Turned to Stone Read online

  The restaurant was a big place, and it had charm: two floors decorated with nautical objects and reproductions of maritime antiquities. The quality of the food, the brisk service, and the friendly owner were among the reasons why the establishment was one of the most popular in the area.

  Jaime sat at one end of the table, some distance away from the others, and enjoyed the flavors and aromas in silence. Back in El Burgo de Osma, he’d vowed to the cow spine that saved his life that he’d go vegetarian. He quickly decided that because prawns and clams had no vertebrae, they were fair game. He felt strangely at ease at this table in a restaurant by the sea, far from his attic apartment in Madrid, sitting alongside a bunch of virtual strangers. For the moment, he could forget all about the void he’d face when this was all over. He wished it didn’t have to end.

  Something the others were saying caught his attention and brought him back to the present.

  “The curse?” Kraniotis said. “Come on, Vicente. You can’t believe all that stuff.”

  “I don’t,” replied Amatriaín. “But it’s something that seems eternally linked to the sculpture. Ask Azcárate.”

  Everyone turned to look at Jaime, who felt a surge of heat in his chest at suddenly becoming the center of attention.

  “Wow, Jaime.” Sonia Durán gave him a wry smile. “You’re an expert in ancient curses?”

  “Me? Not that I know of.”

  “Come on, Azcárate. Don’t be so modest,” Amatriaín said. “You’ve written tons of articles on paranormal phenomena: the temple cat, the Table of Solomon, that thing about Saint Fructus—and of course an article on the curse of Medusa. The extraordinary is your department.”

  “Possibly,” Jaime replied. “But that doesn’t mean I believe in those things. Not all of them, anyway.”

  Professor San Román made a small “O” with her mouth, as if she’d just remembered something. “Wait a minute: it is true. I read something about it. That sculpture carries a terrible curse.”

  “What do you mean?” Andrade asked.

  “I read it—that’s it! In that magazine, Arcadia! Were you the author?” Jaime gave a reluctant nod. “In the article you said that the statue has caused a number of deaths and a lot of misfortune throughout history.”

  “Particularly in recent times.” Amatriaín peeled a prawn with this knife. At no point had he taken off his leather gloves. “From its first owner, Domenico Corsini, up to the security guard at the museum in Verona, there has been a trail of victims. It’s said that the spirit of the gorgon Medusa lives in the statue and brings misery to anyone who gets close to her.

  “In Greek mythology, if you recall, Medusa started out as a beautiful woman who conceived two children with the god Poseidon in a temple devoted to Athena. The goddess didn’t take kindly to the situation and got revenge by turning her into a being so horrible, anyone who looked in her eyes would turn to stone. Perseus, son of Zeus and Danaë, supposedly killed her and cut off her head, and later gave Athena the head to place in the center of her shield.” Amatriaín smiled. “The creature we’re dealing with has been through a lot. It would seem advisable not to provoke her.”

  Several of the others listened to Amatriaín with open mouths.

  “It’s a terrifying story, Vicente,” Kraniotis said in a mocking voice. “Perhaps we should call off the operation?”

  “Of course not, it’s just a legend. But we should be considering things from every angle.”

  “Even superstitious ones?”

  “Even those, Juliun. One thing that’s not based in superstition, however, is the very real death of the security guard at the museum in Verona. It doesn’t make sense, but he insisted he’d seen blue smoke that gradually devoured him—”

  “That shouldn’t really come as a surprise,” Jaime interrupted. “You said yourself that the liqueur he drank was spiked with hallucinogenic mushrooms. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my work, it’s that curses ‘from the other side’ have very tangible causes in the real world.”

  He turned away from the conversation and quickly became lost in his thoughts again, which skipped back and forth between Medusa’s serpents and Paloma’s sleek bob. He looked up as someone sat down beside him.

  “What is it? Are we boring you?”

  His heart raced as he found himself looking into aquamarine eyes and a face that smiled in a cautious but friendly manner. He smiled back. “I was arranging my thoughts in alphabetical order.”

  “I hope you’re not planning your escape. We’re all in this together, you know.”

  “It’s no secret that we all expected this mission to end in disappointment.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m used to working hard without any reward. It’s part of my job description.”

  She spoke with an air of detachment that surprised Jaime. It reminded him somehow of Paloma, whose humanity seemed to fade when she was buried in her work. He was addicted to his job, too, but he also tried to enjoy himself as much as possible. Both women seemed to barricade their responsibilities away from their emotions. “What do you think of the boss?” Sonia lowered her voice so as not to be heard over the murmur of the other conversations.

  “Amatriaín? The job’s too big for him. And his mood changes too much.”

  “The others think so, too. And he doesn’t seem very at ease with Kraniotis.”

  “Inferiority complex?”

  “Rivalry. They get along on the surface, but I think it’s all show.”

  Jaime thought she was probably right. Kraniotis called the shots in the operation, but he did it with style and efficiency. Amatriaín seemed intent on proving at all times that he was the one in charge.

  “Why did you take this job?” Sonia asked. “You don’t seem very happy to be here.”

  “A few reasons. Mostly because my boss asked me to.”

  “I met her a while ago. Laura seems great. What are the others?”

  “The other women?”

  “The other reasons.”

  They laughed and Jaime suddenly felt even less eager for the mission to end. “I don’t know—to break the routine. Because Amatriaín helped me unblock my bathroom. And because I knew you were coming.”

  Sonia’s cheeks reddened. “Is that true?”

  “As true as these clams are delicious.” Jaime figured it best not to continue too far along this path until their work was done, but the prospect of where it might lead certainly was an interesting one. “What about you? What brought you to this end of the Mediterranean?”

  “Like you, the change of scenery. I was tired of spending all my time in that crypt they call an archive.”

  “I can relate.” Jaime’s smile was sincere. “Before I started working at Arcadia I was an intern at the CHR’s library. I still have nightmares about the hours I spent underground searching for books. I went without sunlight for so long, I nearly turned into an insect.”

  “I believe you.”

  Just then Professor San Román called over to Sonia. As his companion excused herself and went back to her seat, Jaime came back to reality.

  After their delicious meal, the restaurant’s owner tried to entice them to sample an herb liqueur, but both Amatriaín and Kraniotis declined the offer, despite the protests of the rest of the team. There was a brief discussion, but in the end professionalism won out over the desire to get drunk, and they headed back toward the ship.

  Jaime’s spirits soared as he enjoyed the sea air, the sparkle from the streetlamps reflected on the water, and especially the company of the woman walking beside him. For now, he needed to focus on his work. But when they returned to Madrid, who knew what might happen? Maybe he’d have good reason to consider disobeying Isidro Requena’s order relating to Sonia Durán.

  The walk was a short one. Sooner than he would’ve liked, they were back at the port and waving at the check
point guard.

  Nobody noticed anything out of the ordinary about the Artemis, but Jaime was struck by the feeling that a dark aura had enveloped the ship, something strange and malevolent that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. The feeling grew as a cloud passed in front of the full moon and obscured it, as if in a Romantic landscape.

  The ominous feeling gave way to cruel reality when they climbed down into the hold. There, they found Rosselli’s container open and part of its cargo spread over the floor.

  Most of the artifacts were gone.

  19

  “Oh my God!” cried Mercedes San Román. “What happened?”

  Kraniotis poked his head into the container and confirmed that it was empty.

  “They’ve taken everything!”

  “Nobody leaves here,” Amatriaín ordered, his face etched with worry. “Azcárate, come with me.”

  Jaime followed him out into the passageway and up the ladder to the upper deck. There, he stepped into Amatriaín’s path, blocking him from going farther. “I suppose now you’ll tell me I was right and we should’ve finished the job instead of going out for dinner?”

  “Damn it, Azcárate. You must promise me you won’t say anything about this.”

  “What about freedom of the press? Are you afraid the public will find out we went on a seafood bender and left the ship unguarded?”

  “Azcárate, don’t play games with me. This is serious.”

  “Calm down. I won’t say anything until we know what happened.”

  “You’d better not. It would be a disaster if the world found out all that artwork was stolen from right under our noses.”

  “Did you see the port guard? He waved at us as if nothing had happened. There’s no way anyone could’ve emptied the hold without alerting him. He’s in it up to his neck.”

  “I agree. Bribery’s rampant here.”

  “Not just here. What surprises me is how fast they emptied the container. Maybe we should search the ship before—”

  Suddenly he realized Amatriaín was looking past him, over his shoulder. In the half-light, Jaime thought he could see the man’s tanned face taking on a yellowish hue. He looked like he was about to be sick. “What is it?”

  Then Jaime saw it, too. He went stiff.

  A bluish smoke was rising up the ladder from the belly of the ship and moving directly toward them. “What’s that?” Jaime asked.

  “I don’t know. Could be steam.”

  “Steam isn’t blue.” Jaime wondered why the rest of the team wasn’t coming out. “Wait here, I’m going down.”

  “Down? We have to sound the alarm. If the thieves are still here—”

  “Can’t you see the others aren’t coming out? The smoke is probably keeping them from finding the exit.”

  “I’m in charge, Azcárate. I won’t let you—”

  Jaime didn’t wait for Amatriaín to finish giving his order. Under cover of the thickening fog that was gathering on deck, he slipped through the hatch. The smoke was even heavier below deck. Jaime retraced his steps until he found the passageway wall and, pressing himself against it, advanced until he reached the door to the hold. He was surprised to find that it was closed now, and even more surprised that there seemed no way to open it.

  Beneath his feet the ground began to vibrate and his limbs felt slightly numb. The trembling grew stronger until it felt as if the whole ship was shaking. He quickly realized what was happening: the engines had been started and the Artemis was beginning to move off in the water. He banged several times on the hold door. “Hey! You in there! Can you hear me?”

  He pushed with all his might, but the door wouldn’t budge. He had felt the same sense of powerlessness when he’d been locked in the walk-in freezer in Casa Genaro, though at the time he’d been fighting to save himself, not to rescue others. He missed Roberto Barrero. If the potbellied security guard were there, he’d smash down the door with his body or take out the bolt with one clean shot. In that moment, Jaime understood that his only hope was to use Amatriaín’s weapon to shoot off the lock. He dashed back up to the deck and was left breathless.

  The Artemis was already sliding past the wharves toward the open sea. Whoever had started the engines was intent on sailing away with both cargo and passengers. Then it hit him: this was more than a curse or a robbery. It was a hijacking!

  He looked around for Amatriaín, but the freighter’s deck, as far as he could see, was deserted. Why hadn’t the police shown up yet? How could they not have noticed a giant cargo ship leaving port in the middle of the night? “Amatriaín!” he bellowed. There was no reply.

  The wharves slipped past impassively. From the front of the ship, Jaime could just make out the lighthouse that marked the entrance to the harbor. Then he heard something to the stern: part human-like cry, part synthesized sound. When he turned his heart gave a leap of joy. Like a sardine swimming after a sperm whale, a little police patrol boat was pursuing the Artemis.

  Jaime climbed onto the railing and gripped it with one hand while waving with the other at the two men in the motorboat. They were screaming through a megaphone, demanding that the ship stop. The freighter was travelling at no more than five knots, and the motorboat overtook it easily. Feeling euphoric, Jaime smiled, shouted, and waved so that the team’s rescuers could see him.

  Suddenly, a yellow trail streaked out from somewhere in the ship, travelling toward the patrol boat. As it struck the boat a tremendous explosion of fire and shattered metal lit up the sky and then rained down into the sea. The motorboat and its occupants had been pulverized in an instant.

  A shockwave hit the Artemis and Jaime fell to the deck, the smile wiped clean off his face. Despair overcame him as he realized that all hope of them being rescued had died with those men.

  Who had launched that projectile? And from where?

  It occurred to him then that screaming like a madman hadn’t been his best idea.

  He heard a gunshot, and a bullet whistled past him. Jaime hit the deck and crawled between two shipping containers. He could make out the sound of a firefight in the direction of the stern. He assumed Amatriaín was trying to keep their attackers at bay until reinforcements arrived.

  When the shooting stopped, he feared the worst. Their assailants might have abandoned ship, an outcome that would warrant another seafood feast. But they could just as easily have killed, wounded, or captured Amatriaín, and Jaime knew that if they had, he would soon meet the same fate.

  How had he ended up in this situation? He was just a journalist who wrote about art!

  It was a question he’d been asking himself for far too many years.

  He was torn between the desire to stay hidden and an impulse to jump overboard. Neither seemed like a good idea. If he stayed put, he would become one of the hostages. If he jumped, he’d be abandoning his colleagues like a yellow-bellied rat.

  He decided to jump. If he was lucky he could reach the shore undetected and get help.

  Before he got to the gunwale, he came across a body. To his relief, it wasn’t Amatriaín’s, but that of a heavily built man dressed in commando gear. Jaime found it reassuring that the EHU officer had eliminated at least one of their adversaries. A pistol lay nearby. Jaime picked it up. Its weight in his hand made him feel more confident, though given his marksmanship, he knew he’d be better off avoiding an encounter with a living enemy.

  He climbed down to the hold and aimed at the door lock, but the sound of creaking timber startled him before he could shoot. Unable to see through the darkness and smoke, he aimed blindly down the passageway. All he could hear was the beating of his heart.

  But he could tell someone was there.

  Driven by some survival instinct, he lifted the pistol the way Roberto had taught him—arms outstretched, knees bent—and pressed the trigger. It was virtually impossible to miss in such tight quarters�
�but still that’s what he did. The sound of footsteps grew louder. He fired again, but this time the pistol made only a metallic click. He was cornered, and he’d run out of bullets. Behind him was the locked hold door, and in front of him, an armed man drawing closer. There was no point in resisting; the ship had left port and soon they’d be on a course to Salamina.

  Jaime could smell gunpowder. A silhouette appeared through the smoke. The figure, dressed entirely in black and wearing a face mask, signaled to him to walk out in front.

  Reluctantly, Jaime let the masked man direct him to the deck with an assault rifle. Along the port gunwale he saw two others holding Amatriaín prisoner. Both wore the same kind of night-vision mask and held the same rifle as his captor.

  What was happening? This reminded him of the video games he played from time to time with Roberto.

  “They’re pirates,” Amatriaín said through clenched teeth. “They want the freighter and all its cargo.”

  Jaime turned and looked at his captor, trying unsuccessfully to make out some feature of the man’s face. Neither he nor the other two men said anything. They must have been trained to remain silent, and they were doing a pretty good job of it.

  “What have you done with the crew and our colleagues? Did you kill them like you did the port police?” said Amatriaín.

  The absence of a reply infuriated him. His eyes blazed. “I demand to know what you’re going to do with us and where you’re taking this ship!”

  One pirate signaled almost imperceptibly with his head and the man nearest Amatriaín dealt him a blow to the stomach with the butt of his rifle.

  Amatriaín’s knees buckled and he fell to the ground, panting.

  Jaime clenched his fists but did nothing. This was no game. For now, his best move was to keep quiet and still.

  The smoke was now enveloping the ship, making it impossible to see anything but dreamlike forms and spectral lights. Jaime weighed their chances of escaping. If there had been a slim possibility before, now there was none. He looked at Amatriaín, who remained lying on the floor, holding his side. He bent and took the EHU officer’s hands in his own, causing him to groan with pain as he pulled him up to a sitting position. Amatriaín then climbed to his feet and nodded his gratitude as he rubbed his stomach where he’d been struck.