Happy Holidays, jinxed_wood!
Title: The Best Laid Schemes 1/2
Author: Atlanta of the Golden Apples
Written for: jinxed-wood
Characters/Pairings: Methos, Amanda, Joe Dawson, Rebecca, Amy Brennan
Rating: Gen, with a light holiday seasoning of Het and a side of Sapphic Sauce.
Wordcount: 16,000
Author's Notes: Online .pdf notes from Professor William Harris of Middlebury College on variant translations of Sappho and Archilochus influenced this work, but all lyric misuses and errors are my own. Beta readers are from Above and Beyond.
Summary: A lot of work goes into planning a proper caper, whether in ancient Greece or modern France. A lot of discussion. And a lot of bar tabs. The question is, who picks up the bill?
* * * * * *
"Relax, Amanda, we’re going to Le Blues Bar, not the Bastille," Methos promised as he drove the twisting, rain-washed streets of Paris in December. "The statue is still at Rebecca’s old roundhouse. And I still think my plan to steal it is better."
"She belongs with family," Amanda insisted. "There’s a freighter leaving for the St. Lawrence Seaway tomorrow. No one will be looking for her in Canada. The Watchers won’t expect it."
"The Watchers expected the Spanish Inquisition. They probably already have customs agents on Mars."
"It’s been over three years now since Rebecca died," Amanda worried. "I should have taken care of Sappho right away."
"The hiding place stayed secret for two thousand years. After Luther and Stern stirred things up, we couldn’t move it--too many prying eyes. There was no reason to think the Watchers might stumble over it now."
"Sappho is a her, not an ‘it,’ " Amanda said firmly.
"It is a marble statue, not a person," Methos reminded. "It won’t get depressed if we talk about it behind its back."
"So you say, but I’ve seen her face move, if you look long enough."
"Oldest art trick in the book, unless you count Chauvet. But you’ve known that since you lifted your first velvet painting of Joan of Arc."
"At least I stole it from the Vatican," Amanda justified. "Joan deserved better. But this is worse! The abbey’s estate manager said their lawyers found a codicil disposing of ‘Sappho’s statue’ to the Watchers’ asset corporation. It has to be a forgery. I can’t believe it. She would tell me!"
"It is suspicious, on the surface. But she may not have known you survived Luther at the time she wrote it. Time was short. And she didn’t want Luther to realize the significance, either. It would look like a grocery list to the estate executors."
"A grocery list in ancient Attic Greek? Like that didn’t stand out tucked in next to the MasterCard bills." Amanda fumed. "But willing it to the Watchers?"
"She probably knew I’d hear about it. She knew I dipped in and out of the Watchers. In normal circumstances, we’d have centuries to steal it back. We still do, really."
"I refuse to reward their conniving. I hate to see trespassers on her land. You’d have thought the Watchers would be done with the abbey by now."
"Yes. You would," Methos agreed. "I wonder who loosed the hounds."
"We should shake it out of Joe." Amanda forced back a yawn, miffed at her own lapse. "Forget I said that."
"You didn’t sleep on the plane from Montreal, did you? You tend to fret when you’re tired. Joe will have coffee," Methos soothed.
"Don’t make me unpack my sword. I don’t fret. What if Joe doesn’t agree to help rescue the statue?" Amanda fretted. "He didn’t even show up when we tried to liberate the Methuselah stone."
"He didn’t show up because we didn’t ask him to the party. Joe’s a serial busybody--he would have jumped in up to his neck--and probably would have had it slit for interfering. The fact our plans went pear-shaped was not his fault."
"He didn’t help us fight Luther," Amanda pointed out. "You can’t say he didn’t know MacLeod was involved, or that Rebecca was in danger."
Methos winced. "Joe’s had a steep learning curve over the last few years."
"Haven’t we all," Amanda said, in soft apology to the absent.
"Joe’s our best choice for a wheelman at short notice. He’s emotionally invested. And best of all, he has a four-wheel drive. Look at it this way," Methos went on, with a sly half smile. "Rebecca knew MacLeod. Joe knows her chronicle, probably as well as he knows yours. He even watched them back in the seventies, when he was still a properly secret Watcher."
"Hmm. Ew?" Amanda cocked her head, more amused than disdainful. "I’m going to have to review my own contributions to MacLeod’s dance lessons in the disco era. Maybe there’s something I can blackmail Joe with."
"Not unless you caught him on tape singing Saturday Night Fever covers."
"Still, I think I can make him feel guilty enough to support my plan over yours," Amanda checked the finish on her nails. "Care to wager?"
"Poor Joe," Methos said mournfully. "He was a model Watcher, back in the day. Now look at him. Consorting with all manner of Immortal riffraff. Sad state of affairs." Methos glanced over at Amanda. "Are you disappointed at the idea of Joe spying on you, or jealous he also spied on Rebecca and MacLeod canoodling?"
"Jealous, of course," Amanda raised a brow at the thought. "And a little sad. Rebecca and I painted Paris a lurid shade of red in the sixties. We just missed corrupting Joe in his winsome youth. Do you think he regrets missing us?"
"Who wouldn’t?" Methos grinned.
Amanda brightened. "So, technically, Joe’s known Rebecca and me longer than he’s known you. That gives my rescue plan another advantage. We put the statue on a slow boat to Toronto and stash it in the safe room in the townhouse."
"Advantage still mine, I believe," Methos countered. "I took a bullet for him, once."
"So did I! More than one. O’Reilly’s henchmen were terrible shots. And I have lineage on my side. I was Rebecca’s student."
‘My plan is more logical. Joe’s a logical man." Methos accelerated on a straight section of the road, splashing puddles. "The Swiss armory that houses my gallery is closer. And I knew Rebecca longer than she knew you. I should get first crack at reclaiming the statue. Age before beauty."
"That’s your logic? After the first thousand years, that age argument gets a little stale," Amanda said pointedly. "Besides, I don’t remember Rebecca telling me she knew you on Lesvos. It’s not like meeting one of the former Horsemen would slip her mind."
Methos downshifted, taking a sharp corner. "Reputation can be one’s own worst enemy. I introduced myself as an aspiring poet, and itinerant Immortal, nothing more. I used to follow Sappho and Alcaeus around like a puppy. I practically invented fan worship."
"First Fanboy of the Apocalypse?" Amanda shuddered.
"It could have been worse. Look at the Dionysians. No sense of humor at all when it came to auditing mysteries."
"Drive faster," Amanda urged. "Rebecca’s gamekeeper said he recognized one of her old Watchers lurking on the rail spur near the abbey. What if they’ve already found it? We don’t have a lot of time."
"The Watchers will have their hands full with this storm," Methos said calmly. But he also drove faster.
Amanda crossed her arms against the winter chill. "Bad as the Watchers are, I’m more worried about the rumor that the Sappho statue still exists. The antiquities collectors would go crazy. And the reparation lawyers. Moving her across borders would be a nightmare. In a few days, weeks at the outside, she couldn’t safely travel anywhere."
"True, but if the statue isn’t found, we can launch rumors of our own about a fake," Methos said. "We’re still way ahead. They won’t be searching for it at this time of night, in this weather." He hoped not, anyway. Any delay might give him time to bring in his own agents, and make the move to Switzerland a fait accompli.
"What if Joe’s not at the bar?" Amanda was back to fretting.
"Where else would he be? When MacLeod goes on a meditation binge, Joe counterprograms with long, lonely, late night solos at the bar. It’s all very yin and yang of them."
"Your yin-yang will hear about it if you’re wrong," Amanda warned as they pulled into the empty parking area in front of Le Blues Bar, only an hour after closing. She picked the lock and blew into the bar, an Aeolian gust of fresh air, clearing the lingering fust of wine corks and beer taps. Methos followed closely, the tail of his dun duster whirling, her shadow’s shadow.
The stage was backlit, familiar to the point of homesickness, Joe under the spot picking out the counterpoint to the melody of a sad love song. Amanda pulled up short when she saw Joe was sharing the stage with a woman, half his age, with hair the color of dark honey. "Who is that?" she asked Methos through thinned lips. "He’s involved with someone. You should have told me. This might change our plans."
"The gentleman never tells," Methos said righteously. "But I will. Romance is the farthest thing from Joe’s mind. Sadly for him, that woman is all business. Which means we should keep our own proposals quiet until she’s gone."
"If Joe picks my plan, I get the bed, you get the couch."
Methos rose to the bait. "And if he picks my plan?"
"I get the bed, Joe gets the couch, and you get to go out in the rain and steal a one ton statue."
* * * * * * * *
"They’re here early," Amy Brennan-Thomas hissed. "Amanda must have slipped her Watcher. Again. And you never keep a proper watch on that man."
"It’s what she does. And he’s not safe to chronicle at the best of times," Joe didn’t stop picking out his melody, though he kept his voice low and turned his face away from the microphone to reply. "We just advance the calendar. That is, if you’re still game."
"It’s not a game, Joe." Amy responded in a forceful whisper, while she busied herself coiling stray cords and other trip hazards on the stage. "The organization is just looking for just one misstep to come down on you like an avalanche."
"It’s all a game," Joe said softly, his expression unchanging, but the blue notes hanging in the air turned just a shade bluer. "You can back out now. The legwork is almost done."
"Funny. It’s crossed my mind. But I’m not the one in the line of fire, trying to pull the wool over the eyes of two of the canniest Immortals on the planet. She’s putting you in a bad position, Joe."
Joe studied his fingering, picking a complicated countermelody. "She’s worth it."
Amy sighed. "My mother warned me you had a tendency to fall in love with your work. Remember, we need ten hours, minimum."
"I’ll delay them," Joe promised. He stepped down his tempo, dragging on a chord.
"How?" Amy gathered up her bag and raincoat and stood, her will wavering.
"I’ll sing. If necessary, I’ll dance. And in a pinch, I’ll lie my ass off."
"Like that’s worked so well in the past," Amy pointed out, flicking a glance at Methos, slouching at the bar across the room. "He’s smirking. I know it," she added under her breath.
"Apparently irony is a genetic flaw in our family," Joe’s eyes danced. "My mother should have warned me." He bent a note to its breaking point before bringing it back into the fold of the melody. "I’m trusting you to watch out for her for me, if this goes south."
"Don’t you smirk at me, too. I swear you’ve fallen in love with that woman. Just like MacLeod, she’s leading you astray. You’re incorrigible."
"I love you too," Joe added a patiently amused riff.
"Ten hours. What if they figure it out too soon?"
"Well, then I’ll deal with the fallout. Amanda won’t hurt you."
"It’s not Amanda I’m worried about," Amy said, shooting a worried glance at the two Immortals patiently watching Joe play from the far side of the bar.
"There’s still time to introduce you to her. That might make a difference, down the line."
"I’m still my mother’s daughter, Joe. And we come from a very long line of Brennans that don’t talk to their Immortals."
"Speaking of women who led me astray?" Joe laughed at himself, and wound up his melody with a final azure sting. Pushing himself up, he stiffly descended from the stage as Amy hovered. Nettled at her solicitude, Joe shepherded her to the back door and out into the black winter storm beyond. "Be careful. It’s starting to ice up out there."
"All part of the romance of being a Watcher. It’s in the brochure." She shivered as a wind gust rattled the bar windows.
"You’ll be in sunny Mytilene in no time. Say hello to your archaeologist boyfriend for me."
"Costas is not my boyfriend. Lucky for him. Imagine having you as a father-in-law."
"Imagine me at a Greek wedding," Joe grinned, gripping his chest. "One to the heart. That’s all Eros needs."
"I got an ‘A’ in Archery at the academy. Don’t make me shoot you," Amy grabbed Joe’s lapels and shook him, very gently. "You be careful. I’m still just getting used to having you around."
* * * * * * * *
Joe locked up the back door and ambled behind the bar, picking up a shot glass. "Sorry about the slow service." Automatically, he set up mugs of coffee from the pot warming behind the bar to cut the chill. "What else can I pour you tonight? It ain’t a fit night out for man nor beast."
"Speaking of beasts, I have a bone to pick with you, Joe," Amanda announced, wrapping her hands around the mug and planting herself at the cash register near the office. Methos ignored the coffee and meandered around the end of the bar nearer the door, hemming the bartender in his lair.
"The right bone, I hope," Joe answered, fencing, not flirting. He put down an over-polished glass and surveyed the bar floor. The tables were cleared, but his guitar was still propped on the stage. He edged around Amanda. "I should put away my gear."
Amanda took advantage of his inattention to steal a kiss, sighing when he pulled away, red and ruffled. "Defenses up, drawbridges raised, that’s no way to court a lady, Joe. Especially now that Duncan is celibate again, and my calendar is open."
"That’s not what you told me," Methos teased, earning a glare from them both, which bounced off as he turned his total attention to inspecting the beer mugs.
"Timing is everything," Joe apologized to Amanda, clearly not taking her offer seriously.
"Then you are involved with someone," Amanda challenged. "Who was that woman, Joe?"
"She might try out for new lead singer," he replied in a carefully neutral voice.
"She’s a Watcher, not a diva," Methos contradicted as he commandeered a tap to pour a burly stout. "Tell her not to quit her day job."
"I think you paid more attention to her than to me," Amanda said with a teasing smile. "I hope you have designs."
"Busted. Pretty, isn’t she?" Joe openly bluffed. "Do you like her?"
"Don’t believe his puppy dog eyes, Amanda," Methos interrupted, "especially when they crinkle in the corner like that. Joe doesn’t date on the job. Any more. I consider it a character flaw." Methos picked out a roomy mug and scrutinized the taps as if he’d never seen them before.
"Amy’s here to keep an eye on the Watchers investment in the bar, so ease up on the pour, willya? You’re cutting into the margin," Joe conceded, lying only a little. Just to be contrary, he poured Amanda an expensive snifter of brandy from the top shelf to complement her coffee. "There are no designs. Hell no. That gal is out of my league."
"What is this ‘league’ you speak of?" Amanda dismissed airily. "Like the honeyapple turning red on the high branch?"
Joe caught the Sapphic quote and ran with it, bending his full attention upon the immortal Amanda. "High on the highest, the apple pickers missed it. But no, they did not miss it." He extended a guitar-scuffed finger as if to brush away a stray lock, but shook his head and withdrew his hand, without even the barest touch. "They could not reach it."
"Oh!" Amanda’s breath caught on the fragment’s finish, hearing the poet’s heart in the singer’s voice. She placed her nimble fingers over Joe’s knurled knuckles where they balanced on the bar. "Thank you. So few people sing Sappho these days."
"Greek is not on your resume, Joe," Methos peered at him, puzzled.
"Every other year they had Greek 101 back in high school, and Father Frank made us memorize bits and couplets," Joe waved it off, slipping his hand from under her warm touch. "There’s so few lyrics left, they were easy to memorize. I didn’t get the uncensored meaning until I moved to Paris, or I would have learned more verbs. But what about you, Amanda? I know Rebecca had Attic Greek, but that was a little before your time."
Amanda’s eyes glittered with mischief. "You could say I learned in Paris as well. Rebecca’s abbey, at least, close enough. Rebecca used Sappho to bait me into learning Greek. She tricked me into declining."
"Declining or reclining?" Methos murmured into his ale. Amanda didn’t deign to reply, or deny. Da Vinci would have appreciated her smile.
"My favorite way to learn conjugation," Joe’s eyes caught the amber stage lights as he warmed to the concept. "Listening to Rebecca teach Sappho would have motivated the hell out of me."
"When you’re ready for a refresher course, just whistle," Amanda pursed her lips, warming more than Joe’s concepts.
"Can’t you just taste the apple?" Methos intruded cheekily, his chin sticking over Joe’s shoulder. "Do you know why Joe doesn’t date on the job, Amanda? Especially that particular woman? There’s an interesting story behind that..."
Joe rapidly pulled out of his poetic reverie, pushing off the bar and bouncing back into his chest. "Watch it, bud," Joe growled, contrarily trusting Methos to catch him before he passed the tipping point.
"The point being, you’re wise to be careful of your amours," Methos admonished, smoothly steadying them both. Moving his stout to safety, he declaimed, " ‘...the desire of love-making weaving itself under the heart pours a thick cloud over your eyes, stealing the delicate wits right out of your breast.’"
Amanda and Joe drew away from Methos as if he had sprouted cooties. "Archilochus? Seriously? In the presence of a lady?" Joe objected. "Not in my bar."
"A lady? Where?" Methos looked about wildly. "Not in your bar," he mimicked, unashamed.
"Archilochus was a cheating, conniving, cowardly, clod of shit," Amanda stated with ladylike distinction. Her words were so distinct that now Joe edged back from the bar away from both Immortals until he ran into the glass rack. "And he was a cynical cad. The kind of man to make any self-respecting lady to swear off men for a century."
"Most soldiers were, in those days. These days, too. Honor is rare, which is why it’s a cause for celebration," Methos shrugged, meeting Joe’s eyes, not Amanda’s. "But Archilochus knew how to turn a phrase as well as he could turn a sword. And those who followed his survival tips tended to...survive. In fact, I won many a free night’s spree declaiming his soldierly verses to armed drunks."
"I’ve been undercharging," Joe muttered to himself. "From now on, this armed drunk demands a stanza a beer."
"Archilochus was a good bit before your time, young Amanda," Methos chipped in hurriedly, before Joe started totting up bar bills. "Why rail at a poet you never knew?"
"Rebecca told me all about him," Amanda sniffed. "He was a troll. And a stalker. He used his poetry to hound and humiliate his former lovers. A total jerk."
"Granted, he didn’t do Eros well," Methos admitted, allowing an echo of hollow regret to tinge his words. "Archilochus treated love like any other form of battle, and he was a sore loser. Ares and Apollo blessed him for a while, but Aphrodite turned her face."
"‘I have one good friend, one good enemy, and my fine ash spear...’, " Joe quoted, his attention drifting into a dark memory.
"You have two good friends standing right here, Joe," Amanda set him straight.
Methos did not demur, but merely turned to pour Joe a glass of his private stock from under the bar. "Sharpen your spear, keep an eye on the enemy, and we’ll tell you why we’re here," he said, holding his glass up for a toast.
"The enemy?" Joe returned the toast, looked around, focused on the empty stage, and then closed his eyes. "Shit. What did the Watchers do this time?" he asked. "Does it have something to do with the classical turn of the conversation?"
"Like Archilochus, you spot the rhythms in people," Methos beamed.
Suspicious of cryptic Methic utterances at the best of times, Joe turned to Amanda. "What am I sharpening my fine ash spear for this time?"
"The Watchers are stealing Sappho, Joe. We want her back."
* * * * * * * *
"Sappho. The poet. ‘Songs that break the heart of the earth.’ That Sappho." Joe dropped his eyes, grabbed a towel, and started cleaning nonexistent rings from the bar top. "By most accounts, she lived to the ripe old age of seventy or so, and died, what, 2,600 years ago? Unless you know something I don’t. Not that that isn’t the normal state of affairs around here."
"Sappho. The statue." Amanda clarified. "Rebecca commissioned the sculptor Silanion to create the statue and plinth, and had her erected in Syracuse."
"What happened to Sappho’s academy on Lesvos? Shouldn’t the statue have been placed there?" Joe asked, scrabbling for a pen.
"The Persians happened," Methos said. "Often. And the Sidonians. The Thessalonians. The Romans. Sappho’s academy was razed, and Rebecca’s villa near Mytilene abandoned for years at a time. Wars are hell on the muses, Joe."
"Tell me about it," Joe said, meeting Methos’ eye until he copped a clue. "Meanwhile, back in Syracuse..."
"Meanwhile, back in Syracuse," Methos quickly continued, "Rebecca was running a school teaching the science and economics of entertainment and seduction, to wayward girls, if I remember correctly."
"It was an academy of the arts for female artists, sculptors and poets, I’ll have you know," Amanda shot back. "Professional hetairae."
"There’s a difference?"
Joe, who was taking notes on a bar tab, lightly punched Methos in the shoulder. "Shut up. I want to hear this."
"You already know this next part, Joe," Methos rubbed his arm as if gravely wounded. "It’s on Wikipedia, gods help us. The Syracuse town fathers erected the statue in honor of the poet and Aphrodite. It was quite the attraction for years. Even the Romans honored the poetry. Until it was stolen."
Amanda ticked down the provenance with professional thrift of words. "To cut to the chase: around 70 BCE the statue was stolen by a light-fingered Roman politician named Gaius Verres after Cicero exposed his high crimes and misdemeanors in office. All he left behind was the footing that identified the statue as Sappho. Anyway, no one mourned when Verres was murdered, but art historians all say the statue was never recovered."
"For given definitions of ‘recovery’," Methos stretched to top off his ale. "Rebecca called Verres a creep, even by late Roman standards. We both agreed he got his just dessert."
"Did you kill him, or Rebecca? She wouldn’t tell me," Amanda asked tentatively, as if she were not sure if she wanted to know the answer.
"You’re probably tired of me saying the times were different. But they were. And the circumstances might matter, now." Methos turned his attention inward, searching through his flooded memories. "We planned the raid by the Persian method. It went well. Too well, really…."
* * * * * * * *
"At ease, Alcaeus," Methos checked his much-scarred stallion, who was misbehaving in the presence of Rebecca’s well-mannered mare.
"You named your horse after Alcaeus of Eressus?" Rebecca laughed.
"It fits. He’s poetry in motion, and he’ll try to mount anything that moves, cheerfully including other studs. I swear his tail grows bald, I use so much horsehair sewing him up after his romantic adventures."
"That’s Alcaeus, all right," Rebecca said, shading her eyes as their small caravan approached a well-appointed villa with well-guarded walls. "Cloaks over your weapons, now," she commanded her household escort, a dozen trusted mercenaries long in her employ, but now dressed as cart drivers, clients, and most uncomfortably, household slaves. "All but you, Cousin. Verres will expect an aristocrat to carry a sword, and a single swordsman will look more like an opportunity, than a threat."
"I think I invented that ploy in Troy," Methos boasted.
"On which side?" Rebecca asked, concealing her own short sword and long knife under a cloak of the finest cloth from the Indus Valley.
"Both. Twenty years is a lot of time not to get killed in a war. I changed sides a few times. The Greek camp was nicer in summer, cool breezes off the water, fresh fish. But Troy was warmer in winter. Braziers, a calderium, real beds."
"We’ll sleep in a real bed tonight, if our plan works," Rebecca promised, and she rode forward and hailed the gate, making an earnest and innocent appeal for entry, aristocrat to aristocrat, a fellow traveler soon to be benighted on the road.
Methos followed, every inch her cousin/escort/protector, deliberately not taking notice of archers hidden behind the walls, or a small squad of Scythians tending the corrals, who eyed their horses hungrily. He was the layabout cousin of fair Rebecca, he decided, an aunt’s second son, unintelligent, bored, lazy.
Vain, even. Absently, he polished the pommel of his sword, making Rebecca repress a laugh.
The gates opened, and the Scythians followed them in, intent on trapping the caravan within the walls and stripping its goods at their leisure for their master Verres, the former Roman governor, career seducer and thief.
As the Scythians turned to pull the gates closed, Rebecca’s disguised household guard fell upon them, pinning them without pity to the oaken frame. The archers above, shaken at the sudden attack, shot poorly, and scattered screaming as Methos rode at the wall, drew his feet up so he crouched on Alcaeus’ wide croup, and vaulted among them, hewing unhindered.
In mere minutes as measured by the sundial, the villa was theirs.
Methos surveyed the inner courtyard, but no more enemies threatened. Servants and slaves hid behind the well, or milled about among a throng of statuary strewn haphazardly about the yard, undignified and unkempt. "Cicero was right. Verres truly does have issues with womankind. Would you like me to behead him for you, Rebecca?" Methos offered cheerfully. "The man has no proper appreciation for art."
"Beheading may be too swift a justice."
Unarmed clients and slaves shrank away as Rebecca approached the janitor that crouched at the door to the master’s dwelling. He trembled as he barred the way with a staff. Verres had chained the man in place. "Open the door, ostiarius," she commanded.
"Verres will kill me if I do," the janitor replied, "and all the slaves within."
"Are there many slaves within? Many more than, say, Verres?" Rebecca asked sweetly.
"...Yes," the janitor answered, eyeing Methos’ bloodied sword as he joined Rebecca.
"Just kill the janitor and force the door," he said laconically. "It’s sunset, and I’m hungry. Besides, you promised a real bed for us tonight," Methos managed not to leer. Rebecca didn’t appreciate the finer points of leering.
"I’ll reward any slave who captures Verres for me with a place in my household, and a promise of manumission," Rebecca stated in a voice loud enough to be heard throughout the villa. There was a short silence, then a sinister rattling from behind the dwelling door.
"Silanion’s Sappho is here, but we’re going to have to put this lot to scrubbing her down," Methos said, raising his voice over a shrill cry from within. "I’m not sure if there is a Latin name yet for Verres’ fetish, but it’s vile."
"Load her in the wagon," Rebecca ordered, green-faced and grim. "There’s clean spring water a league away from the stink of this buzzard nest."
Methos chivvied Verres’ servants along, mainly by blatantly cleaning his blade on the nearest wool tunic if they moved too slowly. "Stop! Load that one, too!" he commanded, ignoring many surrounding gods and godlets set to stone to have a lowly bust rescued from a midden heap. "No, don’t clean it, just wrap it up," he added, stealing a bloodied Scythian cape to throw over the short marble column.
"One of your triumphs?"
"One of my miscalculations. Who would have thought a simple bust carving would be so...so…"
"Permanent?" Rebecca offered, eyes merry.
"Pride goeth before a peccadillo. Marble busts should have gone out of fashion centuries ago. You can’t trust the mortals to properly lose something, when you want them to."
"Or save it when you need," Rebecca added, increasingly dismayed at the damaged art surrounding them.
"I will offer the bust to Poseidon to calm the wine-dark sea when we make the crossing back to Lesvos," Methos said with a theatrical touch of regret and sacrifice.
"Best wait till we make Mytilene harbor," Rebecca said, unimpressed. "Just in case Poseidon laughs his ass off and dumps us all into his lap. We’ll at least be able to swim to shore." She checked the twilight sky, reassured to see the full moon rise behind the villa. "We’ll travel by moonlight. I want to get out of here, now. We can leave a discreet word for Cicero to rescue the rest of the statues--this lot has no love for them."
"No bed?" Methos asked, piteously, just before the door opened behind the janitor, and a large, misshapen lump was rolled out. Rebecca and Methos stepped back, fastidiously drawing their cloaks away from the carnage.
"Definitely, no bed. I do not trust slaves or free clients that can turn so quickly on their master, even an evil one." Rebecca’s face was set as hard as Silanion’s marble as she turned her back on Verres and mounted her mare. "Who knows what other vermin this vermin Verres harbored?"
Methos scratched his ribs. "Let’s not linger and find out."
* * * * * * * *
"I think Rebecca felt a little guilty about Verres, or at least for letting the slaves do the deed, rather than cleanly killing him herself," Methos remarked to Amanda. "The household tore him apart, which marked them as outlaws, and fair game for slaughter if they were caught. We headed for the nearest port for the same reason."
"Sailed off into the moonrise, did you?" Joe asked, still taking notes. "Or do I write ‘Beat a hasty retreat?’ "
"Verres was not a nice man, and did not come to a nice end, but he was once a Roman governor, and the powers that be didn’t cotton to aristocratic assassination. Either version works. Maybe make it more like a spaghetti western, only I got the girl in the end."
"Sergio Leone it is," Joe said equably, making a note.
"The table must have been bare, Methos, if Rebecca settled for you," Amanda sniffed.
"We had an agreeable partnership at the time, after a rocky start. Sappho quite literally kept us from beheading each other once, when we came to blows about some filthy lyric of Alcaeus’," Methos said, unoffended. "Sappho taught me how to make life new, again. Her lyrics made men and women think differently, even Immortals. I see her in art everywhere, even now. Still new."
"And that’s why you sailed half the Mediterranean to save her statue?" Joe questioned quietly.
"Rebecca could talk me into all sorts of trouble," Methos said with a sly grin. "But beyond the obvious, at the time, we both shared a certain devotion to preserving the arts of our youth. Every Immortal goes through a hoarding stage. Some never get over it."
"So, Mr. Hipster-Beyond-Hoarding-Instincts, why the sudden interest in the statue now?" Joe asked, the very model of reasonable inquiry. "And remember, I’ve seen your cellar."
"Would you believe nostalgia?" Methos said lightly.
Joe tapped his pen on the bar pad, letting silence stretch as he gave the question serious consideration. Finally, he nodded. "Yes."
Defenses oddly undermined, Methos stepped back and raised his beer in a silent toast, not quite mustering irony.
"So you took the statues back to Lesvos?" Joe prompted, back to business. "What happened then?"
"I dropped Silanion’s bust into the foamy brine. That should have been the end of that."
"But it wasn’t," Joe guessed, frowning in thought.
"Don’t jump ahead," Methos ordered. "Rebecca created a small shrine to Aphrodite out in the lava beds, away from prying eyes, and decorated it with Sappho’s statue. Facing east, a nice little volcanic vent, very tasteful. It even attracted a proper cult. Did I ever tell you that Lesvos is volcanic? Lava beds, lava tubes, lava domes, petrified forests. Did I mention lava?"
"Your point, Methos? We’re on a mission, here," Amanda reminded, checking her watch.
"The point being, after another invasion or three, not to mention the spectacle Pompeii made of itself a few decades later, I thought Sappho might benefit from a change of scenery, to some place less likely to be invaded, buried, or blown to smithereens."
"And you didn’t check with Rebecca," Amanda reproved. "You didn’t even leave a note."
"What would it say? The Persians are coming! The Persians are coming!" Methos temporized. "I couldn’t dial up the nearest Delphic oracle and leave voicemail, could I? Besides, she returned tit for tat."
"How?" Joe asked, grabbing another stack of blank bar checks.
"Oh, this one I’ve heard. Rebecca loved this story. She just told it with an alias, ‘Alcaeus’ Ass,’" Amanda purred, while Methos managed to look almost embarrassed. "You remember Methos’ own personal polished pillar? Rebecca told me they dropped it off the prow of the bireme just before they docked in Mytilene. When Rebecca came back to Lesvos and heard Methos had absconded with Sappho, she walked out into the sea, attached a line, and winched in the bust. Then she gave it to Sappho’s cult and told them to keep watch for him until the sea boiled and the sun went dark. The next time Alcaeus’ Ass visited Mytilene, he was swarmed."
"Hey, that wasn’t funny! You try outrunning a whole pack of pre-modern protestant Dionysians armed with cheese knives, crazed on moonshine retsina and religion."
Joe snickered. "Yeah, that’s funny."
"Hey, I gave Rebecca the Sappho back! With improvements, even. A new plinth. Sacks of ochre for her paints."
"On Lesvos?" Joe asked, the chronicler in him worrying at the threads, teasing out the story.
"I found her summering in Hibernia. She eventually came around to my way of thinking without beheading me, and we wandered up the Seine to visit the Parisii in Lutetia. Sappho has graced her halls and hideaways there ever since."
"What happened to change Rebecca’s mind and abandon the shrine?" Joe prodded. "And what happened to your bust?"
"The usual. The seas boiled. The sun went dark. Earthquakes. The shrine collapsed, burying the bust and altar stone forever, no doubt to the delight of a few pesky new religions. You know the type. And then more Persians. Or Romans. Or Carthaginians. I forget."
"You never forget," Joe said, a contrary edge creeping into his tone. "Maybe you could mine your memory for Sappho’s lost poems, some fine day. You know. To preserve the arts."
"I do believe I detect an air of avarice, Joe," Methos peered at him. "Poetry is your price? I can work with that."
"There’s just a few scraps left of Sappho’s lyrics. There were once a dozen scrolls. You could bring her to life, again."
"Make the mortal immortal, Joe? Are you sure that’s wise?"
"I’m sure ‘wise’ isn’t your foremost consideration. Just how much beer would it take, Philistine?"
"You could start a brewery," Methos said helpfully. "I know a lovely Philistinian recipe."
Amanda cut in before the both of them picked up steam. "Don’t let him tease you, Joe. And stop delaying, Methos. Time is wasting."
Backing down, Joe looked over his shoulder at the bar clock. "4:00 am. Just the shank of the evening. There’s no point in going out in the storm until the roads are sanded. I prefer not to make my worldly exit freezing in some ditch." Joe checked his notes. "Tell me something else. What did you mean, you ‘planned the raid by the Persian method?’ "
"An old ploy of Xerxes’s. Or Darius. Or mine. I do forget, sometimes," Methos insisted. "The king and his generals would get roaring drunk and hatch a battle plan, then go to bed. Then they’d go over it again in the morning, sober as hungover judges. If they still liked the plan, they’d attack. If it didn’t pass muster, they’d make another plan. The catch was, they had to get drunk and go over the plan again, before putting it in gear. Just think of it as Classical Strategy and Tactics 101."
"Whether that’s real down-and-dirty history or Herodotus in his cups, it sounds like a plan to me," Joe said, rearranging his notes, and wincing slightly, reaching for his coffee and chasing it with something stronger. "I’ve hatched some of my worst ideas stone cold sober."
"That, I remember," Methos said archly. "Getting tired, Joe?"
"Pipe down in the peanut gallery, and pour. How about we grab a table?" Joe gave all his attention to Amanda, and held out his arm, channeling his inner gentleman.
While Methos amiably refreshed their beverages, Amanda linked her arm with Joe’s, leading him to a seat, and as he eased the weight off his legs, she leaned in close. Very close. "You wouldn’t be trying to delay me, too, would you?" she asked, her lips very close to his ear. Very close. "Because that would be very disappointing to me."
Joe ran his hand through his hair. "I wouldn’t want to disappoint you, no," he echoed. "But honestly? What do you want me to do? I don’t even know, precisely, where to find the statue."
"Oh, but I do. I just need your help to move it."
"My help?" Joe said, genuinely puzzled. "To move Rebecca’s statue? How? Where?"
"To Toronto."
"Switzerland!" Methos called out from the bar.
Amanda ignored him. "I’ve got the freighter all lined up. But I need to get the statue to the docks before those pot-hunting, legacy-thieving Watchers get their hands on it, or worse, close the ports and let the lawyers step in."
"I hate to burst your bubble, but I’m not exactly a mover and shaker in the organization these days, darling." Joe looked down and away. "Firing squads and demonic possessions turn out to be bad career milestones."
"Oh, but you have reputation, Joe," Amanda twirled her finger around his ear, making him twitch. "A vast reputation. You’re the man who survived hails of bullets! Millennial demons! And twenty five years watching MacLeod! People are awed! They listen to you. You have contacts."
"Yeah, yeah, all due to my supernatural powers of worldwide hoodwinking," Joe grumped. "I wish. If I was that good, I’d practice on you."
"That’s our Joe, ever the skeptic, but always aiming for new heights," Methos said in approval as he slid beer, brandy and bourbon onto the table. "We can always count on you to blow holes in our vision statement. What do you think Joe should tell the Watchers, Amanda?"
"That’s what we’re here to figure out," Amanda confessed.
"Right. I call headquarters up and tell them, ‘Look! Amanda is stealing Sappho!’ I send the Watchers on a merry goose chase to Lichtenstein after a fake statue. All the while I’m sitting in a truck playing lookout and wheelman for you two while you dig up the real statue and ferry her out of the country." Joe took a long breath, and a longer drink.
Methos and Amanda looked at each other, and nodded.
"It sounds like a plan," Methos observed.
"I could work with that," Amanda said calmly. "Now, the details."
"The details," Methos agreed. "The devil is always in the details. I’ve got a map to Switzerland in the car."
Amanda took back the reins. "We need you to drive us to Rebecca’s roundhouse, Joe. It’s an old locomotive repair shop on a siding near the abbey. Rebecca built it when steam engines came into vogue, and ran it until the diesels made it obsolete."
"The statue’s just sitting in the roundhouse?" Joe objected. "Isn’t that a little...obvious? You’d think someone would notice."
"Not in. Under. Hidden in an old priest’s hole, under the spur tracks themselves. The roundhouse stands on the site of an old chapel, which is on the site of an old barrow, and who knows what else. Rebecca was an early recycler," Amanda unsuccessfully stifled a yawn as she meandered off topic. "Sorry. Jet lag isn’t just for mortals."
"Too bad we can’t just fire up the locomotive and load up the train car, blow right through the Watchers like Butch and Cassidy," Methos said nostalgically. "Those were the days. Could you call the Watchers to clear the line, Joe?"
"Who do I look like, E. H. Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad?" Joe snarked back.
"It would take months to clear the paperwork on the permits," Amanda muttered as she sketched the roundhouse on one of Joe’s bar tabs. "If we ran an unscheduled train on the national line without a pass, the government, Interpol, NATO and the French Foreign Legion will come down on us like Greek fire."
"And the unions. Don’t forget the unions," Joe chipped in.
"We can back the Jeep into the roundhouse. There’s a concealed trap door under the thirteenth railroad tie from the end. We’ll have to bring a crowbar to get in. Two. A crate and padding. Winch and pulley, with padded slings. I have what we need in my work storage here in town."
"The thirteenth railroad tie?" Joe confirmed, writing furiously.
"From the east end of the track. Rebecca called it her lucky number."
"Of course it was," Joe said dubiously. "Why the trap door, may I ask? It would seem safer to just pave it over or something."
"Rebecca and I used it in the war when the Germans took over the railroads. We’d hide below, and then hitch a ride on the Nazi art trains or arms shipments, wait until the train moved up the line to another siding, then loot to our heart’s desire."
"You know I want the full story, someday," Joe promised.
"Train robbery, it’s a lost art, Joe." Amanda yawned again, this time dragging Joe into imitation.
"Stop that, or I’ll fall asleep in my whisky. Listen. I need to make a call or three that you don’t need to overhear, just to start some early rumors that won’t get traced back to me. In the meantime, we’re going nowhere until the ice storm lets up. If you want a pre-burglary nap to dream up some new details, Amanda, my apartment upstairs is yours. I’d give you my keys, but you’d pick the lock faster. The sheets are almost new."
"What about me?" Methos asked plaintively.
"You know where the couch is. It’s not new."
"What about you, Joe? I’ll keep the bed warm for you," Amanda ruffled his hair, and he ducked away.
"I’m going to have to work the phones and start bamboozling. There’s a lot of bullshit to shovel in the next few hours."
"Are you all right, Joe?" Methos reached over to check his forehead for heat, forcing Joe to duck again. "Turning down an invitation to keep Amanda warm?"
"Stop teasing, will you? I’m not drunk enough yet to appreciate it." Joe groused as he poured himself one last small shot. "To Persian planning!"
"Plan in a trailer big enough to hold the statue, too, Xerxes," Methos recommended, "unless you want it hanging out of the back of your Jeep." Methos stole a couple of bottles off the table as Joe added it to the list.
As Methos guided them upstairs, Amanda paused for a moment. "Do you think there might be something really wrong with Joe?" she asked. "He’s diving head first into this project, like there’s no tomorrow. Burglary was never his strong point in the past."
"He didn’t argue...enough," Methos frowned. "He just volunteered to help, once more into the breach, semper fi. He can be that irrational with MacLeod, but he’s usually more careful with us."
"Speak for yourself."
"Amanda, we’re all careful around you," Methos pointed out. "But there’s probably a simpler explanation. MacLeod has been rusticating for a while, now. Maybe Joe’s just bored out of his very hard skull."
"He really feels the poetry. I didn’t expect that."
"I noticed. Sappho still casts her spells," Methos said. "But then, he’s a bard, and it tends to run in the thumos. You saw how he soaked up our stories. I’ve seen such a bard drop his sword and bare his neck before the enemy, just to gain the chance to recite one new perfect couplet."
"Did you spare him?" Amanda asked, voice hushed.
Methos turned away and led her down the darkened corridor. "I forget."
* * * * * * * *
"All right, Amy, you’ve got the location, the tools, the transport. Anything else?" Joe asked, ticking off points as he tucked the phone under his chin and went over Amanda’s diagram again. "The thirteenth railroad tie. The trap door. The winch. And most important, both boxes."
"It’s going to throw the schedule off, but two boxes it is. If your information is right, and the statue is there, we’ll take care of it. But you still haven’t told me how you’ll get away if something goes wrong."
"I’ll wing it," he said vaguely. "I’ll have the Jeep. You just remember to stay out of sight. They know you."
"Joe, that’s your godforsaken plan? To wing it? Have you been drinking?"
"Not enough, apparently. Don’t worry, you have the hard part. Your crew has to actually move the marble," Joe pointed out, the model of reasonability. But if you have compunctions, I’ll go to Plan B."
"There’s a Plan B?" Amy asked hopefully.
"I’ll wing it."
"Somehow, I knew you’d say that. Just as long as you’re not hopping any trains."
"You never let me have any fun, Grandma," Joe needled.
"What did I do to deserve a teenager dad? Now let me get to work. I’ll meet you on the island. You owe me ouzo. Lots and lots of ouzo."
"I’ll buy if you fly. Stay safe." Joe clicked off the satphone, and checked his last minute preparations. Passport, wallet, extra ID and credit cards under extra names. Everything else he needed, whether his vacation was temporary, or his retirement permanent, should be waiting on the island.
"Now for the final touches." Joe piled a crowbar, some extra blankets, a few equipment straps, a cooler of sandwiches, and two heavy duty thermoses of coffee at the back door, ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Then he limped into his office and crashed onto his battered recliner, setting the alarm on his desk for three hours. "Just enough time to sober up and go over this godforsaken plan one more time," he said to himself, and closed his eyes.
* * * * * * * * * *
On to Part Two
Author: Atlanta of the Golden Apples
Written for: jinxed-wood
Characters/Pairings: Methos, Amanda, Joe Dawson, Rebecca, Amy Brennan
Rating: Gen, with a light holiday seasoning of Het and a side of Sapphic Sauce.
Wordcount: 16,000
Author's Notes: Online .pdf notes from Professor William Harris of Middlebury College on variant translations of Sappho and Archilochus influenced this work, but all lyric misuses and errors are my own. Beta readers are from Above and Beyond.
Summary: A lot of work goes into planning a proper caper, whether in ancient Greece or modern France. A lot of discussion. And a lot of bar tabs. The question is, who picks up the bill?
* * * * * *
"Relax, Amanda, we’re going to Le Blues Bar, not the Bastille," Methos promised as he drove the twisting, rain-washed streets of Paris in December. "The statue is still at Rebecca’s old roundhouse. And I still think my plan to steal it is better."
"She belongs with family," Amanda insisted. "There’s a freighter leaving for the St. Lawrence Seaway tomorrow. No one will be looking for her in Canada. The Watchers won’t expect it."
"The Watchers expected the Spanish Inquisition. They probably already have customs agents on Mars."
"It’s been over three years now since Rebecca died," Amanda worried. "I should have taken care of Sappho right away."
"The hiding place stayed secret for two thousand years. After Luther and Stern stirred things up, we couldn’t move it--too many prying eyes. There was no reason to think the Watchers might stumble over it now."
"Sappho is a her, not an ‘it,’ " Amanda said firmly.
"It is a marble statue, not a person," Methos reminded. "It won’t get depressed if we talk about it behind its back."
"So you say, but I’ve seen her face move, if you look long enough."
"Oldest art trick in the book, unless you count Chauvet. But you’ve known that since you lifted your first velvet painting of Joan of Arc."
"At least I stole it from the Vatican," Amanda justified. "Joan deserved better. But this is worse! The abbey’s estate manager said their lawyers found a codicil disposing of ‘Sappho’s statue’ to the Watchers’ asset corporation. It has to be a forgery. I can’t believe it. She would tell me!"
"It is suspicious, on the surface. But she may not have known you survived Luther at the time she wrote it. Time was short. And she didn’t want Luther to realize the significance, either. It would look like a grocery list to the estate executors."
"A grocery list in ancient Attic Greek? Like that didn’t stand out tucked in next to the MasterCard bills." Amanda fumed. "But willing it to the Watchers?"
"She probably knew I’d hear about it. She knew I dipped in and out of the Watchers. In normal circumstances, we’d have centuries to steal it back. We still do, really."
"I refuse to reward their conniving. I hate to see trespassers on her land. You’d have thought the Watchers would be done with the abbey by now."
"Yes. You would," Methos agreed. "I wonder who loosed the hounds."
"We should shake it out of Joe." Amanda forced back a yawn, miffed at her own lapse. "Forget I said that."
"You didn’t sleep on the plane from Montreal, did you? You tend to fret when you’re tired. Joe will have coffee," Methos soothed.
"Don’t make me unpack my sword. I don’t fret. What if Joe doesn’t agree to help rescue the statue?" Amanda fretted. "He didn’t even show up when we tried to liberate the Methuselah stone."
"He didn’t show up because we didn’t ask him to the party. Joe’s a serial busybody--he would have jumped in up to his neck--and probably would have had it slit for interfering. The fact our plans went pear-shaped was not his fault."
"He didn’t help us fight Luther," Amanda pointed out. "You can’t say he didn’t know MacLeod was involved, or that Rebecca was in danger."
Methos winced. "Joe’s had a steep learning curve over the last few years."
"Haven’t we all," Amanda said, in soft apology to the absent.
"Joe’s our best choice for a wheelman at short notice. He’s emotionally invested. And best of all, he has a four-wheel drive. Look at it this way," Methos went on, with a sly half smile. "Rebecca knew MacLeod. Joe knows her chronicle, probably as well as he knows yours. He even watched them back in the seventies, when he was still a properly secret Watcher."
"Hmm. Ew?" Amanda cocked her head, more amused than disdainful. "I’m going to have to review my own contributions to MacLeod’s dance lessons in the disco era. Maybe there’s something I can blackmail Joe with."
"Not unless you caught him on tape singing Saturday Night Fever covers."
"Still, I think I can make him feel guilty enough to support my plan over yours," Amanda checked the finish on her nails. "Care to wager?"
"Poor Joe," Methos said mournfully. "He was a model Watcher, back in the day. Now look at him. Consorting with all manner of Immortal riffraff. Sad state of affairs." Methos glanced over at Amanda. "Are you disappointed at the idea of Joe spying on you, or jealous he also spied on Rebecca and MacLeod canoodling?"
"Jealous, of course," Amanda raised a brow at the thought. "And a little sad. Rebecca and I painted Paris a lurid shade of red in the sixties. We just missed corrupting Joe in his winsome youth. Do you think he regrets missing us?"
"Who wouldn’t?" Methos grinned.
Amanda brightened. "So, technically, Joe’s known Rebecca and me longer than he’s known you. That gives my rescue plan another advantage. We put the statue on a slow boat to Toronto and stash it in the safe room in the townhouse."
"Advantage still mine, I believe," Methos countered. "I took a bullet for him, once."
"So did I! More than one. O’Reilly’s henchmen were terrible shots. And I have lineage on my side. I was Rebecca’s student."
‘My plan is more logical. Joe’s a logical man." Methos accelerated on a straight section of the road, splashing puddles. "The Swiss armory that houses my gallery is closer. And I knew Rebecca longer than she knew you. I should get first crack at reclaiming the statue. Age before beauty."
"That’s your logic? After the first thousand years, that age argument gets a little stale," Amanda said pointedly. "Besides, I don’t remember Rebecca telling me she knew you on Lesvos. It’s not like meeting one of the former Horsemen would slip her mind."
Methos downshifted, taking a sharp corner. "Reputation can be one’s own worst enemy. I introduced myself as an aspiring poet, and itinerant Immortal, nothing more. I used to follow Sappho and Alcaeus around like a puppy. I practically invented fan worship."
"First Fanboy of the Apocalypse?" Amanda shuddered.
"It could have been worse. Look at the Dionysians. No sense of humor at all when it came to auditing mysteries."
"Drive faster," Amanda urged. "Rebecca’s gamekeeper said he recognized one of her old Watchers lurking on the rail spur near the abbey. What if they’ve already found it? We don’t have a lot of time."
"The Watchers will have their hands full with this storm," Methos said calmly. But he also drove faster.
Amanda crossed her arms against the winter chill. "Bad as the Watchers are, I’m more worried about the rumor that the Sappho statue still exists. The antiquities collectors would go crazy. And the reparation lawyers. Moving her across borders would be a nightmare. In a few days, weeks at the outside, she couldn’t safely travel anywhere."
"True, but if the statue isn’t found, we can launch rumors of our own about a fake," Methos said. "We’re still way ahead. They won’t be searching for it at this time of night, in this weather." He hoped not, anyway. Any delay might give him time to bring in his own agents, and make the move to Switzerland a fait accompli.
"What if Joe’s not at the bar?" Amanda was back to fretting.
"Where else would he be? When MacLeod goes on a meditation binge, Joe counterprograms with long, lonely, late night solos at the bar. It’s all very yin and yang of them."
"Your yin-yang will hear about it if you’re wrong," Amanda warned as they pulled into the empty parking area in front of Le Blues Bar, only an hour after closing. She picked the lock and blew into the bar, an Aeolian gust of fresh air, clearing the lingering fust of wine corks and beer taps. Methos followed closely, the tail of his dun duster whirling, her shadow’s shadow.
The stage was backlit, familiar to the point of homesickness, Joe under the spot picking out the counterpoint to the melody of a sad love song. Amanda pulled up short when she saw Joe was sharing the stage with a woman, half his age, with hair the color of dark honey. "Who is that?" she asked Methos through thinned lips. "He’s involved with someone. You should have told me. This might change our plans."
"The gentleman never tells," Methos said righteously. "But I will. Romance is the farthest thing from Joe’s mind. Sadly for him, that woman is all business. Which means we should keep our own proposals quiet until she’s gone."
"If Joe picks my plan, I get the bed, you get the couch."
Methos rose to the bait. "And if he picks my plan?"
"I get the bed, Joe gets the couch, and you get to go out in the rain and steal a one ton statue."
* * * * * * * *
"They’re here early," Amy Brennan-Thomas hissed. "Amanda must have slipped her Watcher. Again. And you never keep a proper watch on that man."
"It’s what she does. And he’s not safe to chronicle at the best of times," Joe didn’t stop picking out his melody, though he kept his voice low and turned his face away from the microphone to reply. "We just advance the calendar. That is, if you’re still game."
"It’s not a game, Joe." Amy responded in a forceful whisper, while she busied herself coiling stray cords and other trip hazards on the stage. "The organization is just looking for just one misstep to come down on you like an avalanche."
"It’s all a game," Joe said softly, his expression unchanging, but the blue notes hanging in the air turned just a shade bluer. "You can back out now. The legwork is almost done."
"Funny. It’s crossed my mind. But I’m not the one in the line of fire, trying to pull the wool over the eyes of two of the canniest Immortals on the planet. She’s putting you in a bad position, Joe."
Joe studied his fingering, picking a complicated countermelody. "She’s worth it."
Amy sighed. "My mother warned me you had a tendency to fall in love with your work. Remember, we need ten hours, minimum."
"I’ll delay them," Joe promised. He stepped down his tempo, dragging on a chord.
"How?" Amy gathered up her bag and raincoat and stood, her will wavering.
"I’ll sing. If necessary, I’ll dance. And in a pinch, I’ll lie my ass off."
"Like that’s worked so well in the past," Amy pointed out, flicking a glance at Methos, slouching at the bar across the room. "He’s smirking. I know it," she added under her breath.
"Apparently irony is a genetic flaw in our family," Joe’s eyes danced. "My mother should have warned me." He bent a note to its breaking point before bringing it back into the fold of the melody. "I’m trusting you to watch out for her for me, if this goes south."
"Don’t you smirk at me, too. I swear you’ve fallen in love with that woman. Just like MacLeod, she’s leading you astray. You’re incorrigible."
"I love you too," Joe added a patiently amused riff.
"Ten hours. What if they figure it out too soon?"
"Well, then I’ll deal with the fallout. Amanda won’t hurt you."
"It’s not Amanda I’m worried about," Amy said, shooting a worried glance at the two Immortals patiently watching Joe play from the far side of the bar.
"There’s still time to introduce you to her. That might make a difference, down the line."
"I’m still my mother’s daughter, Joe. And we come from a very long line of Brennans that don’t talk to their Immortals."
"Speaking of women who led me astray?" Joe laughed at himself, and wound up his melody with a final azure sting. Pushing himself up, he stiffly descended from the stage as Amy hovered. Nettled at her solicitude, Joe shepherded her to the back door and out into the black winter storm beyond. "Be careful. It’s starting to ice up out there."
"All part of the romance of being a Watcher. It’s in the brochure." She shivered as a wind gust rattled the bar windows.
"You’ll be in sunny Mytilene in no time. Say hello to your archaeologist boyfriend for me."
"Costas is not my boyfriend. Lucky for him. Imagine having you as a father-in-law."
"Imagine me at a Greek wedding," Joe grinned, gripping his chest. "One to the heart. That’s all Eros needs."
"I got an ‘A’ in Archery at the academy. Don’t make me shoot you," Amy grabbed Joe’s lapels and shook him, very gently. "You be careful. I’m still just getting used to having you around."
* * * * * * * *
Joe locked up the back door and ambled behind the bar, picking up a shot glass. "Sorry about the slow service." Automatically, he set up mugs of coffee from the pot warming behind the bar to cut the chill. "What else can I pour you tonight? It ain’t a fit night out for man nor beast."
"Speaking of beasts, I have a bone to pick with you, Joe," Amanda announced, wrapping her hands around the mug and planting herself at the cash register near the office. Methos ignored the coffee and meandered around the end of the bar nearer the door, hemming the bartender in his lair.
"The right bone, I hope," Joe answered, fencing, not flirting. He put down an over-polished glass and surveyed the bar floor. The tables were cleared, but his guitar was still propped on the stage. He edged around Amanda. "I should put away my gear."
Amanda took advantage of his inattention to steal a kiss, sighing when he pulled away, red and ruffled. "Defenses up, drawbridges raised, that’s no way to court a lady, Joe. Especially now that Duncan is celibate again, and my calendar is open."
"That’s not what you told me," Methos teased, earning a glare from them both, which bounced off as he turned his total attention to inspecting the beer mugs.
"Timing is everything," Joe apologized to Amanda, clearly not taking her offer seriously.
"Then you are involved with someone," Amanda challenged. "Who was that woman, Joe?"
"She might try out for new lead singer," he replied in a carefully neutral voice.
"She’s a Watcher, not a diva," Methos contradicted as he commandeered a tap to pour a burly stout. "Tell her not to quit her day job."
"I think you paid more attention to her than to me," Amanda said with a teasing smile. "I hope you have designs."
"Busted. Pretty, isn’t she?" Joe openly bluffed. "Do you like her?"
"Don’t believe his puppy dog eyes, Amanda," Methos interrupted, "especially when they crinkle in the corner like that. Joe doesn’t date on the job. Any more. I consider it a character flaw." Methos picked out a roomy mug and scrutinized the taps as if he’d never seen them before.
"Amy’s here to keep an eye on the Watchers investment in the bar, so ease up on the pour, willya? You’re cutting into the margin," Joe conceded, lying only a little. Just to be contrary, he poured Amanda an expensive snifter of brandy from the top shelf to complement her coffee. "There are no designs. Hell no. That gal is out of my league."
"What is this ‘league’ you speak of?" Amanda dismissed airily. "Like the honeyapple turning red on the high branch?"
Joe caught the Sapphic quote and ran with it, bending his full attention upon the immortal Amanda. "High on the highest, the apple pickers missed it. But no, they did not miss it." He extended a guitar-scuffed finger as if to brush away a stray lock, but shook his head and withdrew his hand, without even the barest touch. "They could not reach it."
"Oh!" Amanda’s breath caught on the fragment’s finish, hearing the poet’s heart in the singer’s voice. She placed her nimble fingers over Joe’s knurled knuckles where they balanced on the bar. "Thank you. So few people sing Sappho these days."
"Greek is not on your resume, Joe," Methos peered at him, puzzled.
"Every other year they had Greek 101 back in high school, and Father Frank made us memorize bits and couplets," Joe waved it off, slipping his hand from under her warm touch. "There’s so few lyrics left, they were easy to memorize. I didn’t get the uncensored meaning until I moved to Paris, or I would have learned more verbs. But what about you, Amanda? I know Rebecca had Attic Greek, but that was a little before your time."
Amanda’s eyes glittered with mischief. "You could say I learned in Paris as well. Rebecca’s abbey, at least, close enough. Rebecca used Sappho to bait me into learning Greek. She tricked me into declining."
"Declining or reclining?" Methos murmured into his ale. Amanda didn’t deign to reply, or deny. Da Vinci would have appreciated her smile.
"My favorite way to learn conjugation," Joe’s eyes caught the amber stage lights as he warmed to the concept. "Listening to Rebecca teach Sappho would have motivated the hell out of me."
"When you’re ready for a refresher course, just whistle," Amanda pursed her lips, warming more than Joe’s concepts.
"Can’t you just taste the apple?" Methos intruded cheekily, his chin sticking over Joe’s shoulder. "Do you know why Joe doesn’t date on the job, Amanda? Especially that particular woman? There’s an interesting story behind that..."
Joe rapidly pulled out of his poetic reverie, pushing off the bar and bouncing back into his chest. "Watch it, bud," Joe growled, contrarily trusting Methos to catch him before he passed the tipping point.
"The point being, you’re wise to be careful of your amours," Methos admonished, smoothly steadying them both. Moving his stout to safety, he declaimed, " ‘...the desire of love-making weaving itself under the heart pours a thick cloud over your eyes, stealing the delicate wits right out of your breast.’"
Amanda and Joe drew away from Methos as if he had sprouted cooties. "Archilochus? Seriously? In the presence of a lady?" Joe objected. "Not in my bar."
"A lady? Where?" Methos looked about wildly. "Not in your bar," he mimicked, unashamed.
"Archilochus was a cheating, conniving, cowardly, clod of shit," Amanda stated with ladylike distinction. Her words were so distinct that now Joe edged back from the bar away from both Immortals until he ran into the glass rack. "And he was a cynical cad. The kind of man to make any self-respecting lady to swear off men for a century."
"Most soldiers were, in those days. These days, too. Honor is rare, which is why it’s a cause for celebration," Methos shrugged, meeting Joe’s eyes, not Amanda’s. "But Archilochus knew how to turn a phrase as well as he could turn a sword. And those who followed his survival tips tended to...survive. In fact, I won many a free night’s spree declaiming his soldierly verses to armed drunks."
"I’ve been undercharging," Joe muttered to himself. "From now on, this armed drunk demands a stanza a beer."
"Archilochus was a good bit before your time, young Amanda," Methos chipped in hurriedly, before Joe started totting up bar bills. "Why rail at a poet you never knew?"
"Rebecca told me all about him," Amanda sniffed. "He was a troll. And a stalker. He used his poetry to hound and humiliate his former lovers. A total jerk."
"Granted, he didn’t do Eros well," Methos admitted, allowing an echo of hollow regret to tinge his words. "Archilochus treated love like any other form of battle, and he was a sore loser. Ares and Apollo blessed him for a while, but Aphrodite turned her face."
"‘I have one good friend, one good enemy, and my fine ash spear...’, " Joe quoted, his attention drifting into a dark memory.
"You have two good friends standing right here, Joe," Amanda set him straight.
Methos did not demur, but merely turned to pour Joe a glass of his private stock from under the bar. "Sharpen your spear, keep an eye on the enemy, and we’ll tell you why we’re here," he said, holding his glass up for a toast.
"The enemy?" Joe returned the toast, looked around, focused on the empty stage, and then closed his eyes. "Shit. What did the Watchers do this time?" he asked. "Does it have something to do with the classical turn of the conversation?"
"Like Archilochus, you spot the rhythms in people," Methos beamed.
Suspicious of cryptic Methic utterances at the best of times, Joe turned to Amanda. "What am I sharpening my fine ash spear for this time?"
"The Watchers are stealing Sappho, Joe. We want her back."
* * * * * * * *
"Sappho. The poet. ‘Songs that break the heart of the earth.’ That Sappho." Joe dropped his eyes, grabbed a towel, and started cleaning nonexistent rings from the bar top. "By most accounts, she lived to the ripe old age of seventy or so, and died, what, 2,600 years ago? Unless you know something I don’t. Not that that isn’t the normal state of affairs around here."
"Sappho. The statue." Amanda clarified. "Rebecca commissioned the sculptor Silanion to create the statue and plinth, and had her erected in Syracuse."
"What happened to Sappho’s academy on Lesvos? Shouldn’t the statue have been placed there?" Joe asked, scrabbling for a pen.
"The Persians happened," Methos said. "Often. And the Sidonians. The Thessalonians. The Romans. Sappho’s academy was razed, and Rebecca’s villa near Mytilene abandoned for years at a time. Wars are hell on the muses, Joe."
"Tell me about it," Joe said, meeting Methos’ eye until he copped a clue. "Meanwhile, back in Syracuse..."
"Meanwhile, back in Syracuse," Methos quickly continued, "Rebecca was running a school teaching the science and economics of entertainment and seduction, to wayward girls, if I remember correctly."
"It was an academy of the arts for female artists, sculptors and poets, I’ll have you know," Amanda shot back. "Professional hetairae."
"There’s a difference?"
Joe, who was taking notes on a bar tab, lightly punched Methos in the shoulder. "Shut up. I want to hear this."
"You already know this next part, Joe," Methos rubbed his arm as if gravely wounded. "It’s on Wikipedia, gods help us. The Syracuse town fathers erected the statue in honor of the poet and Aphrodite. It was quite the attraction for years. Even the Romans honored the poetry. Until it was stolen."
Amanda ticked down the provenance with professional thrift of words. "To cut to the chase: around 70 BCE the statue was stolen by a light-fingered Roman politician named Gaius Verres after Cicero exposed his high crimes and misdemeanors in office. All he left behind was the footing that identified the statue as Sappho. Anyway, no one mourned when Verres was murdered, but art historians all say the statue was never recovered."
"For given definitions of ‘recovery’," Methos stretched to top off his ale. "Rebecca called Verres a creep, even by late Roman standards. We both agreed he got his just dessert."
"Did you kill him, or Rebecca? She wouldn’t tell me," Amanda asked tentatively, as if she were not sure if she wanted to know the answer.
"You’re probably tired of me saying the times were different. But they were. And the circumstances might matter, now." Methos turned his attention inward, searching through his flooded memories. "We planned the raid by the Persian method. It went well. Too well, really…."
* * * * * * * *
"At ease, Alcaeus," Methos checked his much-scarred stallion, who was misbehaving in the presence of Rebecca’s well-mannered mare.
"You named your horse after Alcaeus of Eressus?" Rebecca laughed.
"It fits. He’s poetry in motion, and he’ll try to mount anything that moves, cheerfully including other studs. I swear his tail grows bald, I use so much horsehair sewing him up after his romantic adventures."
"That’s Alcaeus, all right," Rebecca said, shading her eyes as their small caravan approached a well-appointed villa with well-guarded walls. "Cloaks over your weapons, now," she commanded her household escort, a dozen trusted mercenaries long in her employ, but now dressed as cart drivers, clients, and most uncomfortably, household slaves. "All but you, Cousin. Verres will expect an aristocrat to carry a sword, and a single swordsman will look more like an opportunity, than a threat."
"I think I invented that ploy in Troy," Methos boasted.
"On which side?" Rebecca asked, concealing her own short sword and long knife under a cloak of the finest cloth from the Indus Valley.
"Both. Twenty years is a lot of time not to get killed in a war. I changed sides a few times. The Greek camp was nicer in summer, cool breezes off the water, fresh fish. But Troy was warmer in winter. Braziers, a calderium, real beds."
"We’ll sleep in a real bed tonight, if our plan works," Rebecca promised, and she rode forward and hailed the gate, making an earnest and innocent appeal for entry, aristocrat to aristocrat, a fellow traveler soon to be benighted on the road.
Methos followed, every inch her cousin/escort/protector, deliberately not taking notice of archers hidden behind the walls, or a small squad of Scythians tending the corrals, who eyed their horses hungrily. He was the layabout cousin of fair Rebecca, he decided, an aunt’s second son, unintelligent, bored, lazy.
Vain, even. Absently, he polished the pommel of his sword, making Rebecca repress a laugh.
The gates opened, and the Scythians followed them in, intent on trapping the caravan within the walls and stripping its goods at their leisure for their master Verres, the former Roman governor, career seducer and thief.
As the Scythians turned to pull the gates closed, Rebecca’s disguised household guard fell upon them, pinning them without pity to the oaken frame. The archers above, shaken at the sudden attack, shot poorly, and scattered screaming as Methos rode at the wall, drew his feet up so he crouched on Alcaeus’ wide croup, and vaulted among them, hewing unhindered.
In mere minutes as measured by the sundial, the villa was theirs.
Methos surveyed the inner courtyard, but no more enemies threatened. Servants and slaves hid behind the well, or milled about among a throng of statuary strewn haphazardly about the yard, undignified and unkempt. "Cicero was right. Verres truly does have issues with womankind. Would you like me to behead him for you, Rebecca?" Methos offered cheerfully. "The man has no proper appreciation for art."
"Beheading may be too swift a justice."
Unarmed clients and slaves shrank away as Rebecca approached the janitor that crouched at the door to the master’s dwelling. He trembled as he barred the way with a staff. Verres had chained the man in place. "Open the door, ostiarius," she commanded.
"Verres will kill me if I do," the janitor replied, "and all the slaves within."
"Are there many slaves within? Many more than, say, Verres?" Rebecca asked sweetly.
"...Yes," the janitor answered, eyeing Methos’ bloodied sword as he joined Rebecca.
"Just kill the janitor and force the door," he said laconically. "It’s sunset, and I’m hungry. Besides, you promised a real bed for us tonight," Methos managed not to leer. Rebecca didn’t appreciate the finer points of leering.
"I’ll reward any slave who captures Verres for me with a place in my household, and a promise of manumission," Rebecca stated in a voice loud enough to be heard throughout the villa. There was a short silence, then a sinister rattling from behind the dwelling door.
"Silanion’s Sappho is here, but we’re going to have to put this lot to scrubbing her down," Methos said, raising his voice over a shrill cry from within. "I’m not sure if there is a Latin name yet for Verres’ fetish, but it’s vile."
"Load her in the wagon," Rebecca ordered, green-faced and grim. "There’s clean spring water a league away from the stink of this buzzard nest."
Methos chivvied Verres’ servants along, mainly by blatantly cleaning his blade on the nearest wool tunic if they moved too slowly. "Stop! Load that one, too!" he commanded, ignoring many surrounding gods and godlets set to stone to have a lowly bust rescued from a midden heap. "No, don’t clean it, just wrap it up," he added, stealing a bloodied Scythian cape to throw over the short marble column.
"One of your triumphs?"
"One of my miscalculations. Who would have thought a simple bust carving would be so...so…"
"Permanent?" Rebecca offered, eyes merry.
"Pride goeth before a peccadillo. Marble busts should have gone out of fashion centuries ago. You can’t trust the mortals to properly lose something, when you want them to."
"Or save it when you need," Rebecca added, increasingly dismayed at the damaged art surrounding them.
"I will offer the bust to Poseidon to calm the wine-dark sea when we make the crossing back to Lesvos," Methos said with a theatrical touch of regret and sacrifice.
"Best wait till we make Mytilene harbor," Rebecca said, unimpressed. "Just in case Poseidon laughs his ass off and dumps us all into his lap. We’ll at least be able to swim to shore." She checked the twilight sky, reassured to see the full moon rise behind the villa. "We’ll travel by moonlight. I want to get out of here, now. We can leave a discreet word for Cicero to rescue the rest of the statues--this lot has no love for them."
"No bed?" Methos asked, piteously, just before the door opened behind the janitor, and a large, misshapen lump was rolled out. Rebecca and Methos stepped back, fastidiously drawing their cloaks away from the carnage.
"Definitely, no bed. I do not trust slaves or free clients that can turn so quickly on their master, even an evil one." Rebecca’s face was set as hard as Silanion’s marble as she turned her back on Verres and mounted her mare. "Who knows what other vermin this vermin Verres harbored?"
Methos scratched his ribs. "Let’s not linger and find out."
* * * * * * * *
"I think Rebecca felt a little guilty about Verres, or at least for letting the slaves do the deed, rather than cleanly killing him herself," Methos remarked to Amanda. "The household tore him apart, which marked them as outlaws, and fair game for slaughter if they were caught. We headed for the nearest port for the same reason."
"Sailed off into the moonrise, did you?" Joe asked, still taking notes. "Or do I write ‘Beat a hasty retreat?’ "
"Verres was not a nice man, and did not come to a nice end, but he was once a Roman governor, and the powers that be didn’t cotton to aristocratic assassination. Either version works. Maybe make it more like a spaghetti western, only I got the girl in the end."
"Sergio Leone it is," Joe said equably, making a note.
"The table must have been bare, Methos, if Rebecca settled for you," Amanda sniffed.
"We had an agreeable partnership at the time, after a rocky start. Sappho quite literally kept us from beheading each other once, when we came to blows about some filthy lyric of Alcaeus’," Methos said, unoffended. "Sappho taught me how to make life new, again. Her lyrics made men and women think differently, even Immortals. I see her in art everywhere, even now. Still new."
"And that’s why you sailed half the Mediterranean to save her statue?" Joe questioned quietly.
"Rebecca could talk me into all sorts of trouble," Methos said with a sly grin. "But beyond the obvious, at the time, we both shared a certain devotion to preserving the arts of our youth. Every Immortal goes through a hoarding stage. Some never get over it."
"So, Mr. Hipster-Beyond-Hoarding-Instincts, why the sudden interest in the statue now?" Joe asked, the very model of reasonable inquiry. "And remember, I’ve seen your cellar."
"Would you believe nostalgia?" Methos said lightly.
Joe tapped his pen on the bar pad, letting silence stretch as he gave the question serious consideration. Finally, he nodded. "Yes."
Defenses oddly undermined, Methos stepped back and raised his beer in a silent toast, not quite mustering irony.
"So you took the statues back to Lesvos?" Joe prompted, back to business. "What happened then?"
"I dropped Silanion’s bust into the foamy brine. That should have been the end of that."
"But it wasn’t," Joe guessed, frowning in thought.
"Don’t jump ahead," Methos ordered. "Rebecca created a small shrine to Aphrodite out in the lava beds, away from prying eyes, and decorated it with Sappho’s statue. Facing east, a nice little volcanic vent, very tasteful. It even attracted a proper cult. Did I ever tell you that Lesvos is volcanic? Lava beds, lava tubes, lava domes, petrified forests. Did I mention lava?"
"Your point, Methos? We’re on a mission, here," Amanda reminded, checking her watch.
"The point being, after another invasion or three, not to mention the spectacle Pompeii made of itself a few decades later, I thought Sappho might benefit from a change of scenery, to some place less likely to be invaded, buried, or blown to smithereens."
"And you didn’t check with Rebecca," Amanda reproved. "You didn’t even leave a note."
"What would it say? The Persians are coming! The Persians are coming!" Methos temporized. "I couldn’t dial up the nearest Delphic oracle and leave voicemail, could I? Besides, she returned tit for tat."
"How?" Joe asked, grabbing another stack of blank bar checks.
"Oh, this one I’ve heard. Rebecca loved this story. She just told it with an alias, ‘Alcaeus’ Ass,’" Amanda purred, while Methos managed to look almost embarrassed. "You remember Methos’ own personal polished pillar? Rebecca told me they dropped it off the prow of the bireme just before they docked in Mytilene. When Rebecca came back to Lesvos and heard Methos had absconded with Sappho, she walked out into the sea, attached a line, and winched in the bust. Then she gave it to Sappho’s cult and told them to keep watch for him until the sea boiled and the sun went dark. The next time Alcaeus’ Ass visited Mytilene, he was swarmed."
"Hey, that wasn’t funny! You try outrunning a whole pack of pre-modern protestant Dionysians armed with cheese knives, crazed on moonshine retsina and religion."
Joe snickered. "Yeah, that’s funny."
"Hey, I gave Rebecca the Sappho back! With improvements, even. A new plinth. Sacks of ochre for her paints."
"On Lesvos?" Joe asked, the chronicler in him worrying at the threads, teasing out the story.
"I found her summering in Hibernia. She eventually came around to my way of thinking without beheading me, and we wandered up the Seine to visit the Parisii in Lutetia. Sappho has graced her halls and hideaways there ever since."
"What happened to change Rebecca’s mind and abandon the shrine?" Joe prodded. "And what happened to your bust?"
"The usual. The seas boiled. The sun went dark. Earthquakes. The shrine collapsed, burying the bust and altar stone forever, no doubt to the delight of a few pesky new religions. You know the type. And then more Persians. Or Romans. Or Carthaginians. I forget."
"You never forget," Joe said, a contrary edge creeping into his tone. "Maybe you could mine your memory for Sappho’s lost poems, some fine day. You know. To preserve the arts."
"I do believe I detect an air of avarice, Joe," Methos peered at him. "Poetry is your price? I can work with that."
"There’s just a few scraps left of Sappho’s lyrics. There were once a dozen scrolls. You could bring her to life, again."
"Make the mortal immortal, Joe? Are you sure that’s wise?"
"I’m sure ‘wise’ isn’t your foremost consideration. Just how much beer would it take, Philistine?"
"You could start a brewery," Methos said helpfully. "I know a lovely Philistinian recipe."
Amanda cut in before the both of them picked up steam. "Don’t let him tease you, Joe. And stop delaying, Methos. Time is wasting."
Backing down, Joe looked over his shoulder at the bar clock. "4:00 am. Just the shank of the evening. There’s no point in going out in the storm until the roads are sanded. I prefer not to make my worldly exit freezing in some ditch." Joe checked his notes. "Tell me something else. What did you mean, you ‘planned the raid by the Persian method?’ "
"An old ploy of Xerxes’s. Or Darius. Or mine. I do forget, sometimes," Methos insisted. "The king and his generals would get roaring drunk and hatch a battle plan, then go to bed. Then they’d go over it again in the morning, sober as hungover judges. If they still liked the plan, they’d attack. If it didn’t pass muster, they’d make another plan. The catch was, they had to get drunk and go over the plan again, before putting it in gear. Just think of it as Classical Strategy and Tactics 101."
"Whether that’s real down-and-dirty history or Herodotus in his cups, it sounds like a plan to me," Joe said, rearranging his notes, and wincing slightly, reaching for his coffee and chasing it with something stronger. "I’ve hatched some of my worst ideas stone cold sober."
"That, I remember," Methos said archly. "Getting tired, Joe?"
"Pipe down in the peanut gallery, and pour. How about we grab a table?" Joe gave all his attention to Amanda, and held out his arm, channeling his inner gentleman.
While Methos amiably refreshed their beverages, Amanda linked her arm with Joe’s, leading him to a seat, and as he eased the weight off his legs, she leaned in close. Very close. "You wouldn’t be trying to delay me, too, would you?" she asked, her lips very close to his ear. Very close. "Because that would be very disappointing to me."
Joe ran his hand through his hair. "I wouldn’t want to disappoint you, no," he echoed. "But honestly? What do you want me to do? I don’t even know, precisely, where to find the statue."
"Oh, but I do. I just need your help to move it."
"My help?" Joe said, genuinely puzzled. "To move Rebecca’s statue? How? Where?"
"To Toronto."
"Switzerland!" Methos called out from the bar.
Amanda ignored him. "I’ve got the freighter all lined up. But I need to get the statue to the docks before those pot-hunting, legacy-thieving Watchers get their hands on it, or worse, close the ports and let the lawyers step in."
"I hate to burst your bubble, but I’m not exactly a mover and shaker in the organization these days, darling." Joe looked down and away. "Firing squads and demonic possessions turn out to be bad career milestones."
"Oh, but you have reputation, Joe," Amanda twirled her finger around his ear, making him twitch. "A vast reputation. You’re the man who survived hails of bullets! Millennial demons! And twenty five years watching MacLeod! People are awed! They listen to you. You have contacts."
"Yeah, yeah, all due to my supernatural powers of worldwide hoodwinking," Joe grumped. "I wish. If I was that good, I’d practice on you."
"That’s our Joe, ever the skeptic, but always aiming for new heights," Methos said in approval as he slid beer, brandy and bourbon onto the table. "We can always count on you to blow holes in our vision statement. What do you think Joe should tell the Watchers, Amanda?"
"That’s what we’re here to figure out," Amanda confessed.
"Right. I call headquarters up and tell them, ‘Look! Amanda is stealing Sappho!’ I send the Watchers on a merry goose chase to Lichtenstein after a fake statue. All the while I’m sitting in a truck playing lookout and wheelman for you two while you dig up the real statue and ferry her out of the country." Joe took a long breath, and a longer drink.
Methos and Amanda looked at each other, and nodded.
"It sounds like a plan," Methos observed.
"I could work with that," Amanda said calmly. "Now, the details."
"The details," Methos agreed. "The devil is always in the details. I’ve got a map to Switzerland in the car."
Amanda took back the reins. "We need you to drive us to Rebecca’s roundhouse, Joe. It’s an old locomotive repair shop on a siding near the abbey. Rebecca built it when steam engines came into vogue, and ran it until the diesels made it obsolete."
"The statue’s just sitting in the roundhouse?" Joe objected. "Isn’t that a little...obvious? You’d think someone would notice."
"Not in. Under. Hidden in an old priest’s hole, under the spur tracks themselves. The roundhouse stands on the site of an old chapel, which is on the site of an old barrow, and who knows what else. Rebecca was an early recycler," Amanda unsuccessfully stifled a yawn as she meandered off topic. "Sorry. Jet lag isn’t just for mortals."
"Too bad we can’t just fire up the locomotive and load up the train car, blow right through the Watchers like Butch and Cassidy," Methos said nostalgically. "Those were the days. Could you call the Watchers to clear the line, Joe?"
"Who do I look like, E. H. Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad?" Joe snarked back.
"It would take months to clear the paperwork on the permits," Amanda muttered as she sketched the roundhouse on one of Joe’s bar tabs. "If we ran an unscheduled train on the national line without a pass, the government, Interpol, NATO and the French Foreign Legion will come down on us like Greek fire."
"And the unions. Don’t forget the unions," Joe chipped in.
"We can back the Jeep into the roundhouse. There’s a concealed trap door under the thirteenth railroad tie from the end. We’ll have to bring a crowbar to get in. Two. A crate and padding. Winch and pulley, with padded slings. I have what we need in my work storage here in town."
"The thirteenth railroad tie?" Joe confirmed, writing furiously.
"From the east end of the track. Rebecca called it her lucky number."
"Of course it was," Joe said dubiously. "Why the trap door, may I ask? It would seem safer to just pave it over or something."
"Rebecca and I used it in the war when the Germans took over the railroads. We’d hide below, and then hitch a ride on the Nazi art trains or arms shipments, wait until the train moved up the line to another siding, then loot to our heart’s desire."
"You know I want the full story, someday," Joe promised.
"Train robbery, it’s a lost art, Joe." Amanda yawned again, this time dragging Joe into imitation.
"Stop that, or I’ll fall asleep in my whisky. Listen. I need to make a call or three that you don’t need to overhear, just to start some early rumors that won’t get traced back to me. In the meantime, we’re going nowhere until the ice storm lets up. If you want a pre-burglary nap to dream up some new details, Amanda, my apartment upstairs is yours. I’d give you my keys, but you’d pick the lock faster. The sheets are almost new."
"What about me?" Methos asked plaintively.
"You know where the couch is. It’s not new."
"What about you, Joe? I’ll keep the bed warm for you," Amanda ruffled his hair, and he ducked away.
"I’m going to have to work the phones and start bamboozling. There’s a lot of bullshit to shovel in the next few hours."
"Are you all right, Joe?" Methos reached over to check his forehead for heat, forcing Joe to duck again. "Turning down an invitation to keep Amanda warm?"
"Stop teasing, will you? I’m not drunk enough yet to appreciate it." Joe groused as he poured himself one last small shot. "To Persian planning!"
"Plan in a trailer big enough to hold the statue, too, Xerxes," Methos recommended, "unless you want it hanging out of the back of your Jeep." Methos stole a couple of bottles off the table as Joe added it to the list.
As Methos guided them upstairs, Amanda paused for a moment. "Do you think there might be something really wrong with Joe?" she asked. "He’s diving head first into this project, like there’s no tomorrow. Burglary was never his strong point in the past."
"He didn’t argue...enough," Methos frowned. "He just volunteered to help, once more into the breach, semper fi. He can be that irrational with MacLeod, but he’s usually more careful with us."
"Speak for yourself."
"Amanda, we’re all careful around you," Methos pointed out. "But there’s probably a simpler explanation. MacLeod has been rusticating for a while, now. Maybe Joe’s just bored out of his very hard skull."
"He really feels the poetry. I didn’t expect that."
"I noticed. Sappho still casts her spells," Methos said. "But then, he’s a bard, and it tends to run in the thumos. You saw how he soaked up our stories. I’ve seen such a bard drop his sword and bare his neck before the enemy, just to gain the chance to recite one new perfect couplet."
"Did you spare him?" Amanda asked, voice hushed.
Methos turned away and led her down the darkened corridor. "I forget."
* * * * * * * *
"All right, Amy, you’ve got the location, the tools, the transport. Anything else?" Joe asked, ticking off points as he tucked the phone under his chin and went over Amanda’s diagram again. "The thirteenth railroad tie. The trap door. The winch. And most important, both boxes."
"It’s going to throw the schedule off, but two boxes it is. If your information is right, and the statue is there, we’ll take care of it. But you still haven’t told me how you’ll get away if something goes wrong."
"I’ll wing it," he said vaguely. "I’ll have the Jeep. You just remember to stay out of sight. They know you."
"Joe, that’s your godforsaken plan? To wing it? Have you been drinking?"
"Not enough, apparently. Don’t worry, you have the hard part. Your crew has to actually move the marble," Joe pointed out, the model of reasonability. But if you have compunctions, I’ll go to Plan B."
"There’s a Plan B?" Amy asked hopefully.
"I’ll wing it."
"Somehow, I knew you’d say that. Just as long as you’re not hopping any trains."
"You never let me have any fun, Grandma," Joe needled.
"What did I do to deserve a teenager dad? Now let me get to work. I’ll meet you on the island. You owe me ouzo. Lots and lots of ouzo."
"I’ll buy if you fly. Stay safe." Joe clicked off the satphone, and checked his last minute preparations. Passport, wallet, extra ID and credit cards under extra names. Everything else he needed, whether his vacation was temporary, or his retirement permanent, should be waiting on the island.
"Now for the final touches." Joe piled a crowbar, some extra blankets, a few equipment straps, a cooler of sandwiches, and two heavy duty thermoses of coffee at the back door, ready to go at a moment’s notice.
Then he limped into his office and crashed onto his battered recliner, setting the alarm on his desk for three hours. "Just enough time to sober up and go over this godforsaken plan one more time," he said to himself, and closed his eyes.
* * * * * * * * * *
On to Part Two