The Copernicus Legacy: The Forbidden Stone (13 page)

Two minutes later they were rushing into the lobby, where Wade and Darrell were huddled around their father, who was on his phone.

“Uh-huh. Really? Was anything . . . I can’t right now, we’re in . . . we’re out of town. Yes. Yes. Please. As soon as I can. Thank you.” He closed his phone.

“Dad? What is it?” asked Wade.

“Is it about Mom?” Darrell asked.

Uncle Roald shook his head. “No, no. She’s fine. I mean, that wasn’t her. It was the police back in Austin. Our house was . . . broken into last night.”

“Oh no,” said Becca.

“What’s gone?” said Darrell. “Not my Strat!”

“The police aren’t sure anything was taken,” Roald said. “That’s what worries me. A rear door was forced open, but the house was in good shape. Except . . .” He turned to Wade.

“Dad? Except what?” asked Wade.

Dr. Kaplan looked at him for what seemed like forever before he said, “Your room was really torn apart. It looks like the thieves went straight to your room and ransacked everything, top to bottom.” He patted Wade’s arm. “I’m sorry. This is terrible. The police are investigating . . .”

“They won’t find anything,” said Darrell. “These guys are too good. Not to mention international. They have to be the same bunch.”

Wade’s face went pale. Then he unzipped his backpack and slid out the leather folder. “This. They were after my star map. Dad, they know who we are. But how?”

“Wade, I can’t tell you,” his father said. “This is so far beyond what I’ve—”

Beep!

The woman behind the desk waved over to them. “Cab is here for Keplens. Embassy and airport. Heppy travels!”

“Are we still going home?” Wade asked. “Will it be safe?”

Roald looked around the small lobby. Besides them and the staff, there were three other people. Then he glanced down at the bag at his feet. Lily knew the dagger was in there. Suddenly, he picked up the bag and nodded them all out of the lobby onto the busy sidewalk.

He looked both ways. “You know what? No. We’re not going home. Not yet.” He moved them past the waiting taxi and down the street from the hotel, where he hailed a second cab.

“No! No!” The first driver yelled loudly, storming into the hotel.

A second taxi pulled over. “Everyone in,” Roald said.

They got in. “To the embassy then?” said Wade. “Where after that?”

“Drive down the street,” Roald said as the cab pulled away from the curb. “I’ll call the embassy. We need to get out of the city as quickly as we can. I don’t like it here for us.”

“Where will we go?” asked Becca.

“Italy,” Roald said.

Darrell nearly jumped. “Dad, are you kidding?”

“My friend will help us. I don’t . . . I don’t like it here and I don’t trust anyone. Call it irrational. I hope it
is
irrational. But there are two mur . . .” He glanced at the driver and whispered. “Two incidents so far. Going home is not exactly safe right now. I believe we should keep on the move until things settle. Lily, trains might be the best way—”

“Already on it,” she said, reading from the tablet. “There’s an overnight train to Verona in forty-five minutes with a connection to . . . our destination.”

“Bahnhof, bitte?”
said Becca.

The driver nodded. “I get you zere plenty time!” He roared through the next intersection as if he were on a mission, making green lights from
Strasse
to
Strasse
in a kind of blur. Between being crushed by Darrell on one side and Becca on the other, Lily kept her eyes peeled for any silver SUVs.

Luckily, the journey didn’t last long. Spinning almost completely around on the street—which pushed Wade and Becca pitch-pipe close—the taxi screeched to an impossible stop directly in front of a giant complex of white and glass.

The driver boomed, “Tren station!”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

W
ade was still trying to process the scary news that their home had been burglarized when they entered the expansive central Berlin train station. It was a madhouse, a vast modernist structure of glass and steel, roaring with voices and constant movement. The floor rumbled nonstop as heavy trains arrived and departed on dozens of tracks leading off the main concourse.

Darrell nudged him. “Dude,” he whispered. “Our home.”

“I know. Who
are
they?”

His father herded them toward the ticket counter, then stopped. “Listen. To understand what Uncle Henry wanted us to find, we have to stay ahead of these people, whoever they are. I told you I have a friend in Bologna. Isabella Mercanti. She was married to Silvio Mercanti, one of the Asterias students. He died in a skiing accident last year, but Isabella and I have kept in touch off and on.”

“An accident, Uncle Roald?” said Becca.

His father’s face darkened momentarily. “I don’t think there’s any doubt about that, but maybe . . . Anyway, she teaches art and literature at the University of Bologna. We’ll find her. She can locate this fencing school for us. She’s a good person. She’ll help us.”

Urging them to the ticket counter across the chaotic room, his father seemed to shift himself into gear, which was more comforting to Wade than he realized. But Becca had asked it, and it suddenly seemed possible that nothing was an accident anymore. From ships sinking to skiing accidents.

What in the world was the Copernicus Legacy, and who were these killers who wanted it?

They stood quietly in the shortest line together, their documents ready. Within minutes his father distributed tickets for five seats in a sleeper cabin to Verona and secondary tickets for the ninety-minute connection to Bologna.

“For twenty minutes, we lay low,” his father said, pulling them under an awning as he searched for their platform. Wade unzipped his backpack and peeked inside. The celestial chart was safe. Of course it was, but how safe was
he
? How safe were
any
of them?

“Did everyone see the silver gun that woman had?” Lily asked

“Of course we saw it. And her,” Darrell said. “How could we not see her? How could we look away?”

“Isn’t the most bizarre part of the whole thing that there was this young woman in the middle of a nasty group of killers?” said Becca. “I mean, what?”

“No, no, no,” his father suddenly said, tugging on the end of his beard. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

Wade turned. “Done what?”

“The credit card,” Roald said. “I bought our tickets with the card.”

“What’s wrong with that?” asked Lily.

But Wade got it instantly. “Because they’ll know. They can track credit cards. If they have friends in the police, it means they can do all that kind of stuff. They’ll know we’re here right now.”

“Stay here five minutes, then go to the platform,” his father said. “I’m going to get some cash. We can stay off the grid after that. There’s an ATM by the book stall.”

Off the grid.

“I’ll meet you on Platform Nineteen in a few minutes. It’s just over there. In the meantime, take what I have, a hundred euros—that’s a hundred and thirty dollars, give or take.”

“Shouldn’t we all go with you, Roald?” Lily asked, though Wade wasn’t sure if she was afraid for his father or for them.

“No,” he said. “I don’t want us all to go across the big room again. We might be spotted.”

“Spotted?” said Lily.

“Do as I say!” Roald snapped. “Sorry. Wait five minutes, then go to the platform and wait for me there. Take these things.” He slid the dagger and his student notebook directly into Wade’s backpack.

Wade pocketed the euros. “Dad, are you sure?”

His father studied the big room. His face was drawn and tense. “Just until we’re safe on the train. If anything happens, we trust no one until we find Isabella Mercanti. After this, we do not separate, you hear me?”

“We hear you, Dad,” Darrell said. “Hurry up, though, okay?”

He was already gone.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

H
is father was too fast.

Roald Kaplan had disappeared into the throng in seconds. Wade sensed that his father was trying hard to keep his emotions under control, trying to be the same old dad for him and Darrell and the girls, but he’d never seen his father so anxious and abrupt.

We trust no one.

Was there something about Uncle Henry’s message that Dad wasn’t telling them? What had Asterias really been about? If Uncle Henry was dead, if Bernard Dufort and Silvio Mercanti were both dead, his dad must be in danger, too. Maybe they were all in danger because they were here together?

He didn’t know.

What he
did
know, or was beginning to know, was one thing: that if his father was pressing ahead despite the danger, he himself needed to step up. Sons did that, and he needed to be at the top of his game.

The clock on the wall said 14:24. European time for 2:24 p.m. The train would leave in just over fifteen minutes. Becca, Lily, and Darrell were huddled together, facing one another and invisible from most of the people running around
. That’s smart. Darrell’s right to think about spies. Maybe that’s who these bad guys really are.

He glanced into his backpack at the map, and now the notebook and the dagger. He patted the money in his pocket.

“Five minutes are over,” he said, his throat tightening. “Let’s find our train. And be cool about it. The goons could be here already.”

Darrell made a face. “Not to mention the lady with the silver gun.”

“Not to mention that you
always
mention the lady with the silver gun,” Lily snapped.

Platform 19 was as crowded as everywhere else. They immediately took up position behind a fat column when the platform thrummed and a giant red train rolled down the tracks into the station. As soon as it stopped, the platform became a sea of passengers descending from its doors—businessmen swinging briefcases, families dragging suitcases, carrying bundles, and pushing strollers through the crowds waiting to get on. The train idled while crews of sanitation workers poured onto it and jumped from car to car with plastic trash bags.

“I wouldn’t want that job,” said Darrell.

Wade watched the clock. 14:28. 14:31.

Where are you, Dad?

“Has anyone ever been on a sleeper car?” Becca asked. “I haven’t.”

“Once,” Wade said. “I took the Texas Eagle from Austin to Los Angeles to visit my mom. If German trains are the same, there should be a corridor inside the car. The cabins are marked.”

“We’re in cabin seven,” Lily said, trying to see inside the car, but the windows were too high. “How do you sleep?”

“Sleeping is crummy,” he said. “There are benches and upper beds that fold out into a kind of bunk bed thing.”

“I’m on top!” said Darrell. “The cabin is probably tiny, right?”

“But it’s ours,” Wade said. “There won’t be strangers in there.”

“Uh, yeah, there won’t be,” said Lily.

14:33.

His chest went icy. A thousand things could be happening while they waited like idiots there.
Dad, come on!

At a sign from a uniformed conductor, passengers began mounting the steps on either end of their car, showing their tickets to the conductors positioned near the train. The crowding on the platform eased.

Dad . . .

“Should we wait until he gets here? Or get on now?” said Darrell, pacing the length of the train car.

“Of course we’ll wait,” said Lily. “We have our own cabin. The seats are ours, so no one else can take them. We’re fine—”

“Uh . . . no.” Becca nodded toward an escalator across the concourse. Going up to the next level of the station, their heads swiveling like owls, were four thick men dressed in black. “Are they from the cemetery?”

Wade couldn’t believe how fast things were happening. “They traced the credit card when Dad bought our tickets. He was right.”

“They must have a computer surveillance system,” said Darrell.

“And troops everywhere,” said Lily.

“Please don’t call them troops,” Becca said, hiding behind the column, then peering out. “I don’t see the woman. But I saw one of those guys at the funeral.”

The men fanned out on the level above them and scanned the platforms below. “They know we’re in the station, but not which train we’re taking,” Wade said, turning his face away. “So they don’t know where we’re going. Not yet, anyway. Which means if it
was
Dad’s credit card, it was just the amount, not the destination. That’s good.”

“Not seeing them at all would be so much better,” said Darrell. “I knew this would happen. In spy movies, it always happens this way. Everywhere you look, there they are. They know things they couldn’t possibly know but they still know them and that’s how they know.”

Wade wanted Darrell to put a sock in it, but he was right. No sooner had the first four men taken positions overhead than a second group of similar goons appeared at the end of their own platform.

Becca lowered her face. “Why is your dad taking so long?”

The large round clock on the platform column read 14:35. Less than five minutes to departure.
Dad, please!
Had something happened? Or was he just picking up snacks for the long train ride?

Lily’s phone rang suddenly. “Hello?” Her eyes grew wide, and she thrust the phone at Wade.

“Hello?” he said, taking it. “Hello? Dad! What? Where are you?” Wade swung around. His father was walking quickly across the concourse toward their platform. “Dad says everybody on the train. Now!”

The kids flashed their tickets and jumped onto the train car. An announcement in German boomed over the station address system. Wade leaned out over the stairs and saw his father sprinting full speed toward Platform 25.
No, Dad. It’s this one!

Behind his father were three men from the cemetery, walking quickly but not running. Someone in the crowd shouted. Then a shrill whistle blasted. At the same instant, his father leaned forward and twisted his feet oddly.
What? Why?
Roald stumbled right in front of the men. He crashed to the floor, taking two goons down with him. Someone shouted again. Another whistle. The train squealed. The car jerked once on the track.

“Dad!” Wade yelled from the open doorway. “Da—”

Becca put her hand over his mouth. “Shh!”

A crowd of passengers jammed up against the huddle of men, apparently unsure of what it was all about. They tried to help Dr. Kaplan to his feet. A uniformed policeman appeared, his hand on a holster at his waist, but he was blocked by the crowd around his father and the fallen men. A second policeman was joined now by several other men in suits, all hovering around his father. The train squealed again, and it started to move.

Darrell banged his fist on the door. “Dad! Dad!”

The train gasped once more and pulled away from the platform. The short policeman from the cemetery appeared now, gesticulating frantically to his men, one of whom shouted into a cell phone. Others butted their way through the crowd toward the end of their platform, but the head car was already out of the station. The train was gaining speed.

“Oh my gosh,” said Lily, staring out the window as the station receded. “What . . . what . . . what are we going to do?”

“The police have Dad!” Darrell shrieked, grabbing Wade by the shoulders and shaking him. “He saved us from being caught!”

Wade couldn’t breathe. “The last thing he said on the phone was about Isabella Mercanti. The lady in Bologna. He wants us to find her. He said we should try to not to get caught. And she’d help us.”

“Don’t get caught?” Lily frowned. “Ohhhh, man . . .”

“I have to call Mom right now,” said Darrell. “I don’t care where she is!”

Wade handed him Lily’s phone. He tapped in Sara’s cell number, as the train sped through the train yard. Everyone watched his face. “Mom!” he said, then paused and breathed out. “Voice mail. Of course. She’s in Bolivia already. Mom? Hey, it’s me. Look, we’re on a train in Berlin and Dad just got—”

“Wait!” Wade put his hand over the phone. “They already broke into our house. They don’t need to know about Sara. Plus she’s off the grid. Which is what we should be. Close it.”

“But I have to tell her!”

“She can’t come here!” Wade insisted. “These guys may know we’re going to Verona, but maybe not to Bologna. Don’t give it away. End the call.”

Darrell gave him a dark look, pulled away, and said, “Call you later,” and hung up. “What a fail,” he groaned.

“You did the right thing,” said Lily.

“Nobody calls anywhere,” Wade said, trying to sound calm, although he really felt like screaming and punching something over and over. Then he felt a touch on his arm. It was Becca.

“Look, your dad is . . . going to be okay. There were hundreds of witnesses back there. And we have passports and tickets,” she said. “Plus a little bit of cash. The best thing to do is get off at the next stop, wherever that is. Go to the American embassy, or call it first, or whatever, and do our best to explain what’s been happening. We can try to get in touch with Isabella Mercanti from there. If she’s your father’s friend, she’ll help us.”

Wade looked at her. Suddenly, he could breathe again. “Yeah, you’re right. That’s amazing that you could figure all that out. Under pressure and everything.”

Becca sighed. “I have some practice, but never mind that. Are we all agreed?”

Everyone nodded. They found cabin seven, a small room with two facing bench seats with a narrow bed folded up overhead above each one. They sat down, trying to catch their breath as the train picked up more speed. Outside the windows the downtown was diminishing rapidly into suburbs and wooded areas broken by highways. It was a gray day like the day before. Germany was a gray place.

Lily pulled her tablet from her bag and swiped at the screen.

“The next town with an American embassy is a place called Magdeburg. It’s a pretty big city—”

The compartment door jostled suddenly and squeaked open.

“Sorry, zis cabin-zee is taken-zee,” said Darrell.

The door swung wide to reveal two men with flat expressionless faces blocking the way like a pair of oak trees.

“Whoa, what the—” Wade stood.

A third man with a plump red face and badly dyed black hair squeezed between the man-trees. He had a cell phone at his ear.

“Ya,” he said into it. Then he lowered it. “You, show me ticket, now!”

Without thinking, Wade showed him his ticket.

The man barked into the phone. “Bologna.”

At the sound of the word, Wade’s stomach twisted. Why had he simply obeyed the man?

Redface turned the phone around and snapped a picture of them.
Bwip!
A moment later, he said, “Ya!” into the phone again and hung up.

In an accent as thick as peanut butter, the red-faced man with the black helmet hair said, “If you vant to zee your vater Dr. Keplen alife again . . . you vill come viss us. Now.”