When Napoleon
Bonaparte died in
exile in 1821, he
took to the grave a
powerful secret. As
general and Emperor,
he had stolen
uncountable riches
from palaces,
national treasuries,
even the Knights of
Malta and the
Vatican. In his
final days, his
British captors
hoped to learn where
the loot lay hidden.
But he told them
nothing and in his
will he made no
mention of his
treasure.
Or did he?
Former-Justice
Department operative
Cotton Malone is
about to find out
after trouble comes
knocking at his
Copenhagen bookshop.
Actually, it breaks
and enters in the
form of an American
Secret Service agent
with a pair of
assassins on his
heels. Malone has
his doubts about the
anxious young man,
but narrowly
surviving a
ferocious firefight
convinces him to
follow his
unexpected new ally.
Their first stop is
the secluded estate
of Malone's good
friend, Henrik
Thorvaldsen. The
wily Danish tycoon
has uncovered the
insidious plans of
the Paris Club, a
cabal of
multi-millionaires
bent on manipulating
the global economy.
Only by matching
wits with a
terrorist-for-hire,
foiling a
catastrophic attack,
and plunging into a
desperate hunt for
Napoleon's legendary
lost treasure can
Malone hope to avert
international
financial anarchy.
But Thorvaldsen's
real objective is
much more personal:
a vendetta to avenge
the murder of his
son by the larcenous
aristocrat at the
heart of the
conspiracy. Which
places Malone in an
impossible
quandary-one that
forces him to choose
between friend and
country, past and
present. Starting in
Denmark, moving to
England, and ending
up in the storied
streets and
cathedrals of Paris,
Malone plays a
breathless game of
duplicity and death,
all to claim a prize
of untold value.
But at what cost?