her hands. ‘Ugh.’
‘Problems?’
‘Of course. The mayor’s changed the VIP list again. Which means the Secret Service will be calling to yell at me in about five minutes.’
‘You want me to tell ’em you’re a communist?’
‘Don’t tempt me.’
‘Still,’ Eddie said reassuringly, ‘after tomorrow it’s out of your hands and you can stop worrying about it. You just have to fly to Frisco, show off all the stuff from Atlantis, meet the President . . . then you can finally get back to what you really love. Digging bits of old junk out of the ground.’
It was her turn to look offended. ‘Ha ha. Although it will be good to get back to some real archaeological work.’ She glanced at a display case in one corner. ‘Maybe I’ll finally figure out where Prince came from.’
Eddie grinned, going to the case. ‘Prince. That still makes me laugh.’ He peered at the small purple figure within. The statuette, crudely carved from an oddly coloured stone, had been discovered inside the Pyramid of Osiris, but it bore no resemblance to any known artefact from ancient Egypt, and even after five months of analysis nobody at the IHA was any nearer to identifying its origins. ‘Tell you what, give me a hammer drill and ten minutes alone with him, and I’ll find out everything he knows.’
‘I don’t think that approach would get through the peer-review process,’ Nina joked, then she became pensive.
‘What’s up?’
‘Just thinking about the President,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to expect. I mean, the guy was Dalton’s vice-president. He might not be too happy that we forced his boss to resign.’
‘Are you kidding?’ said Eddie. ‘He became the most powerful man in the world because of us. We ought to be on his bloody Christmas card list. Anyway, I thought him and Dalton couldn’t stand each other.’
‘It was something of a party-unity ticket, I suppose. I’m still worried, though.’
‘If he had any problems with us, the Secret Service wouldn’t let us within a mile of him.’
‘You’ve got a point. But I’ll be glad when it’s all over.’
Eddie rounded the desk, leaning over the back of her chair to give her a shoulder massage. ‘You just need to chill out, that’s all. Think of it as getting a free trip to San Francisco. How bad can it be?’
Nina tipped her head back to look up at him. ‘Isn’t that normally what one of us says just before something explodes?’
Eddie laughed. ‘Come on. What are the odds of that?’
3
San Francisco
T he Halliwell Exhibition Hall in the city’s Civic Center district was wreathed in fog, streetlights beyond the glass façade reduced to indistinct UFO-like glows. San Francisco’s notoriously changeable weather had gone from clear, if cold, to completely smothered in barely an hour.
In some ways, Nina wished the fog had descended earlier. That way, Air Force One’s landing might have been delayed, forcing President Leo Cole to change his itinerary. The official opening of the Treasures of Atlantis exhibition was, she was sure, the least important of his three engagements of the night before he embarked on a tour of the Far East prior to the upcoming G20 summit in India. But he was here, accompanied by his family, his political entourage, the press corps and what seemed like several hundred Secret Service agents, impassive eyes constantly sweeping the room.
The speeches had been made - first by Nina, then the mayor of San Francisco, and finally the President himself - and now Cole and his family were being given a personal tour of the exhibits by Rowan Sharpe and Nina. ‘And here,’ she said, indicating one of the display cases, ‘we have an artefact recovered from the Temple of Poseidon: a golden trident.’
Cole nodded appreciatively. ‘A solid gold weapon. I guess Atlantean defence contractors weren’t that different from ours!’ Sycophantic laughter came from his retinue.
Even though she knew he was joking,
‘Problems?’
‘Of course. The mayor’s changed the VIP list again. Which means the Secret Service will be calling to yell at me in about five minutes.’
‘You want me to tell ’em you’re a communist?’
‘Don’t tempt me.’
‘Still,’ Eddie said reassuringly, ‘after tomorrow it’s out of your hands and you can stop worrying about it. You just have to fly to Frisco, show off all the stuff from Atlantis, meet the President . . . then you can finally get back to what you really love. Digging bits of old junk out of the ground.’
It was her turn to look offended. ‘Ha ha. Although it will be good to get back to some real archaeological work.’ She glanced at a display case in one corner. ‘Maybe I’ll finally figure out where Prince came from.’
Eddie grinned, going to the case. ‘Prince. That still makes me laugh.’ He peered at the small purple figure within. The statuette, crudely carved from an oddly coloured stone, had been discovered inside the Pyramid of Osiris, but it bore no resemblance to any known artefact from ancient Egypt, and even after five months of analysis nobody at the IHA was any nearer to identifying its origins. ‘Tell you what, give me a hammer drill and ten minutes alone with him, and I’ll find out everything he knows.’
‘I don’t think that approach would get through the peer-review process,’ Nina joked, then she became pensive.
‘What’s up?’
‘Just thinking about the President,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to expect. I mean, the guy was Dalton’s vice-president. He might not be too happy that we forced his boss to resign.’
‘Are you kidding?’ said Eddie. ‘He became the most powerful man in the world because of us. We ought to be on his bloody Christmas card list. Anyway, I thought him and Dalton couldn’t stand each other.’
‘It was something of a party-unity ticket, I suppose. I’m still worried, though.’
‘If he had any problems with us, the Secret Service wouldn’t let us within a mile of him.’
‘You’ve got a point. But I’ll be glad when it’s all over.’
Eddie rounded the desk, leaning over the back of her chair to give her a shoulder massage. ‘You just need to chill out, that’s all. Think of it as getting a free trip to San Francisco. How bad can it be?’
Nina tipped her head back to look up at him. ‘Isn’t that normally what one of us says just before something explodes?’
Eddie laughed. ‘Come on. What are the odds of that?’
3
San Francisco
T he Halliwell Exhibition Hall in the city’s Civic Center district was wreathed in fog, streetlights beyond the glass façade reduced to indistinct UFO-like glows. San Francisco’s notoriously changeable weather had gone from clear, if cold, to completely smothered in barely an hour.
In some ways, Nina wished the fog had descended earlier. That way, Air Force One’s landing might have been delayed, forcing President Leo Cole to change his itinerary. The official opening of the Treasures of Atlantis exhibition was, she was sure, the least important of his three engagements of the night before he embarked on a tour of the Far East prior to the upcoming G20 summit in India. But he was here, accompanied by his family, his political entourage, the press corps and what seemed like several hundred Secret Service agents, impassive eyes constantly sweeping the room.
The speeches had been made - first by Nina, then the mayor of San Francisco, and finally the President himself - and now Cole and his family were being given a personal tour of the exhibits by Rowan Sharpe and Nina. ‘And here,’ she said, indicating one of the display cases, ‘we have an artefact recovered from the Temple of Poseidon: a golden trident.’
Cole nodded appreciatively. ‘A solid gold weapon. I guess Atlantean defence contractors weren’t that different from ours!’ Sycophantic laughter came from his retinue.
Even though she knew he was joking,
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