Gabriel's Horn

A short cab ride later, Annja paid the driver and got out in front of her hotel. She’d chosen to stay in the Old Town where the surroundings were more Gothic than industrial. She loved the older sections of European cities. All she had to do was look at the buildings and she could imagine the wagons, carriages and horses clattering down the cobbled streets. History, hundreds of years of it, was ingrained in the architecture.

Her hotel boasted a collection of gargoyles that perched along the roof and looked ready to swoop down on her. She frowned a little when she realized they made her think of Garin. She didn’t know if it was because they looked like predators or simply devious.

“Are you all right, miss?” the cab driver asked in hesitant English. He held the door open and stood with his cap in his hand.

Jarred back to the present, Annja looked at him. “I am. Thank you.” She reached back into the cab for her backpack. She never went anywhere without it. Her notebook computer, GPS locater, extra batteries, cameras and other electronic equipment, as well as the change of clothes she habitually carried were inside.

She gathered the backpack by the straps and strode up the stone steps leading to the hotel.

“Ah, Miss Creed.”

Barely in the foyer, Annja turned and found one of the hotel’s assistant managers standing there. “Yes, Johan?”

The old man smiled. “You remember my name.” He clapped in delight, then smoothed his long silver mustache with his fingertips.

Annja suspected he was old enough to be her grandfather, but he was thin and elegant and moved like an athlete. His dark suit was immaculate and fit the antique furnishings of the refurbished hotel. Soft yellow light gleamed against the surface of the stone floors.

“You’ve gone out of your way to make my stay here pleasant,” Annja replied. “Of course I’d remember your name.”

“You flatter an old man.” Johan put a hand over his heart.

Annja smiled. During the past few days while she’d been a guest at the hotel, Johan and the other staff had taken good care of her. They’d seemed disappointed that she wasn’t more demanding. As it turned out, several of them were fans of Chasing History’s Monsters.

“There was a bit of a problem while you were gone,” Johan said. He looked a little nervous. “It was most confusing. I was told it was supposed to be a surprise, but I could hardly allow such a thing.”

That troubled Annja a little. “What thing?”

Johan crooked a finger at her and guided her off to the side of the foyer. “The man. I simply couldn’t allow him into your room without you being there.”

“A man tried to get into my room?” Annja thought at once of the men she’d chased. Maybe they had tracked her down.

Johan closed his eyes and shook his head. “Of course not. Had that been so, I would have called hotel security at once, and then the police. The hotel does not put up with such—” he fumbled for an American expression “—shenanigans.”

“Of course.”

“He claimed he was arranged for.”

“Arranged for by whom?”

Johan shook his head. “Why, that is part of the problem. He wouldn’t tell me.”

“What did he want?”

“To dress you.”

That threw Annja off stride. “To dress me?”

“That’s what he said. He said he was arranged for and sent here at his employer’s request. I have his card.”

“The employer’s?”

“No. The man who is here.” Like a magician, Johan’s hand exploded into motion and a card was produced as though he’d plucked it from thin air.

The card was heavily embossed and decorated in an understated manner with pale pink flowers that assured affluence. It had only one word—Gesauldi.

There wasn’t even an address or phone number. Nothing on the card suggested what the man did.

Johan studied her face. “I was hoping that you would know him, Miss Creed.”

“No.” Annja slipped the card into her pocket. “Did he leave?”

Johan shook his head. “I wouldn’t so casually turn away a man such as he.”

“He’s still here?”

“But of course. I put him into a room for the moment.”

“Then let’s go talk to him,” Annja said with a sigh.

6

Gesauldi answered the hotel door but didn’t look happy about it. He had the air of a man who didn’t answer doors, not even his own.

“Mr. Gesauldi,” Johan said. “I present to you Miss Annja Creed.”

Annja had automatically dropped into an L-stance and prepared to defend herself. Lately there hadn’t been many social calls in her life, and danger had dogged her heels. She didn’t think she was being paranoid. She thought more of it as recognizing potential threats.

Gesauldi was slim and elegant, and roughly Annja’s height. His neat black hair was clipped short, and his cheeks looked freshly shaved. His suit fit him like a glove. He looked to be in his late twenties, but her immediate impression of him was that he was older.

“Miss Creed,” he cooed in a soft voice. “I’m enchanted to meet you.” He took her left hand in his.

Annja stopped herself from recoiling as he lifted her hand briefly to brush his lips against the back of her hand. Gently but firmly, she reclaimed her hand.

Gesauldi shifted his attention to Johan. “Could we perhaps have some tea? A nice Chinese green tea with mango or peach would be splendid. And some biscuits if that wouldn’t be too much trouble.” He glanced back at Annja. “After all, we want you in the proper mood for the fitting, or course.”

“What fitting?”

Gesauldi’s eyebrows rose toward his hairline. “Why, for your date tonight.”

Annja took a deep breath. “Did Garin Braden send you?”

Gesauldi lifted his hands and spread his elegant fingers. “Please. I don’t like to bandy names about. Especially when I’ve been asked to keep a confidence.”

Unable to believe what Garin had done, Annja was just about to tell the man politely that she wasn’t interested in being dressed by him. Then she saw the evening dresses on a free-standing clothes rack.

“Was there something you wished to say, Miss Creed?” Gesauldi asked.

Despite her irritation at Garin, Annja was mesmerized by the dresses. “Wow,” she said.