“Thank you?” I said.

“Wala, I know this is a lot to take in,” Sill said. “I mean, you’ve been here only one day.”

“Do you believe you’re under surveillance?” I asked.

“I most certainly am. I have the house electronically swept every other day. It takes them at least a day to realize that their devices have been neutralized.” He led the way toward the library. “The thing about being a supervillain is that everyone knows about you. That’s sort of what makes it fun. See that painting?” He pointed to a wall in a sitting room.

“The copy of the Mona Lisa?”

“Not a copy. I stole that some five years ago. It’s an unreported theft because it’s so embarrassing for the museum. I stole it in broad daylight. It’s worth more to the Louvre to let me keep it and have everyone believe that such a crime is unimaginable than to possess the real thing. Hell, no one is ever close enough to it to see the difference. What, is some Austrian businessman going to start shouting that it’s a fake? So, better to accept the loss.”

“That’s crazy,” I said.

“I suppose. But true nonetheless. If three million eager tourists learned that they had crowded together in that room last year to get a distant glimpse of a fake, what do you think would happen? It would call into question the authenticity of every work in the museum. Can I sell it? No. I don’t need to sell it. You know what, if you get really close and stare at it for a while, you won’t be so impressed. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a work of genius. Marketing genius.”

“Back to your seafaring activities. What does any of this have to do with Fort Knox?” We stepped into the library and immediately I felt more relaxed. “You can’t very well sail that thing to Kentucky.”

“First of all, you don’t sail a submarine, but you know that. Can’t a man have hobbies? Even a diabolical fiend, such as myself, has to blow off a little steam now and again. Villainy is tough work.”

For some reason my mind turned to Eigen. “Should you check on Eigen? After all, you drugged her.”

“She’s fine. Just a little gamma-hydroxybutyric acid.”

“I’m afraid that means nothing to me.”

“Liquid ecstasy. Though I have to admit with her constitution a glass of champagne would have sufficed.”

“What is your favorite book in here?” I asked, changing the subject.

“You might think it would be my Gutenberg Bible. There are only forty or so of them left and this one is actually the very first one off the press. But it’s not. It’s this Gutenberg, Ars minor by Aelius Donatus. I can’t read a word of Latin and I don’t know who the fuck he was, but this is the first book Gutenberg printed.”

“Stolen?” I asked.

“Of course. I’m a thief, Wala. I stole this from a Russian military base. It had been in a Soviet armory, but it had become home to the Russkiy Voynneyy Dzhaz-bend, pardon my bad Russian. The Russian Military Jazz Band, the official name. They specialized in Gershwin and Goodman.”