.

“It’s not the reputable collectors I’m worried about,” he said.

The professor grumbled a thank-you to the inspector and led Mr. Gupta and his daughter out of the Reading Room. Constable Lethbridge sighed with relief.

“That wasn’t too bad,” he said.

“Lethbridge!” the inspector barked. The friendly tone he had used with Mr. Gupta had evaporated. “Thanks to you, the Metropolitan Police Service is a global laughingstock. Someone manages to smuggle themselves into this room hidden inside a statue—a statue of an elephant no less—then proceeds to use your arse for target practice before disappearing with the most valuable diamond in the world, and you think it’s ‘not too bad’!”

“Well, I thought—”

“You’re not paid to think, Lethbridge. Your diamond thief escaped, leaving the room locked from the inside. So there must be another way out. I suggest you round up any of your colleagues who’ll still talk to you and find it.”

“But we’ve already looked—”

“Well, look again!”

Inspector Parrott stormed out of the Reading Room, leaving Constable Lethbridge speechless.

Ruby motioned for the others to follow her to a nearby desk.

Before he moved, Sam said in a deep voice, “And hurry up about it, Lethbridge.” Across the room, the constable spun around as if he’d heard a ghost. He shook his head, then hurried off.

“Very funny,” Ruby muttered as her brother and Gerald laughed. “But if we’re going to solve this mystery, we need to find how the diamond got out of this room.”

Gerald turned a full circle, scanning the walls of books. It seemed impossible. How could anyone get out of a room and leave it locked from the inside? Then, high up on the second balcony, to Gerald’s astonishment, one of the bookcases swung open. A woman stepped out from behind it and walked around the balcony, replacing books on shelves. Gerald noticed that every so often one of the bookcases had a doorknob on one end.

“Look,” he said to the others. “Some of the bookcases open like doors. Maybe that’s how the thief got out.”

Sam and Ruby followed Gerald’s gaze. A number of bookcases on both balconies popped open and police officers stepped out, searching for clues.

“Not much chance of getting up there to have a look with that lot stomping around,” Ruby said. “Let’s have a look down here.”

Like the higher levels, the ground floor was ringed by bookcases. But they couldn’t find any sign of doorknobs. They moved around the room until they came to a small alcove under a section of the lower balcony. Inside the alcove, they were hidden from the rest of the library. There was a closet on one side that was full of jackets on hangers, and a glass-paneled door on the other. Gerald tried the handle.

“Locked,” he muttered. Next to the door was a set of pigeonholes, some of which had mail and other bits of paper stuffed into them. Like the rest of the alcove—the ceiling, walls, and floor—they were made of dark polished wood.

“Well, there’s nothing much in here,” Sam said. “Want to look somewhere else, Gerald? Gerald?”

Gerald’s eyes had glazed over. A dull ache throbbed across his brow. The pattern of pigeonholes seemed to lift off the wall and wash in front of his eyes. The grid of squares weaved and shimmered like a flag in the breeze. All the squares were dark, deep holes, openings to endless tunnels. Except for one. One square shone with a harsh blue light.

“Gerald!”

The sensation of Ruby tugging hard on his elbow yanked Gerald out of his apparent stupor.

“Are you okay?”

Gerald rubbed his eyes.

“I’m fine,” he said. “I sort of blanked out, I guess.” Gerald was used to wandering off in his thoughts during school lessons—especially during history classes—but he’d never wandered off on his own time before.

“That’s weird,” he mumbled. “I thought one of these boxes—” He stuck his hand deep into one of the pigeonholes and let out a surprised grunt.

“What is it?” Sam asked.

“It feels like a metal handle. You know, like on a cabinet.”

“Give it a twist. See what happens.”

Gerald turned the handle clockwise a quarter turn. There was a dull click. He pulled his hand out of the pigeonhole and looked at the others. “Maybe this bit of the wall opens up like those bookcases,” he said.

He pushed on the far edge of the shelf but it wouldn’t budge.

“That was a bit useless,” Gerald said.

Then the wooden floor beneath their feet dropped dead away.