has missed in the last a hundred and twenty years?’
‘Of course not,’ Ulster said as he held up his grandfather’s journal. ‘Thankfully, we have a lot more to go on than good old-fashioned luck. We actually have a detailed set of instructions. All we have to do is find the starting line, and this journal will do the rest.’
It took a few seconds for the comment to sink in. Once it did, Payne shook his head in disbelief. Leave it to Ulster to wait so long before he revealed something so vital to the group. One of these days, Payne was going to have to teach Ulster how to start off with the most important news before he went off on his tangents - just in case Ulster died of old age before he finished his background information.
Payne laughed to himself. ‘In that case, what are we waiting for? Let’s go and find Ludwig’s treasure.’
22
Mount Schachen
Bavaria, Germany
In Kaiser’s world, there were very few guarantees when it came to money: deals frequently collapsed at the last minute; long-time associates often tried to screw him for table scraps; and rivals always looked for opportunities to steal his clients or get him in trouble with the police. Being in the business for as long as he had, Kaiser had learned many lessons along the way. One of the most important was the danger of greed. Early in his career, he had lost plenty of money because of his recklessness. Like a gambler who refused to pocket his winnings, Kaiser used to take too many risks when the smart play was to walk away. But all that changed a few years ago when he lost millions of dollars worth of merchandise in a warehouse fire. Instead of selling the goods to a trusted customer who had offered a fair price, Kaiser had tried to leverage a better deal for himself by negotiating with an unsavoury character from the Russian mafia. The whole thing fell apart when the two clients found out about each other. To this day, Kaiser still didn’t know which of them had torched his warehouse - although he assumed it was the Russian - but from that point on, he decided to minimize his risks whenever he could.
With that in mind, Kaiser skipped the next leg of the journey to protect his discovery. While Payne, Jones and Ulster flew to the top of Mount Schachen to search for the location of Ludwig’s treasure, Kaiser made travel arrangements for the gold they had already found.
Known as the Konigshaus am Schachen in German, the King’s House on Schachen took three years to build (1869-1872) because all the supplies had to be carted up the mountain. A lover of the outdoors, Ludwig chose this site for the spectacular views of the surrounding peaks and for its isolation. Thousands of feet above civilization, the two-storey alpine cottage was Ludwig’s sanctuary anytime he wanted to escape the politics and prying eyes of Munich. Up here among the clouds, he used to fantasize about starting his own kingdom across the sea, a modern-day Camelot where he would build the most spectacular castle the world had ever seen.
As the pilot circled the ridge line looking for a place to land, Payne and Jones, staring out of the chopper’s windows, were filled with disappointment. After hearing so many stories about Ludwig’s opulence, they had been expecting the cottage to rival the Taj Mahal. Instead, they saw a plain, wooden structure that looked like a hunting lodge.
Jones spoke into his headset. ‘If that’s the outhouse, where’s the King’s House?’
‘I’m afraid you’re looking at it,’ Ulster replied from the front seat. ‘But don’t let the exterior fool you. The interior is far more lavish.’
‘That’s not saying much, because the outside looks like a shed.’
Payne cracked a smile. ‘A shed with a hell of a view.’
‘Good point,’ Jones admitted.
‘If we flew a little higher, you could see Austria. We’re just north of its border,’ Ulster said as he stared at Mount Dreitorspitze of the Wetterstein Mountains.
‘Isn’t that kind of stupid?’ Payne asked out of the blue.
Ulster turned in his seat. ‘What are you referring to?’
Payne answered. ‘The placement of this cabin. I mean, if I’m a Bavarian general, there’s no way in hell I’d let Ludwig build a house this close to a foreign border. Look at the surrounding peaks. This area is indefensible.’
Jones nodded in agreement. ‘Jon makes a valid point. Set a few explosives on the top of that ridge,