The Project 05 - The Tesla Secret

the one that had failed him back in Mexico. Back when Selena was shot. He shook off the thought.
    They went up the stairs single file. The steps ended at a closed wooden door.
    "This feels too easy," Ronnie said.
    "Uh huh," Lamont said. "That's what I was thinking."
    "There could be alarms," Korov said.
    Nick shone his light around the closed door, looking for anything to show the door was wired.
    "I don't see anything. But something doesn't feel right."
    "I had a place like this, I'd have an alarm on the gate." Lamont spoke softly.
    "And someone on the other side of that door," Korov said.
    Nick flicked the selector on his MP-5 to three round bursts. He thought about Selena, paralyzed in a hospital bed because of the man somewhere in this house. As far as he was concerned, everyone here had forfeited the right to presumed innocence. This early in the morning they weren't going to run into the cleaning lady.
    Nick put his hand on the latch and felt the adrenaline begin. He mouthed the count.
    One. Two. Three.
    He opened the door. Nothing happened.
    They stepped into a hallway lit by a single bulb. To the right, the passage ended in a brick wall. To the left, there was a window at the far end and another set of steps.
    The soft rubber soles of their shoes made no noise. The hall floor was paved with large marble tiles in black and white. They moved down the hall, past a side passage to another set of stairs. Looking up, Nick saw a high, plaster ceiling, dimly lit. He climbed, quiet and careful. The others came behind.
    The stairs led to a room big enough for an embassy reception. A second story balcony lined with a railing ran along three sides. More stairs led up to the balcony at each end.
    Brocaded sofas and chairs and antique end tables were scattered about in ordered groupings. Four elaborate crystal chandeliers hung from a ceiling forty feet overhead. The floor was tiled with white marble. Museum lights illuminated oil paintings in gilded frames on the walls, pastoral country scenes and portraits of medieval nobles with malevolent eyes and sharp noses and floppy hats. There were no religious paintings.
    A large white marble fireplace dominated one end of the room. Over the mantle, a single light shone on a larger than life-sized portrait of a hard faced man in a blue pinstripe suit and lavender tie. The man sat in a carved wooden chair that could have been a throne. The artist had caught a gleam of light on the arm of the chair where the man rested his hand. It looked as though he held a butcher knife.
    Foxworth.
    Nick pointed at Ronnie and Lamont, signaled for them to clear the rooms on the left. He pointed at himself and Korov, indicated the right. The first room Nick entered was a dimly lit conservatory with high ceilings and tall French windows, filled with plants of every description. He stepped back out. Across the way Ronnie and Lamont emerged from a doorway and shook their heads.
    They came together at the last room. It was a study and library, rich with leather and wood and soft rugs underfoot. The windows faced out toward the river below. The room was on the far side of the house, away from the boat.
    Nick went to the desk. It was a modern piece, out of place in the library's atmosphere of classic European elegance. He started opening drawers.
    Papers. A bound stack of purple Euro notes. A Walther pistol. Two British passports. Nick glanced at them. One for Foxworth. One for someone named Mandy Atherton. The bottom drawer was locked. Nick used his knife to pry it open. Inside was a brown, tissue-thin envelope with blue writing on it. Nick took it out and opened it. It was a list of names. One of the names was Ogorov's. He showed the paper to Korov.
    "Take a look." His voice was quiet.
    The Russian read the list. "Ogorov. So, he is involved. A traitor." His expression was grim. "This one, Maupassant. That's the name of the French Finance Minister."
    "Yeah. I think we've got what we need."
    Nick heard the scrape of a boot somewhere outside the library. His ear began to throb. He tucked the envelope inside his shirt and signaled. The four men moved silently to the door.
    From where he stood, Nick couldn't see anyone in the main room or on the balcony to the sides. There could be someone on the balcony above the library. He spoke in a whisper.
    "Someone's out there."
    "Guards?" Ronnie said.
    "Maybe. Time to leave."
    "What about Foxworth?"
    Nick patted the paper under his shirt. "We've got proof he's mixed