The Jerusalem Puzzle (23 page)

The thought that I should contact her family crossed my mind.

But I’d only met her family once. We’d had a dinner in London, at Aikens in Chelsea on New Year’s Day. It had been a lovely meal, if a little formal.

But what was I going to tell them? Your daughter’s been kidnapped?

She’d only been missing an hour.

I walked around the whole block of shops and apartments, and started looking at each doorway for a sign that she might have visited a nearby business. It was possible, wasn’t it? Maybe she’d needed a doctor?

I checked for alleyways, coffee houses. There weren’t any. Then I stood outside Simon’s apartment block and considered the possibilities as they raced through my mind.

I felt totally dazed, as if my body wasn’t connected to my head. Everything we’d come to Jerusalem to do seemed stupid now, ridiculous. What the hell had I been thinking putting Isabel in danger?

But I also knew that it would have taken a ridiculous effort to force her to stay in London without me. I took a long deep breath.

Was there any possibility she’d gone off somewhere?

There had to be, but it was a slim one. She would have told me if she had to go, wouldn’t she?

No, I couldn’t hide from it anymore. I had to accept there was a reasonable chance she’d been kidnapped.

The word buzzed in my head. Kidnapped! Like Susan had been! Like Kaiser had been! The drumming in my chest was faster now.

My legs wanted to move. I had a sudden desire to run up the street, shouting Isabel’s name.

Then I thought of Susan; her body hadn’t turned up, which meant that whoever was holding her probably hadn’t murdered her. Yet.

And then I remembered how Kaiser had died; in a ball of flames after being cruelly tortured.

The thought of anything like that happening to Isabel made a trembling shudder pass through me, like a stuttering engine. There was acid in my mouth. I had to stop this.

‘Are you okay?’ It was Jeremiah’s voice.

I straightened. He was standing a foot away, a concerned look on his face, his hand reaching out to me.

‘I think my girlfriend’s been kidnapped.’

He shook his head sympathetically. ‘You must go to the police. You must go straight away. They are good at their job.’ He bent towards me, his black curls dangling in front of him.

‘I am sure you will find her.’ He stretched out his hand further. I took it, gripped it, even though I knew he was just trying to placate me. His fingers were cold, but they had the strength of steel wire.

I nodded. Then he was gone.

Could I go to the police?

Could I expect proper help from them if I didn’t tell them everything, in particular about the dig in the Old City and why I was suspicious of the Heaven’s Legion? And they’d probably arrest me, throw me in a cell for God only knew how long.

I took another breath. Maybe none of that mattered. Maybe the police would be better at finding her. That had to be a possibility.

All that mattered was getting Isabel back.

My phone was ringing. My heart flipped. Blood rushed through me. Was it Isabel? As the phone came to my mouth, I saw it was a UK number.

Was this something to do with Isabel’s disappearance?

‘Hello?’ The line crackled.

‘Is that you, Sean?’ It was her step-mother. My heart headed down.

‘Yes,’ I replied. A wave of dread washing up inside me. What was I going to tell her?

‘Where’s Isabel?’ She said it cautiously.

I could sense the hope in her voice, that I’d say
hold on
and pass the phone to Isabel.

‘I don’t know.’ There was a pause. I could sense it filling with expectation.

‘What do you mean?’ There was a shard of tension in her tone.

I’d felt echoes of it before, as if it was related to questions about who the hell I was, and why the hell had Isabel fixed on me for her attentions.

I explained, slowly, what had happened.

She repeated my words with added shock as if for the benefit of someone else listening in to the call at her end. There was a crack in her voice as she spoke. I stifled a rush of emotion.

Another voice came on the line. It was Isabel’s father, Arthur. My face was heating up again. A bead of sweat ran down my cheek. I rubbed it away.

‘This is not good, Sean,’ said Arthur. His tone had a crack in it too.

‘When did you last see her?’ He said it fast, as if trying to take command of the situation.

I explained again about what had happened that morning. I spoke slowly, for myself too, as if my mind needed to hear it all again to take it in.

‘Have you called the police?’

I hesitated, then said, ‘I will.’

‘You must tell them, straight away.’ I’d rarely heard such quick anger.

In the background I heard Isabel’s step-mother say, ‘You’re not well, Arthur. Don’t upset yourself.’

I could tell he was holding himself back from the quiver in his voice as he spoke.

‘If you don’t call the Israeli police at once we will tell the Foreign Office what’s going on. Actually, I will call them anyway. You are in Israel, that’s right, isn’t it? In Jerusalem?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

He coughed, as if he was ill. ‘That was what Isabel told me last night, when she rang. She said there was something strange going on. What was she talking about?’ He got it all out, then coughed again.

I felt guilty now and in shock. That explained who Isabel had been calling last night.

‘Dr Susan Hunter is missing too,’ I said.

He ignored what I’d said. ‘Isabel doesn’t call us often.’ He hesitated. A stifled humming noise, as if he was holding his emotions back, came over the line.

‘Not recently anyway,’ he went on.

That was a dig at me living with Isabel.

‘But we are very close, despite all that. If anything happens to her, you might as well come and kill me. Do you understand?’ He sucked in his breath.

‘I will do everything I can to find her. I will not leave here until I do. I promise you.’

‘I know, dear.’ It was her step-mother’s voice again. It sounded firm this time, as if she was putting a brave face on things.

‘When Isabel told us you had moved in with her, I knew you’d treat her well. She told me what had happened to you, about your wife dying in Afghanistan.’ She stopped. I sensed it was almost from embarrassment; that she felt she was intruding.

‘She wanted to get out of the Foreign Office, and if you helped her do that we are grateful.’ She paused.

The phone felt heavy, hot, in my hand. I heard someone blowing their nose in the background.

‘Please bring her back home. Please.’

‘I would die for Isabel Mrs Sharp. She means the world to me. Everything.’ My voice cracked. I pressed my lips together. My hand was in a fist. Anger and fear welled up inside me like poisons.

‘Just find her.’ She cut the line. No doubt they would call the Foreign Office and there’d be an investigation. It was what I would do. Would they call Mark too, to see if he knew anything about his ex-wife’s disappearance? That had to be likely, didn’t it?

I should call him.

I made it back to Simon’s. My head was spinning. I willed myself to calm down, to think. He was all concern. He wanted me to call the police as well. I said I would. I went to the bedroom we’d used, looking for Isabel’s phone. When I turned it on, it wanted a password. I tried to remember it. She’d told me it.

What the hell was it? I could feel it, like a shadow in my brain. Was it 1906? 1909? 1919! That was it.

I was in. I looked up Mark’s number.

He answered the phone after two rings. It sounded as if he was expecting to hear Isabel’s voice.

I explained quickly what had happened. He had to ask me twice what part of Jerusalem we were in. My brain had thoughts spinning around in it.

‘I bloody well told you not to go back there,’ he shouted when I was finished. ‘Who’s this guy you’re staying with?’

I told him.

‘I’ll be in Jerusalem at six this evening. Don’t do anything stupid.’

‘Thanks for the advice, Einstein. I’ll keep it in mind.’

‘What are you going to do today?’

‘We were going to go to that dig in the Old City, see if we could snap any of the people there, maybe show the pictures to you to see if you can find out anything about them.’

‘You still think they’re connected to what’s going on?’

‘Yes, and I think I should go there. Get as many pictures as I can. It’s the only lead I have.’

‘Well get clear ones, please. They are Christians on that dig, yes?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘They may have a few people working today, especially if they’re on a limited licence, but don’t expect the full complement. It’s definitely not in the Jewish quarter this dig, is it?’

‘No, it’s in the Christian quarter.’

‘Some of that area will still be closed today.’

A gust of wind rattled the window. Something sparkled on the glass. Was it fine sand from the desert? Was this normal?

‘How are you getting here? I thought the border was closed? There were a lot of tanks rumbling down the streets here last night.’

‘They’ve closed the crossing, but embassy staff can still get through,’ said Mark. ‘I’ll be there at six.’

‘Okay.’

‘Do you trust that man you’re staying with?’ he said.

‘I do. He’s helped us a lot.’

There was silence on the other end of the line. I could imagine a sceptical expression on Mark’s face.

I heard a noise and turned around. Simon was standing behind me. He had a gun in his hand. It was pointing at me.

Susan Hunter opened her eyes. All she could see was a thin glimmer of light. It came from the side of the trapdoor at the top of the stairs. But it was a beacon. She’d positioned herself directly below the stairs the previous day, at least she thought it was yesterday. She wasn’t a hundred percent sure of the passage of time anymore.

She could tell when he turned the lights off in the house up above, and whether it was day or night by the dimness of the thin glimmer, but that wasn’t enough to tell if a full day had passed.

She couldn’t hear any noises from up above. No distant TV or banging sounds. Could he have gone out? Fear
tightened
inside her. If something happened to him, if he died in a freak accident, would she starve to death down here?

She took the sliver of rock from her jeans pocket. They felt like a dirty dishrag around her.

The sliver was the size of half a thumbnail. She’d found it in the far corner of the stone-walled basement. It felt good between her fingers. It was her key to get out of the place. Her key to escape.

The big question was, when should she use it?

The last time he’d been down with her food, she’d asked, in as calm a voice as she could muster, why he was doing all this.

‘The change is coming,’ he’d shouted at her. Then he’d laughed.

Now she was on her knees. It was easier to crawl than to walk. And it was easier to be quiet too when she was on all fours. If he had a microphone in the room and was listening for any noises she might make, there would be almost none to pick up when she was on her knees.

She felt like an animal as she went slowly up the stairs. She could smell things now, like an animal, which she would never have smelt before. The wood of the stairs under her hands smelt resinous. The plaster on the wall near the top smelt like bread. She’d imagined eating it a couple of times, when he’d seemed late with the food, but she’d managed to resist, so far.

When she reached the platform at the top of the stairs she leaned up, put her eye to the crack in the edge of the trapdoor. She could just about see into the kitchen of the house above. It wasn’t a great view. She could see the thick legs of a wooden table, a red tiled wall stretching away, and the side of a brown sack. But it was enough. It was a view of the world.

She stuck her tongue out. She could taste normal air. And there was something on the breeze coming through to her too. A taste of food. A taste of eggs and something else, olives!

Her tongue darted out. She couldn’t help it. She licked the trapdoor with the side of it. It tasted of sand.

Then there was a noise. A shout! An explosion of voices. She pushed back. She was only halfway down the stairs when the trapdoor above opened and a wall of light came crashing into her eyes. She put her hand up.

‘You should have stayed down below!’

She waited, head down.

He’d hit her before she could think too much about what might be coming. Stars flew through her head. Then he pushed her and she fell down, stumbling, to the rough earth floor. Everything was spinning.

Then she heard it.

A groan. She opened her eyes, blinking. There was someone else here! A woman.

She looked up. He was standing on the stairs above them. He had a knife in his hands. It was long, shiny, as big as any she’d ever seen. He sliced it through the air, practising using it.

‘Get ready,’ he said, looking down at them. ‘There’s something I want you to do.’

She hadn’t wished for death before, but now she did.

Simon’s gun was old, a dull black. It had scratches along its top edge, but it looked as if it would do the business.

‘What the hell?’ I said loudly. I wasn’t thinking about my own life at that point. I wanted to go back in time, just a few hours, and wake up again with Isabel near me this time. I wanted for all this not to be happening.

‘We may need it,’ said Simon. He pointed the gun downwards, as if he’d only just realised it had been pointing at me.

He put his other hand out in front of him. In it was a small cardboard box with a line drawing of bullets printed on top.

He put the bullets back in the pocket of his cargo pants.

‘What’s your plan?’ he said.

Should I trust him? But who else had helped me here?

‘I have to go into the Old City. I think the guys at that dig are involved in all of this.’ I let my breath out slowly. ‘I’m going to take pictures of the people, if there’s anyone there today.’