Chapters (50)
- Praise
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- EPILOGUE
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- Teaser chapter
“There’s no point in selling any of it, though,” she said. “Not right now. There’s no money for this kind of stuff. Not even the Amis want it. Not yet. I’m waiting for the market to come back. But now”—she toasted me, silently—“now, maybe, I won’t have to wait for the market at all.” She drank some more. “And all I have to do is turn up at this bank and sign a receipt?”
“That’s all. You won’t even have to mention his name.”
“That’s a relief,” she said.
“Just walk in the door and I’ll be waiting for you. We’ll go to a private room and I’ll hand you the cash. Or a banker’s draft, as you prefer. Simple as that.”
“It would be nice to think so,” she said. “But nothing involving money is ever simple.”
“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” I said. “That’s my advice.”
“It’s bad advice, Herr Gunther,” she said. “Think about it. All those veterinary bills if the nag is no good. And let’s not forget what happened to those poor dumb Trojans. Maybe if they had listened to Cassandra instead of Sinon they might have done just that. If they’d looked the Greek gift horse in the mouth they would have seen Odysseus and all his Greek friends huddled inside.” She smiled. “Benefits of a classical education.”
“You have a point,” I said. “But it’s difficult to see how you could do it in this particular case.”
“That’s because you’re just a cop who’s not a cop,” she said. “Oh, I don’t mean to be rude, but maybe if you had a little more imagination you could think of a way for me to get a closer look at the pony you walked in here.”
She removed the roll-up from my fingers and took another short puff on it before extinguishing it in an ashtray. Then she snatched off her glasses and leaned toward me until her mouth was just an inch or two away from mine.
“Open wide,” she said, and opening her lips and teeth, she pressed her luscious mouth against mine.
We were there for quite a while. When she pulled herself back, there was honey in her eyes.
“So what did you discover?” I asked. “Any sign of a Greek hero?”
“I haven’t finished looking,” she said. “Yet.” And standing up she took me by the hand and tugged me up onto my feet.
“Where are we going now?” I asked.
“Helen is taking you into her palace boudoir,” she said.