The Thirteenth Skull (Alfred Kropp 3)
“Well, one life at a time. One thing I can’t figure out— well, there’s a lot of things—but the biggest thing is how killing me gets Jourdain the Skull.”
He frowned. “ ‘Jourdain the Skull’?”
I nodded. “The Skull of Doom.”
He didn’t say anything. He just stared at me.
“You’ve never heard about the Skull of Doom?” I asked.
“Of course I have. I was an Operative Nine.”
“Well, he told me he was on ‘the last knightly quest for the Thirteenth Skull,’ which everybody knows is the Skull of Doom.”
“That is one of its names, yes. And if that is his ultimate goal, he is doomed to failure.”
“Why?”
“Because the Skull of Doom is a myth. It doesn’t exist.”
“How do you know?”
“I was an Operative Nine.”
“And that means what? You’re all-knowing like God?”
“Far from it.”
“Then how are you so sure it doesn’t exist?”
“Because we could find no evidence of its existence.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s a myth.”
He shook his head and waved one four-fingered hand.
“It doesn’t matter. Jourdain believes it exists, apparently, and that’s all that matters.”
“Which is the point I was trying to make! He somehow thinks killing me is going to help him get it.”
“It may be something far simpler than that.”
“Like what?”
“Like revenge.”
I thought about that. He was right, as usual. The why really didn’t matter. It didn’t even matter if killing me had anything to do with getting the Skull. The only thing that mattered was he wasn’t going to stop until I was dead.
“Right. On one side, a madman chasing a myth and on the other a sociopath on a crusade to lobotomize me. So we slip between them and head straight for headquarters.”
He said, “Headquarters.” His eyes cut away. The elephant was back.
“Only I’m not sure exactly where headquarters is, but you know and that’s where Abby Smith is.”
“Who may or may not be in a position to help us,” he said.
“We don’t have a choice.”
“No choice,” he said. He wadded up the wrapping from his sandwich and dropped it into the bag. Then he took his napkin and carefully wiped off the table.