look on her face. She could sense that there was another time mission in the offing here, and not just a friendly jaunt to the Azores to chat with this Fairchild lady.
“Anywhere,” said Paul. “You said yourself the key was just sitting there in the Selene Horse, in the British Museum. If we target a time before the Blitz it should still be there.”
“So you think you can just waltz into the British Museum with a rock hammer, chip a piece off the Selene Horse and say thank you very much?”
“Something like that.”
“Oh, be realistic, Paul. There will be security there. Alarms, guards. The risk of apprehension would be very great.”
“Well then how about we target the time they were being moved into the subway system?”
“I can help on that,” said Nordhausen. “I’ve been looking into the Elgin Marbles while you were gone, Paul, and I found out where they were stored during the war—at the Aldwych branch of the Tube. The entrance was on the Strand. In fact, it was once called Strand Station before they renamed it, and it’s Charing Cross today. Stephan Walter mapped it all out, including all sorts of historical oddities found beneath London. Did you know they found old Viking weapons, and a helmet dated to the battle of Waterloo, in that vicinity? It was also known as the suicide hotspot of the Thames.”
“And they stored the marbles near there?”
“Right beneath New Oxford Street, just up Kingsway from the Strand. The British Museum station was very close. Well, they suspended passenger service for that line on September 21st, 1940, and then made them available as wartime shelters. It’s a lucky thing they were moved there, because the Duveen Gallery where they had been displayed was badly damaged by German bombing. So they had it all planned out, and even called the whole thing “Operation Elgin.” Most of the Marbles remained there in the Tube until the 25th of November, 1948. Only a few were eventually moved in that shipment on Rodney. I’ve got the whole thing wired.”
“How did they move them?” asked Paul.
“They were all crated up, about 100 tons, and then transported using what was called a low-loader lorry. They went to the London Transport Depot at Lillie Bridge, Kensington, and then they were moved over the rail line to the Aldwych Station. A bit of a roundabout way to get them there, but I suppose they knew what they were doing back then. When the Blitz started, and the Germans used 1000 pound bombs, they started to think the Tube was not safe enough. That’s probably when they got the idea to ship them over to Boston, though I know of no planned shipment other than the one on Rodney.”
“Interesting that the Selene Horse was moved,” said Paul. “Could they have known about the key?”
“I hardly think so,” said Nordhausen. “It wasn’t chipped at the base and exposed until you were there aboard Rodney.”
“Well, that whole chain of custody there gives us ample means for intervention. I could pose as a truck driver, lorryman, loader.”
“You?” Maeve protested. “I hardly think you look the part.”
“I would do much better,” said Nordhausen. “I can manage a fairly good British accent, and pose as an official from the museum wanting to fret over the shipment somewhere en-route. It will have likely happened anyway, and to the workers involved I would just seem another bothersome official wanting to stick my nose in it. Just tell me how to find the key, Paul. I’ll fetch it double quick!”
“Still risky,” said Maeve. “And your assignment to the mission is a large part of that.”
“What? Me? Look here, I’ve made a firm resolution not to muck about in the history. Lord knows we’ve seen the damage it can cause.”
“Yet they’ll be crated,” said Paul. “A hundred tons of them. You would have to go through the crates to find the one housing the Selene Horse.”
“Well, they also used part of that Tube as a air raid shelter. That’s another angle to get us close during an air raid.”
“A lot of people crowded into one place,” said Maeve, “and most likely well segregated from the artwork storage areas. No. What we need is to find a way to get at them without all these human obstacles, drivers, laborers, museum officials, guards, and crowds of frightened people. It’s not the sort of environment you can go crate hunting in, let alone breaking into the crate and willfully damaging a priceless piece