The Jerusalem Puzzle (30 page)

How could bodies be burning?

Then I saw the frames of paintings among the bodies. The smoke, rising fast, had obscured them. I could hear a
crackling
hum from the flames too, but no shout from outside
penetrated
the thick walls.

The smell was almost choking. It stuck in my throat. I was ten feet from him.

My fists were up. Had he killed all these people himsel
f
?

A plan was forming in my head. I would …

My foot touched a ridge in the stone floor. The noise of it, slight, but real, made the man turn. And that was when I saw the gun in his hand, black, menacing.

He spun around to face me as the sound of bells ringing, from somewhere up above, pealed out.

Then a flash bloomed from his gun like a firework exploding.

The Bang & Olufsen 37-inch flat screen TV on the wall of the St. George’s Hotel in London, came to life with a flash of colour. The hotel featured the latest technology, an integrated TV and internet experience, which allowed visitors to turn on all screens in each suite by gesture alone.

Lord Bidoner had gestured as he passed out of the bedroom. The ‘escort’ he’d left behind would have to content himself with the stack of magazines on the bedside table. The young man was a regular, so his discretion was assured, and being from India he knew that if he ever made a mistake, his whole family would most likely meet a bloody end, if not the whole village where he came from.

The fact that he didn’t speak English was a bonus for Lord Bidoner. There was no need for the bullshit that most English speaking escorts liked to spin.

But he didn’t want the boy to even see his facial expressions as he watched the drama unfolding in Jerusalem.

Arap Anach had a good chance to redeem himself. His attempt at infiltrating an Islamic rally in London and spreading a virus had been a disappointment. The incident had drawn a lot of attention from the Security Service to a variety of people which he’d had to be very careful not to aggravate.

But if he managed to get this operation done and some execution-by-fire videos uploaded to the internet there was every chance current events would ignite a very useful wave of revulsion and anti-Muslim feeling in Europe, which would help to spur on what was happening in Israel and the
conflagration
that was to come.

Never mind the pleasure such videos would give to
connoisseurs
of similar delicacies.

He smiled, clasping his hands together in front of himself as he watched the TV anchorwoman asking a Palestinian representative who was denying any knowledge of what had happened to the priests inside the church, why they weren’t responding. The man was waving his arms hysterically in reaction to the possibility that was put to him that one of the Palestinian factions had taken over the church.

‘There is no proof of such a thing,’ he said.

Lord Bidoner closed his eyes for a moment. It was all going perfectly.

If the promised video of Isabel Sharp’s death was as good as the video of Max Kaiser’s final minutes he had something truly special to look forward to in the next few hours.

Perhaps he should ask the escort to stay another night.

Was there anything else he had to do?

Go over his security arrangements.

Lord Bidoner considered every aspect of his connection to Arap Anach again. A few encrypted phone calls were all that could be proved against him. No court of law could judge him based just on those.

There was a more obvious risk, clearly, if Arap were to be captured, but Lord Bidoner had made plans for that eventuality too.

The big question in that regard was whether his contact would be able to intervene fast enough if Arap fell into the hands of the authorities.

The interview with the Palestinian was over. He turned the television up with a gesture. The situation in Jerusalem was developing fast.

Sky News HD was relaying images of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre from the corner of the Muristan, about thirty feet from the entrance to the church, and from a helicopter circling a hundred feet above.

Images from the helicopter were on the screen now. All that was visible was a group of priests and a cluster of police in the courtyard of the church. Then a trickle of smoke rose from the cupola of the building. The commentator didn’t seem to notice it for a minute, than her tone went up at least three octaves.

Lord Bidoner passed his hand over the flame of the black candle burning on the coffee table. He turned his hand over and let the flame linger on the scar on the back. Pain seared through him.

He held his hand steady for a few seconds, then pulled it away. A taste was enough for him. It kept him grounded.

He thought about checking Ebony’s portfolio of stocks. He knew what would be happening to it already on the Israeli future’s market – they’d all be climbing fast – but he decided to wait until he saw which way the Jerusalem situation developed.

When to sell was going to be the next big decision. Their gains would be far higher if he waited until a war actually started, and everyone was rushing to move into the right stocks. The wave of stock increases might crest higher than a two hundred percent jump, if he got his timing right.

He stood. The commentator was talking with the blogger who had notified the media that the mobile phone system had been out in the area of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. He’d watched the Israeli police units arrive on a tourist webcam overlooking the entrance to the church.

There was still no sign of any fire brigade equipment. The commentator wondered loudly what was taking them so long. The smoke from the roof of the building was a thin column, but it was rising fast.

Lord Bidoner turned the sound down. It was time to make the phone call. If the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was badly damaged, the reaction in the United States would be critical.

Five star generals might already be updating their war scenarios. What mattered in the coming hours and days was ensuring the right people knew who to blame, who to hate.

Anders Breivik in Norway had proved how much pain one man can inflict, but he’d gone down the wrong path.

It was better to inspire hatred than to seek publicity.

And a hurricane of hatred was about to arrive.

Isabel cradled Susan’s head. The rock beneath them was no place to lay it. She was desperate to prevent the worst of Susan’s pain, to stop the harsh reality of where they were being all that Susan experienced in her last moments.

They were in pure darkness. It was the sensation of emptiness Isabel hated. Waves of paranoia and fear passed through her regularly.

Cold was seeping up from the rock she was sitting on, as if it was crawling up her. There was a sickly smell in the air too, a smell of infection and damp and death. She could taste it.

At times Isabel imagined she was back in her apartment in London, in bed with Sean, with her eyes closed. It helped. But at other times the blackness was a gloved hand around her head and she wanted to beat it away.

A few times she swung her arms all around when faint noises gave her the impression that something was moving close to her.

There wasn’t much time left for Susan. She knew that.

Susan Hunter had given up. And Isabel couldn’t blame her. They both knew that their captor had left them underground and might never return. And even if he did, it might only be to inflict some awful final torture on them.

He’d moved them earlier that day. She knew it was daytime, because of the daylight she’d seen before he’d covered her eyes. Isabel had wanted to lash out, to kick and scream, but there isn’t much you can do when your hands are tied behind your back and you can’t see what to kick.

She’d tried it just the same, had kicked out at what she thought was the source of the pushes she was receiving in her back, but she’d suffered a slap across the head and laughter for it, which had made her think hard before doing it again.

Whatever the reason he’d brought them to this new place, it was not for anything but evil. She was sure of that.

‘Isabel.’ The voice echoed.

Isabel shook from the suddenness of it. It was Susan Hunter speaking and her voice was more lucid than it had been for a day or more.

‘Hush, save your strength,’ said Isabel. ‘We’ll be out of here soon.’

‘That’s not true.’ Susan’s voice was flat, accepting.

‘Stop that. It is true.’

‘I don’t have long. Listen to me.’ A rasping noise, like a death rattle, or something near it came from Susan’s throat.

‘I’m listening.’

‘There are dark forces. They want power.’ The rattle came again.

‘There are always dark forces,’ said Isabel.

‘No, no. You don’t understand.’ Isabel felt the weak grip of Susan’s hand on her arm. It was like a baby’s.

‘Don’t say any more. No more!’ Isabel didn’t want to hear about dark forces. This was not the time for such talk.

‘They want compassion to die.’ Her voice was small, like a child’s.

‘There have always been people like that.’

‘They must be stopped. If you get away … you must stop them.’

‘I will. I promise. Now stop talking.’ She said it softly.

‘I met Max … before he died. He knew.’ Susan coughed again, weakly. Then her voice came back.

‘I think we’re going to be sacrificed, Isabel.’

‘What?’ The idea was numbing, incomprehensible.

Susan slumped in her arms. She could feel Susan’s body fading, as if she was giving up the fight.

‘Stay with me,’ she whispered. ‘We’ll get through this. Don’t even think about all that stuff.’ She had no idea if they would survive, but she had to say it. She had to believe there was hope.

‘There was a secret in that book you found in Istanbul, Isabel,’ Susan coughed.

‘What secret?’ Isabel hadn’t asked Susan about what was in the book.

‘A secret that could change the world.’ Susan shivered. ‘I came here to see Max. You know that, don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ said Isabel.

‘I needed parchment … to do a carbon dating comparison.’ Susan coughed and coughed. Each cough was weaker than the last.

Isabel held her. She wanted to ask about the secret, but Susan was fading and she didn’t want to do anything that would hasten the end.

After another minute Susan’s voice started up again in the darkness.

‘I needed to check, you see … to see if it was a forgery,’ she said.

Isabel waited. It was another minute before Susan spoke again.

‘One part of that manuscript you found is a quire … goatskin folded into leaves, like they used to use in the first century.’

‘Is that what you wanted to carbon date?’

Isabel was holding her tight. She could feel Susan’s head nodding. ‘Max said they’d found quires. They sounded similar.’

Susan groaned, it was a wrenching sound. The sound of someone in pain, near the end.

She couldn’t resist any longer. ‘So what’s this secret that could change the world?’

Susan spoke slowly when she responded. ‘There’s an official Roman transcript of the trial of Jesus in that book you found.’

‘My God,’ said Isabel. Could this be true? It would certainly be spectacular if it was. It would be a sensation. Sean would be amazed.

‘But that’s not all of it, Isabel.’ Susan was shaking her head.

‘What?’

‘There’s a secret in the symbol in that book. I don’t know what it means. But it’s referred to in the trial document. Right at the end.’

Susan talked on in the darkness, drew the arrow and square shape on the back of Isabel’s hand. Isabel shrugged when Susan asked her if she knew what the symbol meant. At that moment she didn’t care.

Smoke was streaming fast from the mound of bodies. The fire crackling must have covered my arrival for a vital few seconds.

I was on him as his gun went off.

I smashed my fist into the arm he was carrying the gun with. Rule number one, disable any weapon.

The force of my arrival propelled him back on his heels as he was trying to get up. I could smell his sweat. The undiluted adrenaline of the fight poured through me, tunnelling my vision. I had to subdue him!

I found his throat, gripped it with my right hand. He was moving his head violently from side to side. I grappled with his gun hand. He still had the gun. His arm was swinging around, trying to get free. I was surprised at how he squirmed.

‘You can’t stop me,’ he screamed in a strangulated roar.

I squeezed his neck, hoping he would give up. I felt his blood vessels pumping, his windpipe and skin squelching like rubber as he shifted away from me.

‘Where is she?’ I screamed. He reared up, tried to push me off him. My breathing was in loud gasps.

‘You will die like Kaiser, begging for the pain to stop!’ he screamed. His gun hand was coming towards my stomach. I jerked it away.

His blue eyes were neon lit. Hatred roared from them, as if I was the one who’d done some terrible wrong to him.

Warm spittle hit my face.

We rolled. I banged his skull against the grey stone floor. Heat from the fire seared my back.

My head hit stone with force. I heard a crack, hoped it was from something else.

Sparkling lights swirled in my vision. Move!

I pushed desperately to the left. He came with me. My hand was still squeezing his neck. I was going to kill the bastard!

He slammed a fist into my stomach. Pain surged in a boiling wave. But my grip on his neck didn’t falter.

I pushed his head back hard, rolling away from the fire, over and over. If only I could …

A chest pummelling blast, and a roar of wind hit us. I was knocked backwards as if a hand had taken me. It took me a few seconds to realise I wasn’t dead and to reach around in the clearing smoke and discover that he was gone. He’d slipped from my fingers! Bastard!

I stood, stumbled, then looked around, hearing shouts. I was shaking.

Other arms were grappling me. There were voices. I was being dragged away by policemen clad in blue bulletproof vests. What the hell?